Step by step, mile by mile

Felt like I had a fever in the morning, but felt good enough in the afternoon to set out for a run. 3 WU, 4x200 w/ full recovery, 3 CD. Hit 30, 30, 30, and 29. Was supposed to do 8-10 200's, but after #4 I got dizzy and started feeling sick. I'm happy with the 29 bc I wasn't planning on stopping after, so I didn't even have the extra motivation of "I'm almost done".

Couldn't fall asleep again. My sleeping schedule blows. 4 miles at 2AM. My stomach was so wrecked from having a huge Moes burrito for dinner. Two more miles here and there throughout the busy college life.

My calves are tight and my glutes are sore. I haven't worn my aggressive spikes since junior year when I mained the 800. Not too sure why I decided after two years of it to switch to the 3200 senior year. I don't think I had ever even ran it before then.

This morning I woke up but the only food we have was the cookie cake for my roommate's birthday yesterday, so I had a slice of that before class. After class I was gonna nap bc I felt pretty bad from not sleeping well, so I decided to eat what we had, another slice of the cookie cake. After that I decided I might as well run now because I wasn't as tired. Ended up feeling pretty lifeless in the run after all. Scratched the workout. Did a mile striding 150m on the first three laps w/ 250 off, then another 100 off coming into the last lap so I could finish with a hard 300m. Did the mile in 5:29. Did some pushups and sprints up the bleachers but my legs really didn't have any life in them today. CD. Might go lift later today. I'm gonna run to Publix later and buy some Nyquil to have a real party tonight. In my dreams.

7 miles down riverwalk to a paved road for running I saw a couple days ago. Turned out to be a bust, it was maybe a quarter mile long. Went a bit quicker, watch lost signal but when it worked the pace was in the 6:20's, so a little bit quicker to make up for probably having no workout tomorrow.

The main high school around this area is American Christian Academy. They've won many state championships, and are thought to win this year too. I've been talking to their coach a bit about training me, and yesterday he called me. He talked to me about running for a while, and asked a few questions to determine which event he thought I'd be best at, based on workouts I liked and excelled at. He offered to train me if I, in turn, trained with his team as well. It'd be something like the job of an assistant coach(while still training to make Alabama's team, of course). Coach Tiller is going to introduce me to the team tomorrow, and see what I think.

7 miles with the ACA. Nice group of guys. Me and the teams varsity did a 45 minute trail run. Pace was very slow and I just felt great throughout. Did 4x150m strides after and felt supreme. I finished probably 20m ahead of the guys every time and it felt easy, but that's not much to brag about. Got around 22-25 for the strides. 

Overall I really liked the team. The boys were really nice and we had some good talks and I got to know Nick, Garrett, and David throughout the run. Didn't get to know the girls too well, but from the looks and awkward hells I was getting from them, I assume that might have been a disappointment! My looks never fail. I made sure to stay towards the rear end of the pack of 7 of us, and it felt really nice to run slow.

A mile later to find keys

A few thoughts/aspirations about the next few weeks...

I'm racing a 2-mile road race next Saturday. The plan is to go sub ten. Two weeks after that I'm going to Birmingham(where they held DI nationals earlier this year) to race at the BSC icebreaker. I'll be signing up for the 3k, mile, and 800 and race what I feel like(probs 3k and mile, but if I feel I need another couple hours to recover from the 3k, I'll drop the mile for the 8). With the San Diego half marathon just 20 days later, I think my half debut will have to wait a while. Maybe I'll race a Christmas 5k instead. I'm glad. Instead of tons of half marathon training/stressing over break, I'll have time to relax, run some killer trails and smash some workouts.

It's been a couple of months since my last real race(CC and homecoming were more of brisk jogs). I'm starting to get some speed in my legs and that excites me. I ran a sub 5 mile a week ago, and I barely did that senior year due to sickness(and suckness). I'd like to get back the level of speed in my legs where I can run sub 2:15's and sub 60's in track work again. I'm not too far off; I did a sub 30 200 earlier in the week and from how I felt I could have held it at least to 300m.

This last summer I got some crazy mileage in that gave me great endurance, but in return I was putting so many easy miles in my legs that I didn't put enough hard ones(except maybe some good tempos before Ragnar). I sacrificed my 5k fitness for the one of a marathoner, when 5ks were the only thing that mattered. That's my midnight ramblings, I don't think I've had any on the blog yet.

Felt sick yesterday. I was warming up to the track when I stopped at a red light and got hit with a wave of sickness. I probably could have done the workout, but I bet I could run it better tomorrow. The sickness was probably eating a ton of baked lays before the run. Time to go back to my wholesome fuel of a whole lot of veggies, fruit, and coffee.