Category: Last Week in Running

This is the ninth week of my marathon training plan for the Columbus Marathon. The marathon is October 20, 2019. I’m following the Pfitzinger 18/55 plan again. In keeping with the Star Wars theme, this is the revenge of the soup… because there wasn’t enough soupy weather last week, apparently. This week feels like a pull-back week, and I think it is, considering it’s 43 miles down from 49 last week and next week is looking like 56 miles.

Monday: 8 miles recovery. Took this one slow, although my legs felt like they were going faster than my watch says they were, but I didn’t push it because I know what the schedule says for tomorrow. Ran mostly in the park until I took a pitstop, and then into the adjoining subdivision, where I noticed that they’ve made a lot more progress on getting the gap in the streets to fill in (more below). 8.03 miles in 1:12:24 (9:01 min/mile pace).

Tuesday: 8 miles with 5x800m @ 5k pace. Ran this entirely in the park since it was intervals. The warm up was pretty slow, but the intervals were mostly within paces: 7:03, 7:14, 7:09, 7:10, and 7:22 – the goal pace range was 6:55 – 7:15, so the last one was a little slow. It was quite warm, so I was happy with most of them being within pace (and on the last one – if I was four seconds faster, it would have been within pace). Overall, 8 miles in 1:10:10 (8:46 min/mile pace). I was also treated to a light show. Finished the run with some weights and SIX pull-ups (up from 5 last week!).

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Wednesday: 5 miles recovery. Kept this mostly easy, although that went off the rails for the last two miles where I started posting mile times in the 8:15 range.

Thursday: 8 miles + 8 strides. Went up to East Fork to get my hills on. I got there under a little bit of a light show and a threat of rain in about an hour. The rain started about 3.25 miles in, and by mile 5.25 the wind and rain were fairly extreme – I was having difficulty seeing because the wind was blowing the rain into my eyes and the light from my RunLites couldn’t cut through that much rain – there was THAT MUCH rain coming down. Overall, 9.1 miles in 1:23:44 (9:12 min/mile pace).

Friday: 14 miles. Got up and heard rain. Didn’t really want to run and got back in bed, and even thought I’d run in better weather (both cooler and less rainy) on Saturday. Got back up a few minutes later and decided I’d run in it since a RD wouldn’t cancel a race over rain. It did stop raining after a while… a loooong while. Ran in the park and the subdivision next to it. Then right at 14 miles, my watch froze. 14 miles in 2:05:47 (8:59 min/mile pace).

Saturday: got up to my wife telling me the water was off. There was a water main break near my subdivision. Between Facebook posts and reality, water was turned off sometime around 3:45 AM and it wasn’t back on until after 1:00 PM. So I guess it’s a good thing I ran in the rain.

This week was 44 miles and change. This is a down week, next week is going to be up to 55-56 miles with the second 20 mile run of the plan.

Mind The Gap

While I’d almost prefer to run my very long runs in downtown, I’m a half hour away and that really takes a lot of time out of my schedule. So a lot of my runs are around Batavia Township Park, which is a minute or two from my house (it’s so close that I could run from my subdivision to the park using the other subdivision, but I’d be running on a 45 MPH roadway).

When I run in the park, it’s a 1.25 mile loop (the blue line in the map above). Adding part of the next subdivision (it connects with a sidewalk at the NW corner, and a partially-paved connection in NE corner – both the purple lines in the map), I can add another mile or so.

When the weather is dry enough, I can use a dirt connection between the two subdivisions. They are building a street to connect (if you click on the map above to zoom in, you’ll see that both sides are named Autumnview Drive). The eastern (larger) portion is about 3-3.2 miles all the way around. The smaller portion is a little over a mile in one direction.

I tend to start at the SE portion of the park, where the big parking lot is south of the baseball fields). I found that one full loop and one partial in the park (2 miles), then going into the smaller section and running it to the connector (2.5 miles cumulative), then running four loops in the larger section (15.4 miles cumulative), finishing the small section (16.5 miles cumulative), and coming back the other way and back into the park (18 miles cumulative) and then doing the remainder of the loop and another loop gets me to 20 miles. Once the new street is in place, I expect that I’ll be doing full loops, which are going to be somewhere around 5 – 5.5 miles for a single direction. It’ll be nicer that way.

