Week -9 is done; less then perfect, but it will do.

After the very easy Monday recovery (25 F), Tuesday was brutal: going out at 6:22pm for 14 miles in 22 degrees. My last water bottle froze shut by the end. so I ran the last 5 miles without water. Big snot and sub-20 temperature on Wednesday forced me on the treadmill, then two easy days with 0 and 6 miles (29 F).

Saturday was 16 with 12 at marathon pace, but it wasn't happening. Too cold (38 degrees), too hilly, too tired somehow. Still pushed it a bit, and I ran miles 5-10 pretty hard (essentially marathon pace or close), and the rest also decently fast. So I ended up averaging 8:05/mile (moving). Not sure why, but by the last mile, my legs didn't want to move.

OK, I'm slow as fuck, but at least I got the miles in. Last cycle I never exceeded 95 miles in consecutive weeks, and I've just cleared 106 these last two. Maybe that's why I'm slow.

Next week is recovery. Week -8:

S: Rest

M: 8 GA

T: 8 w/ 5 x 800 at 5K pace, 50-90% jog 

W: 5 R

T: Rest

F: 8 GA w/ 6 x 10 s hills + 8 x 100 strides

S: 14 MLR

This is not hard, though I'm not sure how fast I should do the 800s. Doing them by feel is not stupid.

I've finished week -11 reasonably well. I did all my miles. I cut the LT run to 5.5 miles, because I don;t want to go over 40 minutes, and because it sucked big time, and I was much slower than I expected.

My splits on that run were 6:58, 7:13, 7:19, 7:15, 7:15, 3:32 for the last 1/2 mile. After the first sub-7 mile, I knew it wasn't going to happen, so I slowed and ran the rest by feel. Well, that was my threshold on that day, in that temperature (29 F), in that part of the training. This comes out to be 7:11/mile on average. It looks like I'm not any faster than I was in October. This, and the MP run points to 47 VDOT, as opposed to my 48 VDOT in October. In fact, reading back my blog, I don't look any faster than in the last cycle. The only saving grace here is that I am much farther out.

Week -9:

S: Rest

M: 6 R

T: 14 MLR

W: 6 R

T: Rest

F: 6 R w/ 6 x 100 

S: 16 w/ 12 @ MP

Total: 48 miles

The only hard one is Saturday, but that's  plenty hard. I'll go out at 7:30's, and I'll see how long I can maintain it.

Also, the weather forecast is brutal. Wednesday will be snowing and temps are in the 10s, so that's a treadmill run for sure. Even Tuesday will be quite cold (low 20s), but I'll try that outside. The problem is that the snow won't melt until next week. So I may need to do my Saturday run indoors as well.

From my last post: "Last cycle this time I was was trouble. I skipped so many runs that I had to change to the 12 week cycle. At least I seem to be in better shape now."

Well, I jinxed it... I had a very busy Monday, and I just couldn't get myself to get out the door in the evening, in the dark and cold to do a 5-mile LT run. So I didn't. And as it happens sometimes, I just didn't run until Friday.

On Friday, I finally broke the spell, and I ran 7 miles. And on Saturday, I ran 17, the longest until now.

Why these mileages? I have no idea. Somehow I managed to totally misread the plan, because the Saturday run was supposed to be 18. Too late... The frosting on a bad week.

Let's try to correct it next week. It will be large.

M: 7 R w/ 6 x 100

T: 12 MLR

W: Rest

T: 10 w/ 6 @ LT (probably make that 40 minutes instead).

F: 5 R

S: 20 L

Total: 54 miles. LT should be under 7 min/mile, but who knows. It may be too hard. Medium and long runs should be a bit slower, because of the brutal mileage and effort.

The Thursday workout sucks, because if I do it at Thirsty Thursday, it will have to be solo. Maybe I'll do it in the morning.

Edit: I just realized an additional complication that Saturday is the MSF meeting. I think there is still no other way to do this week than running that day. But it won't be much fun!

Little hiccups in Week -13.

