Rapid-turbo Catchup!

Happy Labor Day weekend everybody! Hope you all had a nice, relaxing weekend, and were able to get in a few runs! Fell behind on my running log and running around like a madman, so here we go with a long recap:

Thursday evening, Crystal and I went over to a local subdivision to do our scheduled hill workout. Weather was ok – kind of warm, but later in the day, so wasn’t too bad. The hill we picked was a monster, and we were in for a tough workout. Both of us had commented earlier that our legs were starting to feel the wear and tear of the aggressive training cycle, so I think we were pretty tired coming in. Didn’t wear a Garmin, and the sidewalk we were running on was wide enough for 1 person so I led the reps. Parked our car a little bit away, jogged roughly 1/3 of a mile to the hill. First one, didn’t really have a good idea of pace, apparently went off way too fast because after about a minute I had already lost Crystal. She claimed I was trying to kill her (a pretty consistent accusation), but quite honestly didn’t know what was going on with speed. Slowed it down the next couple reps, finally found our stride. Legs were worn out by the 5^th rep, but battled through the last two reps. Last rep, changed direction and ran towards the car and surprisingly the worst rep, as the hill we ran on was almost like a “progressive rolling hills” hill. Cooled down back at the house. Total mileage: ~4 miles – splits were pretty consistent, all around 1:35, give or take a couple seconds.

Friday, day off. Went to dinner with Pat and Crystal at Laurie’s, then a few beers and a spirited battle of ping pong before turning in early. Woke up early Saturday for our 2^nd 20 miler. Weather was raining, so texted Crystal and decided to wait a little bit to see if it would stop. Well, it didn’t, so we decided to suck it up and try to get it in since I was going to the Illini-Mizzou Arch Rivalry football game that afternoon. Stopped raining by the time we started, but within 5 minutes it started to come down again. It never got any better either, as the rain was just falling pretty consistently. Miles were going by pretty easily, and legs felt great. We were pretty much soaked by the 4^th mile, and all I could hear besides the rain falling everywhere was the “squish squish” from my soaked socks and shoes. At mile 5, gave us the option to turn around and try the 20 the next day, but we ultimately decided to finish it out. Felt great at the turnaround, nothing to note other than I splashed Crystal pretty good with a puddle by accident! – lol I swear listening to her curse and yelling at me totally makes my day – LOL Next few miles, the rain started to come down really hard, but were luckily in the shade of many trees so wasn’t too bad. Hit the downhill on the trail, was just coasting at this point. Last 3 miles, I always seem to get into super focus mode because it’s uphill and just want to finish the run without too much discomfort. We kind of picked it up a bit, was flying the last 2 miles at nearly race pace. Felt a little discomfort the last 1.5 miles, but overall great seeing the run was executed with no problems at all in crappy conditions. 2^nd 20 miler was done!!! Total mileage: 20 miles – splits were: 9:01, 8:37, 8:27, 8:28, 8:37, 8:42, 8:25, 8:26, 8:12, 8:23, 8:26, 8:13, 8:11, 8:03, 8:02, 8:02, 7:47, 7:59, 7:26, 7:26.

Went to the Illini game, if you want to call it a game, fun times I suppose, had a little “too much fun” if you know what I mean, crashed out early (more like passed out!). Woke up to Crystal texting me to get my butt over so we could execute our scheduled run, so stumbled over there. Weather was a little muggy and sunny, so wasn’t really feeling too great. Decided to do out and back on the Troy loop. Started out feeling pretty stiff – first mile went ok, but Crystal wanted to slow it down. “Shockingly” (heavy sarcasm here), I look down to see 2^nd mile split 15 seconds faster (what ever happened to slowing it down?!), so figured it was going to be one of those days :/ Started to get in a much better rhythm, and the middle miles flew by. TONS of bikers everywhere, was nice to see a good showing on the trails that day. A couple passed us on bike and remarked that we were running at a pretty fast pace, which was nice to hear – not surprisingly, guess who is suddenly motivated to go faster?! Fast enough to pass a couple biker stragglers on the trail coming home! Last half, picked it up to race pace, then just blazed through the final mile. Felt good, tired, but happy to have that over with. Total mileage: 10 miles – splits were: 7:57, 7:47, 7:30, 7:41, 7:18, 7:25, 7:21, 7:17, 7:14, 7:00.

Week recap – 53 miles, 2-10 mile pace/tempo runs, and a 3/1 20 miler. Whew!!! What a great running week, but probably overdid it a bit! Monday, got our scheduled recovery run out of the way fast. Did GC, SLOW pace – both of us were pretty tired from the aggressive last week. Did GC trails out and back, weather was hot and humid (high 70’s), run went by pretty quickly since Pat joined us for the last 3 miles of it on bike. Nothing much to report, I felt like crap for the first 3.5 miles but got into more of a groove. Pace was decent, nothing too crazy. Total mileage – 5 miles: splits were high 8’s, low 9’s. Stretched, had an impromptu Labor Day BBQ and played some games on Pat and Crystal’s patio! A nice Labor Day weekend, and a TON of running!

Yesterday, was pretty sluggish all evening, and the hot/humid weather didn’t help. Finally got moving by 8ish, did out and back on the roads of G.C. Legs felt like mush and very sore, so just strapped on an IPOD and away I went! Loosened up eventually, run felt relatively easy effort-wise but was certainly feeling some leg soreness. Hit a few stretches where I was trying to avoid traffic, so threw in a couple sprints which didn’t feel too great. Pace felt easy – a little faster than I would have liked but didn’t push it too hard. Total mileage: 6 miles – 48-50 minutes.

Today, scheduled easy day, but considering a day off since we have been running like madmen, and legs just need a break. Race coming up this weekend – just checked the weather forecast this weekend, hot and humid. BLAH!!!!!!!!!