I noticed Friday that they have the curbs set, so hopefully by next Friday they’l have the road in.

This is the eighth week of my marathon training plan for the Columbus Marathon. The marathon is October 20, 2019. I’m following the Pfitzinger 18/55 plan again. In keeping with the Star Wars theme, this is the week of the Soup Wars.

Monday: 6 miles recovery. Ran 6 miles in the park and the subdivision next to it. It was a decent morning out – 64 with relatively low humidity. 6.03 miles in 52:52 (8:46 min/mile pace).

Tuesday: 14 miles. This was a hot and sticky run in East Fork. I arrived later than I wanted and started getting abdominal cramps halfway between East Fork and Williamsburg… and of course the bathrooms in Williamsburg Community Park were padlocked shut. After getting back into the park and taking a pitstop, I ran down to the lake, leaving around 4 miles left, and my headphone’s battery died. It was very hot and sticky and slow. 14 miles in 2:15:44 (9:34 min/mile pace).

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Wednesday: 6 miles recovery. Woke up to dense fog advisories. It wasn’t foggy when I started running, but it was by the end. Ran in the park in basically the same arrangement as Monday. The temperature was warm and the humidity was high – I had to wring out my shirt. 6.03 miles in 53:05 (8:48 min/mile pace).

Thursday: 16 miles with 12 at M pace. Ran my long run early because of the race on Saturday. It wasn’t as bad as the last two days, but it was still soupy. Despite my house’s air conditioner going out the evening before, I got decent sleep and the spaghetti for dinner helped (it also helped me figure out that the AC stopped working). Took the two mile warmup conservatively, and then maintained a fast-but-conservative pace for around 10 of the 12, and then heated it up for the last two miles of the set. The cool down was at a much slower pace, but after the prior 14 miles, it felt tough but good. Fueled with Gatorade Endurance Mango gel, hydrated with water at odd miles, and Gatorade Endurance Lemon-Lime at even miles. The 12 mile M pace portion was at an 8:22 min/mile pace, which is a little slower than the 7:50 – 8:15 target, but given the heat and humidity, I’m okay with it. Overall, 16 miles in 2:17:37 (8:36 min/mile pace).

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Friday: The original schedule was for 6 miles. I decided I was crazy to do that much and just did 3 considering I have a race on Saturday. I took it very slow and just kept it in the park. 3.34 in 31:44 (9:30 min/mile pace).

Saturday: RACE. Ran the Bulldog Blast 5k. I’ve run this race two other times, and it’s a low-frills race. The course is kinda messy with multiple loops/hairpins, and they added more – it used to be four loops and one area that gets congested for the midpack. Now, the congested area doesn’t exist, but there’s now six loops/hairpins. I thought that I might have a shot at a PR (narrator: “but that wasn’t in the cards today”). Last year was 21:46, this year was 21:59. I keep trying to find a bright spot in my results… for some reason I couldn’t remember going faster than 7 min/mile in a 5k, but my lead-off miles in both were sub-7: 6:43 in 2018, 6:55 in 2019. Mile 2 was 7:09 in 2018, 7:22 in 2019. Mile 3 was 7:19 in both years. The last 0.1 was 34s in 2018, and 28s in 2019… FINALLY something better in 2019!!!

So that’s the week, and the second race of the 2019 summer. Nearly 49 miles this week. There’s two more on the calendar and two more I’m considering (although I might only do one). And I do need to figure out what I’m doing for a spring goal race next year.

Next week includes some speedwork and more soup to run through (highs will be pushing into the low-100s F).

Upcoming Races:
Saturday 9/21: Hudepohl 14k Brewery Run
Sunday 10/20: Columbus Marathon

This is the seventh week of my marathon training plan for the Columbus Marathon. The marathon is October 20, 2019. I’m following the Pfitzinger 18/55 plan again.

Since last week was Return of the Triple Doubles, it seems that this week is the Twenty Mile Menace. Or maybe I should stop naming these after Star Wars Episodes (nah!).

Monday: 7 miles + 6 strides. One thing I meant to do was see if these were supposed to be 7 miles including the strides or if the strides were in addition to the mileage. Since strides don’t add a lot and I’m too lazy to change the workouts in Garmin Connect, it stays. Ran this in the park on what was not the hottest morning. Because of chafing, I used a belt pack for water (which I don’t like). 7.71 miles in 1:05:37 (8:31 min/mile pace). Began this one with form drills, ended it with some strength exercizes.

