Training Log: October 1 - October 7

Monday, October 1: Flowery Branch Roads – 7 miles – There was a little bit of light rain this morning, but it was actually kind of nice. Today was a good start to the week. I need to get back on the horse after struggling a little bit last week. The west-coast trip took a little more out of me than I thought it would have.

This run has become my go-to, pre-work run. It starts out a little rough on Falcon Parkway as there isn’t a lot of room to run on the side of the road and there is still a fair amount of traffic with people driving to work and/or school. Once I get through about a mile and half its nice quiet back roads for most of the rest of the run. It also has a couple of good little hills in it and I feel like I run a much more honest pace on the road.

Tuesday, October 2: Flowery Branch Roads – 7 miles – My car tire blew out yesterday, so I had to drop the car off to get it replaced in the morning, which meant no run until after work. Fortunately, I got done with everything early enough to get out for seven miles before the sun set. I hit my FB loop and planned to make the decision on five or seven once I got to the old burnt out factory that I can either turn left and run five or stay straight and run seven. I elected for the seven mile route, but my stomach was killing me. There was a point when I didn’t think I’d make it back to the office. I had to stop in an abandoned lot and take care of it. After that things smoothed out a little bit but my stomach was still off the rest of the night. Just one of those days I guess.

Wednesday, October 3: Flowery Branch Roads – 7 miles – Same old today. Nothing special, but I did feel much, much better than I did yesterday.

Thursday, October 4: Flowery Branch Roads – 7 miles - Up early again to get in my standard morning seven. Felt okay, but I need to hydrate better. Drove downtown after work for face to face then raced back up to Suwanee for trivia. It did not go well. We got smoked. Oh well, fight on.

Friday, October 5: Little Mulberry Park – 8 miles – Ran from the Hog Mountain entrance out to the carriage trail, up to the west meadow trail, around the ravine loop, down around the pond loop trail, up to east meadow then back down carriage road and around Miller lake back to the car. It’s a solid eight mile run (officially 8 according to my garmin) with some decent climbs, especially the carriage and ravine trails. They use park of this park as a local cross country course and Dirty Spokes is hosting an XTERRA race there in November.

Saturday, October 6: GEHC Trails – 8 miles – It was good to get back out on the GEHC trails for a run. With the sunrise coming around 7:30 I haven’t spent much time out on those trails lately as I’ve been doing most of my runs from the office. I’ve gotten in a few three/five mile runs out there but I haven’t done the full eight since the first weekend of the Strava 100 mile challenge. This was a decent run, nothing too crazy, I didn’t wear a watch and just cruised through it. Amanda hasn’t been out on her bike in a about week and it’s probably a good thing because a lot of the greenway trail was washed out by the heavy rain earlier in the week. It’s also becoming increasingly clear each time I run on the GEHC trails that the back section of the sweetgum trail is going to be unusable pretty soon due to construction.

The construction has actually caused Tim to reroute the XTERRA course next weekend. I kicked around the idea of running a race at the GEHC today, but I decided to save the 35 bucks and wait till next week. I’m fully on board with paying 25-35 bucks for XTERRA and Dirty Spokes because I know what kind of race they put on and where that money is going but it’s tough for me to plunk down 35-40 bucks for a random race. If I had paid for that Kaiser Permanente race I would have been pissed. I got second and they don’t even have results posted anywhere. Weak sauce.  

Sunday, October 7: Monument Run in Washington DC – 8.5 miles – Awesome run! We flew into DC for the game and after doing a little exploring on Saturday night, I woke up Sunday morning and ran from Pentagon City into DC. I headed out to the Pentagon from our hotel in Pentagon City and ran up to the Arlington Memorial Bridge, across the bridge to the Lincoln Memorial. From Lincoln, I ran down to the Vietnam memorial then along Constitution Ave. and up to the south lawn of the White House. I stopped at the fence and looked around for a little while, the security guards perked up a little bit since it was early and I was the only person out there. After the White House I ran back down past the Washington monument, around the WWII memorial then back along the reflecting pool past Lincoln, across the bridge and back to Pentagon City. This was a really, really cool run. The WWII memorial was awesome to see. It wasn’t there the last time I was in DC and it was impressive to see both at night and during the day. I found the Massachusetts section and paused for a minute to pay homage to both of my grand fathers who served in WWII then headed back to the hotel to get ready for the game.   

Weekly Totals: 53 miles on seven runs – This was a really solid week for me. I always have a lot of difficulty staying consistent during the football season with work but I’ve been able to say within the 40-45 MPW range every week this season, except for last week after the west coast trip. This week was a big positive that makes me feel like I really have a good shot of training with some consistency through the season before I ramp things up in the late winter/early spring in preparation for the marathon.

Race Recap - Kaiser Permanente Corporate Challenge 5k

In the immortal words of Josh Ferenc this race was a colossal “cluster cuss”. I entered this race as part of the Falcons G.O.A.L fitness/Health & Wellness program (Get Out And Live). Through our company we got a free entry so I figured I had nothing to lose, save maybe a little pride if I got smoked. I entered the elite field with my Run the Rails 10k time, but I never got my number at work. I figured someone would have it at the race so I hoped in my buddy Matt’s new truck with him and we headed downtown to Turner field on for the race. Upon arrival, all hell broke loose for me.

It took us forever to park then when we got to our tent it was abandoned and resembled the scene after the Skywalker ranch got ransacked by storm troopers in Episode IV. We eventually found everyone in the middle of the pack getting ready to line up at the start. Of course no one had my number. I’d already given up on any hope of being able to warm up, but I thought I’d at least have a number, no dice. At this point I was kind of pissed because I really wanted to see what I could run. I thought about just jumping in and running it with the people from work and hanging out, then I decided (again in honor of Ferenc) cuss that! I threw on my Saucony jersey, hopped one of the fences and lined up just behind the elite section.

Just before the start the race volunteers dropped the rope dividing the rest of the runners and the elite section so I made my way up to the second row and got ready to roll. At the start, I got out good to try and get up with the leaders. About 200 meters into the race I was finally able to latch on to a group of four or five runners, running between 4^th and 8^th or so. I had to do a little extra work to get there but once I got in the group I settled in and ran right on the shoulder of the guy in front of me. I recognized one of them, David Bell, who I remembered from the Thrill in the Hills half marathon. I hung with that group for about three quarters of a mile, but I have a tendency to get impatient, especially with all the anxiety of trying to get to the starting line, so right around the mile mark I made a move to try and catch the next group of guys ahead of us.

