Long May You Run

5.65 am miles 51:11   9:04 pace.

13.1 pm miles 2:03:14   9:24 pace.  Lots of hills, up B Street, back and forth along 11th ave, back and forth behind the Capitol, then home.  Didn't run fast, but felt strong. 

5.65 am miles 52:18 9:15 pace

11.9 miles 1:49:14  9:11 ave 7.25 miles on the track.  100 mile weeks are tough.  I'm holding up well, I front loaded a few miles this week so I only have to run about 11 miles tomorrow and a little under 6 on Friday.  I want to be kind of fresh for Saturdays 20 miler. 

5.65 am miles  53:37  9:29 pace

5.9 pm miles  55:15  9:22 pace, so happy for a short run this afternoon, bee looking forward to it all week.  I don't have speed but I still feel power in my legs.  Something good must be happening in this "slog" training.

5.65 am miles, no watch.  Only 20 away from 100!  Plan on spanking out that 20 miler tomorrow morning.

21.08 miles out and back from home including Legacy path.  Tailwind out, very strong headwind back.  I have completed my first 100 mile week.  I liked how I felt today, still felt strong the last few miles.  I'm pretty sure this is my fastest long run so far.  2:58:53  8:29 ave.  I feel pretty good about this run.  On the way back into the headwind I had a 9:30 mile, that was all due to the wind, I had been running low to mid 8's up until then.

8:15  7:55  8:10  (a fast start because I was running with someone otherwise these miles would have been 9's, but it worked out because it set the tone for the run, I was going to stay in the 8:15 to 8:30 range after this start)  8:13  8:25  8:47  8:38  8:33  8:27  8:18  8:21  Turn around  8:27  8:26  8:54  9:23  (strong headwinds after the turn around) 8:29  8:36  8:28  8:26  8:43  8:09

I just realized I've run for 26 straight days and 16 prior to that.  42 days of running over the last 43.  I'm contemplating taking tomorrow off or at least only run 4 or 5 miles, we'll see.  The last 7 weeks have been pretty intense, 3 races and 4 20 milers. 

4.65 miles, snowstorm, very wet, didn't have warm enough gloves.  Didn't feel like fighting the good fight tonight, cut my run down to 4.65.  Looks like this is going to be a low mileage week.

5.65 am miles, lots of snow this morning, ran in trail shoes for traction.  Did not time the run, just enjoyed the snow.

10.1 pm miles, B St route, over to cemetery, behind Capitol then home.   9:21 pace  1:34:29 

5.65 am miles 50:20  8:55 pace.

10.1 pm miles 1:31:18  9:02 pace.  B St route, 11th ave to cemetery, behind Capitol, home.  Felt good, a little pep in my stride.  Shaping up to be a low mileage week, only doing 11 tomorrow and Friday's are always only 5.65, haven't decided what I'm going to do on Saturday. 

5.65 am miles 52:10  9:14 pace

4.65  pm miles 37:15  8:00  pace.  Dentist appointment, straight home, nothing extra.  Warmest day of the year so far.

5.65 am miles, no watch.  I'm feeling very beat up.

ahhhh, first Saturday in 7 weeks that did not include a 20 miler or a race.  My body is thanking me and also asking for some more starting tomorrow.  Went out today for a quick 6 this morning then had me a good ole fashioned Saturday.  So this is how the other half lives?  

51:32  8:35 average pace 

17 miles on the track.  Nice warm day, 54° and sunshine.  As I started this run my goal was to go 15 miles.  Once I got a few miles into it I decided I better get some marathon pace miles in, Boston is only 35 days away.  I'm still not sure what time I should shoot for, but it's looking like about 3:15.  3:20 is my C goal and 3:10 would be wow I can't believe I ran this fast but did goal.  I think I also need to run around Boston a little on Saturday and Sunday to see what this sea level thing is all about.  If I have the strength and fitness to run around 3:15 I might pick a few extra minutes since I live and train at 4500 feet.  I guess I'll see.  So anyway, back to my run today, as I slogged away for the first few miles I thought how can I possibly run a 3:10, that's a 7:15 pace.  With my C goal being 3:20 I figured I'd run some 7:38's.  I wanted to do the last 5 miles at this pace so here is what happend.

9:24  8:51  8:55  9:03  8:53  8:51  8:02  7:58  7:49  7:36  7:27  7:28  7:15  7:16  7:12  7:12  7:14  total time 2:16:22   8:01 ave pace.  Once I hit the 7:15's I decided to see If I could bang out 5 of them.  It took a lot of strength and it felt good to tack on a few extra miles.  I considered see how many more I could tack on but it was getting very hard and I felt like I would have been entering that zone of foolish training so I made #17 my last.  I liked what I did here and feel good about 3:15.

This week is going to be another 100 miler or very close to it. 

10.9 miles  1:38:15  9:01 ave.  I can sure tell I ran hard yesterday.  Today was like lifting weights.  Each step was a repetition with a heavy weight.  I had the strength but not the speed.  It was a good pounding workout.

5.65 am miles 51:51   9:11 ave pace

13.1 pm miles  B Street route, 11th ave to the cemetery, back and forth behind the Capitol then home.  Wow, am I beat up.  This half marathon slog was a real leg builder.  9:15 ave pace. 

5.65 am miles 53:36  9:29 

13.1 pm miles 2:07:01  ave pace 9:42.  wow, that's slow.  cold, windy rain.  I am still shivering.  This was a miserable run, in fact, this one should count twice.  B St. route, 11th ave to cemetery, back and forth behind the Capitol, then home.

Starting off the week with a hard longish run is sure slowing me down now.  Tomorrow will be a lighter day (yay) and Fridays are always very light.  Looking forward to it, after this evening's run, I feel like I never want to run again.   