Tuesday: 12 miles. Since it wasn’t supposed to be a major thunderstorm in the evening, I took two miles off and ran 10, leaving two for a race. Also kept this in the park. Worse, I looked at my watch at 9 miles and I was somewhere around 81 minutes after a slow start. I thought “I can finish this in 90 minutes” and ran fast for the last mile. 10.12 miles in 1:29:33 (8:51 min/mile pace).

Tuesday Evening: 3.2k XC Race. Ran a modified NKU Valhalla course in 14:44. It was a tough race. It was very warm, and a zillion percent humidity. My PR for the unmodified course is 14:14, so lost a little. The humidity was so bad that as I looked down the course as some of the later finishers were coming in, I saw fog just rising up from a valley off to the side. I did win my age group (it looks like they’re using 5-year groups – two people in their late 40s finished ahead of me, but they were 47 and 48).

Wednesday: It was supposed to be 10 miles with 6 at HM pace, but since I ran a race last night, I decided to just go the distance and take it easy. I stayed in the park again (partly because I got up late). I decided to hand-hold water because I hate the belt pack. 10.02 in 1:28:05 (8:47 min/mile pace).

Thursday: easy day! Ran 5 miles in the park, with form drills before and strength after. 5.01 miles in 44:44 (8:56 min/mile pace).

Friday: long run. After getting in bed too late and up too soon, I ran 20 in the park and surrounding subdivisions (2 laps park, 4 laps in the larger subdivision, and 2 laps in the smaller, and then 2 laps in the park). I was not at all fast, although I did speed up a little as I continued. Fueled with Gatorade Endurance Gels at miles 7 and 14, and hydrated with water and lemon-lime Gatorade Endurance. 20.01 miles in 3:08:00 (9:24 min/mile pace). Wore my vest and got chafed again.

That’s it for the week. 54.8 miles. Most in a while. Hopefully these summer miles will make fall smiles!

Coming up:
Another tough week
Saturday 8/17: Bulldog Blast 5k
Saturday 9/21: Hudepohl 14k Brewery Run
Sunday 10/20: Columbus Marathon

This is the sixth week of my marathon training plan for the Columbus Marathon. The marathon is October 20, 2019. I’m following the Pfitzinger 18/55 plan again.

This week is the return of the triple-doubles – what I’ve been calling the weeks that have three double-digit runs in a week.

Monday: 10 miles with 5 @ HM Pace. Ran this in the park and the neighborhood next to it. The HM pace portion ended up being 3 seconds faster than the upper/slower goal pace range at 7:47 (goal range is 7:30 to 7:50). The warm-up was a little slow, but it’s just a warm-up. Hydrated with Nuun. Overall, 10 miles in 1:23:30 (8:21 min/mile pace).

Tuesday: 4 miles recovery. It was expected to storm today, and I arrived at the park to see a light show with no sound or effects 😎. Ran my 4 miles slow because I had a race scheduled this evening. 4.06 miles in 36:26 (8:59 min/mile pace). Followed my run with squats, one-leg squats, single-leg deadlifts, and six pull-ups (increased by one!).

Tuesday Evening: got to the race parking lot and wondered how I could get such a good parking spot and also wondered why they didn’t have a tent up. Well, they cancelled the race due to weather.

Wednesday: 11 miles. Ran this in East Fork park. It was a foggy morning. They are working on adding better drainage to the path, which is good, and they had the equipment out of the way while they weren’t working. My legs felt sore (🤬 leg day!), so I ran on the slow side until the last mile. 11 miles in 1:41:47 (9:14 min/mile pace).

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Thursday: Supposed to be 7 + 8 Strides, did 8 Recovery. I didn’t check the schedule or anything, so I thought that the 8 miles was just 8 miles. Ran this in the park, and was sore from Tuesday’s weights and Wednesday’s 11 miles. Also, the park’s blacktop is closed because they just laid tar, so I ran most in the neighboring subdivision but finished up part while running on the grass next to the path. 8.11 miles in 1:13:46 (9:06 min/mile pace).