I used a downhill to surge and catch the guy in third then second. I took over second place and then focused on the leader thinking I’d probably blow up somewhere around two miles. I took a look at my watch and realized I was running at a good clip, between 5:06 and 5:08 pace on my Garmin. I was a little worried it was too fast, but I just tried to tune those thoughts out and focus on catching the leader. About 1.5 miles into the race we climbed a long gradual uphill that I ran surprisingly well. I was able to maintain that pace and was slowly but surely chipping away at the lead.

I missed the second mile mark and I didn’t hear my watch beep for the spilt, but I was really trying to focus on cutting into the lead. I knew I didn’t have much in the way of wheels, but I figured if I could catch the leader on the long straight away over the final 600 I’d be able muscle past him and get the win. At this point I was really surprising myself. I took a quick glance back as I rounded a turn but I didn’t see anybody, I still felt good and I was almost sure I would catch the leader. This was a shock since I figured I’d be struggling to finish in the top 10 not having a shot to battle back for the win.

With 800 to go I was sure I was going to win. I could see myself powering past this guy and running away from him at the end of the race. We made the final turn onto Hank Aaron Blvd and I started the hard charge for the finish line under the Olympic rings outside of Turner Field. I’d closed to within 20 or so yards of the leader and felt like I was going to pull even and then past him any second, he went out too fast I told myself…but…with about 200 to go, reality set in. I just didn’t have any more gears or any more gas. I made one last push but it didn’t do any good, over the course of the race I’d closed what was probably a 100-meter lead down to 10 or 15 meters but that was as close as I was getting. I ended up cruising through the finish in 15:58 for second place.

When I looked down at my watch, I was pumped. There is no way in hell I thought I’d run that fast. I thought 16:30 would be a great result. It was the fastest 5k I’ve run since Iron Teams in 2007 when I ran 15:30.  The last 5k I ran was in Philly in 09 and I ran 17:04. I’ll take 15:58. I just wish I would have run one during the summer when I was really training. Either way, it was a great race for me and it has really made me feel good about the fact that I’ve pushed myself to get into work early and run before starting my day.

Overall it was a good experience. It was fun to run with people from work. Everyone was pumped that I got second and finishing under the Olympic rings was really cool. My only complaint, besides running bandit and having to explain my situation to the RD was that they had no results and no awards. Kind of weak sauce for such a big race (25,000 people).

Catching Up

Catching Up

I’ve been MIA from the blog for over a month now, so this is going to be a brief rundown of the last couple of weeks. After I got home from vacation it was right into training camp at work so I haven’t had a ton of time to run or blog. I will say that this was probably my best camp in terms of running. That’s not really saying a whole lot since last year I logged a whopping 51 miles for the entire month of August and probably even less the year before that. Comparatively, I ran 174 miles this August, not bad when you consider I took four days off after the Dirty Spokes finale. At this point though, just getting out the door is a victory in my book. While I do hope to run some races this fall, my training is more focused on being prepared to hit the ground running in the winter after the football season ends, unlike the last two years.

 

Picking up where I left off…Amanda and I spent about a week back home and I ran on the roads in Middleton and then I ended up biking 35 miles one day to mix it up a little bit. After getting back to Atlanta I raced the finale of the Dirty Spokes Trail Series at Sawnee Mountain. I won the race in 24:38, Tim has it posted as a 3.5 mile race, but I think it is a little bit longer. Last year I ran 21:34 and after talking with a couple of people post-race I was able to confirm that they took out the steepest section of the decent and made the trail a little longer to reduce the risk of someone falling. As it turns out the results are listed as 4.0 miles so that makes it about three minutes longer than last year and that would make sense.

 

My running hasn’t been great over the last few weeks but it’s been solid. My parents got me a Garmin 210 for my birthday and after playing around with it a little bit I came across the Strava Trail Runner Magazine 100 mile challenge. The premise was to run 100 miles in 16 days. That doesn’t seem all that hard on the surface, but with my work schedule it was definitely a challenge. I ended up getting to work early and running seven miles (occasionally five) during the two week stretch. I finished with 104 miles in the 16 days, including one day off and one day that didn’t count because Strava.com only counted miles logged with a GPS device, so I lost out on 8 miles.

 

Since I got back from my vacation back home, I’ve hit 40, 15 (oosh), 33, 37, 45, 37, 45, 49 and 48 mile weeks. I can’t believe it’s been nine weeks since my last post. At this point in the year my training is all working towards being prepared for the spring, but in order to keep myself going I am trying to use short term goals, like the 100 mile challenge to keep me from getting lazy or bored.

 

I’d love to be able to hit between 40 and 50 miles each week, but I think my log over the next few months is going to resemble the last few weeks, sometimes I’ll hit 40-45 others will be 30-35 and then I’ll have a handful of low weeks due to long days at work and late games. For example, this week I ran Monday before our game, but took Tuesday and Wednesday off because I was completely exhausted. That’s just kind of the way it is at this time of the year.

 

On the Horizon

I have a couple of things that I’m using to keep me motivated right now. It’s tough to say focused and get out the door most days if the goals I set are all months away, so this fall I’d like to run the Xterra Georgia trail series  as well as a few 5k road races.

 

 The first thing on my extremely tentative schedule is the Kaiser Permanente Corporate 5k during the second week of September. I’m not sure that I’ll actually be able to make it from the office to Turner Field for this race on a weekday, but I’m going to try. 95 percent of the reason I entered was the fact that we have a company team running it and I got a free entry, but if I can get down there in time it should be fun to run with some people from work and it will be a good test to see how much fitness I’ve been able to hang on to over the last month since my mileage has dropped from 70+ mpw to 30-40 mpw. I entered the elite field, since my Run the Rails 10k time qualified me (you had to have a race result that was six minute pace or faster), but I am probably going to get roasted. After a quick look at the results from the last couple of years, it would probably take a mid to low 15 minute run to win (last year was 15:13 – 2010 was 15:37 and 2009 was 15:14), earlier in the summer I think I would have gotten under 16 minutes, but right now I’m hoping for anything under 17. I’d like to finish in the top 10, but this is going to be more about having a little fun and getting a good hard effort in.

 

After the corporate challenge, I’ll be aiming for the Xterra Georgia series. Last year every race was on a road game Saturday, so I had no chance to make any of them. Even the fall fitness race that is literally in my backyard was the week we went to Seattle and left on Friday. This year I should be able to make most of these races, which the exception of the opener at Harbins, as I will be in San Deigo that weekend. I’m okay with that though, since I always, without fail, run slow at Harbins. I’ll aim to kick off the series with Fall Fitness at the GEHC in early October. After or before that…who knows.

