Buttsweat Towel© season has begun

64F, 97%.  7:44 AP.  A little warm/humid, but I took it pretty easy anyway.  A nice shirtless run - probably won't have too many more of those.  Felt pretty decent; good enough to finish it off with a few strides.

So this finishes a 65 mile week.  I plan on just keeping the mileage there as opposed to going too crazy, and maybe that will be enough to snap me out of this slump in the next few weeks.

71F, 83%.  Forgot to look at AP, maybe 8:50's today, little slower than usual since I wasn't running long enough to get going.

Possible 5K this weekend....

68F, 98%.  7:54 AP.  Soupy morning slog.  Should have a couple more warm mornings, then it'll cool off for good.

It's almost time to retire my first pair of kinvaras (that I wore today).  At almost 700 miles, the upper is starting to pull away a lot, to where I can feel it while running.  Shame though, because the sole is still good.  Maybe I can tape it or something.  Maybe I'm being too cheap.

66F, 96%.  7:48 AP.  Early morning slog - took a long time to get going, as it usually does when I start at 4am, but the last 7 or 8 miles went smoothly.  Just the fact that I have finished a 14 and 15 miler with some energy to spare in the past few days means I've made some gains from where I was a couple weeks ago.  Whether or not I can run fast remains to be seen.  I'm about to sign up for a 5k, so maybe that will give some indication.  Probably not much, since I haven't sniffed 5k pace in quite some time.

67F, 85%, 8:26 AP.

39F, N 17 mph.  7:55 AP.  Yeah, I guess the cold front made it.  That wind had a nice little bite to it.  Just ran easy with some bouts at 5K pace.  Should still be nice and cool for the race tomorrow, which isn't until 10:30am.

40F, 6:11 AP.  Well, I thought maybe if I could at least break 19, I might be starting to return to normal, but....not so much.

5:51, 6:19, 6:23, :52 for 0.14 (6:00 pace).

First mile was net downhill, then slightly uphill for #2.  3 was level.  A few hills.  Once again, the pace felt right to start with, but then I died as usual.  It almost feels like I'm just out of shape.  Am I overtrained or undertrained?  This is confusing.

After this marathon (I've all but completely let go of any thoughts of sub-3), I think it's time for a break.  Maybe a few weeks off will help reset everything.  I'll just get nice and fat over Thanksgiving and take it easy.  Then I will figure out how to train for Boston.  I can't tell if maybe I just need to just start running a huge number of miles, or maybe just scale back and go to the track more.  I never did approach the mileage I ran this spring when I was at my fastest.  Anyway, something needs to change, I'm too young (in running years) to be on the decline already!