Tuesday, May 29: GEHC Trails - 8 miles – Normal morning run. I’ve
got this run pretty dialed in as I’ve been hitting it between 57-59 minutes on
most mornings without putting in a whole lot of effort. Unfortunately they are
not really very exciting to blog about, just a standard put the work in eight
miler. I am in a good rhythm though, as much as I would love to sleep in until
7 once in a while I am really enjoying getting out and getting a run in early.
It is allowing me to add extra miles in the afternoon if I choose or to go on
with my day without knowing I need to get out and run at some point in the day.
I feel like that is how running becomes a chore, when you feel like you have
get a run in and it’s hanging over your head. I’ll have that feeling once in a
while but since I’ve moved down here I’ve been better at just enjoying it.
/rant.
Wednesday, May 30: GEHC Trails – 8 miles – Took it nice an easy
this morning. I have a workout planned for tonight, but I wanted to make sure I
got a solid run in easy just in case anything comes up at work.
PM Run – Suwanee Creek Greenway – 12 miles – 30-60-90s – I ended up
running a little longer than I had originally planned, but it was good to
finally get a mid-week workout in. I didn’t realize they had added 1.25 miles
to the end of the trail making it 10.5 out and back instead of 8. I started at
the George Pierce Park rec center, ran down to the start of the Greenway then
ran out and back on the greenway and back to my car with 8 sets of 30-60-90s in
the middle. They are still doing a little bit of construction just before
Suwanee town center but I hopped the fences and ran along the dirt path that
they will eventually pave. It’s a little ridiculous that I am hopping fences as
a 27 year old, if they can’t take a joke…anyhow; the workout went pretty well for
about 10 miles. I was running solid on my pickups and my rest was pretty good,
it could have been better but by the time I made the turn I was starting to
tire out a little bit. The last two miles were really tough. I did not run in a
strong as I would have liked but I think that was a result of running 8 in the
morning. 20 miles for the day was a little more than I was really prepared for.
Ran in my Type A5s for the
first time, I liked them. They are nice and light and they fit well. A really
comfortable ride for a racing flat.
Thursday, May 31: GEHC Trails – 8 miles – GAAAAAHHHH…my calves are
insanely tight this morning. Probably a result of running 12 miles in racing
flats, maybe not my best idea. I knew I was going to pay for running 20 miles
yesterday. My legs loosened up a little bit as I went on, but I had to stop at
the GEHC, at the pavilion by the apartment and at the tunnel to stretch out my
calves. Other than tight calves though I felt alright for having run a long
workout yesterday, a little sluggish and slow to start but okay once I got
going.
PM Run – GEHC Trails - 3 miles – Normal three mile loop after work.
It probably would have been smarter to run five and five today instead of eight
and three as my calves were still really tight and didn’t loosen up all that
much over the three miles. Hopefully I didn’t overdo it on Wednesday.
I hit an even 300 miles for
the month of May. I know that’s not a ton of miles, but it’s better than my May
last year and I’ve been increasing my mileage every month since I refocused my
training in January. For the year I’m at 1,204 miles. Not crazy, but that’s
about 240 miles a month, which I’m pretty happy with. I feel like the last
couple of months have really helped me feel like I can train and race well
during the offseason…now if I can just figure out how to stay in some kind of
shape during the season at work.
Friday, June 1: GEHC Trails – 8 miles – Normal route, up homesite
to creekside and around the GEHC, down sweetgum then out and back on the
greenway for eight. Just going with one run today, as I’m going to run the Run
the Rails road race in historic Buford tomorrow. I want to see what I can run
on the road for 10k; hopefully it will be something good. I need it after a
crappy race at Mt. Tabor and then the abomination that was the Sutalle Trace
race…which again was straight up and down miserable.
After work I headed down to
historic downtown Buford to register for the race, but not before sitting in an
express oil place for 2 hours while they changed my oil and replaced a rusted
fuel filter. My car is running horribly right now and I definitely need to take
it to a mechanic next week. When I signed up for the race the lady at
registration asked me if I’d ever done the race before, I said not this one but
I’ve done a bunch of others. She thanked me for signing up and then told me there
was a hill around three miles and that I might want to pace myself, which I thought
was kind of funny, but probably good advice since I haven’t run a road race in
about a year.
