I only run on days that end in a "y."

travel day back - no run.

7.25 easy miles - the knee held up pretty good.  Going to try the workout tomorrow am and see how it goes.

Met up with my old training group for 1000's.  It was low 30's but compared to NE is felt like the bahamas.  Pulled my hoodie off at the track and ran in a base layer and long sleeve shirt. 

I held on with the lead pack for 5 and then had to take a bit of a break. These guys are peaking right now for the Austin marathon so I knew I probably couldn't hang for 8 repeats so I told myself I would do 6.   I tried to jump in on a 6th but my knee - which had been a non-issue - acted up.  I worked on it a bit with some strong pressure - it's really lower left side of knee coming up the side of the calf.  This worked and I did a 6th 1000m with no issues.  However, when I attempted the 200m strides it was a no-go.  I hobbled back the 1.75 miles to the annex and then hit the foam roller pretty hard.  I don't think it is serious and with some rolling it should be OK.  I will have to stay away from speed for a while though.

6 x 1000 - 3:50 to 3:40 ish (6:00 ish pace) with 200m recovery in between.

Met up with the group at 5:45 with the plan of running 16.  Fortunately the first 6 miles was a loop - 3 up and 3 back down - so I could drop out.  The injury started hurting when I tried to take off again after getting water.  It is a strange one - it doesn't hurt while running but if I stop and then try running again it starts hurting.  

So I got back in the car and drove to the gym for a fun 1:10 hours on the eliptical.  At least I got in 2 hours of cardio work.  Then did some core work since I was there.

I may have to stick to this routine for a few days and try again.  Bad timing to say the least.  I am so out of marathon shape it is not even funny.

6 miles - 7:40's. 

3 easy miles on the indoor track at the gym followed by 60 mins spinning class with sprints, and then 2 fast miles on the indoor track.  Knee felt fine until I pushed it on the last mile.  Different spot this time - so in a way that's a positive since the part that was bothering me didn't.  

6.5 miles on the trail at lunchtime.  No knee issues!!  I will try for 10 miles tomorrow.

Woke up to 40's and a bit of rain.  Really hard to get out the door but I did it.  

Ran the hills through Great Hills - my go to course for hilly marathons.  My injury started acting up at mile 6 but I ran through it and by the last couple miles it was better.  I had to let up on the pace a couple times and then picked it up again.  Pretty sure it's my legs getting used to my new shoes, which I absolutely love.  

No Garmin but ran the miles at a pretty good clip.  I will start working on getting these runs back up to 14 miles. 

Just had enough time to squeeze five super easy miles in after work.  

Met up with the group of 2 miles warm up followed by 3 x (3 min hard, 1 min easy, 2 min hard, 1 min easy, 1 min hard, 1 min easy) on the trail.  Paces for the hard parts were 6:40 down to 6:17.  2.25 miles after for bonus mileage.  Legs felt heavy towards the later stages but it was good to get some turnover.

6 super easy this am.

14 miles - assalt on Mt. Bonnel.  Just happy to have made it through.  Big bump in mileage this week over last week so legs were pretty heavy towards the end. Not a great run but it is in the books.  7:30s-7:40s.

Late night last night so slept in today.  Didn't get a chance to go down and root for my friends at the half.  Did manage to run 8 easy miles when I finally got out the door at 9am.

Cold, windy, light rain, dark, 5 am, all reasons to stay in bed.  Somehow I got myself dressed and out the door.  Met up with the group at the annex but had to get started early so I took off before the huddle.

2.3 miles warm-up to Spring Creek.  Then 6 x .32 mile hill work - long gradual climb the first half then steep hill followed by a bit of a flat stretch to the end.  Was working on the second one before the rest of the group showed up.  Coach arrived early and caught me after my first one.  He told me to run these at 2:15 - first one was 2:24 and that was hard enough. So I pushed it and got down to 2:12 but most were around 2:16 - 2:18, with the last one back to 2:22 because my legs were on fire up that steep part.

Then 3 x backwards up the steep bit.  No time for hill strides as I had to get going to make a 7:30 work meeting.  Would have liked to add a couple more miles back at the end, too.  Oh well.

2.3 miles back to the annex - 7:30's or so. 

Went out for a double - I decided I better start getting ready for Boston.  LOL.  

4.75 miles easy on the trail at lunchtime - a solid 13 mile day. 

5 recovery miles at lunchtime on the trail.  Low 8:00's for the pace.

Met up with the group for 8 miles with some fartleks.  Nice and cold.  We ran most of the fartleks on the road today which definitely helps compared to the trail.  

3 x 3 mins fast with 1 min recovery in between, then 3 x 2 mins with 1 min recovery in between, then 5 x 1 min with 1 min recoveries.

Nice progressive effort - 3 minutes on bits @ 6:30's-6:40s,  2 minute fast bits run 6:10-6:20's, and 1 minute fast bits run at sub 6 pace.

Legs are feeling strong again which is a welcome relief.  Also, my heart rate seems better since I started taking a iron supplement every day.  I didn't have my blood checked but though it might be the culprit.  We will see.  A lot of the symptoms listed in this article I have been experiencing - http://www.pfitzinger.com/labreports/iron.shtml

Added some easy miles in after the workout in order to put in a solid 10 mile morning.

First run in my brand new Saucony Fastwitch which are awesome shoes.  On clearance at runningwarehouse so I may need to pick up another pair or two. 

5 miles at lunchtime around the trail.  Feel like I am coming down with something - I hope I will be able to get my long run in tomorrow.

