Mileage Reporting 26th Week of 2013

I really should get back into swimming. Regular swimming really seems to help soothe my ankles and upper legs after the ravishes of running. Brick (bike then run) after the swim. I'm impressed. I find that running after biking is one of the hardest things to master.
I was trying to emphasize that it was a very short lesson. No effort involved to speak of, but I will take credit for the run being hard after the bike! Got to do it to prepare for the triathlon, though. :)
 
I have a few standard replies to various questions/comments.

Where are you shoes?
"Still at the store.... I'm indecisive and cheap"

You're going to step on something!
"No, I'm going to step on everything!"

Doesn't that hurt?
Oh yeah, I'm into pain.

Love the last 3, left the last one alone and added my own to the two above the last.
 
friday: hour plus maybe ten minutes swim. legs feel nicely loose for a run tonight, but I might save it for tomorrow and bike (or, say, cook a dinner) instead


yeah, I went to bed at 8pm. No run, no bike. no dinner. Too many nights in a row on way too little sleep.
Can't even confess what I fed the kids before I passed out. It was pure junk. Felt great by 6:30 am Saturday though!
 
Registered for the Groovefest Quarter Marathon with my son. I will just refer to it as a long 10K, I can deal with the term Half Marathon, but not Quarter. What's next, naming 5K's eighth Marathon's? Anyway, this being my first run on pavement in months and my first race in even longer, the plan was to just take it easy. Nope, I just can't control myself during races. The race started at 8:30 pm, a little odd, but they wanted to make it part of the music festival that was going on. I wanted to dress groovy, but the heat ruled out any costume wearing. My bare feet would give me plenty of attention anyway. About 40-50 people ran, with an additional 20 or so in relay teams. My son found a cute friend to run with before the race and I felt like the third wheel so I did my own thing. All of the usual pre-race comments that I have missed lately, but some extra concern because 1/2 mile of the race was through an underground drainage tunnel that was muddy, dark, and had some glass. I received some extra caution from the race director, but he had heard of my barefoot adventures and had no problems. I joked as long as there were no needles or other used items, I could handle a little glass. It turned out that stretch was ok, I just took it slow, the biggest concern was the uneven concrete joints and then a few hundred yards of a low ceiling. Bad for the form, I tell you, to run hunched over. After the tunnel, I kept a pretty good pace, even in the heat, and then last 2 miles the temperature started cooling a little with darkness and I finished strong. Ended up at approx. 52:45 for approx. 6.5 miles. Good enough for 2nd place Male Masters (ouch).

Total miles for the week - 45 in three runs. 11 of those barefoot miles, yes!
 
Ran 7 miles at 5:00am, 79 deg., 60% rh.. Just after mile 1 I turned a corner and out of the corner of my eye ahead I saw something starting out across an intersection. My first thought was Fox (then I blinked quick and thought large cat) the street lights were bright in this area an my first thought was correct a rather large Fox. I saw a few rabbits and heard the rooster crow.
Thursday ran 7 miles but did not log in this forum I took off on a mountain biking trip for a few days to southern Oklahoma. great trip. a little cross training. Great wildlife! I saw deer, turtles, tortoises, beaver, quail, rabbits, turkey, many different bird species.
This is the end of week 10 of training total 19 miles (only 3 days running this week) (I did taper for 1/2 coming up 7-6-13).
Feet good. Legs good.
 
Ran 6 miles this morning after waking at 5:00am. Temp was a cool 61F and the winds calm. Nice! Drove to the trail and ran my usual slow pace. Ran past a small farm and heard the roosters crowing bringing back memories of my grandparents farm in North Dakota. Saw two deer startled by my presence. They continued to run ahead of me then stop and check my location for about .25 mi before running in an open field away from the trail. Calf muscles were slightly sore but ok. At my last mile and a half of my run I saw a person about a half mile ahead of me on the trail wearing a bright orange shirt. For an added challenge I decided to see if I could catch up to the bright orange shirt. I picked up my pace slightly and ran about .25 miles before picking up the pace a fair amount more. The new pace felt great! I was running smooth and the calves felt better now then at the slower pace. Once again I believe picking up my pace during my runs would greatly help out my calf muscle tightness. Anyway after about a half mile I could see I was gaining on the person in the orange shirt. After holding this pace I caught up with this person and it was a younger girl wearing blue shorts with the orange shirt. Quite the color coordination!:) I stayed behind her for the last .2 miles and then reached my car where I then stretched and walked around some before heading home. Had a great barefoot run this morning. Decided to run at a quicker pace on my early morning runs which these will probably only continue to be on the weekends as work starts too early during week days.
 
