Old brick road reclaimed by the woods near Peninsula, Ohio.This is the best time of year for runners, or at least for this runner. Our northeast Ohio weather has completed the transformation from cold and gray, to warm and sunny. The spring mornings are often foggy, dewy, with a slight chill...invigorating. On early morning runs through the woods, you are enveloped in misty shades of green, like the image above. As the sun moves higher in the sky, it burns the fog away, and as the air becomes clear. These are the days when, if you are a trail runner, you cannot wait to lace'em up and hit the dirt.
This was the first training week since several weeks before Boston, in which I hit 80 miles, 39 of those on Saturday and Sunday, and ran real tempo and speed work. I made it to the track on Tuesday and resumes speed work in earnest. Instead of 3 x 1 mile repeats, I did 1 mile at 5:49, then 4 x 400 at 1: 26, 1:25, 1:23, 1:20, then my last mile at 5:47. Not my fastest but starting to get my wheels back. On Friday, I did a short (7 mile) tempo run, but really pushed through the hills in and out of Glenwillow. I kept the pace in the 6:50 area, not where it should be but getting back into the range.
Saturday, I met up with a few runners to start an hour earlier, then continued our trail running with the 8:00 AM group, for a total of 15.7 miles. It was a nearly weather for running in the woods, yet my legs were feeling tired and sluggish. On Sunday, I ran 15.15 with the SERC group, mostly with E-speed and Kurt M. I had planned to do 20, but again my legs were heavy and I felt like I was working too hard for the pace we were keeping. E-speed convinced me to break it off and just go 15 miles. Later, around 3:00 in the afternoon, it was such a gorgeous, sunny day, I decided to tack on another 7+ miles. I was still not feeling bouncy, but not not hurting.
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I saw the following video on boingboing. I don't know what to say about this, only that Damien Walters is amazing and if you start to watch this, you will not be able to stop.
4 comments:
Frank: With the heavy legs I am concerned about what a big effort at Seattle might do as you prepare for the Burning River 100. I've gone through bouts of heavy legs "sydrome" (aka trashed legs) too and I think the best approach is a day off. Good luck!
I keep hearing that. Maybe I need to give it a try.
Spring has the same effect on me! Great description of the morning atmosphere. And this season's got me itching to run trails... which I have not been doing. Got a few friends who are going to show me the ropes and am looking forward to it. Regarding the video - have you started working backflips into your tempo runs yet? ;>
frank, you looked great last Thursday. Hope to see you this Thursday at the Boston Store at 6:30. I plan on getting some easy early miles in as well, so let me know if you are coming.
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