Getting back to Boston

Intended to get up at 4:30 and get in my first run of the new year. that was before a night of tossing and turning and not much sleeping. Alarm went off at 4:30; I decided to reset it and go back to sleep (and my wife concurred in that decision). Reset the time instead of the alarm; fortunately, my body woke itself up at the right time to get to work for our lovely Saturday clinic. So no 12-miler this morning.

 However, despite my lack of a nap later on, I felt good enough Saturday night to go run 6 on the TM and watch the playoffs at the same time. Ran the first 5.75 at a steady pace, then picked it up to MP for the last 400 just for fun. Run went fine, no twinges or issues. So now I'll be doing Sunday's rescheduled 12-miler on semi-tired legs; we'll see how that goes.  

Reminded myself again why I don't do doubles. My six-miler last night ended at 8 p.m. or so. Ten hours later, I'm back out doing a 12-miler. And it's 70 degrees with 100% humidity on the first Sunday in January????? Cold front with a nice breeze finally moved in, after I'd already run nine or ten miles, but by then I was already drained. Humidity and I just do not get along; same with me and doubles, even if there happens to be a midnight between the first half and the second half. But I got my 12.33 in, and actually felt up to putting in a decent kick in the last few miles (being downhill helped). Total time, including more Gallowalking than I would have liked, 2:08 for almost 20K.

I have one week to go on Pfitz' five-week post-marathon recovery program. That leaves 20 weeks to Newport, if that's where I'm going to run. So I'll base build for two weeks, then start Pfitz 18/70. Unless my new edition of Pfitz arrives by then, in which case I may start on 18/85. We'll see what it looks like.

Easy 5 on the TM. It was gonna be TM or nothing, because it's 32 degrees and raining. Only the fact that it was 70 degrees yesterday and the ground is still semi-warm prevented central Arkansas from becoming a total skating rink. As it was, overpasses are still nasty. But not a night to run outside.

One month to the day since Memphis, and my best run since Memphis. Started out as a GA with some fartlek, and the fartlek turned into MP surges or intervals or whatever you want to call them. One lap, then two, then three, then six. Legs and GI tract handled it well, even with a tummy full of lasagna. Definitely the most life in the legs in a while. Probably in a month.

Easy 5 on the TM. Stayed up too late Tuesday after the basketball game and then didn't sleep well once I went to bed, so it was a rough day from that standpoint. Run was OK, although I was still dragging.

Good hard 7 on the TM, mostly at 8:34 pace, with nine strides at the end. Finished in 59:01. I've had some 59-minute runs that were about five miles, not seven. I'm starting to think that's the way to go for May -- not do too much with the mileage, maybe top out at 80 mpw but with a higher mpw average, but push the pace more. Get to where sub-8:00 is more routine. Then routine it for about 3:25 in Newport or wherever (I need to pin that down pretty soon).

Kinda pushed the pace this morning out at Maumelle; ran sub-9 for a lot of the way before the hills and then the brown bear got me. And when the bear bit, he bit hard and he didn't let go for about a mile and a half before I got somewhere where I could deal with him (if you have no idea what I'm talking about, count yourself fortunate). Once the bear went away, the rest of the run was fine -- except the cold front that blew through with 20 mph wind turned my hands into icicles. Better that than the 65 degrees it was at 5 a.m. before the front arrived. Anyway, even with the bear, I averaged 9:33 miles.

This started out as a recovery run, but as I went along, I got faster and faster. Before I knew it, I was in the low-8:00 range and ended up averaging almost exactly 9:00 for the six miles. Legs obviously felt pretty good after 13 yesterday.

I've been reading Tim Noakes' book and his theory of a reprogrammable central governor that is the primary limitation on our performance in distance races makes sense. I think that's what I did for Memphis -- reset the popoff valve to tolerate low-8:00 pace. Now I just have to reset it again to, say, 7:35 and I'm golden.

Had a change in plan for the next race. No, it will probably still be Newport, but the family won't be going with me. Instead, the family wants to go to New England, or Canada, or both in the early summer. So it appears that I'll go solo to Oregon and then the family will head northeast, across the border if we can get the passports in time.

Kind of a fortuitous circumstance tonight. Had planned to do 8 on the TM, but I get to the fitness room and the TM is taken. I didn't figure the not-so-fit guy on there was going to stay on it very long, but I didn't want to go home and come back later. Decided to get on the recumbent bike and do some crosstraining, then run when the guy left. So I got 18 good minutes on the bike, which didn't feel like much until I got off and the quads were burning, then did 6 recovery miles on the TM. Almost like doing doubles in terms of targeting the quads and then working everything else.

Pfitz arrived today. Right now, I'm leaning toward tweaking the 18/85 down a bit rather than tweaking 18/70 up, but I'll look at it further. Also got some good news in that I may not have to do clinic Saturday morning, so I may be able to do a regular LR instead of something abbreviated so I can get to work. 

One of those runs I didn't think would go well when it started, but got better as it went along. Eight miles GA at sub-9 pace with 8 strides at the end. As I warmed up, the legs started feeling better. Didn't pick up the pace, but the pace got easier. Last two miles were fairly easy, then I did have to push some to maintain the 6:40 pace on the strides. Total time less than 69 minutes for the full 8.

Chalk last night up as DNFLR -- Did Not Feel Like Running. Or remaining awake, for that matter. Got about three hours' sleep, dragged through work (which ran late), didn't get home until 7:30, wouldn't have finished running until after 9. Nope. Wasn't going there. So went to bed by 10 and slept -- hard.

Tonight, felt better. It's in the low 20 and falling right now, so back to the old friend the TM for a good hard 9-miler. Ran the first seven at MP + 10%, then put the hammer down for MP, or maybe even a little faster, for the last two. Wound up with a sub-8:30 average. I think this kind of run will reset the old central governor, if Tim Noakes is right, and get me ready for sub-8 and thus BQ.

Will do a light jog tomorrow night to sorta make up for DNFLR, then do 12 or so on the river Saturday morning, when hopefully it might even get above 25 degrees.

This morning was kind of a test. I decided to go out and push the pace more than I usually do on a Saturday and see how long I could hold it. The answer, it seems, was 10 miles.

Temp was about 30 this morning with a bit of wind, Since I'm once again battling sniffles and coughing, I bundled up more than usual -- tights under track pants, a long-sleeved tech shirt under a wind shirt, a fleece headband, my UA skullcap and gloves. And off I went. Didn't look at the watch for probably an hour, just ran.

The official Crackhead distance today was 10. I started out planning to do 12, but when I got to the turnaround, I kept going all the way to Big Dam Bridge, which equals 14 miles. Started wishing I hadn't done that at about 10 miles when I ran out of gas. But the time for 10 miles was 1:27, which is as fast as I've ever run for that distance any time that I didn't pay for a bib, a chip and a T-shirt. Then I kinda hit an early wall. Probably due to the upper respiratory stuff, which fortunately didn't bother me this morning until after I finished. And I was able to run the last mile in sub-8 anyway.

So now one more week until the Newport training plan begins. I'm gonna try to do a recovery double tomorrow to get used to that.

Yuck. This illness just is NOT GOING AWAY. I lay in bed last night (in the spare bedroom, my wife having kicked me out so she could get some sleep) listening to myself wheeze. Which led me to do three things today: Go home from work at 10 a.m. because my breathing was not any better; have my nurse call in a prescription for an inhaler for me before I left; and finally, get an afternoon appointment with my PCP.

After he listened to me detail what has gone on, starting with the 12/6 marathon which undoubtedly knocked down my immune system and started this progression, he told me he thinks what happened is that the course of antibiotics right after Christmas reduced but did not eliminate the sinus infection. Which has come back with a vengeance, and the resulting drainage has triggered my asthma, hence the wheezing. So he put me on a stronger antibiotic for 10 days. Otherwise, he said the self-treatment was pretty reasonable -- the inhaler, the antihistamine to try to reduce the drainage. He said the first course of antibiotics would have been fine if all I'd had was bronchitis, but it didn't knock out sinusitis.

But in the meantime, I have not been able to run since Saturday. Nor will I for a while. Ten-milers and wheezing is not a good combination. Get this under control, then start to train again. I still have 18.5 weeks left until Newport. If it takes 10 days before Im ready to run again, so be it. My 18-week plan will become 17. Still enough time to get ready. In the meantime, I think the rest of my body will welcome a little break -- especially since it's not feeling too good now either. We'll have to see if I'm ready to RTW tomorrow. Right now, I'd say the answer will be no.

Back to work today, but still no running. Give that one more day, I think. The lungs still feel a little congested. I think the legs feel better; this is the longest break they've had in 18 months. Maybe do a little 3-4 tomorrow night, do 8 Saturday with the Crackheads, then get back into the swing next week. Or maybe not. We'll see how the pulmonary shapes up tomorrow night.

Running at Newport, which is still the target, is getting a lot more complicated. I was informed last night that the kid's post-graduation trip must start on May 22 and that Pam wants to return from New England on May 30. Which, of course, is the day of Newport. Does that mean Newport is out? No, it does not. Here's the plan: We all fly to Boston on the 22nd and roam the Northeast for a few days -- visit Pam's friend in Vermont, maybe go u to Montreal, check out New Hampshire and Connecticut and Maine and Rhode Island. Amtrak may or may not fit into this plan. Then I am to fly out of Boston to Portland on the 28th and go down to Newport from there. Pam and T stay in Boston and play around for two more days. I nail the BQ on the 30th and fly home on the 31st. That, in a nutshell, is the plan.

Back on the road this morning with the Crackheads after a week on the DL with this asthma/sinus stuff. Only ran eight, but pushed the pace hard -- 8:44 average. I was the first eight-miler to finish, as far as I could tell. Lungs cooperated, although there was of course a little drainage to stir things up (unavoidable for me when I run in 35-degree weather; the nose WILL run, period). Legs felt a little weak, for lack of a better word, but I was able to maintain the pace and even run a negative split, if you can negative split an 8-mile training run.

Going to finally go join the athletic club across the street this morning after I get my nap. Let the family work out, swim, get active, etc., and it gives me more options for crosstraining and treadmill use than just depending on the little fitness room in the clubhouse.

First venture onto the track at the neighborhood fitness club, 12 laps to the mile. I think I ran 72 laps, but not sure; losing count was a real issue. Also not sure how long it took. Had to constantly look out for kids wandering across the track oblivious/wired into their iPods. So boredom wasn't an issue. Then I did a little crosstraining -- upperbody weights, some work on the glutes -- got in the whirlpool, showered and walked one block home. Nice workout overall. Now if I can just get the family over there to join me.

Still a little stiff after last night's 6-miler/crosstraining session, but the schedule said LT, so LT it was. LT on the TM, of course; that bane of Mid-South winter weather, the ice storm, is in full display tonight. I darn near busted arse on the sidewalk going over to the fitness room. Once I got there, I warmed up with 3, then cranked the TM to about 7:20 pace. I could only do 2 miles at that pace, so I jogged another mile at about 9:15 pace, then cranked it back to 7:20 for another two miles. So I got my prescribed 4 miles at LT, even it it took two tries.

Schedule says 12 tomorrow. Not sure that's going to happen. May have to shuffle Wednesday's 6-mile recovery run up a day and run 12 on Wednesday, but we'll see. Maybe cruising 12 won't be that bad.

Talked an old high school mate who is getting started in running into coming out Saturday to join the Crackheads. She's planning to run the half in Little Rock in six weeks. I figured a good dose of Crackhead at Oucho's would be just the ticket for her. Surprisingly, she agreed.

Tried out the TMs tonight at the athletic club. The TMs were fine. The lack of ventilation around them wasn't. There was one fan in front of one TM (occupied, as was the one next to it). I was at the other end, sweating like a cochon, until the ventilated TM came open. That was five miles into my run. So I moved down for the final two miles. I had already determined the legs were too sore for the originally planned 12 miler. So I just kept a steady pace, on both TMs, until I completed the 7 in about 62 minutes.

Probably now will run 10, maybe 11, tomorrow night on the old familiar TM at the fitness room.

 Also took the spousal unit over for her first workout  at the club. She did 7 minutes on the bike (about all her post-surgical knee could handle after months of inactivity since she finished PT), then we went downstairs and did mostly lower-body strength stuff on the machines -- leg curl, leg extension, abductors, adductors. Then she went home and I went to find a treadmill. 

Torture time on the dreadmill tonight. Fartlek/progression run, ramping up to GMP + 10% for the last four miles plus surges, and about 1.5 miles of GMP surges. Averaged 8:30 for the entire run. As hard as it was, this is the kind of run that's going to get me to Boston. So, I did it.

Back on the dreadmill tonight for another running/basketball watching session. Really took me about five miles to get warmed up where the thighs quit hurting. Gradual progression tonight; ended up averaging about 9:05 for the 10 miles. Really need to do an ice bath tonight -- after the basketball game ends :) Hogs might even win this one!

Back to Oucho's for another torture session. Oucho's is our name for a run through the Himalayas of West Little Rock, starting at what used to be Gaucho's Restaurant, hence the name. You need ropes, crampons and a Sherpa to run Oucho's -- particularly today when I was dodging patches of black ice; those crampons would have come in handy. It was about 28 and clear this morning, but there was still frozen runoff from the rain earlier in the week. I'd say Oucho's is like running up and down a ski slope, for 16 miles. But it was a good run. I pushed  on through when the quads were screaming at me, felt better once I picked up the pace, and finished at less than a 10-minute average. I thought that was decent for my first 15-plus run in two months, especially with all those hills.

So I've completed week one of the 18-week plan for Newport with 60 miles. I'll get up over 80 a time or two in the program, but this is a good start. This is building the base that I need to have to get that 3:30:xx with time to spare. Newport doesn't have hills like this, but a few Oucho's runs will help me get the quad strength I need to carry a sub-8 pace.

Recovery run during the Super Bowl, in two sections. Took my son over for his first visit to the athletic club; he rode the bike for 30 minutes, while I ran the first 4 miles, and then went downstairs for some ab work. I went down to supervise, then went back to the dreadmill to finish the final 3 miles. Easy run, nothing special, legs felt pretty good after yesterday's hillclimbing.

Had to gut one out on this Groundhog Day -- literally. Waited two hours after eating to run; it wasn't enough. Stomach cramps hit after 4 miles. Thought about quitting right away, then figured out, one, it wasn't getting any worse (although not better either) and two, I could push through it as long as it didn't progress to cricket-feeding time. Since the evening's buffet was staying put, I kept going, and even threw in another mile at the end. Total nine miles, with 8 X 100 strides at the end. Total time 79:37. All in all, a darn good run when circumstances were going against me.

Got off work late, wife got off later (in fact, she's not home YET, three hours after I got home). So I put dinner in the oven for the teenager, told him to watch it and turn oven off at the appropriate time, and went to run. And run. And run. A half-marathon on the dreadmill, in fact. Finished in an hour-54, a clocking that would have thrilled me a year ago. Tonight, it was just a good progression-type training run, with the last half-mile at GMP mainly because I still could and because I wanted to FINISH AND GET OFF THAT BELT.

Then I did what I believe is the coldest icebath I've ever had. Falling overboard on "Deadliest Catch" couldn't be much colder, and that's the Bering Sea in January. But that should certainly flush all the lactate out of my legs, along with the rest of the blood that was in there.

Speaking of blood, I took off my left shoe after the run to find blood on the sock, and dried blood on a couple of toes. But I really cannot figure out where the blood came from. There is no visible wound. I did notice a little bit of irritation in that area during the run, but nothing unusual, and it really didn't last that long.

So then I capped off the night by registering for Newport. I'm committed now (or maybe should be committed). Just have to come up with the money for the trip now. A good stimulus payment in the next four months would help :)

Change of plans in mid-run tonight. Was scheduled for 8 mile recovery on the dreadmill, but legs felt good after last night's dread-half, so I decided to flip days and run Thursday's planned 11-mile GA. Threw in some fartlek, and my usual progression, then bumped it to GMP for the last mile and 6:40 pace for the final 400. Handled that pretty well, I thought.

 Nice to have any remaining uncertainty out of the way. it's Newport now. So I can focus on that, and just lock in for the next 16 weeks on scorching the shores of Yaquina Bay, or whatever it's called. I really like how my training is going so far; better than I had hoped after being sick so recently. Maybe my legs needed to rest at that point.Build tthe base, learn to lay down 7:30-ish miles, and go to Oregon from Boston in May confident that I'll be back in Boston 10.5 months later. That's the plan, anyway; let's see if I can pull it off.

Legs felt like I'd run 33 miles in the past three days when I started tonight's recovery run. They just did not want to get loose. Finally, around the four-mile mark (which seems to be my magic distance), they got going. It was definitely a recovery run (76:17 for eight miles, followed by an ice bath).

Saturday's Crackhead distance is 18 miles. That will give me 66 for the week -- and there's still 16 weeks to Newport. Somebody asked on RWOL how many miles we thought we'd run this year, and I guessed maybe 2400. I'm starting to think that will be low -- maybe way low, barring injury or major burnout. But we'll see. I should put in about 1200 before June 1, and go from there. 

Didn't expect too much when I started this morning's run with the Crackheads -- and the Crackheads were out in force; I estimate maybe 300 people out there. My legs felt really heavy. Which probably worked out in my favor, since there was no chance of going out too fast. Just set out at what felt like a really slow, plodding pace -- which turned out to be about 9:40 to 9:45 (I remember when a 9:40 run felt like a sprint). And I just kept plodding, down the river trail, through Burns Park, across the freeway on the Funland loop, back through the soccer fields, and down the trail to the skate park.

After the turnaround at the skate park, I started a game. It was called Pass As Many People As You Can. I don't know if the people I was passing were running 18, 10, 5, or just happened to be out there at the same time as us Crackheads. Didn't matter. I just kept picking them off. I probably passed 30 or 40 people, got passed by zero. Got back to the surgical hospital in 2:50 for exactly 18 miles. Definitely the best run I've ever had on that particular run, where I have had some problems in the past. I would not have been happy if this was a race, but for a training run 16 weeks out, it went really well.

Interesting day. Crashed early last night and slept for 12 hours; the rest of me felt great when I got up but my back had completely locked up and took more than an hour to loosen. Then my wife and I spent some time planning the trip that will include my flight to Oregon for the marathon, then I worked on my taxes and FAFSA for my son enrolling in college. (Yuck and double yuck). After all that, I was ready to run, but by now there was a time consideration. DW and DS wanted to go to the athletic club, but it was already past 6:30 and the place closes at 8. Got there and got on the dreadmill at 6:50; a little math told me that at recovery speed, I had time to run 7 miles but not 8. So I ran seven, maybe a little faster than I had wanted because of the time constraints. Averaged exactly 9:00 for the seven miles. 

Had to flip a couple of days this week. I'm supposed to attend a social event tomorrow night at the Governor's Mansion (unknown if the Gov will actually be present) for the agency where my wife works, which will eat up a good chunk of the evening. Thus, no time to do 14 miles tomorrow. So I did it tonight instead. Took me just a smidge under two hours on the TM, watching the Obama newser along with the punditry afterward. Folks, I don't like running for two hours on the dreadmill, but my schedule doesn't lend itself to doing anything else. So I suck it up, as I told Cindy in an email, and put up with the DM.