Friday: 18 miles. I put the slow in “long slow distance.” This was a tough run – my legs were still rough from the prior two days, plus I mowed the lawn Thursday evening and I woke up at 3:45 AM to get this run in. I ran this in downtown, and stopped around mile 11.5 to refill my water bottle (I had a bottle of Gatorade Enduracnce and a bottle of water). Fueled with a Gatorade Endurance Gel at mile 9. Overall, this run is why I decided my first two marathons would be in the spring – I’d rather run in 40-50 than 65-75 degree weather! 18 miles in 2:52:27 (9:35 min/mile pace).

July ended during this week, and I made it through with only one missed planned run (not counting the cancelled race). 187 mostly-tough miles in July. August is already shaping up to be a tough month too.

Coming up:
Another tough week
Next Tuesday PM: Brian Rohne XC Championship 3.2k off-road race
Saturday 8/17: Bulldog Blast 5k
Saturday 9/21: Hudepohl 14k Brewery Run
Sunday 10/20: Columbus Marathon

This is the fifth week of my marathon training plan for the Columbus Marathon. The marathon is October 20, 2019. I’m following the Pfitzinger 18/55 plan again.

This week was a vacation week. I took my family to Cedar Point, and we stayed in Hotel Breakers. There was little time spent off Cedar Point’s property this year – this is probably the fifth time my wife and I have been to CP or Sandusky, and seventh or eighth for me, and at least the second for my kids. In prior years, we made it up to Marblehead Lighthouse, South Bass Island and/or Kelly’s Island, and we’ve also taken trips to Firelands Winery and the Merry-Go-Round museum. This time it was all Cedar Point.

The weather was nice compared to the heat wave last week. In fact, there were times we wish we had jackets.

Monday: 8 + 10 * 100m strides. Obviously, I ran this around the Cedar Point Penensula. Lake Erie was very rough, and lake conditions were yellow-flag. I put my feet in the water anyway because why not. Hydrated with Gatorade Endurance. Overall, 9.16 in 1:20:03 (8:44 min/mile pace).

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Tuesday: 5 Miles Recovery. I took this slowly, partly because of GI issues, and partly because I did *a lot* of walking on Monday – we entered the park before the general admission gates opened and didn’t leave until 10:00 PM. The Lake Erie beach conditions went to red-flag. Anyway, 5 miles in 44:54 (8:59 min/mile pace).

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Wednesday: 8 miles. For doing a lot of walking and standing over the past two days, I felt oddly good. I had been expanding on the “running area” and watching where other runners run, and sometimes see interesting things… like where they keep explosives! Hydrated with water. 8.01 miles in 1:10:03 (8:45 min/mile pace).

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Thursday: 4 miles recovery. After a start in large swarms of bugs, I was a little more adventurous on this run – I ran outside the park and down Cedar Point Road – which was the old way to get to Cedar Point prior to 1957 (Cedar Point was opened in 1870, which pre-dates the Ford Model T by only 38 years). Lots of nice houses along there, all with private beaches and structures. 4.01 miles in 35:24 (8:50 min/mile pace).

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Friday: On Thursday evening, the bugs came out again – as we were leaving the park EVERYONE was trying to wave them out of their face, and when we entered the hotel, we stopped in the vestibule to make sure we brushed off any stowaways. Between the two buggy experiences, I decided to sleep in and run Saturday.

Saturday: 12 mile long run. Got up late – I had set an alarm for 5:30, but it was set to M-F only, so I didn’t end up getting up until 7:30. I ran around the park and the nearby subdivisions. Weather started at 63-ish, but quickly rose to 72. Hydrated with Nuun. Almost cut the run short because I told my wife I should be home between 8:30 and 9:00 (I got home around 9:15, she was not angry). 12.04 miles in 1:44:58 (8:43 min/mile pace).

That’s the week. 38 miles of running in some decent running conditions. On to the next!

This is the fourth week of my marathon training plan for the Columbus Marathon. The marathon is October 20, 2019. I’m following the Pfitzinger 18/55 plan again.

Monday: 9 with 5 at HM Pace. The last TWO pace runs were rough due to weather. This one was no exception, but execution was better! Kept it in the township park, where there were two polite dog walkers I’ve seen several times, and another gentleman that was walking around, and I think he was picking up trash (!!!). The HM pace portion was 5 miles in 39:01 – a 7:48 pace. The goal pace was 7:30 – 7:50, so I was within the range. Overall, 9 in 1:14:52 (8:19 min/mile pace).

