I got a new pair of shoes a week ago that I'm planning on running Boston in (same model as my current shoes), but it's taken me longer to get used to them. The fit just seems a little different. I think they were laced up differently at the store and I'm still working to get the right fit on them. I didn't feel particularly smooth during the run even though I was moving at a pretty quick pace. I stumbled a couple of times and knocked my legs together numerous times. I've been feeling a little lethargic lately. I'm not sure if it is related to my allergies or allergy medicine, but they have been pretty bad the last week. Hopefully I will get well rested as I Boston is a week and a half away.
Saturday, April 10, 2010
Friday - 4/9/10 - 8.5 miles including 6 mile tempo run
I made myself do a tempo run run Friday evening since I hadn't run hard since last Saturday. I did a 1.5 mile warmup, a 6 mile tempo run and then a one mile cooldown. I probably should have done another mile warmup or so, but it went ok. My tempo splits were 6:05, 6:00, 5:58, 5:54, 5:58, 5:56. It was in the low 70's and I was hoping that I'd be a little quicker or it would feel a little easier, but it went ok. I was running at the park so I lose a little time on the dirt trail and it was fairly crowded out and I was having to avoid people too.
Thursday - 4/8/10 - 8 miles
I felt pretty good and ran 8 miles in 55 minutes at the park. Planning on a harder workout on Friday.
Sunday 4/4 - 14.5 miles
I got up early Sunday morning to get a long run in before I headed up to the Shell Houston Open with one of my friends. I made it through the run, but it wasn't a lot of fun. It was 100% humidity and misting on and off and about 70 degrees out. My legs were a little tired and I averaged about 7:50 pace for the first 11 miles. I ran from my house down to Rice and Hermann Park and did a lap around each and back home. Near the end of the run I picked it up a little and averaged about 7:25 pace for the last 3 miles to finish the 14.5 miles in a little over 1:52.
Saturday, April 3, 2010
4 the Park race - 6th overall
I finished the 4 miles race in 6th place in 22:09 and 1st in my age group once you throw out people they put in the wrong age group. This was a tough race and not my best, but considering the week of training and the weather conditions I wasn't too disappointed. When I picked up my race # at Luke's Locker yesterday, Joe Flores told me that Adam Davis was running since the winner got a free airline ticket. Any time a race gives out airline tickets or a decent cash prize you get some of the good runners showing up so I knew I didn't stand a chance at repeating as winner. I wish they had given away an airline ticket to the winner last year!
The weather was warm and it was very humid. When I got up at 6:45 I checked the weather and the temp was in the mid-60's with 94% humidity and it didn't get any better at race time. I like this race since my house is only 3/4 of a mile from the start line. I did a 1.5 mile warmup with my friend Benson and changed shoes and did some stretching at the house and then about 8:20 left to jog to the starting line and did strides while I was on the way. I saw Adam Davis, Luis Armenteros and Junior Mitchell at the start line so I knew realistically the best I would get was 4th unless one of them dropped out.
The gun went off and Adam, Luis and Junior took off and Rudy Rocha, Tom King and Brian Alvarado all were ahead of me and they quickly separated into two packs. I was all alone in 7th place and probably 10 - 12 seconds back of Rudy, Tom and Brian. I've run quite a few races against these guys and usually I can beat Tom and Brian and sometimes Rudy depending on what kind of shape he's in. I hoped to reel them in later in the race. I was still all by myself at mile 1 and went through in 5:23 which is pretty close to where I wanted to be and I was probably 12 - 15 seconds back of the 3 guys in front of me. I didn't really gain any ground during mile 2 and went through at about 10:59 with a 5:35 2nd mile. I tried to pick it the effort during mile 3 and I started to gain a little ground, but midway through the 3rd mile Brian put a gap on Tom and Rudy. I thought I'd be able to catch Tom and Rudy, but Brian was pulling a little farther away.