All in all, for two hours on the dreadmill, it was a pretty good run. Averaged obviously right at 8:30 miles. I've run 10Ks at slower paces than that. No fartlek this time, just steady, consistent 8:30 miles.

Had our Youth Home recognition dinner at the Governor's Mansion, or to be more precise, the banquet hall/ballroom attached to the back of the mansion, which I had no idea existed. Nice shindig. Pam got a door prize of a gift certificate from Bosco's, which is a restaurant we've been wanting to try, so that works.

The dinner broke up at 8, we went home, I changed and hit the TM at 8:30 for my GA run. Seven miles at just over 9:00 pace, then strides for a mile. Legs really took 6 miles to loosen up, although a little stretching might have helped in that area :) I think to get to my 70-mile goal for the week, I'm gonna have to get up early Friday and do 4 or so on the TM at the AC before work. But we'll see how that works out. Saturday's run has been moved to the River Market, which should be a little more favorable for my 8 miles of planned GMP in the middle of the 17 miles. Also gonna have to start early so we have time to get out of town and head for Fayetteville for our Valentine's weekend date. 

Another night on the dreadmill, while hoping the evening's Mexican dinner doesn't bite me...

Pretty much a steady 9:00, slowly accelerating until the last 800 when I bumped it up to GMP. Total time about an hour-46. Legs felt OK from the beginning, but they did not want to keep moving for nearly two hours. So just sucked it up and did it anyway. No attacks from the Enchilada Brigade, fortunately. 

Easy eight on the TM, except to baby the big blister I got on my right heel last night (never had one in just that spot before), I shifted to more of a midfoot landing, and thus got a big blister on the ball of my right foot. That one, however, is not nearly so tender, and I think the one on my heel is going to improve quickly.

Plan to get up early tomorrow to go to the AC for a quick 4 or 5 on their TM, then shower, dress and go to work. This is as close to doubles as I get, having finished tonight's run at 9 p.m. and start tomorrow's by 6:30. Then 8-10 Saturday morning before I leave for Fayetteville, and 17 sometime Sunday.

My version of a double -- after running 8 last night ending at 9:00, back on the TM first thing this morning. Weather was nice enough to go outside, but I wasn't sure how my legs or blistered feet would hold up -- and didn't want to be semi-stranded two or three miles from home with work looming.

As it turned out, the feet did OK, but the legs weren't that great. I guess I'm  not quite up to semi-doubles, although I guess I could get there with a few more sessions like this. Anyway, just a steady 30-minute run at 6.5, which comes out to 3.25 miles if you're not up to the math. Shower, breakfast, off to work.

Weird morning all around. For one thing, I got a good night's sleep, which is rare. Felt good, went out to meet the group -- but when I start running, my right fifth metatarsal is quite painful. Nice. Is this a stress fracture? Well, didn't hurt at all standing or walking, doesn't seem to be getting any worse, so I'll keep going. Wind is blowing 25+; got one gust between two tall buildings downtown that darn near took my legs out from under me. Seconds earlier, a guy running near me tripped on the trolley track and DID fall down. Finally, about the two-mile mark, the foot quit hurting. Run's going pretty well at this point, although the temperature seems to be falling (I dressed for mid-40s, not expecting it to fall further) and the wind is not letting up.

 Then I get back into downtown LR at the five-mile mark and my cellphone beeps. I'm on call, like I am every other weekend, but I have never once gotten called during my Saturday morning run. Until today. Medical exchange gives me a message to call a patient who was in clinic yesterday and wasn't doing very well. I cut off my run, head directly back to my car (fortunately not too far away) and call her. She's not doing well now either, and wants to come in to get her implanted pain pump adjusted. But she lives an hour away. I tell her to come in and meet me at the office. Then I go home, shower, get dressed, and go to the office to open up and get ready for her. We got the pump adjusted, I gave her a prescription for nausea, and then I'm able to proceed with my Valentine's weekend plans. But my planned 8-mile run (already abbreviated because of those weekend plans) got cut to 6. Oh well. I may run 15 or so tomorrow morning from my hotel, or I may take the day off and let that foot rest.

Very good run this morning. Not that my legs felt that strong, or that I ran that fast, but it was a good run over a new trail that I hope to use again and again as the years go by. I just learned yesterday that a friend who lives in Northwest Arkansas is also a marathoner; he ran a 3:36 in his first race last fall. He tipped me off that Fayetteville has an excellent (and expanding) system of trails, and I set out this  morning from my hotel to explore them.

Most striking thing about the run was the snapped trees all along the route. Fayetteville and all of northern Arkansas was hit recently by a severe ice storm which knocked out power to most of the area; some outlying areas STILL do not have power restored. Fayetteville's power is back and the trails (fortunately) are clear, but the trees along the trail look like they were hit by a tornado. Or a bomb. BIG trees snapped in two. One huge branch, broken off its tree, was suspended over the trail by surviving branches. If there had been any significant wind this morning, I would have been extremely leery of running under that branch; if it falls, anyone unlucky enough to be under it might well be skewered by the falling limbs.

Anyway, once I got oriented and got on the trail itself, as opposed to streets paralleling the trail, it was a very pleasant run. Temp was about 35, no wind to speak of, overcast, and a little damp after overnight rains. The city of Fayetteville has spent a LOT of money on this trail -- numerous bridges over creeks, a 300-yard tunnel under the I-540 freeway, mile markers set into the pavement so that no one can steal them. And they plan to build more than 100 more miles of additional trails. One surprising thing is how flat the trail is. Fayetteville is a very hilly/mountainous town, but they kept the trail really flat. The way they did that is to run it through creek bottoms, hence the need for numerous bridges. From my hotel on the southwest edge of town, I ran east for two miles to get to the trail system, then headed north until after crossing under the I-540 freeway, then turned northeast for another two miles. At that point, I turned around and retraced my path back, finding parts of the trail that I missed the first time. Of course, the tunnel cut off the GPS signal to my Garmin, so I'm not entirely confident of the distance it gave me, but it says I ran 17.8. Maybe I ran more than that; I don't know. Took me a bit under three hours, a 9:42 average.

Pretty good day for a Monday. Got plenty of rest after an early crash, work was not too bad, the weather's decent and the run went pretty well. Schedule for Sunday was an 8-miler followed by 10-mile GA with strides. Since I did 18 on Sunday, I decided to ditch the 8-miler entirely and do the 10 on Monday as per the original schedule. If I then do 13-8-11-rest-20 for the rest of the week, that would be 80 miles -- my biggest week ever, and what I had planned to max out with on this plan. I may still max out at 80, but now I'll do at least two 80 weeks.

As for tonight, I ran most of it at 8:30ish pace with 10 strides at the end at 6:40 pace. Legs felt really good considering I ran 18 yesterday. After a fairly bad week last week, I feel like I've moved up a level and am in better condition. Maybe it's just because I've gotten a couple of good nights' sleep recently; adequate rest seems to be the weak link in my training.

Back on the TM tonight for 14 miles I really did not feel like running. Talk about having to push myself through a workout for more than two hours. But I pushed through. As sometimes happens with me, the legs started to feel better as I went along, although overall I was very tired.

Speaking of my legs, something weird is happening below my left knee for the last week or so. Intermittently during a run, particularly early in the run, I feel a brief, sharp pain on the outside of my tibia, and my knee feels like it wants to buckle. No pain in the knee itself, only in that one spot. 

But I'm definitely in better shape, maybe almost as fit as I was for Memphis three months ago.  Not as fast as I was then, but in very good shape.

Easy 8 on the TM at the athletic club tonight. Barely felt like I'd run at all when I finished in 73:37. Well on my way to 80-plus this week, which would be a PR, and that's without a Friday morning jog.

Family duties kept me off the TM tonight. So I'll get up in five hours (brain not turning off right now), and head to the athletic club for 10 on the TM tomorrow before work. That will put me on track to finish my first 80-mile week with 20 on Saturday.

Speaking of Saturday, that 20 will be with the Crackheads, most of whom are running their one and only 20-miler before Little Rock in four weeks. I'm kinda missing running my hometown race, even though I have my target set for Oregon in May. Thought about running the half at LR, but economics convinced me not to -- couldn't see paying $80 to run 13 miles on a course I could (and have) run in my sleep, and will run essentially in its entirety Saturday morning. I'm paying less than that for the full 26 at Newport, travel costs aside (which are not insignificant). I'll just do another 20-miler the day before LRM, and I may or may not even attend the race. What I really ought to do is find some way to help out at the race, but it's probably too late for that.

Bad night's sleep, very good run. Up at 5 today to go to the club since I could not run last night due to family stuff. Got there at 5:30 and claimed one of  the treadmills that faces the street with a built-in TV. Couldn't see out the window because of reflections from the lights behind me; TV wouldn't stay on for more than 30 seconds at a time. No matter. Legs started to feel pretty good between 4 and 5 miles, and I decided to crank it in the last half of the run. So I ran 3 of the last 5 miles at GMP, which for me right now is about 7:40 pace. Felt strong throughout, even with the lack of sleep.

Now we'll see how a couple of things work out: How I feel through a Friday clinic, always the worst of the week; and how I feel tomorrow morning when I join the Crackheads for a 20-miler. Hopefully 23 hours rest will let the legs spring back. If not, at least I got a good workout in today, and I'm set up to finish my first 80-mile week tomorrow.

Oh yeah, got to try out my new pair of shoes this morning. My adidas Supernova Glides arrived yesterday. Great fit, comfortable, light, good cushioning, nothing rubbing me in the wrong places. Once I discovered that adidas runs a half-size small and adjusted, their shoes have been great for me. Last week's blisters are still there, but they don't hurt at all, they're just loose skin.

What a difference a year (or 54 weeks) makes. On Feb. 9, 2008, I did my first 20-mile run (almost). Took me 3:25, which was a huge struggle with a lot of walking. Today, in a cold rain, 3:09 over the same course, and it was a LOT easier -- not that it was easy. And it was also a full 20.

Talked to Coach Tom after the run about two things: volunteering at LRM, and becoming a coach. Tom warned me that since I'm so OCD, I will have to be really careful as a coach not to push people beyond the breaking point and get them hurt. The idea is to get them ready, but not get them injured. As for volunteering, I still haven't definitely decided to do so, but the option remains open; they can always use more people.

I've always heard that the definition of insanity is doing the same thing the same way over and over and expecting different results. I have a new definition: Running 20 miles in a cold rain in February. 

Main side effect of yesterday's activity was not a sore back or sore legs. It was sore abs from last night's little ab session at the AC. Really hard to bend over or cough or anything of the sort until some NSAIDs kicked in in early afternoon. After that, I was fine. Took care of some things that needed to be taken care of this afternoon, like filing FAFSA and my taxes (one refund, one with taxes owed), then went for a 10K recovery run on the riverfront.

The weather was absolutely perfect -- 50 degrees, just a hint of a breeze, not a cloud in the sky. It felt like I was running SO slow -- and I averaged 9:15. I would have been thrilled to average 9:15 in the LRM 51 weeks ago today. If I had, in fact, I might have just checked 26.2 off my bucket list and then moved on to something else... naw, I wouldn't either. I can't be satisfied with that. Now if I'd run a BQ on my first marathon, I might have called it quits after running Boston, but not a 4:02:XX.

Today is my first prescribed day of recovery doubles on Pfitz, so I wrapped up the day tonight with another easy 5 on the TM to get to an even 11.25 for the day. Considering I ran 80 miles last week, my legs feel remarkably good. Knock off 75 this week, then a stepdown week. 

Interesting evening -- and run. First, had to drive an hour away to see a patient in the hospital. Pam joined me out of boredom, I guess. By the time I got there, saw the patient, we drove back, got some dinner and got home, it was nearly 8:15. I had to let dinner digest a while or risk feeding some crickets, so the run couldn't start until 9:15. Both the fitness room and the club close at 10. I went to the fitness center and got through 7.5 miles on the DM before the security guy showed up and kicked me out. So I went outside and finished my run, guessing at the needed mileage, then went back and measured it in my car after I finished.

The run itself was supposed to be a 10-miler with 5 miles at LT. Got through the warmup and four miles of LT before I got booted. So I headed out at LT pace on a route I was pretty sure was close to a mile. Turned out it was 0.9. So my tempo run was a tenth short. Big deal. The rest of the run, the cooldown if you will, was actually 1.8, so I totaled 10.2. I thought the tempo part went really well, better than I had hoped. A 7:20 pace actually felt kind of easy. Even outside after I got booted.

One of those nights where the box labeled "Easy Miles" above is a misnomer. Nothing about tonight's run was easy. My legs were not sore after last night's tempo run, but they kinda felt dead. It really took about 12 miles tonight for them to respond. In the meantime, the sweat glands decided to come back from vacation. It wasn't any warmer in the fitness room, at least it didn't seem any warmer, and I had the fans on full blast, but the sweat just poured off. I had to stop the TM twice to go reload my water bottle, and even that wasn't enough.

But with all that, I persevered, I got in my 15 miles, even ran the last mile at roughly GMP, and I managed to finish before the security guy showed up to toss me out again -- but not by much. Took me about 2:19 to finish 15 miles, including the breaks. I'm pretty sure February is going to be my alltime PR for mileage in a month, even with 2-3 fewer possible running days and some marginal weather.

Easy 8 tonight at the club. Able to commandeer my own fan tonight, so the relatively warm temperature was not as much of an issue. Jus kinda cruised at something like 9:10 pace. No muss, no fuss.

I'm kinda reassessing my training approach for Newport. Emphasize miles over speed, or combine miles AND speed, or back off on the miles and stress speed? The miles/speed combination worked well for me for Memphis, but it also carries the highest risk of injury and/or burnout. I think for now I'll keep doing what I'm doing, but be hypervigilant for signs that I can't maintain the program. Good news is that the base building ends in a couple of weeks, then it switches to more speed-oriented work (although still plenty of miles).

Legs felt DEAD tonight. No snap at all. Stretching didn't help a bit. I was all ready to shut my run down at 8 miles tonight when suddenly at about 7.4, I started to feel some signs of life south of the acetabula. Still not great, but enough to run two more miles at a decent pace before I shut down. Not the scheduled 12-14, but at least a decent run. I'll probably get up early tomorrow for 4 or 5 at the AC before work to try to get the kinks out.

Up early today for a quick 4 to work out some kinks -- and some frustrations. Yesterday was not good from start to finish, and I just needed to try to put it behind me. We'll see if I succeeded. A better night's sleep would have helped.

Call this a mini-race report: It's my first run at any kind of extended speed since Memphis, nearly three months ago. In three more months, I'll be in Oregon trying to get my BQ. Right now, I'm very pleased with my run this morning, but I haven't gone through the data in my Garmin yet. Let's see how I feel about it in 10 minutes or so.

The goal for today: 17 miles with 10 at GMP. The site: Murray Park with the Crackheads, who are in taper mode for Little Rock in two weeks, thus planned 12. I took their route and basically added 3 miles to the turnaround point. Weather: 40 degrees and very windy. I thought I was back in Memphis for a while, running directly into the wind from miles 3-7 and 11-15. I also thought I was underdressed given the windchill, although things got better once I got warmed up.

Now to the Garmin...

First mile, start slow and gradually build. Average just under 10:00. That's fine, consistent with the plan. Second mile, pick it up, 9:00 pace. Now, put the hammer down. Mile 3: 8:25. Good, but not MP. Mile 4: 8:17. Better, still not MP, and I turned back into the wind during this mile. Mile 5: 8:23. Now I better appreciate what I did in Memphis, holding my pace as well as I did in this kind of wind in the final 10K. It's HARD to run fast with this kind of wind in your face. Mile 6: 8:17. Better. Mile 7: 8:13, and this included the big uphill of the Big Dam Bridge (http://www.bigdambridge.org/).

But now I turn downwind AND get the boost of the downhill ramp off BDB. Mile 8: 8:05. Still not MP. Mile 9: 8:13. Mile 10: 7:56. FINALLY something under 8:00, although I'm really shooting for something in the high-7:40s as GMP. Mile 11: 7:54. Better still, but I'm starting to bonk a bit (should have done a gel back around mile 6). So, after nine miles at speed, I back off at the turnaround and head back into the wind. Jogged through miles 12-13 while my legs recovered, then picked up the pace a bit. Decided now my goal is to put the hammer down again in mile 17, taking advantage of the BDB downhill on the other side, to get that 10th mile at semi-MP. Mile 14: Faster, at 9:09. Mile 15: 9:02. Mile 16: 8:57, including the BDB uphill. Mile 17: 7:47. A REAL GMP mile, finally (even if I got a bit of help from the BDB designers), plus it was back into the wind. Evidently I went a tad farther before the turnaround than I had envisioned, because I'm still nearly a mile from my car after I backed down from GMP. Although I didn't back down much: 8:07 pace for the last .75.

So I ran three miles at sub-BQ pace, 7.7 at near-BQ pace, and seven miles of GA. Not a perfect MP run, but not bad. Wind didn't help, and I have run more than 150 miles the last two weeks, so the legs are a tad heavy. Next week is a stepdown week, and I think I need one. Pat thinks I'll either get another big PR in Newport or kill myself training for it. He might be right, although I'm going to really try to be alert for my body telling me to back off. Right now is one of those times, so I'm glad Pfitz threw next week's backoff in when he did.

One more thing: My first marathon was 52 weeks ago in Little Rock. One young man, Adam Nickel of Madison, Wis., did not survive that marathon; he crossed the finish line, collapsed in the chute and could not be revived. He was found to have died in part because of hypokalemia and dehydration related to the warm, muggy weather that day. I thought this morning that if we'd had this kind of weather one year ago, Adam Nickel might be alive today. And as I was leaving the park, driving down LaHarpe Blvd. toward the LRM finish in Riverfront Park, I noticed a little sign under the Mile 26 marker: "In memory of Adam Nickel". To Adam's friends and family, please know that we in the Central Arkansas running community are still thinking about him and you are in our prayers.

Started off March with a really bad backache from the moment I woke up. Hurt to bend over, get up, sit down, stand, you name it. Hot bath, stretching, ibuprofen didn't touch it. Finally about noon, tried the one thing I hadn't tried yet: Running. Jog around the block (0.8 miles) hurt like the dickens, but it got the blood flowing, and soon my back felt much better. I was even able to go shopping with my wife.

So I'm winding up with a triple workout today, so to speak, which may screw up my per-run average for March. After the 0.8 midday jog, I just finished a 6.25-mile recovery run, and will go for another 4-mile run later while my wife works out at the athletic club to cap off an 11-mile recovery day. Addendum: Wife didn't go to the AC, but I did, and legs felt good enough to crank it up to GMP for the last half-mile. Even put the 1% incline on the dreadmill for the first time in a really long time.

When I actually got around to looking at my training schedule for this week, I found that yesterday was supposed to  have been a 7-mile single, not a 10-mile double (or 11-mile triple, which is what I actually ran). And tonight was supposed to be a 10-miler. So I flipped days, sorta, and ran 8 miles of GA on the dreadmill. Also was supposed to do strides tonight, but didn't; I'll put those on tomorrow night's run.

