Monday, May 30, 2011

Week of 5/22-5/28

Sunday-3.7 miles: Flew back from Orlando today and wanted to get a run in before the bad thunderstorms got here. By the time I got to Mt. Airy the sky was pretty dark, but there was no rain and no wind so I figured I would be ok for the 5 mile loop. About a mile into the run it start raining a little, but it felt good since it was 80 degrees. About 2 miles in it got so dark I could barely see the trail and the wind started picking up a lot. At about 3 miles it was getting kind of scary so I took a cut through trail to the ridge road. The second I stepped onto the road the rain started coming down hard. Because of the crazy winds the rain was basically coming sideways and stinging pretty hard, especially since I had no shirt on. One the lightning started I got kind of freaked out. I looked down at my garmin at one point and I was running about 5:50 pace. Accidental fartlek workout I guess! I dove in my car and headed home.

Monday-5 miles: Went back to Mt. Airy to run on a very nice day, but it was so muddy and slick from the rain last night I could barely keep a decent pace. I was going to run farther, but I was dead after one loop.

Tuesday-5.3 miles: Ran at 9:30pm around the neighborhood. Night runs are always kind of fun.

Wednesday-4 miles : Ran with Robert around Hyde Park. Knee is swollen and hurting pretty bad. I didn't want to run on the road, but it was nice to actually have somebody to run with.

Thursday-7 miles: Went to Clear Creek Park after work for a run on the grass fields to hopefully give my knee a break. After 2 miles I saw a thunderstorm rolling in, and roll in it did. After about 3 miles of sideways rain it passed, the sun came out and there was a double rainbow. It was actually a pretty nice run.

Friday-11 miles: I was going to do a track workout today, but I thought a longer run would be better for me. I went to the Little Miami River Trail for an out and back. I ran at a casual effort and averaged about 7:15 pace. After the shorter runs this week it was good to get a little volume in.

Saturday-4 miles: Ran in the neighborhood after work and the knee was killing me. After running 7 straight days I think I am going to take one or two days off and try to heal this up.

Totals:
Miles: 40
Time: 5:07:27
-Decent increase in mileage this week, but hopefully my knee is not a casualty of it. I did four runs on the road this week which isn't good. Next week I plan on running on the grass at Clear Creek Park more even though it is VERY boring.

Monday, May 23, 2011

Week of 5/15-5/21

Sunday-12 miles: AM-Headed to Mt. Airy for my first trail race, a very low key 120 person 5.4 mile race in very sloppy conditions. After a 2 mile warm up we hit the trail. I ended up finishing 10th overall averaging 7:58 pace, pretty good considering everybody was sliding all over the place in the mud due to rain that had fallen the previous day. PM-Did an additional 4.5 miles around the neighborhood just before dinner. Shins are sore, but feeling pretty good otherwise.

Monday-10 miles: After work I was not in the best mood (fairly rare for me) and decided to head to the Little Miami River Trail, fairly flat with only 460 feet of elevation change). Ended up having a solid run with splits of: 7:11, 7:05, 7:06, 7:02, 6:46, 6:43, 6:43, 6:32, 6:27, 6:17 for a 6:47 average. I was shocked at how good I felt, especially since I went at 7:00/mile effort for the first 7 miles. Great run, but it may be the last of the week since we are headed to Florida for a couple days.

Tuesday-0 miles: Bad weather, work, and packing for vacation.

Wednesday-0 miles: Flew to Orlando and went to Hollywood Studios for the afternoon/evening.

Thursday-0 miles: Animal Kingdom the first half of the day, sat by the pool for a while relaxing, then headed to Downtown Disney for dinner and drinks.

Friday-0 miles: Magic Kingdom all day, then took a ferry to the Fort Wilderness Lodge for dinner, then back to the hotel for 10 hours of sleep.

Saturday-0 miles: Epcot from 9am-7pm, then took the monorail to the Magic Kingdom for some more rides and the Projection/Firework show. I have to say, the Projection show they did on the castle was one of the coolest things I have ever seen in my life. Absolutely amazing how they do that.

Totals:
Miles: 22
Time: 2:43:53
-Only two days of running due to vacation, which is fine with me. We were walking the parks for 10-12 hours a day which I consider cross training...sort of. The two days of running were pretty solid though, so now it is back to the grind. Congrats to Michael Burke for finishing his first 50 mile race out in Washington coming in 8th place overall with a time of 7:21:44. That is just motivation for me to get the trail miles up! Here are two photos I took with my phone at Disney. The first is on the Test Track at Epcot when we got up to 64.8 mph in this little car! We may have rode it more than once :-) The second is of Carrie going through the door of our Toy Story themed hotel.


Sunday, May 15, 2011

Week of 5/8-5/14

Sunday-6 miles: Brad Bullock came by the store when we closed so we could do a run around Blue Ash and Montgomery. He ran for Northern Kentucky University and is an assistant coach at Fairfield High School. It looks like I will also be an assistant coach there for cross country in the fall. He said they are expecting about 40 boys and 40 girls on the cross team, so it should be a lot of fun.

Monday-5 miles: Headed to Clear Creek Park for a morning run in the tall wet grass. Felt very sluggish and achy for whatever reason. I am loving this warmer weather!

Tuesday-6 miles: Bought a pair of Asics Nimbus 13's today, and they felt GREAT on the road. The weather was great...80 degrees has never been so enjoyable. I could do with a little less humidity, but it beats the rain we have had all spring.

