January 26th-February 1st

Monday: 10 miles (6:39); 7 miles (7:25)

Tuesday: 8.7 miles (7:01); 8.5 miles with 6x20s strides(6:26)

Wednesday: 11 miles with 9 mile medium progression. Goal was five seconds a mile faster than a couple of weeks ago: three miles each in 18:45, 17:30, 16:15.  Ended up at 18:31 (6:13, 6:05, 6:13), 17:26 (5:50, 5:48, 5:48), 15:50 (5:28, 5:26, 4:56). First section was super easy but I had a nice tailwind for most of it.  The second section wasn't too bad, even though there was a strong headwind for about half of it.  I struggled a little bit the first two miles of the last section because it was mostly into a headwind.  On the last, I got a little push from behind and since I was 5:05 pace at .7 miles, I decided to push the last quarter and break 5:00. Felt decent afterwards and happy to see I'm getting more fit with each additional week; 9.1 miles (7:11)

Thursday: 9.9 miles (7:26); 7 miles (7:21)

Friday: 10.7 miles (6:26); 7.3 miles with 4x10s hill sprints (7:13)

Saturday: 21 miles with 12 miles fast. I was going to do a light but fast fartlek on Friday and a 12 mile moderate run on Sunday but the weather was supposed to be really bad on Sunday.  And since Joey Elsakr wanted to do 12 miles at 5:25 pace on Saturday, I decided to join up with him for that.  I was super intimidated for the workout because it was about 10s a mile faster than I wanted to run and I didn't want to hold him back or get whooped by the young'n.  We ended up at 5:22 pace for the 12 and it felt really good.  The first six went by really quickly before slowly getting a little bit of tiredness.  But once I hit 10, it was smooth sailing and a huge confidence boost.  Instead about being about 15-20s out of shape, per mile, I feel like it's now close to 10-15.  Afterwards, we celebrated at Jumbo and Delicious.   Also, I ran 133,1 miles in the last seven days, which is a new lifetime PR.

Sunday: 6.8 miles (7:35); Skipped second run.  Dreary, cold and rainy all day and I can enjoy a skipped run after a solid workout and heavy week.

Week Total: 117 miles. Great week overall.  Two solid runs and the best sign that I'm coming around is that my legs felt light and fresh all week long. Time for some hard training.