Sunday, 020308, 10 miles, week in review, plan for next week

I got Lucy out for a four miles (she is insanely strong, I ran four miles during this but she easily ran at least six as I was throwing the frisbee for her while running) and then quickly changed and got on the mill. I wanted some turn over and so I did 17 x 1 minute on, 1 minute off. Why 17? Because I was done when I got there. Really, I needed to be finished to get out with the kids for a bit. 10 miles in 68. The minutes on were at 5 m/m pace and the off minutes were 8 m/m pace. Stride counts were hitting 44-46 - so I think that is improving. My lower abs are still a touch sore, and I am not sure why - but I have suspected the treadmill! I think I might pull it a bit funny when I hit the front end of the deck (overstride onto the part that does not move). My gimp foot Ach. is a bit sore, but that is what you get for putting your foot in a lawnmower.

It was a good week. 80+ miles. 584 minutes.

M - 10 +, easy

T - 4, 7 w/ tempo run (treadmill)

W - 8e

T- 20, building (treadmill)

F - 6e, 5e

S - 10 steady state

S - 10 miles, 17 x 1 min on 1 min off

Next week I'd like to get a solid track workout in, do another good long run (but I might back off the distance a hair or two) and see if I can sneak a few other runs in to up the overall mileage. That said, I might shift things up and jump in a 5K race to get a quick status check. I feel good. I am starting to realize the benefits of this last two months - I am turning a corner. I still have a lot of work to do, but it is good to start to feel some of the benefits.

Week ago at this time: (note - this is freaking crazy stuff to do on the treadmill ... I do want to do this again, but I am not focused on this sort of work at the moment). I remember this run ... it was pretty insane.

17 miles, 3 hours, 8 minutes. Got the idea to do a long run in the evening on the mill while the family went to a scout sleep over at the aquarium. Decided to emulate PPA for as much of it as I could. The grades break out like this
1.25 miles 4.5%

3.05 miles (4.3 miles) 13.5%

3.3 miles (7.6 miles) 8.5%

2.6 miles (10.2 miles) 13%

3.1 miles (13.3 miles) 12.5%

I did a warm up of a mile in about 7:15. Decided I was not feeling so hot and that I would just take this one easy and as it comes. I figured if it opened up, I would go for it but the goal was to do an ascent simulation easy, and then open it up a bit to get three hours in. As it turned out, I struggled a bit but on whole it was not so bad. (I have the splits, but it is about an ascent in 2:41 on the mill). Then flattened it out and did some turn over miles to emulate down and to get to 3 hours. (7:55, 7:07, 4:46 for the last 7 tenths to bring it to 3:01 total. I obviously screwed up how to measure in the later miles. I took a gel after mile 7. Had water, DVD, the works. I was going back and forth between some walking and running in the second half, but it was pretty even efforted. I do want to get on this bugger and go after it. I would be nice to run the ascent in like 2:15-2:20 and then just cruise another 6 miles for a nice 20 in three hours.