Step by step, mile by mile

AM - hilly 8 mile w/u, 4xquarter mile hills w/ equal recovery, c/d for 12.

was gonna do more, but i work later today and didn't get much sleep last night so didn't do too much. spent most of the workout thinking of a cool name for the hill; i settled on "stairway to heaven". good start to the decade. averaged 84 but i think they’re a little longer than my watch says since jogging back down i hit .25 miles about 30m before the start. doesn’t really matter since effort and good form is what this workout is for. that hill is killer

PM - 8 after work.

AM - 4. was planning on shear-willing my way through some k repeats in the rain but i underestimated how hard it has to be raining for half the state to be on flood watch. plus my shift got upped to a double so i was pressed for time. might do a mile pickup on the treadmill after work if wearing my headband makes treadmill running any less insufferable; i'll get in a good lift either way though so it won't be a complete waste of a day for training. hope this stupid rain goes away

AM - 3 mile shakeout. got called in yesterday and was dead by the end of the shift so no running. if i get in a solid long run later today i won't get hung up on it.

PM - 12. had an off-and-on side stitch from the start, as soon as i hit around 11.6 it hit hard, the severity level where you can’t even keep your torso straight. if the wind hadn’t been 15 mph i think it would have been 6-minute pace. so ended it there, but got in a good full-body lifting session after. sauna too.

10 post-work with plyos after. legs were a bit sore from weights but i did way more than last time and i'm less sore than last time. idk the exact pace conversion after a 9-hour shift but i'd say it'd have been 7-flat if i hadn't worked.

AM - 6 mile w/u, 3 mile tempo in 17:06, mile c/d.

being my first tempo run since 2017, i guess this met expectations.  i wanted to do 5 but i learned the hard way you can't have rice and beans the night before a tempo, unfortunately. not a bad start but i have work to do, happy i finally had the stones to do a tempo run considering how much i hate them though. lots of room to grow.

PM - 5, gym after. felt REALLY good on the 5, good enough that i might be able to get past my disdain for tempo runs to feel like that again.

AM - 5 mile shakeout

AM2 - 8 mile w/u, 8x100m w/ 100m walking rec, mile cd. timed #2 and #7, 13.99 and 13.02.

felt so much easier and smoother than the 200's last week. felt like i was able to tweak my form a little bit on every one until i was cruising those last couple. hopefully i'm not too tired next tuesday from the tempo run because that 3x300 could be really fun if i'm feeling good. my PR for that workout is something like 40.2, 40.3, 40.2 which i don't think i'll beat, but still. ran the easiest 6:30 of my life that first mile of the warmup, felt like pure jogging.

PM - 5 easy + gym. kept the running extra easy to keep the legs feeling good for the next 3 days

AM - 5 easy. right ankle felt a tiny bit off getting out of bed so i took it extra slow, ready to pull the plug if i felt it on the run. i didn’t, legs actually felt pretty good by the end, i guess it was probably just some DOMS from the sprints yesterday.

AM2 - 7 mile w/u, 5 x quarter mile hill w/ equal jog rest, 81 avg, c/d for 12

was going to do 2 sets of 4 hill repeats, but i took a longer recovery between sets and my legs being a bit heavy my foot caught on a rock and i faceplanted hard. well, i almost did. i displayed the most impressive feat of reflexes in my life and managed to turn my body and tuck my arms and hit the ground rolling in that half-second between trip and impact. i was wearing a thick shirt and gloves so minimal damage sustained, did hit my right ankle on a rock though. nothing major, just gonna be sore for a day or so. decided to do one more after that, times were 83, 82, 81, 80, 79. changing the name of this hill from "stairway to heaven" to "penance". it's much more accurate. actually felt great on these aside from the whole falling thing. to paraphrase rocky, it isn't about how many times you eat shit but how many times you clean your mouth out

PM - 5 easy. skipped gym because my stomach was hurting. felt better by the end of the run but i'd rather get an extra hour of sleep tonight. didn't feel the fall from this morning, but i'll have to get a night of sleep before i really know if all the effects have passed.

SOTD: never in your sun - stevie wonder. SUCH a great song

AM - 5 mile shakeout

AM2 - 5 mile w/u, 4x1200m aerobic w/ 400m rec in 4:17, 4:05, 4:04, 3:58

was surprised the first one was that slow, but told myself to not sweat it and just move on to the second one. effort wasn’t too hard(max heart rate 139 according to the watch), but i thought they’d be faster. putting aside my ego and using perspective with running 4 workouts the past 4 days, i’m lucky to still be standing, let alone feeling pretty normal. plus, even if i feel good there’s no way i’m running this fourth straight workout at 100%, so there’s nothing to do but recover, get in my PM 5 and a long run tomorrow and recover with an easy weekend and i’ll be back next monday in better shape than i did this one. so with that in mind, it was a good one.

PM - 5 after work. right ankle was feeling all those track turns for this morning by the end.

AM - 5 easy. 

right ankle wasn’t giving me trouble but i knew i’d be playing a dangerous game if i went too far. i thought about it, and i think i’d be better off moving my long run to saturday. yes it would be after an 8 hour shift, but i think it’d be easier on the body than doing it after all the weekday workouts. i usually think up my own training, but i saw that bekele did something like this in his prime(the same 4 days of tempo, sprints, hills, intervals), while i did modify it to make it a bit easier considering this is my first real training block since high school, i realize it’s still a tall order. still, i think i’ve proven myself to have a ridiculously durable body, and the tuesday and wednesday workouts are more of fine-mechanics-tuning than workouts. but anyway, bekele did the same monday-thursday workout spread, with a long run on saturday with a day of recovery before and after. i’m not gonna try and make my workload more than the greatest runner of all time by doing that long run a day early. i’ll do another 5 on the treadmill after work, and skip the long run this saturday since it’s supposed to storm something terrible tomorrow.

PM - 5 after work. this shift was pure hell; you'd think dying was going out of style but felt SUPER good, pace wasn't crazy or anything, but even if i hadn't worked i still felt good enough that it's worth mentioning. finished right before the storm hit! score!

real conversation between me and a patient:

pt: what’s your name 

me: gene

pt: what was it before

me: before what

pt: wait were you born a guy

PM - 3. stomach wasn't feeling well so just a shakeout. ran in pajama bottoms over my boa 1" shorts from high school bc i was doing laundry. i can't believe i used to wear those lil skimpy things lol

overall great week of training! mileage could have been higher, but still.

AM - off.

caught a stomach virus. would have been okay to run yesterday if i hadn't worked, that def slowed recovery. i'm probably good now but i'll just do my two runs before and after work to play it safe. not that there's good timing for stuff like this but with storms the next couple days i wouldn't be running workouts anyway. should still have good enough weather to get in my hills and intervals, maybe a long run too.

ended up feeling better and ran 4.25 at 11. was gonna do 5 but got hit with some wicked stomach cramps right after 4. threw in some light surges(about 6-flat pace) in the middle to loosen up

PM - 1.75 after work. stomach still felt bad.

AM - 1. stomach still felt bad

PM - 5. stomach felt good! ran on the turf field, threw in lots of 60 yard strides that last mile and a half. hopefully this break from running was short enough that i won’t have to deal with my usual hiccup stemming from jumping back in too fast

AM - 5. managed to start before 4AM and felt extremely good with that in mind. did some strides the last 1.5 again to see if it does anything for my next run

AM2 - 15 miles @ 7:07 pace. ran out of clif bars yesterday so all i had eaten between runs was a dark cherry & cranberry juice smoothie(plus my usual black coffee) so those last couple of miles sucked, even if they were my fastest. finishing 20 miles before 9:20AM... this is what i live for

PM - 5 before work. really had to use it

PM2 - 10 after work. biggest mileage day ever with a shift worked; i'd say it's good enough to be a 40-mile day, but i'll keep it at 35. also fastest average pace on a quadruple i believe

AM - 5 miles. legs felt good all things considered, had to use it as bad as i ever have that last 2k

AM2 - 20 miles. the difference in mental difficulty between a 15 and 20 miler is palpable, i swear every mile feels twice as long. it was muddy, windy, and my hair was constantly in my eyes and/or mouth so it was pretty insufferable. very happy i got it done, now i'm gonna eat and lie down for about 4 hours

PM - 5. was going to get a pair of secondary trainers at Ross, but all they had were some flyknit fly's(essentially 4% knockoffs). i'm personally on the side of the fence that the whole "carbon plate acting as a springboard" aspect is cheating and never planned on getting a pair, but for $44.99 i thought about it and realized my real problem is them being used for ratified world records(yes Kipchoge is 100% the fastest marathoner ever, and i still think Bekele would have ran faster than the old world record without them too, i just think Nike cheated the system a little bit to get him under 2 hours(Nike if you're reading this i'm sorry give me my contract already)). wearing them around my apartment after the run, i understand the hype. they really force you on your toes when you move forward. i'll have fun doing workouts in them.

PM2 - 15 easy. learned the hard way it’s not a good idea to drink like 4 cups of coffee before this run lol

AM - 5. before i even got out of bed i could tell my legs were thrashed, so decided to give themselves a few hours to recover a bit. it's understandable; i did just set a two-day mileage PR by 5 miles with 80(just in case anyone thought the 200-mile week was a fluke :) ). i don't think it's anything serious considering i felt fine on the run, but i feel it a bit after. i'll just do 5 after work and two 10-milers after work this weekend and should be back monday good. 