Usually when I'm at the AC, I'm there at off-peak hours and not too many people are there. Tonight, it was peak time and the TMs were full -- but there was no line, so no one bugged me about hogging a machine for 72 minutes instead of the 30-minute limit. The woman on the TM next to me was interesting. She was running intervals or fartlek or something, and when she cranked it up, her leg turnover was something else. She HAD to be doing 200 strides per minute minimum; those little legs were a blur. Looked like one of those stupid commercials for Comcast cable internet (if you've never been subjected, consider yourself fortunate). She said she was going to run a leg in the Little Rock Marathon relay in two weeks. I think if she can maintain that turnover for 10K, she'll do quite nicely.

 Speaking of the LRM, today is the one-year anniversary of my first marathon at Little Rock. Undertrained, dumb as a box of rocks, hard-headed, you name it, I'm lucky I survived, much less finished. Fortunately, I learned from my stupidity and at least a few of my mistakes and managed to correct them for Memphis. After struggling to finish in 4:46, I'm reasonably certain that if I went out on a training run this weekend at a moderate pace and just kept going after the planned distance, I could easily finish 26.2 in 4:20 or less now. 

Definitely this was a good time for a stepback week. "Only" 64 sounds so easy after 80 and 76 the last two weeks. A year ago, I would have gone apoplectic if you'd told me I'd run 64 miles in ANY week, much less do it week after week after week. I topped out at 30 mpw for Little Rock, remember. 

Rest in peace, Adam Nickel. 

Surprisingly good run tonight. After an especially greasy cheeseburger did its thing to my digestive tract, I decided to try to run as much as my GI would let me, whatever that was. The plan was for a 13-mile progression run on the dreadmill, working my way up to GMP + 10%, which right now is about 8:20 pace, capped off by strides. Had to take one two-minute break, but otherwise no problems. Legs felt great, and I noticed as fast as I was going, my breathing was remarkably slow. The last five miles before the strides were indeed at 8:20 pace. And the strides felt pretty smooth at sub-6:30 pace. I couldn't have asked for this run to go any better -- especially not after the hour or so preceding it.

Actually passed up the dreadmill tonight due to nice weather and rampant DM boredom for a moonlit run along the Arkansas River, despite the objections of DW. Main risk on this run was the cyclist who ran me off the trail despite my reflective vest and that spotlight he was wearing on his head (he could definitely use it for some illegal deer hunting). Speaking of which, I saw more deer and more rabbits on this run than I did people -- and this in the middle of a metro area of a half-million-plus.

Anyway, this was recovery night after last night's hard 13-miler, and I kinda cruised 8.01, from the I-30 Bridge to the wooden bridge at Burns Park and back. Legs took quite a while to loosen up, but did better in the last three miles. With temps in the low 50s, no clouds and not much wind, it was a very pleasant night to run without either freezing or overheating.

I posted last night on RWOL that I felt like a slacker after finishing my 8-mile recovery run, and I wasn't sure whether it was because I "only" ran 8 or because I ran them slowly.

Well, 8 more tonight, and I think I have my answer. Tonight's run doesn't really fit labels like progression or tempo or fartlek. I think I'd describe it as a push-it, as in push the pace -- hard. I pushed the pace early when my legs felt like lead, and I really pushed the pace late when I loosened up. Lots of variation in pace, but not fartlek-type. And I ran mile 4 and mile 8 at GMP, mile 8 was actually significantly faster than GMP. Total time: 67:59 -- a tick under 8:30 average. And no slacking.

Ever have one of those runs where you just knew you were going to bonk at some point, the only question was when? That was today for me. I knew I hadn't been eating and hydrating properly all week, and the legs just didn't feel right from the beginning this morning. Plus it was 70 degrees at 7 a.m. (have I mentioned lately how much I hate running in warm/hot weather?) and I forgot to pack my GU gel in my new Amphipod belt, which has solved the abrasion-of-my-back problem but not the predawn memory lapse problem. So I just decided to treat it like a regular run as long as the legs would hold out, complete with the progression to MP + 10%. I managed to do that, and got in about three miles at MP+10 before the bonk. From there, it was just a question of getting back to the car as best I could.

The Crackheads are in their final week before the Little Rock Marathon and were only running six today. Since I was planning to go 10 miles more than that, I decided to sleep in an hour, start my run at a different site and go on my own course. I did all that, and darn if I didn't run into a mob of Crackheads on the Main Street Bridge and beyond on the river trail. I guess they selected a different course than I had expected for the final six miler.

One new thing today: The first time I had done the complete River Trail loop, both sides of the river and across the Big Dam Bridge. Started from the River Market, looped down to the Clinton Center, back over MSB and down the north side of the trail to BDB, across to the LR side, down to downtown, back to the Clinton Center and loop back to the car for the full 16 miles.

Legs still felt really dead this afternoon. Took about 5.5 miles to loosen up. Then, with the wind behind me, I could run decently. Before that, it was a struggle. Stretching didn't help. Neither did the 80-degree temps or the headwind in the first 3.5 miles. If today was a recovery day, I'm like the economy -- there's a lot more recovery needed.

Planning another five miles later on, probably on the DM. Turned out to be 5.02 in 47:00, with the DM set at 2.0%; legs felt a lot better at 7:30 p.m. than they did at 1:30.

Addendum, shortly before I go do my second run of the day: Have some thoughts about this process I want to get down. If someone wants to comment on them, great; if not, I just want to sort through what's in my head.

All the experts say train for where you are, not where you want to be, and adjust your training as your fitness improves. I don't concur with that, because my whole purpose in doing this is to get faster. I believe that I will get faster as my training improves, not the other way around. Put it another way, if I never ran a faster time, my training would not change under the experts' advice. I think I have to MAKE myself run faster times by working harder. Yes, that increases the risk of injury, but that's part of the process too. I'm seeking out my limits -- not only how fast I can run, but how hard I can train without breaking down. I want to listen to what my body tells me to minimize the risk of injury, but I know that in seeking out my limits, I may slam into one of them headlong. If that happens, so be it; I found one of those limits I'm seeking. Then I'll try to figure out how to change or get around that limit.

There's another limit that I found 34 years ago. As a 14-year-old high school freshman, I ran an 880 in 2:14 (yes, I'm old enough that I ran before all U.S. track converted to the metric system). Mediocre to be sure, but that was my best performance as a kid. The running calculators say that a 2:14 880 is somehow equivalent to a 2:47 marathon, if I trained for the marathon as well as I had trained for that half-mile as a ninth-grader (was that the best I could have done? Who knows?). The calculators also say that that 2:14 880 indicates a VDOT of 63. I also ran a 2-mile in 11:02 as a 15-year-old, which converts to a VDOT of 57. Even using the more conservative number, a VDOT of 57 corresponds to a 2:50 marathon, properly trained. Point here being, at one point this body was theoretically capable of sub-3:00 marathoning. I'm 48 now, and I'm not going to run any more 11:02s or 2:14s, and I'm probably not going sub-3 either. But the questions are, how much of that ability I used to have is still there, and, unanswerably, how much more talent did I have then that I never tapped? That's what I'm trying to find out, and that's why I'm willing to slam headlong into those limits. This is all a big experiment, and I'm my own lab rat, complete with treadmill.

In this running life, my best performance was the half at Conway last October, when my 1:40:29 converts to a 44.87 VDOT. If I had been able to run Memphis at a 44.87 VDOT, I would have qualified for Boston. My 43.63 VDOT at Memphis left me 2:43 short of BQ. The calculator I'm using says that 3:30:59 (the slowest I can go at this age and qualify for Boston) is a 44.31. So, obviously, the immediate goal is to train so that I can get that 44.31 at least. But since I've already done better than that in a half, I know that 44.31 is not my VDOT limit. I want to know, or at least get a better idea, what that limit is for this body at this age range. Is it 45? Is it 48? Is it 50? The calculator says a 50 converts to 3:10:xx. Can I run a 3:10 eventually? 

My theory is to overreach some in my training, so that if I don't have a perfect day on race day, I still have room to get my goals. Train for a 47 VDOT or so to try to make sure I can get that 44.31, and maybe I can run a 46 along the way. That plan worked for me in Memphis in getting a huge PR and getting well under 4 hours. I hope it will do the same in Newport to get the BQ and beyond. I don't want to have to rely on picking up that extra five minutes to BQ as a 50-year-old in 2011 (which means a VDOT of 43.08). If I have to do that, so be it, and I'm sure not going to turn down a BQ, but that's not testing my limits. That's settling for a sub-limit performance I already know I can top. I want to squeeze what I can out of this body, while I can.

Mind over matter tonight. Had hoped to do my tempo run outside tonight, but had to work late and it was still 82 and humid when I got off work. Time for Plan B. So I went to the fitness room and waited for the DM to clear, one of the few times in two years I've actually had to wait for a dreadmill. It finally cleared at 7:30 and I started my 11-miler. One thing became evident quickly: It was just as humid inside as outside, the the fan didn't create enough breeze to compensate. In short, very quickly I was hurting. I had to stop twice to refill my water bottle in the first half of the run, which fell at the halfway mark of my five-mile tempo segment. Jogged two laps to recover after the second water stop, then cranked it back up for the final 10 laps. I wanted to stop about, oh, 30 times in those 10 laps, but I never did. And in spite of the heat stress I was feeling, I was able to maintain my tempo pace of 7:24 average for the whole five miles. Then jogged it in to complete the 11 miles.

I'm kinda guessing at how far I ran tonight -- the Garmin quit before I even started, and I was trying to stretch a known 14-mile route by one mile in the dark. I got an estimate of 14.7 using mapmyrun, but the trail twists and turns much more than I can indicate on mapmyrun. so I'm gonna call it 15. What I can definitely call it is a very encouraging run. After a slow warmup, as I went along I felt stronger and stronger, and if I've ever gotten the infamous runner's high, it was tonight in the last four miles. The pace got very strong, maybe even sub-MP, the legs felt strong, the breathing was even and I was in sort of a zone. Final time for 14.7 or 15 or whatever, completely run by feel, was 2:12 according to the clock in my car. If it was a 15-miler, that's well under 9:00 for the whole run. At about the 7.8-mile mark, someone told me it was 7:25 -- an hour and 12 minutes after I started. I ran the last 7.2 miles in less than an hour -- darn near my GMP. As good a midweek run as I've ever had. I took two gels and plenty of water, and there was enough breeze that the temps in the mid-70s weren't much of an issue. All in all, especially considering the warm conditions, I'm very pleased with it.

Lousy night's sleep last night; I guess I was kinda wired after that great run, plus the weather wacked out, with the temp dropping 30-plus degrees overnight and rain to boot. But it was off to the club tonight for 8 on the dreadmill. Managed to snag a mill with a floor fan for the last 6.5 miles, which helped. Legs loosened up OK after the halfway mark. Wound up covering 8 in 74:01.

So now I'm gonna try to catch up on that sleep.

A little different spin on my usual progression run tonight. Went to the River Trail for an out-and-back. Ran out for exactly one hour (6.30 miles), including a slow warmup and two shoe-tying stops. Decided I wanted to get as big a negative split as I could. Didn't look at the Garmin, since I knew the mileage, just ran. Got back to the car in less than 53 minutes -- more than a minute a mile negative split (showed 6.27 miles coming back, maybe because I tried to run tangents on the trail where I could).

I could run a lot of tangents coming back because I had the trail to myself. In two hours I saw two people, standing besides a car parked at the skateboard park, and one set of headlights. That's it. No runners, no bikers, no dogwalkers, and two furry creatures of undetermined species, maybe otters or muskrats or some other aquatic rodent.

Another lousy night's sleep in the guest bedroom (kicked out for keeping DW awake); ignored the strong urge to turn the alarm off and actually got up for a morning run at the AC. My back stayed in bed, though; it took almost four miles to semi-loosen and still doesn't feel great a half-hour later. But I got in the planned 5-miler on the TM to get the kinks out.

Still don't know really what my weekend looks like, because I don't know what I'm doing Sunday at the marathon. If my assignment doesn't involve escorting stragglers up Dillard's Hill, I'll probably do a double tomorrow -- or do a second lap of my 10-miler with the Crackheads. If I am on chase patrol, not sure what I'll do. I may still do a light second run just out of sheer OCD to get my miles up to 80 for the week. Definitely need to make more time to spend with DW, though. We've been invited to a Saturday night dinner involving friends who are participating in LRM, so that will be fun. DS is going to his state Spanish competition Saturday morning, so he'll be busy himself.

Another PR week of nearly 84 miles, topped off with 20 today. Met Pat and Kevin at the River Market and we ran the Little Rock Marathon half-marathon course, basically. Dropped those two off at the finish line, went back out on the course and ran the North Little Rock loop again, which got me to 20 for the day. So I ran the half-marathon today for free, instead of paying $80 for a T-shirt and a little medal tomorrow. :)

Amazing that, 24 hours before a marathon, there was very little clue that there would be a race run over that course. I saw a couple of crews just starting to set up. In fact, there's still a barbecue competition going on at the Clinton Center, four blocks from the LRM start, and the course through there is essentially blocked with RVs towing portable grillers. We had to dodge our way through them and through the clouds of hickory smoke or whatever. Not the smell I really needed at 6:05 a.m. And all of that is going to have to be gone by 8 a.m. Sunday.

Anyway, Pat kinda led the way on the run and Kevin and I tagged along. We started slow, maybe 10:00 pace, and Pat gradually accelerated. Finally, the last half mile or so, we just let him go and we kept on going at our 9:15 pace or whatever we were doing. Kevin is running the relay tomorrow, so he didn't want to burn off too much glycogen, and I knew I was gonna do another six-plus miles after the other two finished.

When I restarted, after a Gatorade/potty break, I continued at a good clip in the low 9s, back across the river just as we'd done two hours before. Came back over the river, hung a left just after the 6-mile marathon marker, and came back to the car. Total of 3:08 for the 20 miles.

I now know that I'm going to be a course marshal for the last few yards before the finish. Which will be fun, but it will also mean a very long day. I have to report at 6 a.m. and stay until 4. No running involved, I guess, so I went ahead and did the 20 today. When I went to the expo last night to pick up my T-shirt and lovely orange vest, I saw a woman flaunting her Boston Marathon warmup jacket, the really gaudy semi-official one (below). I kinda grumbled at her under my breath, but my next thought was, "Next year I'm going to have one of those!"

Interesting day to be sure. Up at 4:45 to get out to the marathon course by 6 to serve as a marshal on the last 0.1 mile of the course. Of course, the guy I was supposed to report to at 6 didn't show up until 7:15, by which time the 5K was well underway. Had to juggle barricades between the 5K and the half marathoners, then positioned myself on the median of LaHarpe Blvd, where half-marathoners would pass on one side, marathoners on the other. My job was to keep the course clear, to keep people from standing on the median, and, oh yeah, to encourage the runners. I quickly found that runners liked hearing they had only 200 yards to go; that quickly brought smiles to their faces. So I repeated it over and over. Saw quite a few people I knew -- fellow Crackheads, online acquaintances from RWOL, and even a few Facebook friends. One of my Crackhead colleagues won the women's marathon, which I really enjoyed. By 1:15 p.m., I'd been on my feet for more than 7 hours, and my back was shot. So I kinda, uh, sneaked off, after determining that there were enough other marshals in place and that there was no threat of mass chaos on the course.

After four or five hours' rest, I felt like running, so I went to the club for a TM recovery run. Dividing my likely pace into the amount of time left before the club closed at 8 p.m., I determined I could run 8 miles. Which I did -- and finished at 7:57. Good, steady pace, nothing difficult, legs left pretty good considering 20 miles yesterday and seven hours' marshaling today.

The volunteer stuff was interesting, but I don't know that I want to be a course marshal again -- unless I bring a chair. Maybe next year I'll volunteer to work the expo or stuff packets or something less wearing on my back. Or maybe I'll run the darn thing again. 

This was supposed to be an 8-mile GA run on the dreadmill, but you know me -- if the legs feel good, I can't leave anything alone. And I didn't. Eight GA became 10 hard, progressing from 9:13 pace at the start to GMP for the final mile. Average for the 10 miles was 8:23 -- pretty much MP + 10%.

Speaking of hard paces, I'm having to think seriously about when and where I'm going to race between now and Newport. The Cabot 5K is only 12 days away; Hogeye Half is 20 days away. Part of me wants to race Cabot, Hogeye and Toad Suck. The other half wants to pick Cabot or Hogeye, not both, but definitely run Toad Suck (which is a 10K I ran last year, so my performance there on the same course will provide a benchmark on how much I've improved in 12 months). If I do one or the other, I'm inclined to do Hogeye only; a half is more valuable to me, I think, than a 5K in preparing for 26.2. Maybe I need both -- all-out speed and a 13-mile tempo run. I'll think about it some more, but I need to enter Hogeye by Wednesday or the fee goes up. 

Back on the River Trail tonight, repeating the exact same 15-miler I ran last Tuesday. No smooth run tonight, no runner's high. I had to work this one from start to finish. But I kept the legs turning over when they didn't necessarily want to turn over, and kept the pace high (for me; I am aware this would be a recovery run pace for several people on this blog). The last 13 miles were all at sub-9, the last 1.5 or so were at sub-8. And I finished nine minutes faster than last week's run.

This is the kind of run that's going to help me get to Boston, I think, meaning I needed a few like this before I went to Memphis. Needed practice on keeping the pace high when the legs didn't feel their best, and that's what tonight was. Once I got through the two-mile warmup phase, there was never a point where I slacked off and let the pace drag. I kept trying to go faster, and as far as I can tell from the splits on the Garmin, it worked. 

Complicating factor to tonight's run. After taking care of some things that needed my attention, I went to the club with just enough time to run 8 miles at my usual TM recovery pace before they closed the door/kicked me out. That was before my electronic leash intervened at the 2.75 mile mark; a patient was calling and I spent four minutes or so dealing with that. That meant that my original planned pace was not going to be sufficient. So I ended up bumping it up a little more, then running the last half-mile at just about GMP, to just finish before 10 p.m. Then I forgot the cellphone on the way out and had to U-turn to retrieve it. Fortunately, our new NP is on the job now and my weeks on call are about to decrease by 50%. And not a moment too soon.

Lousy night's sleep last night, which I need to rectify tonight. Blogger out. 

Good, solid, steady 14-miler on the River Trail. Once I got warmed up, kept it below 9:00, and the final mile was at GMP. The legs didn't feel great, but I really didn't make a huge effort to push the pace like I did Tuesday, just tried to keep it steady. Consequently, it was a little slower than Tuesday -- but I still got through 13.1 in 1:55 or so.

Probably be up in a few hours to get the kinks out before work with a 5-miler at the club. That would mean my 22 on Saturday will get me over 80 for the second straight week.

Forced myself out of bed today for a prework run, figuring that with the miles I've put in lately, there'd be some kinks to be worked out before the big Friday clinic.

And boy, were there some kinks. The right hamstring just did not want to warm up. Glutes weren't much better. Today was as slow a slow run as I've had in quite some time; 39:00 for four miles, including a 45-second stretch break. Then some whirlpool/stretching time in the locker room. I may still be kinked a bit, but a lot better than I was at 6 a.m.

