Monday: 4 miles easy on the treadmill. Intermittently I stopped and did a wide variety of strength/core stuff including push-ups, burpees, crunches, leg raises, shoulder press, lat pulls, bicep curls (for the obvious reason..), hamstring curls, quad extensions, lunges, dead lifts.
Tuesday: 5 miles easy in the dark during rush hour. Time to start running closer to 6:30pm. This 5pm stuff is too sketchy.
Wednesday: 6.2 miles with Newbould and Alex. 7:10 pace
Thursday: 7.4 miles with Alex in the murky darkness. 6:31 pace somehow. Sketchy visibility and traffic conditions per usual!! I signed up for a 5k on Saturday. That should be... interesting. I'm going to try to take it out around 5:10 and see what happens.
Friday: Easy 5 miles in 34 minutes on the treadmill. I felt fine but wanted to keep it short for tomorrow.
Saturday: I ran the inaugural Penmen for Patriots 5k at SNHU in Hooksett. I got there early so I spent a lot of time warming up on the course. I ran 3 laps, the first 2 alone and the third with Chris Mahoney who happened to be at the right place at the right time. I felt good on the warm-up in lots of layers. Meanwhile I noticed how every time I crested the one long, gradual uphill on the 2-lap course the wind gusted harder, and harder.
The race eventually started and I went to the front to try and clear out any fakers in the race. I also wanted to give myself a chance at a good, fast time despite the windy and cold conditions. In the end, I think going out in 5:04 might have cost me a bit of fight toward the end of the race, but at the same time, I don't think it would have changed the outcome. Chris and a young college grad named Joe were right there into mile 2 and hung through into mile 3 where Chris made a small jump and Joe responded. Vocally, I had been lamenting how I wished we were all on alpine skis in order to experience the 40mph gusts and cold that we were running into, and I guess I got complacent when the move was made.
I gave chase into the last uphill but with the two of them fighting for supremacy I knew my bid at the win was lost. When the leaders turned and saw the home stretch, I watched Joe turn on the after burners and the race was over. I had a tiny inkling that maybe I could catch Chris, but I didn't even attempt so it was more of a mental "what-if", and the gap in finishing time shows it. My finishing time of 16:56 (watch) was slow, but so to was the finishing time of the winner who last year this time was racing XC in the 25s for 8k.
Anyway, this was a good opener because I took it out hard, earned a few bucks, and had fun racing. It also helped scare me by showing that ... maybe I truly am in high 16 5k shape?
It's clearly time to focus!!
Sunday: 3.8 miles nice and slow after dinner. Good core and stretch session after. Felt very good. Long on Monday, hopefully.
Week in Review:
I ran every day this week. That is huge for me. I can already feel the benefits of the consistency in terms of energy levels and feeling generally better each run. Granted... Saturday was the only substantial mileage day and I'm looking at 43 miles on the week which is normally the bare minimum when I'm training at full steam. Feaster Five and Mill Cities Relay in the next few weeks have me feeling motivated about getting off to a good start for the winter season. Goals for this week: 50 miles, a fartlek or interval session, 2-3 core sessions.
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