I've just read about the Morris Island Lighthouse again, and I realized that my first race was the "Save the Light" 5K in 2009. I went back and read my race report. I ran the race in 22:03, about which I was satisfied, and I wrote: "One day, I may be able to run a sub-20 5K." Isn't that funny that running sub-20 is now very easy for me, and I'm working on sub-18? Even though I'm more than 5 years older.

Run with our Heroes 5K Race Report

Goal: sub-19:00 and winning my age group

I signed up for this 5K because I decided to go into 5K mode over the winter, and three weeks out of my half marathon I wanted to gauge my 5K shape. I chose this one, because this was the weekend when I had time on Saturday morning (isn't that crazy?), and especially because the location was the UofL campus, and UofL participated in organizing the race. The race course actually went by the building I work in, twice!

The course was looping around campus with *lots* of turns, but the final version of the course had no u-turns. It was mostly flat, but there were two somewhat significant inclines: we went over an overpass right after the start, and then under one in the last mile.

It was uncharacteristically cold in the morning: temperature was 22F, which went up to about 25 by start time. Still too cold to race. I also had problems with my training the week leading up to the race, because I was too busy with work. I didn't run on Tuesday and Thursday, and I only ran after 8:00pm on Friday: a brisk 4 miles at 7:20/mile, which might have been a bit too fast considering that I was about to race within 12 hours. So given the cold, the turns, the training, and my not so great last track workout (November 9, see my notes there), I decided to aim for a sub-19 minute finish time. However, driving to the place in the morning, I decided to give myself a chance to PR and not to be afraid to run a sub-6 minute first mile if I would feel up to it.

I arrived around 7:30 for the 8:00 start, and ran 1.5-2 miles easy in my coat and sweatpants (over tights). Got back to my car at 7:45, shed the coat and the pants, so now I was in long sleeves (over a shirt), tights, and shorts over them, gloves, my warm hat, and my trusted Virratas. Meanwhile my family had arrived, and watched me run a few strides. After the opening ceremony (it was a Veteran's Day event), we lined up at 8:05. It was a small event with probably less than 100 runners, so I lined up in the front. At 8:07 we were off.

Two kids jumped out in front of me, so I had to run around them after 200 yards when they realized the race was a bit longer than that. :) A guy on my right went out even faster than the kids, but he seemed to keep a good pace; I was running behind him up on the overpass in second place. I checked my pace on the top and it was just below 6 min/mile, which is a bit scary given that we went uphill. I dialed back a bit, and the leader started to pull away.

At the half mile point we reached the end of the overpass, and it seemed like the leader was slowing drastically. What a jackrabbit! First I wanted to hang behind him a bit, but he got so slow that I worried that others will catch us, so I passed him. Then it was only the "lead car", which was an ATV in front of me. Unfortunately ATVs don't have to pass strict emission standards (I guess), and the exhaust did bother me when he let me close. But they had to use one, because we were using campus walkways where cars could not pass through. Maybe I should suggest a bicycle for next year.

Mile 1: 5:55

Good pace. I looked back and I saw the second place runners at least a hundred meters behind me. I gave him this distance in like 600 meters. So at this point I knew a few things: (1) I'm racing to win this race now, or at least to place high in the overall; (2) the original leader is probably not a factor; (3) people are probably coming behind him, who'd love if I blew up. So I changed to a somewhat more conservative pace. This was a flat portion; we went into the heart of campus, to the car free walkways; ran under the breezeway of a building. Straight visibility was more limited, so I waited for a longer straight walkway to glance back, and I saw nobody behind me. The driver of the ATV saw me glancing back, and he shouted back: "You're all alone, buddy!"

Mile 2: 6:05

We had the hardest incline still ahead. I glanced back a few times, but I never saw anyone. I did keep some reserve power in case somebody would show up. We went up the hill, where I ran pretty slowly, turned a corner, and to my surprise, the lead ATV went straight ahead toward the finish line. I remembered an extra loop from the course map (I am very familiar with the area), but the volunteers directed us clearly to the road. Later I learned that they did this on purpose: the original course was determined to be too long, so they cut out the loop. Well, this made the course too short then... After a few moments I realized that this meant that the course would be under 3 miles. So I glanced back (still nobody), started my kick; then I had to slow back down a bit, because I started too far out. :) Of course I was in pain, but then I saw the finish line, and then I didn't feel the pain any more. I scanned the crowd and saw my wife and kids, cheering, and I couldn't help but smile; raised my hands, and ran through the finish in the 1st place.

Mile 2.94: 5:30 (5:51/mile pace)

Total time: 17:30ish for 2.94 miles.

It's kind of a bummer that it was short, but I have no chance of winning any serious race anyway. It was a great experience to win my first race outright. My older daughter, who is 11, told me that she almost cried, she was so proud to see her dad being the best of a crowd of runners. That alone was worth it.

This pace projects to about 18:30 for 5 kilometers, which is right at my PR. Meaning that I'm in as good shape for the 5K as I have ever been. I received a beautiful glass (or plexiglass) trophy in a very nice award ceremony.

So the work is just starting now. The cold is not a problem, if one only has to run a few miles. I'll train hard, I'll train smart, and I'll go below 18 minutes by this spring.

PS: Official results are now posted. My time was 17:31. Curious fact that the original leader finished at 4th place with 18:38.

Week -1 is finished with 49 miles, and the quality workout on Saturday was OK. I ran 2 x 1.25 miles on a blacktop high school track. I had to try two tracks to find one that was available... I really do hate scrambling for tracks on a Saturday... And it was a busy day with the kids with me, who were just nice enough to entertain themselves for an hour at the track facility while I was running my total of 33 laps for about 1 hour.

So the fast splits were 7:19 and 7:23, and this is OK, given that the goal was 7:26 or better. But it's a bit of a scary thought that I'll need to run this pace for a PR for 3.1 miles on Saturday. I might just need to be satisfied with a sub-19 time, especially given that the course has a crazy number of turns, and at least one of them seems to be a 180 on a walking path.

Race week plan:
Mini taper, and the Pfitzinger plan really doesn't apply well. Also, Thursday will be forced rest day.

Sun: 7 miles.
Mon: 8 miles.
Tue: 4 miles.
Wed: 8 miles.
Thu: Rest.
Fri: 4 miles.
Saturday: Race.

I did a laid back recovery week after the race by only running when I felt like it. With the busy week I had, I only ran 20 miles. (I did swim 30 minutes on Wednesday.) I did a workout today at the track: 3018 meters (1.875 miles) in 10:59. Quite a weak performance. I wasn't into it at all: I went out too hard, then I couldn't get myself to push, it was too cold, etc. Goal was sub-11, so I did that, but it was hard as hell with the last two laps deep in the paincave.

Next week I'm getting back to regular running. I'll follow the last 3 weeks of Pfitzinger's Schedule C with added miles to make 70 miles = 100%.

Week -2: 49 miles

Long runs: 9 and 7 miles.

VO2 max: 2 x 2K at 5K goal pace. That is 5:57/mile (for 18:30) or 1:29/lap, 7:26/rep on imperial track, 1:28/lap, 7:22/rep on metric track. This should be doable. My 3K today was run at 5:52/mile pace. So if the first feels easy, I'll push the second a bit harder.

Easy runs: Average 8.25/day. Ideally doubles.

I realized that I wrote nothing about post-race yesterday. So after the finish line I felt remarkably human, and I chatted with Ryan a bit. He said he isn't into road running these days, and he is certainly not as fast as he used to be. Very nice, modest guy (also unitarian minister). Then I waited for Gerard, and we analyzed our races a bit.

I only had one banana - that is all I could eat right away. I did some bourbon tasting, but even good bourbons tasted bad after this run... I had a bowl of Kentucky burgoo: that was good. Walked back to my car to put on some clothes and exchange my shirt I got in my packet (it was the wrong size). I waited for awards, which was low key, and as I mentioned, only winners were announced. Congratulated the male winner, and I left. It was very crowded by this time, and I thought it would be hopeless to find my teammates. Also, before I left, I confirmed it with the announcer that other awards won't be announced.

This was a well organized race, better than in the previous years. The greatest improvement was that finally they used paper cups at every aid station, so I could drink! I wish they announced my feats of performance, but I can't let my pride take over, so I'll say this was just fine.

Urban Bourbon Half Marathon Race Report

Goal: 1:25:00

The course was a rather difficult one, probably more so than it was in the past 3 years. Here is the elevation profile.

The first 5 miles are  flat to rolling hills, but nothing major. Miles 5 to 10 have the four big hills of the course, one after the other, never flat. Then from 10 to the finish line it's flat again. My plan was to run slightly faster than the required 6:29 pace for the first 5 miles, slow down as needed on the hills, and reassess the race at mile 10.

I was also running for the UofL team in the Corporate Challenge of the race. In this competition 5 team members, who work for the same company, run the race as normal, and the best 3 times are added together to compute positions. I was definitely one of the 3 fast runners, so I knew that my time counted. Therefore, I couldn't take too much risk here, because if I fail spectacularly, it hurts the team, too.

My morning routine was as usual. Since the race started at 8:30, and the start was only 20 minutes from our house, I had the luxury to sleep until 5:30. I had my usual egg breakfast, got to the place early, warmed up by jogging around. The weather was perfect: 50F, cloudy, and no wind. We made a team photo at 8:00, then we wanted to line up at 8:15...  except I needed to pee, and the line for the port-a-potties was about a mile long. I almost panicked, and I started to run around the blocks to find a place relieve myself, when I found a White Castle that saved me! I went back to the start, and lined up with teammate Gerard.  He was also aiming for 1:25, so we decided we would go out together.

After the trumpeter played My Old Kentucky Home and The Star-Spangled Banner, the race started exactly on time. Running with Gerard helped me avoid my bad habit of jackrabbit starts. I carefully monitored our pace for the first mile to keep it around 6:20-6:25. The field thinned out quickly: by the time we reached the first mile we were separated from other groups with around 20 people ahead of us.

Mile 1: 6:22 (splits are Garmin splits)

Interestingly, the Mile 1 marker was quite a bit farther than my GPS indicated, but the rest of the markers lined up with the GPS so well that I have to suspect it was the marker that was at the wrong place. But of course I didn't know that, which made me want to push the second mile. I decided to try to keep the pace in the low 6:20s for the first five miles.

