Feeling surprisingly good after yesterday’s marathon, and after being stuck indoors all day it was great to get outside in the sunshine and stretch my legs for a few miles.
Nothing spectacular to report – it was just nice to run and not think about anything. My plan is to take an easy two or three weeks to recover fully from Frederick, then play with some speed work for a while to see how fast I can get over the shorter distances this summer. I hope to run the Richmond Marathon again in November, so will attempt to keep the weekend long runs going over the warmer months too.
Today’s run: 5 miles in 37:05 = 7:25 pace
Have a good week…
I did an easy (less than) 2 mile walk this evening with my wife. I did a lot of walking around at work today too. I don’t see myself running much this week at all; probably Thursday night with the coaching group is it. Next week I’ll reverse taper it (a week delayed) until I’m at “normal” mileage again near June, and then do another month to 6 weeks of base building before starting to do the speed work to get ready for the late August and September 5k races. Sub-16 is the next goal!
Good luck with the recovery. Don’t rush things too fast.
Oh, I won’t rush, don’t worry.
Sub-16? Tremendous! My 5k PR is 17:23 – from a couple of years ago. Would love to break 17:00, but not sure that’s ever going to happen.
Good luck with your recovery too…and thanks by the way for the numerous blog comments you’ve recently left.
I’ve come very close to breaking it when I was in college, and come moderately close since then. There’s no reason that I shouldn’t have broken it yet; I think it’s mostly a psychological barrier. I ran mid-16s last year just a few weeks after a 50k, so it’s the focus this year even if that means not running a marathon. (You’ll note that I already got my 2 states for the year out of the way…)
The first part, though, is to not try to ride my current wave of fitness to far in to shore though. Much better to do some recovery and cross training and give myself a chance to heal and base build before starting to do the speed work again. It’s hard to be at a high state for longer than 6 to 10 weeks at a time (if that) and I don’t really want to peak in June or July.
Huh… running already. I’m impressed. I’m doing my first bout of track work tomorrow. Wish me luck. Nothing crazy (5 x 400). But, I’m curious how it’s gonna treat me.
Good luck Eric and enjoy the Garmin!! 5 x 400 eh? What sort of recovery time/distance to you get with those?
400 light jog between. I’m hoping I can keep up. 5 x 400 sounds like a mountain right now. Hopefully that doesn’t last long.
Just mentally break up each 400 into 100s –
first 100: roll into it, don’t start too fast
second 100: concentrate on your form, turn the pace up a notch
third 100: ride the bend, try to relax and
fourth 100: accelerate off the bend and look like a pro to the finish line!
if it’s a warm day have a water bottle somewhere on the top bend which you can pick up, take a quick sip and dump on the ground for the next recovery. concentrate on getting your breathing back to normal and shake out any tension in your neck, shoulders, arms. a couple of “butt kicks” before the next 400 usually helps me too (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UfCH8LMmLH8&feature=related)
Hope that makes sense and doesn’t ruin your workout!
–Steve
Definitely helps, thanks.