PM - 1 after work

so i honestly can't remember if i felt this before the morning run or not, and i didn't during, but after i felt a very slight issue in my left knee. i've never had a problem from running that felt anything like it before, but i can describe it to a T. it feels like one little spot in my knee is bruised, like someone punched me in the kneecap and it's the day after. it isn't in the muscle or tendon or anything, it isn't painful and doesn't affect my running form, and stretching doesn't aggravate or relieve it. i'd probably not be talking about it if i properly recovered today instead of working the most bs shift yet(i got the employee of the month laurel(let's pretend laurel is a noun(that doesn't mean shrub))) anyway despite that it went away completely over the course of the shift anyways, but i felt it the first step of the run and it didn't get any better(or any worse) a mile in so i stopped there. barely felt it getting groceries after, i rolled my legs out and jogged in place and walked around and didn't feel it at all. hopefully it's just some very weird minor thing, i'll barely run tomorrow and hopefully it'll be gone by sunday. gonna ice it and take advil like tijuana donkeys take viagra the next day or two and i'm gonna be money again

oh and favorite part of the shift:

patient: *points behind me* hey look at that fine young lady

me: *turns around, sees him pointing at my reflection in the mirror*

PM - 2 after work

didn't feel my knee at all during work, didn't feel it until about a half-mile in, didn't get much worse by the end. def felt better than after work yesterday, but my 6th sense is telling me it's an issue that would be better off letting rest than training through. simply put, i got greedy after the time off from the stomach virus and went full throttle too fast. it's really annoying, but i guess the silver lining is knowing i can do that much still. i'd say a full day of recovery would get rid of it, but 2 shifts of 13 hours on my feet with an 11-hour break in between isn't full recovery, so i'll be back either monday night or tuesday morning, and let next week be a sort of brick week to get back to the fitness of a couple days ago the right way.

AM - 5. no knee pain! yes!!!!! with it being my first run in under 30 degrees in years, the stiffness from the past few days off was definitely accentuated, but i think some good stretching between this run and the next will probably take care of it

PM - 10. felt good, probably the most effortless 10 i've ever ran. legs were hurting a little the last 10 minutes or so, but that's just from not running the last couple of days. even though the AM run went well i knew this was the real test if the knee was okay, i'm so happy to say it is.

so about 30 minutes after my PM 10 the left knee started to get sorer(?) and sorer. nothing worse than last friday night, but about on par. its mild enough that i could run on it, but i think it’ll get worse. i barely feel it after waking up which is good. i didn’t feel it at all after my AM 5, so my two takeaways are 1.) it needs a few more days to fully recover(hopefully just that since 2 days off nearly did the trick) and 2.) i’ll probably need to ramp training back up a bit slower. obviously i’m frustrated, this isn’t the most inopportune time but with about 12 weeks until the 5k i was planning on peaking for, it’s not great. i’ll take today completely off, cross train and do some upper body lifting thursday and friday and try again on saturday or sunday. 

stretched my IT band during my lunch break and the knee felt really good after, and the "can't run" depression was getting me down enough that i couldn't stand to wait any longer and did 5 after work. knee feels fine 30 minutes later. working a 12-hour shift before adds some solidarity to it too. still have a couple of benchmarks to clear before i can stop being paranoid about it; waking up tomorrow and feeling fine will be the first

so cleared the first test by the knee feeling good when i woke up. was gonna do an extra 5 this morning but i was so fired up from actually running again that it took me like 3 hours to fall asleep and i slept in too late to have time before work. it’s probably for the best for today.

PM - 5 after work + gym for weights. ran with an extremely heavy heart

AM - 5. took out my insoles; i get a new pair with every pair of pegasus’ i purchase(now say it 5 times fast tough guy) because i think the left one shifted and thought it could have something to do with the IT band. not sure if it did or my legs just feel better as they get used to running again but felt good. pretty convinced at this point that i should have just stretched it out instead of took time off, but what’s done is done

PM - 5. a tiny bit faster with the pace. feels so good to be training again

AM - 5 on the turf at 4AM. good ol’ faithful 

noon - 2. knee was a bit sore after the morning run; i purposely ran clockwise so my left knee took the most of the weight from 100+ turns, just to put a little extra pressure on it. it was a little sore after so i tried some new stretches and found one one that hit the problem right on the money; it made the knee ache a bit but i know it was in a good way because i was finally able to bend my leg the way i said last week without any issue. i knew it'd probably be sore if i didn't give it a few more hours but i wanted to test my theory that this is a problem that i can just stretch out; it lets me know how to respect it going forward. i was right about it being a little sore, more than the past 3 days but much less than before that. did the stretch, then did the things that normally aggravate it(kicking the leg back, heel-to-posterior stretch) and no issue. jogged around for a little bit more, still no issue. 30 minutes since then, haven't done my standard post-run stretching or rolling yet... no issue. so either way this is a win, it's an extra win if i decide to do a night run, but if not i'm still happy with it.

AM - gym for core, hips and glutes + a mile on the treadmill. no knee issue which surprised me but with the past 10 days of it i'm not singing kumbaya or anything. should be good to run after work though, might try going farther than 5

PM - 6 after work. wanted to do 9 after a couple miles of no issue but thought a smaller dub would be smarter than a riskier one. put off stretching for a bit by getting groceries first but i also bought a heating pad so i’d say it evens out for today, and was the better move for the near future. knee still feels fine but until i can triple again i’m not saying i’m out of the woods

SOTD: moanin' - charles mingus. eye-opening and mind-expanding jazz music

AM - 5 easy. felt good. splits were 7:09, 7:15, 7:22, 7:15, 7:09

PM - 10 after work. was completely exhausted by the end of the shift and thought i'd tap out at 2 but i willed myself to 5 and after that i just took it mile by mile until i hit 10. knee seems fine, guess we'll see if it has another sucker-punch up it's patella for me

AM - 2, then hips and glutes. was gonna do 5, knee wasn't sore but thought it might be around mile 3 so i drove to the gym, planning on doing weights for the IT band area to loosen up then another 3 on the treadmill. glutes made it a lot worse, but it feels a bit better a few minutes later. 

PM - 4. knee felt fine. wanted to do 10 but was exhausted from work and figured if i can do 10 after work tomorrow i'll have done a 60 mile week and likely proved to myself i can increase the workload, but i'll need to be super anal about recovery the next couple of weeks. or it'll sucker-punch me again because as AZ said on illmatic...

PM - 10 miles after a 10-hour shift. knee felt... like it was pretending to feel good so i'd say it felt good and get sucker-punched. ha! subversion

PM - 10 after work. legs were tired from another 10-hour shift, plus working 8 of the past 9 days, but i get the next two days off and the added bonus was this was the first time i've felt like myself in over two weeks.

also huge shoutout to Sunbeam Xpress Heat because their heating pad broke 4 days after i bought it. wouldn't have been worth getting if i shoplifted it

AM - 5. it's the precipice of spring in the south so a lot of rain on the horizon, so probably a lot of treadmill running on the horizon too. 

PM - 12. ran without music and had this(https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-WmMj4lfpdc) going on in a loop in my head the last 6 miles

sotd: born under punches(the heat goes on) - talking heads

AM - 5. slept in so gonna get a little less recovery if i'm tripling like i hope to.

Noon - 10. legs having been sore after last night's 12, first mile or two felt like i'd be lucky to get the average pace under 8 minutes but i started thinking about the next couple of months of training, and before i knew it i felt really good. not just good as in "my last 2 weeks were 20 and 60 miles so i'm not in the best shape" good either, just felt great. was cruising those last 30 minutes or so.

PM - 12 in the rain. quads still sore, so just easy running letting the miles rack up.

AM - 5 easy. put it off for a few hours because the quads seem a little more sore than the day before. it's not like i ran 27 miles in 12 hours or anything :) so it looks like a "two steps forward, one step back" scenario. i think i can do 5 miles early in the morning and 12 in the evening no problem right now, but with the quad soreness i think adding that third run in between could be detrimental. so, i'll probably just do the 17 mile days until friday, 10 miles after work on the weekend, and try adding that 3rd run next week. might skip tonight's 12 just to let the legs heal up a bit from yesterday.

AM - 5 on the treadmill. stormed something crazy all night and morning. wasn't sure on the incline to offset the fact that treadmill running is easier than real running so set it to 1.0, also find it very hard to run on a treadmill mentally so kept speeding up the pace every couple of minutes by 0.3-0.5 mph to make it more exciting, started at 8.0 and ended at 11.0. felt good once the pace got in 5-minute territory.

PM - 12 easy. cold and raining, everyone's favorite running weather.

SOTD: mahogany - lil wayne

AM - 5. it was snowing this morning!

PM - 12. ran the first 4 breaking in the zoom fly's. no cap, if i was forced at gunpoint tomorrow to race a half-marathon in those or birkenstocks i'd choose the sandals. most uncomfortable shoes i've ever ran in by a mile(no pun intended). i'll give them the benefit of the doubt since i was running on grass and i assume they're meant for the roads and give them a second chance on the next tempo run i do. with that being said, best i've felt on a 12 this week.

sotd: no woman, no cry - bob marley & the wailers

PM  - ~15 after work. watch was nearly dead so just ran for a tad over 2 hours, long enough that even on a bad day i'd have hit 15 miles at least 5 minutes before i stopped.

so happy to be back to triple digits!!

PM - 10. slow. felt okay. i think if i had tripled both days this weekend my legs would have recovered more; at least i'll get a nice paycheck.

AM - 5. the storms tuscaloosa is supposed to suffer through all week were just starting to roll in. a drizzle during my shakeout turned into heavier rain on my drive home, and 30 minutes later it was raining hard enough that flooding started. guess it's a treadmill day.

AM2 - 9-mile progression on the treadmill at a slight incline. ran the first 5 in 31:30, the next 3 in 18:00, and decided my original plan of 5 miles at 9.5 mph, 5 at 10 mph, 5 at 10.5 mph would probably go out the window at about 11 miles, so swung for the fences instead for a 4:57 final mile. 54:27 total time. not the same as running it out on the grass but i'm happy with it. cooldown for 15, man those post-tempo cooldowns feel long.

PM - 5 after work. probably my most taxing 5-hour shift to date, i'm happy i got out to the gym and while i think i could have done 15 easy outside 5 is all i could mentally handle on the treadmill. i honestly think people who enjoy treadmill running should be locked up. vote eugene for president 2036 so we can make that dream a reality 

sotd: long gone lonesome blues - hank williams

AM - 5 + core & hips. slept through the alarm and was a bit sore from yesterday so decided just to do a shakeout this morning and get my shoes wet this evening. i’m already sick of the treadmill running, no way i could do even half my normal mileage on one consistently.