Very good 22-miler this morning with Pat and Kenny. Did a 10-mile loop on the River Trail, dropped Kenny off at his car, then a 12-mile loop across the river, up Kavanaugh and down Cedar Hill. I left Pat shortly after the turnaround at Mount St. Mary's and wound up beating him by almost a mile. We started slow, picked up the pace later, particularly after starting the second loop, and I pushed the last five miles pretty hard. The result was 22 miles in 3:25. If it's true that you should be able to run 22 in training in about the same time as 26.2 in a race, I should be in good shape in Newport. A 3:25 will get me where I want to be, which is Hopkinton.

I think this is definitely the best LR I've ever had. Certainly a lot better than my 22 in October before Memphis, when I really struggled. The weather was ideal -- mid-40s, overcast, minimal wind. A few sprinkles fell but not enough to get anything wet.

I'm starting to like the idea of going out really conservatively in Newport, then gradually picking up the pace as I go. Kinda what I did today, only with a little faster start; maybe run in the low 8s for four or five miles and then pick it up from there. It was nice being able to actually accelerate after the 17-mile mark today. The turnaround in Newport is at mile 15, so that would correspond pretty well with trying to put the hammer down at the turnaround. Psychologically, I do well with accelerating on the return leg of an out-and-back, which is one reason I think Newport was a good choice for my BQ. Maybe that realization that I'm homeward bound helps me overcome my governor in the Noakes central-governor theory.

Kind of a weird day. Started out at the inlaws in Camden, where I turned off my cellphone alarm set at 7 for an early run and stayed in bed for another 2.5 hours. Yes, I needed the extra sleep, but as usually happens when I stay in bed too long, my back was really, really stiff all morning. And much of the afternoon. Finally got it loosened with a prolonged stretching session, and I was fortunate that it didn't lock up again on the drive home. Then I took a nap when I got home before going out for a recovery run.

As usual, the RR was on the river trail, which I'm using a lot because I think it's the closest thing around here to the course at Newport. I started really slowly until my legs warmed up, settled in at a modest recovery run pace of 9:30 or so, but the last two miles the legs felt really good and I decided to put the hammer down after I entered Alligator Alley. The last 1.25 were not only faster, they were sub-GMP. So much for a recovery run, but the legs still feel good.

Trying to decide how to juggle the training schedule around Hogeye. Do I flip weeks so that the MP run originally set for this Saturday winds up on Hogeye Sunday? Or do I do the MP run this weekend and then a mini-taper for Hogeye? I'll think about it some more. 

Good thing I didn't do the early run in Camden this morning, I think. The pine pollen factory is working full blast down there. Just what my asthma doesn't need right now. 

Tonight may have been  more of a recovery run than last night was. Legs were a little sluggish, and I started late enough that an outdoor run was no longer an option, which relegated me to the dreadmill. Nonetheless, I chugged through 10 and change at a fairly steady rate, excepting one water/stretch break, and finished in 93:01. Just your basic put-in-the-mileage miles. Tomorrow, back out for another 15. I may do the complete river loop then; I'm tired of north side only running for a while. Tomorrow also will put me over 700 miles for the year, I think.

Ever since I decided last week to enter the Hogeye Half on 4/5, I had been debating whether to flip weeks in my training schedule, so that the MP run now set for this weekend would instead fall next weekend, and thus in essence be replaced by Hogeye.

Well, the weatherman kinda made that decision for me. A big line of thunderstorms rolled through here this evening, followed an hour later by another one. There was not going to be my scheduled 15-miler on the river trail tonight. But there could be a VO2 max run on the treadmill, which was on the schedule for next Tuesday. Voila -- instant flipped weeks.

So I get on the treadmill, warm up for three miles, and then crank it to 6:35 pace. My legs have one immediate reaction: "What in blue blazes are you doing to us?" This was my first real speedy speedwork since November, and I could tell it. But the legs adjusted pretty well. I really didn't have too much trouble holding pace, or finishing the scheduled 6 X 800 at that pace, and cooling down to finish the 9-miler in 76:29.

So I have a VO2 max run under my belt now. And it will have some time to take effect before I go to Fayetteville next week. Will that help me get down around 1:35? On that mountain range of a course, who knows? (It makes Little Rock look like something out of Friday Night Lights, if you recall the West Texas terrain that depicts.)

More thunderstorms tonight, so across to the AC for 8 recovery miles on the dreadmill. Took exactly 71:59. Then soaked in the hot tub (whirlpool jets disabled because it was too close to closing time, I guess), stretched, showered again and came home.

Tomorrow, my first scheduled midweek double, if I can haul my carcass out of bed in eight hours to do it. Total of 15 tomorrow; four early, 11 later.

Think I'm going to move into the guest room tonight and see if I sleep any better. Sleep seems to be my Achilles heel in this training program; I wake up, I dunno, six, seven times a night because I'm cold or I'm hot or my back hurts or my shoulder hurts or my bladder's full. At last on the memory foam in the guest room, the back and shoulder aches are minimized. Doesn't do the marital bliss any good, but then DW barred the memory foam from our room. 

Midweek double for me today, starting with four easy on the DM at the club before work. Hopefully weather will cooperate and I can get in 11 on the river trail after work. DW and DS have left me to go exploring northern Arkansas overnight, so I'm solo for a while. Meaning I can go run when I want to and go to bed when I want to.

Worked till almost 6 tonight, fixed some spaghetti and then went to the river trail to run. My legs never did really loosen up, but that didn't keep me from maintaining a sub-9 pace for about the last 7 miles of the 11-mile run. I must have had the real marathoners' shuffle going because the left hip flexors just were not going to loosen up and give me normal leg lift.

Not going to do the predawn thing tomorrow; I think I need another hour of sleep more than I need 5 early miles. I'll still do 5, just do them after work. Don't know if the family is returning tomorrow or staying up there. They seem to be having a good time, which is great. Wish I could be with them, but duty calls, and May will be here soon enough. 

Slept in just a tad with the house to myself this morning. Will coll weather in advance of (another) line of stroms coming in, I got in a 6-miler on the RT. Started out very slowly; by the end I was sub-GMP. Go figure. Anyway, this "back-off" week is going to end up somewhere in the 73-75 mile range. Not sure exactly which because I'm running with Pat tomorrow and he's not sure either. He's doing mile intervals at a bit under HIS GMP, which for me should be no real problem (that would be about 8:50 for him), and with warmup and cooldown, it should be in the 16-18 range. So I'll go with him, unless thunderstorms intervene, and we'll see how far we go.

Next week, I think I'll probably do a 15 on Tuesday and then back down from there in a mini-taper for Hogeye. Something like 10-9-15-7-9-8-6-13.1. Which is still a 64-mile week leading into a half. Then a couple of recovery days after that before I knock out an LT and a 24 at the end of the following week. 13.1-7-8-13-12 LT-8-24 equals 85, my big week of the entire cycle.

A bit under 17 today, but far from a routine run. Two reasons: I ran with my friend Pat, who is shooting for a sub-4 at Oklahoma City next month and is doing extended interval sessions at his GMP. Second, a cold front came howling in this morning with 20 mph winds, gusting to 40, and we were running directly into the wind for half of the run.

Eleven one-mile surges at 8:40 pace don't sound too bad, and maybe normally it wouldn't have been an issue, but with the wind, it was HARD. Especially when one of those gusts hit. The quads were not happy, but they responded when I asked them to respond. And on the last interval, I picked it up to pretty close to my GMP, which left Pat behind.

Went over 300 miles for the month today, too -- a new PR for me. Likely to get another PR in April before the taper in May. 

Kinda guessing at the distance on my first run; forgot to recharge the Garmin, which of course died, and had to semi-measure it afterward using car odometer. After yesterday's howling wind, today is much more pleasant: 50 degrees, sunny, very light breeze, absolutely cloudless sky. Even ran in my sunglasses, which I basically never do, and my hat instead of the everpresent headband. Anyway, the odometer says 3.1 from where I parked to where I turned around, so I'm basically calling this one a 10K. Took me somewhere in the 56-57 minute range, and, as usual, I'm pretty sure I ran the second half faster than the first (just hope I have the discipline and good pacing to do that in Newport). Just an easy, no-muss, no-fuss recovery run, and legs felt pretty good after yesterday's exertion. Good night's sleep on the foam helped.

So I'm thinking back to Chile Pepper, my first lame attempt at a race in this running life. Not in good shape, went out way too fast, crashed and burned, and finished 10K in 57 minutes. Today, a RECOVERY RUN (which really felt like a jog) was faster than that. 

Went back to the boathouse at dusk after watching Tiger win another one for my second run, a 5. Five turned out to be 5.71, and I tried a little experiment: Imagine that I'm at 24.5 at Newport and I need to run the last 1.75 in less than 14 minutes to get my BQ. So I ran in it 13:22, including 7:13 pace for the last .75. I may be doing quite a bit more of that in the next eight weeks, since I'm now 62 days from the race. Practice putting the hammer down when I'm tired and I have to suck it up to get there.

Leave it to me to not leave well enough alone. I probably should have kept tonight's GA run kinda slow just to recover from yesterday's recovery run. Uh, no. I started off at a good pace and got faster and faster and faster, until the last mile was just about at GMP. Total 10 miles in 86 minutes.

Been thinking about my strategy for Hogeye. I want to see how fast I can go, but the terrain may preclude the kind of race I ran in Conway, where I just tried to lay down 13 consecutive miles at the same pace. I'm thinking run about 7:20-7:30 pace for the first three hilly miles, put the hammer down in the "flats" at about 7:00 pace for the next seven miles, then see what I have left when I get back to the hills. What I'd REALLY like to do is go sub-1:30, but that would require a 6:51 average. Not sure I could do that on a flat course, much less this one.

Old OCD at it again. Not content with merely a big monthly PR on mileage, I had to run at least 15.13 miles tonight so that I could average 11 miles per day for the month of March. So I did. New course, sorta; started at the soccer fields, went across BDB, turned around at the 4-mile mark, back across BDB, Gatorade break at the car, then southeast on the RT until almost the end of Alligator Alley before turning around again and returning to the car. It was quite light when I started and pitchblack 2 hours, 18 minutes later when I finished. Getting buzzed by mobs of wacko cyclists for the first hour; solo as usual for the last 45 minutes. So I finished March at 341 and change. Now I start my mini taper for Hogeye.

Easy 7 tonight on the dreadmill, starting my mini-taper for the Hogeye Half on Sunday. Pretty comfortable run at just over 9:00 pace. Otherwise, not much to it. I think this comes at a good spot on the schedule; take it easy for a few days will recharge the batteries, not only for the half but for a big training week next week, including a 24-miler on the 11th.

One last dose of speedwork before the half-marathon on Sunday. Hit the dreadmill at the club for a good hard 8, and ran the last 2 at GMP. Overall average 8:20, and I felt like I could have gone faster; GMP was not any kind of strain. Gives me more confidence going to Fayetteville. Probably 6 tomorrow, and 4 Saturday morning with the Crackheads before we go northwest.

Also went over 800 miles for the year tonight. There have been probably three of the five decades of my life that I haven't run 800 miles TOTAL. In March alone, I ran equivalent to the distance from North Little Rock to Arlington, Texas.  

Easy 4 tonight to work out some kinks. Didn't start until after 9 p.m. and just ran around the flattish areas of my neighborhood (which are not very extensive) over and over until I got in four miles.

Looking ahead to the half on Sunday, if I can hit my goal time I might be able to win my AG and finish top 20 overall. Basically I'm going to start out at 7:15 pace through the opening hills, see how I feel when I get down to the flats and maybe put the hammer down after we split from the marathoners at mile 8 or so.

I feel like such a slacker -- only 8 miles the last two days, and only 60 this week. Only 60. Yikes.

Four miles from Murray Park over BDB this morning. Last dose of hill training before Hogeye, I guess, courtesy of Hobbit. Ran it faster than I probably should; well under 9:00 pace. But legs felt good, and as usual I picked up the pace going uphill and never backed off.

Going back, I think, to the same strategy I used at Soaring Wings -- lay down as many miles at my desired pace as I can, and see what I have left for the last three miles. In this case, that will be 7:15, which would get me a 1:35 if I maintain it. If I can pick ip up through the last three miles, even better, but I have to be aware of how I feel through the earlier miles. If a 7:15 feels too easy, push it.

Somehow managed to turn a half-marathon into a 13-mile MP run. Not that there's anything wrong with an MP run, but I hoped for better. Legs didn't loosen up properly, but I didn't push through it. And I'm not happy with it.

The Hogeye course is an out-and-back, at least the half marathon is. First half is net downhill, second half, therefore, is net uphill by the same amount. And it's a significant amount; high point to low point is nearly 300 feet, and the start/finish is just about at the high point. And for all intents and purposes, I ran even splits -- meaning I ran the 300-foot uphill as fast as I ran the 300-foot downhill. That STINKS. I'm reasonably happy with my effort in the second half, but not with my first half.

I thought I might have a chance for age-group honors on this course, and if I'd run about a 1:35, which is what I wanted, that would have been the #2 time in 45-49. As it was, I finished fourth, my best age group finish. A decent first half certainly would have gotten me into the top three.

Splits:

1 -- 7:46. Lot of traffic, net downhill. Still should have been faster, even with the glutes not wanting to loosen up.

2 -- 8:15. Big uphills and downhills. Lousy effort. Probably gave away 30 seconds here.

3 -- 7:23. More like it. A lot of downhill here.

4 -- 7:43. Pretty flat section.

5 -- 7:58. Flat to downhill and I still didn't take advantage. Gave away more time here.

6 -- 8:04. Slight uphill, but not much. Bad effort. As my high school coach would have told me, I didn't compete; I was jogging.

6.55 -- Halfway point. 4:22 for the 0.55, slightly under 8:00 pace. Slight uphill. I'm starting to get upset with myself, with reason. 

7.55 --7:40. Better.

8.55 -- 7:49. Pretty good uphill in this mile past Razorback Park Golf Course, so this was a better effort. And I'm starting to catch and pass some people.

9.55 --  7:48. Fairly flat mile, still reeling some people in.

10.55 -- 7:49. Consistent. Biggest uphill of the entire course, so that was good effort to maintain pace. And I'm still catching people. This is pretty much the high point of the course.

11.55 --  8:24. Big downhill followed by an even bigger uphill.

12.55 -- 7:36. This one had better be pretty fast, because it's mostly downhill.

13.11 -- Not sure of my exact split here, because I forgot to stop the watch at the finish (and because this was not a chip race, so my official time includes six or seven seconds before I got to the starting line). I estimate about 4:30 for the 0.56 miles.

The good news is that this is easily the hilliest course I've ever run a race on, and I have not trained much on hills because, well, Newport only has one, and I do most of my training on RT which is similar to the Newport course. And that even with my sucky effort and the hills, I ran a half fast enough that the pace would get me a BQ. The bad news is that hills or no hills, I left a LOT of time out there on the course by just failing to compete. I have to compete for 26 miles to get my BQ. And it could have been a lot worse -- the big winds moved into Fayetteville about 20 minutes after I finished, and slapped my car around on the freeway for three hours going home.

Also, the Oxysox were great -- no calf issues, no blisters. The 5-mile warmdown run was badly needed, getting the kinks out after a half and a three-hour car ride.

At noon today I was pretty sure my consecutive days-run string was not going to hit 30. My back had been very stiff all day, I had a miserable morning at work, and I was ready to bag today's run. But the back loosened up, thanks in part to a noontime trip to the hot tub at the athletic club and a big load of Celebrex, and by 8 p.m., after my son's honor banquet, I was ready to go run. So I hit the DM at the fitness room for 7 at about 9:20 pace. The quads were still a little sore from yesterday's mountaineering, but the back was not an issue at all and the run went pretty well.

I've decided the sore quads were evidence that I didn't dog Hogeye as much as I thought I did. One-43 isn't a bad half, it's just not what I had hoped for. And as Leah pointed out to me after the race, that is not a PR course. I ran tough the last seven miles, passed people on the uphills, and came in at my GMP. If all it was was a workout that I got a medal and a tech shirt for, it was a good workout, one that should pay some benefits in Newport in seven weeks on a considerably flatter course.

Back out to the RT tonight for my usual 15 on the Campbell Lake loop, with a detour through the soccer fields. Pushing the pace was not a problem. The last 13 miles were below 9:00 pace, excepting mile 6 when I stopped for about 30 seconds to get a drink of water, and the last mile and a half was below 8:00. Considering I ran a half-marathon less than 60 hours before, I thought this was a pretty good run. Once again, the last half-mile was an exercises in visualization: "OK, a mile and a half to go and you have 12 minutes to get there to get your BQ." And I did.

Easy 9 on the moonlit RT tonight. Some interesting things going on; the Travs were playing an exhibition game, I think, at the ballpark and I could hear the organist playing and see the video board from the trail. And they're still draining water from the sunken restaurant-barge parked next to the submarine. The run itself was no muss, no fuss, just a routine tun at about 9:25 pace.

Another exercise in reprogramming my central governor, if you believe Tim Noakes, or improving my lactate threshold, if you listen to Jack Daniels (I'm more inclined to go with Noakes, for reasons I've cited on this blog in the past). Twelve miles on the RT with 5 at tempo pace. This is actually the first tempo run I've ever done that I didn't have the dreadmill forcing me to run at the proper pace, so I was interested to see how I'd handle it.

Started at 6 p.m., earlier than usual for evening runs, so I'd finish before dark. Unfortunately, even that start was delayed by a few minutes by traffic on the freeway getting to the RT. From what I could tell, the cause of that tie-up was a fatal accident; as I drove by the overturned vehicle, the police had a sheet there to hide what was happening behind it, which is a pretty good indication that there was a fatality. Really a downer for me, and my prayers are with the family and friends of the victim or victims.

Now, back to the inconsequential stuff. Started out slow and gradually picked it up. I thought I'd calculated it so that my five-mile tempo run would start at the top of a hill on the outgoing half and end at the base of the same hill incoming. Uh, no. I ended up starting and finishing at just about the same place -- the top of that hill. Plus the incoming half was right into a pretty stiff wind as more rain blows into central Arkansas tonight.

I had to calculate the times and averages for the tempo section. As I suspected, my paces were inconsistent without the TM to force me into the exact pace, and the wind and the two fairly substantial uphills on the incoming half were no help either (yes, I know I got the benefit of those two downhills outgoing, so quiet already). I ended up averaging a 7:27 for the five miles. I might have actually set my 5K PR tonight without knowing it, because my PR averaged 7:15.5. Probably not, but with my variation in pace, who knows?

A short 4-mile recovery run tomorrow, then 24 on Saturday for my first (and possibly last) 90-mile week. 

A bit of therapy as well as recovery miles tonight on the DM after a brutal day at work. Not brutally hard, but very, very stressful. Needed to run, as well as a little liquid relaxation, to unwind for sure. Just a routine 40-minute run at 9:22 pace, covering 4.26 miles. Tomorrow is 24, my longest training run ever, with Kenny and Robert in lieu of the Crackheads, who are still in post-LRM recovery mode at 6 miles or so (and running in Maumelle -- yuck). That will take me to 90 for the week and 900 for the year.

