Training June 21 - 27

Monday - 16 (5, 11 with Jake Klim)

Tuesday - 15 (8, 7 at gym)

Wednesday - 14.5 (4, 10.5) ... Workout on CCT with GRC: We did 3 miles, 2 miles, 1 mile with about a half mile for rest. It was 100 degrees. We were thinking marathonish pace, but in conditions like this, during a big week in training, no pace is particularly easy. For the 3, I went 5:30, 5:26, ?, as I didn't see the last mark and ran by it -- stopped when I looked at my watch and saw more than 6 minutes. Turned around, jogged. The first rep was mostly downhill; for the second, we turned around and had a tough climb. Jake and I ran an even 11 minutes, with Chris Bain right behind us. Finished in 5:18, perhaps a second behind Klim. That rep was on a slight uphill grade as well.

Thursday - 14.5 (5, 9.5, gym) Let's face it: Training on Thursday never feels very good. These runs are very easy.

Friday - 12 with 5 strides on grass. Weather was cooler; that helped. Tried to save something for the 20-mile "Duel Ferries" workout tomorrow morning with GRC.

Saturday - 20 ... "Duel Ferries" is a classic GRC workout. We meet at Edward's Ferry, Lock 25 and Mile 30 along the C&O Canal Towpath.
Our loop consists of two 10.1 mile loops, and while the run has been completed at a casual pace, usually we make it into something of a workout. The collective mindset, I think, is that we might as well: For one, it takes everyone about an hour to get there. Also, it's entirely natural surface -- beginning with 4 to 5 miles of packed dirt which take us to the entrance for White's Ferry, where we sort of turn around onto a dirt-rock road which segues into the toughest portion: a .9 mile stretch (btw miles 6 and 7) with the sun beating down and endless view of fields on both sides. We call this stretch "Kansas."
We had a pack of 14, half of which were going the full 20. We kept everyone together through the first loop in 66 minutes and change; then, as was the plan, we picked it up. Karl Dusen, Joe Wiegner and I took it out a bit too hard. I think we realized that, too, after about 20 minutes, when we stopped at a water pump and regrouped with everyone else. As we approached Kansas, though, Jake Klim took charge and Wiggy followed suit. Karl and I hung back a bit. Then Karl gapped me. Then Wiggy gapped Jake. Then Chris Sloane caught me. There was a line of us, all of us Chicago bound, with 50 to 100 meters of separation ... and what a sight it was as we crossed through Kansas: "This is awesome," I thought. "This is why you join a team."
My stomach hurt a lot. My right calf and achilles was pretty tight. The last 20 minutes or so, though, I was able to catch a second wind and finish the loop in less than 60 minutes, for about a 5:50 avg. and a rough total of 2:05 low.
The "course record" was 2:07. Today, we put seven guys under that mark.
This was very good training.

Sunday - 10 After a long night of sleep, took it very easy this morning. My right calf is still a bit banged up and I appear to be losing a toenail on my left foot. My energy level, however, was actually pretty good.

Total - 102 ... Comments: None at the moment. Still ruminating.

Father's Day 8K

Our evening race on the CCT was a success. I worked at the turnaround during the race and then filed a quick report for Run Washington, which you can read here: http://www.runwashington.com/news/2722/314/Georgetown-Running-Company-Father-s-Day-8K.htm

A Down Week - June 14-20

Monday - PM 12 with Jake Klim

Tuesday - PM 9 with 8 hill reps in the neighborhood

Wednesday - PM 15, Georgetown loop, humid

Thursday - AM 10 with Dave Fontaine

Friday - AM 9, 10 strides on grass

Saturday - AM 16 in Easton, PA

Sunday - PM 9 on treadmill ... 58 minutes and jogged the first 10 minutes to warm up

Total - 80

Comments: Not much to report. It was fairly typical down week. Early in the week, I didn't really get enough sleep to executive the objective: REST. But, a relaxing weekend with Emily's family in PA helped. Throughout this cycle, my plan is to reduce my mileage as such every fourth week and during this time also stay away from hard workouts. The hill reps (not at all taxing) and the strides are thrown in to maintain some semblance of sharpness, and the medium long on Wednesday in place of a workout seems to work really well for me.

GRC's Father's Day 8K

For the first time, this annual race will support our racing team. If you have any interest in getting a race in Sunday evening, please consider signing up. Find a link at our blog: http://georgetownrunningcompany.blogspot.com. Or go to http://www.facebook.com/#!/event.php?eid=129433320404309&ref=ts

FROM GRC: The Georgetown Running Company's Joe Wiegner will attempt to defend home turf on Sunday evening in the second annual Georgetown Running Company Father's Day 8K.

The 4.96 mile out-and-back race will start and end under the Key Bridge in historic Georgetown and is held during National Men's Health Week. The event will also feature omnipresent American endurance athlete Michael Wardian and an Ethoiopian contingent that includes Dawit Assefa (2:17 marathon PB) and Berhanu Wukaw (2:20). Wiegner comes off a 31:38 10k PR last weekend and a 15:07 5k effort less than four weeks ago.

Almaz Megerssa and Keneni Orgessa are expected to lead the women's field, though rumors at time of press indicate that two former American collegians might enter the race.

BREAKING NEWS UPDATE (11:28PM EST): Haile Gelelcha (13:50) and Gurmesa Megerssa (28:45) have entered the race.

June 7 - 13

(Chicago 2006: Cold, windy, miserable and perfect. How'd I get so skinny for that race?)

