Every Run is a Great Run!

AM: Ran 8 very slow solo miles. Playing it safe after WBR weekend. Very little sleep last night which was a bit unexpected after the exhausting weekend stuff. 

Legs actually feel the best they have ever felt following a WBR weekend. I suppose it helped that with all the stomach/ulcer issues I didn't run all that speedy.

Lower abdominal and groin pains are about the same as always. Going to see the doc tomorrow to see what he says. Even if he says I'm still good to run I've decided to bag the 3-hard-3-easy-workouts-a-week experiment (speed/tempo/long) and go back to the winter 2-hard-4-easy schedule.

I can't see that I've gained a thing by adding the extra speed day but rather have always felt partially injured or tired enough that I haven't felt rested the way I like to feel on hard days and my workouts for the most part have felt forced and unnatural. Recent races have all been off as well.

At this point I would just be happy to get back to where I was toward the end of winter. Don't know if sub-2:50 is in the cards this year with the lingering injury situation and apparent loss of fitness, but I hope at least sub-3 will be doable. If not I suppose there is always another year and I can continue to enjoy my Coach Tom duties and watching Kim's amazing improvement as she prepares for her very first marathon.

AM: Ran the Lakeview 6 mile route nice and easy with Kim. I have been in a bit of a funk the last couple of days so Kim surprised me after work yesterday and had planned a little one-night excursion to help snap me out of my bluesy state. Well I think she was successful as so far the day (and last evening) have been great.  Thanks Kim!

Ave pace 10:17.

I also went to Doc Takasaki today to check on the abdominal/groin pains. He confirmed that I do NOT have a hernia (hooray!) and that it's all muscular stuff that will just require the right balance of rest vs. training to fully heal. He said that continued training shouldn't make it any worse, so I should be fine to continue training for SGM, and he gave his blessing to my plan of going to just 2 hard running days instead of 3. Also said to just use common sense, adequate rest, ice, anti-inflamatories, etc. He gave me a prescription for some kind of once-a-day NSAID to try out that is typically easier on the stomach than ibuprofen or aspirin which sometimes give me ulcer problems.

PM: Just over 6 miles at work solo. Decided to run Kuhni Road since I did Lakeview this morning with Kim. Still keeping everything slow and easy. For whatever reason I felt more little post-WBR aches and pains today than I did yesterday.

Ave pace 8:56.

AM: Nice easy 6 mile run with Kim on a super-windy SF canyon "breeze" morning. Still in recovery, very easy only running mode. My legs and problem/pain/injury areas felt really good this morning, but I'm resisting the urge to do what I've done in the past which is to do a hard run just as soon as the body starts to feel good. I'm trying to maybe wait until I feel good for 3-4 days straight or an entire week before doing anything faster than very easy pace. I'll try and keep the pace in the 8-10 range until Saturday. If I've felt really good up until then I'll insert some sub-8 min pace miles on my 20-miler. Hopefully this will be the formula that gets me past the injury bug. Also I've decided no races until at least mid-July. Perhaps a 5K on July 12.

Ave pace 9:55.

PM: Ran 1.5 on the treadmill then 4.5 with Nate toward Lakeview in the HEAT. Good news is that I felt very good, didn't pay much attention to the garmin, and what I would have guessed was an 8:20 pace was closer to 7:55. So yes I cheated and went faster than the goal pace for the next few days of 8 min or slower. What can I say...Nate made me do it. Hope I don't pay for it tomorrow. At least I was only faster by 5 secs per mile.

Ave pace 7:55.

AM: Went over to Payson to give Kim her first taste of Payson canyon uphill/downhill running. As usual it was a little hard to get the legs to wake up in the early AM hours but after a couple of miles I was feeling pretty good. Kim must have also been feeling good because she kept speeding up every mile on the uphill. We ran 3.5 miles up then turned around where Kim starting doing 3 1-mile repeats back down with 2-minute jog rests in between. I've been wanting to do only very easy miles for a few days to try and resolve some lingering injury issues. So far so good although it was tough to stay in the easy pace range since Kim was cranking out some sub-7 min paces during stretches of the downhill mile repeats. Overall we did around 7:30 pace on the repeats. My legs are still feeling great so I'm thinking after another easy day tomorrow I will try to keep the majority of my 20-mile run on Saturday in the 7:30-8:00 range.

Besides seeing many deer and 1 fox (2 if I count Kim), there was also a sighting of fellow FRBer Marion (I could have included Marion in the fox count as well but wasn't sure if that was proper ettiquete!). She was running strong up the Canyon while we were coming down finishing up. Good job Marion!

Overall ave pace 9:22.

Late AM: Ran a couple slow miles on the treadmill (8:30 - 9:00) then did my core workout.

Morning easy run just over 9 miles. Started out with Kim and ran just over 2 with her then finished the rest of the miles solo. Legs feeling pretty good. Can still feel some discomfort in the lower abs but not much of any pain at all in the groin so I think we are making progress. Man it sure would be nice to be like Kim who never gets sore no matter what workout I put her through! Lucky!!! Oh to have virgin running legs again......sigh...

Ave pace: 8:56

Had a great 20 mile run with the SF group this morning. Kim and I and everyone ran together for a few miles before the various pace groups went their ways. After going up Harry's I got a bit of a runner's high and was able to have a few miles of easy, effortless, fun running in the 6:45-7:30 pace range. It's been quite a while since I've felt this good so I hope I didn't overdo it. No pains during the fast running but toward the end after slowing down and after finishing I am feeling the familiar pains in the lower abs and groin. I've been doing the R I C E treatment and an ice bath awaits.

Was wanting to keep the middle miles under 8-min pace if my body said it was OK. Ended up averaging 7:50 for the 15. Rest of the miles were mostly in the 8-9 range. Ran some of the faster miles solo and also some with a group consisting of Hal, Pat and Alison.