Are your heads spinning from all the acronyms? Let me break last week (9/8 - 9/14) down for you, acronym by acronym......
TM: Last Tuesday, I had to run on the treadmill and you all know how much I dislike the treadmill. But I actually had a great run and found a way to beat the boredom. I like to call it "pyramids." After a 1.5 mile warm up, I set the treadmill to a comfortable (but not too easy) pace. Every minute for 10 minutes, I would increase the speed by 0.1 mph and then work my way back down in the same way. I did this a couple of times and its a great way to kill 20 minutes on a TM without getting bored. Finish up with a mile cool down and I was looking at a 7 mile run.
HR: After last weekend's long run in the humidity (see last post),I tackled the Newton Hills again on Wednesday for my 14 mile medium-long run. It was a cool night and I decided to turn my Garmin so that I couldn't see the pace and run based on feel. I felt great the whole run and finished with an average pace of 8:55 min/mile but even more impressive was my average heart rate (HR)- 159....crazy low for me especially with the 5 major hills I tackled.
PR: Last Thursday was the final race in the Let's Run Series that I have posted about before. It was a cool night and I wanted to go for a PR but didn't know how my legs would feel after 14 miles on the hills the day before. My previous PR for this course was 31:42. Luckily Bryan and I were able to get towards the front to avoid most of the crowds. I was feeling good and was in a good groove. Besides a PR I have really wanted to break 30 minutes at one of these races. As I crossed the last bridge, according to my Garmin I had 1.2 miles left and was at 22:xx minutes and thought the sub-30 was out of reach but I could go for a PR. I forgot that my Garmin always measures a little short on this course (I think its because of the bridges it goes under). As I rounded the last corner, there was a race volunteer yelling out the time and I realized I had a shot at the sub-30......I ran as hard as I could towards that finish line and crossed in 30:19!!! Still a 1:20 minute PR and oh so close to that sub-30.....I cursed myself for not pushing harder during the early miles, but was really happy with my finishing time. I know that sub-30 is possible, especially without the 14 miles the day before.
MP: Last Saturday, I had my second marathon pace long run of my training....18 miles total with 14 at planned MP. I ran the first 3 as a warm up with John and then kicked it into MP. Overall I felt really good and the miles were for the most part very comfortable. Fastest was 8:14, slowest was 8:29 (ironically the first mile was the slowest!).....average pace for the 14 MP miles was 8:21. I was very pleased with how this run went and definitely boosted my confidence for race day!
Add in a couple easy recovery runs and I was looking at 50 miles for the week!
PS. In case you are interested, I beat Bryan by 1:30 :)
Sunday, September 21, 2008
Tuesday, September 9, 2008
"You know its bad when....
.....you are disgusted by your own smell!" This was the comment I made to John on our 18 miler this Saturday. In case you don't live in the north east, we had some of the most humid conditions on Saturday that I have ever run in! I looked at weather.com when I got home:
Real Temperature: 75 degrees
Dew Point 73-74 degrees
Humidity: 85-93%
You have got to be kidding me!!!!
We ran out of Fitcorp so hit all the major Newton Hills. We refilled water when we could and yet I was still thirsty. I don't think I have ever sweat so much in my entire life! 18 miles got us to the bottom of Beacon Hill and we all chose to walk up it rather than running the extra 0.4 miles....I was exhausted! I finished a couple minutes before John and Paul and was sitting outside Fitcorp to cool down. When I got up I realized I had left behind an actual puddle....yuck! Then I saw an ant stuck to my leg that had apparently drowned in my sweat....poor guy!
We were all so happy to have that run finished, but I am so proud of all three of us for sticking it out and covering the 18 miles in a great pace.....by my watch we averages a 9:05 - 9:10 min/mile.
Please, please don't make race day like that!!!!!
Real Temperature: 75 degrees
Dew Point 73-74 degrees
Humidity: 85-93%
You have got to be kidding me!!!!
We ran out of Fitcorp so hit all the major Newton Hills. We refilled water when we could and yet I was still thirsty. I don't think I have ever sweat so much in my entire life! 18 miles got us to the bottom of Beacon Hill and we all chose to walk up it rather than running the extra 0.4 miles....I was exhausted! I finished a couple minutes before John and Paul and was sitting outside Fitcorp to cool down. When I got up I realized I had left behind an actual puddle....yuck! Then I saw an ant stuck to my leg that had apparently drowned in my sweat....poor guy!
We were all so happy to have that run finished, but I am so proud of all three of us for sticking it out and covering the 18 miles in a great pace.....by my watch we averages a 9:05 - 9:10 min/mile.
Please, please don't make race day like that!!!!!
