DW - I'd be incredibly upset with those volunteers, it's a shame that happened, but you seem to have a good attitude about it. I know some people that don't take such things well. I'm curious are you choosing to swim/water run less to avoid people? I've been assuming the chlorine makes pools relatively safe as long as you're not sitting at the end of the lane chatting it up with people. I have been avoiding showering at the gym as well as using any of the normal gym equipment.

Marco - have you seen a doctor? Those do sound like long term Covid symptoms and you wouldn't be the only one with them, but it certainly sucks. Best of luck. Every time I hear about stuff like that I get scared into wearing my mask a little bit more religiously when indoors even though I know it doesn't really help me personally.

James - I'm with you on the weight. I'm up 7 pounds and can feel it in the running. ugg. Good job shedding so much pre-race. That's a solid time regardless of age IMO but you must have been speedy when you were younger. That's kind of crazy that you didn't pass anyone in the second half of the race, I love starting conservatively and passing people and usually someone obliges.

Piwi - 3x2k @ 10k sounds rough but you're crushing everything these days!

Mark has yet another really good week! I hope you get to race with that fitness.

Watson why did you choose to go watchless?

Steve  - 5 hour drives are rough.

You Kiwis start your races crazy late. Most of our start at 6 AM because they want the roads unblocked ASAP, it doesn't matter if it's dark or not. I always appreciate ones that start latter.

1% slopes at the end of a HM are just brutal. I died at mile 12 of my HM PR because of a tiny incline.

Piwi - are you part Irish? They only drink on days of the week that end with a "Y".

I personally have been having too much beer which is aiding my weight gain. It also impacts my RHR/AVGsleepingHR and I don't feel quite as good as when I don't have them. I'm not ready to give them up but I'm trying to cut back to 1 a night and only if someone is having one with me.

I had a solid, if shortish week. I wanted to re-establish routine and I did that.

M - 5.5 mi w/ 7x10sec hill sprints which really destroyed my quads and were way harder than they should be

T - 8.1 w/ a terrible 800m progression. Started at 3:31 pace and only made it 5 reps. The legs were super beat up and wouldn't turn over.

W - 6 easy

Th - 7.8 w 11min tempo, min rest, 9 min tempo. Very dissapointed with my 7:15 pace during the tempo effort but it is what it is.

F - Rest

Sat - 90 minutes on a super hilly course (1350 feet of elevation gain/ 9 miles).

Sun - Easy 8. Started out just jogging for awhile and very slowly sped up to easy pace.

Sun eve - 7 mile bike + 1 mile run "brick" with my son who is doing a triathlon in a few weeks. He trained really well for the race .. in April. with the postponement due to Covid he kept it up into June but really dropped the ball and I'm worried this is going to go beyond "learning experience" to "I hate running" experience level very quickly. I actually advised that he Gallowalk it but we'll see, 13 year old boys don't usually take that kind of advice well.

44 miles.

Oh yeah those limitations make things difficult. You end up planning around the gym instead of planning gym time around the more important stuff.

My son's (and mine) tri is just a sprint so 500m swim, 20km bike, 5km run. Two months ago he was jogging 2.2miles with our dog twice a week no problem (it's a neighborhood loop I used to run often) but yesterday after a  7 mile bike ride we ran a mile at 9 min/mile   and he said his legs were killing him just a quarter of a mile in. I guess it's good it's not the lungs but eek the bike ride was really slow (13mph on a road bike). I'm sure he will finish but it would have been more enjoyable when he was swimming 5 days per week, cycling 3 times and running twice. He legitimately likes swimming and misses his team so I expect him to do well on that leg. It's out of my hands at this point, I did give him weekly reminders so he knew it was coming but as a parent I don't want him to have a totally negative experience. A painful one is good, but there's a fine distinction there. Oh well.

DWave - It sucks about the volunteers not directing you properly. In that situation I would have stayed on the road just as you did.

James - Great job snagging that sub-20. I don't doubt that you'll be able to go sub-90.

Mark - Awesome weeks lately. And 12 hours of video calls? Wow, that sounds like exactly zero fun. Bourbon fan? You might see if you can find a movie/documentary on Netflix titled "Neat" that's quite interesting.
Any chance you'd want to run a flat out-and-back marathon in rural Arkansas in late November? 

Flavio - Nice week, and I agree with DWave that the ladder is interesting.

Steve - Good week as well.

