Every Run is a Great Run!

Uneventful solo run around 7 peaks loop (short version) just before noon. Kim and I decided to yield once again to Mother Nature this morning as it was 20 degrees but with the worse-than-usual SF canyon 'breeze' the wind chill must have been near 0. Our WOW powers are faltering a bit as of late, but since this is a reduced-mileage/taper week for both of us it's not a big deal. Besides it's just not right for it to be this cold and nasty in April.

Ave pace 8:03

Finally this week for the first time we had nice, more April-appropriate weather conditions for a morning run. Mid-30's, no wind, sliver of a moon, pretty nice I thought. And having Kim for company for most of the run was even nicer. Mostly uneventful except for a couple of cat encounters that Kim mentioned on her blog. After a 2 mile warmup I did a couple miles at 1/2 marathon pace. Garmin said 6:24 & 6:17 for splits but I think it glitched on the 2nd mile which was probably closer to 6:25. Felt good, invigorating. Wore the Adidas flats that I'll use on Saturday. Looking forward to a good nap during the lunch hour today.

***PM Update*** - Well I got my nearly hour long nap at lunch so that was good, but even BETTER, I got a confirmation from the St. George Marathon folks that  YES they did remember that they burned me last year in my attempt to volunteer as a blind runner guide, and YES they were marking me down for guaranteed entry into this years marathon. Hooray! Now the next step is to get Kim in for her 1st ever marathon experience. I tried to kindly hint to the SGM folks how cool it would be for Kim to get in but they didn't offer me any promises or guarantees. Guess we may have to wait until May to find that one out.

AM relaxed 3-mile run with Kim. Another pretty nice morning with very little wind. Did a few striders during the last mile to wake the legs up a bit. Actually my legs are feeling really good today. They feel pretty juiced right now and are asking why we did a nice 3 mile warmup and then stopped?! Ready for 10 more! Hopefully we can save all that pent up energy for Saturday. I haven't yet gotten my pre-race/taper anxieties and antziness yet but by the end of the day and tomorrow that might be another story. Apologies in advance Kim if I start acting doofy later :)

Day off from work today so we slept in a bit. Did a couple of miles solo in the sun which was probably good since it doesn't look like much sun will be shining tomorrow at the race. Kim would have joined me but was supporting Stacie with the wogging routine. 

Well I can say I had a great time socializing with all the blogger's that ran today! The race on the other hand.......UGGHH! Let's just say the go "out like a lion" aggressive strategy worked for about 1/2 of the race, and then the rolling hills and in particular the NASTY HEADWIND took their toll and I ended up doing the crash-and-burn pretty bad.

I was pleased at least to see that the bloggers who also did the race last year were quite a bit slower as well as those who did Painters this year. At least it makes me feel better about blaming the wind. However I must say the women bloggers seemed to have great PR efforts despite the conditions. Kim had an amazing blowout PR performance, shaving 7 minutes or so off her Painters effort finishing in 1:58:35. Josse also did very well, improving on her Painter's effort by a few minutes finishing in 1:32 something. Does this mean the women handle the wind better than men? Or perhaps more likely just reaping the rewards of stellar training over the previous couple of months. Good job!

Ended up officially with a time of 1:25:43 (garmin says 1:25:36, don't know what's up with the extra 7 seconds). Third place in my age division and 4th overall master's, although with the 2 guys ahead of me in AD I ended getting awarded 1st in AD. I'm a bit angry at myself for letting a few guys pass me over the last few miles that I had passed earlier. In particular Bill Cobler who is in my AD and who ended up just beating me by 30 seconds or so to bump me out of top 3 overall masters. Have to see if I can return the favor next time :)

Even though fellow FRB runner Andy B also passed me after I died, I was pleased to see him have what I think was great race and great time. Andy ran a lot smarter than me, next time I hope to be wise like him and pace myself a little more intelligently. He didn't have a watch so had to run completely by feel so maybe there is a lesson to be learned there.

Except for the wind the weather was actually pretty nice, especially the first 6.5 miles. Very little wind at first, temps around 40, almost perfect. But then the ugly wind had to come and be the spoiler.

So here we go with mile splits and commentary....

1 - 6:00 Feeling good, but probably too fast as this first mile although net downhill actually had a bunch of uphill maybe .5 miles worth. Ran with Andy most of this mile.

2 - 6:13 All is well for the next few miles, I pass a bunch of guys.

3 - 6:12

4 - 6:15

5 - 6:13 Miles 5 and 6 are supposedly downhill but they sure seem pretty flat to me.

