Monday - 6.5 miles easy

Ran a very easy 6.5 miles Monday evening in 51 minutes. Temperature in upper 80's/Heat index mid-90's. Was holding back so I would be fresh for speed workout Tuesday morning. Ran workout at avg pace of about 7:50/mile.

Saturday Long Run

12.5 miles - warm and humid. I didn't feel the greatest today, but I made it through the run and was able to pick up the pace and finish strong the last couple miles. I was pretty wiped out Saturday morning after a couple recovery days that were harder than I really needed. We started out around 7:30 pace and I was content to run that pace. I was tired and not real well hydrated so I was just looking to run an even pace. One of the high school guys who has run with us a few times took off ahead and Andrew commented that we'd probably end up catching him later. Most of my miles bounced around between 7:10 and 7:20 - probably depending on whether we had some uphill or downhill in the mile. I made sure to get plenty of fluid at the water stops. Once we left Memorial park on the way back, we picked up the pace and run a couple of sub 6:50 miles to finish. When we were about 1/4 mile from the finish Andrew and I had left the rest of the group and we saw the high school guy up ahead walking and looking pretty tired. We laughed a little bit about Andrew's prediction coming true and as we went by him he decided he needed to try to kick it in with us. He stayed with us for about 1/4 mile before he hit the wall again. I averaged between 7:15 and 7:20 pace for the 12.5 miles. Nothing to write home about but it beat trying to run 12 miles later in the day when the temp was in the mid 90's

7 miles - hot

I ran with a friend a lunch today around a loop that is about 7 miles long in 50:30. The temperature was about 90 and the heat index was in the mid 90's. I was a little tired today after yesterday's quick run so I was planning on taking it a little easier. We ran at a comfortable conversational pace most of the run until the last two miles where my friend wanted to run sub 7:00 pace. We ran the last two miles in the 6:50's and averaged about 7:15 pace for the run. I probably would have run 10 or 15 seconds a mile slower if I was by myself, but it was nice to have somebody else to run with. It was hot at lunch, but I just checked the weather and the heat index is currently at 102 so at least it was cooler than than if I ran this evening.

Thursday - Easy Day

Today was supposed to be a nice easy day just to get some miles in at the park. I ran at the park and the temperature was in the upper 80's when I started. Usually if I am feeling good, I get to the "0" mile marker at the park in under 5:50. I looked at my watch today as I passed it and did a double take when I saw that it was at 5:31. I ended up running my 7.6 mile run in 51:00 flat. My splits were 7:06, 6:56, 6:54, 6:51, 6:44, 6:36, 6:24, 3:31 for 0.6 miles. I guess that's what listening to Linkin Park on the iPod will do to your run. I was really surprised how good I felt and how quick I was moving considering how warm out it was. Tomorrow I will run slow and I'll be out early for the Kenyan Way long run Saturday morning. My wife told me she heard on the radio that it could hit 98 sometime this weekend. I can't wait.

Wednesday - Speed Workout

I've been completely swamped at work but it should be easing up by this weekend, but I made plans to go running at lunch and make sure I got a workout in. My schedule called for 3 x 2000m with 4:30 rest between each one. I was contemplating just putting in 6 - 8 miles, but I decided that I needed to get a hard workout in after Monday's workout that didn't go quite so well. I checked the weather before I headed down to the locker room and it said that it was 88 degrees out and the heat index was 94. Note to self: Do hard workouts inside on the treadmill when heat index is above 90. I stepped outside and it was hot and muggy. I probably should have just done easy miles in that weather, but I decided that I needed to work on my mental toughness and do hard workouts in tough conditions. I ran a two mile warmup in about 14:30 and did some drills and strides. I stopped to stretch and was just dripping in sweat. I planned my route where I would finish each 2k near a drinking fountain and I could get water. My schedule had initially given me a goal time of 6:20 - 6:28 or something like that, but I knew i had no chance of hitting a time like that in these conditions so I decided that I would try for 5:20/mile pace which would be 80 second quarters and finish in 6:40. While I was warming up there was a little cloud cover, but when I got ready to start the workout the sun came out.

I started out and hit my first qtr in 81 seconds. I managed to keep knocking out about 81 second quarters and finished in 6:44 which was about 5:24 pace. The last qtr of it was pretty tough but I knew I only had a little farther to go. The rest flew by and I started my 2nd one. I hit the first qtr and looked at my watch and it was 82 seconds, but I didn't feel like I had a lot in me to pick it up. I hit the half mile in 2:47 and 1200 in 4:12. At this point I decided that I needed to pick up the pace so I figured I would just go as hard as I could for the next 400 and then see what I could finish in. I managed 77 qtr and managed to go through the mile in 5:29. I ran an 81 second last qtr and finished in 6:50 and thought I was going to die. I was so dead and dry heaving at the end of the 2nd 2000 I decided to call it a workout at that point and jog back in. I probably would have been above 7:15 if I would have even been able to finish it. I did a 2 mile cooldown at about 8:30 pace. As I was slowly jogging in under the blistering sun, I had not so fond flashbacks to the 2007 Chicago marathon where the weather was pretty bad. The weather was just too nasty today to get a good speed workout in outside. My project will be finished later this week so I should be able to get back to more consistent running.

