Of Mice and Marathons

AM: 60' on the trainer. 134W. HR 91. 

Active recovery ride. Nothing else today. The program triggered a red day, and I need it. I am going to get in an additional recovery today tomorrow and not do anything hard with a maintenance day on Tuesday to absorb everything. It's time. 

I wanted to do the Coffee Ride, but I wasn't sure if anyone was doing it and it was supposed to rain, though I think that was coming later. 

AM: 8 miles, averaged 8:11. HR 135. Did some strides.

PM: Off.

Planned to run, but it got late. We did go for a nice walk as a family for the first time in a while. Boys played on the playground and got soaked and muddy, but they had a lot of fun. 

AM: 8 miles, averaged 7:48. HR 137. 

Hit some low-7' pace miles coming down the Polly Ann. HR was still in the upper part of zone 2. Feeling amazing. I probably need to have Tuesdays as a dedicated run day and double to get some more mileage. I could probably get plenty of cycling volume from 4 days, especially in the summer when I can do long rides on Thursday, Saturday, and Sunday. That could have Monday as a recovery day and I could try to do my midweek running workout on Tuesday, but we shall see. 

We got a lot more rain last night and this morning, so likely on the trainer this afternoon/evening, which is fine. 

PM: 120' on the trainer. 224W. HR 128. 

4 x 12' Criss Cross Tempo/Threshold

3 (3, 1)

262W @ 141 BPM, 261W @ 140 BPM, 263W @ 141 BPM, 267W @ 144 BPM

Decent session. Nothing too taxing, just a little quality thrown in. 

AM: 8 miles, averaged 7:35. HR 146. 

Beautiful morning. Upper 50s to low 60s and warming. Moved along pretty good. HR a bit higher than yesterday, but still fine for "easy" running. 

PM: ~120' on the trainer. 228W. HR 128. 

3 x 20' Tempo Bursts

Solid session. Not too taxing, but a little bit of work done. I wanted ot go outside, but couldn't risk a mechanical and being late to pick the boys up from school.

AM: 8 miles, averaged 7:34. HR 142. 

A bit chilly, but the kind of weather runners like. Gloves but no hat and a warmer baselayer. 

Started taking creatine this morning in an effort to reduce the effects of age-related muscle loss. I am not sure I will do the loading phase as I want to avoid a ton of weight gain and possible GI distress, which means it will take longer to see the effects, but that is okay. Over the last several months, and really the last 8-12 I have been refining my nutrition. Not so much meals, though I always try to work on that but fueling workouts and post-workout recovery. I believe that and consistency has led to my being able to get back to where I am at. That and kicking alcohol. 

Looking forward to the group ride tonight, though it might be a bit cool and windy. Yesterday was beautiful. Weather is trending up this weekend though. 

PM: 3 hours. 53.5 miles @ 17.8 MPH. 217W. HR 139. 

Thursday Night Dirt

It was chilly. Good ride. Dropped on 36 but rode with another guy and kept up the effort. Legs felt like junk on the ride over, but started to feel much better. I did better covering surges this week, but the wind through the Proving Grounds was a little tough and a gap opened and that was that. Roads were rough. 

Loop Data: 30.4 miles in 1:29:51. 20.3 MPH. 253W (280 normalized). HR 153. 

AM/Lunch: 16 miles, averaged 7:30. 

6 x 1 Mile + 5 x 200

Got a decent night of sleep. Planned on doing this workout, but I had a few other ideas, including doing a heart rate based progression run to try to get something a bit over 2 hours, but I settled with my original plan of doing 6-7 x 1 mile. I told myself to keep the first one fairly "easy" and settle into it. I figured anything under 6:20 as long as I progressed nicely by the end would be fine. I was trying not to compare things too much to previous workouts, such as when I did 6 x 2k @ about 6:10/6:11 pace, so I guess maybe I did compare a little :-). I wanted things to feel roughly like the start of a half marathon and then work done to 10k pace or faster by the end. Mission accomplished.

I decided to stop at 6 and not do 7. I did want to do something slightly faster at the end without being overly taxing, so I was going to do a couple 400s on the track (about a 5' jog from my house), but decided just to do some long strides (200 meter repeats). Those were far from my fastest but decently fast given current abilities and the fact that I did them close to the 2-hour mark. 

~4 up/4.6? down with the 200s

6:14, 6:10, 6:07, 6:06, 6:02, 6:03 (6:06 average)

42, 42, 40, 41

PM: 3 hours 34'. 65.2 miles @ 18.3 MPH. 214W. HR 137.

2 x 30' 

Head out the Polly Ann and headed east to some familiar roads I haven't been on it a while. Around Oxford the roads were very rough. Dropped my chain twice and a bottle came off of the cage but I caught it with my leg and pinched it against the frame. I went to Stony Creek midish ride to do some efforts around the lake. I was shooting for a hour of sweet spot but it wasn't happening. I tried to find the rhythm on the changing topography, but wasn't quite able to find my gearing. I ended up doing 2 x 30' @ sweet spot. My AI program told me to cut it back to two hours of endurance at the most, but it was way too nice out for that. Took just 5' steady @ 189 watts between intervals

273 watts @ 154 BPM and 272 watts @ 158 BPM

Megan and I went to Oakland's Meadowbook Amphitheater to see Sturgill Simpson. It was my birthday gift to her. It was a great show and we were pretty close. Our friend watched the boys. The show was pretty much three hours straight with barely a transition between most songs or any of the usual banter and stuff between songs. Quite impressive. He did LA Woman, which was pretty awesome.