My first 24-mile training run ever. Did the first 12 on  the RT with Kenny and Robert, both of whom are tapering for races coming up before mine. Finished 12.04 with them in 1:56, then set off on my own for another 12. Decided to get a change of scenery and went across the river to basically run the LRM half-marathon course, with a couple of tweaks. As I had  hoped, the solo portion went a little faster than running the RT with the guys did; I had about a six-minute negative split, despite having to stop several times for traffic as downtown got semi-busy on this beautiful Saturday morning. Lopped a little extra to Main Street, back to the Broadway Bridge, then back down Riverfront to where I was parked at the boathouse, and the mileage was just about perfect -- 24.01.

I have become an absolute believer in Oxysox compression socks in less than two weeks. No blisters and no calf issues in 24 miles with some considerable hills today. Same thing last weekend at Hogeye. I promise you I'll be wearing them at Newport -- and on the plane coming home from Oregon. 

Weather today was just about perfect -- mid-40s at the start, little hint of a breeze to keep the sweat out of my eyes, but not enough that running into it was any kind of chore, clear sky. If it's like this 49 days from today in Oregon, I will be quite pleased.

49 days. Seven weeks. Definitely on the home stretch of my training. People are wowed that I'm going to make a serious BQ attempt. They see BQ as unattainable. I don't know about that. I'm no great athlete, no speedburner. I've just worked my butt, and spare tire, and a few other things off for the past 21 months to get to this point. If I can, with my post-op back and high-stress job, I think many people could that don't think they can. I'm a little more obsessed than most, maybe even too obsessed. You could probably get there without quite my level of OCD.

Back locked up again this morning. Not unusual for a Sunday, I'm sorry to say. But this time, it waited until AFTER I got up to tighten. I felt good when I got up around 8, but by the time I finished my first cup of morning coffee, it was stiff. I remembered a few weeks ago when it took a little run to get the blood flowing and loosen my back, and decided to try that again. But then the thunderstorms moved in. Still went to run, just went to the treadmill at the fitness room. By the time I finished an easy 5, my back felt better, and it was pouring. So I jogged home to get out of the way of any stray lightning.

Legs feel remarkably good after yesterday's 24-miler, and even felt pretty good last night. I must admit that I briefly entertained the thought of adding another 2.2 miles yesterday just to say I'd run 26.2 in training, but I discarded that notion pretty quickly. Another 20 minutes on top of 3:46, when I wasn't in any real distress the way I was going, probably would have been OK, but why risk it?

Went to do my second 5-miler at the AC after the Masters finally ended, then hit the whirlpool for 10 minutes (it was working again), then went to the supermarket. Then finally got to eat dinner at 9 p.m.

Back on the dreadmill for a VO2 max run -- 5 X 600 at 6:35 pace. Almost seemed to get easier as I went through the reps, like the legs were getting used to 9.1 mph running again. The sweat was flying, but otherwise not too bad. With warmup and cooldown, 9 miles in 75:57.

Down to 47 days and counting to Newport. Even more important, 36 days until my son is a high school graduate. Yikes. And 39 days until we leave for Boston (for which Delta keeps changing our itinerary; it's like a game show -- Name Your Flight). 

Decided to push the midweek MLR a little harder than usual tonight. Basically after a pit stop at about 3.5 miles, I put the hammer down, and the rest of the way was well under 9:00 pace, even taking into account water stops and attempted water stops (two fountains out of order). And the last mile and change was under MP. Overall average, stops and all, was about 8:32. Which for me is a pretty darn hard push, considering that 8:03 would get me to Boston. I thnk the legs feel a little stronger now; whether that's due to a little better nutrition, a little better quality sleep, or the supercompensation for last week's 90, hard to say. I'd probably credit sleep one,diet two, and there hasn't been enough time for supercompensation yet IMO.

Seven-mile recovery run tonight on the dreadmill with7 X 100 strides at the end. Legs were really rubbery early, came around later and I actually had some good knee lift for the strideouts. It's been a long time since I had that much knee lift for strides or anything else; it actually felt like a sprint. So an encouraging run even for a semi-meaningless RR.

Decided to take a mental health day off from running today. I can only be so placid and so calm when forces beyond my control are kicking me in the gluteus maximus, and that's what Thursday was. I needed to unwind, and 12 miles did not constitute unwinding. So I skipped the run. ending my consecutive days streak at 40.

Back on the horse again for an easy 4 on the dreadmill, just to get the kinks out. Then I sent my only child off to his senior prom, dateless (just like his dad was 31 years before). Oh well, I sort of turned out OK, and he should do the same. He hasn't stressed out about being a loner nearly as much as I did at his age; he kinda seems to prefer it.

Don't know what gave me more trouble -- the hills at Oucho's or the three hours of sleep before the hills. Probably a combination of both. Humidity didn't help either, although the breeze and a bit of mist kept it more tolerable than it could have been with the relative warmth (low 60s, 95% humidity). But the legs had no spring left by about the halfway point, so the last nine miles was pretty much a slog. I was the only Crackhead who ran more than 10 miles this week, so Tom and Hobbit probably had to wait almost an hour for me.

OK, I survived this week and the associated stressors. Hopefully next week, with no prom and hopefully no occupational drama, will be better. Six weeks to Newport -- and three weeks to taper. And I'm over 950 miles -- which took me until August to get last year. My year end total was only 1900.

New week, same old beginning -- wake up with a sore back that gets worse as the morning goes on. Just what I need with six weeks to go -- something to plant doubts in my  mind, like what if I wake up on may 30 and my back feels like this? Anyway, hit the whirlpool at the AC when it opened, plus some stretching in the sauna, and that got it loosened up enough to do 6 on the dreadmill at recovery pace. Back felt pretty good during the run, but now it's trying to stiffen again. Guess I need to stretch some more. Anyway I'll do another 4-5 this evening.

My taper starts 21 days from today. Forty-one days to the race. Yikes. Just cross my fingers that the rest of the preparation goes well, I don't get hurt, and I give myself the best chance I can when I line up in Newport.

Anyway, Pam and I went back to the club tonight. I did my 4-miler, and Pam swam and hit the whirlpool. While she was in the whirlpool and I waited outside, I believe I identified the recurring Sunday morning problem wit my back: Failure to properly stretch after the Saturday LR. I bent over to try to touch my toes and couldn't get within six inches -- and the pulling was in the back, not the hammies. A few more reps got the fingertips down to the tips of my toes, and the back felt much looser. Will do some more stretching tonight before bed, and try to maintain the stretching through the week. I would have to say that my stretching has not been what it should have been during this cycle, but I have enough time to fix that.

It's probably just as well that I was too busy this morning to think much about the fact that this was Patriots Day, and that my office firewall (and my schedule) prevented me from watching the Boston Marathon webcast or following the race online as it unfolded. Because I probably would have been beating myself up, that if I'd just run a little smarter race in Memphis, I would have been there instead of plowing through a Monday morning clinic.

That, by the way, might actually be true, but it's water under the bridge. My task now is to make sure that I'm not doing clinic NEXT Patriots' Day, that I'm in Hopkinton instead. Toward that end, I had what may be my toughest workout of the entire cycle tonight -- 6 X 1200 at VO2 max pace, dropped into a 12-mile run. Had thought about doing it at the track at the nearby high school, but it was just a bit too warm and windy today, so decided to do it inside, where I could at least make sure I maintained the proper pace on the dreadmill. So I ran all six reps at 6:40 pace (9.0 mph). Finished the 12 miles in 1:40, including warmup, 600-meter jogs between reps, and cooldown.

Did have a little time today to think about strategy -- strategy for the Toad Suck 10K, and strategy at Newport. I think I'm just going to try to go out and run steady 7:00 miles at Toad Suck, since I know the course and it has no brutal hills. At Newport, I think I'll start fairly conservatively for the intown four miles, pick up the pace a bit after I clear the hill at mile 4, and try to pick it up even more after the turnaround at mile 15+. If I run the kind of pace I want to run, I'll have a chance to break 3:20 entering the last 10K, and I'll also have some cushion for cramps or whatever. I'd like to break 3:20, but breaking 3:31 is essential, and I want to build in some cushion for that. Then the last six miles, balls to the wall with whatever I have left -- something I really didn't do at Memphis.

The reasonable thing to do tonight would have been to cruise through the 14-miler after a tough interval session last night. Uh, no. Not old OCD here. Ran the first seven in 1:05, then turned it up a couple of notches on the inward half. Last seven in 56 minutes, the last five at GMP. Now is the time to back off a bit before a hard MP run on Saturday. Let's see if I actually back off a bit.

A short blog entry tonight; I really need to make up for that 3.5 hours of sleep last night. Hit the TM starting at 8:30 for a 10-mile cruise/recovery run at a steady 8:57 pace. Left leg felt kinda weird, not hurting, but felt weak, particularly the quads. But that improved after four or five miles, and I maintained the steady pace throughout.

Found out today that my son has a test three days after his graduation -- the morning we're supposed to leave for Boston. It will cost more to revise his ticket than it did to buy it in the first place. Fortunately, buying a new one-way ticket is cheaper than that, so we'll do that, get him to Boston on the night of the 22nd, and Pam and I will fly up as scheduled, then pick him up at the airport after we go to the Sox game. He can still use the return half of the original ticket.

Speaking of Pam, tomorrow is a difficult day for her: the 22nd anniversary of her father's sudden death from a heart attack. She had thought today was the anniversary, was going through all that today, and then her mom told her the date was the 23rd. So now she has to go through two days of that anguish. She was definitely Daddy's girl and April is consequently a very emotional month for her. Hopefully next April she'll have the distraction of another trip to Boston to cheer on her marathoning hubby.

Reminded myself once again why I hate running in hot weather. Waited until 8:00 to let today's record-setting temps go down (a little), set out in 85 degree weather, and it was still 80 when I finished nearly two hours later. It could have been worse (low humidity, a bit of a breeze), but still I got light-headed in the last mile, which obliged me to back off a bit lest I pass out or something. Still finished the run in 1:49, barely over 9:00 pace.

Have some decisions to make. Tomorrow is my niece's wedding rehearsal and rehearsal dinner, both of which I am supposed to attend. But since the rehearsal is at 4 p.m. and there is no way I can leave work before 5, that ain't gonna happen. And both of them are an hour-plus drive from here, so I don't think the dinner at 7 is going to happen either. Not for me, anyway; my wife will have to represent us. But I'll be at the wedding Saturday afternoon. the question there is whether I run 20 before the wedding, or put that off until Sunday morning and do 8 or 10 on Saturday morning. Weather may play a factor there too.

Five-miler on the DM just to work out some kinks, and boy, are there some kinks to work out. Glad next week is a bit of a backoff week. I'm still debating whether to do my MP run tomorrow or postpone it until Sunday. Weather when I get up may be a factor. I'll probably do it tomorrow, then wish I hadn't at the wedding tomorrow afternoon.

Put off the 20-miler until tomorrow, but that doesn't mean I got off easy this morning. Did 10-plus at Murray Park with the Crackheads, and once I got warmed up, I pushed the pace pretty well. Averaged 8:30 for the entire run, at least the last 0.71 was at GMP, and probably more than that, since the Big Dam Bridge downhills were part of miles 9 and 10. Get a nap, go to the wedding, and try to do my big MP run tomorrow morning. It was humid and 60ish this morning, but again a bit of a breeze kept things more tolerable.

I kinda don't believe what I did tonight. See, I'd been having a little crisis of faith, starting to doubt myself in the running sense (the other kind of crisis of faith happened years ago and I stil haven't resolved that one satisfactorily). I wasn't sure I could get my BQ, and I definitely wasn't sure I could complete this weekend's scheduled long run -- a 20-miler with 14 at GMP. I let myself postpone it from Saturday, using the excuse that I had to be in Hot Springs early for Shannon's wedding (which was true but immaterial). Then I let myself go back to bed this morning rather than getting up to do the 20 (I did need the sleep, but I could have taken a nice long nap after the run). Then I almost had myself talked out of it completely this afternoon -- my toe hurt, blah blah. Finally, at 6, I roused myself and went over to the fitness room. If the toe hurt too much to run, I would be right here instead of having to limp miles home from somewhere on the RT.

So I set out on the three-mile warmup. So far, so good; toe's not a major issue. It's pretty warm  in the fitness room, as it was outdoors, but the ceiling fan helped, I had plenty of water and even some HEED, and I soon got rid of my shirt. So at the three-mile mark, I cranked the TM up to GMP -- 7.9 mph, or 7:35 pace, and settled in. Soon became obvious that the legs would be fine at that pace, but the warmth continued to be an issue. Drained my fluid supply quickly and had to stop twice to go get some more, but I maintained 7:35 for about 105 minutes -- which means I ran a half-marathon on the TM about five minutes faster than I did at Hogeye three weeks ago. Then I jogged in the last  three miles. And the toe never was a big issue, although there was some discomfort throughout.

Rest of the week's kind of a backoff, especially after a 14 in Tuesday, and a mini-taper for Toad Suck. After that, four weeks to blastoff. 

Interval time tonight: 5 X 600 at VO2 max pace (about 6:30 for me), dropped into a 9-miler. Handled them pretty well considering the 20-miler with 14 @ GMP last night, I thought. As tired as my legs are, and as ready as I am for this cycle to end, I'm starting to round into racing shape. Surely all this work will get me what I want, especially since I had the good sense to pass on OKC, which would have been a disaster -- 75 degrees, high humidity and 30-mph winds. I'm getting enough work at high temperatures as it is, so if I get a typical Oregon morning in a month, it should feel positively energizing. And if it's a little warmer than that, well, I should be pretty well acclimated.

Last night was a good confidence boost, but if I can rip about five minutes off my 10K PR at Conway on Saturday, that would really send me into the last four weeks of training on an emotional high.

DW and I had a little heart-to-heart over the weekend and I think we understand each other better. She understands that when she gives me crap about running too much and being too skinny, that I tend to view it as sabotage, undermining my work toward my goal. I, in turn, understand better that there hasn't been enough of me available to the family after work and running, and that DW really does support me and wants to see me at the line in Hopkinton next April too.

Postponed the planned 14-miler tonight since I had to wait for the teenager to get home from his class sushi party (?) because I needed to talk to him before I ran. That wasn't until 8 p.m., so too late for 14. Just as well; the legs needed a break after what amounted to three hard days in a row (fast 10, 20 with 14 at MP, VO2 max intervals). Even a slow 8 on the dreadmill was a bit of a struggle. I think I'll take it easy pace-wise tomorrow when I do the 14, which will put me over 300 miles for the month again.

Fourteen tonight in the rain at 9:30 pace. Rain didn't bother me much when it was just drizzling, but as it came down harder, it became an annoyance. I could feet my feet sliding on the wet pavement and there were too many puddles to dodge. I therefore decided to slow down a bit just to try to avoid slipping and falling -- or slipping and injuring myself, even worse. I think I came through it OK.

Now over 300 miles for April. Won't get near 300 in May what with the taper, but that's two consecutive 300-mile months. I'll be over 1100 for the year by week's end.

Capped off the month with 71 minutes on the dreadmill at recovery pace. Ended up with 7.65, which took me to 309 for the month. Thought about going longer (or faster) but decided to take it easy with an eye toward Toad Suck. Tomorrow, 4, maybe even 3, reaaaalllllyyyy sllloooowwww.

Starting off the new month low and slow -- three miles at almost 10:00 pace. Just work the kinks out, then some stretching, then early rack time before the 10K in Conway.

This 10K is darn important to me. No, a big PR tomorrow doesn't mean a darn thing when I stand at the line in Newport in four weeks (four weeks! wow!). But I need to know that I can translate all this training into something productive on race day. I had hoped that Hogeye would provide that afffirmation, but it didn't. Maybe I expected too much that day on a very hilly course. But I really feel like I need something in the 43s to validate what I've been doing, to convince me that I haven't been just training for training's sake. And tomorrow is my last chance to do that.

I needed a good run today in Conway to boost my confidence with a marathon in four weeks. I got one. I didn't run as fast as I had hoped, but I got a nice PR by 3:42. That in spite of running through a thunderstorm with extremely heavy rain and plenty of puddles to splash through. I started out too conservatively, due in part to tight hammies, as well as the failure of my Garmin to fully charge up this week; it quit on me on the drive up there. So I was flying a bit blind on pacing. My pacing was not too far off, just a little slower than I had hoped. I think the rain and lightning were bigger issues, at least psychologically. But by halfway, the hammies were loose and there was a downhill and I was ready to let it out. I'm prettty sure it was a negative split; the timer at 3 miles called 22:35 or something, so I ran the last 3.22 in around 23:19. Could I have run faster? Yeah, the first half was too conservative. But I got what I wanted -- a good time going into Newport.

Cut today's planned 18-miler short because of extensive flooding on the RT, plus some rather aggressive geese who thought I was running too close to their goslings. Went to the TM tonight to get the other 6. The legs feel a little heavier than I had anticipated after the 10K, whether that's because the water made me work a little harder, or because I didn't do my planned RR last night, or I didn't stretch enough, or all of the above, I dunno. Could be I'm right on the brink of overtraining, just as I was in early November last year; the taper was enough to get my legs back. We'll see how this week goes; I might dial back this week a bit if the legs don't snap back. Legs REALLY felt heavy on the TM for the first three miles, then felt a little better, which they never did this afternoon on the road.

Another of those runs where I seemed to get stronger as I went along, in par because I started out still sore from the weekend's exertions. Took about four miles to get loose, but by the end, I was kinda cruisin', and GMP for the last 400 was no problem. I felt like I could have easily gone another 4-5 miles -- but I'm glad I didn't. I have enough miles on the docket this week as it is.

I know it's a good idea to try to eliminate as many stressors in your life as you can as a big race approaches, but it ain't working that way for me. I have a son freaking out about graduation, a big trip upcoming, a coworker who just got fired, meaning I have to do two people's work, etc., etc. The good thing about that is it encourages me to get out and run to escape all the other crap. The bad thing is it doesn't help either my peace of mind or my sleep patterns.

Oh well, 26 days to go now. Six days to TAPER MADNESS. 

No running for me today. Tyler's academic awards assembly went from 6 to 8:30, we hadn't eaten, I was starved, and it was too late to eat, then run. So I bagged tonight's 8. Will get up early Wednesday and Thursday and make up those easy miles.

Happy Cinco de Mayo, amigos!

Up early today to make up some of the miles I missed Tuesday night. Easy 4 on the dreadmill at the club. Do it again tomorrow, maybe with strides at the end. Tonight, my interval session on the DM at the fitness room. Warmed up with 3.5, then 6 X 1200 at 6:35 pace with about 4.5 minutes in between, which generally worked out to two laps jogged, then about 2 miles of cooldown. It was hard, but doable, and I was whipped when I finished. But not because I'd taxed my cardio capacity. HRmax, according to the Garmin monitor, was 160. That's about 90% of my heart rate reserve and 92% of MHR. I continue to believe that if my legs ever catch up to my cardio, I might go sub-3 -- but that may never happen.