 

Other than that I will just try to keep getting out the door and getting runs in as many days as possible. Amanda got me a Nike fuelband for my birthday, so I’m currently obsessed with reaching and surpassing my goal (3500 fuel points – that seems soft but my runs aren’t worth what I thought they would be). Without a run I come in between 2500 and 3000 fuel points for an average day, so in order to get my goal I need to get out the door for a run. I am really looking forward to testing it out in the offseason. I’d love to know what those 20 mile days with 10-12 mile workouts would be worth! It’s a little silly, but it’s a fun way to keep me from being lazy during the football season.

 

I’ve also gotten a good bit of use out of the Garmin watch that my parents got me for my birthday, yes my arm basically like the Ironman suit now. It’s been good to know the distances of runs around work and it’s allowed me to do a little exploring.

Training: July 9 - July 15

Monday, July 9: GEHC Trails – 8 miles – Status quo for the morning run. I felt a little bit sluggish after slogging away in the heat on Sunday. It was brutally hot today so I opted for one run. As much as I want to keep my mileage up this week it is going to be a little tough traveling back home.

Tuesday, July 10: GEHC Trails – 8 miles – Ran the normal loop. I ran the last mile or so a little quicker than normal today. After feeling a little sluggish yesterday and only running once I wanted to try and turn my legs over a little bit.

PM Run – GEHC Trails – 5 miles – Out and back on the greenway. The weather was actually pretty nice for this run.

Wednesday, July 11: GEHC Trails – 8 miles – Today is a travel day. Amanda and I are flying up to Boston for our vacation. I wanted to go longer today but I had to stick around the house in the morning to do a couple of work things before leaving for the airport. I also had hopes of running as second time when we got back to Middleton, but Dad made burgers so I feasted instead.

Thursday, July 12: Hamilton Falls, Vermont – 12 miles – Awesome run on an awesome day with Josh Ferenc up in Vermont. I drove up early and met Josh after he got out of teaching summer school. We jumped in his truck and drove up to Hamilton Falls where we ran down to the dam, went up and over the dam then down around to a campsite. We ran through the campsite trails back to the base of the falls then climbed to the top and swam for about 30 minutes before heading back to Saxtons River.

On the way back to his house we stopped at an ice cream shack on a farm that ran on the honor system. It was really cool. We grabbed some ice cream, I went with peanut butter cup, and hung out for a little bit before heading back to the house and tooling around on Josh’s scooters for a little bit. We even traded some guy an old bike seat for a pair of clipless pedals. I have no idea if they are any good or even if I’ll be able to find a pair of shoes and cleats to match, but for free it’s worth a shot. We hit the Vermont country store then I drove home to meet Amanda to hang out for the night.

Friday, July 13: Middleton Roads – 11 miles – In an attempt to avoid the heavy horse and deer fly population in my hometown this time of year, I elected for a road run this morning. I ran down maple street/62 to the old Danvers state hospital (fun fact - Arkham Asylum from Batman was based on Arkham Sanitarium, which HP Lovecraft based on Danvers State Hospital and it is now an apartment complex.) ran down Gregory street then back roads to Rt. 114 down to River St. all the way to Boston Street and back home.

Saturday, July 14: Middleton Roads – 11 miles – Same run as yesterday. I’ve never done this run before but it’s not bad. The section along 114 is kind of shitty and the first 35 minutes or so has you out in the sun quite a bit, but overall it’s not a bad route.

Sunday, July 15: Zero – Today was a day off from running but I went to OSG and played paintball all day with Danny and Chris, so I definitely got some exercise in. After getting home and showering, I drove down to Old Lyme, CT to meet Amanda and her family to hang out at a beach house for a few days.

Weekly Totals: 63 miles on seven runs – This had to be one of the first weeks I have had without doubling in about four months. I wanted to run more, but when we go home it’s tough to get a ton of running in unless I do it all in one run because there is so much we want to do. I got some good runs in including an awesome day up in Vermont with Ferenc, and my road runs at home weren’t bad either my mileage just suffered a bit without the secondary runs or the one really long day that I’ve been getting in lately. I’m not overly worried about only getting 63 miles in this week and I don’t mind backing off a little bit going into the Dirty Spokes series finale next week. I am going to have to back off during August because of work and while I am sad to see my 70+ mpw streak end, I could definitely use a little bit of a break.

Race Report - Dirty Spokes Central Park Trail Race

This race report is a few weeks old...It was sitting in my dashboard as a draft...whoops.

This was a big race for me personally. After struggling at Mt. Tabor and then having a miserable experience at the Sutallee Trace I kicked my training up a notch to try and get ready for this race. I logged five weeks over 75 miles and put in 72 miles the week of this race. I know that’s not a crazy amount of mileage but with my schedule it’s what I can realistically get in without feeling tapped out. I also think that, for me, 75-85 miles a week is my sweet spot. I’d love to ratchet it up and run 90-100 mile weeks but that’s not realistic for me.

Heading into this race, I backed off a little bit and only ran a couple of doubles in the week before. I still ran my monster mileage/workout day with my 8 mile/11 mile double on Monday. My workout (11 miles w/ 10 sets of 30-60-90s) went really well. It was faster than what I did the week before and had me feeling confident early in the week. I was also coming off of a road PR in the 10k (even though it’s still soft), which was a big confidence booster, but I was on my feet and out in the sun all week at work, so I was a little nervous about that.

Saturday morning I woke up early (5:30 am) to do clips, which wasn’t bad because I was up early all week with minicamp at work, ate an English muffin with some peanut butter then headed out the door to get to Central Park around 7:30. When I got to the rec center at the park and walked over to get my number I tried to figure out where and how we were going to get on the trail, as there is no trailhead at the rec center. Apparently last year there were too many cars at the trailhead parking lot, which also serves baseball and softball fields so Tim was forced to move the race to the rec center and reverse the direction of the course.

I grabbed my number and met up with Mitch to head out for a 2.5/3 mile warm up where we went over most of the course. Getting a third loop on it before the race was definitely beneficial. The race was two laps on a 2.5 mile trail (which I’m pretty sure was a little longer than that). I knew that the last section of the loop was going to be tough. It was tight with lots of twists and turns and from my experience last year I knew it would be chalk full of lappers.

After the warm up, Mitch and I headed over to the start line and tried to find a little bit of shade as it was really starting to warm up. When we got to the line I saw Jesse Rappolle from Big Peach and a Steve Wilcox from Atlanta Track Club and knew that those guys would most likely be upfront at the start. I got in a few strides, talked with Jesse for a minute then toed the line. From the gun I wanted to get out well because I didn’t know how we were going to get on the trail and didn’t want to get stuck in a bad spot like I did at Olde Rope Mill.