Tuesday: Supposed to be 5 miles, but travel to and from Chicago messed that up.

Wednesday: 10 miles. Ran in East Fork. Prior to starting, I realized one of my RunLites was dead. It was rainy-ish going to the park with some drizzle, etc. Then around mile 7 it started to rain harder. Hydrated with Gatorade Endurance. 10.26 miles in 1:32:19 (9:00 min/mile pace).

Thursday: I went to bed last night with heat advisories. Today was warm, and the dead RunLite is really dead (I tried charging it, no dice), so I ran around with one headlight (earworm!). I did my normal twice-a-week form and mobility drills and then ran an easy 5 miles, stopping once to pick up trash and yelling at geese three times (twice near a highway patrol officer doing paperwork in the nearby parking lot). I actually did tell one goose to “hiss at me again, motherfucker!” Finished with stretches, squats (with weight!), single-leg squats (no weight), one-leg deadlifts (with weight!), and five pull-ups. 5.01 miles in 43:46 (8:44 min/mile pace).

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Friday: 16 miles with 10 at M pace. So today was an excessive heat warning…

I set out with a 16 oz bottle of water, a 16 oz bottle of Gatorade Endurance, and a “Hoppy Trails” Gu. My watch complained at me for every one of those 10 miles, as I never got a good pace. I alternated water and Gatorade until I ran out of Gatorade (around mile 12-13), and not long past I ran out of water, so I drank some at the park’s fountain and added ~4 oz to my water bottle for the last 2 miles. I did a fair bit of walking in this, but I survived. I took the Gu at mile 8, but I didn’t take much as it didn’t taste very good. Overall, 16 miles in 2:43:15 (10:12 min/mile pace). I’m sure yesterday’s weights didn’t help, and also not having many carbohydrates last night and going to bed a little late didn’t either.

Following the run, I got cleaned up and dressed and sat down to put on compression socks and ended up falling asleep for around 45 minutes.

That’s the week. I was considering a shakeout run on Saturday to get those 5 miles in, but given the heat, my wife’s reaction to falling asleep in the chair, and the laundry-list of things I need to do, it’s unlikely. 40.27 miles for the week.

This is the third week of my marathon training plan for the Columbus Marathon. The marathon is October 20, 2019. I’m following the Pfitzinger 18/55 plan again.

Monday: 8 miles + 10 Strides. Ran in the park and the subdivision next to it, and with a bit of GI issues that even persisted through the day. Not sure what I ate, but something got to me. The run started with watch issues, and phone issues. My watch decided to update before I ran (Garmin, your timing is impeccable). Then, my phone decided to reboot (that one is rare). Then, during the strides, my watch decided to reboot. UGH. Overall, 9.26 miles in 1:20:18 (8:40 min/mile pace). Finished with stretches and four pull ups. And Garmin thinks I ran a 6:07 10k (uhhh, nope!).

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Tuesday: 5 miles recovery. Didn’t sleep too well last night (despite getting to bed at a better time), and got up late. Then my watch decided to update again. Didn’t really push these miles until the end (I saw another runner and was going to pass him 😈, but he stopped just before I went to make my pass). 5.02 miles in 43:26 (8:39 min/mile). Finished with stretches, squats, single-leg squats, unweighted single-leg deadlifts, and FIVE pull-ups (went up one!).

Wednesday: 10 miles. Returned to East Fork Park for this one, and miraculously didn’t have to wait on my watch. However Monday’s GI issues decided to return, which ruined the last half of this – the first 5 were in 45:50, the second five were around 54 minutes. Overall, 10.01 miles in 1:39:13. I don’t even want to talk about the pace.

Thursday: miles. Ran in the park and got there kinda early. It was warm (72 on my phone, 75 on the park’s message board), so I went shirtless. When I arrived, I saw lightning in the sky, but no thunder and it ultimately didn’t storm. Started things off with form and mobility drills and capped off my 4 miles with some squats, single-leg squats, and unweighted single-leg deadlifts. And then I forgot to do pull-ups. Overall, 4.01 in 35:15 (8:46 min/mile pace… not pushing it!). Later on, I did some planks, hamstring curls, and crunches.