Successfully bumped up my mileage this morning. I've been running 6 miles, 3 times a week for a while. This morning I ran just a little over 7.5 miles in just under an hour. This puts me in pretty good position to do a 1/2 marathon in early August and have a decent chance at beating my previous record of 1:43. The weather has been a little on the warm and humid side (for Minnesota), so I've been getting used to that. Warmer weather really zaps my energy more than anything else. So, maybe it will be later in the year (the Monster Dash in late October) when I have a better chance at that record.

Looking back to the first days this year when I was able to run outdoors without shoes, it has been a solid 3 months with absolutely nothing on my feet. Woot!
 
6mi trail on Sat. Was pretty hot and humid even in the morning. I'll need to go right at dawn next time. Saw a shirtless shoddie as I was finishing up.

Swim lesson today. Apparently, my freestyle, backstroke, and breaststroke are coming along. Did some shopping at the warehouse store, and clobbered myself while pulling the cart behind me. Peeled off a good quarter-inch by inch strip of skin along my achilles. Good thing that I keep bandaids and ointment in the car. Though, I had to stop by another store to get some bigger bandaids. Hour long massage on the back and traps. MT said I was really tight. I ordered a Body Back Buddy to see if I can get at those spots myself, since massages can get expensive over time.

Probably do some more weights tomorrow, in order to give my skin some time to heal.
 
at 36 miles for the week it's my second highest mileage week yet. i ran 6 days with saturday off. i even went for a bike ride and may do one later today also.

i did run one day in shoes. i beg forgiveness and kindness here. please don't put me on probation or anything worse. i believe i had a decent excuse. the day i did intervals i stepped on a big piece of glass that left something nearly a 1/4 in my foot. i got it out after the run because it was bothering me when i walked.

i've been running in the midday to help improve stamina. this new plan is kicking my butt as it focuses on strength and speed then stamina. did a short one today and was surprised with the pace i kept. i did 6x10sec sprints and my HR didn't go higher than 164.

we got together as a group. jen posted pics of us. i went for a long run after. 8 miles in 2 hours. stopped a few times to deal with my constant trigger points where i had an encounter that must go in the other thread "things people say" or whatever. ya, bait and switch. suck it up buttercup.
 
1.25 hours. Gym. Started doing assisted dips today which I desperately need to do. I totally forgot all about them -a must for obstacle courses. I make up exercises -today I used a Bosu ball in a discus-like manner. I need to videotape them some day. I did 20 minutes on the climbing machine, but in 5 minute increments. I tried to run this morning but my body almost immediately went into some serious shock. I guess, from the heat. So I gave that up.
 
Skipped my run last friday due to being too sore from working on my truck the day before so made up for that somewhat today with my longest run of the year. Ran at Stone Mountain park...speed walked up the mountain then ran down then 3 laps around the mountain 8.5 miles trail plus about 8 miles pavement...finished with .5 mile walking in the wet grass. 16.5 miles running 1.5 miles walking total...ave pace for all the running 10:25 m/m. Feets held pretty well except the last 1.5 miles they were getter a bit extra sensitive on the trail. Actually saw 2 other barefooters running down the mountain...haven't seen a barefoot runner in the wild for several years that wasn't someone I know already.
 
Friday afternoon 6/28/2013
Was warming up on the bench press, got up to 175, which is my base, but then felt my left shoulder strain a bit. I guess it was still a bit sore from the tunneling on Monday. So I decided it would be best to give it a few more days' rest before resuming weight lifting. Which meant I had time to make French fries to go along with our T-bone dinner.

Saturday morning 6/29/2013
Once again I succeeded in getting in an early morning run before a family outing. I ran almost six miles first thing in the morning. My legs felt pretty stiff though, probably from missing Thursday's run, my upper right glute was kinda knotty, and my left MCL just a tinsy bit sore, so I quickly abandoned the idea of getting in a 12-mile-plus long run. Still, it’s nice to know I can now knock out an hour’s run even when I’m not really up for it, and I love the peace and quiet of the early morning hours.

Had my first protein drink afterwards. Mixed the powder in with some Almond milk. Tasted pretty good.

Sunday morning 6/30/2013
At Nick’s suggestion, I tried my first micro run since last February, just around the block, one-third mile. I was intrigued by Nick’s report that his pace has been falling rapidly due to his running more days per week. I also get the sense once in a while that I should be running pretty much every day. I just need to find the right mix. Maybe I can try running a mile first thing in the morning for a week and then begin lengthening the runs every other day on the non-ST days. We'll see . . .

I was also going to try to do a make-up st session after missing all of them last week, but I ended up setting up a new pool for the kids in the morning instead.
 
Registered for the Groovefest Quarter Marathon with my son. I will just refer to it as a long 10K, I can deal with the term Half Marathon, but not Quarter. What's next, naming 5K's eighth Marathon's?

this is tempting me to start reporting everything in terms of complex fractions of a marathon, as in "today's run was 2/7ths of a marathon. legs were good with some mild tightness after I was at the 3/14ths mark..."