PM - off. started raining super hard so i knew the flooding wouldn’t stop until the next morning, and as much as i love running, i hate running on treadmills more. if you couldn’t tell already

AM - 5 easy. finally woke up at 3:30 again! the first morning is always the hardest

AM2 - 20 miles! getting this done makes these last 3 weeks of training irrelevant because i finally feel like myself again. wasn't 100% sure i'd make it all the way at the start but i lucked out with it being one of those runs where you feel like you can run forever. well, almost forever. hit a brick wall right as i began mile 20 that made that last mile feel longer than the 19 before it combined. probably wouldn't have dealt with that if i wasn't constantly having to jump and sprint through puddles, two and a half hours of that tires you out a bit. very happy my body held up with getting 25 miles in before 10am, i wouldn't even care if i was too tired to get my post-work run in. i'd sure like to though

PM - 5 after work. wanted to go longer but did something as rare as a total solar eclipse and showed restraint

sotd: this old house is all i have - against all logic

AM - 5. windy and wet. was starting to get into it the last 10 minutes

AM2 - 10. after reading that running laps the same direction constantly can lead to the knee issue i had, i started doing them clockwise instead. tried doing it counterclockwise again last night, and my knee was a little sore when i woke up. gonna keep running clockwise so i don't think it'll be an issue, but it's annoying knowing that the problem is still there, albeit avoidable. only did 10 to play it safe

AM - 5 miles. very cold and very windy.

AM2 - another 5. not gonna run again until after work on saturday to let the knee feel good again and hit next week hard. hips after

9. could have been a better past 7 days, but the tempo makes up for the sub-par mileage. how jaded i've become where 104 miles is a bad week; i swear that 200-mile week ruined mileage perspective for me. anyway hopefully the knee gets better because if it hadn't rained and i hadn't re-aggravated the knee running the opposite way this week definitely would have been at least a 140-mile one

on a happier note(and also surely jinxing myself(referencing a jinx jinxes the jinx, nullifying it(or that jinxes the jinx of the jinx, ad infinitum))), if i can average more than 115 the next two weeks i'll beat my monthly mileage PR on the shortest month of the year(EDIT: i meant 165 miles per week. i love a good challenge). also i saw a guy on my run that looked EXACTLY like DMX, i asked him where the hood where the hood where the hood at and he didn't have the answer though so i don't think it was him

5 after work. started feeling good the last mile; probably because i saw my future wife

sotd: since i left you - the avalanches 

AM - 5. felt pretty good. first time i’ve woken up at 4am feeling like i woke up naturally

AM2 - another 5

PM - off. stomach was absolutely killing me by the end of my shift, i can barely stand straight. should be good to go tomorrow, even if it’ll all be in rain.

AM - 5. slept in on accident

AM2 - 15. took a lot out of me but that's the feeling i live for. max HR for the run was 130, my resting HR is 34 and i'm under 160 pounds for the first time since november. not in killer running shape yet but those numbers say i'm close to breaking through to that kind of shape again

PM - 5. another storm is rolling in to continue what weather.com told me was “one of the south’s wettest February’s so only gave myself about 4 hours of recovery between runs. i’m not in 4-a-day shape but that’s the recovery i’d give myself between those runs so at least it isn’t a foreign concept. actually felt really good with that in mind; def could have gone longer

SOTD: walk alone - the roots

AM - 5. slept in again

AM2 - 15. same pace as yesterday's 15, but felt way easier. very happy about that. could have gone for 20 but decided to try for 10 after work instead

PM - 2 after work. would have been fine for 10 if i rested but working 5 hours on your feet isn't recovery, at least when you're actually nursing something. this knee is driving me absolutely mad

AM - 5 on the treadmill. knee had a very fast turnaround after that post-work run yesterday. i’m sure it’s not gonna vanish by tomorrow or anything, but better than it feeling way worse.

decided to take the rest of the week off to let the knee(hopefully) heal up fully. it's been getting better basically every week, but it's still present enough that it puts a pretty hard cap on my training where i'm limited to about 60% of what i'd be doing without the issue. 60% being 100-110 miles a week just shows i'm in great shape right now :) so i decided i'd rather just get back to 100% sooner by taking a little more time off than later by constantly training and getting a little stronger day-by-day. i can hear the bloggers thinking "about time he has some gd sense". gonna go do some upper body/hips/core at the gym in a minute, then take it easy until sunday

oh also, the past 35 weeks(from the start of my 13 week 100+ mile streak in mid-june to last week) i've run at least 100 miles 20 of those weeks, averaging 122 those 20 weeks. so i guess that'll make me sleep a little better at night in place of the exhaustion from running.

sotd: the champ - ghostface killah. this song gets me hype as hell

AM - 5 before work at the gym + hips. knee felt fine but need a few pain-free days before i’ll start to forget about it

PM - 10 after work. last 200m in 40”. def the best i’ve felt the past 5 weeks; not perfect, but i didn’t expect to. still happy about it. having a budweiser while i do my post-run stretching; gotta get those carbs

sotd: eugene - arlo parks. no, you’re narcissistic 

AM - 5 at the gym. last heavy-rain day of the month so all my running today will probably be on the treadmill. at least it's only a 20-mile day. can't believe i just said "only a 20-mile day" and meant it

AM2 - 10 miles with a 3-mile progression in the middle in 16:43. first mile in 6:00, second in 5:38, third in 5:05. warmup and cooldown for 10. did a really solid lower-body weight session after. great session! finished all this before 8:30am so a great start to the day.

PM - 5 easy. felt good; knee was a tad sore, but i expected that with the weight session earlier. felt better over time which is the first time that’s happened since it arose(besides yesterday); it’d either get worse or just be the same level of annoying throughout. happy about that.

sotd: money folder - madvillian

AM - 5. felt pretty good.

AM2 - 15. ran 13.1 at hilton park because i thought saying i ran a half marathon warmup sounds ridiculous, then drove to the track to do 8x100m but there was a five-o right by the entrance who gave me hell, i thought about saying how the entrance was open and i've ran here at least 100 times and the coaches have even locked up the track while i was still running and told me to hop a fence to get out once i was done, but i remembered last time i argued with a cop about where i was running(at hilton last november) he threatened to arrest me so i just ran the other 1.9 easy. thank god for tuscaloosa police keeping madmen like myself off the streets

PM - 5 miles fartlek. when i say fartlek, it means striding out every couple of minutes, nothing genuinely hard. i've said it before and i'll say it again, fartleks get me into shape better than anything else.

sotd: sloppy toppy - travis scott

AM - 5. four day streak of waking up at 3:30! it’s getting easier every day

AM2 - 20 miles, i'd say it was probably the easiest 20 i've ever done. anyone who's run 20 miles knows they aren't ever easy, but mentally it went by fast which makes a run that long a lot easier. picked the pace up at the end of the last mile, then as soon as i stopped i started feeling woozy and weird and all that fun stuff, only other time i've felt like that post-run was the 30-mile run, it's like i stave off the tiredness and pain and then it hits all at once as soon as my body knows it's done running. quads are pretty sore, but that's about it. haven't felt the knee problem at all for the past 3 runs which i'm super happy about considering before that i never had a run where i didn't feel it post-strain. if this doesn't aggravate it either that's a great sign. probably could have gone even longer if i had any reason to, probably not 30, but then again i didn't think i could run 30 until i finished that run.

PM - 5 after work. absurdly windy

AM - 5. ended my streak of waking up at 3:30 by waking up an hour late when my alarm didn't go off, the fact that if you set a timer on an iPhone while it's on vibrate means it won't go off is poor product design. like what, do they expect people to be hiding from a serial killer but also need to know when their casserole is done cooking? get the hell out of here

AM2 - 20. first 5 miles were a little slower then started feeling good for the rest of the run. even picked it up a bit the last mile, felt really good speeding up when i'm that many miles in, it just feels so natural. i think this might be the first time i've done 20-milers two days in a row. good stuff, plus i don't work today so i can get some better recovery. already set the bar for highest mileage week this year!

PM - 10. felt good on the run, alright after; i did start it a bit earlier than usual so that might be why. just need to power through tomorrow and hopefully recover during work on saturday and this will easily be one of my best weeks of running to date.

AM - 5. legs felt beat up, but after the shakeout, stretching and rolling they feel better.

AM2 - slow 10. was going to do 20 again but stopped after 7 miles to take a leak and could tell my legs were still beat up enough that i'd be breaking myself down more than getting more fit. probably should have stopped there but did another 3, i'd say the PM run tonight is 50/50. these last 5 days were good enough that i've really gotten everything i need out of the week; coming back next monday ready to build on that fitness is more important than cranking out a few more miles

gonna take another couple days off for the knee. it’s progressed from painful when i run before my break in january, to getting sore when i run before my break last week, to not feeling it all when i run but getting tight after. not sore or painful like before, but i’d rather just take one more break to get rid of it again and up my training a little slower; i think the pressure of racing in early april made me keep trying to go full throttle too fast and making it harder to get rid of. so i’m gonna dead those races and  just try to get some summer races in and go from there. see y’all around tuesday probably

might have enjoyed that break too much...

~10 minutes on the turf field. didn’t mean to start again until tomorrow but i drove by the field on the drive home from work and figured i’d stop by and say hi. felt good.

AM - couldn’t sleep so left for the gym at 3am and did 5 on the dreadmill + legs.

