Weekly Wrap-Up: December 17-23

Everything pretty much worked out this week, and it went pretty well. Except for the part where I wanted to make some progress on my New York City Marathon race recap. But hey, I found some time to get this wrap-up out on time, so there’s that.

Weight Check: 167.5 pounds, down 0.3 from last week. I did my weigh-in before my short Saturday run, but still, considering everything, I’ll take it.

This Week’s Runs
Day Scheduled Total Miles
Monday 4 miles easy 4.01
Tuesday 15 minutes easy, 2 x 10 minutes comfortably hard with 2 minutes easy in between, 15 minutes easy 4.86
Wednesday 4 miles easy 4.01
Friday 11 miles easy 11.01
Saturday 3 miles easy 3.11

Total: 27.0 miles

Wow, 27 miles even, I did not plan that.

Monday was cold, 34 degrees, but not too bad. My legs were a little tired. The first 3 miles were consistent, but slower than I’d like. I did manage to get a bit faster on the last mile, so I’ll take the strong finish.

On Tuesday, I did my workout. The weather was similar to Monday, cold but not terrible. My legs felt OK at first, then started to get a little tired, especially during the second interval, and were pretty fatigued during the cool down, but it was understandable. I was able to run faster in the 2nd interval, and I even had enough for a little push at the end of the cool down. Also, I managed to avoid walking during the 2 minutes between intervals and at the beginning of the cool down (although it was definitely a very slow jog). Overall, it was a pretty solid workout.

Wednesday was a treadmill run. My legs felt good, but as usual, my mind hated it. My paces for each mile were 11:32, 11:19, 11:07, 10:55. So I guess it was a good treadmill run.

So, Friday I had the day off work. I had been hoping to do my long run that day so I’d only have to run 3(.1) miles on Saturday before leaving town. However, the forecast was giving me flashbacks to last Saturday. Still, when I got up that morning and saw a break in the rain, I decided to go for it.

It was damp, a little windy, and it rained a little bit during the run, mainly in the last half. But it didn’t rain as much Thursday, so there weren’t as many puddles as last week. Also, it was more than 10 degrees warmer, and that made a huge difference. There was still some flooding keeping me from part of the greenway, but I was able to put together 11 miles without too much repetition.

I can definitely see an increase in pace on the second half, which is good. My legs felt pretty good for the most part. I think they started to feel a little tired on mile 9, my slowest mile during that stretch, but I recovered and pushed it near the end, maybe not quite as much as my long runs before last week, but the last mile was still my fastest. And after last week, I was relieved to make it through all 11 miles.

Saturday was much cooler, but not too terrible (and more importantly, it was dry). My legs definitely weren’t 100% the day after an 11 miler, but I thought they held up pretty well all things considered. I managed to gradually speed up over the course of the run without pushing too much until the very end. It was a good, solid run.

Next week, well, there’s a little holiday coming up, and some travel. I have a schedule. Whether I can stick to it is another story.