January 21st-27th Training

Monday: 5.4 miles (6:32); 9.3 miles (7:45)

Tuesday: 11.6 miles with 11 miles medium@5:36.  Was a little rusty at first but felt really good by the end.  Right before the turnaround, I saw man run out of his trailer and start puking off his porch.  When I passed him again, he was blowing out snot/puke rockets and yelled "honey, I ain't taking no more medicine!" Who needs to train in Flagstaff or Boulder when you get to see stuff like this?; 6.2 miles with 10x.15 miles with .35 recovery.  Ran these as glorified strides and to get in some faster turnover on some tired legs, without causing too much stress.  Legs felt really slow at first but felt really good by the end.  Started out in the 4:40s and worked down to sub 4:20 with a 4:30 or so average for the fast ones.

Wednesday: 10.4 miles (6:26)

Thursday: 4 miles (6:19); 6.4 miles (6:54) with 4xhill blasts

Friday: 7.5 miles (6:44); 3.4 miles (7:33)

Saturday: 4 miles (7:14); 8.1 miles with 5k in 15:12.  Ran a little harder than AT effort.  I feel like this course is about 20s short or so but it is so insanely twisty, it is as "fast" as a legit course.  From about 1.25-3 miles, you are constantly making sharp turns, going up or down, etc.  During that time there's hardly any stretches for more than 5-10 seconds where you are running straight.  Was happy with how my legs felt.  Ran 16:18 here last year and 15:51 the year prior.

Sunday: 20.1 miles (6:06).  Really good run and was already running 6:15s a few miles in, so I made myself relax.  With Boston potentially on the agenda, I've decided to start running downhills a little harder to get my legs more ready.  For my long runs, I'll usually run The Boomer and then St. Blaise but I swip-swapped it so I can finish running down Saundersville, which is mostly downhill but has some climbs as well.  I feel that will replicate Boston pretty well.  Ran in the upper 5:30s for the last two miles.

Week Total: 96.4 miles. Pretty decent week and feel a ton better than last week.  I'm really pleased with my recovery and I'm surprised I've been running my easy days as quickly as I have been.  I think a large part of that is my reduction in mileage and intensity.  If you are training very hard, you have to slam on the brakes on the easy days.  I should finalize Boston as soon as I hear back from someone.  If it works out, I'll add in some intensity next week.  If not, I'll just keep it easy for a few weeks.  Also put on about four pounds since the marathon and am getting my off-season pooch in already.  Ate the rest of the ice cream and Teddy Grahams so they would be out of the house (good logic there)