Shortly after the marker we saw Ryan Althaus, the inaugural winner stepping off the road, but restarting after a stretch. Everything was good until the first water stop at around 1.7 miles. I didn't need water yet, but Gerard slowed down to get a drink, and I maintained the pace. I was waiting for him to catch up, but he only got farther behind. By mile 2, it looked like I would have to slow significantly to let him catch up. This was weird: we absolutely needed this pace here to get to 1:25 (knowing what was ahead), and it seemed like he just couldn't do it. I felt bad about leaving him behind, but it would have been foolish to wait for him. Plus, we agreed at the beginning that we are not tied to each other. (Nevertheless, I still feel kind of guilty...)

Mile 2: 6:21

I was maintaining a steady pace, and passed a few runners who went out too fast. We hit some hills, and the pace felt a bit hard, which was a really bad sign in less than three miles into the race. I slowed a bit. Somebody was catching up with me; I was hoping it was Gerard, but it was somebody else.

Mile 3: 6:24

I took water at the aid station after the marker. We were entering Cherokee Park, where we spent the next 4+ miles. This is a really gorgeous part of the course. Cherokee Park is beautiful all year long, but it's stunning in the fall. The organizers advertise this race as having "Louisville's best course". I have to agree with them. Not PR friendly, but it's a great course. We hit some downhills, and I felt better.

Mile 4: 6:16

After running a flat portion of the park's Scenic Loop, we ran an out-and-back portion on the road by Beargrass Creek. I generally don't like out-and-back, but at least I saw the leaders, and counted myself to be at 18th place (I think I counted wrong and in fact I was 19th here). I also saw Gerard when I was running back, and he was about a minute behind. I gave him the thumbs up and he yelled "Keep up the pace!". (At least I think that's what he said.)

Mile 5: 6:22

We hit the first hill. This one was a new addition to the course, and I've never ran it before, not even in training. And it was a beast. Steeper and longer than any of the other three. I tried to control my pace but I still felt lactate accumulating in my muscles. Then steep downhill on the other side. Then we hit the bottom, and the next hill started. A guy in an orange singlet in front of me slowed a bit on these hills, and I got closer to him. Mile marker was midway up the second hill.

Mile 6: 6:55

By the time we hit the top of the second hill, I was right behind the orange singlet. The top of the hill has a water fountain called Hogan's Fountain, and I saw my trail runner friends finishing their Saturday morning trail run there. I shouted: "Trail Runners!" They recognized me and shouted back my name. It gave me a boost and passed the orange singlet guy.

All these times I saw Ryan Althaus from time to time on straight parts of the course. Now he was the guy just ahead. He kept his distance of probably 200 yards (despite my efforts), but it gave me energy to think that the inaugural winner is just one position ahead. Clearly, he was not as well prepared today as the year when he won, but still...

The hills were not over: two more to go (some people might argue that there were three left, but the last is easy and I don't count it). Next up was Doghill with a rock'n'roll band playing at the top. I was doing fine.

Mile 7: 6:35

Down on Doghill, and out of the park. This was a long stretch of downhill that lead us out of the park. I was all alone, but I saw Ryan in the distance. I took water at the next aid station (only for the 2nd time in the race). I started to feel tired, and then we hit the fourth big hill. It started to get really hard.

Mile 8: 6:25

We climbed the last big hill and then the small one that doesn't count. I was out of breath but I knew the hills were over. I kept Ryan at a constant distance. I didn't push hard on the other side, because I had to recover before the last push.

Mile 9: 6:40

I was focusing on recovering. The time of truth was at the 10th mile. I had to be on pace or very close to it to have a chance for 1:25. But 3 miles is an awfully long distance after 10 fast miles of which 5 is very hilly. So I just let my legs go easy (but no braking). I also took my last water at the next aid station.

Mile 10: 6:20

I was on pace with about 15 seconds to spare. So I knew I had run run the last portion at about 6:30/mile. Oh boy! But I also knew I had sub 1:30 for sure, so there won't be any big disasters today. Hence I decided to risk a little, and go for 1:25.

I was running a steady 6:30 pace, but somebody still passed me. The guy seemed to appear from nowhere, and he was so much faster that I had no chance of keeping up. I saw Ryan passing a guy ahead in a blue shirt, and since our distance was still the same, it was clear that I was also faster than the blue shirt guy. I made it my goal to catch him.

Mile 11: 6:30

Right on pace. I kept steady. We were back in downtown. I focused on the blue shirt, and I got really close... but then I heard somebody coming from behind. An older guy with short, white hair passed us both, while I was passing the blue shirt guy. Gain a position, give a position. I was still 19th. I just kept my steady pace.

Mile 12: 6:28

A right turn, and a few blocks later another right turn, and we were back on Main Street, which means finish line (very long). I tried to pick up the pace, but my body fought back. Only half mile from the finish I felt terribly weak and I thought I would collapse. It was like finishing a 5K. I don't think I slowed, at least not much, but it hurt like hell.

Mile 13: 6:23

The magic finish line was in sight, the magic finish clock just turned to 1:24 when I first caught a glimpse of it. I knew I could still lose it, because it was a bit far, but my pain disappeared and I was flying to the finish. I ran the last portion at a sub-6 pace, as usual.

Official finish time: 1:24:36.36

I was so happy, I clenched my fist at the finish line. I'm looking forward to seeing the photos.

Overall 19th out of 2776, age group 1st out of 194. This race only announces the male and female winners, so nobody heard my age group victory. :( Nevertheless, I'll get a $100 coupon in the mail to be spent toward a running shoe purchase in the local Fleet Feet.

The course is hard enough that I believe this performance equals my half marathon PR. I am in as good a shape as ever. Time to race some 5Ks next.

Gerard ran 1:27:51, which is still a good time, but it's 15 seconds per mile slower than my performance. The point is: it was a good decision not to wait. He has a new baby and he had a rough night before the race. He is plenty good runner, and his PR is better than mine, but this wasn't his best day.

The third member of our team ran 1:46:05, and this year this was enough to take the 1st place trophy for the Corporate Challenge. We'll get individual and team trophies for that.

I finished the week with the planned 54 miles, including the 3 x 2000 meters today. I ran it at the imperial track, so I ran 3 x 1.25 miles instead. At this distance the difference is getting significant: about 2-3 seconds per interval. My fast intervals were 7:24, 7:25, 7:22, and no pain cave, except for the last half lap. But even then, I only did it, because I *wanted* to experience it - I would have run a fine interval without it. It's also telling that my cooldown was at 7:25 pace.

I'm in as good shape as I have ever been. My plan is solid: I go out slightly below 1:25 pace for the HM (maybe 6:27 or so) for the first two miles, and I'd like to gain a total of 15-20 seconds before the Cherokee Park hills. Run the hills sensibly, and reevaluate at the bottom of Baxter Avenue. It's flat from there. I hope to hit 1:25.

The hay is in the barn. A sensible taper with all easy runs next week is what follows.

Last long run (12 miles) completed last night at 7:15/mile. It's fast for me, but it felt easy after the rest day on Tuesday. I stopped for a drink once at mile 8, and I also dropped off my HRM (didn't work - I think the battery is out), and my MP3 player (finished podcasts), so I lost about 45 seconds there. I count that off for my average pace.

Now I'm in the finish line of training. Here is the strict plan for the rest of the cycle:

10/16 Thu: 8 miles easy.
10/17 Fri: 8 miles easy.
10/18 Sat: Track workout: 3 x 2000 meters at 6/mile; a bit slower is acceptable.
10/19 Sun: 9 miles long.
10/20 Mon: 7 miles long.
10/21 Tue: 6 miles easy.
10/22 Wed: 5 miles easy.
10/23 Thu: Rest day.
10/24 Fri: 3-4 miles very easy.
10/25 Sat: Race.

I've just read this:

http://www.runnersworld.com/running-tips/the-uncomfortable-truth-about-recovery

Interesting how much this fits my "stupid" theory about your body is just giving up. Let me explain my theory. I noticed that when I ramped my mileage to a previously unfathomable level, instead of getting extremely tired, sometimes, especially *before* rest days, I felt really good. It was like during the ramp-up, my body was screaming at me, begging to stop, but when I didn't, my body just "gave up". It didn't scream any more - with a bit of nagging pains and tiredness, it resolved to do the regimen. Then I took a rest day, and I was hardly able to get out of the bed the following day. Like my body thinking "oh, there *is* a chance of getting rest - give it to me now then!"

Of course I assumed this was just a stupid mind game - anthropomorphising my body - but now it seems like it actually may be true.

Finish line of training (a.k.a. semi taper a la Pfitzinger):

Week -1: total of 54 miles.

Long runs: 12 and 9 miles.

VO2 max: 3 x 2K at 8K-10K goal pace. That is 6:05-6:08/mile if the goal HM pace is 1:25. But it would be nicer to run them at 6:00/mile pace to match my HM PR. That is 7:30 for 5 laps. That is still slower than my last similar workout a year and a half ago. Total mileage is 8.25.

Easy runs: 8.25 each.

I had a very decent track workout today. On the 440 yard high school track I ran a 6 mile time trial. I held back in the beginning, and I think I could do better in a race, because I wasn't really in the pain cave except for the last 300 meters or so, but even that wasn't too bad. Anyways, here are my mile splits: 6:13, 6:16, 6:11, 6:18, 6:16, 6:10. Any 5K in this is under 20 minutes. Corresponding 10K time would be under 39 minutes, though I wouldn't PR.

All this at the end of  a 60 miles week. If my body holds up, I should be able to run 1:25 in two weeks. I'm going out no slower than that pace for sure.

As an added bonus, my kids came out to the track to root for me. (OK, in all fairness, I was in charge taking care of them, so they had to come with me.) They did give me a boost.

Week finished with 64 miles! I'm back in business. If my body can take it, I might just be able to finish the training plan miles. I'm actually suprised I was able to get back to this mileage after so much missed training. It must be my solid summer base that did it.

Today I ran to my usual high school track, and they had football games there. I'm so appalled to see those fat, beer drinking, cigarette smoking adults encouraging their kids to get brain damage... I ran home (already 4.3 miles), and then I tried to scout out a nearby high school track hoping to find it open with no football game. I did find one (though it wasn't exactly open - but the fence was not much of a barrier), and - as tradition have it (see April 25, 2013) - I had a good workout.

