It looks like we will have a heat wave during my race - night temperatures around 75 F, probably close to 80 by the time we race. This makes a sub-20 all but impossible. Which means that I will have to go on and train for a fall race. Looking at the average expected temperatures, it looks like October 11-12 is the time when night temperature averages go below 50 F. So how about racing on October 8? There is a Susan G. Komen race for the cure in Louisville that day - which I would probably hate to run, because it is too big and slow/runners walkers won't understand that they shouldn't line up on the front - but there may be races around that date that pop up later.

Counting 12 weeks back from October 8:

Race week starts on 10/03.
Week -1: 9/26
Week -2: 9/19
Week -3: 9/12
Week -4: 9/5
Week -5: 8/29
Week -6: 8/22
Week -7: 8/15
Week -8: 8/8
Week -9: 8/1
Week -10: 7/25
Week -11: 7/18

This means I'll have about 1 week after coming back (and the jet lag is over) to start the cycle. It looks like I can't entirely stop running in Hungary.

Log: Wednesday, 7 miles from home in 57:02 in Saucony. 10:00 PM, 82 F (seriously).

Log: Sunday 11:20 am, track session. 85 F, sunny. Shoe: adidas. 3400 m warmup, 3200 m cooldown at ~8:20/1600 m. 3000 m time trial. Splits are:

200: 42.85 (started a bit fast, I should average 46 seconds on 200 m)
600: 1:32.94 (good)
1000: 1:33.85 (getting hard, it is too hot today)
1400: 1:33.99 (the black asphalt of this track seems to radiate the heat - I'm very hot)
1800: 1:35.56 (the heat - or whatever - is starting to affect my time)
2200: 1:40.40 (I'm trying to save this workout but cutting the speed, so I can still run)
2600: 1:40.92 (I switched to irregular breathing - I'm trying not to puke)
3000: 1:32.65 (fuck-fuck-fuck-fuck-fuck-I'm-dying)
Total: 11:53.16. Pretty disappointing, as I was trying for 11:29. But maybe it was just the heat. I ran 11:33 in a similar time trial last April, and that training cycle didn't give me the sub-20.

BTW with this run I finished a 44-mile week successfully.

Race week:

M: 7 miles.
T: 6 miles.
W: 5 miles.
T: 4 miles (very easy)
F: rest.
S: 2 miles warmup + race + cooldown = 8 miles.
S: rest, beginning of my summer break.

Total: 30 miles.

Week -1: 36.5 miles.

Long runs: 9 and 7 miles.

Track: 2x2000 meters in 7:50 with 800 m recovery. With warmup and recovery 3200 m each, a total of 7 miles.

Easy runs: three times 4.5 miles.

Log: Saturday 6:00 pm, 7 miles easy in Saucony in 56:46. Temperature: 84 F, partly cloudy.

I think I'm going to make my students watch this:

http://www.ted.com/talks/leonard_susskind_my_friend_richard_feynman.html

We organized a conference in town this week and that killed my training plans. I only managed to get 34 miles in (instead of the planned 47). It's like one (really) long run short. I only ran 5 days of the week. Oh well. I consider my losses and prepare the next week like nothing happened. At least I had my VO2 max workout, which is probably the most important in this phase. I ran 5x1000 meters in 3:55, 3:56, 3:54, 3:54, 3:53.

Next week (-2) should be 43.5 miles. According to Pfitzinger, this is how it should look like:

Long runs: 9 and 8 miles.
LT run: 3K or 2 mile race. With warmup and cooldown this would be a 6-mile day.
Three easy runs: 7 miles each.

One change I'm contemplating is that the LT run could be a straightforward 4-mile tempo (plus warmup, cooldown) instead of the race. It is basically impossible to find a 3K race here, so I would have to make it a time trial, and a tempo might be more beneficial. Though the time trial has it's own advantages, especially because I don't do strides, so I may need more anaerobic training. I'll decide later.

Week -4 is finished with the planned 47 miles. This is cutback from last week, but the intensity is dialed up; in fact, probably the first time ever, my average pace was under 8 min/mile. Not that I planned for this, but I felt great for virtually all my runs (except maybe the Monday easy 7-miler). In fact, at the moment of writing this, I have run seven days in a row, 58 miles in those seven days (including last Sunday's 11-mile long run), just finished my 9-mile long run for this week, and I feel fresh. Nevertheless, I'll rest tomorrow, though I bet I will feel a little sluggish on Monday.

Plan for week -3: (47 miles)

Long runs: 10 miles and 9 miles.

Track: 3200 m warmup, 5x1000 m at race pace (1:33/lap, 3:53/interval - if this doesn't work, it is allowed to slow down somewhat, but all intervals must be strictly under 4 minutes). Recovery is 400 meters. 3000 m cooldown. Total of 8 miles.

Easy runs: 3 x 6 miles.

Edit: I should learn to add. This is only 45 miles. For this, and other reasons, I couldn't do this week as planned, see next post.

