Where's the Donuts?

Over in Seattle for a wagon-load of family stuff over the past few days, my brother and I snuck out and did my five-mile Husky Stadium loop. Down the B-G trail, cut off at Husky Stadium then around through some UW wetland reclamation area. It's a nice route, and we stopped to see if the UW football team was practicing. They weren't, but looking at their schedule for the coming fall I suggest they get themselves out there. 

Pace was easy, nice to run with Timm and keep it slow. 39:23.

supernova red -- 51 

Last night I'm standing in the grass and my left knee started irritating me. Right on the little bump at the outside of the knee, where a tendon from the lower leg connects. Not a real serious pain, but an annoying little thing that came out of nowhere. Didn't feel it at all in the a.m., but there it was all of a sudden. I jogged a bit and nothing hurt then, but anytime I was standing (or later sitting in the car) it would get painful. 

This morning I felt it as soon as I woke up. I went out and got through three miles; nothing feels wrong structurally but it's a nagging pain that hangs around. After 2.5 I decided to call it quits and come back to ice. So a three-mile run, 23:23. We'll see what sitting at work today brings and hopefully this goes away soon.

supernova red -- 54

Pretty morning, 10 (maybe a bit shy of that, actually) on Tracyton Beach Road out to Essex and back. Good medium pace, just under 7 min/miles. My knee didn't bother me much at all today, once I thought I felt that twinge but it was gone just as quickly. So that's good news. Felt good about the mid-week miles though. 66:49.

supernova -- 64

Cloudy morning, easy run on the 11th-Shore route. Everything felt fine, I was able to hold a nice medium pace for most of the run. I even threw in 6x100m striders, been awhile since I did that. My legs needed the first one and a half to shake the slow-twitch rust off, but they felt good to do once my legs were stretched out. Hopefully the striders will get me ready for more of a workout, I'd like to get something up-tempo into next week's schedule so I can get a few workouts in before August is over. 35:59.

supernova red -- 69

Rainy morning on Beach Drive, first time it's been wet in awhile. Small crowd again, only saw three other Slugs. Started at a good pace (6:40, 6:35, 6:50), then at mile 3 had to hit a bathroom pretty seriously. So I did a walk-run for mile 4 (8:40) and was overjoyed to see the Waterman port-o-pot. Got back on the road feeling better and returned to the pace. I knew I was pushing a bit and maybe didn't need to, since this wasn't a speed workout, but I've struggled with consistency on this run somewhat lately. This run continued that, I was pushing fairly close to Tinman Tempo on some but then lagged a bit on a few — 6:15, 6:48 to the turnaround on a slight uphill, then 6:40, 7:00, 6:05, 6:30, 6:18, and 6:43 when I tried to ease off.

I shouldn't complain about having some fast miles on a 12-mile run, but I never felt in control of the pace or focused on the splits. I didn't set out with a pace in mind, maybe that was the problem. But I felt fine, the knee twinge from the other day was nothing more than that, and I rushed home to shower and grab an early ferry to Seattle. I spent the rest of the day painting, so Sunday was a needed rest day. 1:21 total. I felt good about the week, two runs over ten miles and 35 miles total. The goal for next week is over 40, then evenly bring that up to 50 by the first or second week of September.

If anyone's reading this, go read this week's New Yorker article on Ryan Hall and marathoning. It's a great read, more for a general audience than runners, but some really interesting stuff about the origin of marathon racing in the U.S.  Then think about having a scientist cut out a chunk of your thigh muscle (you'll see what I mean).