Everyone is an athlete, but some of us are training, and some us are not. -- Dr. George Sheehan

Monday - PM 12 with Klim, Charlie, Klim's buddy from work. Charlie took us on an interesting city route.

Tuesday - 14 (10, 4)

Wednesday - 17 (4, 13) - 6,5,4,3,2,1 plus two times 30 seconds on, off. On grass. Rest was half the time of the interval. Pace was steady for the first half; picked it up for the last three reps.

Thursday - 15 (10 with Dave Fontaine (easy, 75 minutes; 5, gym)

Friday - 15 --- 60 minutes easy, gradually picking up the pace; 30 minutes on; 5 minutes hard; 5 minute easy. Continuous. I doubt I was really going that fast after an hour -- maybe a bit faster than 6 minute pace. I'm pretty tired right now and so particularly mindful of injury, so with workouts like these I want to make sure the progression of everything is very gradual. Generally, I don't run fast workouts alone; I run fast workouts in a group. During a big training week, I need the group, in fact, to run fast. Alone, then, I focus on effort, take no splits, put in the work and try to simply achieve the objective of this secondary workout I've been doing the past month or so (and I'll resist the desire to use a curse word): This is about getting really, really strong.

Saturday - 12 -- Early in the run, on Independence Ave., I noticed a runner ahead I'd seen a few times since moving to Capitol Hill in November. I pushed it a little bit and caught him on Maryland Ave., where I introduced myself.
This habit of mine goes back a long way: If I am running alone and see a runner who is clearly legit, I try to track them down and say "hello." Usually, it goes over well, and I've made some great friends this way.
Part of the reason I was intrigued by Dan Rose was that, at least twice, I saw him wearing a USA jersey, and usually the only runners who don such sacred singlets are the ones who have earned them (and not through their paycheck.) As it turns out, Rose, who lives a block or two away from me and works at the Library of Congress (sweet commute!) is a very good ultrarunner -- so good, in fact, that he's on the U.S. Team for the 24-hour run, having placed third last year at the national champs in Ohio, where he covered 139.28 miles. I joined him for his loop around Hains Point (I was probably heading there, anyway), an 8.5-mile run that he does during the week (and today because he was tapering for a 100-miler). He typically runs 25-ish on Saturday and 40-ish on Sunday. And ... he's a cancer survivor.
Check his story out: http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/news/story?id=3569221 ... Also, he blogs at http://run192.blogspot.com/

Sunday - 20 - I was in NJ. Ran some familiar roads, for sure. The weather was so much cooler than it is down here. I sort of groaned when, on my return, I parked outside my apartment and stepped out into an oven -- at 10:30 p.m.

Total -- 105 ... Comments: I feel good about the last three weeks of training, if for no other reason than because they were very consistent. Hard running, on grass, on Wednesday. Something gritty on Friday. Long Sunday. This is a pattern I'd like to abide by, as I think the routine really helps during weeks of high volume. Like, on Wednesdays, I think even though, overall, I was pretty tired, my body really knew -- as I drank my coffee while driving home from work -- what was coming and responded.
Six years after getting it as a gift, I'm finally reading "Running Within," which explores the mental side of the sport -- a side of it, as it happens, that I've sort of been denying a long time. Particularly after college, when I no longer had to race every weekend and could put myself through long, uninterrupted blocks of training, in my mind, performance became training + course + conditions = result. The mind had nothing to do with it. You just executed. You just stayed out of the way.
Or maybe that's just it: I need to continue to do the training and stay out of the way -- as much as possible, to run without any sense of limits and absolutely no doubt.
In the picture above, I was 25. It was my third marathon. I was more of a blank slate than I am now.
Some people were kind of surprised when I ran 2:29; I was actually hoping to run faster, and faltered a bit against the 35 MPH headwind on Michigan Avenue, the last 7K. But I was oblivious then to the many things that can go wrong (I didn't really fully understand how hard the marathon race is).
I'd never run a marathon in 100-plus temps without water for 20 miles. I'd never had someone clip my heel and cause me to lose my shoe. I'd never run through a downpour. I'd never had my legs tighten up at 11 miles, as they did in Philadelphia. So many things have to come together for a runner to run their absolute best in the marathon.
It can be tough when you have a feeling you are going to be ready to run considerably faster than you ever have, but there is no real precedent to suggest you should. You have to stay out of the way, believe, be blank, try not to let the doubt creep in. Going to back to an earlier post, Don Juan, I recall, said something to Castaneda along the lines of erase your history. You need to think like Bill Rodgers or Dick Beardsley, which I think is very similar to how the African runners of today are thinking.

May 31 - June 6

(Notepad in hand, at work on an article about "beach clubs.")

Monday - PM 12

Tuesday - AM 10 PM 5, gym

Wednesday - AM 5 PM 10 with ... 4 times 5 minutes at 5-10k effort with two minutes jogging for rest. On grass. Did this with Patrick Murphy.

Thursday - AM 10

Friday - AM 14 ... 40 minutes easy, 20 minutes on, 5, minutes off, 20 minutes on, 10 minutes off ... PM 5

Saturday - AM 12 with GRC

Sunday - PM 17

Total - 100

Comments: All in all, a good week of training. Realistically, though, I can't juggle this much training around so many things -- like working (on assignment in So. Md.) all weekend. Long runs Sunday evening, for one, are a drag. I wore new trainers for this run and this usually works out for me, but my feet were very upset for the duration and my achilles feels pretty bad right now as a result. Iced last night, took some faux Advil and slept til 8 this morning. I'll see how I feel tonight after work. My plan calls for 105 this week, then a down week.