I ran 4x600 today, just two days after the time trial. I felt good, so I was aiming for 2:19/600 m. Everything went according to the plans. Splits were 2:20, 2:20, 2:19, 2:17. Recoveries were 1:11 each. (I covered 200 meters a little faster than that, then I was waiting until my watch turned 1:11, then I went on the next interval.)

I ran a 10000 meter time trial today at the local high school track. Guess what: 41:29. My goal was 41:33, because that is the 20:00 5K equivalent according to McMillan, but I wasn't sure if I could do it. I was fairly confident though that I could go under 42 minutes. So I decided to go out at 1:40/lap pace, which is 6:40/1600 m, 6:42/mile. Here are my 1600 m splits:

6:40, 6:40, 6:38, 6:41, 6:37, 6:42, 1:31 (for the last 400 m).

Before the last lap I was on pace for 41:38, and I was able to kick 9 seconds in the last lap.

I am more than satisfied. I know that track is easier than race, but this was in training! McMillan says this translates to a 19:58 5K. Also, my 5K splits were 20:50, 20:39.

Log: 7 miles in 54 F, and the fucking rain. In my Saucony. Five out of my seven most recent runs were all in rain. It looks like it barely stopped raining in Louisville in the last two weeks.

Unofficial log: Sunday, 11 miles, light rain, 65 F, adidas.

Plan for week -4:

Total: 47 miles.
Long runs: 8 and 9 miles.
Time trial: 3200 m warmup, 10000 m time trial, 3200 m cooldown. Total of ~10 miles.
Track: 3200 m warmup, 4 x 600 m at goal pace (faster than 2:24, but no faster than 2:19 - these correspond to 1:36, 1:33/lap respectively). Run 200 m recoveries no faster than 1/2 of the time of the interval. 3400 m cooldown. Total of 6 miles.
Two easy runs of 7 miles each.

We misunderstood each other with my running partner (for a day), and in fact he will be in town next week. Nevertheless, I ran 7 miles this morning by myself, running 6 laps on the Seneca Park running trail. What can I say - it was rather boring this way. I didn't even bring my MP3 player. Also, I ran 10 miles yesterday evening, so this makes it 17 miles in little more than 12 hours. My legs felt it! But now I'm at 39 miles for the week, and no injuries. My muscle soreness after the weekend is almost completely gone. Looking forward to the 11-miler on Sunday.

It's now official: I'm running Johnny's 5K Memorial Run on June 4th.

Today I got rained on again. I'm getting fucking tired of this. 3 out of 4 this week so far. And we're not talking about drizzle. I'm soaked wet every single time.

On Tuesday I ran 2x2000 m, and it was hard. The first one was fine (7:52), but after 800 m recovery, the second one was really hard. The last two laps were test of my guts (literally), but I finished it in 7:53. This is not ideal, but I guess it was somewhat expected. The weather has warmed up, I basically skipped a week, and the workouts are getting ever harder. If I could do all of them with no trouble, I would have a guaranteed sub-20. When in reality, I know that the best case scenario is that I barely break it.

Yesterday I ran 7 miles in the rain, and so far, out of the three runs of this week, two were in rain. I'm a bit fed up (and with all the flooding that comes with it). Tomorrow I'll run early in the morning in Seneca Park with an on-line pal. Cool. Today I'll do my 10-miler.

Finished the week with 47 miles with a 10-miler in Spruce Pine, NC. I ran the 10-miler on a very hilly course, but I managed to accomplish an 8:30 min/mile pace by accelerating toward the end of the run.

Next week I will combine week -6 and week -5 of the plan, because I have to save a week to run a race on June 4th. So I will run the lower mileage of week -6, but I will do the better quality work of week -5. The week will look like the following:

Long runs: 11 + 10 miles.
Track workout: 3200 warmup, 2000 fast (7:52.5, 1:34.5/lap), 800 recovery, 2000 fast, 4800 cooldown (might want to consider this on the street). Sum of about 8 miles.
Easy runs: 7 miles each (of 3).
Total: 50 miles.

Today I did 5x1000 meters. Essentially the same workout as two weeks ago, except the intervals were supposed to be faster: 3:56. My splits were perfect: 3:54, 3:53, 3:55, 3:55, 3:55. The weather was quite nice, 62 F and sunny, although just slightly warmer than ideal, but it didn't seem to inluence my prformance too much. It was a bit harder than 2 weeks ago, but not terrible. I ran my cooldown (3000 meters) at 8:01 min/mile pace (with no rest between the last interval and the cooldown!), which shows that I was not completely exhausted.

It was fun to watch some high school kids training just as I finished my run. They were running 600s quite a bit faster than I could (like in ~2:00). I mean I could certainly run 600 meters in 2 minutes, but not many of them.

I plan to run 7 miles tomorrow morning, then we travel to NC (Easter camp), where I will do a 10-miler probably Sunday early morning.

Unofficial log: home, 9:05pm, 7 miles, 56:30, Saucony, 49 F.