Training Log Archive: ebuckley

Easy jog round the hood.

Warmup (20min) and warmdown.

New Town Blast 5K. Guess I'm not as far off as I thought. Ran the first mile just matching the pace of the M40 leaders. It felt tough, but I was surprised when we hit the first mile at 5:58. Remaining splits were 6:01 and 5:59.The other two leading M40's faded a bit in the second mile. I wasn't able to lift the pace any, but felt like I could have held it longer. 5th overall, 1st M40. Fun race.

In to work. Really nice morning but it's supposed to be another scorcher once the sun comes up.

MLK all the way out to Lucas & Hunt, then north and around the airport. Pretty stiff breeze from the west, so I just spun the 60" gear. Legs feel OK; maybe I will race tomorrow.

Hanging controls for the Carol's Team sprint at West Tyson plus picking one up after. Went easy figuring I'll at least pretend I'm still trying to run fast on Saturday. The reality is that I may skip the race altogether since my body is telling me it's not ready for a true competitive effort just yet. We'll see.

C • west tyson 1

In to work.

Home by way of Martin Luther King and Page. Some might argue that's not enough different from Delmar/Olive to count as a novel route, but it really is. Delmar is on the edge of the hood - MLK is the hood. Not that I worry about that any. Yes, there's plenty of violent crime in these parts, but I never hear the victim described as "some guy just minding his business riding his bike home from work." On the upside, MLK and Page seem to have been granted special dispensation from the city engineers. While most major corridors like Grand and Jefferson are getting chip sealed, this route was brand new blacktop. So smooth even PG would like it. Plus, who's gonna mess with him? An old skinny white guy riding through the hood on a bike. Sure, he might be a wayward accountant completely out of his element, but he might be some crazy dude packing a 9mm.

C • 6

In to work. Was feeling particularly law abiding this morning so I didn't run any lights.

Hadn't taken Grant's Trail back home in a while and with the Dougherty Ferry bridge open again there are lots of novel routes available. SInce I was planning on running later in the evening, I took the easiest route, just heading straight north on Barrett Station to Mason after crossing the bridge.

When I got home I knew the sensible thing to do was simply to get the run in right away. Be done with it. But, I didn't want to do a dial in run when I had just ridden for 2 hours and it was really hot and windy. So I waited...

Of course, I was pretty hungry, so I had some dinner. By 8PM the heat and wind were at tolerable levels, but my body had shut down. Wait some more and just for yucks, let's stand on the scale. Dagnabbit! 164. Too low. Eat and drink some more and now I'm really shut down. Now the sensible thing to do is simply to go to bed and run first thing in the morning, but it seems just plain dumb to build a whole week's training around a dial in workout and then postpone it. Around midnight, I finally feel like running and my legs are perky enough jogging over to the track, except the hamstrings are still pretty sore from the hammering on the flats last Saturday (haven't spent much time in the tuck position this summer).

I would hope for 18 minutes this Saturday, but I figure that's not too likely, so I plan to dial in a 6:00/mi pace and if it feels OK, I'll try to get the seconds back. The plan is 4x800@3:00 400R. First lap feels good - oops, that's because it's done in 96 seconds. OK, pick it up and finish the first 800 in 3:07. Right hamstring is not happy. Next one is 3:00 on the nose, followed by 2:59, but the hamstring is still complaining so in the first good decision of the evening, I head home.

There's no way in hell I'm running that pace for 5K. Fitness is off more than I thought. Rats.

Four control-picking courses of 1100-1500m at Rockwoods Range (1:15). Easy jogging between courses. As with Castlewood last week, I was clean and reasonably fast in the open, but slow in the green. Need to fix that in the next few weeks or get toasted at Chicago.

C • I'm tired just reading 2