Week Ending 5/20

My review of Scott Jurek's new book, Eat & Run, due out on June 5, has gotten tremendous interest. If you haven't yet read my review, it's here.

***

My energy wasn't good a the week wore on. I'm not sure what the issue was, but I was cranky (just ask my wife), a bit mentally down and just flat-out tired. The fact that I had 7:30 a.m. meetings on Thursday and Friday, which caused me to get up at 4:15 for my runs, obviously didn't help. Sometimes I'm my own worst enemy. Anyway, I still managed decent volume (72.5 miles) and decent quality with my intervals and tempo run.
 
Here's how the week went:

Monday: super-easy
AM: 4 miles in 32 minutes on my treadmill. Felt good for a Monday.

Tuesday: intervals
AM: 9.05 miles in 1:08--about half at the track and half on the trail loop behind Legend High School. Was a bit late getting out the door because I couldn't find one of my arm sleeves.... After a 1-mile warm-up run to the track from my doorstep, I did 3x100M striders to wake up the legs and then went right into my workout: 1x800 at 2:43 (400M recovery), 2x1200M at 4:13 and 4:15 (400M recoveries) and 2x400M at 1:24 and 1:22 (200M recoverie)s. I continue to see improvement in my times. Felt better than last week--lungs good, leg turnover good. Feet hit the track gently. Nice to have some good company with Scott also there working away.

Wednesday: easy
AM: 9.7 miles in 1:13 on the trails around my neighborhood. Lower back a little achy, probably from tight hamstrings.

Thursday: tempo
AM: Unfortunately, I had limited time due to my early meeting, so I did what I could. 7.4 miles in 51 minutes on Parker streets and the Sulphur Gulch "Trail" (paved). This was a decent, albeit short, tempo run. Splits were: 1) 8:40 (warm-up), 2) 6:23, 3) 5:50, 4) 6:03, 5) 6:11, 6) 7:30 (begin cooldown), 7) 7:34, 7.4) 3:08.

Friday: easy
AM: Once again very limited time because of an early meeting. 7.2 miles in 54 minutes on the trail loop behind Legend High School. (Would have liked an afternoon session but I spent the entire day in meetings.)

Saturday: long/road
AM: 17.2 miles in 2:14. From my doorstep, I basically took East Parker Road all the way to its end, and then turned around and came back, hitting the Legend High School trail loop for a few miles. This is a fairly hilly course. My original plan was a 20-miler but the weather absolutely sucked for running--cold, rainy and windy. My legs got numb and week toward the end because of the cold, wet conditions. My Garmin says the run involved 987 feet of climbing but there's no way that's true. I'd estimate closer to 1,500 feet. I no longer trust my Garmin on climbing--I've seen too many inconsistencies and crazy findings, such as climbing while I'm running intervals around a pancake flat track (WTF?).
 
PM: 4 miles in 33 minutes on the treadmill. Legs a little wobbly from getting frozen earlier in the morning.
 
Total miles for day: 21.2 miles

Sunday: long/trail
AM: 14.05 miles in 2:12 at Mount Falcon. Intended to go for at least 3 hours but my legs were trashed--not sure why. Made it to Walker's Dream in 34:55--a nearly 2,000-foot, 3.5-mile climb up rocky trail. After that, I felt an unusual amount of fatigue on the climbs up to the summit of Falcon. GPS reports 2,700 feet of climbing. That's actually fairly accurate, though I would have guessed closer to 3,000 feet.
 
Weekly totals:

• 72.5 miles run
• ~7,000 feet of climbing (estimated)
• Total training: 9:39
• 8 total runs
• Averaged 8:00/mile
• Less core work than usual because of mild lower back issues

Year to date mileage:

• 1,320 miles run
• 118 miles biked
• 6.55 miles walked

So, overall, not the greatest week ever because of: a) limited time during the week due to meetings, b) general fatigue and c) crappy weather on Saturday that, for some reason, sapped my legs.

***

I think it's getting time to stretch out my tempo runs a bit. I've been keeping my actual tempo mileage (not including warm-up and cooldown miles) to about 6 each session. I want to start ratcheting that up with a goal of eventually getting in a tempo run of 10-12 miles by the time Leadville comes along. I'm fairly happy with my track workouts because, for the most part, I'm seeing improvement. I miss mile repeats, like what I used to do back East, but at 6,200 feet I'm finding that 400s, 800s and 1200s provide a nice workout.

My goal for the coming week is about 80 miles, including some quality trail work. On Memorial Day a few of us are planning to run Mt. Bierstadt, a 14,100-foot mountain that's pretty tame and runner-friendly. To the summit and back is about a 7-mile roundtrip, all between about 10,000-14,000 feet. In addition to a time trial on the Hope Pass double-crossing (would like to do Twin Lakes to Winfield and back to Twin Lakes in 5:30 or faster, which is what I need to break 20 hours at Leadville) and some more work on the Incline, this summer I also really want to run the Bross/Cameron/Democrat/Lincoln loop, which is about 7.25 miles and hits four 14,000-foot mountains. Can't beat that!