Recovery Week

The past week was one of the easier weeks I’ve had in quite some time from a workout perspective. Two off days (yes, I cheated and swam on one of them – trying to work on form and relaxation) plus a number of shorter distance runs (except for the 9 miles last Tuesday, which included runs up a “short hill”). Note to Coach Andrew – if a workout takes place in whole, or in part, on a “hill” and I am running 100-200 meter sprints up this “hill”, the “hill” cannot be called a “short hill”!

If you’ve ever been to Alexandria, VA and know where the George Washington Masonic Temple is located (near King Street Metro) – you have an idea of where this so-called “short hill” can be found (on King Street going away from Old Town). Note also there is no mention of “steepness”. Note to self – next time find a short, less steep hill to run on. If you’ve been there you know what I mean. At any rate – since the “hill work” phase of my marathon training is now done it seemed like a good time to complain.

Next up is the “speed work” and that continues on Tuesday’s through the end of September. I’ll try to keep comments to myself on that until it’s done. Second note to self – visualize that this part of your training is taking place in Jimmy Smith Park – you will feel like you are running much faster (a 3 rock 3 bench run) than you actually are, and you’ll be laughing. Note to teammates - iD leadership (JM) can explain and maybe he’ll even show us “the movie” at camp in November.

The “distance work” will continue to lengthen over the next few weeks as well. I’ve got a nice route from Alexandria to Arlington (which goes right by where I used to live and overlooks the Pentagon) with a couple hills incorporated (I will not be sprinting during that portion of the workout and the word “short” is not associated with the word “hill” in this case). This will help me remember and prepare for the fact that although Chicago is flat, St. George is definitely not…like I need a visual on that one…I’m not laughing either. Since some readers may not have been to St. George the chart below shows the "hills" on the marathon portion of the IMSG. Note that the bike portion is pretty much the same.



This morning’s 14-miler was not easy – I experienced some cramping in the calves (probably dehydrated given the amount of water I’ve put into my body today) and found out that I have a bruise on the bottom of my right foot (no clue how that got there), so the last 3 miles were exceptionally slow (not that I typically qualify my running as fast either).

This weekend is my second Olympic distance tri – this one taking place at one of Georgia’s State Parks. It has a two lap swim (with a run on the beach in the middle I think), a shorter bike ride than Chattanooga, and a two lap run (part on trails). As a result I’m hoping the time is a little faster and the fan club will get to see me a couple times. I’m also looking forward to getting the new Triabetes Tri Kit (my uniform) for this race as well. Rumor has it that the artwork is great! After that I have one 5k (and maybe one 10k due to the need for that distance and a race pace on one of the upcoming workouts) and 3 more weekend tri races that will take me through the middle of September. From there I’ll have a week to get a 20 mile run completed and then taper (looking forward to that part) before the Chicago race.

To sum it up, I have a several busy weeks between now and Chicago 10/10/10 – but the workout program seems to be working well based on my 5k time from a couple weeks ago and the progress I’m seeing in the tri events (which are still not where I’d like them to be). Tune in next week to see how things go this weekend.