PM - another 10-minute jog after work. could have gone longer but didn't eat anything all day(besides the sugar in my morning coffee) so stopped after 2 laps. legs felt pretty good; i keep bending my leg and expecting to feel pain/soreness in the knee but i'm happy to be disappointed in not feeling anything. gonna start being a real runner again tomorrow! weighed myself after; i haven't gotten under 157 in years so being at 159.2 already is a good place to be at

AM - 5. forgot about daylight savings so i woke up an hour later than i'd want to get 5 in before work, but as i was getting ready i got put on call so i was able to get it in. felt good. probably at about 90% of the fitness i was before the break, should get that back over the next couple of weeks.

noon - another 5 before i got called in. went shirtless since it was nice out and it's supposed to rain for two weeks straight starting tomorrow so i won't get that luxury again any time soon

AM - 5. knee felt a bit sore during work yesterday but felt fine this morning, inner left hip felt tight at times during the run and lo and behold my knee was sore after. i've been about 90% sure the problem is because my hips got put out of alignment when i did that 35-45 two day combo when i wasn't in great shape, i think all 80 of those miles were ccw loops. anyway the hip tightness upped that to 99% but since i'm what you call "blue collar" i'd need to save up for a couple of weeks to be able to afford to see someone who can pop them back into place. dammit, just dammit. i'll take today off since i work later and maybe try stationary and weights tomorrow

AM - 5 at the gym + lower body/core. knee felt good, bc that’s made a difference

sotd: rape me - nirvana

AM - 5, first 3 miles a bit faster(under 20 minutes), then the next two without a watch. surprised the knee was totally fine with this, but really my thoughts on the next week of training are just run what i can until i get my paycheck next friday and get professional help.

sotd: very ape - nirvana

AM - 5. did a nice lil' progression

think i'm gonna stop blogging for about a month. i'll still be running, as the strava homies will attest to, but i'm in a rut right now and having to write about training when absolutely every ounce of enjoyment has been sucked out of it these past couple of months isn't helping. that being said, i'm still hopeful that this is an issue that'll be solved by basically just having my hips popped back into place. also lost 5 pounds in 5 days and i'm sure that's good for me. anyway see y'all in a month, hopefully i'm in way better shape than everyone else by then

sotd: all apologies - nirvana

oh and i've been wanting to say this since january; the coronavirus is some overhyped bullshit that can come kill me at my hospital job if it's so dangerous. i'd rather die than live with this zombie-apocalypse ass world i'm finding myself in anyway. and rudy golbert is a moron

off

AM - 5 before work

PM - 5 after

AM - 5

AM2 - 10. first run was faster bc no coffee, and being a little out of shape; RHR is under 35 which usually only happens when i’m knee-deep in high mileage so that’s invigorating. i’d say it’s 50/50 whether i weigh in under 150 at some point this week(i have it in my head 145 is the magic number, but anything under 150 is excellent)

assuming my occasionally crazy training inspires people rather than makes them think i have something wrong with me, realized i’d probably owe it to them to show them me climbing back to that craziness in real time. i’m nothing without my fans after all

AM - 5

PM - 10. was more hyped than i've been for a run in a long time, so kept it honest the first couple of miles, then thought that it'd probably be better to just skip the long run this week. i'd rather undertrain until the chiropractor and i can easily run a triple-digit week so i'll just do that and do it next week. last half-mile in 2:42. nearly 80 degrees, stressing bc i have no idea how i'm gonna be able to do a 30-miler when it's about 20 degrees hotter this summer. might just do it for a couple months and switch the long run day to a 4-run day in june; i think it'd have similar benefits but since no one right in the head does that i'm sure there's not too many studies on it.

sotd: facts(charlie heat version): kanye west

also i was kicking myself over the weekend because i called rodeo by travis scott the peak of trap music in my end of the decade albums list and realized it's totally not, droptopwop by gucci mane and metro boomin was. i wouldn't take rodeo out of my hm section for it though bc rodeo is way more progressive. please listen to it if you're a fan of hip-hop, it's easily gucci's best post-prison work and it slaps like hell. i love every song on it but if i had to recommend some they'd be 5 million intro, dance with the devil, met gala, and both eyes closed

AM - 5. slept on my left arm weird.

AM2 - 10. last half mile in 2:36. under 150! now if i just keep the diet up through the weekend i'll be close to 145 and get my paycheck to restock on food and be able to eat something other than overnight oats

AM - 5. currently rewatching breaking bad for like the 4th time because better call saul season 4 was that good

AM2 - 10 easy with a couple strides after. the kenyans showed up towards the end, those guys know how to jog

sotd: wicked world - black sabbath

AM - 5. same old song. saw an opossum 

AM2 - 10 keeping it honest for 6 miles at 6:22 pace, but unfortunately my morning coffee decided not to do it’s magic so the last 3 miles were all about surviving.

sotd: it could happen to you - ryo fukui

AM - 5. slept in... woke up at 3:59!

AM2 - 10. worked down the pace a bit those last few minutes. easiest 100 mile week ever!

sotd: see me on top - big krit

AM - 5. stomach didn't feel great and my coffee didn't expedite the process like i hoped so i'll just do the other 5 after work tonight.

PM - off. stomach still hurt.

AM - 5

AM2 - ran a quarter-mile and bagged it. started pouring the second i got in my car so taking that as a sign.

so 99% sure the reason the knee thing has been persisting is that the peg pair #4 are past their usability. my legs felt completely normal all last week, and when i wore them on my saturday morning shakeout it felt a little sore after. it hasn't really since then, but my 6th sense says give it a couple more days off just to make sure that's out of the way, never use the pair again and i'll be okay. so i'll be back wednesday

also throat is super scratchy this morning, i think i might have some sort of virus, if only every news channel and social network could tell me what it is. jk, i was throwing up last night and it's probably just from that

AM - 3 easy before work. been super consistent on my strength-work so dropping a 6:20 last mile took nothing out of me

sotd: break ‘em off - 8ball & MJG

PM - 3 miles. held off the waistline pretty good over the break; felt about 15 pounds heavier though. since my timer was off overcompensated on pace and ran the 3 miles in 20:00. that’s 1:01 faster than my 9th grade PR. strength routine after

another shakeout before work, no watch. gilbert kigen showed up towards the end

AM - one last shakeout before work. did a lap(1200m) pickup in 4:22. felt smooth

AM - 5 easy before work. definitely not in shape but didn't feel as out of shape as i thought i'd be. 7:02 pace

AM - 3. wanted to do 10, but since all the parks are closed and it rained yesterday i knew intramurals would be flooded and didn't feel like driving up to Sandy so just drove aimlessly until i found a secluded road and ran all the extensions for 3. very hilly. would have done more but didn't want to deal with the dogs again, plus 97% humidity and over 400ft elevation gain mean i got more fitness out of it than a normal 3-mile shakeout. would do another run tonight but it's supposed to rain; still might though. realized during the run that this was the first route i've ran in over a year that wasn't Sandy, Hilton loops, turf loops, or intramural loops.

sotd: chop suey - system of a down

AM - did some chaste lewis and clark roleplaying by trying to make up a 5-mile shakeout route since the park is closed and i'd be cutting 10 minutes out of my morning routine by skipping the drive to and from it. doesn't seem like much time but when you wake up at 3am and have to get in 5 before your 6am run there's no time to waste. ended up being 5.04 with no extensions, loops, or turnarounds which makes me think i knew sacagawea in a past life. saw lots of lightning during it so stopped at 5 which was a good move since it started pouring right after i finished.

sotd: somebody changed the lock - dr. john

also finally set up my chiropractor appointment tomorrow. knee isn't hurting but probably 5 times yesterday i felt it, just for about a second at a time when i bent my leg suddenly or stood up but still, i've lost a lot of the fire these past few months and getting my hips realigned and getting back to normal(aka running 3 times a day), i'm sure it'll be back in no time. i can't believe i ran 140 miles on a bum knee in a mormon week of mileage in february; i think that's more impressive than any week of mileage i've ran besides the 200 one.

also was thinking about back in 2008 when i saved up enough to get an ipod touch my dad let my buy 3 albums for it and i picked late registration by kanye(12 years later and it's still my favorite album ever), futuresex/lovesounds by justin timberlake and in utero by nirvana. i was 10 and wanted to listen to albums with songs called crack music, futuresex and rape me and 12 years later and i think it really shows

AM - 5 after the chiropractor. ended up being right and my hips were out of alignment; i thought when my knee wasn't sore these past few months it meant i was 100% but after how i felt on this run i know i wasn't... i was today though :) went unintentionally quick, had less to do with getting my knee fixed and more to do with a conversation i had with connor baller yesterday where he asked if i was ever gonna run faster than 6:30 pace. at the time i thought he was just being a horse's ass but really he was lighting a fire under my own, so s/o to him. 6:39 pace, i'll get under it soon homie. eugene's back!

sotd: the payback/untouchable - django unchained soundtrack(2pac and james brown)

AM - off. woke up to a gnarly charlie horse in my right calf so i'll just get a run in after work. even though i could still get 25 miles in the AM with the knee bugging me, post-work runs were nearly impossible to do without making it feel much worse so i'm very excited to be able to do that again. my weight this morning makes me think my goal of getting down to 145 by the end of the month might have been an undershoot

PM - 10 minute shakeout after work. wanted to do more but i was tired from working overtime this week and had to be back at work 11 hours after i got off. supposed to storm really bad tomorrow so probably no running but monday real training starts back up.

12AM - 5 miles after an 18-hour shift. about as fun as the last 5 miles in a 45-mile day. as mike can probably attest, this is not said sarcastically! 

10AM - 5 before work. body was beat from yesterday.

Noon - 5 before work. night shift cancelled so i had to work my second 18-hour shift in 48 hours, but the difference with this one was i only got 6 hours off after it before i had to be back at work instead of 12. so got home at 7am this morning, slept for 3 hours and ran 5 miles before going back in. might run another 5 after work if the body isn’t too broken down, hopefully don’t have to work my third straight night shift either

PM - off. felt good enough to run but figured i'd rather just get a bigger mileage day in tomorrow. about to do my strength routine and get some much needed sleep. s/o to connor baller for calling me (probably) to wish me happy bday while i was sleeping this AM. we making big moves this summer bro

a very special edition of my song of the day series: my 22 favorite songs to commemorate the 22 years i’ve been on earth. it was an incredibly hard list to make; i had to whittle it down over about a week from a list of about 300 songs

bob dylan - simple twist of fate

bonnie “prince” billy - i see a darkness

d’angelo - untitled(how does it feel)

david bowie - changes

DJ shadow - midnight in a perfect world

joy division - passover

kanye west - jesus walks

madvillian - all caps

marvin gaye - i heard it through the grapevine

the microphones - i felt your shape

nas - the world is yours

nirvana - all apologies

ol’ dirty bastard - brooklyn zoo

otis redding - (sittin’ on) the dock of the bay

outkast - B.O.B. 

outkast - she lives in my lap

pete rock & C.L. smooth - they reminisce over you(T.R.O.Y.)

prince - when doves cry

radiohead - decks dark

radiohead - everything in it’s right place

stevie wonder - never in your sun

talking heads - born under punches(the heat goes on)

AM - 5 before work. wanted to get more but needed sleep more than mileage after the past few days. i’ll get in another 5 after work and hit that double-digit run tomorrow

PM - 5 after work. when "bulls on parade" came on those last couple of minutes i started flying

sotd: brave in the heart - big pun. i have a soft spot for 90’s new york hip hop in the summer

AM - 5. woke up at 3!

