Buttsweat Towel© season has begun

3.0 in the nice flat neighborhood streets (25 min).  Felt good to run again, even with only 2 days off.  I'd call the ankle 95% now - I'll assume it can heal the rest of the way while I run through it (even though I know nothing about running and injuries).  It must be the most minor of sprains according to anonymous random internet websites.  Good enough for me.

Early morning run - cold and dark.  8:22 average pace felt good, definitely in the aerobic catagory.  Normally this is the run where I'd throw in some faster stuff but I'll keep it moderate this week for the ankle.  Iced it afterward (thanks Vinh) and it feels good.

Just as I was about to call the ankle fully healed, it pulls a fast one on me again.  Felt fine all day, then 30 seconds into my run tonight it starts hurting.  By 1 minute it's too painful to run on again, just like Saturday.  I really don't get it, it sems to be completely random.  I've been icing it when I can, even when it didn't hurt.  Most of what I read said it's ok to run on a sprain if you can do it without pain so I wouldn't think I've been reaggravating it (running Monday and Tuesday), but tonight would suggest otherwise.  My plan is to try again tomorrow.  If that fails I'll take a week off, then go to the doctor if it's still not good after a week.  Very confused....

AM - My wife slept in through her 5am fitness boot camp thing so I had a rare unplanned opportunity to run.  I got up and there was no pain in the ankle at all so I did what any over-eager newbie would do and put on my shoes for a run.  I felt it a little on the first couple of miles (pain was a 1 on a scale from 0-10) but then it went away completely.  Finished the 4.0 mile run with an 8:34 overall pace.  Iced the ankle and it still feels good.  So weird.  Maybe I'm stepping on it weird or there's some kind of problem with my form on the days when it hurts.

PM - Ok, another 4 miles.  Ankle started out about a 2-2.5 out of 10 then went to a 1 after a mile, and completely painless by three miles.  I made it an up-tempo run (8:00-8:05 pace for the first three miles).  Then I threw in a 3:20 half mile followed by a half-mile recovery. 7:54 overall pace for the entire 4.  The legs just wanted to go tonight so I let them.  Iced the ankle and it's doing fine.

4 more @ 8:10 pace.  Ankle remained predictable - slight dull ache for the first 2 miles only.  Hopefully good to go for my first 10-miler tomorrow.  I think I might have been babying it too much before.  Now I'm exercising it at work all day with ankle circles, etc.

Finally got in the big ten miler.  Laps were 8:05, 8:20, 8:25, 8:27, 8:24, 8:22, 8:19, 8:13, 8:19, 8:31.  8:20 average.  I wasn't shooting for a pace really, just whatever felt right.  By mile 8 I was starting to feel the burn and I could feel my form getting worse.  I'm starting to get the point of these long runs - mile 10 was sloppy and I just wanted to finish.  Hopefully I'll be able to keep it together for longer as I progress.

The left ankle, which was my problem ankle, felt fine after 2 miles again.  Now the right ankle, which I also rolled 2 weeks ago, started aching a little after mile 6 or so.  Sheez...  So I iced the right one first when I finished.  I definitely won't be entering anymore trail races again; I'm just too clutzy.

Weekly mileage cracked 30 for the first time (31.0).

5 recovery @ 8:48 pace.  Legs were kinda sluggish from the prior 3 days of abuse but did fine for a recovery jog.  No troubles from the right ankle, and the left had only the same mild discomfort for the first 2.  I also ran on a new pair of shoes - same brand of Asics that I had but without the tread worn down.  They worked out fine.

Normally I take Monday out but Danielle is going out of town and I'll have the kids to myself so I'll take Tuesday or Wednesday off.

My ankle is 99% now and the entire run was pain free so I decided I'd throw in a sprint mile.  I picked mile 4 because it climbs 50 ft uphill and I don't want to go around overestimating my speed (although, crap, I realize now there was a 10mph tailwind).  Anyway, I did the first 3 at an 8:27 pace, then broke into a nice 1-mile sprint.  The climb all comes in the first half-mile and I was right at a 6:40 pace at the top after 0.5.  Then I started working it down as the terrain flattened out to finish at a 6:28 for the mile.  So maybe a little faster than I expected, which was cool.  Last mile was an 8:51 cooldown for an 8:09 overall pace.

If I put 6:28 for a mile into some of the predictor calculators out there, it says my 10k and HM paces should be faster than I know I can hold for those distances, so there's further confirmation I'm not in shape yet.  For example, 7:55/mile for the half is hilariously beyond my ability, so I think I'm doing the right thing trying to add a few miles each week.

