The Week of May 12-18, 2008

Synopsis of Week’s Training:
This week’s running did not turn out exactly as planned, but the deviations were probably for the better and it was a great week nonetheless. Read on for a summary of my training this week.

Monday I broke a cardinal rule the cardinal rule – Never miss a run, because you were blogging. That said, after three and a half weeks (38 days) without a day off, this wasn’t a bad thing. Had I actually wanted to run, I was home early enough that I still could have squeezed it in. One nice thing about the day off is that I could take a good reseting heart rate that night. The pleasant verdict was 42-43 beats per minute, which was lower than expected.

Tuesday, I ran to WUS and then did a moderate 8 with Keith. He showed he was ready for MMT. Met what seemed like half the MMT field for pizza and beer afterwards. Wednesday was another solid morning run with Wardian with second five miles spot on 7 minute pace. Hit the track for a couple miles of fun on Thursday night – ran 3.25 at 6:15 pace and then brought it down for the final three laps.

Friday was a wash with a morning run skipped to rest up for pacing duties and travel out to the Massanuttens in the afternoon. Sadly, my Saturday run was nixed when good friend Mike dropped from MMT. I could have paced another, but thought that my training would benefit from an off day and a full night of sleep than a slow 30 miler and a sleepless weekend. I got that full night’s sleep (almost 11 hours!!!) and went out for my favorite lop in all of Virginia’s mountains – the Jeremy’s Run Loop. Great loop with almost 5,000′ of climb (that’s a GPS figure – I think it’s a bit less) over the course of 17 miles. I took out Mike Mason’s nephew for his first mountain run and longest run ever. He had a blast, spotted a bear and a great horned owl, and saw tons of wildflowers. I took a fun header, too!

While I ended up taking three days off this week, I still ended up with four quality workouts and 47 miles. Plus with the rest days I’m counting this as an unscheduled down week. I continue to feel stronger and feel fresh. Time to rip it up in training for a another three or four weeks!

By The Numbers:
Monday – 0. Doh!
Tuesday – 11.5. Moderate night trail run.
Wednesday – 10.5. Moderate run.
Thursday – 8. 4 miles of tempo.
Friday – 0. Travel.
Saturday – 0. No pacing.
Sunday – 17. Mountain run.

Weekly Mileage: 47
Year-to-Date Mileage: 896
Three Week Moving Average: 60.0
Year-to-Date Weekly Average: 45.4

Upcoming Training Goals:
Run 6 or more days this week with at least 1 hard run and one moderate run. Make this weekend a triple solid run weekend, but remember you haven’t done many long runs and are not in peak shape. Temper the enthusiasm and run smart.

Related articles:

1. The Week of January 7-13, 2008 Synopsis of Week’s Training:After not running 12 of the final 14 days of 2007, I started running again in the new year. Heading into this week I’d run 6 straight...
2. The Week of January 28-February 3, 2008 Synopsis of Week’s Training: Now THAT’s what I’m talking about! Six days of running this week with a 10 mile weekday run, a 16+ mile run on the weekend and...
3. The Week of January 14-20, 2008 Synopsis of Week’s Training:I came into this week having run 13 straight days, including my YTD longest run of 8 mile the preceding Sunday. On Monday, my legs felt tired....

Filed under Bryon · Tagged with Training Update, Weekly Update

Bryon Powell is the Editor-in-Chief of iRunFar.com, which he founded five years ago. Also the author of Relentless Forward Progress: A Guide to Running Ultramarathons and a contributing editor at Trail Runner magazine, he's quickly approaching 10 years as an ultrarunner and 20 years as a trail runner. These days he calls Park City, Utah and its trails home.
All posts by Bryon Powell