AM2 -10. felt good to get my 15 for the day in before 8AM.

sotd: ace of spades - motörhead

AM - 3 shakeout. after working 14 days straight, i’m understandably beat. ran enough that i wouldn’t be stiff tomorrow, and now i’ll catch up on the R&R i’m in desperate need of.

PM - 2-mile shakeout. felt very out of shape; was planning on starting up again tomorrow but needed a reason to get on here to wish my good friend connor arnell a happy 22nd.

PM - 5 in the evening. kneeshin felt sore, i'm thinking it's from something unrelated though. guess we'll see. 

sotd: viral evolution - guy scornik, zab scornik. i wonder if they're related

in the interest of avoiding sounding passive-aggressive, i'll try to keep this post short. i got about 10 steps into a run and stopped because of what i mentioned yesterday. it's not the same thing as what gave me grief most of 2020 so far and i'm hoping a triple-shot of time with an icy-hot and ibuprofen to chase will do the trick for it, i guess we'll see. i'd say a run tomorrow is off the table though

sotd: the mortician's flame - acid bath. a song to scratch that underground sludge-metal itch we all get from time to time, with lyrics vile enough i'm probably on a watchlist just for posting it here

knee/shin/whatever feels a lot better, either taking tomorrow off or just doing a PM run. anyway i’m just here for the sotd

sotd: ghost rider - suicide

if the leg was 90% yesterday it's (at least) 99% today, but with two shifts this weekend i'd hate to reaggravate it and spend two days all on my feet and make it worse. i've learned my lesson! if i feel good enough after work tomorrow to run then i should be 100%, if not we'll play it by ear.

sotd: been down so long - the doors

i ran a mile after work, someone cancelled on sunday so i got stuck with a double shift so didn’t feel like testing my luck when the shin was almost immediately sore, not as bad as before though. was really mad and probably would have posted a rant about how karma isn’t real, etc. but after some consulting with dr. google i diagnosed it as shin splints, believe it or not despite 10 years in the game i’ve never gotten shin splints before. did some stretches recommended for that and felt much better

also a mini-rant, yesterday the PCA that cancelled, instead of calling in sick(which she does all the time, you’d think a hospital would be the last place a hypochondriac would work) she comes in and hands the charge nurse a form saying she’s being tested for COVID. i’d bet my fertility she’s just getting tested as a reason to not work the shift, but either way why would you come into the workplace if you’re claiming you might have the coronabug, especially if it’s a hospital floor specializing in long-term care, meaning most of the patients are elderly?! also while i’m just blabbering on i’ve started calling my main chick “boob” as a term of endearment and i think it’s the funniest thing ever because much like my co-workers i’m a moron

AM - 3 miles easy. legs felt good during, shin was a little sore after but less than it's been this past week. it's better than nothing. i'm weighing in under 150 and my RHR is down to 34 so at least i'm in a good place to start training back up.

sotd: bigmouth strikes again - the smiths

strength routine. squats, push-ups, core, the whole nine yards.

i worked a 16 hour overnight shift last night, went home and slept for about 3 hours then came back and worked until 7pm. despite being exhausted and going to bed maybe 10 minutes after getting home, next thing i knew two hours had passed and i wasn't anywhere close to sleep. i had a lot on my mind; mainly how depressing the past 10 weeks have been for me; not to come off as a pity post, it's just running is something i use to combat negative things in my life and without it i've really spiraled lately. anyway i've probably been in the clear with the shin splint issue but keeping what i just said in mind, i really don't want to start training with a chink in my armor, so to speak. new shoes would probably help because the structures expire much faster than pegs i find(plus i've been wearing them to work for about 4 months now, and i average around 4 miles of walking a shift so they've probably hit nearly 1000 lol), and my paycheck hits friday so i'm probably waiting until this weekend, so until then i guess the strength routine will be something to keep the addictive personality used in the right way. anyway felt like i needed to write this out to be able to sleep

here's a bunch of sotd's i've neglected to post that are not to further the agenda of a jolly mood

love will tear us apart - joy division

reach out, i'll be there - four tops

pastime paradise - stevie wonder

goin' out west - tom waits

mutual slump - DJ shadow

rain king - sonic youth

beyond the realms of death - judas priest

just realized i missed my blog anniversary for the 5th year in a row. on one hand being a junior in high school feels like forever ago and on the other hand i feel even farther removed from it than 5 years. regardless, i still remember every lap of the region track meet that graced my first post(5 years later and i’m still kicking myself for kicking way too early in that 800m; 100% would have gone to state if i didn’t take that lead 300m in :) ) anyway plan on starting running again tomorrow, been feeling pretty good but got hit with a rough wave of nausea an hour or so ago. i’m far enough removed from actual training that things like 40+ mile days and running 20-milers like they’re nothing are put in perspective, but god can i not wait for them to mean nothing to me again. might see the chiropractor again just to be safe. gonna buy equipment for a home gym tomorrow so my body will match the hair once i get the “brad pitt from thelma and louise” cut i’ll probably get at the end of the month... my hair’s been growing out since december 2018 and it’s basically a radiator in this summer heat 

sotd: enjoy the silence - depeche mode. i can’t believe i forgot about this when making my birthday songs list last month

AM - 3. worked some night shifts this past weekend that messed up a good sleeping schedule so decided to start a load of laundry at midnight, get my run in at 2AM and not get a good night's sleep so i'll be tired enough after work tonight to go to bed early for the first time since february. legs felt good during and after

sotd: something i can never have - nine inch nails. trent reznor's fanbase has to be just about the most depressed in all of music

AM - 3. mainly a test to see if i'm ready to do 5 tonight. survey says... yes!

PM - another 3. brief but violent storm swept through this evening so couldn’t get out until 10PM, and since i work a 16-hour shift starting at 6AM and at least wanted to try waking up early enough to run before that, it’s all i really had time for. 3 runs with no issues, hate to jinx myself but i’m happy about it

sotd: the wait - killing joke. to commemorate the past 8 weeks or so of mental hell i've been in desperate need of running as a means of escape from, the rest of my songs this month are going to be the music i was really into during. so, either unbearably depressing industrial or thrash metal, basically. maybe some horrorcore too(have i already said 1-800-suicide by gravediggaz? i'd have had to)

PM - 3. got cancelled as i was leaving for work this morning, but around noon got called to be told i have to work the night shift now, which, considering i'm scheduled to work the day shift tomorrow, means i have to congratulate hospital management, because this was the 100th time i've thought "are you guys on crack?" !!! your prize is my spite anyway because of that had to do the run at 4PM in 90-degree sunny weather. drank more coffee than water and the only calories i had were in the sugar in the coffee, so when my first run with a watch told me easy pace was 7:08 i was pretty happy.

sotd: dark entries - barhaus. only band that makes me think of joy division, on a musical standpoint. if anyone reminded me of joy division's songwriter ian curtis it'd probably be cobain though. my two favorite songwriters!

noon - 5 miles. wanted to do this run at 7am after my night shift, but i'd been up 24+ hours and was beat. only had time to get 4 hours of sleep to have a chance to run before another night shift i wasn't scheduled to do, so fun weekend. very hot, combined with lack of fitness probably the hardest mental run i've done this year. hopefully these heat-death runs get easier because if i want to do 4-a-days again at least one will have to be around mid-day.

sotd: the seventh seal - scott walker. if i were to ever soundtrack a movie(something i'd love to do) this song would be what plays at the end montage after the lead goes out in a blaze of glory

off. body was pretty wrecked from two tough back-to-back overnight shifts this weekend so figured i'd get some much needed R&R(i may not have ran much the past few months but i've worked a ridiculous amount; i think the past 3 weeks i've worked at least 60 hours for each one). knee's fine, might need to see the chiropractor because it feels like it needs an adjustment but it's really nothing to worry about as is.

sotd: paint it, black - the rolling stones. i don't have a favorite beatles or bowie song but i do for the stones and it's this one

PM - 5 easy

sotd: less sex - daughters. easily the least abrasive song on my favorite abrasive album

AM - 8 easy. working both night shifts last weekend messed up my sleeping schedule so since i'd been awake since noon this one was pretty slow. longest run i've done in a while. hopefully going to be saying that a lot these next few weeks. was just listening to otis and realized i need to make a list of my 10 favorite kanye west beats on here at some point

PM - 5. felt pretty good! tired, but the pace didn't show. slept from 6-10am so hopefully i'll be tired enough soon to reset the sleep schedule. if only i hadn't agreed to cover a night shift next monday to mess it up again

sotd: graveyard - public image ltd. 

AM - 10. managed to actually sleep last night, only problem was it was maybe 80 minutes at the most. slow and tired because of it, happy it's all smooth sailing so far though. quads are pretty sore, but i expected that since it happened in february when i got back to 15-ish miles a day too. if history repeats itself i'll be pretty sore for a week then i'll adjust

PM - 5. legs were very tired which excites me because it means i'm putting in work. hopefully they bounce back fast enough to do 12 tomorrow morning.

core before bed. only 3 pounds from stopping the diet and not getting dizzy when i stand up too fast lol

sotd: skulls - misfits. having an overtly goth fashion sense means i have multiple misfits shirts so i'd be remiss to not have a song of their's on my blog

AM - 5.25. was going to do 12 but a couple of reasons had me decide to stop early, those reasons being 1.) i hadn't gotten any sleep again and figured an hour less spent running could be use to push my sleep an hour back since i absolutely need to sleep tonight seeing how i work 16 hours tomorrow and 2.) i plan on doing some 20 and 25 mile days next week if all goes accordingly and figured i'd gain more from a shakeout than a run that'd take more energy. i'll still do 5 after work tonight.

sotd: london calling - the clash. i live by the river

also here's some art i really like

off.

didn’t end up running last night bc my 3-7p shift got stretched to a 3-11p shift because someone called in, and i had to be back today to work 6a-11p so didn’t have any time to run in the morning, and i’d rather get to sleep earlier and get more miles in tomorrow morning. quads are no longer sore so i think i’m ready to up the ante again next week. id say 90% chance a triple digit week is on deck

sotd: spellbound - siouxsie and the banshees

PM - 5 after work. brought someone back from the dead during the shift bc my patients die when i say they can(wasn’t even my patient lol)

sotd: she’s lost control - joy division. i’ve been meaning to do a themed week of sotd’s for a while, it was fun doing that

AM - 5-mile shakeout. gonna take a little while for these to go by as fast as a shakeout should.