At the start, we ran through the parking lot then around the backside of the rec center before climbing a fairly steep hill and making a hard right onto some power line trails. Once we hit the power line trails I tried to open it up a little bit and see if I could stretch it out a little. Jesse settled in behind me and we ran the down and up a switchback hill. At the top of the hill I knew it leveled off and then was slightly downhill until you hit the woods. I put in another short surge, just trying to use the downhill but keep a relaxed effort. I ended up carrying this surge into the woods and ran well for the next mile or so. We came out of the woods and jumped onto a single track trail (in the truest sense of the word…the trail was maybe eight inches wide). At this point, I felt really smooth so just tried to keep it rolling, knowing that I had a slow section coming up. Before we hit the last section of woods, I took a peek back and didn’t see Jesse. I brushed it off, figuring he was closer than I thought rather than further back.

The final section of woods was tough. It was a roller coaster with a ton of tight turns and it killed my pace. I was really worried about getting caught or giving back a lot of time here. When I came out of the woods I tried to get back into a rhythm on the flat power line trail as I headed out for my second lap. I struggled a little bit climbing the switchback but settled down again on the downhill afterwards. I tried to maintain that pace all the way back into the woods, but with about two miles to go I was starting to feel like I went out too fast.

My legs started to get really, really heavy. My lungs felt alright, I wasn’t gassed but I felt like I was running in cement shoes. I tried to battle through it, hoping it was just a rough patch but the further I ran, I kept feeling like I couldn’t settle in without slowing down. After rough half mile, maybe three quarters of a mile I finally started to get back into a rhythm at a faster pace. I put my head down and grinded up the short uphill past the water station where I dumped two cups of water on my head to try and combat the heat, and focused on finishing the race strong.

I rallied really, really well on the next stretch, which was single track trail cut into the side of a hill. Any ground that I lost during my little pity party mile, I made up on this stretch. Knowing that the last half mile was going to be slow due to the terrain, I really pushed to try and finish strong. Once I got back into the woods it was nightmare city. I ran into a ton of lappers and about 600 meters from the finish I was completely exhausted from yelling “on your left” at the people in front of me. I stole a couple of glances back and didn’t see any sign of Jesse so I eased up and cruised through to the finish. I crossed the line in 31:43, which was about 1:07 faster than I ran last year. I’m definitely in better shape than I was last year and that’s why I think this course is a little long. It was my second win of the series and my fourth win of the year (all have come since joining the Saucony Hurricanes) and in 12 Dirty Spokes races I’ve managed to finish in the top three 11 times.

I guzzled about a gallon of water and had some Herbalife lemonade, which was really good, but it was like 25 bucks (no thanks) for the powder. I waited for Mitch to come in, hung out and talked with a couple of the usual suspects and grabbed my winnings, a box of cliff bars, a pair of Tifosi sunglasses, a coupon for the Treetop Quest (SCORE!), Montrail water bottle and a medal. Mitch and I ran about a mile and a half cool down before I headed out to Nitro to play some paintball. Good day all in all, but man was it scorching out.  

I’ve got about a month before the series finale at Sawnee Mountain now. My plan is to continue to hit right around the 75 mile mark but add in a few hill workouts. I’m thinking Chicopee Woods or the hills around the GEHC should be a good primer for the Sawnee race. I’m also traveling home for about a week just before the race, so I might taper a little during that time, but it will be good to get in a few runs back home.

Training: July 2 - July 8

Monday, July 2: GEHC Trails – 8 miles – Status quo for the morning run. I’ve been locked into this 8 mile run pretty much every weekday for the last few months. It’s automatic at this point.

PM Run – Ivy Creek Greenway – 5 miles - I originally planned to try and get a longer run in the afternoon but it was just way too hot, mid to upper 90s. I ran out and back on the greenway to get in five. It was kind of nice to ditch the hillier three mile run I normally do for the flatter five mile route, but it was sweltering.

Tuesday, July 3: GEHC Trails – 8 miles – Standard morning run. The mornings have been getting really humid lately, which is not doing good things for my running wardrobe. As soon as I finish and can finally get the sweat away from my body everything is completely soaked. Yeah, it’s gross.

PM Run – Suwanee Greenway – 10 miles – This was originally supposed to be a hill workout, then I decided to change it to a tempo run, and then it became a survival run. I got out of work a little bit later than I would have liked, so I decided to just try and get in a good solid tempo run, but it was still really hot out. Before my “warm up” was done I made the decision to bag the workout and just get in 10 miles at a slightly raised tempo. I wasn’t really happy with his, as I’ve stuck with every other planned workout I’ve had this year. When I got going I just felt awful and I didn’t think I’d get much out of a bad workout, besides being pissed off at a bad workout. I struggled through the 10 miles called it a day.

Wednesday, July 4: Ivy Creek Greenway/Mall of GA – 5 miles – Four the fourth, Amanda and I planned to meet Matt and Kat early to bring Matt down to one of the MARTA stations so he could head to the starting line for the Peachtree while we drove down to the finish at Piedmont Park. I woke up around 5 to try and get five miles in before we headed out. I ran out on the greenway with my headlamp and then decided to jump up on the mall road to run in the street lights. It was about 75 with 94 percent humidity, so this was more of a ‘let’s make sure we don’t take a zero today’ kind of run.

After running we picked up Matt and Kat, dropped Matt of at Doraville (I think) then drove down to Piedmont park, which I found without the GPS after only being there once and having no clue how we got their the first time. (I love shutting off the GPS when I know I am close to a destination and know the way. I always feel like Luke Skywalker and say to myself ‘Luke you turned off your targeting computer, is everything alright?”)

We got to the finish in time to catch the men’s and women’s overall winners (the men’s winner ran 27:30 something…feeding) and then watched the stream of 60,000 people come through the line on 10^th street. We saw Matt finish and regrouped, he got us some phenomenal peaches and we jumped back in the car to head home. I was a little bummed that I didn’t see any King of Pops carts, but with what I ate the rest of the day that was probably for the best.

After dropping Matt and Kat off, Amanda and I headed out to Buford Dam to do a little hiking, just a few miles though nothing crazy. We soaked in the Hooch for a few then headed back to the car. Amanda was a trooper. It was really hot and we ran into a slow moving group, so naturally I put on the burners to roast them up the ridge trail and Amanda hung right with me despite feeling like she was going to pass out. We got some Gatorade and water then headed home to make a 4^th of July feast of hot dogs, burgers and Summer Shandys.

PM Run – GEHC Trails – 3 miles - I got out the door for three in the afternoon because I was disgusted by myself after eating lunch. I could smell hot dogs the whole time and I’m not sure if it was because people were cooking them or because I was sweating them out.

Thursday, July 5: GEHC Trails – 8 miles – I was hurting after yesterday and I really wanted to sleep in, but I fought it and got out for my standard AM 8.

