Buttsweat Towel© season has begun

76F.  I ran early; it looks like it got even a couple degrees cooler than that after I was done.  8:51 AP.  Maybe some 800s tomorrow if I feel fresh.  Otherwise, more slogging.

74F.  Definitely felt cooler out there.  I had no excuse not to do some 800s as this was one of the coolest mornings we've had in months.  So, 6 x 800 with 400m active recoveries.

First, I did 8.12 miles easy, 8:06 AP.  Then rolled right in to the 800s.

3:12, 3:02, 3:01, 2:58, 3:00, 2:53.  Average was 3:01 (6:04 pace).  Too bad about the first one messing up the average.  I don't look at my watch at all during intervals until each one is complete, so I porked the first one.  The recovery 400s ranged from 2:02-2:19.  Afterward, cooled down 2 miles and change to get home.  7:49/mile for the run as a whole.

Pretty successful morning, now I get a day off to soak up the workout after another 70-mile week.  1 more week until my marathon training plan begins...

76F, 73%, N 17-25 mph.  Finally a north wind - the cold front will arrive today!  Too late for this morning's run, but next week will be awesome.

7:35 AP today.  Mostly a progressive run - started out around 8:00 pace and worked my way down to GMP for the last 3.  I did the prison loop road today but turned short of the front gate this time so I didn't get followed by perimeter security.

62F, N 10 mph.  8:46 AP.  Obviously the cold front arrived, felt great.  It should stick around most of this week, too.  Too bad I need a couple easy days, but I'm thinking mile repeats on Wednesday!

AM - 53F.  7 miles @ 8:20 pace.  That was about as slow as I could go with those unbelieveable temps!

PM - 87F.  4 more, 8:33 pace.  Nice to finally be able to do a PM run outside.

59F.  Man I love cool weather.  The workout today was 5 x 1 mile at 10K pace, with a quarter mile recovery inbetween (worked out to 2-minute recoveries).  I wanted to test out 6:30 as a 10K pace because I wasn't really sure where I was at, fitness-wise.

First, 8 warmup miles, AP 8:00 on the nose.

Then the repeats were 6:31, 6:29, 6:28, 6:30, 5:51.

That last one isn't even a typo!  6:30 wasn't challenging me too much (did I just say that?) so I put the pedal down for the last repeat.  I was actually in the 5:40s most of the way but met up with my biggest hill with about a quarter mile to go and could not keep the pace uphill.

Finished with an 8:27 cooldown mile, for an overall AP of 7:29.

I think I will have a legit shot at sub-40 in a couple weeks if the weather is like this.

Danielle is out of town and I got the kids all day...fun, but unfortunately the little one does not have preschool on Thursday so I was stuck inside - 6 TM miles, 8:49 AP.

72F (67F start, 77F finish).  Didn't start until about 9am as I had to drop the kids off at their respective schools first; fortunately it wasn't too warm yet.  7:46 AP.

67F.  I broke out the Type A shoes today - haven't used them in awhile because they seemed to hurt my achilles awhile back.  I'm guessing they won't do it now since I've been running in the Kinvaras, which have an even lower heel.  We'll see, they feel fine now.

7:31 AP today, kinda quick for the GA run I had in mind, but I was feeling good after my day off.  Well, my legs were feeling good...I had to defend against a turd the whole run so it was miserable in that respect.  Kept it short for a Sunday run -- just 11 miles -- as I start the Pfitz schedule tomorrow and want to be somewhat fresh at the beginning.

69F.  8:38 AP.  First day of the Pfitz plan was an easy one.  Actually the first few weeks are easier than what I'm used to, but that won't last for too long.

76F.  7:23 AP.  Got a nice warm morning for my only workout of the week.  I did 5 warmup, then 4 tempo.  5 warmup @ 7:58 AP, then 4 tempo @ 6:40 AP (6:41, 6:37, 6:38, 6:44).  Harder than I wanted to work and slower than I wanted, but I wasn't feeling as peppy as last week when it was in the 50s and 60s.  So I guess that's ok.

79F.  8:04 AP.  It was a hot, early, tired, dark, knee starting to tighten up, legs don't want to go, need immodium the whole time kind of run.  Today I actually took the step of collecting leaves from a tree and had them in hand for a few miles (finally found a non-mesquite tree) but managed to ultimately fend it off.  Every quarter-mile or so I would pick out a spot in case I had to unload.  Rough morning.

67F, ENE 12-19 mph.  Small cold front coming in today - should make for a nice cool run tomorrow as well, but that's about it.  8:38 AP recovery today.

58F.  Mini cold front made it nice and cool, so I was moving pretty good; finished up with a couple at GMP.  7:28 AP overall.

70F, 89%.  8:33 avg.  Cold front is gone, but this is still better than summer...

70F, 92%, SSE 12 mph.  Pretty good run today.  I meant to keep it easy, but by mile 11 my pace had almost progressed to GMP, so I made the decision to finish up with the last 6 at goal pace (6:51, 6:52, 6:58, 6:46, 6:54, 6:47).  This definitely does not yet feel like marathon pace but it was probably too warm to really assess that yet (and I was running a little under GMP anyway).  Hopefully, when/if it cools off again it will feel more sustainable.

7:24/mile overall.

62F.  6 recovery miles, 8:40-ish on the pace (forgot to look).

