Every Race is an Adventure!

I ran the Lake View run at noon. Tom ran hard this morning and was still recovering from his fast 5K on Saturday so he didn't join me. Nathan had told me he would be out of town the next two weeks but I saw him finishing up a treadmill workout when I got to the fitness center. He said he worked out early and was heading to the airport soon to fly out. I also saw Bill Rieske on the the ellipticals and talked with him for a bit. As I was dressing in the locker room I heard Will ask if I was headed out. I said "no", but he knew I was kidding. I told him he always makes me run too fast and my legs weren't up to it today. He said his foot was hurting and we was only going a few miles easy, so I agreed to run with him.

It was fun talking about St. George. Will and I had run together from the start to somewhere between miles 10 and 12. Once he realized he wasn't going to hit a BQ at 3:15 (I admire him for going for it) he backed off a little but still set a new PR at 3:24.

Will turned back at 1.5 miles today to get his 3 miles and I went on to complete the 5.2 miles in 44:37 (8:35/mi). My legs didn't complain about this pace, but communicated to me clearly that I shouldn't try to go any faster. Someone told me it takes 26 days to fully recover from a marathon (1 day per mile). I'm not sure I believe that (I think it takes Sasha about 26 hours), but I plan to continue to listen to my body for a while and try not to push too much too soon.

Still taking it easy until the legs are fully recovered from St. George. Larry, Wayne, and I wandered through the hills of Lindon this morning at a very easy pace. Wayne's shin is still bothering him so we cut it a little short. I added another 1/2 mile after we finished talking, but still only got 4.2 miles. I'm not too concerned about the mileage until I'm recovered. I think Sasha refers to what I'm doing as active recovery, doing light, easy effort instead of just sitting around while sore muscles heal.

Some guys at work have been inviting me to play basketball with them at lunch. Now that they are using light and dark shirts instead of shirts and skins, I might give it a try today.

... 

Well, I didn't play basketball today (because they didn't play), but I did survive some pretty heavy company layoffs. I guess my endurance extends beyond just running. It was still difficult watching good friends and coworkers leave.

I was planning to run at work at noon today, but I ended up not getting into the office today. After the kids were off to school I started the day by taking my wife's car to have the brakes checked. They were making some hideous noises last night. I ended up leaving the car there for $300 worth of brake repairs. If I would have been dressed to run I could have run home (but then I would have been all sweaty). As it was, I couldn't immediately reach any of the three drivers at home so I started walking home. I enjoyed the walk, but I didn't have time to walk all the way home.

I finally reached my wife who picked me up so I could take our son to the doctor to have his back checked out. The doctor suggested he try rest, anti-inflammatories, muscle relaxants, and back exercises for a week. By the time we picked up prescriptions and turned in his work release form at his employer it was past noon. Being a car short, and with rain threatening (so I couldn't ride my motorcycle), I decided to work from home for the afternoon and catch up on some online training I've been trying to get done.

Around 5:00pm I was finally able to get out for a run. I ran 5 easy miles (8:24/mi) around the greater neighborhood in a couple of loops. It was pretty chilly and my legs were reluctant to warm up, but overall they didn't feel too bad.

I ran Lake View solo at noon today. It was a little chilly, but much sunnier and warmer than it was at 5:45am this morning. I took it easy going out. I didn't push real hard coming back either, but I did shift gears a little on the return trip to see how it felt. I went the 2.6 miles out in 23:14 (8:56/mi), and back in 20:49 (8:00/mi). The legs still felt a little sluggish, but I wasn't sure if that was because they are still recovering from the marathon or because they were just cold. Either way, they feel better...not quite perky yet...but better.

I ran Lake View solo again at noon. It was cool (maybe warmish), clear, and beautiful. I felt a little more zippy today so I pushed the pace a little right from the start. I was thinking maybe I'd try to average 8:00/mi. I didn't have my Garmin, and I was too lazy to do the math to calculate the target time for 5.2 miles at 8:00/mi, so I just decided to shoot for around 40:00 minutes, roughly 20:00 out and a negative split back. This would be a little faster than 8:00/mi, but what the heck.

I finished in 39:38 (7:37/mi), out in 20:18 (7:49/mi) and back in 19:20 (7:26/mi). I was pushing, especially on the way back, but I wasn't really working too hard and the legs felt great. I think I'm ready to start bumping the mileage back up next week and start getting back into a training rhythm.

Now I just have to figure out a training program. I had a great year this year, so I don't want to change too much, but I do want to raise the bar. I'd like to start by gradually pushing my average weekly mileage to around 60 miles (from 45-50). Paul Petersen suggested Cody do one tinman tempo and one aerobic fartlek every week, plus 6-8 strides 3x per week. This sounds good to me, once I get used to the increased mileage.

This year I've been running roughly 6 miles each weekday morning, solo M, W, F and with Larry and Wayne on T, Th. These were usually easy runs, with the solo runs sometimes including some tempo miles. I would run doubles on M, W by also running 5 miles at noon with the work guys (Tom, Nathan, others). These usually started out easy but often ended up as tempo runs. Saturday morning was typically a long run with Larry and Wayne, which sometimes also served as a team run for the "2 Slow 2 Win 2 Dumb 2 Quit" Wasatch Back Relay team.

If I continue this schedule, I can add the increased mileage by also running doubles on T, Th, F when work allows, or run longer on my morning runs by leaving a little earlier (which I did occasionally this year). I think that would be enough of a challenge for the winter months. Once spring arrives I can reevaluate. I also need to get with Tom and Nathan (all three of us want to go sub-3:00 next year) and plan our fast runs a little better.

Larry and I went out for 7 at 7 this morning. Larry's aussie shepherd Taz that normally runs with us got out last night so one of the goals of the run was to keep an eye out for him...no luck. We also ran by to take a look at a sprinkler job Larry's crew was doing at a church in Lindon. (Now he gets to deduct the cost of his running shoes as a business expense.) By the way, if anyone needs any sprinkler work done, I highly recommend Larry and his crew (Custom Sprinkler, Orem, UT).

I think we picked a good time to run. We both overdressed slightly because we didn't believe the temperature was really in the 60's. That's probably going to be the high for today. By the time we finished the wind had started to pick up and the temperatures had started to fall.

I probably could have handled a little longer run today, but I'm not too stressed about mileage right now. It's only been two weeks since I hammered my legs at St. George, and there's plenty of time to abuse my old body between now and the Painter's 1/2 in January.