PM Run – Ivy Creek Greenway – 5 miles – Battled the heat to grind out five in the afternoon before trivia. I was a little bit late meeting everyone because it took me about 35 minutes to cool down enough to take a shower. I’m glad I got the five in though, because I’ve got Brian and Amy’s wedding this weekend, so it’s likely that I’ll have to take Saturday off.

Friday, July 6: GEHC Trails – 8 miles – Standard morning run. Nothing out of the ordinary.

PM Run – GEHC Trails – 3 miles – Managed to squeeze in a quick three before heading up to Chateau Elan for Brian and Amy’s wedding rehearsal. It was really nice, quick rehearsal, nice dinner at the winery and then a fun mixer. Amanda was able to make it up for a couple hours too.  

Saturday, July 7: Zero – Day off – Not pumped about taking a zero, but we got home late from the mixer then I had to be back at Chateau for golf at 8:30, so there was no time for me to get it in. After golfing I took a quick shower then drove back to the hotel to get ready for the wedding.  

Sunday, July 8: Ft. Yargo State Park – 14 miles – I finally got to sleep in a little bit, which was vital after we got home around 1:00 am after the wedding. I milled around for a while and watched the Tour then Amanda and I grabbed some breakfast. She headed to work and I drove out to Ft. Yargo for a run. I went with a double loop of the hiking trail so I could stop half way and grab a water bottle for the final seven miles. This turned out to be a really good call, as it got hot fast. My first lap was pretty normal but my second lap was a death march. I drank most of my water and stopped at both bathrooms where I turned on the shower to try and cool myself down. Needless to say it was brutal, but I’m glad I got it in. Barberitos for a burrito after.

Weekly Totals: 77 miles on 11 runs – I'm really happy that I hit my mileage goal despite taking a day off. I feel like I’ve kind of hit the plateau for my training were it is at right now. I definitely feel like I need to mix things up a little bit if I want to keep improving and running well. I don’t know if that is added miles or adding another workout or if it just feels that way because I haven’t raced in a couple weeks to see where I am at. It will be good to get a change of scenery as I am going home for a few days and will be able to get some different runs in back in Massachusetts. I am also planning a trip up to NH/VT to get in on the Keenyan Summer for a day with some friends which will probably be a wake-up call but it’s always fun to get it in with those guys. I might even throw in a random race while I’m up there for spits and whistles.

The next race that is definitely on my calendar is the Dirty Spokes Series Finale at Sawnee Mountain on the 21^st. I have the points title wrapped up at this point, provided I don’t lose to Mitch by 20+ spots, but I would like to close out the series with another win. Sawnee Mountain will be my last race for a little over a month as training camp begins at work the next week. That means the next week I will try to hit 75 again then back off a little for the final series race then I will have to play it by ear as training camp is an incredibly difficult time for me to train. My goal is to maintain 20 miles a week during camp and then try to run between 20 and 40 miles per week during the football season, while running a couple of fall races. It’s really odd to think that I have to get in the majority of my running from January until August when my favorite time of the year to run is the fall, but that’s how it goes. I am still planning to run as many Xterra races as possible and I’d like to use the fall as a chance to run some 5ks. My hope is that putting races on my calendar will help get me out the door.

Training: June 25 - July 1

Monday, June 25: GEHC Trails – 8 miles – Standard morning eight miler. I was expecting my legs to be tired yesterday after racing on Saturday and playing paintball but I felt fine. Today was a different story. My legs were dead from the get go. Just tried to grind through it and get the miles in.

PM Run – GEHC Trails – 3 miles - Afternoon shakeout. I ran up and around the GEHC. Boy was it really hot. Not looking forward to the triple digits they are predicting at the end of the week.

Tuesday, June 26: GEHC Trails – 8 miles – Standard morning eight miler. Uneventful.

PM Run – GEHC Trails – 3 miles - Afternoon shake out. It was nice to get out of work a little early and relax before running. I waited till 7 pm to run and the weather was really nice. It was starting to cool off a bit, even though the sun doesn’t go down until close to 9, it still dips below most of the trees around the environmental center to make for a nice shady run.

Wednesday, June 27: GEHC Trails – 8 miles – Standard morning eight miler. Took it nice and easy and cruised in just over an hour. I have a hill workout planned for this afternoon.

PM Run – Chicopee Woods – 10 miles - Warmed up 3+ miles then did three repeats on Grandma's climb. The climb is about a half mile long hill that has two levelish sections. I went 3:31, 3:29, 3:27 and 3:25. The last one was a little tough but it was a good workout overall. I was happy to go negative on all four. At first I thought I could have run a little bit harder but I’m not sure if I could have gone negative for all four if I’d started out at 3:25 or faster. 3+ mile cool down, calling it 10 even though it's probably a little longer.

Thursday, June 28: GEHC Trails – 8 miles – Standard morning eight miler. Nothing special, but my legs felt okay after yesterday’s high mileage day and workout.

PM Run – GEHC Trails – 3 miles - Afternoon shakeout. I ran up and around the GEHC for my second run of the day. Good to get the legs moving again in the afternoon. I waited until 6:30 to run in the hopes that it would cool off a little. Afterwards I met Amanda, Matt and Kat for trivia. We need to step up our game.

Friday, June 29: GEHC Trails – 8 miles – This will be my one and only run today. It was already in the 80s by the time I finished my run at 8 am...oooosh. I toyed around with the idea of maybe running again but it was in the mid 90s by lunchtime. It was a good day to run once.

Saturday, June 30: GEHC Trails – 8 miles – Probably not the best idea I’ve ever had but I woke up around normal time (6:30) and got in 8 miles to try and beat the heat. It was warming up quickly again today. After my run I hopped in the car and drove out to Nitro and played paintball for a couple of hours. I was smart and brought plenty of water. By the time I left it was over 100 degrees. When I got home, Amanda and I settled on going Taco Mac for some wings and beers then to see Ted because according to my car it was 114. Woof. Ted was pretty fun, definitely similar to Family Guy. Amazingly there were people behind us that had two little kids with them. Really? It was not that kind of teddy bear movie bro.

Sunday, July 1: GEHC Trails – 8 miles – I Waited too long to run. It was a huge mistake. I was absolutely dying it was so hot. Probably around the high 80s, plus it didn’t help that ate a ton of wings and drank zero water yesterday afternoon. Detoxed with a trip to whole foods to get some stuff for the week and Amanda made fruit salad with yogurt for dinner. I may have had a piece of oatmeal toast with peanut butter and nutella also.