Wednesday-0 miles: Took today off to rest up.

Thursday-9.5 miles: Headed back to Mt. Airy for a longer trail run. For the first time in forever, it was almost completely dry! About 7 miles in I clipped a rock and I went flying off the edge of the trail. I ended up banging both my knees on rocks causing one of them to bleed pretty bad. I walked for a couple minutes, then continued running (only had 2 miles left). Later in the evening I headed to Ault Park to throw the football with fellow Fleet Feeter Drew and my left knee was about twice as big as my left knee. Awesome.

Friday-0 miles: Knee is still very swollen.

Saturday-0 miles: One more day of resting knee. Trail race at Mt. Airy tomorrow!

Totals
Miles: 26
Time: 3:21:00
-Did not get a lot of miles in with only four runs because of the fall I took on the trails on Thursday. I was hoping to get close to 40 miles, and next week I won't be running much because Carrie and I are headed to Florida for 5 days. The trail race tomorrow will be a good test, especially since it will be plenty muddy from the rain we have had on Friday and Saturday. Here is a picture when I got back to my car after the run that I fell on.

Sunday, May 8, 2011

Week of 5/1-5/7

Sunday-3 miles: Went down to the 11 mile mark of the Flying Pig Marathon to run with various people from Hyde Park Square up the Paxton Rd. hill and back. Also went down to the 22 mile mark at the Fleet Feet cheering section to run with people again. Hit up IKEA afterwards for some bedroom furniture. Mr. Allen, I curse you for inventing the allen wrench!

Monday-9.5 miles: Headed to Mt. Airy around noon for a tough, muddy run. For whatever reason I felt like I was struggling, especially on another trail I attempted to "explore" which turned out to be a death march coming back up through the muddy, rocky valley. Note to self, do not take that right turn again.

Tuesday-0 miles: Took today off, pretty tired from yesterdays run.

Wednesday-5.5 miles: The roofers showed up pretty early to finish our roof. I decided since I did not have to work until noon to venture to French Park for some muddy trail running on new trails. There are not a lot of trails in this park, but they are pretty technical. I even had to cross through ankle deep creeks about 8 times which was kind of fun. At work tonight Jeff Galloway came to speak and I have to say he is a really good speaker. Bad part is I didn't get home from work until 10pm, but it's all good.

Thursday-6 miles: Once again I didn't have to work until noon, so I decided to cut the grass in the backyard, then go on a run on the roads from the house. It was such a nice morning I had to take advantage of it.

Friday-0 miles: Worked from open-close then headed to The Pub to meet up with Carrie, Rachael, Rusty (aka James, aka Hammer), Kendall, and Ben for drinks and cheese balls. Good times talking about sporadic trips to Vegas and kayaking.

Saturday-11 miles: Headed to the Little Miami River Trail for the first time since my 15 miler on Feb. 25th. I did an out and back 11 miler hoping to run at least 7:15/mile pace. I ended up averaging right at 7:00 pace and felt pretty good doing it. Splits were:
1-7:07
2-7:11
3-7:12
4-7:05
5-6:55
6-6:58
7-6:55
8-7:00
9-6:54
10-6:57
11-6:51

Totals
Miles: 35
Time: 4:47:11
-Was able to get 5 days of running in and up the miles a bit. The long run on Saturday felt good, hoping to keep that increasing over the next couple weeks. Here is a photo of me after Monday's trail run at Mt. Airy and another photo from a Starbucks in Kentucky across the Ohio River from Cincy (pretty cool view of the city).


Sunday, May 1, 2011

Week of 4/24-4/30

Sunday-9 miles: Headed to Mt. Airy in the early afternoon for some fun in the mud. I did one of the usual loops, got a swallow of water and explored one of the cut through trails which worked out very well. This is my first long run since starting back and it felt pretty good.

Monday-5 miles: Warm 77 degrees out this afternoon, love it. Headed to Mt. Airy after work for more hilly mud running. Legs were a little tight/sore from the longer excursion yesterday. Overall a pretty nice recovery run.

Tuesday-0 miles: Legs are pretty tired and the weather is horrible, so I decided to take a day off. Worked late and hit the hay pretty soon after getting home.

Wednesday-10 miles:Beautiful day today and I didn't have to go to work...perfect combination! Another trail run at Mt. Airy, actually decided to do the normal loop backwards. It is amazing when running a trail in the opposite direction how different everything is. I even took a wrong turn and added on some mileage that I had not planned on doing totalling 7.5 miles. I headed over to the track afterwards and jogged a mile, did some drills, then some strides, then jogged another mile for another 2.5 miles.

Thursday-0 miles: Took off today, legs are pretty sore from basically running twice yesterday.

Friday-0 miles: Another rest day, thinking about running on the road after work tomorrow for the first time since mid-March.

Saturday-6 miles: First road run in forever. Ran through O'Bryonville and back then through Oakley Square and back home for 6 miles in 41:07 (splits were 7:08, 6:57, 6:57, 6:49, 6:36, 6:37). I haven't run faster than 8:30/mile pace on the trails, but it obviously builds strength! Back to the trails tomorrow.

Totals
Miles: 30
Time: 4:14:44
-Ran one more day than last week and finally got some decent runs in. Looking forward to doing more of the same next week, hopefully 5 runs and about 35 miles. Here is a photo of the most expensive running shoe I have ever put on my foot, the Mizuno Prophecy. I will say, I have never worn a shoe that felt like this.