Friday: 15 miles. Last night was the homebrew club meeting, so I was up late. I still rolled out of bed early enough to finish the run at a decent time. I took both water and Gatorade Endurance with me. I had meant to bring some Hoppy Trails Gu with me, but I forgot it. I kept this in the park and the subdivisions next to it. The first 10 miles were slow – most of the miles were longer than 9 minutes. During the last third of the run I brought it back to have an overall pace just under 9 minutes per mile. Alternated Gatorade Endurance and water at roughly each mile. 15.02 miles in 2:14:49 (8:59 minutes/mile). After my post-run stretching, I did five pull ups to make up for not doing them yesterday.

That’s it for a rough week. 43.33 miles. 6.5 hours of running. Next week’s going to be a tough week – two speed days. 😱😮

Upcoming Race Schedule:
July 30: NKU XC Series #2
Aug 6: NKU XC Series #3 / Brian Rohne Cross Country Championships.
Aug 17: Bulldog Blast 5k
Sept 21: Hudepohl 14k Run
Oct 20: Columbus Marathon

This is the second week of my marathon training plan for the Columbus Marathon. The marathon is October 20, 2019. I’m following the Pfitzinger 18/55 plan again this time.

Monday: 10 miles. Ran this one in the park and the subdivisions next to it. It was a warm morning, but not too bad. 10.02 miles in 1:26:16 (8:37 min/mile pace).

Tuesday: 4 miles recovery. Ran this in the park (and got out late thanks to a late night at an amusement park Monday evening). 4.03 in 34:21 (8:31 min/mile). Also did leg workouts – squats, single-leg squats, and unweighted one-leg deadlifts in the park, and did some planks and hamstring curls later in the day.

Wednesday: 8 miles with 4 @ HM Pace. Given the pace portion of this workout, I kept it in the park instead of going to East Fork like I normally would. It was hot and sticky, and despite my best efforts, I was unable to maintain the 7:30 – 7:50 pace range – my HM pace portion ended at 7:59 min/mile pace. During the first few miles, there was some thunder, and it started raining around the time I ended the HM pace portion… so I dropped off my hydration vest (with my phone, which was not in a Ziplock bag) in my car and kept running the cool down, only for the rain to stop. Overall, 8 miles in 1:08:39 (8:35 min/mile pace).

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Thursday: 4 miles recovery. Since it was a holiday, I had a smoker to start. I got a pork shoulder on the smoker and got running. 4 miles in my subdivision with squats, single-leg squats, and unweighted one-leg deadlifts after my run on my driveway. 4.01 in 34:03 (8:29 min/mile pace).

Friday: 14 miles. I’m not sure why my legs felt like lead, but they did. It was hot and sticky. I started hungry (even after a piece of toast with peanut butter and honey). My Aftershokz’s battery died about 10k in. I moved at least six e-scooters that were left across paths (I don’t understand the mentality of people that leave these things blocking sidewalks – they’re pissing off people that would likely be ‘on their side’). 14.01 miles in 2:09:50 (9:16 min/mile pace).

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That’s it for a rough hot week. 40 miles, not my fastest but this is the first time I’m doing marathon training during the dog days of summer!

This is the first week of my marathon training plan for the Columbus Marathon. The marathon is October 20, 2019. I’m following the Pfitzinger 18/55 plan again this time.

I signed up for the Columbus Marathon for three reasons:

1. It’s flat and a great race, according to my former boss (it was also his first and best marathon)
2. It’s not a long drive from Cincinnati – only about 2 hours.
3. It’s in the fall. There’s really only three ‘safe’ fall options in the state – Columbus, Northern Ohio/Mentor, and Youngstown. By safe, I mean not-September, since it’s a mixed weather bag, and not trail because the overall goal is still to BQ.

I’m changing a few things this time around. One is more core strengthening. I’ve been wondering if my late-race quad issues is because of a weak core (and I sit all day because work). So I’m going to add one-legged squats, single-leg dead lifts, hamstring curls, hip bridges, planks, crunches, and Russian Twists into the mix.

Monday: 8 miles + 10 x 100m strides. Ran in the park and the neighboring subdivision on a warm and sticky morning. Overall, 9.42 miles in 1:21:58 (8:42 min/mile pace). Finished with stretches, squats, and 4 pull-ups.

Tuesday: 3 miles easy. Ran in the same park, but kept it in the park. Finished with stretches, single-leg dead lifts (body weight only), and single-leg squats. 3.27 miles in 27:45 (8:29 min/mile).