Double again tomorrow -- easy 4 in the AM, then 15 at night. Because, as far as I know, the trail remains flooded and there was more rain today, I guess I'll have to do it on the DM. Yuck. 

Another double day for me. Four easy this morning, although the jerk on the elliptical next to me was not making it any easier, then 15 tonight. Probably the 15 will be on the dreadmill as well. Oh well. Get through it and get to the taper in three days. Only 23 days to Newport!

Note to self after PM run: Do not do a hard VO2 max run and a medium-long run on consecutive days -- especially if you're also doing doubles on those days. The legs could hardly have been any more dead if I'd had them amputated. No life whatsoever. I had to really struggle to finish 13, and another 20 minutes of torture to get those last two miles didn't seem worth it, especially with a 22-miler in, oh, about 36 hours. So I shut it down and went in search of glycogen replenishment.

Skipped yesterday just to give myself a break, but today wasn't much better, starting the the weather. Huge thunderstorms came through between 4:30-6:30 a.m., so I postponed the run. Sure enough, rain had stopped by then, but there were other issues. Stomach still a bit upset after early Mother's Day dinner last night in Benton with my folks. Didn't sleep well because of the stomach issues. Legs still dead. And humidity was 100%. In spite of all that, set out anyway. First eight miles were OK. STopped at the car at that point to get some Gatorade. Next three miles rough. Humidity getting to me, legs really felt dead. Stopped again for fluids, decided I'd probably cut it off at 19. Then the stomach issues REALLY hit. Got about two miles up Kavanaugh on the second loop, turned around and headed back, and, uh, didn't make it... Wound up with 14.6.

Probably just as well I cut it way off. Another 6.4 wasn't going to make much difference in my fitness, so in essence I started the taper about an hour early :) I'm going to have to be more conservative over the next three weeks to get the legs back. The 20-40% cuts won't get it done IMO.

Taper is now officially underway. Did an easy 6 on the dreadmill after we got back from Camden. It was pouring down there this morning, but I couldn't have run anyway because the back locked up (again). In spite of vitually no sleep thanks to the not-my-mattress syndrome, the legs felt pretty good tonight, and the back loosened up finally as we drove home through the rain -- gain. Ouachita River, Saline River, vaious creeks all well out of their banks, and I'm willing to bet Burns Park is largely a lake. River Trail is probably out for the rest of the cycle, especially if it rains all week as is predicted. I have to really try hard to sleep better and eat better over the next 20 days. I do that, I'll be fine. I've done the work. The hay's in the barn. Get there healthy and well-fueled, and let 'er rip.

Back on the dreadmill tonight for another VO2 max interval run -- 5 X 600 at 6:30 pace (a tiny bit faster than usual). Run went well once the left hammy decided to loosen up, aided by a stretch break at 2 miles. The rest interval was one lap at about 8:30 pace, or a smidge over two minutes. Warmed up for 4.5, cooled off got 2600m after the last interval. Pretty pleased with it, and it seemed to be a bit easier than previous VO2 runs. Whether that's because the legs have had a little chance to recover, or because I am actually getting stronger, remains to be seen, but I think it does indicate improvement. Sure was quite a bit easier than the first one of these I did in this cycle, somewhere around March 1.

Not a bad day, all in all; got a decent night's sleep, work was not too stressful, run went well, and my shoes matched. Easy 6 at the AC, followed by a whirlpool session including some stretching, then shot hoops for about five minutes (5 of 10 on foul shots, 2 of 4 on three-pointers). Then came home to cook some spaghetti and do my blog. T-minus 18 and counting...

Last MLR of the cycle. Nearly 90 today, humid, and the trail is still flooded; thus, dreadmill time. Took two headbands and two bottles of Gatorade to the workout room and set out on my 14-miler. Slow progression at first, going from 9:50 pace to 9:15, then to 8:25, and the last two laps at GMP. Even threw in a bit of a hill at the end to simulate that little bump in Newport. One of those runs where the early/slow miles were a struggle and I felt better as I went faster. I hope that augurs well for having to start out on the 30th at a pretty good clip; I don't have the luxury of warming up in the first two miles at 9:30 pace or so. Anyway, happy with the way it went.

The big trip is close enough now that I can look up the advance forecast for Boston for our arrival: high 70, low 57 next Friday, sunny skies. Sounds like a good night to go to Fenway. It'll probably be a bit cooler at Chatham when we get there. I've been forewarned that it may be long pants and windbreaker weather the whole time. so be it. I'll still run in shorts...

Pushed a GA run on the DM tonight, sub-9 pace the whole way with strides at the end. Wound up with an 8:19 average overall. Legs do feel like they're snapping back with reduced mileage. So far, so good on taper madness.

Got in a very good 17-miler today after the thunderstorms cleared out (second straight Saturday that the boomers arrived here at about 4:30 a.m.). Started the run at 6:22, did an 8.5 mile loop, then did the same loop again. It never rained on me, and the sun even came out for a moment, but it was upper-60ish, damp and not too windy. Only issue I had with it was the old sweat-in-the-eyes problem on the first loop, but after getting my headband at the midway point, that went away. I've acclimated myself at least to temps in the 60s and low 70s with fairly high humidity, so if race morning in Newport dawns 40ish as history suggests, I should be good to go with that; 48 will feel like 35.

Anyway, I averaged sub-9 for the whole run, even counting a gel break and an answer-the-cellphone break (I'm on call until I get on the plane to Boston next Friday, so the electronic leash goes everywhere with me). Last two-miles plus were at GMP, even dodging downtown traffic, which was heavier than usual as the farmers' market is in high gear this morning.

Any blow to my confidence from last Saturday's lackluster run was erased today. The run went really well, and the acceleration in the last 2+ felt good. Took two gels during the run, and the first one at about 6 miles really picked me up; I felt the legs respond to a fresh dose of carbs. Also took about 40 ounces of fluid, which is really not enough, but it got me through. I tend to drink more if its readily available, such as at aid stations every two miles on the course. One Amphipod bottle on each hip does not constitute readily available to me; I go through those too fast. 

Cruise through the rest of the taper, one more VO2 max session, a dress rehearsal next week in Boston, and lots of sleep and carbs for the next 14 days. Exactly 336 hours from now (that's 14 days for the math-challenged; it's 10:30 a.m. CDT), I should be almost halfway through the race at Newport. Which means, I hope, that exactly 338 hours from now, I will have punched my ticket to Boston 2010. 

Nice run today, with the family involved. Sunday dawned gorgeous in central Arkansas -- zero clouds, temps in the lower 70s, just a hint of a breeze. Normally I do my Sunday recovery runs on the dreadmill, but it was just too nice not to go outside. So I got the family to come with me. We drove to the skateboard park and walked down to the quarry, about a half-mile walk. I started my run from there, going a mile and a half in each direction so as not to get too far away, while Pam and T explored the quarry. By the time I finished my 6-miler, they had made their way back to the car. Pam got some nice photos, most of which are on her Facebook page (and one of which is on mine -- my sweat stains on my shirt were, un, interesting). Legs feeling better and better. Even got (accidentally) to GMP for the last little bit of the run.

Last interval run -- 3 X 1600 at something approximating 5K pace, although at this point I'm approximating an approximation since I have no real idea what my 5K pace is. In this case I ran at 6:40 pace. Got a little confused; I forgot originally that I was supposed to do the 1600s and started out doing 6 X 600 instead. Realized during the second 600 that this was 1600s night, turned it into a 1000, then ran the last two reps as 1600s. Legs felt pretty good. Actually was not straining too much to maintain that pace, even with the TM cranked to 2% incline to simulate outdoor running. But I'm not sorry I won't be doing any more of those for a while, unless I decide in late June to start doing some serious 5K training.

 Race is close enough that I can look up the long-range forecast at accuweather.com -- low 45, high 62, clear skies. Might be a bit chilly at 7 a.m. in Oregon. In other words, darn near perfect; if there's about a 5 mph wind and a few clouds to keep me from squinting, it would be perfect. Maybe the fir trees will keep me from squinting anyway. Of course, the forecast has 11 more days to change.

Today is much more important to me than the four-mile recovery run I just finished. More important, in fact, than the marathon I'm going to run in 11 days, even if I do get that long-obsessed-over BQ.

On the afternoon of July 17, 1990, I was the first person to see my son, or at least the top of his head, as he crowned while my wife was in labor. A couple of hours later, we got to see all of him, all nine pounds plus. We had had a miscarriage prior to Tyler, and would have one after him as well, so he was the only child we would be blessed with. And he has been a blessing. A great kid. Never had to worry about if I was going to get that call from the principal that he was in detention, or from the police that he'd been picked up after going for a joyride. Main problem, in fact, has been getting him OUT of the house. He's had some health issues, and walking, never mind running, is difficult and painful for him, and will always be that way. But it makes no difference to me that he's not an athlete. He's my one and only and I'm proud of him, and I've enjoyed watching him grow and blossom, particularly after we returned to Arkansas in '06 and he got to be around his extended family much more.

Tonight, he gets his high school diploma from North Little Rock High. Honors graduate, top 10% of his class of nearly 600, winner of several academic honors, top American Government student in his class, academic scholarship recipient. It's a joyous occasion, but yet a sad one, because our little Ty-ty has grown up. Boy, has he grown up: 6-foot-5, somewhere well north of 250 lbs., size 16 shoes. He'll be in college this fall, at my alma mater, 190 miles away. It won't seem right to look in his bedroom every morning and see an empty, un-slept-in bed, or not see a stack of plates and glasses from his snacks. But he's reached the point that he's ready to fly out of the nest, as much as it pains us as his parents to let him go.

The trip to Boston on Friday is for him, too. He wanted to go there. It's fine with me; as a runner, Boston has been my goal, so I get a sneak preview of what I'll hopefully be a part of in 11 months. But my running will be a sidelight, at least until I get on the plane and go to Oregon next week. The only bad thing is, if I do BQ, he can't go with me next April because he'll be in the runup to finals for spring semester.

But there will be a few tears tonight with the cheers for my son. We love you, Tyler, and we are immeasurably proud of you.

My last treadmill run of the cycle (pardon me if I don't shed a tear). Seven miles, mostly at 8:30 pace, with 8 X 100 strides at the end. Felt strong; if my opening pace feels that easy, I'll be in good shape at Newport. Finished the 7 in less than an hour. Now I'm going to pack; my flight for Boston leaves in about 10 hours. Tomorrow night I'm in the bleachers at Fenway Park; Saturday morning I'll be running on Cape Cod. And I'm looking forward to the change in scenery, and getting ready to open a big can of BQ in nine days.

No running Friday, but boy, did I get a workout. Up at 4:30. At the airport a little after 6. Fly to Newark. Have to haul butt through the terminal to make my connecting flight; they were boarding when I got there. Fly to Boston. Stand around forever in the terminal; I can run 26 miles no problem but standing still for 15 minutes kills me. Wait for Pam's flight to arrive from Cincinnati. Stand around some more retrieving her luggage because she is in serious pain. finally get bag, catch the shuttle to the rentacar place. Stand around some more. get our car, drive into Boston and park at Government Center. Walk -- a lot. Catch a subway to near Fenway Park. Walk, and help Pam walk, to the ballpark. Have to change seats, twice, because of Pam's pain. Finally end up sitting behind the Mets' bullpen in great seats. Enjoy the game. Walk back to the subway station. Can't get all the way back to our original station because it's so late, so I have to walk about a half-mile, get the car and come back and get Pam. Then we go back to the airport and wait about an hour for Tyler. He finally arrives, we pick him up and drive to Chatham, arriving well after 2 a.m. Finally in bed at 3 a.m. Accounting for the time change, still a 22 hour day.

I've identified bike trails through Chatham and Harwich that will be good for my runs, or I can do short runs on the beach. Of course I still plan to do my dress rehearsal on part of the Boston course. It's Saturday afternoon as I write this and it's raining and 35 degrees cooler than it was yesterday in Boston. No problem. I'll get a 12-miler in this afternoon.

Well, the hay's in the barn now. I've done the work, the long slow miles, the MP miles, the strides, the intervals, the tempo runs. It's just a matter of resting, relaxing, recharging the glycogen stores and getting ready to nail one in about 160 hours in Oregon.

Seven days. After all these months, it's down to this. I'm more ready now than I was in December, that's for sure. As the football coaches say, now I just have to execute. I've got a good game plan, I've got the base built, I've worked on the speed. I just have to do what needs to be done for just under 3.5 hours next Saturday, and I will have necessitated ANOTHER change in the name of this blog.

When I started this blog last year, I thought I could break four hours, but I wasn't sure about BQ. Sasha convinced me I had it in me, but I had to make the commitment to get there -- meaning a lot more miles than I had been willing to put in to that point. Well, Mr. Pachev, I did what you said, and maybe then some, and I think I'm ready.

Today's run was on the bike path through the middle of both Chatham and Harwich, which are two neighboring towns on Cape Cod. If you look at Cape Cod on a map and see the resemblance to an arm, Chatham is the elbow; Harwich is the outer end of the triceps :) It was almost exactly a mile from our cottage to reach the bike path. I then turned east and ran into the middle of Chatham, past the airport and the high school and a bunch of boat yards (never saw the ocean, though, but saw some lakes) to the end of that path. Turned around and doubled back, then went over the line into Harwich, ran a mile or so into Harwich, doubled back again and went back to the cottage. Total time 1:51, averaging 8:29; ran the last two miles plus in sub GMP.

Good thing about this run is that it was sufficiently hilly that I had to work hard to maintain the pace, similar to what the miles in the late teens will be like in Newport, but because of fatigue, not uphills. Never ran a mile over 9:00, even early in the run when I was TRYING to run more conservatively, and if I hadn't had to wait on traffic at so many places where the trail crossed roads, I'd have probably been two minutes faster. Legs felt good, and should feel even better when I step to the line in Oregon.

No running today. Full day of touristy stuff in greater Boston, including the Revolutionary War swing of Lexington-Concord. Hoped to run when I got back, but the trip back took about four hours, finally arriving well after dark. That's OK. Hay's in the barn training wise. Missing a four-miler ain't gonna matter.

Pace-wise, probably the easiest run I've had the whole cycle. Effort-wise, not so much. Ran on the beach at Chatham, about a 1.2 mile section of beach that I ran back and forth on twice. Sand wasn't that much of a problem, since enough of it was semi-hardpacked that it wasn't too bad, but I had to scramble over rock jetties about every 200 yards, which slowed me down greatly and increased the work level. So the average pace was nearly 12:00.

Tomorrow I plan to do my dress rehearsal run; not sure if I'll go to Boston to do it or run on the bike trail here. My trolley ride yesterday took me down Boylston to the finish line, and we've walked past the Citgo sign which marks a mile to go, so I've seen that end of the Boston course. Might go to Hopkinton tomorrow, or maybe not. We'll see.

Dress rehearsal out of the way. Decided not to go up to Boston to run it; things like how to take a shower afterward entered the consideration, plus what the family wants to do for the rest of the day. So I did my run on the bike trail here in Chatham -- ran three miles to warm up, stretched a bit, then set off at GMP. Tried not to look at my watch too much, just establish a comfortable pace. Turned out that comfortable pace was about 7:40. Then slowed down to a GA pace and logged another three miles on the way back to the cottage.

Wow. Now we're down to four days (and one cross-country flight). The three time zone jump actually works in my favor, I think; I'll be inclined to go to bed early and get up early, so a 7 a.m. start Pacific time will be no problem (10 a.m. Boston time, 9 a.m. in Arkansas). Get up at 6 or 6:30 according to my body clock, and that's be PLENTY early to get to the start without feeling rushed.

I just feel like I'm going to have a really good race -- that I'll BQ with minutes to spare. Don't care if I get under 3:20, and probably won't unless I can actually accelerate in the final 10K, but sub-3:25 would be nice. I feel I can manage that if I manage the race well -- and get my carbs and fluids reloaded in the next three days. Anyway, a recovery run tomorrow, maybe a really short one Thursday before we go catch my flight, a few strides on Friday, then hammer it for 3.5 hours (or less) on Saturday, and hopefully my two years of work will pay off.

Day of messed-up plans. Whale watching cancelled because of bad weather. Didn't call the seafood store in time to get our planned lobster dinner. Didn't get downtown in time for Pam to pick up a birthday present for her mom as planned. But I did finally get my run in, a slow 4-miler through the Cape Cod fog.

Tomorrow, we try again to see the USS Constitution at Charlestown Navy Yard, then I go to the airport to catch my flight for Oregon, and Pam and T drive up to Vermont to visit a high school classmate of Pam's. I'm glad it's getting down to brass tacks. I'm getting antsy, and I'm a little grumpy, and so is the rest of the family. I want to get this race -- this BQ -- over and done with. No run tomorrow. I'll jog a little and do some strides Friday, then Saturday morning is the whole enchilada.

No run today; spent the morning with the family, the afternoon in the Boston airport, and the evening on a surprise nonstop flight. The original flight was delayed at least 90 minutes, maybe more, and I couldn't be sure to make my connection in Newark. So they found me a seat on another airline, nonstop, leaving three hours after the original flight but arriving an hour before the first itinerary got me here.

Spent much of the flight thinking about the race. Is 7:50 pace too slow? Is 7:45 too fast? Don't know. So I'll play it by ear, see how I feel on the course, and adjust accordingly. I still think I probably went out a few seconds too slow in Memphis, and it may have cost me the BQ. Maybe I'll be running 7:50s all day, maybe I'll be running 7:40s. We'll see.

Tomorrow, drive to Newport, hopefully drive the course, get my packet, and hit the spaghetti dinner before an early bedtime. Speaking of which, it's bedtime now.

Now the nerves are hitting. I've done everything I can. Train, taper, carbload, I've done it. Now I have to go out there and do something I wasn't sure I could -- run a marathon in less than 3:31. I know I can now, but I haven't done it yet. I have to do it. No excuses. The weather looks good, the course is favorable, no aches and pains, the dress rehearsal went well, the strides went well except for nearly getting tackled by a loose dog on the beach. But I have a deadline: Finish 26.22 miles in less than 211 minutes. Do that, and I'll be back in Boston next April. Fail... is not an option. I will be in Boston on April 19.

Not sure how soon I can get on here to post results or an RR. I'll try to get the time up quickly and do a detailed RR later when I can.

In about 15 hours, I'll know the answer.

No big race report here. Suffice it to say no BQ, bad cramping and a miserable last two miles. I was still under BQ at 24 miles, until the calves followed through with long-threatened full-blown cramp. Volunteers tried to get me to DNF after I finally picked myself off the ground after 2-3 minutes ono my back. Didn't quit, kept walking, then jogged the last .4 downhill to the finish.

Next up -- a major cutback on my summer mileage, a reassessment of my nutrition/GI issues to see why I keep cramping in races, and a fall marathon somewhere. Probably Memphis.

If anyone wants to read my RR in gory detail, go to the Runners World Online forums, Marathon Race Training, and click the sub-3:20 thread. I'm Spiderpig on there too.