AM2 - 5

PM - 5

today was supposed to go 5, 10, 5, but night shifts still have my sleep schedule messed up so when midnight rolled around today and i was no closer to going to falling asleep than i was when i went to bed at 10 i decided to get my first run in then and get my 20 by doing a quadruple of 5's, getting 2 hours of sleep after the second run, just enough to survive the day but enough that i'd be exhausted enough to pass out the second i hit the sack tonight. it worked in theory, i was actually just about to head out the door for the 4th run, but mentally i'm exhausted even if physically i feel like it'd be easy. honestly i'd rather be running those extra 5 miles on friday anyway, i'd get more out of it after 4 days of solid training preceding it. still, good to know i could have quadrupled today, even if the mileage didn't constitute it. it will soon enough though. june is the month the eugene of 2019 comes back with a vengeance

sotd: the glory - kanye. the opening lines of "can i talk my sh*t again? even if i don't hit again? dog, are you f*ckin kidding" is my running manifesto of the summer  

AM - 5. woke up right at 3am! sucks at first but it's essential for me, especially now that it's the summer and runs between 10a-5p here are basically a death sentence.

AM2 - 5. gonna take an unorthodox approach to building mileage this week, but then again unorthodox is my orthodox 

PM - 5. ran at noon, and what i said after my first run might have been an understatement. heat index of 93F and was significantly more tan after those ~40 minutes

PM2 - 5. felt tired(expected), but wasn't hurting. now the real fun begins :)

sotd: the day the ... took over - dr. dre

AM - 5.

during the morning shakeout i realized today was gonna be a rest day; my legs aren't hurting but after the past couple of days they're definitely under strain. i'll do another shakeout tonight, legs permitting, and get in a couple solid days before the weekend. decided to take the PM off just to get some better rest and catch up on sleep

also, that patient i saved on sunday? he died later that night. not surprising since an hour of cpr turns the chest to mush, but he came back last night as covid positive. so that's fun

sotd: god has nothing to do with this leave him out of it - backxwash. a song i'd describe as industrial avante-garde horror-core hip-hop, aka my 7 favorite buzz words. add in the artist is an underground canadian femcee and the KILLER black sabbath sample and it's one more banger that i can't play around my friends without having to insist i'm not a satanist

also quick rant, i haven't had rice in a month or so but i'm incorporating it back in my diet and since i can't stand plain rice and i'm trying to cut out sodium so my usual soy sauce is out, i bought a few cups of campbell's tomato soup yesterday, with the intention of mixing in some garlic powder, basil and cayenne for flavor, and mixing that with the rice. well i looked at the nutrition facts before i made some for dinner and my lord, might as well call it tomato-flavored soda. SIXTY grams of sugar a can! i feel guilty about how sugary i take my coffee but i don't put half that in my 32 oz thermos i make every morning. suffice to say i did not make soup today

AM - off

alarm didn’t go off and i noticed my knee felt a little sore so i went to the chiropractor to get my hips realigned. she said my knee seemed a little displaced and fixed it and i feel better now. i’ll give it a few hours to set in and run tonight. need to be a little more attentive on hamstring/IT band stretches and foam rolling; i’ve been more focused on calves quads and glutes lately

AM - 5 before work. felt pretty good. stiff, but strong

sotd: never look back - RTJ

AM - 5. pretty sure i got salmonella from mixing raw egg into my rice last night, not realizing the "best by" date passed like 6 weeks ago. at least i can still run for now

AM2 - 10. legs are still green enough that anything more than "slow and easy" pace is out of the question, but getting 15 miles in before 7:30a is something good enough i can look past that for the time being.

PM - 5. felt easy! great great great start to the week, salmonella aside

sotd: handcuffs - parliament/ i'd rather be with you - bootsy collins. two funk classics for the price of one

AM - 5. managed to get it in right before the 3-day aftershock from cristobal comes in

PM - 5. got hit with some wicked abdominal cramps after the morning run from what i still assume to be a milder case of salmonella so skipped the second AM run. barely managed to survive a afternoon shakeout with the cramps still being an issue

sotd: grown simba - j cole. not a big cole fan but i loved the mixtape this is from in high school and this song still gets me super hyped, partly because of the nostalgia of all the times i listened to the tape running in high school, and party because it's a good track

AM - 5. probably gonna be another 10 mile day; abdominal cramps are still bugging me. kind of annoying but probably for the best. it's arbitrary but as long as i feel better by thursday i'll probably get a triple-digit week without killing myself to get it

PM - 5. no cramps, so i think i'm past the salmonella issue

sotd: get back - ludacris

AM - 12. sleep schedule is out of wack so started this one at midnight, or rather 11:58pm yesterday, but who cares. slow and easy, but i'll take slow over hurting any day :') plus the run yesterday was a little quicker so it even out. longest run since february! geez

sotd: the blacker the berry - kendrick lamar. song been hitting different lately

AM - 5 shakeout. ran at midnight again; meant to run 8 in the evening yesterday but a nap at 3pm resulted in me waking up at 8pm when my phone alarm didn't go off. feel like i'm starting to get into a groove again for the first time in forever, sleep aside.

AM2 - 12, grass was more dewey than malcolm's little brother, shoes were drenched by the end. could feel the mileage freak in me coming out on the last mile when i realized i had about as much energy in the tank as i had at the start, but i have some leg strength to regain before i start putting up the ridiculous mileage days again. i mean the plan for today is 25, i guess i can call that safely ridiculous.

PM - 8. ran at 4 because i wanted to get to bed earlier since i work a 16-hour shift tomorrow, good lord was it hot. super happy with today, not because it's the most miles i've ran since february but because how easy it was to get it. first time i've felt like myself since the hip displacement in january. next week will be the real test if i'm back, then the week after that is a down week with a long run. hoping to get my second 30-miler

sotd: some things last a long time - daniel johnston

AM - 5 before work.

sotd: south of heaven - slayer

AM - 5. going off two 3-hour nights of sleep and a loong shift yesterday meant i was exhausted waking up at 2:30, but i did it so i could get in my miles and have time to nap before work. so as long as i get the miles in without a hitch, worth it. shift didn't break down the legs but didn't do them any favors; i think after a couple of weeks i'll be able to recover better during shifts like i did last year

AM2 - 12 easy. thank god for coffee getting me through this because mentally i was dead. gave me a good chance to work on my mental game. managed to just barely get 17 miles in before 7am... awesome.

PM - 8 after work. after a completely exhausting shift i'm pleasantly surprised i got it in without anything hurting.

sotd: doo rags - nas

AM - 5. the weekend workload + lack of sleep got it's revenge in me sleeping through my alarm and woke up at 4:30. my body needed it though. decided after the run i'd be better suited to take today easy; legs need it after 55 miles ran and 24 hours worked friday-sunday.

PM - 5 easy. legs feel ready to jump back into the mileage!

sotd: lies and alibis - lovage. the album this is from(lovage: music to make love to your old lady by) is an extremely obscure and very good trip hop album made by dan the automator of deltron 3030 and gorillaz fame. also, eminem stole the album title "music to be murdered by" from dan's 1989 debut of the same name, but homage is homage i guess

PM - 5. REALLY slept through my alarm today(woke up at 10) so it's going to be an easier day than i would've liked. feel like i'm almost to the point where i can throw in a crazy mileage day and be fine the next day so might do that on friday to make up for the past couple of days, body allowing

AM - 5

AM2 - 15. started feeling really good those last 30 minutes, just loosening up and relaxing. probably best i've felt post-hip displacement. also might switch over from coffee to caffeine pills. it'd cut a lot of sugar out of my diet

PM - 10. went by way faster than i thought it would. overall not too challenging to hit 30 today, you love to see it

torture - natas. 90's horrorcore gem

AM - 5. as i was heading out for the second run decided to cut out the 15 for this morning. was having some chest cramps and my heart rate's been elevated since the shakeout which isn't a big deal because it usually happens for like a day and then it goes back down regardless of training, but feels like i'm at a pivotal point where i'm starting to transition to where i was at the end of last year and i'd hate to screw that up. i'll get back to that mountaintop soon enough

PM - 5. was originally just a shakeout for 10 in the evening, but decided to cut that too. all the stuff i mentioned this morning is gone but my quads are pretty sore, not sore enough i think the 10 would be a problem but enough that i'd probably lower the cap on tomorrow's mileage by doing it. next week i can focus on consistency, this week i'm just trying to get a few really solid days in

PM - 5. ended up getting sick to my stomach in the wee hours of the morning so i was too busy throwing up in the am to run. 

PM2 - got tired around 8 so decided to go to bed early, 2 hours later and nowhere close to sleep decided to go on a run at 10:30 to tire myself out. ended up being one of those runs where you go on autopilot and the miles keep racking up so rode that to 15 miles. fartlek'd the last mile. won't have time to run before work since that shift starts in 5 hours... yikes! good end to the week

AM - 5

AM2 - 10. felt like it was over before i'd even broke a sweat.

PM - 5. work 7p-7a tomorrow so last minute decided to forego tonight's sleep so i could sleep through the day and not be dead enough by tuesday morning to not get a run in before passing out, so did this at 11pm and i'll hopefully get in a longer run in a couple hours. playing the long game here. wish i decided that before i had too much junk food as my post-work meal a couple hours prior. damn you cheetos hot fries; my ghetto vice

AM - 15. felt good aerobically, legs were about at their limit after around 1h50m(slow because running on wet, deep grass in the middle of the night) but having been awake 16 hours, worked 8 of them and ran 5 miles all prior to the run i was just happy to survive. 

