high 5

Nice easy and I mean easy 5 mile run this morning. My work out on Thurs. left me sore. I was glad to hear I wasn't the only one. Humid as hell out this morning, I ran on the bridal path in Central Park.

I spent the afternoon getting recertified as a USAT official. I now get to wear a red polo shirt and give time penalties for drafting. I wish I could do that when I'm out riding 9W.

Down the ladder

Track workout tonight. It was a bit tougher than I thought it would be.

1600

2x800 2.5 sec. faster that 1600

4x400 2.5 sec faster than 800

Thought tougher than I thought, it went pretty well. Everything under 7:50 pace (that was my mile) and I was pretty good at the 2.5 sec. faster thing. I'd rather go down than up. Running the mile last, ugh.

I also ran 1.3 to warm up then the same to cool down, which is to and from my house.

So 2 days of running in a row and all the little things that have been nagging me physically have stayed at bay.

Now it's 9:30 and I haven't had dinner yet.

brick....HOUSE

26 miles of biking on river road followed by 3 miles of running at 8:34 pace.

Pretty damn good.

noodle

Loren and I went on a really nice and easy 30 mile recovery ride. She showed me the Harlem greenway, which will come in handy as a new place to run. We road by the Cloisters, then headed over the GWB and rode river road. There were a lot of cars out there today, I'm so use to riding it alone and with no traffic.

I took it nice and easy and it felt great.

I love days like this, nice short easy ride, come home, eat some good food and call it a day.

In't FR games

In short, the international front runner games is a gathering of folks from different Front Runner teams. My club hosted this year. I'll spare you all the drama of what that entailed. So we had 2 cross country meets in Van Cortlandt park. A 5k followed by a 5 miler. Both are pretty hilly, the 5 miler is a the 5k course with a very nasty hill thrown in towards the end. I had decided to do both races because I love to run there and I wanted to get the miles in.

This may not have been such a good idea. I got 3 hours of tattoo work on Fri. The race started at noon and by then it felt like 80. I didn't run that well. Seems to be a recent theme with me.

5k I did in 27:08, 8:47 pace. (this is a slightly different course than I ran on Thurs.)There were not a lot of women there, I took 3rd over all. Loren won in 21:39 or there abouts. I'm really happy about that. She's been working really hard coming on an injury and ran better than I thought she would. I ran the 5 miler, didn't race it. 46:29, 9:18 pace. Again 3rd, which I thought was funny. Rachel ran both as well and took 2nd in both.

I'm still having this naggin inner calf pain, I'm going to start PT soon to try and get all the kinks out before marathon training starts.

XC and a little swim

Last night kicked off VCTC's summer cross country series. 5k though the hilly trail of Van Cortlandt park in the Bronx. I really love running up there, I've been doing this series for years.

Usually the same people, I can gauge myself pretty well by who's around me. Pretty low turn out last night, I'm surprised. Women's winning time was just over 23 minutes, which is not very fast for a 5k. I feel like I ran a smart race, didn't go out to fast, let my main rival pace me into the woods. The course is funny if you go and look at it. It's about just under a mile of flat grass then goes on to a path in the woods where all the hills are. So if you're watching, you don't see the hill running. I always tell people we go into the woods to suffer. Then it spits you back out onto the flat for about the last, oh, 600 meters. I can get a good kick going there. So my VCTC rival (who I'm friendly with) paced me into the woods, then I left her. We'll go back and forth with this all summer. I finished 25:39 (8:16 pace) Not great, but not bad for a first time out this year. Took 3rd in my age group.

This morning, I got up with the sun and swam. 1700 meters. The pool I go to is 50 meters in the AM and adult lap swim only. It's so nice. the 50m makes a big difference and people up that early aren't messing around. This will be my last swim for a few days, I'm getting tattooed this afternoon and wont be able to get into the water til it's healed.

racing rain II

Another ride where the weather was iffy. I didn't get out as early as I wanted to. 4pm ride to river road, about 26 miles with some nice climbing. If you like that kinda thing. I'm not very good at it so I'm not crazy about it. I had a few raindrops and some wind but otherwise a nice ride.

Took the road bike out today, that was a nice change.

8 at 8

For runs over an hour, would would you belive this is my favorite person to run with?

Well him and or Dan Savage. While marathon training last year, I discovered I much prefer podcasts over music. I fall into a rhythm with music, I know what's coming. I can still get bored. Podcasts do a better job of taking my mind off 20 miles. So I hoard This American Life and only listen to it when I'm on long runs.

Not that 8 miles is really long. It was nice and easy today prework, which is where I should be heading now.

Long run season has started. And so has ice bath season,

Racing Raindrops

For the 2nd time this week, I headed out to Piermont. Door to door, it's about 40 miles. Today I went with Loren who was riding a test bike. It was a really really good ride. The weather was a bit cool, and on the way back, a bit rainy. Not too bad. Managed to get home before it really started.

As it gets nicer, 9w gets more crowded with cyclists, bike racks at the coffee shops in Piermont and Nyack fill up. I much prefer the place in Piermont. They make these amazing cookies.

Wed's ride out there was easy going. Today I worked a bit hard but still felt really really good. 

Now I get to lay around for the rest of the day.

Healthy Kidney 10k

Ugh. What a terrible race this morning. 10k=53:59 about 8:42 pace. This was NOT a good race for me. I was dehydrated from the start and the sun was strong so that didn't help. I thought I went out not too fast, about 8:24 pace and felt ok, nice and easy. I just never got into a good grove. The hills have been killing me. After I got sick in march, I lost all my fitness. While most of it is back, my hill running still leaves a lot to be desired. And Central Park...is hilly. No gettin around it.

I'm disappointed. On the bright side, I did score for my team for the 2nd time this year.  We've had a lot of women hurt so our best runners aren't out there which is frustrating. Really, this is a nothing race, I have bigger goals for the year, I just wanted to run well.

Coming up this week:

Van Cortlandt running!

XC 5k on Thurs and my own team is throwing an XC 5k and 5miler on Sun. 

welcome!

I've started this blog as sort of a training log. I figured I'd spare my non interested friends from my other blog all my blabbering about running.