The high school track has very similar markings to my usual one, and it's asphalt, probably built around the same time, so I'm pretty sure it's a 1/4 mile track. I ran 4 x 1 miles at 6:01, 6:01, 5:57, 5:52. As it's pretty clear, I held myself back in the first two intervals. No pain cave, either! I was supposed to do these one seconds per lap slower my 10K pace, which is 6:08, if my HM pace is 1:25, but it felt too easy. This makes me optimistic. My race is still 3 weeks away - I should be able to run 1:25. I just must not mess up at the end.

Week -2 is 60 miles total.
Long runs: 14 and 10 miles.
Easy runs: 9 miles each.
LT: 8K or 10K race, or time trial or 6-mile tempo (9 miles total).

Despite real life obstacles, I had a decent week. I ran every day since Monday, though I only ran less than 6 miles on Tuesday (firefighter training all afternoon), and I only ran 6 miles on Thursday (but I swam 30 minutes, so that counts like 3 miles equivalent of cross training). Finished the week with 56 miles (59 counting cross training). I can attempt to get back on track now.

Best of all is the 5-mile tempo today. It was warm, and I ran barechested, and I was a bit hungover, but I still managed 6:29, 6:28, 6:29, 6:27, 6:30 miles, and it's not even completely flat (though not a lot of elevation change). I pushed the last mile (it was mostly uphill), but I still wasn't entirely spent. In fact I managed to run a 7:38, 7:16, 7:01 miles in cooldown. Altogether 6:58 average on 10 miles with warmup and cooldown, and I ran a sub-42 10K in it with some warmup and cooldown miles included!

It's surprising how fast I am with so much training missed. Makes me wonder what could have happened if only...

I was so busy last week that I lost another week of training. Just trying to play catch up again. This cycle is doomed.

I ran a good 10-miler on Monday at 7:15 average, and it didn't feel very hard. But I know this is just the by-product of not running. It will bite me back on race day.

I ran a 4 mile TT on the high school track close to our house. This was supposed to happen last week, but I had a horrible fallout last weekend, and for personal reasons (family life) I was unable to complete my Friday and Saturday key runs. So I ran my Saturday on Sunday, and I'll try to do the next week in 6 days.

The TT was not horrible, but it wasn't great either. 24:56 for 4 miles. It's 6:14/mile - more of a tempo pace than TT. In fact for a 1:25 marathon, the corresponding 4 miler should be sub 24 minutes. Well, of course, that assumes perfect preparation for a 4-miler. So maybe this is OK. I did set out to run 25 minutes, and I was able to do that. And I only spend the last half mile in the pain cave.

Even if I add this workout, my last week ended at 61 miles - quite short of the planned 72. I'll try to run 70 miles in the next 6 days - we'll see how I fare. Here is the plan:

Monday: 12 miles long run.
Tuesday: 11 miles somehow. Probably double is appropriate.
Wednesday: 15 miles long. Don't leave for the night (ough).
Thursday: 11 miles in double.
Friday: 10 miles somehow. Double would be best.
Saturday: Track session. Add to cooldown to round out the week. If all goes as planned, this day should also be 11 miles.

The track session: 5 x 1200 meters with 1:32.75/lap, 4:38.25/interval. Goes down to 1:33.28/lap, 4:39.84/repetition on the yard track.

So I've discovered that the high school track close to our house is almost certainly a 440 yard track. Not that it matters all that much after all. The difference in time is about 1/2 second per lap, which is probably unnoticeable at the interval lengths I run.

I'm not 100% sure, but I discovered staggered yellow lines in the lanes, and the innermost starts about 2 meters ahead from the finish line. What are they? Not finish lines for sure. So if they are start lines, they are start lines for what? Not 100 or 200, because they would start somewhere else on the track. The only possibility is 400.

So I will call my intervals 1000s here, even though they really are 1006 meters. Here are my splits:

3:40, 3:40, 3:39, 3:38, 3:36

These are decent intervals, and I love that they got faster! The last one was painful, but I wanted it to be. I could have run another 3:40 with little pain.

The only worry is the lack of miles in my training. These low weeks may bite me back on race day.

The busy schedule and the hot weather made me slack out again. I stopped running for more than a week. This seems like this is the recurring story of fall training.

Trying to get back to the fold, plus withdrawal kicked in hard yesterday, so I ran 6.6 miles. I felt like I ran nothing, it was so easy. So I'll try to pick up my training plan as I didn't stop. We will see if it works - probably won't.

Here is the rest of the plan.

Week -06, 09/07, 72 miles
Week -05, 09/14, 70 miles
Week -04, 09/21, 62 miles
Week -03, 09/28, 64 miles
Week -02, 10/05, 60 miles
Week -01, 10/12, 54 miles
Race week, 10/19, 44 miles

Tomorrow I'll try a 5 x 1000 track workout. Today I should run at least somewhat long, but it's hot, so I'll probably skip it. Maybe just 10 miles or so.

The cool weather is coming next week. No more excuses. So 10 miles today, track workout tomorrow, and then I try a 72 mile monster week. Probably not going to happen, but we can hope, right?

So the week wasn't great, because I missed two days of running and thereby it was impossible to get to my mileage goal, but I had a decent VO2 max workout today. I ran 5 x 800 meters at around 2:55 each. Given that it was 81 F and insanely humid (right after lots of rain), I'll take it.

Yesterday I ran with my running body, Gerard, who made me work way too hard. Of course one of the problems was that I ran to his workplace (already 2.7 miles) in a very hot weather at around 100 degrees heat index (and sunny), then we ran 5 miles together, then I was supposed to run back to campus. So he was fresh when I already was at mile 3, and the heat was a major factor. After a while my body can't fight it off when it's that hot. I had to walk the last mile back. Given this just some 30 hours before my workout, it's even better.

Tempo went surprisingly well. It was fairly cool, 78 F, and cloudy, so quite ideal circumstances, and I ran in Seneca Park, a good course. Fast splits were 6:23, 6:36, 6:33, 6:23, and for an average of 6:28.85. Still slower than in my peak, but much better than recently. I guess it does matter that my weight came down nicely below 150 lbs. I don't need to lose any more. I need more VO2 max and LT training. My base seems solid. I need 8.63 easy miles tomorrow with some strides to get to 62 this week.

Next week:
Total: 66 miles.
VO2 max: 5 x 800 meters.
Long runs: 15 and 10 miles.
Daily average is 10.25 miles for non-long runs. That is so much that it will probably be easier to throw in a 5-miler on my rest day and run only 9/day on the remaining days.

Today I'm planning a 4 mile tempo. Probably post later about how it went. Probably not well... :)

My training is OK, but I do miss a bunch of runs, so not ideal. I'm too busy to even post usually. No. 1 priority is to run, then come all the other stuff, like posting.

Sunday, Monday: long runs in Saucony.
Tuesday: 9-miler in Inov-8.
Wednesday: Saucony again.

Plan for this week: real simple: one 13-miler and the rest is all 9 miles for the total of 58 miles. The nature of the 9-milers is different: one long run (that means not a double and of at least somewhat decent pace), one tempo consisting of 2 x 2.5 miles fast (ouch!); the rest is arbitrary. In fact I'll probably do an easy 4 today in preparation of tomorrow's hard tempo, and I'll take no rest days. With only 4 today, and, say, 5 on Saturday, my body should be sufficiently rested for next week.

I know the miles don't add up from my plan... Anyway, I meant there was also a rest day. Which I had on Tuesday.

Tempo yesterday went better than expected. I ran it after sundown, so it was a bit warm, I was a bit unfocused, overworked, and after dinner. Surprisingly, I still did better than last time. Splits were 6:39, 6:39, and then after one mile of easy (7:47), 6:35, 6:32. It does seem like that my cool weather, ideal circumstances LT max is about 6:30. That corresponds to ~1:27 HM, which is not terrible at this stage with no specific LT training. I'm going to have to take the workouts seriously if I want anything better in October.

Week of 7/13 could hardly be worse than it was... I didn't realize originally that I was flying over the Atlantic back to the USA this week, and this did wreck havoc on training. The time it takes, the jet lag, the different climate, the stress: all take its toll.

My total mileage was only 11.59 for the week, and I just can't seem to run fast. I attempted a tempo on Saturday after only running one 4-miler during the week, and I failed pretty badly. It was supposed to be 2 x 2 miles at LT. The first interval was OK with 6:22, 6:32, but the second one was 6:49, 6:50. It wasn't even too warm. I have no excuse. Maybe I should rethink my goals.

But first, I'll attempt to do another tempo on Wednesday. I'll try to do this 2 x 2 miles again. If I can't even maintain 6:30 pace for that, I'm in big trouble. I won't be able to get even close to my PR then.

Plan for week of 7/20:
Week -13: total of 54 miles.
Sunday: 13 miles easy in the evening. Probably go to some nice place like Floyd Forks.
Monday, Tuesday: 8 miles easy in doubles. Start to get up at 6am.
Wednesday: 9 miles LT: 2 mi warmup, 2 miles fast, 1 mile recovery, 2 miles fast, 2 miles cooldown.
Thursday, Friday: 8 miles easy in doubles. Thursday 2nd run with the group.
Saturday: Group trail run fartlek with 5 x 3:00 at VO2 max. Round it up to 8 miles.

Finding the Northeast Passage

This one is between Felsőörs, Hungary, and Szentkirályszabadja without going through Balatonalmádi. I've spend several days now trying to find a route through the woods, and yesterday I finally succeeded. But the result was much like the real life Northeast Passage - it exists, it is theoretically passable, but it is hardly practical...

In any case, I am 49 miles for this somewhat hectic week, and I have a day left. I ran no tempos unfortunately, but it's OK at this stage of training.

57 miles last week is finished! Considering that I'm not in my regular environment, not even on my regular continent, this is great. Especially that my tempo was decent: with fairly even pace I managed to do 6:30/mile for my 2 x 1.5 miles of tempo. The only blemish is that due to technical reasons I took a lot of recovery (2.5 miles) between the intervals.

Week of June 29th (starting today):
Total: 58 miles.
Long runs: 14 and 11 miles.
LT: 2 x 2 miles at threshold, 8.25 miles for the day.
Easy runs: 3 x 8.25 miles.

It won't be easy, especially because one day is basically out (Wednesday).

