Nov 3rd-Nov 9th: Gettin' Busy

I'm feeling pretty good about the week I was able to have. I started taking care of 'bidness' at my new job and still had fairly decent volume. 56ish miles isn't a lot by any means, but it still averages over 9 miles/day for the days I did workout. If anything, my intensity hiked up a bit this week as there were technically 2 races in a 7 day span and I had to take some fitness classes to orient to my new workplace. I'm pretty excited to get started with work; it's a great atmoshpere to be fit and get fitter. I've had to do some objective fitness measurements as a part of my on-boarding process, so I'm getting to know my body even better than 'running by feel'.

Here's what I know so far:
Wt. is still 150#, body fat 6.9%, Resting Metabolic Rate is 2481calories, 'Body age' fit assessment puts me at 18yrs, VO2 max 68.8, Anaerobic Threshold is somewhere north of 176bpm.

The race on Saturday was one of the tougher 10ks I've endured. The course was quite soggy and hilly but had more rhythm than the previous 8k. The weather was chilly, windy, and damp. Besides that, I just didn't feel like I was racing. My legs lack the strength and speed at this point to keep up with my heart & lungs. I guess things could be much worse; I could be injured, or burnt out, or fatter.

I'll gladly take this feeling over those. Training plans include maintaining current strategy while bumping up mileage and adding in a regular balance & strength endurance resistance program to my core work. I'm really eager to find out what I can do when I add pace-specific training. Here's the breakdown of the week:

11/3 Rest (first day without 'active recovery' in a while)

11/4 10 (1:06:40) River Rd/Summit loop w/ RnF

11/5 7 (49:09) Pleasant lake in the evening, felt pretty good. Also did a 45 min 'Strictly Strength' class @ Lifetime.

11/6 10 (1:11:26) Resneau loop in the rain. 'strictly sore' today

11/7 ~6? I had my VO2 max tested on the treadmill @ Lifetime (twice!-the machine wasn't working properly) So when I finally got a successful test, I was fatigued from a 4:30am wake-up and an hour plus of treadmill work w/ weights/bands. I coulnd't reach my true threshold due to the fatigue. Peak VO2 measured below threshold was 68.8. Guess I'm a little more aerobically fit than I thought at this point. Not sure how to measure total distance...

11/8 2.5 warm-up (17:59) HR max 155, Avg 144
10k race (36:03) Even split, HR max 172, Avg 165
3.5 cooldown (26:25) HR max 149, Avg 134

11/9 10 (1:06:47) Resneau loop, HR max 183?, Avg 140

Total ~56 miles in 6 sessions
Month to date mileage: 76 miles

Oct 27th - Nov 2nd: Strappin in on again

Here's how my week went down:

10/27 7.5 (52:10) Easy shakeout around Pleasant Lake trails. Hip flexors were a bit tight from the long run the previous day. HR 112

10/28 10 (1:05:58) River/Summitt loop in St.Paul w/ RnF guys

10/29 10 (1:08:04) Resneau loop, effort was up too high for that pace. HR 140 and legs felt flat. Full core/balance/active stretching circuit.

10/30 13 (1:30:06) Tamarack double loop from home. HR 142 Weather was so nice I didn't need a shirt for this one! 4x150m strides on grass w/ spikes on...can I still run fast???

10/31 7.5 (52:16) Pleasant Lake trails easy. HR 108.

11/1 9ish (56:27) 8 miler prior to MN State HS XC meet. Ran quite a bit during the races but the extra mile is from the cooldown I did with R.E. after a tough character test. Go cougars.

11/2 11 3 miles warm-up, 8k race, 3 mile cooldown. I didn't get splits on the watch but heard:
1 mile 5:22
4k 14:05
5k 17:11
finish 27:23 but the front-runners took the wrong finish loop that ended up to be 150-200m shorter than the correct course and of course I followed. I went in thinking sub 28 was reasonable and that's about where I likely would've ended up. The weather was warm if not perfect. I felt fine cardiovascularly but never quite felt like my legs were under me. Is that a good sign? Have I run all the speed out of my legs to the point where I can't coax it out anymore?

Total 68 miles in 7 sessions
October Mileage 278 in 29 days of running

It's been a while since I've strapped on the XC spikes (Nov 2005?) and it showed today. To close out a decent week of training where I found myself feeling tired pretty often, I ran the 8k Rocky's Run on the UofM golf course this morning(results can be found here. It's a good thing I'm not expecting to see or feel big gains in fitness after just a few weeks of consistency, or today's effort would be disheartening. (Really, I just wanted to beat my former roommate and teammate Pat )Instead, I'm pleasantly surprised that I was able to feel pretty comfortable at much faster speeds than I've even been thinking about in this phase of training. A little improvement in pace over the TC10but felt much better physically even on a challenging course.

From an aerobic standpoint, I'm making progress as needed and I don't feel any physical injuries other than occasional soreness in my calves and IT bands. Flexibility and core strength are going to be my main focus in the next few weeks to ready my body for higher mileage and strength gains. I'm starting to work soon (finally!) and hope that it only inspires me to get workouts in regardless. I'll be building a business as a personal trainer and nutrition coach. Will I be good enough to be hard on myself? We'll see.