December 10th-16th

Monday: 5.7 miles (7:01); 11 miles (7:26)

Tuesday: 10.2 miles (6:37); 7 miles with 6xhill blasts (7:36).  Felt good on the hills, which is a good sign because I was expecting to have dead legs.

Wednesday: 4 miles (6:55); 14.4 miles with 20x400m with 1:00 rest, 3:00 rest after every 5th. Ended up at 22:32, which is 67.high average.  Took the extra rest because I felt like my legs would need it.  400s at 3k-5k effort put more stress on your legs, and with the marathon a few days ago, I felt like my legs wouldn't be completely up to task.  Started out around 70 and never went over 67 after the 4th, with a lot of 67s and then 66s.  Inner/upper legs were pretty tired and felt like they would give a little bit but they would recover quickly.  Aerobically, this was very easy and relaxed.  Recovery is going very well.  This workout also went by really quickly, while taking a straight 1:00 rest throughout drags on.  The extra rest after five, gave me something to look forward to and focus on.  That shows the importance of mentally breaking up your races into sections, rather than looking at just one big picture.

Thursday: 5.4 miles (7:21); 7.5 miles (6:54); 3.1 miles (7:32).  Busy day.  Not enough time for doubles, so had to cram in a triple.

Friday: NO RUNNING.  Got the puke bug from Mary. I'm getting tired of all this sickness, especially since I'm hoping to hammer the next three weeks.  Was in bed all day throwing up.

Saturday: NO RUNNING. Had a fast finish 22 mile long run planned but I couldn't do a thing.  Barely ate at all and felt really weak.  Man, I needed that session.

Sunday: 5.5 miles (7:05). Weak at first but better by the end.

Week total=73.8 miles. Crap.  After Friday, I would have had like 124 miles in a seven days but the sickness curtailed that. It seems like since August, I haven't been able to string together several good weeks.  I lost 47 planned miles this week, which is a big chunk of change.  And I'm not too confident in my marathon-specific fitness now and I lost that workout on Saturday.  Maybe this will freshen my legs up some, who knows?  A few days before the sickness, I started getting some night sweats and woke up several times during each night, which usually happens when I'm overdoing things and about to get worn down, so maybe somehow I avoided some mild overtraining.  I'm hoping for a very big week this week, as long as my body tells me it's ready.  Also happy with how quickly I recovered from Rocket City.  2.5 more weeks of solid training and then it's time to back off.