The June 8th week had a few mishaps. First, my tempo was lousy. I ran the first block of 1.5 miles fine, but I died after 1/2 mile in the second block. It was a bit warm and I just ran around the block for technical reasons, or I'm just in bad shape. In any case. I gave all I had, but I still couldn't maintain a 6:30 pace, not even for twice 1.5 miles.

Then I was flying across the Atlantic on Thursday, arriving on Friday, and I got sick with a stomach bug, and I had fever on Saturday. I didn't run for several days, so I finished the week slightly short (some 47 miles), and I resumed training carefully in the second half of the June 15th week finishing that week with only about half of the required mileage, and no long run.

I'm trying to resume normal training this week. I already ran 14 miles yesterday. Here is the week's program.

Total: 57 miles.
Long runs: 14 miles and 11 miles.
LT: 2 x 1.5 miles of LT intervals, total of 8 miles. Try 6:30 again.
Easy: 8 miles each.

Finished the 52 mile week with a bit of extra (maybe 1 extra mile), because I miscalculated the mileage and didn't want to run less than 25 minutes today. (I read it somewhere that it is not worth it to train less than 25 minutes.)

Next week (theoretically):
Total: 54 miles.
Long runs: 13 and 11.
Tempo: 2 x 1.5 miles LT intervals. Add a half mile easy jogging in the middle and some warmup and cooldown to reach 7.5 miles.
Easy runs: 3 x 7.5 miles.

That's right folks. We're starting hard work. I'll try to do my LT intervals at 6:30/mile. It really shouldn't be a problem. But I haven't done workouts for ever, so we'll see.

Finished my 50 miles Saturday night. My running buddy, Jim, was running 24 hours to raise money for autism treatment of children, and I joined him for two laps. I don't count those, because they are too slow, but I got in 5 miles between two of his laps in the middle of the night. If I count slow miles, I ran 16+, so I felt a bit beaten up today, and I took a rest day.

Next week (6 days left):
52 miles.
Long runs 13 and 10 miles.
Easy runs: 4 x 7.25 miles.
Speed: 8 x 100 meters strides.

Potential tune-up races:

4 weeks out, 09/27: There are a few possibilities, Coach Hathaway's Running South 10K seems to stand out. Unfortunately it's in Indianapolis, but otherwise it seems like a nice race.

2 weeks out, 10/11: Spotlight on Nursing 10K, Indianapolis (again).
It seems that the 10K is a serious event, so no winning of this one :) but it seems to be very well run.

Of course Indianapolis races are flat - another disadvantage - but not a huge deal.

A bit of a reason to be optimistic: 7 miles easy on Sunday and without effort I ran sub-7:30 miles. I tried to slow down, but the run felt very easy, almost effortless. The weather was nice and cool.

Then on Monday (Memorial Day) in hot weather (88 F), I ran 12 miles with trail and hills in Seneca park - the overall pace is meaningless, but I was strong at the end and finished with sub-7:30 splits. Also, this was my 8th day of running in a row.

Week of 5/25: 50 miles total. First time since last summer.

Long runs: 12 and 10 miles.
Easy runs: 4 x 7 miles.

I plan to run 7 easy today, and be ready for the long tomorrow.

10.6 miles today in 1:18:44. A bit speedy, but I ran without my Garmin (battery is behaving funny), so I didn't know I was so fast. I ran across the Ohio to Indiana though the newly open Big Four Bridge.

5.67 miles today with striders in the middle. It was again quite hard, because it was freaking 85 F. Ran in Altras. I'm now almost two miles behind my week's schedule.

Plan for October 25. I'm changing to Sunday based weeks, because the race is on a Saturday.

Base building:
Week -8, 05/18, 49 miles
Week -7, 05/25, 50 miles
Week -6, 06/01, 52 miles
Week -5, 06/08, 54 miles
Week -4, 06/15, 56 miles
Week -3, 06/22, 57 miles
Week -2, 06/29, 58 miles
Week -1, 07/06, 60 miles

Race training:
Week -14, 07/13, 50 miles
Week -13, 07/20, 54 miles
Week -12, 07/27, 58 miles
Week -11, 08/03, 58 miles
Week -10, 08/10, 62 miles
Week -09, 08/17, 66 miles
Week -08, 08/24, 62 miles
Week -07, 08/31, 68 miles
Week -06, 09/07, 72 miles
Week -05, 09/14, 70 miles
Week -04, 09/21, 62 miles
Week -03, 09/28, 64 miles
Week -02, 10/05, 60 miles
Week -01, 10/12, 54 miles
Race week, 10/19, 44 miles

I ran the Iroquois circle today with the full horse trail. It was 80 F and I had tired legs, so it was pretty hard, but not as hard as last time. My time was 1:30:18 - I didn't wear a Garmin so I'll have to guesstimate the mileage.

It seems like this will work. I ran 47 miles this week, and I'm quite satisfied with how I feel. Rest day is Sunday.

Next week is Week -8 of base training. Total of 49 miles with 12 and 9-mile long runs. That leaves 28 miles for 4 runs; 7 miles each. We can probably start with the 12-miler on Monday, unless I break my back building the brick walkway to the garage this weekend.

12 miles in the rain, 70 F, Inox-8. I ran it pretty hard, but I needed it.

It seems certain now that we will be running another installment of the LSC Half Marathon - this time renamed as Urban Bourbon HM, and will be held a bit earlier than usual: October 25. With my 15 week preparation, I would have to start specific training on July 12. Just perfect. The time I'm coming back to the USA.

I have 9 weeks till then to ramp up mileage. It would be nice to push over 50 mpw for a while, cut back for a week or two, then start specific training at 50. If I could get to 45 this week and 47 next week, I may be able to do this by following Base Training C by Pfitzinger. then I would go up to 60 mpw before cutting back to 50 for the start of training.

I ran 11.5 miles today in 88 F sunny weather. I usually have this "first really hot day of the year when I want to run something hard" that is bound to happen about once a year and ends very miserably, sometimes downright dangerously. At least it wasn't dangerous today. Also, I ran my Iroquois Park trail circle, which means there was some water on the course. Good thing. I did not bring any water myself.

I didn't really want to do such a long run, but I just love that trail, and got carried away. Of course at mile 4 at my second water break I still felt great. Really, the "only" problem was dehydration that didn't hit me hard until mile 8. And I did find more water (in bathroom of a car mechanic) at mile 9, but it was a bit too late by then.

Note to log: I ran in my Altras today, and in my Inox-8's yesterday.

The 40 mile week didn't happen until this one, but now I've hit 41. Hip pain is back on and off, but it's managable. I don't care. I run until I can't.

This week is basically all easy, but my last few miles today on my 6-milers were at 7:15-7:20 pace and it felt easy. So that's a good sign.

38 miles this week with a 10 mile long run and no hip pain. Great! It's pathetic how tired I got after just running 10 miles, but it was at the end of a week that counts as "big" now, and it was 83 F, probably the hottest so far this year.

Maybe for the first time next week I can try a specific goal: 40 miles. Let's try 5 x 6 miles during the week and 10 at the weekend. If it'll bee sufficiently dry weather, I could run the Clark park loop, with an extra lap by the creek - that should be about 6 miles.

It's been quite a while since my last post... and I haven't been training very hard over the winter. In fact I barely got out: mostly one or two runs a week, and those are only 4-5 miles. Keep in mind that we had the coldest winter in decades, e.g. we had a day when the high temperature was 1 F. We had snow and ice covered roads very often. It was quite brutal.

But my main reason of not training was the never healing hip. I basically gave up on it. But when I realized at the end of winter that I'm up to 160 lbs (in my peak I was 147), I decided that I had to train, even if just for fun, even if it ruins my hip. I just need this for my physical and mental health.

I've been regularly training for a few weeks now again. I ran 30-40 miles a week; not a whole lot, but more than all winter. My weight didn't budge yet, but that's quite normal. And actually my hip is a bit better since I've been training again.

I'm dreaming of a sub-3 hour marathon. I should do it before it's too late; before I won't be able to run any more.

Ever since my last post I did very little training... Two things: real life and injury. The injury is not "literal": I have a left hip that is bothering me constantly now. I can still run, most days I can even run fast, but by the end of most runs, I get some increasing pain. So I tried to use the excuse of too much work to rest up and get it healed, but it may be impossible. Sometimes it's better, sometimes it's worse, but it is almost always there.

I'm still running the November 11th race, because I run it for a team, but I can't expect great times. Probably not even 1:30. I've just restarted after a longer break of almost a month, and I have no idea how I will fare.

So not much to report, but I thought I should update the blog so that not the shitty post is the one on the top. :)

Friday night I ran my first real measurable fast workout of this training cycle, though the circumstances were far from ideal. It was 5 x 800 meters intervals. It was late in the night (dark), and I intentionally didn't run during the day because it was so hot. Even after 10pm, when I left for the run, it was still 80 F. I ran at Waggener High School track; not the best, and I had to move benches from the inner lane and dodge sprinklers.

Warning: if you are easily grossed out, you might want to skip this paragraph. So in the second lap of the second interval, I had to run really hard to keep my time decent, and I felt that I was losing control of my rectal muscles. I had to slow down a bit so I didn't crap my shorts. I though my intervals were over, and I wasn't sure I can get home without an accident. But it was really dark at the track, so I just took a dump in the shadows by the track; used some grass to wipe my ass, and then I felt liberated. The I thought that I might as well finish the intervals.

It wasn't easy. I had to push myself to the limit on every single one of them to just put them under 3 minutes. Splits are 2:54, 2:57, 2:54, 2:58, 2:58 (hundredths are rounded down). But with the circumstances, I say it's not too bad. Average of 2:57.7. It barely hits the 1:27 HM McMillan training times, but under more ideal circumstances and later in the training cycle a HM PR is not out of the question.

Here is my weekly mileage plan for the HM:

08/19 (11): 58

08/26 (10): 62

09/02 (9): 66

09/09 (8): 62

09/16 (7): 68

09/23 (6): 72

09/30 (5): 70

10/07 (4): 62

10/14 (3): 64

10/21 (2): 60

10/28 (1): 54

11/04 (R): 44

Bernheim Challenge 7 Miler Race Report

Goal: Top 10

I wasn't planning on running this race until a few weeks ago I volunteered for another trail race and I got two free entries for two trail races of the 2013 series. I got all excited about running trail races, especially after the Bourbon Chase fell through. I didn't specifically prepare for this one, and the race came at the end of a 58-mile week, only the second in a row of large mileage weeks, so I was not recovered. But I didn't care that much and I thought I can still be in the top 10. I previewed the course so I knew where the hills were. The main thing that worried me though was that the trail is very technical, and the older I get, the worse I get on technical terrain. Not that I was that good to begin with...

