Whew! What a running weekend! B-22

What a fantastic 3 days of running!

FRIDAY - 5 miles

Friday was supposed to be a rest day for me, but, as I spent so many days at the SXSW music festival, and then knee issues and workouts that didn't include Karma....  Karma didn't get much love from me.  So instead, Bruce and Meredith met me for an easy 5 miles in the greenbelt for Karma to get some fun of his choice.  Meredith brought Flyer, which gave Karma even more fun!  We had a blast, and both Bruce and I commented during our Saturday run HOW INCREDIBLY FRESH our legs felt from an easy 5 mile greenbelt run after some hard running during the week on Friday afternoon.  Knee: 8/10  (10 being perfect)

SATURDAY - 24.5 miles

The doctor has ordered me to run a mile then stretch my knee (IT Band) for a full 5 minutes before running.  That's impossible to do on a trail, but yesterday Nedra who's been having possibly similar issues met me at 5:10 and we ran 1.2 miles then stretched before our group set off for 24 miles.  The route ended up being 23.3, but with my 1.2, it got 24.5 in.   My knee wasn't very happy with me on Saturday, with shooting pains every so often.  Plus, the 24 miles felt like they took for EVER.  Probably because we purposely ran it at a calm pace of just under 8 min/miles.   Knee: 5/10

Saturday afternoon I spent eating eating eating and trying to rehydrate.  I felt hungry and thirsty when i went to bed but knew I couldn't eat anymore.  

SUNDAY - 6.2 (10km) race + 3.8 warmup/down ( i mapped it!) = 10.0 miles.

I sent this email to my boss (coach) yesterday with my plan of attack.  

Looking at the race course...

I think I'll go for
Mile1- 6:45 slow due to traffic?
Mile2- 7:00 two hills... Rt on congress and up 15th. (Don't blow up)
Mile3- 7 to 7:15 big ass hill over lamar
Mile4- 6:20
Mile5- 6:20
Mile6.2-  whatever I got left

33:40 + 1.2miles of ?? to the finish= 39:59-40:59

Looks good enough to me...  Respectable after todays run, and a knee that doesn't like cold and I don't want to aggravate it so close to Boston.

I heard no response, but this morning I reiterated it, and he felt it was fine.   

The first mile was funny.  I was running and actually laughed outloud.  Why?  Well, watch this video...

My legs felt like wobbly spaghetti strands, and pictured the scene in Bambi where she's slipping on the ice as a fawn. I thought: Oh my, this is going to be interesting! and just chuckled. Not sure if anyone heard but I thought it was hysterical as I had no pressure on myself today.

I missed the 1 mile marker, but Keith who was behind me told me it was a 6:25. Uh oh. Waaaaaay too fast. I slowed up and settled into a slightly slower pace to conserve energy with the hills yet to come. I chatted with a couple of running acquaintances, and kept things loose. Overtime, it was apparent that Chad, Keith and I had a goal of sub 40 as our 'A' goal and we ran together.

I missed the 2nd mile marker too, then finally spotted the 3rd one. 19.49 for 3 miles = 6:36 per mile.

We then turned the corner onto the faster half of the course, and trucked along. Eventually Chad made his move, silently and I knew there was no way in the world i'd be able to hang on to his pace for 2 miles, but figured I'd maybe catch him in the last 1/2 mile to 3/4 mile. (that wouldn't happen). Keith and I ran on, keeping each other loose and I tried to keep things jovial as much for him, but really for myself as well to just think about something other than the tired legs. 

Mile 4- 6:24, and Mile 5- 6:17, exactly where I had planned to be, so I'm happy with that.  Last 1 mile clocks in at 6:21, then the last 0.2 clocked in at 1:07 which apparently is a 5:04 pace. Ha!

I'm happy with my final time. I knew I had taken me 7 or 8 seconds to cross the start line so i sprinted to the finishline and snuck in at 40:06. Clicked my watch, and it rad 39:59. Official time was posted as 39:58. Too cool, beat my desired fast time by a second!

Overall I ran 6:25, which means I ran the last 3.2 miles at 6:16pace, so a 20 second per mile negative split.

Not too shabby with 24.5 somewhat hilly miles on my legs the day before!

Stats:

Time 39:58

Pace: 6:26/mile

35-39 Age Group: 24th out of 565 (timed runners) = 4.2%

Overall 150th out of 18,000+ (including everyone who crossed the start line) = 0.008 percentile ha!

Total miles this weekend = 34.5miles.

Total miles this week = 80.8 miles

22 more days to go

2 more very HARD workouts (saturday long run, and one hard weekday workout)... and it's a date with sub <2:59:59>