I ran mile 3 in 5:38 and was gaining a little ground. The last mile was tough and I could tell I was going to catch Rudy and I passed him with a little over 1/4 mile left, but there was too much of a gap to catch Tom and I finished in 6th in 22:09 with a 5:31 last mile. My 21:00 from last year would have gotten me either 3rd or 4th place, but the weather conditions were definitely better then
I was slower than I would have liked to be, but I ran a tough 20 miler on Tuesday and it was hard running in warmer conditions than I've done any hard workouts in. My hamstring didn't bother me at all during the race which I was felt good about. I may think about running the Bellaire Trolley Run next weekend.
I kind of got screwed for the age group awards since somehow they put Luis in the 30 - 34 age group even though he's in the 35-39 age group so I "officially" got 2nd in my age group. I won't complain too much though since 2nd place got a free 1 hr massage at Koala and 1st place got 5 free personal training sessions with a personal trainer somewhere. I'm not sure if I would use those or not, but I can always use extra massages.
Last week of training
I haven't been doing a great job of keeping my blog updated and when I get too far behind I forget what some of my runs were or how long they were and I had to reset my watch memory since it was full (I only usually wear my Garmin on my longer runs). I'll just give a quick recap of this past week's workouts.
Monday - 3/29 - Kenyan Way hill workout.
I made it out Monday morning for the hill workout and we did 20 minutes of 200 m repeats up one of the cloverleaf hills followed by a 5 minute break and then one mile hard. I started out easy and my first 200 was 44 seconds, but by the end of the workout I was down to 34 seconds. After the 5 minute break I took off pretty hard up the first hill of the mile. We ran on all 4 cloverleafs (up 2 and down 2) and Sean had measured out a full mile. I was running alone and it was probably the quickest mile I've run since sometime last fall and I finished in 5:17. Obviously I've had much quicker miles, but I was happy with the finish to the workout.
Tuesday 3/30 - 20 mile long run in Conroe
Note to self - 20 mile run on hills on one of warmest days of the spring the day after a hard workout isn't always the smartest idea. I took the afternoon off work and headed up to Conroe to try to do a 24 miler. I set out water and gatorade at a couple of the normal water stop locations and started out. The temperature was around 77 degrees and very sunny. I was feeling pretty good to start and was averaging about 6:55 pace for the first 10 miles, but that was a little too quick for the day. I don't think I did a great job staying hydrated enough before the workout started and this was one of the warmest runs I think I have done all year and big chunks of the run had no shade cover. I also misjudged the distance of a couple of loops that I thought were about 3 miles but ended up being about 4 miles. By the time I got to my water stop at 15 miles I was starting to struggle and had to take a little extra time in the shade. My last couple of miles I fell off the 7:00 pace and was running about 7:30 pace but it was tough. My shirt was just covered in salt and I was dripping sweat everywhere. I took about 5 minutes and ate a whole package of clif shot blocks and drank about 20 oz of water. At that point I decided to just head straight back to the car which was about 5 miles away instead of adding on a couple of extra loops to get to the full 24. By the end of the run I hit my last mile (mostly uphill) in 8:20 and I was toast. I finished the 20 miles in 2:26.
Wednesday 3/31 - Day off recovering from last couple of days
Thursday 4/1 - 8 miles
My legs were still a little tired, but I headed out for an 8 mile run Thursday after work. My left quad muscle was a little tight and I had to stop about 5 minutes into my run and stretch it for a while, but it felt ok after that. I averaged about 7:20 pace for the run and finished in just under 59 minutes
Friday 4/2 - 4.5 miles
Easy day Friday afternoon jogging the "4 the park" race course plus a little extra add on. I ran the 4.5 miles in 33 minutes. We'll see how the race ends up going. I didn't really taper too much for this race and I haven't raced anything under a marathon since Thanksgiving. My goal is to break 22:00 and hopefully be down in the 21:30 range.
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