We woke up to a gorgeous late summer morning, temperature in the high 60s, which I guess is not good for me considering that I tend to suffer less from heat than my opponents. The race was held in the beautiful Bernheim Forest and Arboretum. It was a point-to-point course, so at the beginning buses took people up the hill and we ran down back to Guerrilla Hollow (close to the Visitors' Center). I was lucky enough to get a space in a car of a friend of a friend, so I was up on the hill in no time. The race started a little late, but that was expected due to the 100 runners, who had to be taken to the start line.

We started on a fire road in the woods, but in 50 yards, the course took a right turn onto a singletrack trail. I wanted to be close to front runners, and I took the turn in the 4th place. The first mile was mostly downhill, so I pushed myself really hard, finishing the first mile in about 6:30, which is no simple feat on that technical course. Maybe I paid for that later. In any case, I let a few people pass on the subsequent uphill mile, and then settled into a pace and a strategy that I thought I could keep by the end.

Well, it didn't happen. One by one, people passed me and I never saw them again. Typically this happened on the climbs, where I had to walk many times, because I felt exhausted and mentally weak. But even on downhills, I wasn't very fast, and some runners gained on me. I gave up two more positions in the last mile, one, to a 56 year old guy, who was barely faster running uphill than I was walking, but I could not run. I finished in 12th place with a time of 59:40. Age graded is even much worse: 17th place. An old rival beat me by more than two minutes, so that he actually took a wrong tun and lost a bunch of time!

I can try to find excuses, but at the end, this is what it is: a pathetic performance. This kind of trail racing is probably not for me, but even then, I should have done better than this. So it might be all for the better that I won't be able to race Siltstone in November (family schedule), but instead I will race the LSC Half Marathon again. It would be really cool to PR in that hilly race, maybe running a 1:23, but it seems like a long shot with my recent performances...

Long time no post... That doesn't meant that I didn't run, but as usual, summer brought on less running... I'm trying to get back to full training with a November Half Marathon in mind. That would be either Siltstone (trail) or LSC  (if UofL asks me to run for their team - if there is a team at all).

The Bourbon Chase is off. The team that was essentially promised to me vaporized, so we didn't pay the balance, and so the team is off now. I'm bitter about this, and it was also a big financial loss, but it is not worth blogging about it.

I gained 5 pounds during my less-running-time, so now I have something to lose. :) That's OK, and 5 lbs is not that much.

I came back from Hungary (dry continental climate and quite a bit northern than Kentucky) on July 10, and immediately went for a few runs, only to realize that the different climate and maybe the lack of training took away my ability to run decently here. So even though I was very tempted to run the Otter Creek 8-miler trail race the weekend after my return, I decided it wouldn't be fun to embarrass myself. But there was a last minute call for volunteers so I volunteered. That gained me two free entries of future trail races in this series this year, so that's my focus now.

So in a nutshell: I'm starting a HM plan this week, but in the meantime, I focus on trail training (it really is called cross country training) by running more hills and more trails. I can't expect to match my peak form times, but I'll try to get in shape to be able to PR in a hypothetical November flat HM. If things go great that might mean a PR or close in LSC HM (which isn't flat by any means) or possible a good position in Siltstone HM.

The two weeks leading up to the start of the HM plan included one more travel and a bad cold, that cost me some training. But today I ran a "PR" on the Siltstone trail. OK, no big deal, probably only the 2nd time I'm trying to run this in a decent time, but 2:06:22 on a trail that is comparable to the Millennium Trail at Bernheim is not bad, especially overweight and on the very first day of the training plan. Oh, and it didn't kill me: I'm quite fine now.

St. Matthews Street Festival 5K

Goal: 18:30, but at least sub-19

Since this race was a piggyback afterthought after the half marathon, I didn't really take it seriously. I didn't train very much at all since the half marathon, and I actually decided on the time goal on the morning of the race. I knew I wanted to destroy that old PR of mine (19:11), and that I also wanted to run sub-19 (I'm on that thread on runningahead.com), but I also knew I should be capable of more. McMillan equates my HM time with 18:02, but I knew that was unrealistic for several reasons: it was quite warm and humid, the course was not completely flat (unlike the half marathon), and I did no specific 5K training, in fact I slacked out quite a bit in the last two weeks.

So I was putting on my running gear early at dawn, when my daughter and I were standing at the window (admiring a bunny having breakfast in our backyard), and I asked her what I should aim for, and after a short discussion we agreed on 18:30. (She is 9 years old, but already a runner. She completed her first 5K last weekend in 30:41. I did run with her, but that is a different story. I will write about that later.)

I arrived to the race early enough to have plenty of time for warmup and bathroom breaks. It was 68 F (=20 C), which wouldn't be so bad if the humidity wasn't freaking 87%. Also, let me include the elevation chart of the course right here.

Not too hard, but there are a few rolling hills, and it is nasty that the first mile is the easiest and the last one is the hardest. Regardless, the pre-race preparation went very smoothly, and I actually started to worry a bit about how relaxed I was. You need some adrenaline to run well.

I lined up right behind the start line, and exactly on time the race started. I darted out as usually, but in 100 yards I had to realize that I'm not winning this one: a group of 5 young guys in their 20s went out at 5:30-ish pace, and they looked like they knew what they were doing. I settled to a pace that felt like my VO2 max, and my GPS confirmed the correct 5:40-ish pace. I'm saying correct, because with the elevation profile and the goal, I knew I had to complete the first mile well under 6 minutes. As for position, there was the initial group of 5, and one more somewhat slower (but still clearly faster than me) young guy, and I let 2 bare chested guys in their 40s pass me in the first 1/2 mile. So I was at 9th place.

Mile 1: 5:47

So far so good. Right after the mile marker it seemed like one of the initial 5 had more ambition that ability, and he slowed quite a bit. I passed him right after the mile marker. (I think he ended up running 20:04 - after a first mile that was faster than mine.) But the hills started, and the sun came down hard, and halfway through I started to feel lousy. We made a bunch of turns, and I was running in no man's land. The shirtless guys in sight, but too fast to catch, and nobody behind me that I could see. The end is too far.

Mile 2: 5:59 (technical note at the end about mile splits)

The next mile was pure struggle. It was also the hardest in terms of elevation and turns. I ran my last 5K almost a year ago, and I already forgot how much they hurt. I wasn't 100% in the game mentally, and I forgot (seriously) to use my "out of body" technique. But I did think of my forum pals, and my daughter, of course, how disappointed she would be if I slowed down. I also made sure nobody threatened my position. The shirtless guys were at constant distance of 12-14 seconds ahead of me (that's how we finished), and slowed exactly the same rate as I. One more indication that my slowing was not a result of bad race strategy, but the terrain and the natural slight positive splits that is the optimal way to run a 5K.

Mile 3: 6:07

We turned onto the finish line, and I gave everything. I saw the clock and I knew I was sub-19, but 18:30 has just slipped away. I thought of my daughter when I crossed the line at 18:32 (slightly under 6 minute pace for the kick). Well, that's approximately 18:30, isn't it.

I still think I raced this one well, nearly perfectly. I'm not sure I could have done any better than this. But on a flat course, in 50 degrees, and with proper speed training, I might be able to go below 18 minutes. I still have more than 2 years before my 40th birthday. I actually think of racing more 5Ks, with 70 mile weeks and real preparation. They do hurt, but they are pleasantly short, and very abundant. You can race one seriously every other week. And maybe, just maybe, one day, when coincidentally all the good runners stay at home, I could win an overall at a road race for the first time in my life.

The depth of the Louisville running scene is well illustrated by the fact that 18:32 was only good for 8th place at a local 5K. The winning time was 15:37. I got 2nd in my age group, which would get me an award, but I had no time to wait for the ceremony, because I promised my daughter that I would take her to the Science Center today, so I rushed home. The race was so close to our house that I got home at 8:35, when about a quarter of the participants were still on the course. I will pick up whatever I won probably today (Sunday) before I'm leaving town for a week.

*****

Technical note on mile splits: The marker for mile 1 lined up well with Garmin, but the mile 2 marker was grossly different. At the end the GPS measured the course as 3.04 miles, but I'm rather sure that it was the correct distance and the GPS was wrong. I have several reasons to believe that. 1) The organizing company was a very reputable one. I don't think they got the course certified, but I'm sure they measured it carefully. 2) When I overlay my route with a satellite picture, it diverts from the streets a lot, making me cutting corners by running through buildings. 3) When I ran the course in training, the GPS measured it to be longer. That's actually not surprising. When I run faster, the data points will be farther from each other. 4) Mile 1 was accurate, because it was mostly straight. When we started to make many turns, accuracy went dramatically down.

I knew this while running, so I wasn't too worried about my Garmin splits. And for the purpose of the report, I scaled down 2.11 miles to 2.04 (actual to measured) and divided my measured mile splits by this ratio to get more correct ones. These are the ones reported above.

I accidentally erased my training logs for the last 2-3 years. It was never meant to be permanent (this is why I write this blog; *this* is supposed to be permanent), and I did not keep the logs that I used before I converted to SportTracks, but now I feel like I lost something... At least I should have kept the data from the beginning of this year. Oh, well.

Anyway, trying to think of what I have to preserve:

To the best of my memory, my old Mizunos have ~350 miles on them, and the newer ones have ~100 miles. My Kinvaras also have ~100 miles. The pair of Asics I use for speedwork has been on borrowed time for a while, so it doesn't really matter. Let's start from here.

I ran 5.63 miles today in 42:06 in my old shoes. The weather was 86 F, sunny. Summer is here.

I am signed up for a 5K in the weekend, but I really don't feel like running. This is post goal race burnout. Nevertheless, I forced a set of intervals on myself on Sunday. Only 2 x 2000 at 7:15, 7:20 respectively. It was hard as hell. I'm not exactly sure why, because it was nice and cool, and I only ran about 40 miles on the week before (that was my post goal race week, so it was still pretty good). But then after Sunday I missed two days in a row. I did mean to rest on Monday, but Tuesday was just sheer laziness. Or post goal race burnout. Call what we want.

500 Festival Mini Marathon HM

Goal: 1:25:00. Dream goal: 1:23:00.

