Mon: 4.5 miles (AM); 7 miles (PM)
Tue: 9 miles
Wed: 4.5 miles (AM); 10 miles, including turnover work (PM)
Thu: 4.5 miles (AM); 6.5 miles (PM)
Fri: 10.5 miles, including tempo
Sat: 6.5 miles
Sun: 17 miles
Total: 80 miles
I spent a lot of this week running on tired legs, but I guess when you’re training hard that’s to be expected, and as long as you plan in enough recovery and don’t cross the line, it’s actually a good thing. However, it’s a fine line to walk for a couple of reasons. First, sometimes it’s hard to figure out where the aforementioned “line” is, which can lead to injuries, a fact of which I am well aware. Second, you have to strike a balance between quantity and quality such that you’re still able to get after it in your workouts, because as has become one of my favorite sayings, if you wanna run fast, you gotta run fast. The quantity vs. quality balance shifts depending on the event you’re training for, but too often I’ve erred on the side of quantity and not raced as well as a result. All that said, I feel like I got things about right this past week, because in spite of my legs never really feeling fresh, I was still able to churn out some very solid runs.
Thanks to a cold, nasty rain, the first workout of the week got moved from Tuesday to Wednesday. While that was a good move for the most part, it was breezy on Wednesday, which is always extra aggravating when running a workout on the track. I wound up doing 6X400 followed by 6X200, which is the same workout I did five weeks ago as my first track workout in a long, long time. The end result was I ran the 400s 2-3 seconds faster than previously and the 200s 1-2 seconds faster, a nice improvement that showed me I’m making progress.
After an easy day on Thursday, I came back with another workout on Friday. I think it’s best for me to have two days between workouts rather than just one, but this was the second week in a row where various events have forced me to go off just one day of recovery. I wasn’t expecting much accordingly, but got in a good effort nonetheless consisting of a 20 min tempo followed by 3 minutes recovery then a harder mile. None of it was anything to get excited about, especially the mile, but let’s just say that I closed out the workout about as fast as I closed out some of my 5k races last year, so that’s a good sign, especially on tired legs.
I finished the week by running the same hilly long run loop from my house that I ran the week before. I didn’t feel too good early and wanted to be sure not to overdo it as well, but once I got rolling, I wound up with a very solid run. The last 11 miles were covered in 1:11:07, for an average of 6:28/mile, and I hit the last three in 6:21, 6:20, and 6:13. The best part is, for the most part, it all felt pretty controlled and comfortable.
Not sure what this coming week is going to bring. It looks like the weather may play a major factor and could limit me to one workout and possibly even force a day off. I don’t like that idea, but it might even be a good thing in the grand scheme of things. I will say that I’m beyond ready for winter to be over. The wind hasn’t seemed to stop for I don’t know how long now, and I think there were flurries in the air every day from Thursday on this past week. We had a fairly mild start to winter, but once it set in, it did so with a vengeance. We make the time change this weekend, though, so there has to be light at the end of the tunnel (pun intended). Have a good week, all!
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