Week in Review – w/c 9/10/12

Monday:
Planned – AM: 35 min @ 143, PM: 60 min @ 153
Actual – 5.5 miles at 6:25/mile pace to start the new week. Not bad for an easy run! The afternoon run was a lot tougher – 60 minutes of running in the steady zone. The effort was consistent, so it was good to see pretty solid mile splits when I uploaded the info to Garmin Connect. The heart rate graph shows a pretty flat line which is reassuring too. Ended up running just over 9.5 miles in the hour @ an average 6:13/mile pace.

Tuesday
Planned – AM: 35 min @ 143, PM: 12 min WU, w/ 3 x 15 min @ 160 (2 min recovery)
Actual – another cool morning for the easy run – a little bit quicker than Monday at the same effort. Again, the afternoon workout was a lot tougher than the morning session. Plan was for a 12 minute warm up, followed by 3 x 15 minute efforts @ 160bpm with a [insert sarcasm] massive 2 minute recovery between each. The warm up was a breeze, but each of the 15 minute efforts were a real challenge. This may sound odd, but despite a huge effort, I couldn’t get the legs to move fast enough to get the heart rate up to where it needed to be. Still, a very satisfying workout in which I was able to run 10 miles in just over an hour – for me, no mean feat in a solo training run.

Wednesday
Planned – 90 min hills
Actual – the 90 minute hill workout turned into a 60 minute effort, cut short by a niggly right glute. Not exactly sure what happened, but just a couple of miles into the workout I seemed to land awkwardly on a downhill which caused a tightness of the glute/hip flexor area. I hobbled on for a while, but decided [probably a little late] to cut things short to avoid doing further damage. The lap of the lake to make up the hour was probably a mistake, but I was keen to see if a mile of running on the flat would unlock the glute. Unfortunately, it didn’t.

Thursday
Planned – AM: 35 min @ 153, PM: 60 min @ 143
Actual – I knew as soon as I woke up that despite some aggressive Wednesday night foam rolling and icing, there would be no chance of a run today. Instead, I made an appointment with my excellent Chiropractor in the hope that he could perform some minor miracle and unlock the troublesome hip area.

Friday
Planned – rest day
Actual – no signs of improvement so made the most of the planned rest day.

Saturday
Planned – 10 miles easy, with 5 x 50 yard pickups in each even mile (2, 4, 6, 8, 10)
Actual – still no improvement, so another day of no running. I did manage to log an easy 60 minute spin, but it was more a case of needing to do something than to improve my fitness.

Sunday
Planned – 4 loop long run – 23 miles. Loop 1 & 3 @ 143. Loop 2 & 4 @ 153.
Actual – I really didn’t want to miss this long run, but there was no way I’d be able to run even one loop of the planned 23 miles. Again, I settled for an hour outside on the bike and an easy 45 minutes in the pool. Not exactly my favorite thing to do, but it did help take my mind off the pain for a while.

Sunday evening I was lucky enough to have a sports massage by Denise Roberts of The Dai Roberts Group. Denise worked methodically through some troublesome areas, and I left feeling a hundred times better than I’d arrived just an hour or so before. Despite the pain feeling like it was localized deep in the piriformis muscle, Denise worked in and around the psoas major muscle which really seemed to free things up. I’ll know a little more on Monday when some of the initial “pain” from the massage itself goes away, but to say I’m hopeful I can shake this annoying “injury” is a huge understatement. Thanks, Denise!

Summary
After a really strong start to the week, with some hugely confidence-boosting afternoon workouts, I was instantly brought down to earth by possibly just a single foot strike. The last three of fours days have been tough, but I haven’t given up completely on being able to tow the starting line at Saturday’s 12-HR ATR race.

I’ve been looking forward to the event for months, and despite this not being a total “A” goal race, training has gone well and I’m excited to see how I could perform. No doubt this coming week there’ll be tests, and I’m hoping I can come through them with enough confidence to allow me to at least start the race on Saturday. Time to cross the fingers, and see what happens. Happy miles!

Note to self: 39 miles for the week, in 3 days of running @ 6:33/mile average.