July 29th-August 4th Training

Monday: 8.2 miles (7:03); 6.3 miles (7:13)

Tuesday: 10.9 miles (6:49); 4.6 miles (7:16)

Wednesday: 9.6 miles with 12x.15 miles fast stride, .35 miles jog.  This was really glorified strides.  I ran these on a constant rolling route, and had the bad timing of having most of the fast portions on an uphill.  Maybe it was good timing for down the road, who knows; 6.8 miles (7:13)

Thursday: 9.6 miles (6:39); 5.4 miles (6:57)

Friday: 10.7 miles with 9 mile progression.  Goal was 3 miles each in 18:30, 17:15, 16:00.  Ran 18:01 (6:09, 5:56, 5:56), 16:54 (5:40, 5:39, 5:35), 15:59 (5:22, 5:20, 5:17).  Finally finished this without punking out in the last section. First three were "eh", second three were super easy and the last was somewhat tough  The entire first mile of that portion was down a road with a little headwind but with 8:00am traffic and a 50mph speed limit blowing wind in my face most of the time.  I started breathing a little bit hard over the last 1km or so but was able to get it done.  Rusty, but I'm slowly getting there; 6.8 miles (6:57)

Saturday: 9 miles (6:41); 6 miles (7:12)

Sunday: 20.1 miles (6:17). Misery index was around 145, so I was soaked.  Was rolling sub 6:10 a few miles in and then started getting a little dehydrated about 10 miles in, and took a short water stop after the end of the 10.7 mile loop.  Headed out on the Boomer Route and struggled big time on the first hill on Jones Rd. and absolutely crawled up the first hill on Saundersville. Normally I run pretty big negative splits on long runs and close out my last two miles sub 6:00 but today, they were closer to a 6:30 average.  The only fast movement was when I jumped in the air like someone who stepped on a land mine when I thought a dragon fly on the road was a big tarantula.  Luckily I didn't see that piece of tire that I always think is a cottonmouth.  3 miles (7:33)

Week Total=117 miles. Good week overall.  I feel like I'm slowly getting some fitness back and am recovering pretty quickly.  Next week, I'll shoot for 120ish and hopefully will be ready for some structured speed workouts in a couple more weeks.