October 22-28th Training

Monday: 5.6 miles with 4 strides; 5.6 miles (7:39)

Tuesday: 9.2 miles with 9 mile medium progression (5:47). My goal was three miles each at 6:20ish 5:55ish, 5:30ish.  Ended up averaging 6:06, 5:55, 5:23.  Had tailwind on the way out, headwind on the way back.  Normally these runs are tough when I'm just getting back into the swing of things, but I felt good.; 3.9 miles (7:27)

Wednesday: 3.6 miles (6:49); 9.5 miles (6:49)

Thursday: 3.6 miles (6:51); 9.8 miles with 4x10s hill sprints (7:20)

Friday: 5.5 miles; 5.4 miles (7:09)

Saturday: 8.1 miles with 5k in 16:14.  Justus David showed up to the race and I knew he would smoke me.  The course was hilly, windy and had a ton of sharp turns.  We ran pretty lazily through two miles (10:23) before he left me at about 4k. I knew I had no shot with my current fitness level, so I let him go. Maybe could have run 15:30 here if I went all-out but who knows.  Legs felt really flat and didn't feel like running.  Ran in-between 10k-HM effort; 4.5 miles (7:17)

Sunday: 16.3 miles (6:12). Made up a new route with a lot of rolling hills. Ran the first few around 6:30s, into the wind and then started running around 6:10-6:15 for quite some time, even though it felt like I was just jogging. Went sub 5:50 for my last three, with a 5:34 last mile, which was a slight pick-up.  The hills on Sandy Valley, Long Hollow and Longview put a whooping on me.  First run back where I actually felt like a runner...smooth, relaxed and in-control

Week Total=90.6 miles.  Good progression run and long run, with a crappy, unmotivating 5k.  I feel much stronger than I did two weeks ago but I still have a long way to go.  My basic endurance isn't bad but my speed/power is terrible, but then again I haven't done a real speed workout in over two months. Will shoot for around 100 next week with some good workouts.  With getting whooped by Justus, seeing Connor Kamm cruise through a blazing long run and having Kyle Stanton dropping a 2:22 at Frankfurt, I'm ready to get back into the swing of things again.