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Wednesday: 10 miles. Ran this one up at East Fork, which was a little bit of a struggle due to the heat and hills and due to GI issues late in the run. Overall, 10.28 in 1:33:21 (9:05 min/mile pace).

Thursday: 5 miles recovery. Ran in the township park. Another hot and sticky morning. 5.02 in 44:18 (8:49 min/mile). Adjusted my post-run to include fewer (by one set) of normal squats, but added single-leg squats and unweighted single-leg deadlifts. Later in the day, I did some planks, hamstring curls, and hip bridges.

Friday: 13 miles with 8 at M pace. This was not a run. This was a ride on the struggle bus.

The weather was hot and sticky. There were a lot of sidewalk closures (Cincinnati MSD doesn’t seem to give a damn about anything that isn’t Mud, Shit, or Debris). I ran out of Gatorade. Overall, 13.12 (because one does not run 13 miles without tacking that 0.1 on the end) in 1:55:07 (8:46 min/mile pace). My intended pace for the M pace miles was 7:50 – 8:15, but my average pace for that portion was 8:36 min/mile.

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So that was a week. A hot and sticky week. A week where I ran 41 miles. It’s the end of June, and I ran 145 miles in June. It was mostly a good month (even though the ending kinda sucked).

I didn’t rework my pace ranges for my next marathon. My overall pace at Glass City was 8:07 min/mile, so I’m within the range I trained at, and my goal for Columbus is to drop from 3:33 to 3:25, which would require me to be between 7:50 and 7:55 per mile. That’s possible! I charted my cumulative pace throughout Glass City and found that before the wheels fell off after mile 20, I was down to a 7:59 min/mile pace. Hopefully, the additional strengthening will help.

Cheers!

Upcoming Race Schedule:
July 30: NKU XC Series #2 (tentative- I may have a work conflict)
Aug 6: NKU XC Series #3 / Brian Rohne Cross Country Championships.
Aug 17: Bulldog Blast 5k
Sept 21: Hudepohl 14k Run
Oct 20: Columbus Marathon

Welcome to another week of the in-between workouts.

Monday: 9 miles. I ran this in the park mostly because of the rain. It was VERY rainy over the weekend and I ran through a lot of rain this morning. Kept it in the park and ran with probably too little attention being paid to my surroundings – at one point, I was running and heard a hissing like a tire going flat, and it was one of Satan’s Waterfowl. I was running right through a swarm of the fuckers. Then, on another pass through that area, one tried to chase me (I’m too fast, and it smartly stopped). 9.05 in 1:18:24 (8:40 min/mile pace). Finished my run with stretches, squats, and 4 pull ups.

Tuesday: 3 miles. Kept this around the neighborhood. Overall 3.15 in 27:02 (8:35 min/mile pace).

Wednesday: 9 miles. This kinda went off the rails. I ran this in East Fork and got a little bit late of a start. Got partway out and away from the parking lot and started getting abdominal cramps, and of course I’m nowhere near a bathroom. This pretty much killed the pace of the run and made it mostly unenjoyable until about 8.4 miles in where I made it back to the campground. 9.4 miles in 1:32:10 (9:48 min/mile pace). Finished the run with stretches and squats.

Thursday: 5 miles. Most of me didn’t want to get out of bed in the morning, but I did anyway and got a nice 5 mile run in. Despite the expectation of rain, I didn’t get rained on. 5.07 miles in 43:20 (8:33 min/mile pace). Finished the run with stretches and 4 pull ups.

Friday: Planned 13 miles. The reality of today was that I had to drive from Cincinnati to Columbus and back, and Columbus traffic in the afternoon SUCKS BALLS. There just wasn’t time (unless I wanted to make my wife very angry with me). Then on Friday night, we heard a loud SLAM from the garage. We checked the vehicles and I checked to ensure the car didn’t roll into the garage (I was above and away from the garage, but thought that it sounded like something hitting the garage). Nothing found, we went to bed and I thought ‘if I get up at like 6, I’ll go do my long run’. I got up at 8. Then when my wife tried to leave to the store, we found what made the noise: the garage door spring busted.

So that was my week. 27 miles. The lowest in a while, but since next week is entering the second marathon training round this year, it’s okay to have a little break. Cheers!