I decided to run this race, because after I signed up for the Derby Mini, it turned out that I'll be traveling that weekend. So I needed another half marathon in the spring, and this seemed nice. In retrospect, the fact you have to pick up the packet the day before, so I had to drive to Indianapolis twice in two days, is a bit of a pain.

Since it is a two hour drive, and the race is huge, I got up at 3:15 AM in the morning to be able to leave home at 4:00, and to get to Indy at 6:00. The race started at 7:33, but we were supposed be in our corrals at 7:00, and with 30 thousand participants in this race, I didn't want to risk parking issues. I parked the car at 6:00, and I was in the start area at 6:30. It was a bit boring to wait for the start, but with these many people, I think I made the right choice. At least I could a do a good warmup. I got into Corral A at about 7:10 and lined up at about third-fourth line. I was only a few yards from the start line. I admired a few African elites in front with their child size bodies that is capable of maintaining sub-5 minute pace for the distance of a marathon.

We had a bit of a silence for Boston. With the adrenaline pumping in me, or because I was so focused on running, I got quite emotional, especial thinking about the child victim of the bombing. Then we listened to the anthem of my adopted home country. At 7:30, we saw the wheelchairs off, and 3 minutes later we were off running.

It is always a bit surreal running a race. Somehow I just don't feel the effort the same way. Noticing my fast breathing I knew I was running hard, but subjectively it felt easy. So I did a bit of a jackrabbit start (I do this all the time), and the first mile was over in no time.

Mile 1: 6:07 (All splits are Garmin splits, and it showed 13.15 at the end)

OK, that's unquestionably too fast. I have to slow down gradually, because this is guaranteed blowup. We ran through some streets here; I don't have a lot of memory of these, except that I didn't find Indy particularly nice. Supposedly we ran by the White River, but I don't remember water. I was just too focused on running.

Mile 2: 6:13

Still too fast. I let people pass me, because I knew I had to get back to the crowd who are running at 6:20 pace. I have to say it is a bit demoralizing to let people pass you. My breathing became a bit more relaxed.

Mile 3: 6:18

Yeah, yeah, still a bit too fast. But I felt pretty good and the bands here were playing old Rock'n'Roll. It's hard to control yourself. Maybe this was the part of the race when I blew my sub-1:23 chances. The 5K mark had a clock that I passed at 19:23, and that's only 12 seconds off of my PR from 2011, the last time I ran a 5K. (It would probably be easy to run a sub-19 5K if I tried.) But it also meant that the Indiana Runners thread would know I crossed the 5K point with this time. "If I blow this, they will be so disappointed", I thought. Slow down...

Mile 4: 6:15

Too fast. Got to slow down. I let a few more people pass. I also started to feel the heat (it was 60 degrees). I took water at an aid station and poured half of it over my head.

Mile 5: 6:24

That's more like it. Now I was among people who I thought may have the same speed as me.  We entered the vicinity of the famous racetrack. I ran quite relaxed, telling myself that we still have most of the race ahead.

Mile 6: 6:31

We entered the racetrack, and I guess it was supposed to be really special,  but to me it meant essentially nothing. Except that it had a nice straight (or slightly curved) very smooth asphalt road. I saw a guy throwing up by the the track. I though: what a shame that he maintained this hard pace so far, and now his race is over.

Mile 7: 6:25

Now I was down to my 1:23 goal pace average (6:20/mile), so it was time to maintain it. I tried to pace off of people around me, but I soon realized that I wasn't the only one who went out too fast. I started to pass people back who just passed me. The track was long, windy, and boring.

Mile 8: 6:20

At this point I saw that I ran the exactly correct pace in the last mile, but it felt I was working hard, so it was a bad sign... Still, I would have blamed myself forever if I didn't try to finish the race at this pace. We left the track and I was till passing people, but I knew I wasn't fast, but instead they were slowing.

Mile 9: 6:25

I noticed that I was a few seconds off of my 1:23 pace. Still 4+ miles left, so I can't kill myself. I just tried to pace off of a guy in a red T-shirt, who seemed to maintain the right pace, but I was quite tired and he started to slip away.

Mile 10: 6:17

We ran along a long straight road, and I already imagined this to be the finish line, but of course it wasn't. I passed the 10-mile marker at 1:03:20, which is the right pace for 6:20/mile, 1:23 finish. Only 5K was left, so I decided I would give everything. Pushed hard, passed a few people. I was hurting, but my pace was still controlled.

Mile 11: 6:17


We turned onto the road by the river. The field thinned out quite a bit here, and I ran alone in the turn. I felt I was very slow. I changed to a somewhat irregular breathing, because I just needed more oxygen. I tried to do the same strategy: pushing hard, controlled pace, but I was hurting badly. I started to look at my watch just to see how long I was along within the mile. Again, I saw a guy stopped (almost collapsed) by the road.

Mile 12: 6:26

We turned onto a bridge and so we had to climb the slight incline to the bridge. It was nothing, but it killed me. Finally I understood how it feels to blow up at the end of a race. It was not in my head. I was able tell my brain to go fast, but my body just switched off the circuits. I was going as fast as I could. People now passed me.

Mile 13: 6:32

Not terrible, but I saw the finish clock turning 1:23, which was a mild disappointment. I sprinted down to the line.

Remaining: ~52 seconds, sub 6-min pace.
Final time: 1:23:28 (chip time) 143rd overall (out of 30064), 29th in age group (out of 1982).

I was very tired in the finish; a volunteer asked me multiple times if I was OK. We got our worthless medals (everybody gets one), but as a nice touch they gave a "500 club" medal to the first 500 finishers.

This is my first race in a while when I didn't achieve my dream goal, but I still did achieve my regular goal, and more. I think with proper training and ideal race conditions (60 degrees was about 10 degrees too high) I should be able to run sub-1:23, but maybe I really should focus on the queen of all races: the marathon. McMillan is now quite positive that I could break 3 hours.

Post race party was OK, but they didn't give me my free "beer" (I'm putting quotation marks here, because it was Michelob Ultra) without my ID, which I left in my car. I mean come on, I'm 37. I walked back to my car and got back to the finish area a good 1/2 hour later. The area was extremely crowded by then. The two-hour folks have just arrived.

I have to say that even though the organization was extremely efficient, and I'm sure the silly ID rule must be followed if they don't want to get in trouble, I didn't really like this race. Car racing means nothing to me, and frankly, Indianapolis is not very pretty. Besides, the race is just too big. Sure, I can start from the front, but I have to arrive 90 minutes early, I have to park a mile from the start line, and there are just too many people everywhere. The KY Derby Half instead runs through beautiful Old Louisville with its Victorian homes, Churchill Downs, and it's about half the size. Plus, I live in Louisville.

Next immediate goal is to piggyback something off of this training. Might not be anything before Bernheim HM, but that would also be nice.

Two days. Two days left until the big race. Last run today is easy 4.1 miles. Got carried away and ran it somewhat hard in 30:40. (It's all speculative though because I left my GPS at home.) 75 F, partly cloudy, new shoes. I feel tired, regular tired, taper-madness-tired.

What hectic day of training! I did my usual routine of driving to the expressway, 2 miles from the high school track where I do my training, parked my car, and jogged to the school as a warmup. It is more time efficient this way than driving all the way to the school. Plus I save gas and eliminate some air pollution.

During the jog I was thinking that it is great that I do this track workout on Thursday, instead of the usual Wednesday, so I'll probably avoid the fat people I wrote about last week. Well, I did. But instead of a nice empty track, I found the high school track team training there. I asked the coach politely if I could train there, but he asked me politely to use the outer lanes. That would be OK, except I can't run 2000 meters in the outer lanes. I contemplated it for a while, but I just saw no way of doing my workout. Also, the younguns were running pretty fast, so the coach was quite right that I would be problematic in the inner lane.

But my car was two miles away. I knew no open tracks nearby at all. I essentially gave up track training for the day, and I jogged back to the car. During which I thought I would just give myself the chance that the university track is open. I had given up on that track a long time ago, because it was almost always closed (locked) when I tried to use it. I even emailed somebody in the athletic department but I got no response. Anyway, I drove back to campus, parked the car in my usual lot, and jogged another half mile to the track.

And it was open. It is a very nice track. I took a sip of water and in 20 seconds, I was off to fast running. I was afraid that any second somebody shows up and sends me off, so I wasted no time. It was worrisome though that I already had almost 5 miles in my legs. I wasn't sure if I can run well after that crazy and long warmup.

Well, I could. 3 x 2000 meters with 800 m recoveries, and the fast splits were 7:22, 7:26, 7:24. It was never really painful (just discomfort). That is quite awesome. I seem to continue the tradition that the last track workout before a big race goes very well. I also recalled that in my sub-20 5K chasing days about 2 years ago, I ran 2 x 2000 meters in something like 7:50 or 7:55, and it was hard. So this is not bad at all. All intervals were at sub-6-minute mile pace.

The race is close. I'm optimistic about 1:25.

I'm not very good at regularly updating this blog. But I did keep up the running quite well.

On Sunday I ran 10 miles of trail up that mountain in Boulder. A great trail run, but with some walking and of course slow pace. 12:34/mile on average, but it went from 5600 ft elevation to 8000 ft and back, all on trails. It wasn't a very easy run.

On Monday I still ran in Boulder (in snowfall!). I got back to the hotel on time to watch the end the Boston marathon, but of course I turned off the TV (internet) well before the bombing.

No running on Tuesday, long run of 14 miles on Wednesday (hilly -- Cherokee Park -- and fast -- 7:28/m), easy Thursday. I didn't actually do a steady second longest run this week (I was supposed to do 10 miles of that).

On Saturday, I ran a tempo. I wussed out and I ran only 4 miles, though the pace was decent: 6:18 average. On one hand, this is probably my fastest tempo to date. On the other hand, how come I couldn't/didn't do 5 miles at least? I was supposed to run a 8-10K tune-up race. OK, no race (kids were my responsibility in the morning), but I could have done a 5 mile tempo. I felt so bad about this, that I ran the last 0.89 mile fast again, at 6:11 pace. So this was a sort of a silly workout. I should be smarter with my training.

