Training Summary: 6/2 - 6/8

Mon: 7.5 miles
Tue: 6.5 miles
Wed: 5.5 miles
Thu: 0 – Day Off
Fri: 7 miles
Sat: 6.5 miles
Sun: 7 miles
Total: 40 miles

Well, I finally threw in the towel this week. Whether it’s temporary or permanent remains to be seen. I started the week off hoping to get my training back on track and optimistic I could do so, but by Tuesday afternoon all that optimism was gone and I honestly had no desire to run at all. In fact, had I not been scheduled to meet Andrew, I would have headed straight home after work. As is, I decided I was simply going to jog at an easy effort for however long I felt like it then call it a day. That turned out better than I had envisioned and I managed to log 6.5 miles for the day.

During that run, I decided I would take the rest of the week really easy, limiting my overall mileage and slowing down my pace significantly. Accordingly, my runs were all around a 7:30/mile average, which is anywhere from 20-30 sec/mile slower than usual for me. Honestly, it felt good. I was just running at a relaxed effort and couldn’t have cared less what pace I was going nor did I even think about picking it up at any point.

Part of me really wants to make this change permanent and forget about ever competing again. I’m just burned out on it, the training, the sacrifices to optimize that training, the racing itself, all of it. The one thing I’ve realized while only racing three times in the last 10 months is I don’t really miss it. There are times I do and certain aspects that still appeal to me, but for the most part, I’m just as happy to be on the sidelines watching my friends and rivals compete.

I put a lot of thought into where to go from here and came to the following conclusion: there’s still enough of a fire smoldering deep inside me that I can’t completely walk away from the competitive side of the sport just yet. At the same time, I’ve also finally come to peace with the fact that I can’t train like I did when I was 25 nor will I ever be anywhere near as fast as I once was. Work stresses, family life, and age, are all factors in that.

So, I’m going to make a couple tweaks to my training to see if that helps and make one more run at this thing. The primary thing I’m going to do is slow down my easy days just like I did throughout this week. I’m hoping that will allow me to recover so that I’m not so tired and dead-legged all the time and also help me run faster in my workouts, which is where the real progress takes place. I’ve had people suggest this to me for a long time now, but to this point I’ve been too stubborn to listen. Well, stubbornness has gotten me nowhere and I’ve reached the point where I’m willing to give just about anything a shot, so here goes. I feel like by the end of the summer I should know something one way or the other. Either I’ll be feeling less burned out on a daily basis and be running faster, or everything will be the same or worse. If it’s the latter, then I’m going to stop trying to see how fast I can run and just enjoy the sport for the fitness aspect of it. I’m honestly at a point where I’ll be fine with that, but at the same time, here’s hoping it’s the former.