PM - 5 before work. loosened up the legs from last night plus i was feeling pretty good by the end. it'd rained all day so hilton park was drenched, but mid 70's and overcast overshadows that by miles

AM - 5 after work. a good run for fatigue training; i probably wouldn't have had the mental fortitude to go on a run before passing out after working 6p-7a even a week ago so it shows i'm locked in right now.

PM - 5 shakeout

note: going to take tomorrow easier than i originally planned. strained my legs a little too hard by doing the post-work run. not in a major way, nothing hurt then, on the PM run, or after, just enough that i think doing the 5 and 15 tomorrow and thursday will take some miles off the friday long run, which is the focus of this week. honestly it's really nothing, if i just did 5 and 15 the next 3 days i think i'd be back to full strength after my saturday shift, but even if i can't hit 30 miles again i want to give it an honest shot. that being said, training is going great right now. that 200-mile week has been in the back of my mind ever since the hip displacement in January; i don't plan on doing it every week when i'm firing on all cylinders but it's something i need to do again just to prove to myself it wasn't a fluke in november, and i think there's a good chance it'll happen next month

PM - 5 just after sunset. so nice out, low 70's and overcast made it feel more like october than june. pretty sure my legs are fine, it was such a minor thing that it's hard to really tell. i'll do around 10 miles in a few hours and that should give me a better idea.

AM - 5

AM - 5.

AM2 - 15. surprised i actually got that far; after 3 days off my legs felt more brittle than ductile, but managed. finished before 4am but still was so humid that my shorts could've created a 5th ocean if i wrung them out hard enough

AM - 5. legs felt better than yesterday's 5. 

AM2 - another 5. calves are a bit sore since yesterday's 15; felt more like a long run than that distance normally does. 

looking back on june, i didn't magically knock it out of the park despite not being in shape to, like i secretly hoped, but the baseline goal was to bust the rust to have a couple really good months of base training follow it, i'd say i accomplished that. plus i ran more miles than the past 3 months combined, so, dub

AM - 5. calves felt much better after taking yesterday easy. after over 18 months of growing it out, i finally chopped off my hair. got more compliments on it the past year than i've gotten about anything in my entire life, but not getting accidentally called "miss" by my new patients at work alone makes it worth it. felt nice not having my head feel like a radiator

AM2 - 15. last half-mile in 2:55; even though last year my half-mile closes were usually about 2:40, it's the first time i've ran fast since january and it felt good to do.

PM - 5 easy. had some GI issues; i mixed powdered peanut butter into the overnight oats i had for lunch; i don't know why but over the past couple of years anything with peanuts in it messes up my stomach. need to start wearing a sweatband for these summer afternoon runs. i might think they look dorky, but getting sweat in my eyes all run was a total nightmare. solid day of running.

AM - 5. even though i'm adhering to the plan of alternating between low and medium-high mileage days this week, it kind of prevents me from getting in a groove. feel like i'm gonna make a big jump in mileage next week though. might do 30 tomorrow if it isn't raining too much

PM - 5

AM - 5

AM2 - 15. after the first mile did some fartlek; for the next 8 weeks when i say that what i mean is throwing in some lighthearted strides anywhere from 50m to 150m long every minute or two. nothing too hard on the legs, just straddling the line of taking more out of my legs than running the mileage easy would've. got 5 miles in before i thought i might end up dipping into reserves by the end; hoping by the end of the base phase i can do the whole 15 without taking anything extra out of me. went by a lot faster than 15 usually does; i was just having a ton of fun out there. switching gears felt pretty natural by mile 6. 7:19 average, i've ran 15 miles 5 other times in the past 3 weeks and averaged about 8:15 pace so it's nice to see a jump that big, especially on 15 miles of wet grass in full humidity. great run!

PM - 5. legs felt good but fatigued, surprised the pace was under 7:30 for an easy jog, like i always say nothing gets me in shape like fartlek running. could have gone 10 for a 30-mile day, but i don't plan on doing any more than 25 a day next week so i had no urgence in doing so. also, ya know, 16-hour shift tomorrow. we just started a new schedule this week at work but after this one i'll probably go back to 12-hour shifts. i assumed because i could recover pretty well on those it'd carry over, but 16 hours is a long time on your feet.

AM - 5 before work, cruising through to a 100-mile week.

AM - 5. tired from yesterday's shift(and 2 hours of sleep), it was relatively easy by a long shift's standards though.

AM2 - 10. wasn't that focused(read above) so when i realized after the run i'd just mentally waived off a 10-miler like it was a 10-minute shakeout i was pretty stoked. plus i finished before 6, so i'll get a decent nap in before work too. score!

PM - 5 after work.

AM - 5. all i'm doing this morning because i realized after that if i took my normal 90-120 minute break between shakeout and second run i'd be doing 5 runs in less than 24 hours(plus an 8-hour shift). am i crazy enough to quadruple? it's my favorite way to spend the day. crazy enough to quintuple? hell no! could have though.

PM - 10

AM - 5

AM2 - off. my left glute became very tight some point between the first run and the start of the second, nothing major, just feels like i had a charlie horse in my ass. either way decided it wasn't worth running through, hopefully should be good to get back at it tonight

PM - 2 after work. cut short because a storm was rolling in fast. normally i'd brave it but this one was ugly with a capital x. specifically my ex sam. great girl though

AM - 15 on the turf field because that storm went crazy last night and it was the only place run-able. super easy to get in nearly 2 hours of running, starting to remember how in the h i ran a 200-mile week

PM - 5 shakeout. left glute and IT band were tight, but that's what i get for running 15 miles on a 100-yard turf field 12 hours earlier. felt better as i went on. can't tell if it's something to train through or let breathe; i'm going out for 10 tonight so that'll probably be a better indicator.

PM - 5. a couple hours after my second run yesterday my IT band was still pretty tight despite stretching, which is usually the deciding factor on whether i can run through it. took a day off, based on last night i kind of expected it to be something that needed the standard "3-day recovery" treatment, but got antsy and was happily surprised to find the ITB was fine. fastest pace for an easy run since at least february

PM2 - got a mile into the run and my glute/hip still felt a little off; could run on it, but it's irritating me much more than the glute itself is so i bagged it since my paycheck hits tomorrow and i can go see the chiropractor in the morning to fix it. i wanna just blame it on the 15 on the turf field, but it came about earlier in the week than that. don't really care as long as the chiropractor fixes it. at least the IT band feels fine.

off. got my hips realigned this morning, i think it's better now but it's hard to tell until i run again tomorrow. took the day off to let the adjustment set in. he did say one hip was lower than the other so hopefully that reaffirms it. gonna do some core and strength work in a minute, gonna add some hip work into there too. need to buy a resistance band

AM - 5 before work. hip felt better. with any luck today will be my second to last 16-hour shift for the time being which is a necessity for keeping my sanity

slept through my alarm and didn't have time to run before work.

AM - 5 easy

AM2 - 12 easy. was debating a fast finish the first few miles but decided against it, then i saw a shooting star at 11.4 miles and took it as a sign and ran the last half-mile in 2:35. good stuff.

PM - 8. for 4PM on a 90+ degree sunny afternoon the pace was really solid for an easy run. since the peg 37's are out the 36's were BOGO half off so looks like i still have 3 pairs left to retire before moving to the new model

AM - 5

AM2 - 12 easy. feel like this could be the start of a hot streak if i stay consistent the next couple days

PM - 8 at 3pm. even sunnier and hotter than yesterday's PM run, my skin's about 3 shades darker than it was this morning. i'd honestly say the 30-mile long run i did last november was easier than this, mentally speaking. only reason i managed to hold out for an hour was the cold electrolyte drink i had in the car. 

AM - 5. ran slow and felt good.

AM2 - 12. realized with a few miles left i was in a groove and just held on until i hit 12. nothing crazy on account of all the mileage on the legs the past couple days, but felt like i got a little extra aerobic fitness out of the run.

PM - 8 miles microdosing in heatstroke. got insanely windy after 5 miles, normally i'd have been annoyed but with how hard the heat was giving it to me, it was a blessing.

AM - 5

AM2 - very easy 12, avg HR under 120. felt good :)

PM - 8. felt good. 

100 miles in 4 days; what a relief to break through that ceiling again. maybe now the voice in the back of my head will stop telling me i'm washed!

AM - 5. decided on tuesday to take today a bit easier so i could have a day to recover where i wouldn't spend all of it on my feet, a la 16-hour hospital shift. at the time i thought i'd be maxed out if i managed to go 4 straight 25's but honestly i feel like i barely need it. i'd rather get a little too much recovery in by monday then not enough though.

PM - 5. smashed my foot on a protruding door frame yesterday and jammed my left pinky toe pretty bad so took last night and this morning off. foot's still sore but besides that felt great

AM - 10. just went on autopilot and thought about the base training to come. realized this is probably the last time i'll feel fresh for a while so tried to enjoy it.

PM - 5 after work. now that the last dance is out on netflix i don't think i'm gonna be lacking in motivation for a looong time. 

AM - 5. had to deal w/ some acid reflux during the run, i'm convinced a wicked side stitch would have been more tolerable. suffered through it.

AM2 - 12. no acid reflux, thank god. if i had to describe the run in 4 words they'd be easy, breezy, beautiful, covergirl

PM - 8 + strength. little quick. starting to enter the "scary fit" zone!

PM - 10. stomach was hurting this morning so didn't run, guess i'll have to flip the switch early to hit 150

AM - 5. felt pretty good

AM2 - 15. had fun and threw down

PM - 10 easy

AM - 5. slept in about an hour so i'll be a little extra hot by the end of my second AM run. considered swapping the AM and PM runs and doing 10 and taking the rest of the morning off, but i think doing a 5-mile shakeout around 3PM would just leave me gassed before i even started that second run

AM2 - 15. tough one, very tired, no idea why. on a totally uncorrelated note, this makes for 60 miles in the past 36 hours. finished the run strong despite all that.

PM - 10. another 30-mile day!

AM - 5. think i maxed out the legs the past 2 days so today will just be a shakeout or two. still, as long as i'm back to normal after the weekend the one-two punch of wednesday-thursday was a resounding success; feel much more in shape than i was earlier in the week. 