I finished last week with 60 miles then. This week, I'm at 30 so far, not counting the slow 2.5 I ran with my daughter at the Girls on the run meeting. I plan to do 3 x 2000 meters in 7:30/interval today. I could do a second longest run of 9 miles on Friday (travel) or Saturday (conference). I must do a long run of 9 miles on Sunday, 7 at good pace on Monday, 6 easy on Tuesday, 5 easy on Wednesday, 4 easy on Thursday, rest on Friday, and race on Saturday.

Wednesday run was in Iroquois High School, the track. This is the second time that some morbidly obese parents watch some sweet little kids, who are running extremely slowly (it actually looks like a parody of running - and this is no joke). Last time I saw them there were only a few adults (one fat woman walking in the inner lane) and the kids seemed to have a structured workout, and they were even somewhat considerate of me. This time, the workout seemed to be over, and the adults just hung around for an hour or so, while the kids were playing around. Everyone was standing, walking, talking in the inner lane with almost zero consideration of me trying to run fast. Amazingly poor track etiquette.

Nevertheless, I had a somewhat decent workout. I got hot and dehydrated at the end, but I managed to run 4 x 1600 meters with acceptable splits: 5:58, 5:56, 6:01, 6:05. The last one was less than satisfactory, and I spent a good portion in the pain cave... I seriously thought about just giving up. But apparently this is still good enough to satisfy some kind of decent Pfitzinger paces.

Then I ran Thursday morning 4 miles only, because I was teaching and I had a plane to catch to Denver. I thought maybe I would finish the workout on the hotel treadmill in Boulder at 10 or 11 o'clock, when I was scheduled to arrive. Well, weather was bad in Atlanta, so we got delayed at the transfer, and only made it to Boulder at 2:00am. So no more running on Thursday.

We hiked with a group in the Rocky Mountain National Park on Friday almost all day. We climbed a 3000 meter mountain. It was fantastic. I thought that would be the exercise of the day, but then, in the afternoon, reading around about Boulder, I couldn't resist, and I went for a run. My first run over 1600 meters of elevation. It is definitely harder than sea level, but I think I already felt partially acclimated, because it wasn't all that hard.

Today (Saturday), we have had a long lunch break at the conference, so I went out to do my planned tempo and to finish the 64-mile week with an 8-miler. I decided to run 2 easy, 4 hard, 2 easy. Because of the elevation and the hilliness, times are essentially meaningless, so I just jumped into my 2-1 breathing pattern, and pushed my pace as far as I could with this pattern. I decided to stay out of the pain cave this time. If I really honestly just want the training effect, it is not necessary to enter there. I finished, and my splits for the fast portion are: 6:57, 7:39 (steep climb), 6:27, 6:07. The average was 6:47.8, which is meaningless, but it still feels good that I did this pace a mile high and with the hills (and no pain cave). I hope it did help my lactate threshold.

Tomorrow I'm not going to RMNP, as I originally intended. I will probably just climb/run one of the beautiful mountains around Boulder.

Tuesday:

Run 1: 6.6 miles, 52:07, old Mizuno.
Run 2: 4 miles, 32:19, old Mizuno.

Monday runs were done in old Asics.

Today I ran 16 miles at 7:28/mile. It looks bad on the statistics to have a zero mile week, then 37.5, then 35.5, but there is little evidence of any loss of fitness or endurance. I'll see how I'm with LT this weekend. To get back on schedule I'll try to squeeze in two quality workouts this week.

Week -3: total of 64 miles.

Sunday: 16 miles (done).

Monday, Tuesday: 2 x 5 miles or 10 miles recovery pace (Seriously!! I'll need it!)

Wednesday: 4 x 1600 meters at 1 sec/lap slower than 8K-10K goal pace. Let's discuss this. Last week I entered 1:25 HM into McMillan to compute my 8K goal pace, and the paces were too easy. If I had entered 1:23, it would have given me 3:41/km pace, or 88.4/lap. If I add 2 seconds, I get the 90 sec/lap that I was trying to get inside of. So it looks like a good method to try again. So this time I'll try to aim for 89.4/lap, or 5:58/ interval. Essentially run all 4 in less than 6 minutes. Probably 800 meter recoveries.

Thursday: Travel, but try to get 9 miles anyway.

Friday: Hike or 5-mile tempo (total of 9-10 miles)

Saturday: if Friday is hike, or Thursday is bust, do 9-10 easy to get to 64.

Sunday: Hike, but try to run 9-10 or more miles in the Rockies. Pace is irrelevant. This should be part of the following week though.

Nice intervals today. Warmup, cooldown 2.2 miles, and 5 x 1200 meters with 600 recoveries. Fast splits were 4:27, 4:25, 4:25, 4:27, 4:27. It seems like I still have it. I was in the pain cave for the last 400 meters of the last split only. That's quite normal.

Pfitzinger only wants me to run these in 4:38, but that seems super slow. Or if I really run them in 4:27, that means 89 second laps, so my 8-10K pace should be 87 seconds, which is 36:15 for 10K. I'm almost positive that I couldn't do that.

As you'all may have expected, I didn't jump back to 70 miles. I did fine for the first half of the week (37 miles in 3 days), but then more work, more URDs, and that was it for the week. 6 days of no running, and started again this Tuesday with only 4 miles (that was all I had time for, but I had to go out, because I started to have withdrawal symptoms - I'm not kidding). Wednesday I finally had an 11 miler. I left my Garmin at home, so I didn't know my pace until the end. It turned out to be 7:10/mile. I didn't mean to run so fast, but I guess I was hungry for exercise. Then 11 easy yesterday, and I'm about to have some intervals today.

My training is out whack, and I'll have two travel weekends ahead before my race, so I'm not sure how the rest will go.

I know this is frequently returning theme of this blog, but seriously: fuck the fucking weather. When on March 25 the peak temperature of the day is 35 F and there is drizzling snow all day with cutting wind (feels like 25 F), I say enough is enough. And I ran twice today.

On March 16 I finished my largest week in my running history with 68 miles. Then the week after that I went to conference, worked really hard, weather sucked, and I got in 0 miles. That is correct. Zero. I'll try to jump back to training this week like nothing happened. This is according Pfitzinger's marathon training guideline: if you skip less than 10 days, you can try to get back where you were.

Week -5: Total of 70 miles.

Long runs: 15 and 12 miles. Take these easier, keeping them just under 8 minutes pace, unless I feel great.

VO2 max: 5 x 1200 meters at 2 sec/lap slower than 8K-10K goal pace. If I assume I only want to run 1:25 HM, then 8K goal pace would be 90.75 sec/lap. That is 4:32/interval, and I haven't even added the 2 sec/lap. Unless I really lost a lot of fitness this week, I should be able to do much better than that.

Non-long-run days should average 10.75 miles/day.

I'm tired of the cold, but chugging along. Today I had a great track workout at Iroquois High School. It was just over 40 degrees, which is very nice considering the freezing yesterday, but we got a few flurries again.

Anyway, I ran 1000s and 1200s with 600 meters recovery. Splits were the following:

1000 - 3:39.94
1200 - 4:23.93
1000 - 3:38.45
1200 - 4:26.52
1000 - 3:38.82

Very nice progress: these are all sub-6 minute paces. I used to run 1000s in 3:55-4:00. I think these times would predict sub-18:30 on 5K. I really have to go out and run one.

Week -7: 68 miles (oh my!)

Long runs: 15 and 11 miles.

VO2 max: Pfitzinger says 5 x 4:00 moderately steep uphill. But I've grown to like track training for VO2 max, especially because my goal race will be pancake flat. So this translates to something like 1000-1200-1000-1200-1000. McMillan lists 1000s at 3:32-3:42, 1200s at 4:18-4:30. I would probably be closer to the slower end. 600 recoveries would work well. Roughly 9 miles with a sizable cooldown.

Easy days: 11 miles each. Try two runs each, may be easier in spring break and warmer temperatures.

Finished the week with a tempo today of 5 miles. It was tough. I tried to run 6:20s, but at mile 2 or so, I had to realize it wasn't going to happen. So I settled to do 6:25s. Splits were 6:23, 6:21, 6:30, 6:30, 6:24, the whole last mile deep in the paincave. Average was 6:25.48, which barely qualifies as tempo according to McMillan, but at least it was 5 miles, and at least it wasn't like 6:30. I do have trouble with my stamina. The good news is that these very training runs are supposed to make it better. The other good news is that almost surely the 60-some mile weeks don't let me fully recover, so I will hopefully get better after some taper.

Addition: After I wrote this post I checked back to see what 5-mile tempo I've run in the past. So the good news is that the fastest before this was at 6:30 pace last fall, and I was very satisfied with it. This was probably a less hilly course though, but at least I didn't get slower.

I have finished my last week with the planned 66 miles. It was hard. It's a lot of running. I had one URD, so I just finished the week on Saturday, and today I'm about to run 16 miles for this week's long run. Tempo was far from perfect, but with this many miles, I'm fairly happy about the week. I'm in a constant state of physical exhaustion. I sleep 10 hours a day and I really need it.


Week -8:

Total: 62 miles.
Long runs: 16 and 11 miles.
LT: 5 mile tempo
Easy runs and tempo average 8.75 miles a day.

I finished last week with 62 miles, which I think is probably a record, though it did take 7 days instead of 6, and I had larger 7 weeks periods before (but with two long runs at the two ends). But the bad news is that I had a bad tempo run on Friday. 4 fast miles with splits 6:16.40, 6:31.69, 6:29.59, 6:26.90. Works out as 6:26.15 average. Yeah, I lost some seconds because bad timing of cars at intersections, but it should not account for the total inability to run another really fast mile after the first one. I mean for God's sake, this should be my half marathon pace by now. And I was done after 4 miles.

I'm not sure what it is, maybe just the miles, maybe the bourbon I've been sipping more than one evening, including the one before this tempo run. But I didn't drink all that much and I felt no hangover. In any case, after this run, I made a new decision: no bourbon until race day. I still had like 3 glasses of wine last night, but I still had a good 15 miler today.

Speaking of which I'm planning another record volume week. I'm not sure how it will go, because last week I had trouble putting in all those miles. In particular I had to squeeze in another 3.1 mile run on Saturday, which was supposed to be my rest day. But I think that actually worked nicely. It wasn't long enough to tire me out, but it shook out my muscles to have a better recovery. I felt no effect of my Friday tempo by my Sunday long run.

Week -9: Total of 66 miles
.
Long runs: 15 miles and 10 miles.

