Boston, here I come?

Well this was interesting - I set out to do my normal 8 mile route, but as I went north I was running directly into rain.  It was dry at my house, but getting stronger with each step..so I turned west and decided to just make up a route, with some park loops and other neighborhood streets.  Wound up spending most of the time in the rain, which is fine...until 5.5 miles in when I went to turn onto a sidewalk and had my foot go completely out from under me.  Smashed my thigh against the curb on my way down, scraped up my hand and cut my shin.  A couple nearby runners made sure I was okay, which I realized I was after about a minute.  I decided to try to jog, and when it didn't hurt too bad I figured I'd keep going.  I was going slower (wound up with a 7:44/mile pace, I was taking it easy anyway), which was fine, and almost gave up at the 7 mile mark..but decided to tough it out to complete the 30 mile week.  I made it, and I'm happy I did..nothing got twisted or sprained, just a big bruise and a couple of scratches, I compare it to getting hit by a fastball.  Tomorrow was going to be an off day anyway, so hopefully it doesn't hurt too bad in the morning.

Well, the leg has hurt since Sunday, but it's just a bruise - nothing that is going to get more hurt by running.  Had a good run today, covering the 7 miles at a 7:15/mile pace, without straining or pushing hard.  Ordinarily I probably would've done only 5 today but this distance put me over 100 for the month.  The opposite side of my quad flared up a few different times, but I'm guessing it was just upset for having to pick up the bruised area's slack.

Now THAT was a workout!  I strapped on the weight vest (7.5 lbs) and did some hill repeats...brutal.  It's a half mile to get to the hill, then 1/3 mile up and 1/3 mile down..did four repeats on the hill and turned in.  The overall pace wound up at 8:08/mile, but I'm really only noting that to see how much I can improve over the next few months.  Importantly, the fourth repeat was slightly faster than the first, I'm very happy about that.  I've got to do some more of these in the coming weeks to keep building strength, and then do some hardcore speedwork.

This was a tougher "easy" run, being the morning after the hill repeats.  Good opportunity to do a nice easy pace and not exert myself.  Mission accomplished there, kept the heart rate low and averaged 7:29/mile.  My legs are feeling it now though, if I run tomorrow it'll be in the evening..my instinct is to take the day off but I've got a 5K on Saturday that I'm running with a friend in.  It'll be a slower (8 min/mile?) pace so that will be an easy run, seems like I should get a few miles in tomorrow and really make this a strong week.

Easy but important run today, I was very tempted to just stay on the couch watching baseball but worked up the energy to run before going out to dinner.  My pace was 7:11/mile, which felt right for the energy I used.  I'm doing a 5K with a friend tomorrow who I'll stay even with, and who is in the 8-9 minute/mile range..good to have done some faster miles today with that coming up next.

Morning - fun 5K with my friend (and my mostly-walking pregnant wife) down on the boardwalk in Santa Monica.  He did well, with the miles getting faster as we went along, and we crossed the line in 27:20.  Went out for a nice breakfast afterwards and had a good time, I'll hopefully run with him a bit more in the future as it makes the easy runs a lot more fun.

Afternoon - this wasn't planned, but I did another 3 with my brother-in-law near their house in Calabasas.  We went up there to visit them and our six week old nephew, so he could get a break and get some exercise in.  I wound up joining him, and it worked out as another easy run (8:40/mile).  He used to run a lot more (and faster) but has been pretty busy with a newborn so he's slowed down...but as time goes on he'll be back to where he used to be.