The last two weeks
Luckily I have managed not to throw myself in front of any cars since my last post so that is a positive thing! The last two weeks brought another small bump in mileage and quality runs. I am trying to keep my running to only 5 days a week as opposed to the 6 days I ran towards the end of Vermont training but keeping the overall mileage the same. This means tacking a few extra miles onto those mid-week medium long runs which I think helps overall too.
On Thursday 8/28, Bryan and I ran the Twist and Shout 4.2 mile fun run around the river. I have talked about this race series before and how Bryan and I get a little competitive....I've beat him once last year and we've been pretty even this year. Well...I did it again!! Beat him by 40 seconds this time!! I ran in 31:51 (10 seconds slower than my PR) with an average pace of 7:35. My first mile was 8:30 pace because of all the people so I really picked it up for the last three. We have one more of these races this week so we'll see who wins this one!
Last Saturday (8/30) I had a 22 mile run. I met John for the first 13.5 on the Newton hills and then headed down to the river to finish up the last 8.5 miles solo. After stopping at my house to refill my water bottles with John, it was so hard to get my legs moving again! Even though I was tired, I manager to keep my pace fairly even and finished with an overall pace of 9:01....not bad!
The rest of Labor Day weekend was full of activities....a ~15 mile bike ride on Plum Island on Sunday and a 6.6 mile hike up Mount Osceola (4340 ft) in NH on Monday. Man was I tired after all that!
Overall I managed 59.5 miles for the week (it took every ounce of restraint I had in me to not go out and run 0.5 miles to get to 60!!)
Now we are into September, but it sure doesn't feel like it with this weather!
Tuesday - Track workout with 8.25 miles total including 6x600m repeats (90 sec recovery between each). I averaged 2:33 for the 6oom repeats which is only a second or two off of where I was two weeks ago which I was pleased with since I had ran 22 miles 2 days earlier and hiked the day before!
Wednesday - 13.75 medium long run. Its getting darker so much earlier here....not happy about that!! Had to run the last 1.5 miles in the dark :(
Thursday - off!
Friday - My schedule said 8-15k tune up race but its hard to find one on a Friday so I decided to do a tempo run on the treadmill instead. I did 7 miles total with 4 miles at LT pace (averaged 8:03 min/mile)
Saturday - this run deserves its own blog post so stay tuned! Finished the week at 54 miles total.
Overall I am feeling strong and confident in my training. My attitude is completely different this time around, but I think that's a good thing. I am more relaxed and just going with the flow. Two more weeks of "real" training before taper starts....aaahhhh!
On Thursday 8/28, Bryan and I ran the Twist and Shout 4.2 mile fun run around the river. I have talked about this race series before and how Bryan and I get a little competitive....I've beat him once last year and we've been pretty even this year. Well...I did it again!! Beat him by 40 seconds this time!! I ran in 31:51 (10 seconds slower than my PR) with an average pace of 7:35. My first mile was 8:30 pace because of all the people so I really picked it up for the last three. We have one more of these races this week so we'll see who wins this one!
Last Saturday (8/30) I had a 22 mile run. I met John for the first 13.5 on the Newton hills and then headed down to the river to finish up the last 8.5 miles solo. After stopping at my house to refill my water bottles with John, it was so hard to get my legs moving again! Even though I was tired, I manager to keep my pace fairly even and finished with an overall pace of 9:01....not bad!
The rest of Labor Day weekend was full of activities....a ~15 mile bike ride on Plum Island on Sunday and a 6.6 mile hike up Mount Osceola (4340 ft) in NH on Monday. Man was I tired after all that!
Overall I managed 59.5 miles for the week (it took every ounce of restraint I had in me to not go out and run 0.5 miles to get to 60!!)
Now we are into September, but it sure doesn't feel like it with this weather!
Tuesday - Track workout with 8.25 miles total including 6x600m repeats (90 sec recovery between each). I averaged 2:33 for the 6oom repeats which is only a second or two off of where I was two weeks ago which I was pleased with since I had ran 22 miles 2 days earlier and hiked the day before!
Wednesday - 13.75 medium long run. Its getting darker so much earlier here....not happy about that!! Had to run the last 1.5 miles in the dark :(
Thursday - off!
Friday - My schedule said 8-15k tune up race but its hard to find one on a Friday so I decided to do a tempo run on the treadmill instead. I did 7 miles total with 4 miles at LT pace (averaged 8:03 min/mile)
Saturday - this run deserves its own blog post so stay tuned! Finished the week at 54 miles total.
Overall I am feeling strong and confident in my training. My attitude is completely different this time around, but I think that's a good thing. I am more relaxed and just going with the flow. Two more weeks of "real" training before taper starts....aaahhhh!
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