Doug's Running Thingy

Just a couple miles around the folks' neighborhood before heading out to dinner.  Nice visit with the folks.

Jumped out of the jeep after the drive home to Tally and the boychild and I hit the trails.  Got in a good five miler before the sun went down.  Felt about the best I've felt in a long time on a steady run.  Got lots of sleep past three nights - ahhhhhhh.

2.25 warmup on the ravine trail from the track.  Flexibility and stretching before an easy little pyramid - 200 (35), 300 (54), 400 (75), 300 (52), 200 (31).  Felt pretty heavy and weak - will do just dumbbell and core workout tomorrow and hopefully feel fresh for racing the 100 meter on Thursday - 1st week of the summer track series.

Nothing yesterday and summer track meet this evening, so I got out early and did a couple easy miles.

At the track meet I decided to do all of the events except the 5K.  Worked the 100 meter as hard as I could since it was the Grand Prix event this week - ran 13.42 and got 4th or 5th.  Haven't felt strong for a while now - pretty sure its weight and diet related - gonna work on that for the rest of the summer.  Toed the line at 165 lbs - up 7 since racing Indoor Nationals in March - bleh.  Planned on cruising about 70 for the 400 meter, and felt much better than expected - ran 64 real easily - who knew!?  The mile went off immediately after my heat of the 400, so I used the first two laps as recovery and then pressed the last 800 - ran 6:39 finishing fairly strong (42 for last 200).  'Twas good to be back out there for the first time in 3 years.

Decided at last minute to run this race because a rainstorm blew through and dropped the temp from mid-90s to upper 70's for the 6PM start time.  Its billed as approximately 4 miles on rolling trails - mostly grass or clay double-track.  Its also a prediction run with no marked miles, no split timers and no watches allowed - the only clue they provide is that the water station is at approximately the half-way point.

Haven't raced since October, and haven't run more than 5 miles since then, so I really had no clue what to predict for "approximately 4 miles" - went with 28:34.  Felt really good and comfortable through the water station, then the course trended uphill for the next mile or so - ugh.  Nobody passed me after the water station, and I went by 5 or 6 runners between there and the end.  Finished in 35th by clock time at 28:52, and 25th by prediction time at +18.

Miles one, two and four felt pretty good - the uphill third mile was considerably more difficult than it should have been - definitely looking forward to dropping 6-8 pounds before the Midnight Run on July 4.