5.4 am miles  9:14 ave pace 49:54  felt pretty good considering how horrible yesterday was.

4.65 pm miles, straight home, nothing extra.  Ahhhhhhh, so nice to be home.  43:19   9:19 slow and easy.  Only a morning run tomorrow then 20 on Saturday.  I plan on having some spunk back by then. 

5.65 am miles  no watch.  Felt pretty good.  I've been planning all week to run a 20 miler tomorrow it's going to be windy and I find that very demoralizing.  I've already done a 20 miler in the wind, I really don't want to do another.

21.29 miles,  3:14:11  9:07 ave.  This was an out and back from home, but a lot of hills.  I turned around and the high point of the run which was 5223 feet.  The low point of the run was 4239 feet, so that's about a 1000 foot gain over eleven miles.  Almost all of the elevation gain was over about a 6 mile stretch from 4.5 miles to 11.  I chose hills today because of the wind.  I don't care much about my pace when I'm climbing.  The wind was not as bad as I thought it would be.  There were some pockets of calmness which was unexpected.  My route started at the valley floor, up Victory Road to 500 North (road north of the Capitol) loop behind Capitol over to 11th, 11th turns into Poperton and at the top of Poperton is a neighborhood that I weave through (steep climb) to get to the base of the U on the mountain.  Turn around and come home.  Got my 100 plus week in.  I'm thinking of doing another 100 miles next week and this will be the last one for this training cycle.  30 days to Boston!

10 easy miles on the track.  1:34:25  9:27 ave pace.  Very windy, didn't care, dressed warm.  It's 20° outside but the wind and no sun makes it feel very cold.  I needed at least 10 today if I had any shot of going 100 this week.   

10.9 miles 6.25 on the track.  very windy, dead legs, chore of a run.  It's mentally tough to run so many long slow miles.  I could not run any faster if my life depended on it, but somehow, it makes me faster on race day.  9:19 ave 1:41:34 total time.  100 miles this week is going to be very tough.  This is my last high mileage week.

5.65 am miles 50:30  8:56 ave pace

14.65 pm miles 2:13:23  9:06 ave pace B Street route, 11th ave to cemetery, back and forth behind Capitol, 1.5 miles on the track then home.  Legs felt pretty good.  No wind!!

5.65 am miles  51:49  9:10 pace

16.1 pm miles 2:27:50  9:11 ave pace.  B Street route, 11th ave to cemetery, back a forth behind the Capitol then home.  The uphill behind the Capitol was a real challenge.  I felt pretty good at the end of the run.  This is my last big mileage week, and today is my second to last long double day.  I'm on pace for a 100 mile week, the only thing that can throw me off would be the weather, it could be nasty tomorrow and I don't see the point in abusing myself to squeeze out some extra miles.

5.9 am miles 9:10 ave pace 54:04

16.1 pm miles 2:34:11 9:35 ave  same rout as yesterday.  B St. 11th Ave to cemetery, back and forth behind the Capitol then home.  I thought this run was going to be a lot harder.  The downhill from the Capitol hurt so I had to run easy.  It sure feels like I'm at the end of my back to back 100 miles weeks, the hard part is behind me. 

5.65 miles, no watch.  Looks like I'm going to get my 100 miles this week, a 10'er tomorrow should be quick and easy. 3 weeks to Boston, the hay is in the barn!

10 miles out and back from home.  1:39:27   9:57 ave pace.  This has got to be my slowest run ever.  My only goal today was to run 10 miles and get my weekly total to 100.  I knew I was going to go slow, but this is way slow and I kept getting slower with every mile.  Coming back I was faced with a stiff headwind.  I did not have the strength or desire to fight the wind, I gave up and just shuffled along.  This concludes my back to back 100 mile weeks, I am very tired right now.  

I received my Boston Marathon bib number in the mail yesterday.  Number 10748, that's me!  I will be at the front of the 2nd wave (9000 to 18000).  For the first time there will be three waves instead of two.  I am getting extremely excited and I feel good about my training.  My A, B and C goals are 3:10, 3:15 and 3:20.  3 weeks to the race, my taper starts now.  This next week will be more of a mental taper with mileage of about 80, not sure what I will do the next two weeks after that.  Last year I still logged some decent miles and felt like it was the perfect taper so I'll look back to last year and do something similar.  For now, no more long runs or races, just miles of fun running, maybe few marathon goal pace miles here and there.

9.9 miles 1:25:19  8:37 ave  5 miles on the track, decided to pick up the pace a little bit.  Still formulating a taper.

5.65 am miles 49:05   8:41 ave pace, it's been a long time since this run was under 50 minutes, felt pretty good this morning.

10.9 pm miles 1:37:22  8:56 ave pace   I was feeling strong and fast for the first half of this run  but then my legs got heavy.  One thing that I have noticed in this last training cycle is that even though my legs will feel sluggish, I still feel very strong.  If things go according to plan, I should have a very good run at Boston.  It's getting very close. 

5.65 am miles  53:35  9:29 ave   feeling a little sluggish, surprised I was this slow, it felt like I was a little faster.

5.9 pm miles 9:09 ave 53:54  did not feel good at all, just wanted to get home and rest.  Originally planned this to be about an 8 mile run, but no way.   

5.65 am miles  9:12 ave pace 51:57   so nice to be back in crocs.  It's a superior running shoe for me.  Running in the Kinvaras has been good over the last week, I was a little surprised how nice it felt to be back in crocs.

5.9  pm miles 53:54  9:08 ave  what a beautiful afternoon, 65°.  When I'm running a feel like there is now way in the world I could even run one mile at my marathon goal pace, forget about stringing 26 together.  I felt exactly the same way last year and really ran the Salt Lake marathon well.  So I guess this is a good sign?