6 - 6:12

7 - 6:21 OK this is where we turn right, downhill is pretty much done and now we have hills and the STINKY HEADWIND! Wheels are beginning to wobble.

8 - 6:29 Not feeling to good, trying to hold 6:30 or better. I take a GU.

9 - 6:52 Wheels start falling off now, guys I passed earlier are passing me back :(

10 - 6:59 Not a happy camper, also I'm not very near anyone so feeling a bit lonely. Lacking in motivation.

11 - 7:11 Over 7 stinks bad, want to just be done.

12 - 7:11 About the same as 11

13 - 7:00 Notice I'm not breathing that hard but I can't coax my legs to go sub-7 :((

.1 (.07 on garmin) :23 (5:58 pace) Was I really able to go down to sub-6? If so means I wimped out on earlier miles. Still need to work on mental toughness down the stretch.

So I was first quite disappointed but after seeing what experiences other runners had (except for the women) and seeing that the Sasha race predictor still says this gives me 2:52 at SGM I'm upgrading this race to OK.

It was great to meet and socialize with the bloggers. Kim and I, Silvie and Brent, and Mik'L and Clyde were all staying at the Red Moose Lodge and we were able to hook up Friday night for some dinner and chat. We also rode up to the race start line and back to check out the course for those who hadn't run it before. All the blogger folk seem like really great people in addition to being amazing runners. Clay and Cindie were also staying at the lodge but didn't get in until late so unfortunately we weren't able to talk too much with them other than a little before and after the race.

The FRB elite racers rocked and showed up all over the leader board as usual. Good job guys!

No firm schedule for this week or next week. Hoping for mileage in the 50-65 range. Plan is to do mostly all easy running (7:15 pace or slower, mostly slower than 8 min probably). Perhaps a few striders and a fast mile here or there toward the end of this week and next week if it feels good. We will be going to So Cal this weekend for a week of vacation. 

In 2 weeks we'll start up on the marathon-oriented training regiment. I'll be doing my harder runs on Mon-Wed-Fri so on Tue-Thu-Sat I can be Kim's slave-driver coach husband.:) Should be fun getting Kim on track for Sub-4 SG marathon.

AM: Went around 4.5 miles with Kim then another mile and a half solo. Fairly peaceful, mild overcast morning. Lucky for us the rain held off. Legs still fairly weary from Saturday race but feeling only 'good' aches not the bad injury-signaling kind of pains. Had a good time at Sasha's house last night, loads of informative running chat and food for thought (also some food for eating, thanks Sarah!).  Ave pace around 10.

PM: Got 6 more miles at work. I felt surprisingly good on the run today, averaged 7:55 but it felt more like what I'm used to 8:15-8:30 feeling. Perhaps it was because the sun decided to come out for most of the run.

AM: Got in 7 (6 with Kim) on a pretty cold, windy morning. I usually wake up before the alarm goes off but today that wasn't the case and I notice it seems like mornings when the alarm rouses me it takes me a while to fully wake. Today was like that as it seemed like I was sleep running the 1st couple of miles. But after that I felt pretty good and we had a nice run despite the cold and wind. Ave pace 9:40.

PM: 5 more at work. Ave pace 8:20. Did some circuit/weight stuff afterward.

AM: Mostly solo run on this rainy morning. Kim came down with a cold/flu so she wisely stayed in bed this morning. Part way into the run I ran into the Scenic Dr group and ran about 2 miles with them. Had a light rain for 2-3 miles of the run then it stopped. Since it was a "light" rain and there was no wind it wasn't so bad to run in. Ave pace 8:45.

Kim and I have decided to do the Run 4 Kids race Saturday in St. George since we'll be staying there Friday night on our way to So Cal. Kim's doing the 5K and I'm doing the 10K. Should be fun and we look forward to seeing some of the Dixie bloggers there. I don't plan on killing myself at this race since we just raced Saturday and this week is pretty much a full mileage week, I'll treat it like a glorified tempo run.

PM: Ran hill route at work. The weather wasn't my favorite I'm looking forward to the sunny days that are supposed to be on the way soon. Did a 4-5 striders in the middle. Ave pace 8:31

Sun good. Wind bad. Was hoping for a little nicer weather for my noon run today but the wind was the spoiler yet again. But the good thing was my legs felt pretty fresh so I went a little further than I had originally planned. Ran the 7 peaks hill loop route. Ave pace 8:20.