VO2 max: 5 x 3:00 moderately steep uphill. I'm almost positive I'll replace these with 800s, maybe a 1000 thrown in, because the 800s will be slightly less than 3 minutes. I just trust the track more than those hills, and my race will be totally flat.

Average distance for days other than long runs: 10.25 miles. It doesn't matter how get those in, but it would be nice to run two 6-milers on some less busy days.

Week -10:

Total: 62 miles. That is pretty much all time high. I did run 66 miles withing 7 days last year, but it included two long runs, which shouldn't count for the same week, and the second one was a 17-mile run that ended in a death march jogging the last few miles over 9-minute pace.

Long runs: 14 and 10 miles.

LT workout: 10-mile run with long hills or 4-mile tempo run (but 10 miles regardless).

Easy runs: 9.33 miles on average.

I like whiskey. And in particular, I like a good Bourbon. You probably figured that I don't drink a whole lot, so it takes a lot of time to try many different Bourbons, and this hobby of mine only started when we moved to Kentucky. Bourbon is very cheap here, so I bought a bottle. The first one was Jim Beam - a whiskey I knew before, and didn't particularly like, but it was like $12 for 0.75 liters. And it was fine. But I saw all those much higher priced bottles on the shelf in the store and they made me wonder how they taste...

My favorites are the whiskeys produced by the Buffalo Trace distillery in Frankfort. I ran their 5K, too. The flagship BT is fantastic, George T. Stagg is even better.

Today I bought a bottle of Old Forester Signature. This one is produced by Brown-Foreman. The first sip was not very good, but now I'm at the 3rd glass (and it's 50% alcohol), and I have to say I really do like it. Now the only question is, how will work and my 9-mile run go tomorrow.

Bad thing in good thing is that my mileage sucks. Only 30 miles this week so far, in four days, including my long run. Since I'm working toward 58 miles, it should be like one 10-miler and two 9-mile days. Doable. I'll see if I can run tomorrow morning. If yes, I might do 4+6 or 5+5 or 5+6. So I can run less on Saturday. Because I'll have to jump into next week with no rest. I took the rest yesterday.

Yesterday I had a bad day. Working all day like a dog, and I didn't even have any time to run. I was dog tired in the evening, even though it turned out to be an unscheduled rest day (bad thing). I'll have to run on Sunday to make up for that.

Then turn around today, I had a killer workout. I went to the high school track to run 5 x 800 meters. After 2.2 miles of warmup, here are my splits: 2:56.69, 2:53.94, 2:54.03, 2:53.08, 2:51.82. Except for the first one, all are in the McMillan range finally for an 1:25 HM. I could also put the first one there, if I really wanted to, but I wanted to play it safe. It wasn't even all that hard. I could have done at least one more.

Several weeks from now, I'll have a track workout that is supposed to be 5 x 1200 m at 2 sec/lap slower than 8K-10K goal pace. If my HM goal is 1:25, the corresponding 8K goal pace is 3:47/km. That is 3:01.6 split at 800 m. Of course it would be one extra lap after that, but it doesn't seem all that hard. For an 1:23 HM, 8K goal pace is 3:41.5, and the 800 splits are 2:57.2. Even that seems possible now.

Log: Monday, 8 miles, 1:03:11. 47 F, sunny. Mizuno.

After the successfully finished 58 mile week, I'll have another of the same mileage this time.

Total: 58 miles.

Long runs: 14 and 10 miles.

VO2: Officially 5 x 2:30 moderately steep uphill. Recoveries are 50 to 90 percent of the duration of the interval. I may want to change this to another 5 x 800 meters, because that is more measurable, and I need VO2 max improvement.

Easy runs: Need to average 8.5 miles/day, which is a little over my comfort zone. So run 4 + 6 or 6 + 4 when possible, and just make sure we get to the total  mileage.

I ran to the Big Four Bridge opening yesterday. This is an old, former railroad bridge between Louisville, KY and Jeffersonville, IN, that is being converted to pedestrian and bicycle usage. The last train crossed it in the 60's, and after that they took down the ramps, so there was large, elevated bridge, not wide enough to build a road on it, but not worth to demolish. So this was the perfect thing to do.

Still, I thought with the way American society is, nobody would be out there. The news about the opening didn't exactly made the headlines. To my surprise, there was a crowd. Running was like when you line up at the back of the pack accidentally at a large race. Fortunately I wasn't in any hurry. The run was long, took me 10 miles to get to the far side from campus and back. You still can't get down to the ground on the Indiana side, because that ramp is still unfinished. I got somewhat dehydrated when I got back to campus, because it was fairly warm (a gorgeous day all in all).

I'm at 50 miles in 5 days. One easy run away from my weekly mileage.

I ran a very good tempo today. I'm afraid to say that "I'm back", because I'm afraid I would jinx it, like I did last time, but hey, it did go well.

2 x 2.5 miles tempo intervals, and the half mile splits were 3:06, 3:12, 3:16, 3:04, 3:08 (total 15:46.35), then after a half mile recovery, 3:10, 3:05, 3:05, 3:13, 3:13 (15:46.86). That means both bouts were at 6:19 average pace. With this run, I also finished 40 miles so far this week and it's only Wednesday.

Weather was quite nice though, 41 F and sunny.

Long run yesterday, 13 miles at 7:30/mile. I felt pretty good despite the fact that I didn't eat or drink anything. This is very unusual of me, but I only brought Gatorade, and I had some mild gastrointestinal discomfort, so I didn't want to risk drinking the sugary drink. This is probably the first time in my life of running this long without any fluid intake. But it was cold (around 32 F, 0 C), so I didn't sweat too much.

Plan for week -12:

Total: 58 miles.
Long runs: 13 and 9 miles.
LT: 2 x 2.5 miles tempo intervals. Start at 6:30/mile, then try to accelerate. I'm afraid I won't be able to.
Easy runs: either one 8-8.5, or do a double of 5 each or so.

I solved the mystery why I can't run fast tempos. It's because my VO2 max sucks. Surprisingly it seems like I detrained my VO2 max during the weeks following the HM in November. I already may have had some decline before the race, because I barely ever did any VO2 max work.

Today I went to the track and I ran 800's. It's been raining and freezing on and off (and today it was the rain's turn), so I was sure the trail would be like a mud pit. It was a good choice, because it got revealed that I can't do those 800s very fast. I ran 2:56, 2:57, 2:57, 2:59, 2:59. The last two were quite hard, and I know I was at or over my VO2 max. This is still faster than I used to run like a year ago, but it only corresponds to 1:27-1:28 HM time, not 1:25. Well, you just do what you can do. The circumstances were close to ideal (except for some wind), so those are not to blame.

At least I lost two ponds, as of this morning. Down to 151 again. I hope to be 148 or less by May.

Finished the week with 50 miles, but the 2 x 2 miles tempo was a failure again. In the second interval I ran 6:36/miles, but I couldn't run any faster even if somebody chased me with a gun. Seriously. I felt lactate rushing though my muscles at that pace. The 35 degrees didn't help, but this is still super disappointing. I can probably forget about the 1:23 dreams. I should also sleep more and get less stressful in real life, because that takes quite a bit of energy out of me. So I guess I'll have to give up my evening coffee again.

Week -13: Total of 54 miles.

Long runs: 13 and 9 miles.

VO2 max: 5 x 3:00 trail sprints. Total of 8 miles.

Easy runs: 8 miles each.

Easy run today is finished with only minor discomfort in my left hip. So this 50-mile week is going to be counted as success. The only thing I wanted to be better at this point in my training is 6:20 tempos, but I hope the 6:25's I run now are good enough. I'm so excited to start the regular training plan!

Week of 1/20 (-14).

Total of 50 miles.

Long runs: 12 and 9 miles.

LT: 2 x 2 miles LT intervals at 6:20 with 2-3 minutes of jogging between the intervals. Total of 8 miles.

Easy runs: 3 times 7 miles.

On the day of Lance Armstrong's confession, I finally had a nicer tempo. Not perfect, but on a teaching day, finishing in the dark, pretty cold weather (and started with breathing difficulties) I'll take it. I cut the warmup short to 1.57 miles, so I would be more fresh and I wouldn't have net elevation loss. That feels like cheating. So instead I had a 15 feet net gain (with a couple of 20-30 feet hills, but nothing too serious). The fast 4 miles were 6:29, 6:24, 6:25, 6:22. Average of 6:25.165. I only set out to run sub 6:30 (see the first mile), so maybe that's the secret. Or simply the slump is over. At least I ran another sub-20 5K somewhere in there. :)

7.1 easy tomorrow to finish up the 50-mile week. I have almost no pains! My very troublesome right ankle seem to have healed completely, my left hip was pain free today. The only issue I had was my stubborn left heel PF, but that's really minor. Well, maybe I'm speaking too soon. I will see what I'll have tomorrow.

Hard training start next week!

Finished my 50-mile week, which I'll repeat starting today.

Then off to HM plan as follows:

Jan 20: Week -14

Jan 27: Week -13

Feb 3: Week -12

Feb 10: Week -11

Feb 17: Week -10

Feb 24: Week -9

Mar 3: Week -8

Mar 10: Week -7

Mar 17: Week -6

Mar 24: Week -5

Mar 31: Week -4

Apr 7: Week -3

Apr 14: Week -2

Apr 21: Week -1

Apr 28: Race week.

May 4: Race day.

Another sucky tempo is no big news I guess. But it's my responsibility for the future myself to document it. 4 fast miles at 6:21, 6:25, 6:31, 6:26. At the end, I was done for. In the pain cave for the last 0.7 mile. The course was my usual, somewhat hilly course close to work (but not too hilly at all). The weather was perfect, 55 degrees, and my run had net elevation loss. Average pace was 6:25.69. Barely qualifies for tempo run.

Still much faster than I was a year ago, but not where I should be based on my last half marathon. At least hard running is over for the week. Only two days, a little more than 14 miles, and I'm hitting a magic 50. HM training starts on 1/20 (though I should probably double check that).

Here we go. The low of the training: no running since Dec. 29. It was always cold and cloudy outside, and I didn't feel like going out. I rather stayed at home drinking good bourbon. But it's all over now. From today, I'll revamp the training.

I'll do four hour-long runs this week until Saturday. Then from Monday, I'll repeat the staple week twice: total 50 miles, with 13.1 mile long run, 8 mile tempo (4 fast), and 7.23 mile easy runs. The tempo is fine to anywhere between 6:30 and 6:20.