Mon: 7 miles
Tue: 8.5 miles, including strides
Wed: 10.5 miles, including fartlek
Thu: 7 miles
Fri: 5.5 miles
Sat: 11 miles, including 5k race
Sun: 16 miles
Total: 65.5 miles
This wasn’t a bad week, but to be honest, I’m struggling a bit right now. Ever since a week or so before CDR, my energy level in general hasn’t been what I would like for it to be and I’m also having trouble getting my legs to a point where they feel the least bit snappy. As a result, the quality of my harder efforts has suffered, and that’s something I need to see if I can’t remedy soon, especially since those harder efforts are what I need the most. I don’t really have any specific complaints, although a few of those are starting to crop up as well. My right hip has acted a little weird off and on for the majority of this year. It hasn’t bothered me while running and hasn’t limited my training at all, but now I think whatever’s at play there might be spreading to other areas. For 2-3 weeks now, my right hamstring acts up the day after I do any faster pace running. Again, it doesn’t stop me from doing anything and it only bothers me very early in a run, but I feel it, and it’s something to keep an eye on. I plan on seeing my chiro this week as a preventative measure. I’ve got a good streak of training going on, and I don’t want to compromise that if at all possible.
Moving on, after some strides on Tuesday, the first workout of this week was on Wednesday and was a fartlek consisting of 5/3/5/3/2/1 min “on” followed by 2X30 sec. As I mentioned has been the case recently, my legs felt pretty heavy for this one, but it turned out better than expected. We started in the 5:40 pace range and got progressively faster throughout, covering some decent ground in the process. I recovered well between the efforts and felt strong afterward as well, both of which are good signs.
Thursday and Friday were basically easy days in prep for the race on Saturday. That race was the running leg of the Claytor Lake Triathlon, as I once again teamed up with Josh Stick on the swim and Ed Shepherd on the bike to form Team T-Bone. I’m pretty sure we had the fastest splits in each of our respective disciplines and won what was a fairly competitive relay competition, so it was a fun day. I was not, however, expecting my leg to be on trails, so that made things a bit more interesting. More to come on that topic in the form of a race recap in the next day or two.
Sunday I pretty much had to fight my way through 16 miles. Between all the hills on the course we ran and coming off the race the day before (which included a 4:30AM wake-up time), I was tired, beat-up, and really not wanting to run long. I was definitely glad to have Andrew there to listen to me complain – ha, ha. In the end it wasn’t a bad run, but it seemed longer and harder than it was for sure. Furthermore, I felt like the old man that I am when I started. My aforementioned right hip and hamstring were not happy at all, and the uneven terrain tweaked my left ankle and aggravated my chronic right achilles. Suffice it to say that it won’t bother me the least bit if I don’t run on trails again for a while. Running through the woods is nice and all, but those paths would be SO much better if they would pave them! The trails are also one of the reasons I will be visiting the chiro this week, as someone needs to help put Humpty Dumpty back together again!
Anyway, not a bad week all considered, but I definitely need to get on top of a couple things going forward. If I can, I believe I’m still poised to run a few more good races before the year is over. I want to conclude by doing something I’m pretty sure I’ve never done on this blog, and that’s make a plea to all my readers to please sign this petition to help save Men’s Track and Field at the University of Richmond. It was announced at the end of last week that the university has decided to cut men’s track so a lacrosse team can be added. Richmond Track and Field has a storied history and has been successful on many levels, including having an extremely good team GPA. They are the embodiment of what student athletes are all about, and this deal with track and field always being what gets cut when a college eliminates something needs to end if our sport is ever to thrive. So whether or not you have ties to Richmond, if you are a runner or fan of the sport, please take a moment and sign the petition. Thank you!
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