Weekly Totals: 75 miles on 11 runs with one good workout. I was happy with the week, obviously I would have loved to have gotten a long run in on Saturday or Sunday but I decided to take it a little easier with the heat since I knew I was going to hit my mileage goal. I was happy with the workout. It didn’t seem like a ton of volume but it was good to get some hard hill efforts in, since the next Dirty Spokes race is up and over Sawnee Mountain. This week I’m hoping for more of the same, but it might be tough with Brian and Amy’s wedding rehearsal dinner on Friday and then the wedding on Saturday. I am thinking I’ll be up early to run on Wednesday since we are heading into the city to watch the Peachtree and then I’ll be up early again on Saturday to run before golf. Hopefully I can hit Ft. Yargo for a nice long run on Sunday.

Oh yeah I almost forgot. I bought a Nathan water bottle for some of these longer runs when it is really hot. I’ll let you know how it goes.

Training June 18 - June 24

Monday, June 18: GEHC Trails – 8 miles – Normal morning eight miler, once again nothing special…up and around the GEHC then out and back on the greenway.

PM Run – Gainesville State College – 11 miles – 10 sets of 30-60-90s. We have mini-camp this week so the middle of the week is going to be really hectic. I’m going to have to get up early just to get my morning runs in, so I decided to bump my workout up to Monday.

I ran two loops of the mountain bike trail with 10 sets of pickups. This workout went much better than last week. I was faster than last week and definitely felt much better. It was a good tune up for this week’s central park race, which features a similar course. 19 miles for the day, good way to start off the week.

Tuesday, June 19: GEHC Trails – 8 miles – Normal morning eight miler. With mini-camp this week I am likely going to be limited to one run a day. I was up at 5:30 to do clips then out the door for an hour before heading to work for the first day of mini-camp. It was a long day out in the sun and on my feet, exhausted when I got home around 7, so only one run today.

Wednesday, June 20: GEHC Trails – 8 miles – Normal morning eight miler. Same deal as yesterday.

Thursday, June 21: GEHC Trails – 8 miles – Normal morning eight miler. Same story as Tuesday and Wednesday.

Friday, June 22: Central Park – 5 miles – Half-day Friday at work meant I had some extra time in the afternoon to drive over to Central Park and get a few miles in on the race course. I took some cool back roads and bridges to cross Lake Lanier to get to Central Park. I got two easy laps in to survey the course and get five in on the day. I had a little trouble finding where exactly we were going to start the race, so I just ran from the start/finish of last year’s race. This still allowed me to run the course and go to work on my race plan. This course has some really fast spots and a couple that are a little slow. I also think it’s longer than five. The most crucial part of the race is going to be midway through the second lap. This is where I will try and make moves because the final 800+ meters is in really tight, rooty trails.

Saturday, June 23: Dirty Spokes Central Park Trail Race – 10 miles – Ran 10 miles total. Warmed up with Mitch, won the race in 31:43 after taking it out pretty hard and distancing myself from the pack. I ended up winning going away, which all but assures that I will win the series for the second year in a row. All I have to do is finish the final race and make sure Mitch doesn’t beat me by more than 10 spots. It was smoking hot out. I was sweating from the get go, but luckily the humidity wasn’t too bad so I wasn’t soaked until I crossed the finish line, and dumping water on my head at the water station was a great idea. Mitch and I ran a short cool down then I spent the rest of the afternoon playing paintball at Nitro.

Sunday, June 24: Ft. Yargo State Park – 14 miles – After having a little bit of a down week due to mini-camp, I hit Ft. Yargo for two loops of the hiking trail. I didn’t make the decision to head out there until a little bit later in the morning (around 9) and that was a mistake. It was pretty hot, moving towards the 90s by the time I got going. I really should have gotten out there earlier, but I brought plenty of water and the hiking trail allows for a stop at my car and at two different camp grounds. It also follows right next to the lake for most of the way if I ever need to cool down quick in an emergency. Either way I got in a good long run and my legs actually felt a lot better than I would have expected. I started off super slow because of the heat, but only ended up running about three or four minutes slower than normal. Barberitos for a delicious burrito afterwards.

Weekly Totals: 72 miles on 8 runs – As I said, my miles were a little bit lower this week due to mini-camp but I was glad to get over 70 miles again. That makes five straight weeks above 70 mpw and I feel like that has really made a difference in both my racing and overall fitness. I feel fairly fit, which is much better than where I was at when I started out in January and even how I felt when I ran Mt. Tabor and the Sutallee trace. Next week should be another 70-80 week, with a hill workout in there. I am going to need to start getting some hills in to get ready for Sawnee Mountain.

Training: June 11 - 17

Monday, June 11: GEHC Trails – 8 miles – Normal morning run, nothing special but my legs felt a little bit better after having a more relaxed weekend in terms of miles. I wish I would have gotten something longer in on Saturday or Sunday, but it was nice to feel refreshed on a Monday morning. Honestly, I probably needed it with the increase in mileage lately.

PM Run – GEHC Trails – 3 miles – Up and around the GEHC for three miles after work. 

Tuesday, June 12: GEHC Trails – 8 miles – Standard morning eight miler.

PM Run – GEHC Trails – 3 miles – Up and around the GEHC for three miles after work. 

Wednesday, June 13: GEHC Trails – 8 miles – Standard morning eight miler.

PM Run – Gainesville State College – 11 miles – two loops of the 5.5 mile trail with 10 sets of 30-60-90s. This was a brutal workout. I had to add two sets on top of my original planned eight to help carry me to the finish. I knew there was no way I would have finished strong without them. Not that I finished strong, but it was better than it would have been without the extra sets. I think I was a little worn out from doing this workout after one of our OTA media days. I was on my feet out in the sun all day and I think that worn me down a little. About 12 minutes into the run I thought about bailing on the workout because of the heat but I pressed on. Hopefully it will pay off.

Thursday, June 14: GEHC Trails – 8 miles – Standard morning eight miler. My legs were really feeling yesterday’s workout and I made the executive decision to go with one run. I probably could have gotten a second one in before trivia, but I needed to lay on the couch for a few hours.

Friday, June 15: GEHC Trails – 8 miles – Standard morning eight miler.

PM Run – GEHC Trails – 3 miles – Up and around the GEHC for three miles after work. I ran this run around 7 or 7:30 PM and it was awesome. The weather was so much better, at least 15 degrees cooler than when I run around 5 due to more shade. I loved running a little later but I was starving and I’m not a fan of running that late and then getting up and running early. I never feel like I have time to relax when I do that, but once in a while it is a nice change of pace. 