First, Monday LT run was still indoors. It was single digit cold outside. But I couldn't do it. I set the treadmill to slightly below 7 min/mile, and I was good for only 2.5 miles at that pace. My stride started to fall apart, and I had to slow down. I finished the rest at about 8:35 pace.

Then, for the marathon paced run on Saturday, I didn't feel particularly good to start with. Upset stomach, breathing issues, bathroom, inhaler, then go. Still cold outside: just above freezing. By the end of the run, the road was slick (which did slow me down). Still, the fast miles were slower than should have been: 7:21, 7:26, 7:29, 7:25, 7:34, 7:28, 7:34, 7:45, 7:53, 7:36.

Clearly I was done after mile 7. Still finished it as fast as I could without going into some crazy race effort. By that time it was dark, cold, and I was tired. the average is 7:33, which is not the end of the World, but that 7:53 mile there looks really bad (though that part was quite icy). Anyway, I'm not dwelling on it. It's still a fine training run. It's said though that there was a time when I could do 7:15 miles without noticing them much.

I'm definitely overweight (for a runner - at least 10 lbs too heavy), even heavier than a year ago. I eat like crap and I drink too much. So there is definitely space for improvements.

Week -12 is here. This is cutback week.

M: 8 w/ 10 x 100

T:  5 R

W: 8 GA

T: Rest

F: 4 R

S: 12 MLR

Total: 37 miles. No workouts. Looks easy. The 4 R on Friday could be shifted for Thursday for the group run. Finally the absurd cold will change into reasonably cold.

Last cycle this time I was was trouble. I skipped so many runs that I had to change to the 12 week cycle. At least I seem to be in better shape now.

Week -14 was fine. I had a program on Wednesday, so I shifted my 10-miler for Thursday, which went fine. I had a good 15-miler on Saturday. The weather is terrible, but this is spring training so it is expected.

Week -13 is like this:

M: 9 w/ 5 @ LT

T: 5 R

W: 10 GA

T: Rest

F: 5 R

S: 16 w/ 10 @ MP

Total: 45 miles.

I tried to run 5 at LT on Monday on the treadmill (because it was like 10 degrees outside), but I couldn't do it. Fast running on the TM is still harder for me than running outside. So I had to give up after 2.5 miles. That's OK. This part of the cycle is mostly for endurance anyway.

I ran the 10 GA outside (in 23 F) and it was OK. I preemptively used the inhaler.

Saturday the weather will be nicer. We will get above 40 degrees. I'll try to do that MP run, but no guarantees.

Week -15 is done. It was a sad one, because we have a foot of snow on the ground, so all my runs, except for Thirsty Thursday, was on the treadmill. But I did manage to do everything, so I've finished the week. The hard workout, the 4-mile LT run was alright: 6:57 pace for 4 miles on a treadmill. I still feel TM is harder than outside, but it's getting slightly easier as I get used to it.

It's Monday, so my first run is in the books. Week -14:

S: Rest

M: 8 GA with all kinds of crap, like strides and hills sprints, which won't happen on the treadmill. (And it didn't happen.)

T: 5 R

W: 10 GA

T: Rest

F: 4 R

S: 15 MLR

Shift the 4-mile recovery to Thursday, if I make it. Everything is most likely treadmill until Saturday. Saturday, we might get lucky. We'll see.

Total: 42 miles. It doesn't look too hard actually. Just miles.

Week -16 is done. The only challenging run was the marathon-paced: 8 out of 13 was to be run at marathon pace. The goal was sub-7:30, and that was accomplished. Indeed, the splits were 7:02, 7:19, 7:31, 7:19, 7:23, 7:31, 7:24, 7:17. This is a 7:21 average. A bit too fast, but not terribly: it puts me at around 49 VDOT, which is not entirely unreasonable.

Week -15:

S: Rest

M: 10 GA

T: 4 R

W: 8 w/ 4 @ LT

T: Rest

F: 4 R

S: 14 MLR

Total : 40 miles. Friday recovery is better to be done at Thirsty Thursday. LT pace is sub-7.