Rest day.  Danielle's mom had surgery for her cancer in Dallas and it went well so she should be out of the hospital tomorrow.  I may be able to sneak a run in at night if she gets back home in time.

Late night 4.0 @ 8:03 pace.

We got 4 inches of snow..?  Anyway, the streets are blanketed so I opted for the TM today since I was planning on some speed work.

1.5 mile warmup @ 6.7 mph

4 sets of 2 fast minues (9.0 mph) and 2 slow minutes (6.4 mph)

0.5 cool down @ 6.7 mph.

Early morning run, 8:50 pace felt like it should have been 30 seconds faster for the effort I gave - legs were stiff and would not go, which seems to always happen on the pre-sunrise runs.  Good thing it was supposed to be an easy day.

Looked it up...it all makes sense now (http://runningtimes.com/Article.aspx?ArticleID=7567&PageNum=1)  I'm still learning.

My most hated wind, the south wind, was whipping around today.  We live in a subdivision on the south end of a highway, so I always run north to a lake which starts about 4.5 miles to the north.  The south wind means I get thrashed by a headwind all the way home when I'm most tired.  I did good today though, it was a great run.  I almost went down some east-west dirt roads but they were a little too muddy from the melted snow so I pressed north to explore some more of the lake.  My splits were 8:22, 8:24, 8:28, 8:35, 8:17, 8:31, 8:26, 8:19, 8:16, 8:09, 7:40.  1:31:35 total, average 8:19.  I'm pretty proud of the last 4 into a 10-15 mph headwind.  Mile 6 had a closed-off road (hard to tell that from satellite imagery) that caused me to go trail running for about a minute, and I had to leap some cacti and duck under mesquite branches.  My right kneecap didn't appreciate the maneuvering as I'm starting to get a very mild case of runner's knee.  Not enough to bother me during a run though.

One thing I did different today was to pop 200mg of caffeine as I walked out the door.  It gave me a great burst of energy around an hour into the run (right as I was starting those last 4 miles).  I don't feel bad about it at all, I think it really helped!  Next week I'm gonna try taking a gu at some point.  At some point, I'm gonna have to figure out a way to hydrate during the run.

Weekly mileage - 34.0.

5 recovery @ 8:55 pace.  Day off tomorrow should help my knee - I'm starting to get that annoying pain behind the kneecap when going up stairs, squatting down, etc.  Hopefully it's not from bad running form and it goes away by Tuesday.

1 warmup, 3 tempo, 1 recovery - went like this: 8:20, 7:21, 7:18, 7:07, 8:11.  Average was a hair under 7:40.  Great run for me.  My 3-mile time of 21:46 today beat my 3-mile actual race time from November by over 40 seconds, and I didn't sprint it out or anything today.  Finally, crystal-clear proof of definite improvement!  Got the knee twinge after I slowed it down for mile 5 and it's still here now, so this might be something I just deal with until I'm ready to take a week off.  Still hoping it goes away on its own but I didn't feel it at all during the tempo portion so, whatever, I'm running on it for now.

4 painful early-morning miles @ 8:48 pace.  I can't run well at all right after popping out of bed.  24 degrees outside didn't help.  I was huffing and puffing like the pace was 8 minutes.  Too bad races are all in the morning.  I wonder if it would help (for a race) if I woke up like 3 hours beforehand to trick my body into thinking it was at least mid-morning.

Ahh, my first interval experience at the track.  I found out it's almost exactly 2 miles to the ACU track from my house so I did 2 warm up miles, then 3 at the track, then 2 easy back home.  The warmup miles were 8:20s.

The first track mile was 2 quick 400s with an easy one after each.  The fast ones were 1:36 and 1:32.  Some of the track team was there so I went a few lanes outside as they blew by me often.

The second mile I did 4 quick 200s with an easy 200 after each.  The fast ones were 38, 40, 45 and 44.  As you can see I was not doing well toward the end of those!  My easy jogs were getting close to walks.

The third mile I had planned to do 4 100s and jog the rest of the lap.  I only did 2 because my knee was starting to hurt.  It didn't like the speedy runs at all.  But I was also wiped out so I caught my breath for the last 2 laps around the track and jogged home.  I think the 100 times were about 18 seconds but I don't really know where the start and finish for those were supposed to be.  I don't know my way around the track at all; I was a swimmer back in high school.  In fact, I wasn't sure if I was supposed to use the inside lanes to get the right distances in turns.  Is is measured from the middle or inside?  I guessed inside.

I babied my knees on the way home 8:30s pace.  8:30 overall for the 7 miles.  Hope I didn't too much damage to my knee; it feels ok now, just not great.  Will hold off on the track workouts until they feel better, I think.