Back in the saddle tonight with an easy, easy 4 on the dreadmill. Purposely kept the pace above 10:00. Muscles still a little stiff, particularly on the lateral hips, but no major discomfort. Stretched afterward, trying to loosen up some more. I think Monday morning's massage did a lot to help my recovery, and I think I'm in better shape now than I was five days after my other two marathons.

Looking more and more like the game plan will go this way: Start a short "summer training" cycle focusing on speed work aiming for a couple of 5Ks in July: Firecracker and River City. Having hopefully sharpened the speed, start a marathon cycle in early August aiming at, most likely, Memphis. I know the course, the weather is more likely to be favorable for me (meaning cold), and it's reasonably close. Don't know what kind of marathon training I'll do. Pfitz again? Maybe. I'll look at Hudson and Daniels. I may even look at FIRST, although the thought of doing my crosstraining on the spinning bikes at NLRAC does not thrill me. Anyway, I'm back on the road.

Back with the Crackheads today for an easy 6 on the River Trail. Kept it slow, 9:38 pace. Legs felt pretty good, not perfect, but all right. Everybody wanted to know about Newport and what happened. They thought 3:48 was a pretty darn good time for cramping up. Which, in retrospect, it was. Just have to go get 'em at Memphis.

Started out tonight as an easy run, legs felt good, got bored and cranked it up to MP. Since my problem seems to be holding MP for 26 miles, I guess I need more MP miles. So we start that process tonight. No problems at all.

Now that I have the 25th anniversary out of the way and the kid's registered for college classes, I can focus on running a little more. Tonight, battling the humidity on the River Trail for a hard 6 miler -- negative split, last mile at tempo pace, 80-plus degrees at 80% humidity. I'd say the battle was a tie. Got a good run in, but it really kicked me hard. If I'm gonna do good 5Ks this summer, though, I need tough runs like this. Next week, I probably start doing some reps at the East Campus track toward that end.

New addition to the Spiderpig training arsenal: Five miles on the dreadmill -- every bit of it uphill at least 2%, most of it 4-5-6-8%. And progression style to boot, ending with MP for the last mile. The glutes were objecting a little bit, but not too badly, and now an hour later they're not barking. We'll see if they growl in the morning when I run with the Crackheads. Speaking of which, I guess I'll reluctantly go to Maumelle to run. Hate running out there, but at least it's a lot cooler after a front blew through this afternoon accompanied by thunder and more than one twister.

Looking now like a move to NWA is at least a possibility. We'll see what develops from here.

Out to Maumelle today to run with the Crackheads. Tom and Hobbit are just back from Spain and were leading the motley crew again. Normally I don't run well at Maumelle, and we always seem to catch some weird weather, usually humid, but today wasn't too bad. It was about 70, bit of a breeze. Still good sweating weather but not intolerable. Plan was to run 8, and I started out slowly. Got to the turnaround point and the Garmin said 4.36. I said if I'm gonna run 8.72 I might as well make it 9, so I kept going across the boulevard, then turned around and came back. Tried to push the pace more on the return trip per usual, and U think I did so. Got back and the Garmin read 9.04 in 1:24 and change. Not a bad run for two weeks after a marathon and 12 hours after a treadmill hill run. I did feel some discomfort in the right hip, but not where I thought I would have hurt after a  hill run. Was able to push through it, and now after my nap the hip doesn't seem to hurt, so not sure what that was about. Anyway, back up to 25 miles this week. Start my 5K training plan , maybe, next week.

Back on the dreadmill tonight for 4 easy and one at GMP, uphill. Run went well. I think I'm pretty much recovered from the marathon. Probably start intervals tomorrow or Wednesday, trying to get ready for 5Ks to come.

Back on the TM tonight after a two-day hiatus due to job stress and a little baseball game in Omaha. Decided to push it a bit -- sub-9 pace all the way, then a little faster, then MP with a mile to go, then 6:00 pace for the last half-mile. That 6:00 felt pretty good. makes me almost think I could run a sub-19:00 5K. Hey, I'd be thrilled with sub 21, and I'll probably try to pace for sub-20. Anyway, good run for me. No twinges at all.

Did 8.4 this morning at Pinnacle with Pat and the rest of the Crackheads. Decided against the trail option; I'm not an experienced trail runner and a sprained ankle today would not have been good, since I'm going to Clarksville today to talk to Dr. Brooks. So Pat and I hit the roads. One of those 80/80 mornings with zero breeze (80 degrees, 80% humidity). Reminded me of Houston, actually, although Houston usually has some wind anyway. Pat started out way too fast and for once I was the one that reined him in. We ended up doing some common-sense walking in response to the heat, finished our 8.4 miles in a little over 10:10 average pace.

Off to Clarksville in a bit. I may put in 3-4 tonight on the DM just because I feel like a slacker only running three days this week. Or I may not. Hope this meeting goes well. I really am tired of worrying about my job every single day, and I'd like to get back to NWA sooner rather than later.

Addendum: Did go back in spite of a very runny nose and put in 4 miles on the TM tonight. Drainage stopped while I was running, resumed when I finished. Go figure. Start some intervals this week trying to get ready to run a decent 5K at Firecracker.

Over to East Campus tonight for track intervals -- 8 X 200 at 45 seconds per rep, roughly. My first outdoor reps in about a year. Tough night for it; I'm still getting over the weekend illness and it's still 90 degrees and humid. managed to get in all eight reps despite the heat, some wheezing and a bad case of cottonmouth. Probably would have tried to do 5 or 6 X 400 if not for the URI. But this came out OK. I know I didn't overdo it this time. Guy watering his yard offered to hose me down as I was jogging home afterward. I should have taken him up on it.

Probably no run tomorrow; have a birthday dinner for Scott down at Benton. Might get in a short run late.

Still not completely over the crud yet, but felt good enough to venture over to the AC for a late, fast 5-miler. Started at 9:15, had to finish before closing time at 10. Ran the first 3.75 at sub-9 pace, bumped it to 7:53 for the last 1.25. Finished with a minute-22 to spare :) Legs felt a little tight (I've been lax on my stretching lately) but had no problem maintaining pace and then accelerating.

 I'll finally go over 1400 miles for the year tomorrow, I think. It's taken me four weeks to get 100 miles, and that included 26.2 in Newport. But I think I'm ready to step up the training a bit once I'm over this URI. May not be ready to run fast on the 4th, but maybe at Dam Night.

Another run till they chase me off night on the dreadmill. Started a little earlier, ran a little slower, and got in 5.20 before the cop ran me out of the fitness room (he's become more diligent, used to show up at 10 after). Which puts me over 1400 miles for the year. Definitely a slow recovery pace. Felt a little better as I got a tiny bit faster. Running sub-10 miles just does not agree with my legs.

Another 80/90 morning -- 80 degrees, 90% humidity. Tech shirts were no help. Even a breeze was no help. Nothing evaporated. So we just had to slog it out there. Started at the Surgical Hospital, looped around to BDB, the the River Trail. I took Tom's 8-mile course (turn around at the wooden bridge) and added a mile, turning past the quarry, which gave me a 10-miler. Didn't run fast, but I ran. Actually had Gatorade again, which was nice to have a drink with some flavor and some electrolytes.

(Have I mentioned lately that I hate HEED almost as much as I hate running in 80/90 weather?)

Still debating about Firecracker next Saturday. I'll probably run it, but question 2 is how to run it. I think the smart thing to do is to run a fairly conservative pace (but still fast enough for a PR if I can hold it, since my PR is really soft). I haven't done enough speedwork to feel comfortable going for a sub-21 or something. Maybe try to go sub-21 at Dam Night.

Easy 3 on the DM, except the right ITB decided to act up. The RIGHT ITB almost never acts up, so this was unusual, but it just seemed to be sore, not injured, and didn't get worse. We'll see if this continues.

Didn't get to run Monday night; we were looking on the Net for possible places to live. So I decided to get up early to run at the AC. Good thing the cat got hungry at 5:45 a.m., because I set the alarm for 6 PM. But the furry alarm clock took care of that, I got up, went over there, ran a hard 5 with the last 400 at 6:00 pace. Took me just 44 minutes. Good thing the treadmills weren't in heavy demand this morning.

Tonight I decided to do something I may not have done since high school. Or maybe not even then -- two tough workouts in one day. One easy, one hard, sure, but I pushed it pretty good this morning, then pushed it even harder tonight. Back on the treadmill, thanks to heavy later afternoon rains (that made things much cooler but also put puddles on the track at East Campus) for intervals. Two and a quarter warmup with a stretch break tucked in there, then 9 X 200 at 6:00. That pace felt a lot faster tonight than the same pace did this morning, not sure why. I ran 400 at pace this morning and a mile-plus tonight. Then 1.62 of cooldown afterward, total 6. Eleven total for the day, with nearly a mile and a half of haulin'. Anyway, the legs responded, got through it OK without a wipeput on the dreadmill, and now I have four full days of backdown before Firecracker on Saturday (which I entered today).

Easy 4 tonight on the DM at the AC. Legs still a little rubbery from two hard runs yesterday; no real surprise there. Just chugged through it with the benefit of an oscillating fan in front of me. Sure do prefer finishing a four-miler not feeling like I'd been working out in a steam room. The muscles get the same benefit and I don't dehydrate. Anyway, probably won't run tomorrow or Friday, although I may put in 2-3 late miles after we get to Springdale tomorrow night before the big 5 a.m. interview on Friday. Then try to bust one Saturday at Firecracker, and that PR firmed up a bit. Not expecting anything huge this soon after a marathon, but my overall conditioning should let me get in under 22, I hope.

Wasn't sure what to make of my fitness for the Firecracker this year. I'm definitely not fully recovered from Newport yet. I've had some good runs since then, and two interval sessions of 200s have gone OK, but the legs have not recovered their snap, for lack of a better term.

Firecracker is a big net downhill course, although there about about two or three small uphills and one fairly major one at about 2.6 miles by the zoo. Last time, the zoo hill got me and I gave in to the walk monster. I decided this year to run conservatively, not blast the big downhill on Van Buren, and try to have something left to attack the uphill by the zoo.

Started out on the downhill on University and probably went a tad too fast, but once I got on Kavanaugh I settled in at just a smidge over 7:00 pace. Second mile, which has another little uphill going to Mount St. Mary's, I was a little slower, maybe 7:10 pace. Get to MSM, turn on to Van Buren, and except for a bump in the middle, it's straight downhill for the next three-fourths of a mile. I extended my stride a little to take advantage of the hill, but I would not say I pushed the downhill. Still, I was hurting pretty good when I crossed Markham into War Memorial Park, and I knew the zoo hill was coming. Just tried to maintain pace at that point. It helped that a bunch of people who went out too fast were slowing or walking, and I was able to pass some of those. Passing people always gives you a boost.

I told myself I absolutely was not going to walk, and I tried to shorten my stride and attack the uphill as best I could given that I was pretty gassed. Again, I was passing people. Then to the top of the hill on Monroe, maybe a quarter-mile left, and I could see the 3-mile marker and the finish beyond it, and I put the hammer down and started passing some more people. The clock read 22:19, I think, when I crossed the line. I had started maybe five seconds after the gun due to the crowd (no chip timing here) and I think the Garmin said 22:14, but my attempt to stop it at the line failed. So I'm gonna have to take the official time for lack of other evidence. But I am pretty sure it will be a PR when the official time is posted. Definitely a victory for running smart over being in shape. I was in much better shape last July but went out too fast and didn't have the discipline to fight up the zoo hill. If I'd run a little smarter last year, with fresh legs, I'd have broken 22 easily. So I'll take a couple more cracks at sub-22 this summer.

Had jogged about 1.2 miles to warm up, and I'd started the jog up the hill to retrieve my car when fellow Crackhead Robert offered me a ride. I took it. I can get in my slow cheap miles later, after I have my Fourth of July allotment of fat, grease and ice cream at Dad's house. 

Double today. Easy 3 this morning at the AC, then harder 5 tonight, also at the AC. Didn't run Sunday because of an afternoon thunderstorm and our celebration of Tyler's IB scores (worth somewhere in the range of 14-17 college hours). So got up early today to get in a short run. I've decided 5Ks are HARD. I still feel those three miles in my hamstrings. Tonight, went to Heber to fill a pump after work, didn't get back until nearly 8 p.m., THEN had dinner. Finally went to run at 9:15 after finally finding my HRM belt hidden under a basket. Ran first four at slow progression, then cranked it to GMP for the last mile. HR was around 140 for the first 4, up in the mid-150s at GMP. GMP sounds about right; that would be about 83% of HRR. The 140 would be about 70% of HRR; I guess that's OK for a run on the slow side of the GA range.

Interval time tonight as part of the "spring training" program focusing on speed work. Decided to run early(er) rather than wait until almost dark, as it wasn't all THAT hot and humid today. Headed over to East Campus at about 6:20 at a slow trot; 1.5 miles to get there. Once there, stretched, jogged another 200 then began the intervals -- 6 X 400 at what I hoped would be about 6:00 pace. Turned out it was more like 6:12 pace on average, with my usual wide variation in pace from 5:56 to 6:30. Wore the HRM, which showed a max rate of 168. Not sure when that happened, but I bet it was during the last 400. Given that the best previous estimate of my HRmax was 173, I'd say I was bustin' it.

In retrospect, it probably would have been better to do this tomorrow and give my legs a chance to recover from yesterday's double, but I still haven't ruled out the BDB 5K Saturday night and wanted to be able to recover if I decide to tackle that. Probably not going to try that, though. Firecracker seems to have taken enough out of me. But given the fairly tired legs, I thought it was a good session. Then trotted home to complete the 6-mile run in just over an hour.

Easy 5 on the DM at the athletic club. Wore the HRM tonight to see what kind of rate I get on a slow run when the weather is not outrageously warm/humid (i.e., running inside with a fan blowing). AHR was 125, and it says I got up to 142 once, but in looking at my watch during the run, I never saw anything over 130, much less 140. However, I do believe the 125 average, as that corresponded with what I saw for most of the run.

This is the week I start to pick up the mileage a bit after five easy post-marathon weeks. Have 19 already, probably 4-5 tomorrow (40-minute tempo run on Higdon's 5K plan), 3 easy on Friday and probably 8 on Saturday, unless I decide to do the BDB 5K. That would put me up to 35 for the week. At some point, I gotta go get Hudson's book and see if I want to do that for Memphis, or try Daniels, or go back to Pfitz. FIRST isn't gonna happen; I don't have the crosstraining flexibility to do that properly.

Tempo run tonight on the dreadmill. Warmed up for 15 minutes, 15 minutes at 7:24 pace (2.07 miles), then cooldown for 15 minutes. Total 5.25 miles. Not a great run, but I got through it, which I guess is what I need to do on a few runs to get myself back in gear.

Another 80/80 morning in central Arkansas. In spite of that, got in my 10 miles with the Crackheads starting from Murrary Park and going over BDB to the wooden bridge.Not sure of the exact mileage, BTW, since the Garmin never even made it out of the car before it died, but mapmyrun says 10.05, so I'll go with that. Not sure of the time either. Tried to run conservatively because of the humidity, but I'm never sure of my pace when I don't have either the Garmin or someone to run with. Probably ran a little faster than I had planned. Up to 34 miles and change this week -- biggest week since the marathon.

Somehow messed up my back yesterday doing laundry, cleaning up, things like that. Back let go as I bent over to pick something up. Pretty miserable for the rest of the day in spite of ibuprofen, Zanaflex, stretching, a whirlpool session (in lukewarm water) and a hot bath. Fortunately, was able to get comfortable enough to sleep, and felt a little better this morning -- emphasis on little. More ibu, more stretching, still no better, and I noticed that sitting down seemed to make things worse. So decided to go for the old therapeutic run at the AC -- 48 laps around the jogging track. That made things better, somewhat. Pain level now a 3 or 4, where it was 7 or 8 last night. I guess I'm going to have to keep moving today rather than sit down and stiffen up. I also wish they'd get the whirlpool fixed at the club. Lukewarm doesn't get the job done.

Thought the back issues were going away when I got up this morning. Felt pretty good this morning, maybe a 1. Seeing 34 patients at work took care of that. Needed a whirlpool session, then a 4-mille rehab run on the DM. Looks like I'll have to deal with this a while longer.

Ran around Branson. Needed ropes and a Sherpa. Place is HILLY. And humid, at least today; kinda sucked the life out of me. Thought it was going to rain on me and cool off; instead it cleared off and warmed up. And the traffic was a major issue, with often no sidewalks or shoulders. Plus there was a bear attack. But got through it. Supposed to cool off overnight.

Hit the treadmill tonight while waiting for Pam and Tyler to arrive for the birthday celebration. Decided to do a tempo run -- 1.5 mile warmup, 2.22 at pace (8.1 mph) until the DM told me to stop, then restarted it for a recovery jog to finish the 5 miles. Was actually cool enough to run outside, but I was on call and concerned about another bear attack... Bear stayed away, anyway, and finished the run nicely, then met Pam and T at Branson Landing for his birthday dinner.

Another Beat the Cop run on Moon Landing Day. Had about 46 minutes to get in five miles before the cop chased me out of the clubhouse, and decided to crank up a five-miler nd get it in before they tossed me out. Started at 9:00 pace, then 8:42, then 8:20, then the last two miles at GMP. Finished in 41:42.

I'm starting to think what I need to do for Memphis is to stay on about a 75-mpw plan, maybe 80, but push the quality runs harder than I have done in the past. Perhaps that combination, along with better sodium loading, will get me over the hump and into the Boston field. But I still want to look at Hudson before I start any plan.

Another progression run. Started at 6.5, ended up at 9.0. Overall average less than 8:45. Legs felt pretty good. I'm starting to toy with the idea on doing Dam Night Run on Saturday; a lot's going to depend on the weather on Saturday. Something less than 95 degrees and 80% humidity, which is what I got last July, would be nice.

Oh yeah, went over 1500 miles for the year tonight. Only did 1900 all last year.

Easy recovery run. Had intended to go 4, but Astros were rallying when I got to that point and I didn't want to step off the DM and miss the end (sure enough, they won in the bottom of the ninth). So just kept going another 10:10 to make it five miles. Figure if I'm only going to be in the AC for another month, might as well make full use of it.

Double-day today, including a race. Went out to Pinnacle Mountain this morning with the Crackheads and got a good 6-miler in over the hills out there. I think I needed a run like that, to break things up. Plus it won't hurt my strength to have run all those hills at a decent pace. Tried to moderate the pace so as not to wear myself out in case I decide to go to Arkadelphia tonight for the Dam Night Run (which, as I suggested, is likely), but still averaged 9:23 miles even with the hills (and mile 6, which is almost all uphill, I ran in 9:06)

Headed for Arkadelphia in late afternoon, still felt good, a little stiff but OK. That changed on the ride up to the start. DNR is a point-to-point race, and to get to the start from the finish, they carry people up the hill on lumber trucks. You're sitting on a bundle of 2X4s, literally. Which is a lawsuit waiting to happen; there's nothing to prevent people from falling off. Anyway, the road is quite rough, there's nothing to hold on to and you're tensing up trying to make sure you don't fall enough. So by the time we got to the top, my back had locked up. Stretching and a warmup run didn't help -- although they definitely warmed me up; sweat was streaming down my back as I stood at the line. It wasn't as hot as it was for this race last year, but it was darn humid. So I'm three miles from the finish, and my car, and I can either run down the hill or bail out and walk down the hill. So I decided to run.

