Weekly Training Blog January 5 to 11, 2015

Monday

AM Dale road 4 with Uta, the dog, it was icy. 29:48 tot. 4

PM Road 9, 61:01, first 4 with Uta, 28:27, very cold wind chill was 2. 4 strides when I finished tot. 9.5

XT Whartons, YTI

Tuesday

PM 2 warm up on roads in lowell before Ruben talked me into doing the workout on the treadmill. short car ride and then 2 miles warm up on treadmill at Ruben's gym. Then 4 miles at 5:12 per mile, 1/2 mile at 3:00, 3 miles at 5:10 per mile, half mile at 3:00, 1 mile in 5:07 then jumped off for an emergency bathroom break, was back on the 'mill before ruben finished the 2nd mile of that stretch so I did .2 at 3:00 pace to get back in the swing and then a half mile at 5:07 pace, half mile at 3:00, 2 miles at 5:04 pace, 1/2 mile at 3:00, 1 mile at 5:02.  No cool down.  all at 1% incline.  It was disappointing to have to jump in the bathroom and break the rhythm up.  Ruben was able to do the whole session and cover 15 miles in 1:18 with no breaks.  I had a 9 mile and 5 mile that both averaged under 5:20.  Thing is it is hard to be disappointed as in the fall I lost coordination on a 6 mile tempo on the 'mill so this is a huge step forward.  Also it is great to be doing these kind of paces this far out from a potential goal marathon.  Obviously this is perfectly flat so it is really only comparable to running a berlin or rotterdam type course but still it is very good work.  tot. 18

XT whartons 

Wednesday

PM road 9.2, 64:44, first 4.2 with Uta and Melissa, 30:28, rest solo, cold, I was very tired tot. 9.2

XT Whartons, YTI

Thursday

AM Dale road 5 solo, -5 degrees windchill -25 degrees too cold for Uta, 36:46 tot. 5

PM with Ruben, 15 degrees, 5 degree windchill, 2 mile warm up, 15mins light exercises, 10 mile moderate progression run over my regular 10 mile loop, pretty hilly, 55:33 with the last mile in 5:01, Ruben was 4:59 for the last mile and a couple ticks up at the finish as well. tot. 12+

XT whartons, YTI

Friday

PM Road 9, 62:15, first 5 with Uta in 35:50.  It was cold so Uta wasn't happy to be out there and was going pretty slow, except the sidewalks were snow covered which she LOVED, so on the slippery sidewalks we hammered and on the nice clean roads we shuffled.  The dog is lucky she is so lovable or I would have killed her… rest solo, no strides was in need of a bathroom and with the cold I locked up pretty good during that time… tot. 9

XT whartons, YTI

Saturday

AM supposed to do a Dos Santos, but I screwed it up.  It turned into something between a good fundamental tempo to a good specific tempo.  Tough to judge. Very happy with it but it wasn't the session I intended to get.  My plan was 13 miles at 80% goal mp about 6:07 to 6:10 pace.  I ended up using a very hilly loop which I generally regard as 20secs per mile slower than the track.  So I should have targeted 6:20 to 6:30 per mile for this, then from 13 to 16 I was supposed to run mp, now I was going to target 5:20 on this stretch as I have tried to run mp on it before and well that is about as fast as I can go, again very hilly.  Finally I would then do 6x400 on the road in front of our townhouse.  It is uphill one way just a bit and downhill a bit the other.  Anyway I was in a stubborn mood and decided to target 6:00 to 6:10 for the first 13 despite the hills.  This alone was probably ok but it was very cold and I dressed very heavily, over 6 pounds of clothes not including my shoes.  Then I ended up going faster than planed.  My slowest mile was 5:56 and I covered the 13 miles in 1:15:58.  I could tell I was pushing pretty good on the climbs but I was having delusions of grandeur and just kept rocking it out.  It is easy enough to do this as it isn't like a killer effort it is just that I was supposed to be running a much easier one.  At 13 I shifted gears to get after marathon pace.  I had to start on a big uphill and I knew I was in trouble when I was at the top of the hill and I saw my pace according to my garmin was 6:14.  I didn't expect to see 5:10 on the climb but I did expect sub 6:00.  It was more than a 500m climb so I now was way off pace and didn't have a ton of ground to make it up.  I ended up running 5:40 for that mile and about the same for the next two, 17:02 for the 3 miles. It was a hard effort but it wasn't nearly as fast as I had hoped for. so 1:33:00 for 16 miles a 5:48 average.  Then a 100 jog and a hard 400, this first one is the uphill way but as I started it I realized it was into the fairly strong wind that had been beating me up for long stretches on the road already.  I ran 78.  I decided I was done and I would do 1 more 400 back and call it.  I did my 100 jog and took off for the last 400.  I somehow missed the lap button which is too bad.  I was working hard so I stopped the watch at the finish and stopped.  I wasn't able to do the math in my head, again very tired. If I had I would have realized after a 46 second jog I had run 70 for this 400.  Had I hit the watch properly and seen that split I would have kept going.  Instead I packed it in.

  Now if you say that conditions mean nothing and that running on the hills with the extra clothes in the cold and wind should result in the same pace as on the flat in good weather and shorts and a t-shirt I respectfully disagree but even so at this point in my training cycle I would be quite happy with a 5:48 per mile average for 16 miles.  Thing is I feel the hills, wind, clothes, conditions do have an impact and that the effort I put out was far better than a 5:48 a mile effort and that makes me very happy and excited moving forward. tot. 17

XT whartons, YTI, ankle drills

Sunday

Noon (slept late and dog training in the morning, you would not believe the stuff Melissa and this dog trainer have taught Uta to do!) road 7.5 solo in 46:47, tried out a different pair of gloves and they were not as warm as I expect and my hands were very cold for this run.  As such that is pretty much all I thought about for the whole thing. tot. 7.5

PM 45mins on curve treadmill, covered 6.8 miles, then did four 15 second strides with minute breaks upped it to 7.5 miles in 50mins.  tot. 7.5

XT whartons, YTI, Pull ups on assisted machine

Summary

100 miles for the week. 3 great endurance workouts.  Did not get in strides everyday.  Fighting the weather and my stomach on that one. I'm really feeling very fit and I'm responding in a huge way to the long hard efforts.  After my first fundamental tempo of 20k at 5:50 pace a month or so ago I was wrecked for days and now I did three sessions that were vastly better than that one and I recovered quickly and nicely from each one.  I'm feeling very excited and quite confidant that I'm going to be making my comeback to the marathon.  So much so that I'm setting about picking and trying to get into a race.  Hopefully I'll have some info on that next week.  I hope you have had a great week!