Hey where is that warm, sunny weather we're supposed to be getting? Went out for an easy 5 mile morning run in the cold and ending in the snow. Solo today as Kim is still recovering from her nasty cold and made the wise choice to not go out in the chilly, snowy AM conditions. Kind of a boring, lonely, uneventful run. Felt like going really slow so I did. Ave pace 9:09.

On the bright side we're headed to warm and sunny Dixie and So. Cal. for the week! Might today have been the last snowy run day of the season? We can only hope.

38:40 Dang! I can't believe I missed beating my PR by 2 measly seconds!!! I wish I would have been paying more attention to my overall time with a mile or so to go so I could have had the extra motivation to shave another few seconds to get the PR. As it was I was so dead running the stinking hills the last 2 miles of this race I don't know if it would have helped to realize how close I was to the PR. At any rate with this being a tough course with all the hills, even with the lower elevation I think I may have given a PR effort. I would have liked to have been more mentally tough on the worst uphill mile 5, but I felt like I at least stayed focused and didn't give up like I did last week. Also I was still feeling the effects of last weeks race so I'm mostly pleased with the effort.

Miles splits:

1 - 6:00 Net downhill but with more uphill than I was expecting. Playing cat and mouse with another obviously master age runner with no shirt. Also WildBull is not far behind. Clyde, Steve and Holt are up ahead of me as expected.

2 - 5:55 Mostly downhill, I pull ahead of the no-shirt dude

3 - 6:03 Mostly down but with some unexpected uphill. Getting a pretty good lead over shirtless master dude.

4 - 6:14 Mix if down and uphill, probably net flat, starting to get really pooped and nobody around for motivation.

5 - 7:02 Ugh I hate when I can't run under 7 pace. Worst mile of the race, all uphill, getting really tired, shirtless guy is closing the gap on me. I lose focus on this mile a bit.

6 - 6:26 Mostly uphill but finishing downhill. I regain my focus after getting to the top of the last hill and increase the gap on me and shirtless guy.

.2 (.17 on Garmin, 5:35 pace). I finally notice I'm really close to a PR (I had thought there was no chance earlier) so I get some motivation to speed up but I'm too little too late.

I notice in my last few races I seem to still have enough kick at the end to speed up to around 5:30 pace. I need to find a way to find more mental toughness and start the kick earlier in the race.

Kim had super blowout PR in the 5K finishing in 25:44 and 2nd in AD. This was all the more impressive given she has been sick all week. I certainly expect sub-25 within the next month or so. Check out her blog for more details.

It was nice to meet and chat with the Dixie bloggers: Dustin, Clyde, Steve, Bill. Everyone ran well I thought, as expected Clyde won the 10K and Steve was not far behind him. Bill was not too far behind me. Dustin has been nursing an injury so wasn't racing today.

Now off to SoCal for R&R!!!

Quick report today. Not much time to blog. Did Disneyland out-and-back route 4 miles solo then 4 miles with Kim. Ankle/shins still sore from 10K race. I probably shouldn't have run in my super-light flats with not having done much hill training lately. I'll just run easy and make this a recovery week and see if I can get over some lingering aches and pains.

AM run in Anaheim, about half solo and half with Kim. All miles in the 8:00-9:30 range. Legs felt a little better than yesterday. Went to Knotts Berry Farm today. Nice to not have to wait in lines much for any rides but seemed pretty grungy after Disneyland where you can about eat off the sidewalks, all your dreams come true, happiest place on earth, etc..... 

AM: Did the Disneyland loop with Kim extended to 6 miles then 4 more solo. Ended up being kind of an urban fartlek workout as we did impromptu intervals in between traffic lights. Temps probably around 55-60 degrees (just mentioned that for all the Utah folks who said it was 25 degrees this morning). All miles in the 7:30-9:00 pace. I was impressed with Kim's ability to hold the sub-9 pace with ease and fully conversational. Lots of oxygen down here close to sea level.

PM: Kim and I tried the barefoot thing and did a mile barefoot on the beach. Lybi is right, running barefoot makes you kind of feel like a kid. Kind of fun every now and again.

Our final Disneyland run before heading home to the hopefully not too much cooler weather of Utah. Went 5 solo then 5 more with Kim. All miles in the 8 to 9:30 range. Did a few striders at the end of the solo miles.

We had a nice vacation but it's always good to be back home. Legs feeling pretty dead and achy this week. I think between the back-to-back races, travel, zillion miles of walking around Disneyland, etc., I just need to keep the running mostly easy for perhaps the rest of the month.  I don't have any real important races for a while so time to focus on building base and getting the legs feeling fresh as we look toward WBR and SGM.

