Hi all. Another week in the books at a decent if tiring one at that. Got my last really long run and hard workouts out of the way and am looking forward to racing the next three weeks.
The week began with a solo 9.3 mile effort on the roads in my new shoes I had won at the race. I clipped along at an average sub 7 pace and was impressed by the shoes. they have a lower profile than I have been used to of late but I like the better feel of the road you get with these type of shoes so will take the numbness in my forefeet while I get used to them!
Tuesday saw the usual Miners/track double. The track workout was a fairly light one after the race at the weekend. I did 8 400s with a 2 minute recovery. The first 4 I wore my flats and hit an average around the 70 second mark, the last 4 I threw on the spikes and managed a 66 average. I still feel awkward in my spikes and as if I am not exploiting them to their full potential but they're still certainly faster than my flats.
Wednesday I had a lie in (especially for Steve that one!)and just ran an easy 5 at lunch time with my co-worker buddy Ryan. He ran a sub 40 in his second ever 10k last weekend and over the summer I'm going to help him get his 5k time into the 18s hopefully.
Thursday I had decided was going to be long run day so that I could move the second workout of the week back to Sunday. Not only that but as I would be running to work and Lisa was going to have to come and pick me up, I would be doubling and running half way home in the evening. I still wanted to meet up with my usual Dowd am buddies so mapped out a route whereby I could run from my house to the Dowd, meet the guys and run half of the remaining ten miles to work with them. This worked out well although my legs were very tired by the end. That will be the last time I run for over 2 hours in quite a while I would imagine though! The legs had recovered pretty well by the time I ran my 5.3 after work and so hit over 24 miles for the day.
Friday I was able to take completely off knowing I was still going to be on track to hit the goal of 75 miles for the week. I met the Friday runners group that hang out at The Burger Company for lunch and also signed up to run for the store again this coming season. This was the prize I won for coming second overall in the GP series last year and it's the last season they are handing out sponsorships as a prize so I had better make the most of it! I am very grateful for the opportunity to represent the store and am looking forward to picking up my new race shirt next week!
Saturday I got up early and took a trip down memory lane running the old 7.5 mile loop through Mcalpine that Tim and I used to run before he upped and left Charlotte. I ran in the Defyance again and again enjoyed the ride. I got home just in time to get the kids up and head out to watch the Corporate Cup Half and Relay. I had fun just hanging out and watching a bunch of my mates racing and cheering them on. In a series of notable performances it was 14 year old Alana Hadley who once again deservedly grabbed the headlines with a 1:21 win in her first ever Half (on a very challenging course!)
This was the second year running I had watched this race but this year was in much happier circumstances as last year I had planned to run this race until a calf strain two weeks before put paid to that. It is nice sometimes to be able to just kick back and watch everyone else race. I haven't had to take any significant time off since last year's race- this is definitely the longest injury free period of running I have had since I started running!
Today was the climax to the week and was a pretty daunting workout of an 8 mile AT tempo on the Lansdowne loop, jog to PDS track and run a mile in 5:10 and 2 kms in 3:03, all with 400m jog recovery. Luckily I had recruited the company of Rocky Falcone to help me out and help me out he did indeed. We hit 44:43 for the 8 miles having gone through the 10k in sub 35 and then laced up the spikes to hit 5:05, 3:04, 3:04 on the track. I was exhausted but very satisfied with the workout. As I write this Sunday evening my legs are still very sore from the workout but I'm not running until after work tomorrow so hopefully they will be showing some signs of life again by then.
I ended up running 75.5 miles for the week and am looking forward to this week with Tim coming into town Wednesday and Thursday, the track meet on Friday night and the 2011 GP opener on Saturday less than 12 hours after that! I will preview both races later in the week but if you want a good Shamrock 4 miler preview in the meantime, check out Brian's blog....
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