Not pushing too hard

I haven't blogged since Monday, as if you didn't notice. :) Tuesday morning, I met some friends from work at Memorial park for 4 or 5 miles. Man, after Monday night's HARD workout, I had nothing in the tank on Tuesday. I started out feeling pretty good but about 1 mile into it, I crashed, no energy at all. I managed some walk/run through mile 2 and then mustered up enough energy to finish mile 3 running.

Wednesday night, after a brief rain, I made my way over to the park to meet up with a very decent turnout of Striders. We all ran up Crestwood to Memorial drive and were given a choice of splashy fun on the Ho Chi Minh trails or a regular old concrete road run. Well, guess which way I went. That's right. This man went t' muddin'. It was kind of funny when the group split apart. I suspected that the group would split up pretty evenly but when Steeeve said go, it was just me, MattW, and Ryan heading into the woods. And in just a few moments, it was just me. No worries though because the gazelles doubled back to get me after a hard run to the end of the trail and the 3 of us finished together. Of couse, when we got to picnic loop, Matt and Ryan went west and I headed east back to the parking lot and cool refreshments, compliments of the Striders.

The plan called for 5 miles on Friday morning but thanks to thunderstorms, I got to sleep in. So, one run missed this week. No biggie. Since my run this morning was easy peezy, I'll probably avail myself of an easy 4 miler tomorrow morning before church.

Speaking of this morning's run, I got up bright and early to meet up with June and the Striders for a long run. The plan was to get there 30 minutes early to get a head start and be back in time for the post run festivities. June wanted to get started early as well. But we forgot one thing. It's pitch black in this neck of the woods at 6 am. So, we ended up waiting on the rest of the Striders and the planned departure time of 6:30. It's a good thing we did because my old buddy George was there and that means I had someone to run with. I was going to do about 8 or 10 but when I saw June on her way back, I thought I might try to run in with her. I asked what she was running and she said about 13-something. I thought 3 miles of tempo to end the day would be great. So, I turned around to catch June. When I caught up with her, I was able to stay with her for about a mile but she wasn't doing no 13+ minute miles. It was closer to 12. So, I posted about 5 and a half 14 minute miles with a 12:15 right in the middle for a kicker.

So, things didn't turn out this week quite like I had planned. It was really supposed to be a tough training week but except for Monday, I didn't push hard at all this week. Still, with the possibility of another 3 miler tonight and possibly 4 or 5 in the morning, I still could end up with ~24 or 25 miles this week. And I'm feeling really good. I'm taking care not to run myself down too far out from the marathon.