Karate Kid/John Kreese Theme

Altitude running, Hanson's Distance Project, and Ritz.

For some reason, I was thinking about the Karate Kid this morning, and realized that John Kreese's dialogue in the movie has a lot of parallels with my weekend running. So here we go:

Thursday, February 16th - 8 miles (2 up, 2x2 mile, 2 down). Fear does not exist in this dojo, does it?!?! Dreaded tempo work on a perfect evening (40's, breezy). Dragged Mike out to suffer with me, since he had 800 meter repeats. Quick warmup on the roads, quick stretching, then right into the workout. Wanted to hit around 6:00 min/mile, but realistically was hoping 6:10's. Mike wanted to hit 3:10's for his 800's, but decided to pace me through. Anyways, felt ok on the first rep with a great split, but definitely was scared of the second rep and had already written myself off as not being able to finish it. 5 minute break, then jumped into it. Well, my worst fears were written off, as I actually felt pretty good on the 2nd rep (tired legs but to be expected), and hit the split. Slow cooldown on the track afterwards. Big thanks to Mike for seeing me through to the end, and I couldn't have hit it without him. 2 mile splits were: 11:55 (6:00, 5:55), 11:58 (Garmin said 5:53, 5:55 which was off, more like 5:58, 6:00 I am thinking).

Friday, February 17th - 8 miles. Defeat does not exist in this dojo, does it?!?! Legs felt like wet noodles, and contemplated defeat by skipping this run, but ultimately got out there with Crystal after work. Was dragging major butt starting out, but eventually got going towards the turnaround. Did Home Depot route out and back - thanks to the creepy hooded guy that climbed down onto the trail from one of the bridges, that consequently scared Crystal into speeding up. I don't remember the splits, but we started in high 8's and finished in low 8's.

Saturday, February 18th - 8 miles (2.5 up, 10 x hill, TRUFFLE SHUFFLE 4 MILER). Pain does not exist in this dojo, does it?!?! Early morning to St. Charles to run the Big River Running Truffle Shuffle - Crystal and I weren't racing competitively, so decided to get in our hill workout beforehand. Jogged the last mile of the course and back (scout it out for the others), then found a good hill closeby the start/finish of the race, then settled into do the workout. Legs were still awful, and I am not going to lie when I said I was hurting on the warmup. Hilly course + dead legs = not fun. Anyways, hit the hills at mile pace (2-3 miunte rest in between reps), then went to change and meet up with Megan, who I was running with. The course had changed from last year, and was now a big rectangular loop with some nasty hills on the last couple miles. Had a lot of fun running this race, and was happy to help Meg PR by a minute and a half! Congrats to Pat, Timmy, and Mattie (and Crystal too) for their respective PR's, and a great post race celebration complete with Bailey's and hot chocolate! Ran over to Ferguson Brewing Company for lunch afterwards, then stopped by Soulard Mardi Gras to survey the fun/damage.

Sunday, February 19th - 10.5 miles. We do not train to be merciful here. Mercy is for the weak. Long run with Crystal, which was not very fun. Tweaked my back a bit, so wasn't feeling too great. Decided on Old Faithful/Home Depot loop, so started out ok but had to chase down Crystal (she had gotten a bit ahead) which was a little tiring. Then we hit the Meridian Hill, which got progressively more painful as we went further along. Finally we reached the top, where I had to stop and stretch out for a few minutes before starting again. Crystal showed no mercy to me, as we proceeded to negative split the miles coming in, which really sucked, but quite honestly just wanted it to be over. I think we ran 1:25 something total. Afterwards, lots of stretching - lower back felt like it was locked in the joint, which was causing some major pain. 50 miles this week, 119 for February, 284.5 for 2012.

Back is a bit of a mess today, so I'm hobbling around a bit. Easy mileage today and drills, then we'll see how I feel tomorrow before jumping onto the track and destroying myself.