I don't know what I was thinking this morning when I went for my cross-training bike ride. I was supposed to make it a fairly easy ride (following my long run on Saturday) but I ended up ramping it up to a fairly intense ride. Although my speed doesn't reflect a really hard workout I actually rode the second half at about 20 mph.

32 miles @ 18.2 mph (HR 130)

I think I'm going to postpone my Monday Repeat Run and do it on Tuesday.

Proverbs 12:25 

Anxiety in a man's heart weighs him down, but a good word makes him glad.

Today was a good day running. Day 4 on the RLRF program running Track Repeats. I was more comfortable today than last Monday on the mile Repeats. My legs don't have any problem running fast it's just that the Aerobic suffers as the distances get longer. As a note, I set my Garmin on "Pace" and "Avg. Pace" so I could monitor my speed throughout each run. I also set the light to stay on for two minutes (as DerHammer suggested). I was trying really hard to stay on the exact pace through each Repeat...not slow down or speed up. As you can see I did go a few seconds over on a couple of the Repeats. I must have slowed down slightly at the end and didn't realize it :-(

I believe that my other two workouts this week will be achievable without undue stress. I'm now wondering why the first workout was set so hard. Maybe it was one of those tests where the instructor is trying to weed out the ones not dedicated to succeed :-)

11/14/2011
Mile	Time	HR	HR %	Max HR
1	Warm-Up
0.5	2:57:00	151	78%	167
	2 Min. Recovery
0.5	3:04:00	153	80%	167
	2 Min. Recovery
0.5	2:59:00	158	83%	170
	2 Min. Recovery
0.5	2:58:00	159	84%	172
	2 Min. Recovery
1.5	Cool-Down
Total	11:58:00	155	81%
Pace	2:59:30
Track Workout at High School
70Âș - High Humidity
Warm-up .5 mile, Stretched, Warm-up .5 mile, 4 x 800's @ 2:58, 2 Min. Recovery between 800's, 1.5 Mile Cool-down For 4.5 Miles Total. Warm-up & Cool-Down 8:30-9:00 Pace.

Psalm 26: 1-3

 ¹ Vindicate me, LORD,
   for I have led a blameless life;
I have trusted in the LORD
   and have not faltered.
² Test me, LORD, and try me,
   examine my heart and my mind;
³ for I have always been mindful of your unfailing love
   and have lived in reliance on your faithfulness.

Today was a recovery day on my RLRF program so I went to the gym and ran on the Elliptical and lifted some weights. I don't really like biking in the dark of the morning and I've been having a hard time finding the time in the evenings so I guess the Elliptical will be the major cross-training thing for a while.

11/11/2011
Gym workout: 1 mile Elliptical Stretch 1 mile Elliptical Weights 1 mile Elliptical Weights 1 mile Elliptical Weights 2 mile Elliptical Total Elliptical: 6

 Ha Ha..... got to add 6 miles to my biking today. My wife and I went out for a short ride before it got dark.

________________________________________________________________________________________ 

Since today is rest day for me I thought it would be good to use this a a mental preperation day. Here is a great inspirational writing by Ryan Hall...Hope you take the time to read it!

Dwell On What You Want To Become

by ryanhall | Sep 23, 2010 |

Dealing with disappointment is a life skill we all have to learn, and I hope that these words can encourage you through your trials as they have for me. After having a poor performance in this past Sunday’s ING Rock ‘n’ Roll Philadelphia Half Marathon I had a lot to think about, perhaps too much to think about. From my own experiences, I have found that it doesn’t help me to go overly introspective. While I do believe it is not only good, but imperative, to get fresh perspective on a daily and even moment-by-moment basis, I see gaining perspective as much different than questioning oneself. We all experience nagging questions of whether we have what it takes, but I choose to believe the answer to these is “Yes, I do”.

As long as my focus is on what I am going after–and not on my own failures–I can rest assured that I am moving in this direction. What are you focused on in your life? Because whatever you focus on will increase. There is a really good verse that says, “as a man thinks in his heart, so he is.” Are you focused on things you don’t like about yourself and things you want to change? If you are, chances are those things will continue to be issues. Or are you focused on what you want to become? Little by little, this will result in a transformation into the vision.

Of course, the challenge becomes how do we deal with times (like this past Sunday for me) when we aren’t anywhere near where we want to be? First, do not doubt yourself. I really, really believe there is greatness in us all. Focus on that greatness and let it draw you out toward it. Secondly, realize that there are natural physical factors at play. I am still learning how to be in the best physical condition I can be in heading to the starting line. The temptation when I am physically off is to blame the performance on my mental processes, and there is undoubtedly a correlation between the physical and the mental. The two compliment each other well but there is only so much the mind can do to increase performance when the body is off and vice versa.

