Training Summary: March 23 - 29

I need to preface this entry with a short note on me and days off. I usually plan days off, although sometimes life gets in the way or I have an injury. When I finally get in a rhythm with training I try and take very few days off, likely one every 3 -4 weeks, just to stay healthy. The absurd thing is that about 50% of the time I take these days off, the next day I get a nagging pain or injury. Never anything serious, but at times it can be annoying and interfere with training for a while. This week I had planned one day off as I had 2 weeks straight of solid running and wanted to take a day of rest. Low and behold the next day I had to miss my run because of an odd pain in my foot that was bad enough that I couldn't run. I guess there is a possibility that after long periods of activity, the one thing that may throw you off is actually taking some time of inactivity. I need to do some research on this but I just want to say it is annoying, and I don't like it. Sometimes I wonder if I should just never take another day off...

Mon 3/23 - off, planned off day.

Tue 3/24 - off, foot hurt, see comment above...

Wed 3/25 - 9mi, no watch, first 3 solo then 6 with Movin Shoes Wed Night crew, super easy run.

Thu 3/26 - ~14mi, WORKOUT, 5mi in 30:08 directly in to 3 miles of 5:14, 5:09, 5:08. 25min warmup and cooldown. Went out to Mirmar Lake to tag along with George and JLew through a workout. George planned on ~6min pace for 8mi so I decided to cruise for the first 5mi with them and then try to run the last 3mi progressively faster. I had no idea I would be able to pull of a progressive ~15:30 3miler, and it gave me lots of confidence for the Carlsbad 5000 next week.

Fri 3/27 - 10mi, 74:30, easy with George and Di on the bay.

Sat 3/28 - 10mi, 67:45, easy solo on the bay.

Sun 3/29 - 16.06mi, 1:54:03, at San Pasqual with Di, JLew and Darius for the first 12 then 4 solo. Really slow at the start but ended with a really easy feeling effort of 6:10ish pace for my solo 4mi.

Summary: 59mi, 5 days. Considering everything it was actually a decent week, sans the days off. Extremely happy with the workout on Wed and 16mi long runs are a cake walk now. This would have been close to 80mi if I had a full week and I should hit around 80 going from Thu to this coming Thu. The plan is to keep up the volume through Fri and then take a one day taper to hopefully feel fresh for Calrsbad 5000 on Sunday. Anything under 15:30 would make me happy, although I think there's a chance I may surprise myself. No matter what happens I just want to make it a solid effort and race it hard.