Saturday, June 16: GEHC Trails – 6 miles – Woof. Amanda and I went out with some friends and ended up getting home around 1:30 am, way past normal bed time. I got up at 7:30 to do clips then had to go back to bed because I was exhausted. I slept in until around 10:30, which was awesome, then did two loops around the GEHC to get six. This was a get a few miles in run. I had plans to run again later but settled on running 14 tomorrow to get 80 for the week.

Sunday, June 17: Ft. Yargo State Park – 14 miles – Two loops of the hiking trail for 14. I got started a little later so about halfway through the second loop it started to heat up a little bit. All in all it was a good run, not fast but not slow. I was glad to get a longer run in with the next Dirty Spokes race coming up next weekend.

Weekly Totals: 80 miles on 11 runs – Good week of work. I hit 80 miles, which gives me four straight weeks above 75 miles. If I don’t run well at next week’s race it will not be for lack of miles. Next week I’m looking to hit 70 miles, it will probably be a little bit of a lower week since I won’t be able to run in the afternoon after work most of the week and I’ll probably just run five on Friday and try to save my legs a little bit going into Saturday’s race.

Training June 4 - June 10

I’m falling behind on my blog again so I’m going to just write a quick recap of last week’s training, especially since there wasn’t really anything spectacular about it. I was pretty much exactly where I wanted to be mileage-wise this past week, honestly, I was probably a little higher than I anticipated. I got 78 miles in on 11 runs, which as I’ve mentioned before seems like a lot of trips out the door but not that high of a mileage total. I would think most people running 11 times in a week would probably tend to be in the 80-90 mile range or perhaps hitting 100+ territory, but because I really only have about an hour to run in the morning and depending on the day I am usually just doing a three mile shakeout in the afternoon. I feel like if/when I decided to train for a marathon I’ll be able to step up my second run, but for now I am just enjoying getting out there as much as I can. For what I am running these days 70-75 miles works pretty well.

I had a typical start to the week, but threw in a five mile afternoon run on Tuesday because I had a little bit of extra time. Wednesday was very similar to last week with an 8 miler in the morning and then a 10 mile 30-60-90 workout in the afternoon. I ran on the Suwanee greenway again, but this time I cut out the 2 or 3 miles of extra running that I did by starting at the actual trailhead. It wasn’t the fastest workout I’ve ever done by any means and my calves were still a little tight from the road race on Saturday, but it’s important for me to get in a more up tempo effort each week. I race much better when I do a workout and not just running each day (how crazy, right).

I only got a chance to run once on Thursday but made up for it with a double on Friday. I ran my normal 8 in the am then headed to Ft. Yargo and ran seven in the afternoon. I ran my second run at like 1:30 after running at 7 am so I probably didn’t give myself enough time to fully recover but I really wanted to get out there this week and I knew I wasn’t going to make it.

I Spent Saturday at the Red Bull Soap Box derby in Piedmont Park downtown with the McNamara’s, which was pretty cool. They invited me to go down with them at trivia on Thursday night and since Amanda had to work I figured why not? We got there early and got a chance to check out the course that had two “kickers” and a bunch of hay bale lined slalom turns. There wasn’t as much carnage as I was expecting due to a lack of speed from most of the cars, but it was fun to watch none the less. My favorite cars where the guys that made batman’s motorcycle from TDK, which came out of a cardboard version of his tumbler bat mobile, the guys that dressed like the Beastie Boys in the Sabotage video who had a police car looking cart (even thought it was totally weak sauce and didn’t make it all the way down) and the eventual winners from Sweetwater Brewing Co., who made a giant rainbow trout (that Pat Ard would have loved) car. I also dominated some cheese fries and had a peaches n cream popsicle from King of Pops that was soooooo good. Surprisingly, I did not have any Red Bull…probably for the best. Oh yeah, and I ran a quick five in the morning before we left, we also walked around a ton…Matt’s FuelBand said he’d earned like 500+ fuel points so that counts for something.

Sunday I stayed home and ran an easy eight miles. I knew I had the miles that I wanted for the week and as much as I wanted to get a longer run in the crappy weather made me feel like staying close to home and getting breakfast with Amanda instead of ditching her on back to back days in the morning. I made some sweet baby rays BBQ boneless ribs for dinner. They were pretty good but next time I’m slow cooking them on the O Grill instead of using the Foreman.

Weekly Totals: 78 miles on 11 runs

Training: May 28 - June 3

Monday, May 28: GEHC Trails – 8 miles – Typical morning run. Up and around the GEHC and down to the greenway, out and back. Still feeling the busy weekend in my legs a little bit.

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 – 5:11
Mile 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.

Training May 21 - May 27

Monday, May 21: GEHC Trails – 8 miles – Standard morning eight miler. Nothing special, my legs are still a little beat up from Saturday’s race but they are starting to come back around.

PM Run – GEHC Trails – 3 miles – Homesite loop up to Creekside, along Cherokee then back down sweet gum for an afternoon three. It’s starting to get hot. I feel like I’ve said that a bunch, but the temps are creeping up into the high 80s in the afternoon and I don’t think we’re too far from hitting the 90s on a regular basis.

Tuesday, May 22: GEHC Trails - 8 miles – I had a workout planned for this afternoon, but since everyone I’ve planned for the last couple weeks has been shot down by work or something else I wanted to make sure I got a decent run in the morning, so I ran my normal eight. That way if I get kept late or have a random golf outing I’m not scrambling to try and get something in later in the day.

PM Run – GEHC Trails – 7 miles – Forgot to pack shorts, so my initial plan of running at Gainesville state got shot down. I figured I would just head home and run another eight with some pickups, but I was a little more tired than I expected. Thunderstorms rolling in late in the afternoon forced me to cut the run a little bit short. I didn’t want to get caught 10 or 15 minutes out when the heavy stuff came in. Good call, I went to add on a couple loops of the homesite trail and BOOM! Thunder, lighting and torrential downpours by the time I crossed the wooden bridge behind my apartment. I made a mad dash for the breezeway and called it a day. 15 total miles on the day…I’ll take it.

Wednesday, May 23: GEHC Trails – 8 miles – SSDD once again. Nothing exciting to report, ran my normal morning run up the homesite trail up and around the GEHC then down to the greenway, out and back. Just one run today.

Thursday, May 24: GEHC Trails – 8 miles – I’ve had to grab my ipod shuffle for some of these morning runs lately. I’m not a huge fan of running with music but when you run the same eight miler pretty much every day (at least every weekday) sometimes I need the music to carry me through it. That reminds me I need to look into adding some new music to my shuffle (which is affectionately known as iRun by my computer…clever, I know). This got me thinking about the fact that pretty much every song ever is available to me online now and how kids now will never have a stereo with a tape deck that they use to record songs off of the radio, they’re so spoiled.