My left knee has been ever-so-steadily getting worse over the past month.  It's on the medial side, below the knee - only thing I can find that makes sense is pes anserinus bursitis/tendonitis.  Anyway, I'm lucky enough that I can waltz into the flight doc's office and ask a doctor about it anytime, so I'm gonna go see him in a couple hours and maybe score some of my favorite nsaid.  Right now I don't think this will hold me back too much but it's starting to concern me so I'm probably going to back off a little this week.  I can definitely get through my runs without much pain but it's just not going in the right direction...

**total fail at the docs - apparently now that I am flying again, I can't take Rx nsaids.  Should've known since we can't even take cold medicine without seeing the flight docs.  That was my only reason in going; he listed some more common knee injuries that were certainly not what I have, but I kinda knew the internet would be a better source of specific injury info than the young doctors anyway.  Oh well, ibuprofen it is.

59F.  More relative rest, strengthening surrounding muscle groups, stretching, and lots of Vitamin I.  8:24 pace.  Still feeling like I will be a probably be a go for my 10K this weekend.

72F, SSE 12 mph.  8:22 pace.  My knee is definitely feeling better.  At this point though, might as well finish off Thursday and Friday with easy runs to be fresh for Saturday.  I'll kinda be tapered, but it makes me nervous to have run so slow all week and then have to go 2 min/mile faster for the race.  I did a stride at the end of the run today - felt fine.  Maybe a couple minutes @ 10K pace on Friday...

63F, N 19-29 mph.  7:56 AP.  Cold front arriving!  I don't think the coolest air will hang around for the race, but we'll probably see mid 60s for the start -- not ideal but not bad at all.

Knee is probably fine; I'm still doing 2400 mg/day of Vitamin I, but will probably start weaning myself off soon.  Not completely out of the woods with this one, but close...

** PM - I won't be able to run tomorrow morning so I decided to bite the bullet and will take a day off tomorrow.  However, in order to live with this decision I needed to get in a few miles after the kids went to bed, and while Danielle was watching.....Grey's Anatomy....  Threw in 2 x 1 minute at 10K pace since I hadn't really gotten the legs moving all week.  4.31 miles @ 7:57 AP for the PM run.

Played a round of golf this afternoon and shot 90 thanks to a lousy back 9 (42-48).  I had a birdie putt on the last hole for the sub-90 and just missed.  Wonder if that is a sign that I will run like a 40:01 tomorrow.  Actually I would be pretty happy with that anyway.

66F.  Warmish, but pretty good racing weather for this time of year.

I have been looking forward to this race for awhile -- haven't raced in 3 months and wanted to see some progress from all the summer slogging.  Some mile repeats I did a few weeks back told me I'd be really close to breaking 40, but it was cooler when I did those so I had some doubts today.

The course was good in that it was as flat as you can get, and it was USATF Certified.  The bad news was that there were 31 90-degree turns and 4 turns that were closer to 180 degrees; a lot of course crammed into kind of a small space.

So the race started and it's me and red singlet running by ourselves for first.  Like Flatlander has said, we're not terribly fast in Texas.  Anyway, I stayed right behind him for about 4 miles.  He started to gap me in the 5th mile and I pathetically tried to stay close but it was not to be.  I could tell by the way he was thanking the course volunteers all along the way that he had some wind left that I did not.  So he ended up maybe 15-20 seconds ahead.

I should have turned off auto lap on Garmin because they had mile markers and I knew it would measure the course short with all the turns.  But, here are the garmin splits:

6:19, 6:25, 6:31, 6:33, 6:33, 6:27, 0:55.

Measured it at 6.15 miles, but like I said, USATF certified...I can definitely understand a 1% Garmin error with the maze of a course we ran through.

So, I think I'm right on track with the BQ goal.  I still have some improving to do to get there, but not an overwhelming amount.  With a good cycle, I think I'll be where I need to be come January.

official results

finish line pictures...not only did we have to follow the golf cart guy for 40 minutes, he also got in the way of the shot!

Afterwards came the Kids' K

76F, SW 13-22 mph.  Believe it or not, it actually got up around 100 degrees yesterday afternoon.  So, a warm morning today but no problem because I was not in a hurry.  Pfitz wanted 8 @ MP today but I don't think he knew I had a 10k yesterday, so I let the legs dictate the pace and meandered around the industrial parks and ghettos of South Cental Abilene.  Beautiful place, this town.  8:06 avg.

65F, ESE 10 mph.  8:36 pace.

67F.  Instead of the 10 w/ 5 LT that was on the schedule I just did 10 GA miles today.  Didn't see the point of doing a tempo just 3 days after a race.  Plus I have 8 @ MP on Sunday, and a knee thing that hasn't quite decided to disappear.

I did manage to get tangled up in a tumbleweed today in the dark, so that was something new.  7:42 AP overall.

63F.  MLR today and an early, early start.  Dark the whole time with no moonlight either -- which I mention as my excuse for biting the dust once on the dirt roads.  No damage done except to my pride.  7:49 AP.

70F.  8:54 AP.  One of the kids has plagued us all with a cold they brought home from school.

65F, N 12 mph.  Felt crappy today.  7:55/mile avg, although I'm surprised it was that fast.  I guess I'm not doing my immune system any favors by running a lot but it's just a cold - it'll go away eventually.