It was obvious early that my back was not going to let me run fast. I just tried to maintain as good a pace as I could. First mile was like 7:20, second mile was 7:50. It actually seemed to loosen up a bit in the third mile and I was able to pick up the pace in the last half-mile, which included a big downhill. By the time I drove halfway back home and had to stop for gas, I was COMPLETELY locked up and limping.

Easy run tonight, except for the fact that the back still hurts. Maintained the pace for an hour, more or less, and the gluteus medius hurt every step of the way. But got through ti. It's about time to start increasing my weekly mileage toward the start of marathon training in a couple of weeks.

Reading Hudson's book now, BTW. We'll see if it makes sense to me, enough to try it.

Hard progression run tonight on the dreadmill. Started at sub-9 pace, then about 8:20, and the last 2.6 miles at GMP. Actually had intended to do 7 miles in about an hour, but extended it another mile and 6.5 minutes. Back felt pretty good tonight, better than the legs felt. I'm gonna need a lot of runs like this in the next four-plus months to get ready for Memphis.

One of those runs where the plan changes in midstream. Had intended an easy 4-miler around the neighborhood (or as easy as the local hills would permit). But I got turned around a bit in the Calico Creek section, took a couple of wrong turns, found myself back on Calico Creek when I didn't want to be, and figured out that this one wasn't going to go according to plan. After a couple more wrong turns, I finally got back where I'd wanted to go from the start, and by this time I'd actually kinda gotten into a groove. So I decided to stretch this run out a bit. Wasn't going to go real long, in part because I started at 8:15 and it was rather humid after two days of rain, but a little longer than 4. Wound up being a smidge over 6 in 57:42. Hills, surprisingly, were not an issue, although the humidity was. Tech shirt was soaked (imagine if I'd worn cotton).

Quick 4 on the TM before work today. May or may not get in a short run tonight. Have a lot of thinking to do -- finally got an offer from NWA last night.

Took the job offer last night, so that load is off my mind. Now to the run. Met the Crackheads at the Arts Center this morning. It was relatively cool, but humid, and rain was in the forecast by about 9. I hoped it wouldn't take that long, and sure enough, it started raining around 7, at which time I was about to turn around on Kavanaugh up near Cantrell. Put the hammer down on the downhill; all of the last 6 mile splits were under 9, mostly in the 8:30s and 8:20s. ended up basically running a 20K in 1:51:41, averaging sub-9 for the whole run. And the rain felt REALLY good. Good way to jump off into the Hudson plan, which I now have to figure when when I'm going to start it.

Anyway, job won't start until maybe October, so I have two months to work out details, find a place to live, etc.

The official start of training for Memphis today, unless you want to call yesterday the start. Hudson called for a recovery run with two hill sprints at the end, and that's what I did. Six miles, two 8-second sprints. Paced off the sprints afterward and got about 45 yards on each. Not gonna make the NFL with those times (my all-time best 40 was 5.0 with a rolling start in high school), but hopefully I can bring them down a little, and more importantly, get a little stronger.

These next 18 weeks are going to be a real challenge. Not only am I trying to finally get the elusive BQ, but I'm going to relocate, pack and unpack, plus get my son established as a college student. Will be interesting to be sure.

Easy 6 tonight. Resisted the temptation to pick up the pace. Legs felt good, but no need to risk overdoing it this early in the training cycle. Just plugged along and finished in 58:40. Easy again tomorrow, then some hills on Wednesday. Just trying to get easy miles in and get used to going more than 40 miles in a week again.

Another 6 on the DM tonight. Goal, other than just putting in the miles, was to work on keeping my stride low and quick, not the bounding I tend to do on slow runs, TM or otherwise. I think I succeeded; the cadence/HR monitor showed in the mid-170s, not around 160 as I do when I'm bounding (if you're not holding the HR monitor on the TM and it shows a reading, it's counting your cadence, not your HR). Six days in a row now for the first time in a LONG time. Not quite up to the 40-plus days I had at one point in the spring, but not bad, and legs are handling it pretty well so far.

A not-so-easy easy run tonight. Legs did not want to work. Thought frequently about cutting it off at 5 miles, but kept going anyway until I got to 6. Then I jogged over from the AC to the hill on Commercial St. to run my hill sprints. Didn't count on the Wednesday night church crowd leaving at that time, but managed to get my three sprints in without getting run over, then jogged back to Casa SP. Strangely, the sprints felt better, maybe felt a little faster than they did Monday night.

If I haven't mentioned it to this point, I'm trying Hudson for the Memphis training cycle, sort of a mix between his Plan 2 and Plan 3. Probably will top out at around 80, although I might push it to the full 87 if things go well. It will be interesting trying to do this with all that will be going on in my life between now and December; a real test of my focus/dedication/obsession/insanity/all of the above.

Somebody slap me. Please. Knock some sense into me. I took Hudson Level 3 and tweaked down the first week because my mileage hasn't been that high this summer. Eight-milers became 6 milers, including tonight's progression run. Then what do I do? Run eight anyway. Yep, I need some sense slapped into me before I hurt myself. Anyway, no injury yet, and then run went pretty well. Ran the last 5 minutes at GMP. It was a Beat the Cop run tonight anyway; try to finish before I get tossed off the treadmill at 10 p.m. I made it. The couple on the other treadmill and the elliptical, I'd venture, got tossed; they'd barely arrived when I left at 9:58.

Wasn't sure I was going to run today. Legs felt every bit of last night's tough 8, and today was another typical Friday pummeling at the office. But rested for a while, then decided to go put in my easy 4, which I did without any trouble. Finished my first week of Hudson Level 3 with 48 miles -- not his recommended mileage, but satisfactory for my purposes. Start week 2 tomorrow with 14 from the boathouse.

Not sure what was going on this morning. Felt like I hadn't eaten in a month (I had), or hadn't slept in a week (closer to the truth), or my legs were necrotic (they are). Had no energy at all. Heat and humidity didn't help, but a little bit of breeze was no help. I got through 14 miles, but it took a looooong time.

Interesting run tonight. Planned to do it on the TM, but couldn't get into the fitness room for some reason. So got my Garmin and went out on the streets. Humidity quickly started kicking my fanny. After almost four miles, looped back by the fitness room and decided to try again, and this time the door opened. So I ran two miles on the TM inside, then went back out to do my hill sprints X 4 on Commercial Drive. Not a fun run, but got it done.

Fartlek run tonight, so I'm guessing at the total distance of the surges -- which were 8 X 45 seconds at paces ranging from 7:24 to 6:15. Went pretty well; legs felt much better once I picked up the pace. I just have a hard time running 10 minute miles in training. I have to expend energy holding myself back, I think.

Back to the old midweek 8-milers. Was supposed to be easy, but I decided to make it a progession run -- which probably made it easier than it would have been if I'd just loafed at 9:40 pace for an hour-plus. Got up to 9:00 pace and would have gone faster, except the control panel on the DM locked up (which it does sometimes when I'm sweating a lot) and I couldn't turn it up or adjust the incline or do anything else, even stop it at the end; I had to pull the safety string to stop it when I finished. Wound up at 74:30 for eight.

Slow 6 on the TM tonight, then over to Commercial to run hills X 5. The hills are gettingg easier, I think; the slow 6-milers aren't. Legs took about five miles to wake up.

Pam and I met a group of people who turned out to be mostly from Arkadelphia (my hometown) tonight at a pub. Then I left early to go run. Not sure the two are connected, but it was not a good run. Might be because I started at almost 9 p.m. and hadn't eaten since noon (and had some GI distress after that). Legs felt really weak, and I was really hungry, so I cut off the planned 8-miler at 6 miles then went to go find some food.

Up early this morning to run, in part because last night's run didn't go so well. Did better this time, a routine 4-miler at the AC. Weather was really nice, around 68 and not very humid, but I'm still glad I ran on the TM, because there were some mid-run issues I needed to deal with that would have been more problematic on an outdoor run. May do a short run tonight, may not. Then 14 tomorrow.

Pretty good run this morning. Got a break on the weather; it was 68 degrees at 6 a.m., and it doesn't get any better than that in August in Arkansas. Could have used a touch more breeze, but otherwise very nice. Legs felt a little sluggish early, but as I picked up the pace a bit they warmed up. Definitely a better 14 miler than I ran last Saturday. Heart rate was about where I wanted it; averaged  135 for the run. Last quarter-mile some lean 25-year-old pulled up beside me and I decided he was NOT going to beat me, so I put the hammer down. I didn't pull ahead of him, but he didn't pass me either, so I consider that a victory for the old guy. And he congraulated me afterward on the late surge. Garmin said I was running 5:36 pace at the end.

Just didn't feel like running Sunday, so got up at 5:30 today to do 7 moderate miles at the AC. Run went OK, conisdering. Have to leave for Springdale right after work. Might run when I get there, but I doubt it. And tomorrow is going to be a very stressful day, emotionally. Maybe I can get in an early run before we go look at houses or go to campus.

Pretty good run tonight in spite of two straight nights of poor sleep and the emotional stress of sending Tyler to college, trying to get him situated and get his books bought, etc., and signing to rent a new house. Very nice one, in a good area for running, I think. There's a park next door with a trail, plus rolling hills in the neighborhood. I've already mapped out a 4.5 mile loop in the area. Anyway, in spite of dragging through work today, guilt got me after missing two of the last three days, and I went to do a fartlek run on the dreadmill. Warmed up for 2 at 9:15 pace, then started running one-minute surges, with the first one at just about 7:00 pace and the 10th one at 6:15, with three minutes in between at increasingly faster "recovery" speeds, then finished the 8 miler at GMP for the last mile and change. Finished in exactly 66:00, or 8:15 average, but at least a third of the run was at GMP or faster, and the last six miles averaged GMP.

Hudson-style rpogression run tonight -- six miles semi-easy, three miles moderate, one mile at GMP. Took the legs about five miles to really loosen up after the hard fartlek last night. Felt better during the moderate phase, almost oo good during the GMP. Took 89:59. And, in spite of missing two nights, I'm still on track for a 45-mile week. I'll just look at this as my recovery week and press on next week.

Hopefully all the drama is over for a while and I can concentrate on running. Did a recovery run tonight on the DM; planned to go 5 originally but legs felt good so stretched it to 6. Getting up in the morning to do 15, so that will be 21 in about 12 hours. I'll just make this my recovery week and beef up next week's slate accordingly, possibly to near 60.

Another unbelievably nice morning to run in central Arkansas. It just doesn't stay this cool this long in August around here; something weird is going on. Today at 5:30: 64 degrees, reasonable humidity, hint of a breeze, not a cloud in the sky. And things didn't change much between then and 8:20, when I finished my 15 miler -- except the sun came up.

My legs were kinda sore to start with, thanks to last night's 6 that finished around 9 p.m., and the 10 miles Thursday night, and... I figured this would be a good exercise in running with tired legs, as Hal Higdon recommends. Started out at sub-9 pace, which was too fast, but I really didn't slow down much. I did mile 11 in 9:48 with a bit of a walk break, but that was the slowest mile, and the average for 15.05 was 9:06. Hard to imagine I could have run too much faster with the legs in the shape they were, even if the weather were, say, in the 40s instead of the 60s (but I can't wait to find out in October or so). I think this pattern of doing long runs on only 9-10 hours' rest may help me develop some strength that I've lacked in the last 10K at Memphis and Newport -- and maybe help me avoid the dreaded cramp monster as well, along with better hydration and electrolyte management.

Oh yeah, AHR was 138, about 70% of my heart rate reserve using the Karvonen method. Pretty good, IMO, considering it's still warm/humid. I wish my leg muscles were in as good condition as my heart seems to be. If they were, BQ would be a breeze. Cardiac capacity is not my limiting factor here.

"Cross-training" this morning, a recovery run this evening. XT consisted of unloading the storage unit, two full SUV-loads of rather heavy boxes and crates. I think a couple of those crates weighed more than I do. Managed not to throw my back out, which is nice. Then a 7-mile easy run tonight, followed by hill sprints X 6 on Commercial. Legs hurt more than my back now, which I guess is good. Over 1700 miles tonight, or is it 1800? Anyway, a whole bunch of miles.

Another fartlek run tonight. Took the surge part a little easier -- still 10 X 1:00, but slower pace. Srarted out four minutes between surges, then cut that to three. Consequently, was nearly three minutes slower for the full 8 miles than last week. No matter. That's what I felt like running tonight, so I did. Main worry now is getting the kid through a major bout of homesickness until he can get settled in. Right now he's miserable, which makes me miserable.

Hard 10 miles tonight. Not in terms of pace, but of difficulty. Started with stomach cramps that necessitated a short break, then legs refused to loosen for about 7 miles. Finally started feeling better after I accelerated at the midway point to 8:20 pace, then finished with the last .5 at GMP. Left foot didn't feel very good, either, which is a little worrisome; any twinge makes be start thinking stress fracture. Hopefully its just another twinge that will be gone in the morning.

Recovery run tonight. Stretched 6 into 7. No big deal, just felt like it. Needed some tension released with the turmoil at work and with T's travails on campus, basically.

Decided to skip last night due to a flareup of ITBS (hurting down the thigh, which has not happened to me before) and overall dead legs. Then thought about getting up to run this morning, but decided another 90 minutes of sleep was worth more than an 8-miler. So I got 5 done right after work at the AC, before my access to the AC goes away next week. Went all right. no ITB problems. A llittle tizanidine before bedtime last night seemed to help. Probably will do 16 tomorrow, but who knows. We'll see how I feel and what the weather is doing; chance of rain, which would be OK with me. Tyler's survived his first week at school and some -- SOME -- of the early anxiety seems to be subsiding. Now if he can just figure out how to form some bonds with his classmates.

Rather interesting run this morning. Crackheads met at Pinnacle Mountain Visitors Center, not my favorite place to run, but doable hills, or so I thought. Got there late but found a copy of the 16-mile route, which is what I wanted, so I grabbed it and took off. Brief perusal found a couple of roads I wasn't familiar with, but anyway.

First 8-9 miles were all over familiar territory, then I turned onto Highway 300, first time out there. It was OK, a little busy but adequate shoulders. Then I turned onto Roland Heights Road and immediately discovered how it got that name. I was looking up a ski slope. Made my way to the top, ran back down the other side, then turned onto Barrett Road. Barrett was OK, boring but OK. Then I turned onto Twin Bluff Loop -- another ski slope. Got up, back down the other side, back on to Barrett for an out-and-back. More routine boring country road stuff except for the two loose dogs that had me a little nervous for 200 yards or so, but all bark and no bite.

Got back to 300 and crossed over to re-enter the park at the East entrance. I see the words "Base Trail" on the route sheet, so I find a park map and locate the entrance to Base Trail about 100 yards down the drive. Turn on to Base Trail and I find ... rocks and roots. Lots of rocks and roots. And I'm wearing lightweight trainers, certainly nothing designed for trail running. Pick my way through the rocks and roots, take a couple of wrong turns, double back to find the trail again and make my way around the base of the mountain, a mile and a half or so to Pinnacle Valley Drive, then back to the visitors center (which is straight uphill for the last .75).

Garmin cut out somewhere on Base Trail; I was surprised it lasted that long because I had neglected to fully charge. So I don't know the exact mileage or the exact time, but with the doublebacks and the fact Tom's courses tend to be long anyway, I'm estimating 16.5. Might have been more. I think it took just about 3 hours, but picking my way through the rocks and roots slowed me down a bunch, not to mention those ski slopes. Good run, good weather, no sprained ankles or face plants, and I finished before they sent out the cavalry to look for me. There were raindrops on my windshield when I got back to the car, but not a one of them hit me in the whole three hours.

Good news on the college boy front. He went to a Japanese cultural festival last night, being the Nipponphile he is, and was pleased to find a kid named Grant that he had met at Orientation. He also met with his peer counselor Friday evening, so he had two things going last night, thus no sitting around the dorm moping. I'm keeping my fingers crossed that he's finally starting to settle in and this overwhelming anxiety will be a thing of the past. Meanwhile, Pam and her mom are going to Memphis this afternoon to see her brother's son play in a national kid baseball tournament, but I'm staying here to work on hospital privilege applications.

Also found out that one of my new co-workers in NWA is married to a girl who lived on my street in Arkadelphia. Talk about a small freaking world. Unbelievable.

Easy 8 tonight afer Pam got back from Memphis, followed by hill sprints. Glutes were already sore from yesterday's mountain climbing, so they got a little extra stress tonight. Run itself was pretty routine; nice cool evening helped. It was even cooler in the fitness room. Then went outside for the sprints, deciding to get them over ASAP with minimal standing around. Jogged to the bottom, turned around and sprinted right back up. Decided I will run the 5K Saturday, now just have to register.

Another exciting episode of Beat the Cop tonight -- finish my run before the policeman kicked me out of the fitness room. Got a mile of it done early, trotting home from work due to being carless and Pam running late. Then ran 7 after Shan's birthday dinner, with fartlek 10 X 1:00 and closing with 1.4 at GMP. Finished before the cop arrived, but by how much can't say.

Tough 10-miler tonight. Not in terms of pace, but the legs just did not want to respond.  Really didn't get going until I accelerated to 8:30 pace for the last three miles. Ran home from work for the first mile (legs dead then, too), changed clothes and did a couple of errands, then ran 6 slow on the DM, then accelerated for the last 3.

Decided I'm gonna run the 5K Saturday, which means taper time after tonight. Legs are gonna need the break.

Seven easy tonight. Legs felt much better than last night or Monday. Still took me about 4 miles to really get going, though. Now a mini-taper for the 5K on Saturday. it would be nice to run a really good race; I kinda need a confidence booster right now, as I feel like I'm spinning my wheels to some extent.

Good progression run tonight, shortened due to mini-taper but still a good hard run. Went to the River Trail, where despite the unusually cool late summer weather, it was still around 80 and quite humid. The plan was to warm up with 2 miles, run back to the start at GMP or faster, and then warm down with another 2-mile jog. Went pretty well, except for the sweat blinding me. Warmed up, stopped for a stretch break, then took off at what turned out to be almost 10K pace for the two-mile return run. Ended up averaging about 7:32 for the two miles, then jogged out the 6, went and paid the power bill downtown, then went to McD for some high-calorie sustenance. Plan to do a slow jog tomorrow, either AM or PM, of about 4, then show up for the 5K on Saturday ready to go sub-22 (I may be kidding myself on that one, but we'll see how it goes).

Easy 4 tonight on the DM just to knock the kinks out before tomorrow's Clear Mountain 5K. The race is officially the Arkansas 5K state championship, not that I'm in competition for any of that. But it's a flat course, it's a course I know well, and I feel like I'm going to have a good race. Particularly if the weather cooperates (rain in the forecast). I'm also happy because Tyler is home from school for the first time, and he's in a really good mood, which is a lot different than what I've been hearing on the phone for the past 2.5 weeks. I think the adjustment is happening now. Unfortunately, Pam is coming down with a cold or flu or something, so I'm gonna have to keep my distance.