PM - 5 easy. leg strength, hips and pushups after

sotd: sudden death - quelle chris

AM - 5 before work. feel like my legs are almost back to 100%.

PM - 5 after work. barely managed to beat a gnarly storm rolling in. had to run the last quarter mile at 5:40 pace to do so

sotd: can it be all so simple - wu-tang clan

AM - 5 before work. legs getting tired of recovery(i know that's an oxymoron), excited to throw down some more 30-mile days this week

PM - 5. tired from work. let's get it!

AM - 5. accidentally slept in by about 45 minutes.

AM2 - off. normally i don't put too much stake in my HR, but in the ~90 minutes after my run the lowest it got was 75(my RHR yesterday was 31). was also jacked on the 5 miles of easy jogging. not sure what's up with that but i'll take it as a signal to not run again this morning.

PM - 15. was originally just planning on a shakeout, but by the first few steps i knew i'd probably hit 15 miles or die trying. happy to be in that mindstate, but i didn't start my run until 9 since i thought i was doing 5, so not a lot of time to sleep tonight. HR was back in the low 30's by noon and barely hit 130 on the run, so that's good too.

AM - 5. didn't feel half bad, light fartlek the last couple miles

AM2 - 10 with a 4-mile of quarter-mile on, quarter-mile off in 23:50. jumped straight into it after 3 miles of easy running, and stopped for about a minute after it to change back into trainers. just a little something to mix up the tedium and monotony of base training, i didn't think i could break 24 on a normaly 4-mile tempo with my current fitness so it was a nice surprise. happy with it, especially considering this made 30 miles in less than 12 hours. did some new stuff before the run that i'm mentioning in case it helped, namely meditating and light resistance band work beforehand, plus taking my multivitamin i usually take after the run instead.

PM - 15. had some stomach cramps after 11 miles but then migos versace remix came on shuffle and i found the strength to power through. legs felt pretty good for 45 miles in just under 24 hours(started this one a little earlier than yesterday to catch up on sleep)

AM - 5. certainly not on fresh legs right now but they aren't breaking down at the moment.

AM2 - 10. not much faster than the shakeout; guess i used up any speed i had for today yesterday morning. still, mileage is mileage.

PM - 15. perfect summer running weather in the south... low 80's and drizzling with a breeze

AM - 5 jogging

AM2 - 10. 13 second difference from yesterday's run, impressive both in my consistency and that that it was 13 ticks faster; my legs were basically dead fish.

PM - 15. dead fish!!

AM - 5. been running on fumes since waking up yesterday, and even ran out of that by the last few minutes of last night's 15. after that hoped i could get enough strength back to get my AM 5 and 10 in so i could hit 120 miles in 3.5 days, but i could tell stretching after this shakeout my body had hit it's limit, so only AM run today. i'm almost certain if i hadn't done that hard fartlek on tuesday i could've gotten my 4th straight 30-mile day, but hey, at least i hit the 500-mile month. no way in hell i'm running 15 tonight, but maybe i'll luck out and recover enough to get 10 so i can hit a 150 mile week; 99% chance it'll either be a shakeout or nothing at all though. still, amazing past 3 days of training! gonna go take my supplements and get a 25oz budweiser from the gas station at 5am to celebrate the feat(also because i'm afraid i might try and get that 10 anyway if i don't incapacitate myself)

sotd: my heart will stop of joy - the caretaker

AM - 5. felt like someone had taken to my legs with a meat tenderizer, but felt better by the end once i got some blood circulation in the legs. 

PM - 5. shook most of the mileage out of the legs. glad they feel good because in retrospect going straight from a great fartlek on tuesday morning to 75 miles in 48 hours with no recovery was pretty dumb. not that i don't think it's doable; just need a week or two of straight mileage first. def think i have a decent shot of going 5-straight with the 30's next week.

sotd: waves of fear - lou reed. the only exposure i'd had to him prior was the velvet underground and nico, hard as i try i just cannot enjoy that album for the life of me. but, i respect him as an artist, so i was happy to find something of his i liked

AM - 5

PM - 5 after work. tired legs but felt good to shake some life into them. ready to crush some mileage

sotd: no one is ever going to want me - corey giles. discovered this 2011 gem of an album the other day and oh boy am i in love. it's like "yellow house" by grizzly bear meets "doolittle" by the pixies sonically, with the darkly potent lyrics of "closer" by NiN, with just a touch of the ambient genius of william basinski's disintegration loops on top. def would have cracked my top 10 albums of the decade list last year if i'd found it sooner

AM - 5. slept in and woke up at 6:45, since it'll be another few weeks before it's cool enough to run between 9am-6pm that's it for the AM

PM - 15. had some stomach issues as i went on but overall felt okay.

AM - 5-mile shakeout

AM2 - 10. just felt really tired; didn't get much sleep last night. watch died towards the end but i'm sure the pace was slow.

AM - 8. decided to add base workouts in a little early so took yesterday off to reset the legs, so to speak. put in a modicum of effort to find out what my non-jogging easy pace is, which came out to about 7-flat, which is around what i was expecting

PM - 12. ran the first 6 miles at the same effort/pace as this morning, then eased up the latter half to let the legs breathe for tomorrow's workout. i don't really know what to call the pace, going off heart rate it's where the high end of easy and low end of aerobic meet, but closer to easy. i'll call it fit pace until i think of something cooler

AM - 5 shakeout. threw in some effortless surges the last 2 miles just to loosen up the legs.

AM2 - 4 mile w/u, 8 x 200m flat in 34, 33, 34, 32, 32, 33, 32, 32, mile jog to the hill, 8 x 200m hill in 48, 45, 44, 45, 45, 45, 43, 43. 200m recovery jog back to start after every repeat. CD for 13.

ran this at Sandy because it has some crazy hills(>8% slope on the one i ran). i'm naming this hill after my ex jamajah because it's gonna make a man out of me. being a remote country road it isn't a place to run super fast, and i'm pretty sure the 200m's are actually a few meters long, but i'm happy with it.

PM - 12, fit pace first 4 miles. felt really strong, especially in the first 7. next week i'll probably just do 7 instead of 12 on workout days. one of my best 30-mile days ever!

sotd: alberto balsalm - aphex twin

AM - 5 very easy.  counting mileage weeks from sunday-saturday this marks the only time outside of that 13-week 100+ mile streak i've ran 4 straight triple-digit weeks. they've all had quality stretches, but i've yet to have a week where i'm on the ball all 7 days. hopefully, that's what this next week will be.

sotd: you ain't coming back - zeal and ardor

AM - 8, last 5 at fit pace.

PM - 12. felt great, besides the repercussions of drinking a cup of espresso 90 minutes beforehand. i'm switching to hot tea for my caffeine fix

fell in love for the first time today; not with a redhead southern bell but a new place to run. discovered a gravel backroad about 8 miles from my apartment in the middle of the boonies, it's honestly perfect. 3 miles of relatively flat straight road between cornfields before ~1200m of uphill, followed by rolling hills the rest of the way. the long hill is a little too steep to bomb down after the turnaround, but gives you some good momentum to finish strong. mostly shaded by trees too, and only saw 2 cars in the 90 minutes out there. 

in the past 10 months i can count on one hand the amount of times i've done a run anywhere but the turf field loop(.2 miles), intramural loop(.7 miles), or hilton loop(.75 miles). mostly hilton. going over a quarter mile without a 90-degree turn felt super weird, let alone 6 miles. i'd take the loops over asphalt any day, but i can tell it does a number on my ankles and hips, plus even if i've managed to get accustomed to the absolute suck of running 20 or 30 of the same 5-minute loop every day, it still sucks so i'm ecstatic to have a new running spot.

sotd: unhealed - maenad veyl. industrial and electronic go together like a mid-20's social media and false portrayal of lifestyle

AM - 5 easy.

PM - 15. having a lot of fun right now; i'm almost at the point where i can run a 15-miler every day and once that happens things are gonna get scary. had "a gringo like me" stuck in my head the entire run

AM - 6-mile shakeout. hell has frozen over, cats are marrying dogs, the cuban hitmen that framed O.J. have been found: all because i did a morning shakeout that wasn't 5 miles. i was gonna do 10 and do a workout in the evening, but decided to move it tomorrow after 3 miles. felt great, i just figured i'll be doing MWF workouts soon enough so might as well start that 48-hour recovery adapting early. i'll shave a mile off the 15 in the evening because having my mileage not be in multiples of 5 gives me hernias

PM - 14. beat a crazy storm by getting to my car just a few seconds before it hit; 2020's easily been the craziest year of storms i've been part of but it's been years since i saw one like this. type of storm where driving home i could barely see 10m in front of my car. was a little worried that a faster finish and not getting a chance to stretch before the 15-minute drive home would hurt my legs but i think i'll be okay.

AM - 10. nothing like 80 minutes of tough hills and 100% humidity to wake the legs up. slowly learning to bomb the ~1200m hill running back down it so doing that on mile 7 jumpstarted the legs those last 3 miles.

PM - 5 mile w/u, 4 x 200m relatively flat in 32, 34, 34, 32, half-mile jog to hill, 4 x 200m hill in 43, 40, 40, 39. 200m rec. c/d for 15.

had to cut the workout in half since there was a storm coming in and if it was anything like the one last night i didn't want to be 5 miles from my car when it hit. felt a bit sluggish on the flat 200's and much better on the hills. since the course was different i wouldn't compare these times to last week's; that hill is way tougher than jamajah. i'm naming this one after my ex regan because it be leavin me breathing heavy lol

AM - 5 miles of the white kenyan jog. left achilles was a little tight in the post-workout way but otherwise didn't feel half bad.

PM - 15. legs weren't hurting but still a bit tired from yesterday so this run embodied one of my favorite sinatra songs(nice n' easy). was going to do 10 but it's supposed to rain all day tomorrow so figured i'd get some mileage insurance. saw a huge snake around mile 9, thing had to be 30 inches long with a head wider than a half dollar. didn't avoid it until i was like 5 feet away because i thought it had to be a tire remnant or something with how long it was

AM - 5. jogged it, but legs felt great.

PM - 15. rained hard. third straight 15 where i saw a snake. 

sotd: flamingo - todd rundgren