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.