Saturday, June 2: Run the Rails 10k – 10 miles total – I decided to
do a local 10k in my base of operations (Buford, GA) to see if I could get
myself back on track mentally and see what I could do in a road race. The last
road race I ran was the Lahey Clinic “5k” last year around this time. I say “5k”
because I ran 11:58. I’m just guessing but I think they may have cut it a mile
short.
On to the race…it went really,
really well. A lot better than what I was thinking. I figured I would be happy
with something between 34 and 34:30 give or take a little bit depending on the temperature
and the course. I ended up winning the race in 33:13, which is a road 10k PR (I
know my road 10k PR was soft, something like 34:40 or something that I ran at
the Hangover Classic six years ago).
The course was well laid out
and pretty flat. It was two loops of the 5k course with some slight
alterations. We started out at the Bona Allen Mansion and ran down along the
train tracks through “downtown” for the first mile then back up a side street
for mile two, which was a long gradual uphill. The course leveled back out as
you pasted the starting area then ran out for a long way on another flat road
before looping back and passing three miles. From there, you ran through a
neighborhood and then back down main street, repeating the first and second
miles then headed back out for a similar loop on the third/sixth mile. My only
issue with the course was the weird 50-yard out and back we had to do on a side
street just after the five mile mark and the fact that course was really
crowded because of 5k lappers. After that it was smooth sailing to the finish.
I won a train whistle, which
was kind of cool, but I was most pleased with my time and the fact that my
splits where pretty even other than a little bit of a quick first mile
(5:11ish) and what I am assuming was one short mile at, in terms of where the
signs were placed, (5:02). I ran the 10k because I was worried I wouldn’t have
the wheels to run fast enough to win the 5k but I think my splits where both
faster than the 5k winner (16:58), however the kid that won was like 22, so he
probably had more in the tank.
Run the Rails 10k Splits
Mile 1 – 5:11Mile 2 – 5:30 (uphill)
Mile 3 – 5:36 (long maybe???)
Mile 4 – 5:02
Mile 5 – 5:27 (uphill)
Final 1.2 – 6:23
Total - 33:11 (33:13 official according to the awards ceremony)
I had 33:11 on my watch, so I must
have stopped it a bit early, but I haven’t raced with a watch and tried to get
splits in a while so forgive me. All in all it was a great race. It was good to
get back out on the roads and feel like I was running fast. I still like the
trails, but I think it’s clear that I’m a rhythm runner and I’m better suited
for the roads. Maybe I will try and add more road races to my calendar in the fall.
I got to the race a little
late and only warmed up and cooled down about 1.5 miles each. I added 10
minutes when I got back home because I could feel my calves tightening up. 10
for the day.
Sunday, June 3: Ft. Yargo State Park – 14 miles – When I stared
this run I planned on going 7 to 10 but after finishing a loop on the hiking
trail (7 miles) I felt okay and decided to keep it going and add a full second
loop to get 14. I felt pretty good until the last two miles or so when I started
to run out of gas.
Weekly Totals: 79 miles on 9 runs – This was a really good week for
me. Not only does it give me two weeks over 70 miles but I also got in one good
long workout (and one monster mileage day), but I also had a really good race.
The race has definitely restored a little bit of confidence and getting my
mileage up has me amped up for the final two Dirty Spokes races (Central Park
and Sawnee Moutain). I had five straight weeks in the 50s and 60s, and I really
think I run well around the 75-85 mpw mark, so it’s been good to get back up
above 70 and 75 even. I’d like to keep that up for as long as I can, or at
least until the end of June when the heat will start making afternoon runs a
little bit less appealing. Next week’s goals are 70-75+ miles with a workout.
No race next week. I’ll take a week off from that and then maybe try to jump in
a 5k before Central Park.
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