Got in about 10 1/2 with Kim and then a few more miles solo and a couple with Pat, Hal, Kevin and Chad. Nice to be back and running around the roads of SF. The urban-Disneyland-traffic-light-fartlek runs were OK for a few days but I'll take the rural roads of Utah any day, even with our pesky SF canyon winds. I was very pleased that my legs weren't feeling quite as dead today as the last couple of days. Hopefully after a day of rest they'll be a little happier come Monday. Miles mostly in the 8-10 range.

The next couple of weeks will be recovery, base building weeks as Kim and I both take some time to recover from recent races and gear up for more marathon-oriented training. Looking at 60-70 miles this week. 

We'll be basing workouts over the coming weeks based on various pace zones, which include the following: 1 mile pace (1MP), 3K pace (3KP), 5K pace (5KP), 10K pace (10KP), half marathon pace (HMP), Marathon pace (MP), Base pace (BP), and Recovery Pace (RP).

Near as we can tell from recent races, the paces for Kim and I  for each of these zones is something like the following:

Kim: 1MP = 7:25-7:35, 3KP = 7:45-8:00, 5KP = 8:00-8:15, 10KP = 8:20-8:30, HMP = 8:45-9:00, MP = 9:00-9:15, BP = 9:40-10:40, RP = 10:40-12:00

Tom: 1MP = 5:15-5:25, 3KP = 5:35-5:45, 5KP = 5:50-6:00, 10KP = 6:00-6:15, HMP = 6:20-6:40, MP = 6:40-6:55, BP = 7:10-8:00, RP = 8:00-9:10.

Tentative plan for this week:

Mon: AM 5-6 with Kim @ RP, PM 6 @ BP

Tue: AM 5-6 with Kim @ RP, PM 5-6 @ BP w/ 2x30s hill "sprints" in the middle

Wed: AM 5-6 with Kim @ RP, PM 6 @ BP

Thu: AM 5-6 with Kim @ RP, 5-6 solo @ BP w/ 2x30s striders in the middle

Fri: AM 5-6 with Kim @ RP, PM 6 @ BP

Sat: AM 7 miles @ BP, 5-10 miles @ RP

AM: Six mile run with Kim. A little cool this morning but not too bad with the wind being on the gentle side. Ave pace 9:46.

PM: Ran the LakeView extended route 6.1 miles. Sure glad my legs are feeling better than the last couple of weeks. Ave pace 7:37.

AM: So today is our first day of hill repeats (6.5 miles). We started out gentle and only did 2 of them this time, 30 seconds each at "relaxed sprint pace" with about 1 1/2 to 2 min rest in between. So far so good. The wind was nasty today so we decided to start out running away from the wind down past Storehouse and up river bottoms before hitting heartbreak hill for the repeats.

PM: Ran at work toward Eagleview (4.6 miles) so I could do my version of the hill repeats. Had a hard time getting out of 1st gear it wasn't much of a "relaxed sprint pace".  But on the other hand it was a nice warm day and every run is great. Ave pace 8:33.

AM: Ran 6.1 miles with Kim. Temps were fairly mild in the mid-40s but the canyon winds were brutal this morning! For whatever reason - masochistic tendencies or whatever - we felt obligated to run the route that takes us directly head on into the worst of the wind during the middle of the run. But we were then rewarded for our efforts with the wind at our backs for most of the last 3 miles of the run. Ave pace: 9:50.

PM: Ran the Lakeview 10K loop with Paul. Even though we had a nasty headwind for the first 5K it was still a great run with great company and great conversion. Wasn't paying much attention to the garmin but I think we ended up with ave pace of 7:57.

Also did core resistance workout in the evening.

Today is "Take our Daughters to work day" today and so Tani is coming in with me to see what exciting lives software engineers lead. So with that going on I needed to get the entire run in this morning. Got up a bit earlier than usual so I could get 6 miles solo with a couple of 30s striders before meeting up with Kim to do a similar workout with her. Lovely weather for a run today, what the Bostonians might call a "NorEaster" type storm: windy, rainy, hail pellets for a while but by the time Kim and I finished it actually had calmed down quite a bit and we finished happy despite being soaked and having stepped in numerous puddles along the way. Oh well just another running adventure to tell the kids and grandkids (and fellow bloggers) about.

Ave pace for the solo 6 miles: 7:50. Not sure on average for final 5 miles. Somewhere around 9:30-9:40.