Dwell on what you want to become. Daydream about it, focus on it, and acknowledge with thankfulness every step you take toward that vision. Most importantly, when you are in those times (like I currently find myself in) where it takes the most amount of faith to believe that you can become the vision you have for yourself, realize that these times are the most powerful opportunities to focus on what we want to become. Continue to move in that direction because it requires the most faith. In times like these, we can drive a stake deep into our soul declaring this vision that we have for ourselves is where we are going regardless of how far we may feel from it. For I firmly believe that we were created so that which we dwell on will surely increase.

Wow..Today was windy (and cold for me)! Week 2 - Workout 2 on the RLRF program. The schedule said to run 1 mile warm-up, 5 miles @ 7:26 then 1 mile cool-down.

Since I've started committed to stretching I now stop after my warm-up and do it. It takes about 10 minutes. The best spot to stop and stretch on the road near my house is about 1.5-1.75 miles out (depending where I start running). This makes my warm-up a little longer than the perscribed but I'm figuring more warm-up won't hurt anything. Like I mentioned above it was very windy with a steady 18 mph wind. The wind was a cross wind for the warm-up and the first mile but then I turned directly into it and ran 3 miles freezing and fighting the wind. The fourth mile got to me and I was really struggling. Mile 2, 3, and 4, on this route are all up hill with the 4th one being the steepest. Finally at mile 5 I turned with the wind and as you can see from my time I flew :-) The cool-down miles were mostly with the wind too, that's why I ran them at a 8:00 pace (wouldn't it be nice if 8:00 was my normal "easy recovery" pace!). I forgot to put on my HR monitor so I just ran by "pfeel" (wait...that's SlowJoe's term :-). Even though I had a 7:55 mile, when they were all supposed to be 7:26, I believe it was a sucessful workout. I really wanted and planned on making the avg. pace 7:10 but with the wind I just couldn't.

15 miles on Saturday...looking forward to that!

11/17/2011
Mile	Time	HR	HR %	Max HR
1.75	8:55:00	Warm-up
1	7:13:00	No HR Monitor
2	7:21:00
3	7:26:00
4	7:55:00
5	6:41:00
1.5	8:01:00	Cool-down
Total	53:32:00
Tempo Miles	36:36:00
Pace	7:19:12
Ran Small Loop & Smallville
49Âș  -  18 mph Wind
1.75 Miles warm-up, Stretch for 10 minutes, .5 Mile Tempo (Target 7:26), 1.43 Miles cool-down

Today was Cross-Training so I decided to take a couple of hours off from work this morning and ride. It was 43 degrees when I started and 55 when I finished. I've bought leg and arm sleeves, a dry fit hood, cold weather riding gloves and shoe covers for riding in conditions like this. I put everything on and went out but even with all of this on I still got cold. My body, head and hands weren't too bad but when I finished my ride my feet were completely white. It felt like I was walking on stubs and my wife said my feet felt like an ice pack when she touched them. This is going to be a problem if the weather is below 40 at any of my upcoming races. At my last race it was 42 degrees and almost unbearable, my feet were numb at the end of that race too.

 

11/118/2011 (Morning Ride)
Miles	Time	Speed	HR	HR %
10		18.8	135	68%
10		18.8	137	69%
10.5		19.9	137	69%
30.5	Total	19.2
Miles		Speed	136	69%
43Âș at the Start, 55Âș at the end
Road to Redwood, Martindale, River Road, Hwy 80, Martindale, Staples, Home

Revelation 3:16
But because you are warm, and not hot or cold, I will spit you out of My mouth.

Today's RLRF workout was my long run day. The schedule called for 15 miles at 8:11 pace. It's interesting that this run was 2 minutes faster than the first 17.5 miles on my one marathon race and about the same pace as my best 20+ mile run several months ago when I thought I was in the best condition. I don't think I could have gone over 20 miles at this pace but what the heck....I've got 14 more weeks to go on my training :-) I was pretty tire all day from this run. 

11/19/2011
Mile	Time	HR	HR %	Max HR
1	8:03:00	137	69%
2	8:06:00	149	77%
3	8:07:00	150	78%
4	8:06:00	149	77%
5	8:06:00	149	77%
6	8:05:00	151	78%
7	8:04:00	157	82%
8	8:06:00	151	78%
9	7:54:00	154	80%
10	8:05:00	151	78%
11	8:05:00	157	82%
12	8:04:00	158	83%
13	8:03:00	158	83%
14	8:05:00	158	83%
15	8:02:00	161	85%
16	8:10:00	167	89%
17	8:05:00	165	88%
17.5	3:41:00	172	93%
Total	140:57:00	160	83%
Pace	8:03:15
Small Loop + Smallville 2x
Target - Long Run: 15 @ 8:11 Pace 65 Degrees at the start 70 Degrees at the finish, 97% Humidity

Psalms 69: 30

"I will praise God's name in song and glorify him with thanksgiving."