I miss Portland weather.
I’ve got a new pair of shoes on the way. Brooks Adrenaline 16’s, of course. This time, I had to order them, since my current pair of Adrenalines are silver, and since I rotate my shoes, I needed a pair in a different color. Run For Your Life only carries them in one color for my size (10.5 wide), so they ordered me a pair that’s black with lime trim. I can’t say I like the lime trim, but I always say that I’ll run in hot pink and neon orange shoes if they’re comfortable and they keep me from getting hurt.
Weight Check: 162.5, down 3.7 pounds from last week. Uh, wow. I managed to avoid any kind of soda this week, I only had one beer, and I stayed away from junk food. I guess all that paid off. Of course, running in the heat again also helped.
Also, this puts me back in the normal weight range (For a 5′ 8″ adult like me, anything over 164 is overweight.) for the first time since February, and it’s my lowest weight since October 2015.
Of course, now that I’m no longer overweight, the local Publix has decided to start stocking Drake’s. Growing up in the New York City suburbs, we always had various Drake’s cakes, including Ring Dings, Yodels, Devil Dogs, Yankee Doodles, and Coffee Cakes. They’ve never really caught on in North Carolina, though. Every once in a while, I’ve found them, but it’s rare. As much as I wanted to buy up their entire inventory, I limited myself to one box of Yodels. We’ll see how things go.
I’ve got some post-race travel planned for next weekend. I’ll either do my weigh-in pre-race or wait until Monday morning depending on how things go. With the travel, I’ll probably break down at some point and drink some soda, but, as I’ve said before, any ill effects from one bottle of Coke pale in comparison to what could happen if I dozed off behind the wheel.
| Day | Scheduled | Total Miles |
|---|---|---|
| Tuesday | Easy 7.5 | 7.56 |
| Thursday | 3.5 mile warm up, 10 x 20 sec hill sprints with 90 sec recovery, 1.5 mile cool down | 6.61 |
| Friday | Easy 7 | 7.01 |
| Saturday | 14 Miles LSD | 14.01 |
Total: 35.19 miles
This was the first time since May 30 that I didn’t run on a Monday. Back then, I was still on doctor’s orders to only run every other day. This time, I spent the day on planes.
Tuesday was…interesting. I got chased by a dog, I saw a fellow runner in my neighborhood (which almost never happens), I had to adjust to a time change (I started at 4:10 AM Portland time) and the return of heat and humidity, and I was just generally tired from my trip to Portland. I ended up doing a lot better than I expected.
Thursday was another hill sprint workout. They still suck at any temperature, so I might as well do them when the temperature and humidity both suck. I won’t list all 10 splits. I was a little disappointed by sprint #5, with a pace of 9:28/mile, but after that, I rallied, and my last two intervals were my fastest, with paces of 7:50/mile and 7:30/mile.
Friday was just another hot and humid neighborhood run. I did OK, I guess.
Saturday was my longest run since my marathon. I had planned on getting up at 5:15 AM, but I forgot to change my alarm, and I ended up getting up at 6. I got ready in a hurry, and started running at 7. I’m fairly certain if I had gotten up at 5:15, I would not have started running at 6:15. I probably would have started between 6:30 and 6:45. Still, I wish I had been able to start before 7.
Early on, I felt pretty good. I probably should have slowed down a little bit, because I struggled on the last 4 miles. Pacing is hard. I did manage a little kick at the very end, so there’s that.
Because I had to get ready in a hurry, I forgot band-aids for my nipples, and I forgot Body Glide on my inner thighs. I lucked out, no bloody nipples, no chafing. (Maybe my recent weight loss helped with the chafing.)
Next Week:
Monday: Easy 7
Tuesday: 1.5 mile warm up, 1 mile @ Marathon Pace (11:00/mile), 1 mile @ Threshold (10:30/mile) w/3:00 recovery, 10 x 45-sec. Repeats (9:00/mile?) with 1:30 recovery, 1.5 mile cool down
Thursday: Easy 7
Friday: Easy 3
Saturday: 4 mile warm up, Yiassou Greek Festival 5K, 5 mile cool down*
Sunday: Easy 3?
Rumor has it that it’s going to cool down a little this week. I’ll believe it when I see it. Of course, the heat will return in time for my race next weekend.
I put an asterisk next to Saturday because I’m not sure exactly how things will go before the race. I plan on running a total of 9 miles outside of the race, but the split will depend on how early I get out there and how I feel. Last year, the split ended up being 2.5 before/6.5 after, but I got a late start due to some bathroom issues.
Because of my travel next weekend, I don’t know if I’ll be able to fit in Sunday’s 3 miles. I mentioned it to my co-worker who created my plan, and he said that the 3 miles was mainly to recover from the race. So I might skip it, although I’ll definitely try to go for a walk at some point on Sunday.