8.5 mile progressive run - sort of

I decided that I had time this morning before I flew back to Houston to get a run in and I would rather do it in the cooler weather in the morning than in the 90 degree weather in Houston.  I planned on doing an 8 mile progressive run starting at 7:00 pace and dropping 15 seconds a mile and ending at 5:15 pace.  My allergies had really been acting up yesterday so I took a claritin pill this morning right before I went out on the run.  I haven't used Claritin much and I haven't been able to figure out yet how much of an effect if any it has on me.  It was warmer and more humid than I was expecting.  It was in the mid to upper 70's, humid and sunny out.  I started out and my left achilles was pretty tight and I could feel the plantar fasciitis in my foot.  I hit the first mile in 7:06 and by the middle of the 2nd mile I was pretty well loosened up and it wasn't bothering me anymore.  Mile 2 was 6:43 and Mile 3 was 6:31.  Mile 4 was mostly downhill and I hit it in 6:06 without much effort.  After another 1/4 mile I turned around and headed back.  Mile 5 was mostly uphill and I just destroyed myself trying to go sub-6:00 back up the hill which was pretty steep.  I'll have to download some of the data off of my garmin and see how much elevation change there was, but my hard run was basically over at that point.  I think I was getting a little dehydrated and the sun was beating down so I stopped and walked to recover at the top of the hill.  There were a couple more hills on the way back so I ran easy to the hills and then ran hard up the hills and then ran the last couple of miles at about 6:45 pace for a cooldown.  i did the 8.5 miles in about 55 minutes.  I'll do an easy 7 miles tomorrow and then a hard workout on Wednesday and then work on just getting some good mileage in the rest of the week.

Recovery Week off

I think I have Plantar Fasciitis in my left foot and my left achilles has been kind of tight lately and I think they are probably related.  I had a really busy work schedule the past week and was traveling and had very limited opportunities to get my running in so I decided to take a week off to see if there was any improvement.  The pain really doesn't bother me much while I am running after the first 5 - 10 minutes.  I'm not sure if training through it will be making it worse or not, but it doesn't really seem to be getting worse as far as I can tell.  Unfortunately the week off didn't really seem to make much difference.  My achilles and foot were still tight/sore the first mile or so, but the discomfort seemed to fade away once I got warmed up.

On an unrelated note, I can't stand the airport security at O'Hare airport in Chicago.  It's almost like they try to pick the people with the least common sense to run things there.  I checked in for my flight today and headed over to the security checkpoint.  We get there and they are roping it off and they tell us it is closed and we need to walk over to the other security checkpoint.  I guess the middle of lunch hour is the best time to shut down a security checkpoint in a busy airport to make sure all the TSA employees are properly fed so they don't make a mistake because they are too hungry.  We walk for a couple of minutes over to the next checkpoint and the lines are so long they are almost backed out the airport doors.  To make a long story short, I didn't check a bag that we normally would have in order to save some time so we could grab a quick bite to eat before we got on the plane.  I had my carry on bag, a camera bag and my laptop bag so technically I was carrying too many bags.  I've done this several times before and nobody has said anything about it and I could always stick one of the bags into my suitcase if they made a stink about it.  So as the long line is going nowhere, an airport security employee (non-TSA) comes up and tells me I have too many bags.  I told her that I could stick one in my bag, but I would do it after I went through the security checkpoint since they have to x-ray the laptops separately and I've been told in some places that they want to x-ray the camera equipment separately too.  That wasn't acceptable to her and she was going to kick me out of line if I didn't stuff a bag into my suitcase now and she told me I could take it out when I got to the x-ray scanner.  Seriously, why does she have to make a big deal about it.  Then as the line is crawling along and my dreams of a lunch are starting to fade away, they let two families with small children bypass the entire line and they put them in right in front of us.  Since when does traveling with small kids let you bypass the whole security line?  Then the TSA guy checking to make sure that your ID matches your boarding pass spends literally 3 minutes chatting with the little kids and the family while about 18 people go through in the other line.  Finally we clear security and we have to walk back past the first checkpoint we tried to go through to get to our gate and as we walk by we see that it is up and running with people breezing through it.  Go figure.