Woke up not feeling too good, but felt that getting this long run in was critical.  I paid the price later in the day as I had to rest a lot and take a good nap.  I definitely have a respitory infection and felt dizzy after the run.

Met up at 6 am and started out with a new guy who is also running Boston and has run sub 3 before.  He wanted to do 16 but since he didn't know the route he was stuck with me doing over 18.  We ran along the Austin Marathon course.  Of course my watch died on the first mile but I checked in with Collin several times and we were running 7:07 one mile and 7:15 the next, so staying in the low 7's.  When we got to Duval with 3 miles left a group of runners that were pushing it started to run by. We hung for a while but I could tell my legs were getting tired.  I told Collin to follow those guys in and I just kept going at the regular pace.  For me the goal was to get the legs used to the mileage again before I worry about pace.

8 ish with no watch over a moderate hilly course.  Felt terrible but better than yesterday.

Met up with the group for 2k's around Zilker Park.

Wasn't sure how I would do since I haven't been feeling to strong lately.  We did 5 of them but the first was fairly slow and we used it as a "warm-up".  We ran these progressive except for the last one - my legs were dead and it was hard to keep going.  Happy with the result.

2 minutes active recovery, i.e. a little jogging or walking and getting some gatorade or water.

These are a little short of 2k so I will use miles:

1.22 miles in 7:50 (6:30 pace)

1.22 miles in 7:40 (6:17 pace)

1.22 miles in 7:20 (6:06 pace)

1.22 miles in 7:12 (5:55 pace)

1.22 miles in 7:18 (6:05 pace)  legs were burning on this one!

3.27 easy miles back to the annex. 

A solid 5.6 miles of fast paced stuff.  Most likely run a medium long run with fast finish on Thursday. 

7 on the soft trail at lunchtime.  A balmy 67 degrees out.

Over 60 degrees this morning.  Met up with the group after a quick .75 mile warm-up - wanted to get a couple in but woke up to some work issues so that made me a little late.  We ran a 10 mile progressive run on the trail - very disheartening - because the paces felt much harder than they should have - not running anything super fast but it was a grind.  We kept telling ourselves our legs were still recovering from the 2ks. and I am sure there was some truth to that.  I then ran a 1.75 miles easy after the 10 miler to make it a 12 mile day.  Trying to get the legs use to the mileage again.  They are not too happy about it.

8:22 first mile, then 7:30s, 7:20's, last 5 miles sub 7 - 6:50's down to 6:40s, followed by some easy mileage.

I think this is an interesting read:  http://www.rundreamachieve.com/marathontraining80miles/

 4.5 at lunchtime - it's hot out there!

4.5 easy around on the trail at lunchtime - another warm day - 75 and sunny.

Met up with the group at 6 am.  Most were doing 14 miles but I wanted to continue to work on endurance so I opted for 16.  We ran parts of the Austin Marathon course.    Took it easy the first 3 miles as it is almost all a climb.  Kept the pace reasonable considering miles 1-3 and then 6-11 were gradual climbs.  When I hit the turnaround point I dropped the pace to MGP for 5 miles.  It felt good and pretty easy.  Best long run of the season, I hope I can build off of it.  Things seem to be coming together.

Mostly 7:30's-7:20s then 5 at 6:50 pace, last mile 6:30 ish.  

Funny, I couldn't get those paces on Thursday and today it felt easy. 

Met up with some guys for a run on the trail.  8 easy miles.  

5 recovery-ish miles on the trail at lunchtime.  

Medium long run day - the plan is to add a mile a week until I get them up to 13-14 miles and then try to run some fast miles at the end.

It was warm and humid out - 70's, and I will need to get started earlier if I want to get a longer run in.  I got out the door around 5:15 am and made it back just in time to get ready and then it was out the door to drop off my son and then go to work.

 I ran the Rain Creek hills out and Jollyville back.  Time to really start getting some good hill work in.  It went OK, wasn't able to pick it up as much as I wanted to towards the end. 

7:20;s-7:30s and 7 to sub 7:00 at the end.  Don't have my watch but will look up the splits later.

Did 6 x 20 second steep hill sprints after the run and then called it a day.

Just enough time this morning for a quick recovery run.  

4.5 easy on the trail at lunchtime.

Met up with the group at the annex after a short half mile warm up.  I thought we were going to be doing 8 x 800m but the coach said that was changed to 20 x 400m.  This was to be broken up in 4 sets of 5 x 400m with a 200m active recovery between repeats and a 400m recovery between sets.  The intent of the workout was more endurance and turnover based than pure speed.  Therefore, the plan was to start the first set pretty slow and finish fast.  Run the first set too fast and it would get pretty ugly. 

I ran with 3 other guys who kept saying that my recoveries were too fast, but I ddin't think so as they were 56 seconds to 60 seconds almost on the nose.  All in all I thought it went pretty good - this was a continuous workout - no stopping!  Afterward the other guys were like, "are you sure there was not stopping?  We saw a lot of others taking walking recoveries."  I was like, well, yes, a lot of people do that, but the group that I came from always ran active recoveries, and anyway, if you are going to run a marathon I think you need to run these type of workouts without stopping.

So - 2 miles warm-up followed by

5 x 400 @ 1:33-1:36's with 200m active recoveries

400m active recovery

5 x 400 @ 1:27 - 1:32's with 200m active recoveries

400m active recovery

5 x 400 @ 1:26-1:27's with 200m active recoveries

400m active recovery

5 x 400 @ 1:20 - 1:22's with 200m active recoveries

2 x 200 @ 35s

1.75 cool down.

My 4 miles at lunchtime was interrupted by a crisis at work.  Fortunately I had my phone with me.  So I only got 3 miles in.