Imperceptible climbs - The OKC marathon has one of those. In all the times I've run this (racing or training) there has only been one time when it wasn't against the wind, as well. Lots of people really wished they would have removed this part during one of the several course modifications in recent years.

Not a fan of my last couple days of running. GI issues halfway through my intended LR. Would have been physically fine to complete the second half, but wasn't there mentally as well. Then holding threshold effort this morning was way too hard and I cut that run short by about half as well. I've been feeling pretty tired for the last week or so (combo lack of sleep and lack of sleep quality), so I'm going to call this a cut-back week. Reduce mileage, try to sleep in a little and recuperate. This should also help as a taper for a 5k I'm considering running this weekend, depending on how the legs feel (feel good, race. Not-so-good, short LR).

This race is one that drew over 1,000 people last year (massive for the area), and it'll be interesting to see how many people show. On one hand, COVID. On the other, this is the most well-known race to go off in the area since February. Looks like a rolling start, chip time only. Tables with small, sealed bottles of water - no cups. No crowds at the start/finish areas, and no DJ!

Weekly for period: From: 08/17/2020 To 08/23/2020

Total distance: 74.42mi

Zebano - nice week and good luck to your son.

Keen - awesome week.

For those who asked about me racing watchless:

1. The teams time themselves.  Normally using someone's phone, but then you have to share pins, people risk stuff ups etc., so I decided we would use my watch.

2. I am a terrible watch checker when racing, I look far too often, so I wanted to race by feel.

Hey guys, sorry for being MIA! Work has been very busy and life in general with the newborn. Quick passing by thoughts:

- shout-out to James for an incredibly impressive time. I wonder if weighing a bit more actually helps you. If I remember correctly, you're closer to the underweight category. So hard for most of us to figure out what the right racing weight is, but this was interesting experiment

- enjoying the Kiwi speculation here on reopening

- starting up another 5K/10K block for me. My goals are sub 35 10K, sub 17 5K in these time trials. NYRRs has already cancelled all races for the rest of the year, and so has Long Island (through end of October at least), where I do most of my shorter races. I know DW has pointed out CT, may keep my eye on that, but I'd almost rather run a TT than just some race where 5-10 people start at a time.

- Keen: you know how much I love not running. Down weeks are king. This is a great time for a reset. It's totally anecdotal, but the folks I see who never take down time seem to not race as well as those who go up and down in their training. You'll even see it with elites: they'll just take 2 weeks off after a major marathon with some super light jogging. Could be good for you!

- DW: it's interesting how much you ascribe this to your pool running, but you know so much about your training and what works / doesn't work, can't really comment much.

JMac & Piwi - The down week is already feeling pretty good, though my legs were a bit tired this morning still. I even let myself sleep in an extra 45 minutes from usual! I'm not planning on getting to even 50 miles. Maybe mid-40s.

I don't have any particular time goal for this one. Partly because I don't know exactly what I'd be capable of. I just want to go out and run hard. I figure I'll go by feel and maybe look at power from Stryd a bit - no looking at time at all. Stryd does give me an estimate of what it thinks I can do for 5k, and I'm curious to see how it will align with what actually happens.

Assuming it is on, I am running the half at Wairarapa.

I ran the full in 2017, with about 30 racers.  From the 5km mark, I had two people racing the half overtake me, and around 35-37km I overtook one full racer.

I was slightly sick, slightly injured and slightly underprepared, so I had a slow last 15km.  It was the most lonely race I ever had.

 

- shout-out to James for an incredibly impressive time. I wonder if weighing a bit more actually helps you. If I remember correctly, you're closer to the underweight category. So hard for most of us to figure out what the right racing weight is, but this was interesting experiment

 

The extra weight doesn't help.  If it were muscle, maybe, but it's not.  Now that I'm aware of it, I'm pretty sure it'll come off gradually, and (unfortunately) I've got time before any goal races.

Disappointed but not surprised that the Nov. 1 half in Alabama that I was targeting (I think it was plan C) has been cancelled, along with the local 5Ks between now & then.  About the only half option before winter would have me leave at 4:30am and drive two hours for a race outside Atlanta on Halloween morning - if that one is held, which I doubt.  There's a local 5K in November that looks like it'll have a good course, and I can always hope that it's less cold than usual in January when we have a usually competitive half that starts and finishes 3 blocks from our apartment.  At least I'll have some time to try some new things in training.