PM Run – GEHC Trails – 3 miles – Looped the environmental center after work. Nice little afternoon shake out. I really may be an over grown 12 year old…lately I have been climbing the entire little kids treetop adventure course during my afternoon runs. Amanda told me I need to stop before I get us banned for life.

Friday, May 25: GEHC Trails – 8 miles – Standard morning eight. I took it a little easier as I’m still debating running the Mountain Goat 10 miler tomorrow. The last race I did in the series was a good one so I figure I might as well jump in, after all I can’t run worse than last week (Foreshadowing??? Maybe).

Saturday, May 26: Mountain Goat Sutallee Trace Challenge – 14 miles – Mitch and I both went back and forth about doing this race after he told me a the trails are pretty tough, but I figured if I could handle it. In retrospect, Mitch had the right idea by staying home (in fairness he was dealing with some upper respiratory issues). Friday night I decided to make the drive out to Canton to run the race, figuring I’d hit up Nitro and play paintball afterwards and it would be a good day of being outside and running around.

The race was pretty heinous. I ended up taking second but the times were complete garbage. I was 1:11 and change with the winning coming in at 1:09. Looking at the times from last year I knew it was going to be slow but I thought I’d at least be under 70 minutes. I got out well and separated myself and the eventual winner pretty early and we battled over the first five or six miles before he eventually passed me on one of the many climbs around seven miles. At that point, I ran up the white flag and pretty much jogged in the last three miles. It was a miserable experience in very sense of the word, just nonstop up and down. One huge hill around half way (that I actually ran well) and then down one hill to a creek and back up the other side. It didn’t help that it was about 95 degree and humid. At the 8 mile aid station I made the decision to go straight home and park on the couch once the death march ended. Warmed up two and cooled down two to get 14 on the day.

One thing I learned from this is I can’t do these long races without getting a long run in and without doing at least a 30-60-90 workout.

Sunday, May 27: GEHC Trails – 8 miles – I was totally hosed from yesterday. I decided to stay home and run the backyard eight instead of trying to drive somewhere and have another disaster of a run like a couple weeks ago at Harbins. Drove down to Dosser Works in the city to play paintball for a couple hours after then parked on the couch and waited for Amanda to get out of work.

Weekly Totals: 75 miles on 10 runs – Much better week. I’m really pumped to get up into the 70s this week. It still feels like a lot of runs to get there, but I’ve accepted the fact that the way my schedule is running 8 in the morning and 3/5 in the afternoon is the best way for me to get my miles in. The morning runs help tremendously during the times when I have unexpected late days at work or when we’ve got a lot going on and I just don’t have the legs or time to get more than 25 minutes in after work. I am looking to build on this and try to stay in the 70s during June. I will bring my miles back down during July, August will be a wash because of training camp, but I should at least be able to pick things back up with maintenance runs by September, but that’s getting a little ahead of myself.

Maybe a road race next weekend…

Training May 14 - 20

Monday, May 14: GEHC Trails – 3 miles – I had to get over to the River Club for Coach’s golf tournament early this morning so I didn’t have much time to get a run in. I was going to take the day off, but ended up heading out for a quick three mile loop around the Environmental center. I was way too tired by the end of the day to get out for a second run. I did win a Nike Everclear putter though, so that was pretty sweet.

Tuesday, May 15: GEHC Trails – 8 miles – Normal morning run, up and around the GEHC then out and back on the greenway trail before work. I wanted to get out for another 3 or 5 in the afternoon but I got stuck at work a little late and Amanda wanted to go to trivia so I scrapped the second run in favor of dinner.

Wednesday, May 16: GEHC Trails – 8 miles – Today looked like it was going to be a good day to get in a workout in the afternoon, but knowing how the week was going early on I opted to run eight in the morning to make sure I got at least that much in. Turns out that was a wise decision. At the last minute I had to change gears and head down to Buckhead for our State of the Franchise event with some of our season ticket holders and our front office. By the time I got home I was starving and it was almost 9, so no second run let alone a workout. I’ll pay for that on Saturday.

Thursday, May 17: GEHC Trails – 8 miles – SSDD…same shit, different day. Ran the normal route again but at least the pace has been better this week so I feel like these are quality runs.

PM Run – GEHC Trails – 2 miles – Thunderstorms rolling in shortened this run to two miles. Better than nothing.

Friday, May 18: GEHC Trails – 5 miles – Out and back on the Sweetgum/Cherokee/Creekside trails. I got thrown for another loop today. Our GM did bike to work day and rode from Buckhead to Flowery Branch (40ish miles) so I was up at 5am to do clips then in the car to head down for the departure at 6. No morning run. By the time I got out of work I figured the best thing to do was just run five and call it a day with the race tomorrow.

Saturday, May 19: Dirty Spokes Mt. Tabor Trail Race – 12 miles (8 mile race + 3 wu & 2 cd) – I was not into this race at all…mentally or physically. I didn’t feel like my body was ready to run at all and mentally I’ve been out of it for over a week with all the stuff I’ve had going on a work. I’d been on my feet a lot and my mileage dropped again, so going into it I had a feeling it was going to be ugly. In the back of my head I hoped and figured that I’d snap out of it once we got going, but I really just wanted to get through it. I warmed up with Mitch and my legs felt awful. When we got to the line I talked to Jesse Rappole and Nathan Haskins for a quick second (both said they weren’t feel fast today) then we hit the trail. I tried to say close to the two of them but my legs wouldn’t cooperate. I ended up settling into survival mode and just ran the course. I ended up third in 54:15, which in part is a result of the technical difficulty of the course (it was tough) and part because I ran crappy. Last year I ran 52:0X here and a month ago I ran 55:08 for nine miles (yeah oosh).

After the race, Amanda and I drove over to Kennesaw Mountain National Battlefield and hiked up to the top of Kennesaw Mountain. We tagged a summit, even if it’s only like a mile hike to the top and it’s only like 1,000 foot summit, still counts.

Sunday, May 20: Gainesville State College – 11 miles – I needed a day to just relax so I took the short drive up to GSC on Sunday morning for two loops of the race course. I ran this really slow, but it was good to get back to running for an hour and a half on Sunday. My legs were still pretty trashed from the race yesterday and I definitely need to make stretching more of a focus and priority post run. I’m kicking around the idea of running in the Mountain Goat 10 miler in Caton next weekend.

Weekly Totals: 57 miles on 8 runs with one ugly race – This was a an okay week given how crazy it was work-wise. I think I would have hit 65 or 70 if it weren’t for a couple of early mornings and late nights. Hopefully I can get back on track and be around the 65-70 mpw mark over the next few weeks. I think that is going to be the best spot for me mileage-wise as I round out the summer before training camp starts.