Ave pace 7:45

What a beautiful morning for a run. Perhaps a little bit nippy at the start but great once the sun came up. Also no wind today which is always a bonus here in SF. Ran the Leland/Ballpark loop with Kim and got just over 10 miles at ave pace 9:47. Kim is getting to where these 9:30-10:00 pace miles are almost too easy for her. Perhaps we'll start doing more runs in the 9:00-9:30 range. 

Added on 7 miles solo afterward. Ave pace 7:46. 

This week's workout plan will be similar to last weeks so I mostly just cut-and-paste the stuff below. The main differences include adding to the number of hill repeats and striders on Tuesday and Thursday. Also I'll be pacing Kim on Saturday as we run a 5K at our daughter's Elementary school. This is a very flat, potentially fast PR type course if the wind isn't blowing. So I think Kim will be going for a PR and possibly a sub-25 min race.

Shooting for 65-75 miles this week.

Current pace zones:

Kim: 1MP = 7:25-7:35, 3KP = 7:45-8:00, 5KP = 8:00-8:15, 10KP = 8:20-8:30, HMP = 8:45-9:00, MP = 9:00-9:15, BP = 9:30-10:40, RP = 10:40-12:00

Tom: 1MP = 5:15-5:25, 3KP = 5:35-5:45, 5KP = 5:50-6:00, 10KP = 6:00-6:15, HMP = 6:20-6:40, MP = 6:40-6:55, BP = 7:10-8:00, RP = 8:00-9:10.

Tentative plan for this week:

Mon: AM 5-6 with Kim @ RP, PM 6 @ BP. Dork drills: High Knees 2x20s, Bounding 2x20s

Tue: AM 5-6 with Kim @ RP, PM 4-6 @ RP w/ 6x30s hill "relaxed sprints" in the middle (4 for Kim). 2 min active recovery in between hill repeats.

Wed: AM 5-6 with Kim @ RP, PM 6 @ BP. Core workout in the evening.

Thu: AM 5-6 with Kim @ RP, PM 6 @ BP w/ 6x30s striders "sprinkled" in the middle (4 for Kim) @ 1MP

Fri: AM 5-6 with Kim @ RP, PM 6 @ BP. Core workout when convenient.

Sat: AM 8 miles @ BP, 5-10 miles @ RP including pacing Kim during IceBreaker 5K.

Of course this is all subject to change if the body/legs/nervous-system says we should be doing something different on any given day.

AM: 6.1 miles with Kim. We did the river bottoms loop to avoid the brunt of canyon winds which were pretty fierce when we first started out but by the time we finished the winds had died down. All-in-all a nice start to the week. Also did some dork drills: high knees and bounding, 2 sets of 20 secs each. Ave pace 9:35.

PM: Ran 1.5 miles on the treadmill around 7:30 pace. Then met up with Paul and Nate for 4.5 more miles on a shortened Eagleview route. Paul is nursing an injury and turned around just after a mile. Nate was running pretty well after just running Boston a week ago. May have been the hottest run of the year so far with temps around 70 and feeling pretty toasty. I felt OK but not great.

Ave pace 7:33. Felt harder than it should have. Guess I can blame it on the heat.

Did core workout in the evening.

AM: Ran 6 miles with Kim including some hill fartlek. Today was probably our warmest morning of the year so far, but of course we had canyon winds to spice things up so we did the river bottoms loop again. Kept the pace nice and relaxed but in the middle I worked with Kim getting in what was supposed to be 4 hill repeats of 30 seconds each with 2 minute rests in between. Except that "Coach Tom" messed up on the second repeat and made her do it for 1 minute instead of 30 seconds. So we decided just to do one more 30s repeat after that.

Late AM: Went out earlier than usual so I could enjoy the nice comfy temps. Did 2 mile warmup then did similar hill workout as I did this morning with Kim except that I did 6 repeats instead of 4. Felt better than last week for most of the repeats but I was feeling a twinge in my left hamstring toward the end that I need to watch closely.  Ave pace 8:55.

Noon run today. With running 12+ miles the last 2 days on the 2-a-day schedule and with the hill repeats yesterday I needed a bit of a break, so Kim and I skipped the planned early run and did our stuff separately later in the day.

Got to the gym a tad early so did 1 mile on the treadmill slow waiting to see if any of the other guys would show up. But alas nobody came so I went out solo and did the Lakeview 10K route backwards. I was pleased that the weird hamstring twinge I felt yesterday was gone. I'm still waiting for the lower ab and groin pains to go away but they are slowly getting better.  Ave pace 7:55.

Core workout in the evening.