3 @ 8:20.  Long run tomorrow!

I got my first introduction to "The Wall" today.  For starters, there was a 15-20 mph south wind, gusting to 30.  So I knew they way back home would be brutal, but it turned out to be the least of my worries.  The problem was I didn't fuel up before I left at about 11.  I got up early, went to my daughter's soccer game, and all I had was a piece of toast....dumb!  Probably didn't hydrate well either.

So I took off at normal-feeling pace, but had a huge tailwind so the splits were a bit low.  Here's the first 6 miles: 8:11, 8:09, 8:23, 8:24, 8:27, 8:34.  Perfectly normal long-run splits for me considering the first 2 were hugely aided and the next 4 were slightly aided.

Now coming back: 8:50, 9:10, 9:11, 9:24, 13:13, 11:12.  So I was fighting the wind on the way back and at first attributed the slowness to that.  Nope.  Completely ran out of fuel.  My legs felt like they were made of lead.  The odd thing was that I was breathing easy, probably a decently low heart rate but zero use of my muscles.  Felt pretty dehydrated too.  At the 10.5 mark, I started walking and my legs were wobbly.  At this point I would have called my wife for a ride home...if I brought my cellphone (lesson learned).  Walked a half mile, then tried to run the final mile home.  I managed to "run" it all and could only do it in 11 minutes!  Wow, how am I ever gonna do a marathon, or even a half!?

Time to take it easy this next week and hopefully I learned my lesson about fueling/hydrating.  Very humbling day after last weekend's long run went so great.  Gave me more respect for the distance as well.  I will start slower no matter what next time.

Weekly mileage: 36.0

Calling off my run today, and probably tomorrow.  I think I did some additional damage to my knees yesterday (now they're both bad)!  So a recovery week this week, even if that means only running 2-3 times, then easier miles the next week when I start building again.  When I think about it, I had only been running 12-14 miles/week a couple months ago, now I'm trying to do 12 mile runs.  Gonna try that "listening to my body" thing and not force it so much.

No run again, knees are not doing good going up and down stairs.  Now the left knee is worse than the right.  Maybe an easy TM run tomorrow if it snows again as advertised.

We got another 4 inches of snow today/last night.  The fact that snow is almost normal now is scary.  Anyway, went with the treadmill since the knee could probably use the extra shock absorption.  Did 30 minutes at easy speeds with only minor discomfort that went away after a mile.  I think this scale-back week will be just what the doctor ordered.

Early morning run outside, 8:30 pace, 24 degrees F.  That was very cold for me, I think this is about my lower limit unless I get some good gloves and warmer underwear.  Boxers did not cut it today.  Anyway, this time the left knee did great and the right ached just a little more, probably because of running on the hard surfaces vs. the TM from yesterday.  Weird how it switches like that; at least it's even.  Still, they're feeling pretty good now.

Winds today were from the south at 26 mph gusting to 36.  And I thought I'd go ahead and run on my north-south highway...I may not do that again.

So the fist 3 miles (going north) I almost felt like I was walking, my effort was so low.  I could feel the wind picking me up and it felt like I was being carried down the road.  Averaged 8:22.

I knew it would be bad coming back, so I set 9:00/mile as a goal and managed to average 8:51 coming back.  Those were probably almost tempo pace effort, no kidding.  The gusts would actually knock me back on my heels a bit.  Judging by my breathing, I was definitly giving huge effort.  So much for taking it easy this week - I shoulda just kept the same effort and run 10-minute miles since my knee started complaining about the hard effort I gave coming home but I couldn't stand not meeting the arbitrary goal I set.  Anyway, the knees are doing ok now so no damage done I think.

6 early-morning miles (caffeine aided this time, so much more energy).  Averaged 8:09 with the last mile in 7:28.  Felt great, I think my knees have turned a corner and I'm on the downhill portion of recovery.

Tomorrow would be a beautiful day for a long run (perfect weather) but my wife is going to Fort Worth to run Cowtown so I'll be watching the kids.  Maybe I'll get in a short evening run to cap off my recovery week.

I wound up having time for 5 before dark so I decided to go at my half-marathon goal pace (8:00) to see how tough it would be.  Splits were 8:03, 7:57, 8:03, 7:50, 7:54 (7:57 avg).  I was definitely working harder than normal but I was pleasantly surprised that it wasn't too bad at all.  I could have kept going a few more for sure, though I'm pretty sure I could not have done 8 more like that.

Weekly mileage - 25.4

6 recovery @ 8:38.