Why I like Floyd...

"What kind of Crack are you on?" See the Floyd article below about the crappy day at Le Tour

http://www.bicycling.com/tourdefrance/article/0,6802,s1-7-123-14942-1-0-0-0-1542,00.html

Pit Bull

Every now and then one gets to challenge things difficult enough to adopt their own name. Such an opportunity was afforded this weekend while running with the Todds Road Stumblers ( http://www.toddsroadstumblers.com ).

It was time to run 15 miles, Chicago isn't far away and the miles have to increase. The route is affectionately referred to as "Pit Bull" by the members. It features an exceedingly steep hilly section for about 4 miles on Jones Nursery Road, which is followed by about a mile of very steep grade to come back up from an elevation very near the Kentucky River.

I went out and ran a portion of the route last thursday just to get an idea of what I was running up against. 9 miles in the hills with bad rest and too much sugar during the day. I figured Saturday morning with good sleep and better nutrition would be a breeze. Even better, it was supposed to be overcast and cooler than normal.

Saturday morning at 6:30 am, 4 people began the run. After 4 miles, the pack had spread, and I was chasing a Frenchman with a 3:07 marathon under his belt (great idea, moron). But I kept him in sight all through Jones Nursery and chased him up Pit Bull. The issue though, was the sun. It came out. And it was hot. Coupled with the heat was the rain of the three previous days. Thus it was ridiculously humid too. The Frenchman ran 18 miles and made it look easy. I hobbled in broken after 15+. Great day.

Pit Bull is no puppy. He is a dog, and that's Mr. Dog to you...

Oh I love Puns: Recognizing the Bad-arseness

So I'm offically a bike geek now. Since the new bike has come into my life, I've studied the sport of cycling to some degree and decided I wanted Floyd Landis to win the Tour this year. He's been looking Good, in Cali, Nice, and Tour of Georgia.
I've been frustrated with the problems in the two time trials (bad wheel, broken aero bar handles, and just kept saying, "wait for the mountains, that's when it happens."
After yesterday's breakaway by two riders and the large gap they put on the peloton, I was feeling a bit dejected...But today, the hardest stage in the Pyrenees, Floyd Delivers. He finished third, but was outsprinted by the two other guys in the attack group. Floyd now has approximately a one-minute lead, and I am stoked. The picture is especially nice, because it's Floyd (on the left) and Lance on the right (you know I love the Torch) Word.

Great week (end)

If you read the last post, you'll know that this was an important week to get back on the horse. Turns out, it was a great week. I had a relatively unsuccessful 10k (42:09), but realized I was simply being a little too tough on myself. I decided to ease up on worrying about pace and enjoy the runs and workouts. Well, apparently I'm a friggin' genius!
Just playin', but it's amazing how much easier exercise is when one is not putting ridiculous time demands on oneself. For instance, the run thursday night (7.5 miles): I was taking it easy, ended up running around 7:20/mile. Good pace for a mid-tempo run. Saturday, I just decided to have fun and run with some folks at Todds Road and did 13 miles at about a 7:45 pace (this ends up being right on target with my marathon plan). So I guess my point is to take it easy on yourself if you're getting out there and doing what you can. That's really a great deal more what it's about than some insane time goal.

So the week consisted of great workouts, wednesday night was a 30-min elliptical machine workout post race, friday had a work commute and a home commute plus (33.5 miles total) followed by a shoulder workout and a little bit of swimming. Saturday was 13 miles, followed by riding the bike to and from the gym around a leg workout. But sunday was great. I went and ran at one of my favorite places, Raven Run nature sanctuary. The pictures are withing (taken in spring). There's nothing quite so nice as getting out and pushing yourself and enjoying nature.

Enjoy the pictures, and get out and enjoy your surroundings.

Remorse, Rethinking, Retooling

First a quick race report: The 10k didn't go as planned. Poor sleep amounts the two nights before the race. Decided I'd still try to go out at planned pace and see at Mile 2. At about 1.5, I felt like I was going to look like the pumpkin if I went much longer, and didn't have much juice in the legs. I finished in 42:09 (i think). Not a bad race, but far from what I wanted. This coming on the tail of a couple poor weeks of training left me wanting a bit more.

So it's time to retool and reload. I had to slow down and look at where my training errors are/were. I think the speedwork was too soon. I'm not experienced enough at finding a smooth easy running pace to be doing serious speed training. I screwed up most of my workouts last week (being stressed highly from work) and really killed my mindset. I'm tougher than what I showed in the last week.

So here's the plan:
1) Periodize the training plan. Higher frequency lower intensity workouts for the next 2.5 weeks. It's time to re-find the love of running. (Part 1 can be called "I feel His pleasure."

2) Realize that I'm in a pretty good spot. Not that I want to go onto some kind of relative scale, but I need to be mindful of how well I'm doing. 5 years ago, I weighed 240 and running 4 miles was a chore that couldn't be completed in less than 33-34 minutes. I'm now 192-195 and I feel great.
3) Re-find the mental dominance and push myself in the middle of the training plan. (Hills and speed workouts are still coming back later on. I'm also considering running some massive amounts of stairs to mix it up. along the same vein, a couple grinder hill workouts might have to be completed at Raven run in the upcoming weeks.

4) Not take it too seriously: this is the first marathon and it's a bit crazy to think I've got some kind of competitive future in distance running. It's got to be fun and a release from the stresses of life. It also has to be a placid thing at time.

10k Motivation

Following some not-so-great workouts this week, I'm hoping to rest up today and tomorrow before the bluegrass 10,000 the morning of the 4th of July. I think it's gonna be a hot one, but I'm going for it anyway. I think I'm still more fit than I was in Louisville.

Steve Prefontaine would say work it out so it's a pure guts race. Well Steve, since I'm racing myself, I think I can make it happen. Here's to pushing my limits once again. Gotta embrace the pain for 40 minutes.