January 2019 Monthly Running Challenge

My January goal was to:
"Ease out of my downtime and run a HM, or even a 30 km (Last HM was Dec 2, last 30ish was 11 Nov)."

On Jan 20 I did a HM.

Today I did 30 km. Happy!

5.5M Treadmill tonight with intervals

January Running Totals (miles)
1/1 – 10.09 warmup + 7.5 mile race
1/2 – 6.28 easy w/fast finish
1/3 – 6.76 warmup, intervals, cool down
1/4 – rest day
1/5 – 16.65 warmup, Winter Warrior Half
1/6 – 8.09 easy
1/7 – rest day
1/8 – 8.64 warmup, speed work, cool down
1/9 – 11.08 easy
1/10 – 8.25 warmup, speed work, cool down
1/11 – rest day
1/12 – 15.94 warmup, 5 mile race, post-race easy run
1/13 – 12.46 easy with hills
1/14 – rest day
1/15 – 8.19 warmup, speed work, cool down
1/16 – 10.01 easy to MP
1/17 – 9.82 warmup, speed work, cool down
1/18 – rest day
1/19 – 15.12 with snow and wind
1/20 – 8.10 indoor track
1/21 – rest day
1/22 – 8.19 warmup, speed work, cool down
1/23 – 13.16 easy with hills
1/24 – 3.81 warmup, aborted speed work
1/25 – rest day
1/26 – 8.59 warmup + 4.9 mile race

January running total to date – 189.23

Nominal January mileage goal: 200 miles

Real Goals: Train well toward Boston. Work the January races into the training plan smoothly. Remain uninjured, even if it means cutting back on planned mileage or races.

Today's Yesterday's notes – Freezeroo #4, the Hearnish 5-mile, is a tribute to Bill Hearne. The Hearne mile was reputed to never be precisely a standard mile, ranging randomly between a metric mile of 1500 meters and a nautical mile. So the Hearnish race is never precisely the nominal distance. Its current incarnation is about 4.9 standard miles long.

It was 14° F (-10°C) with 9-12 mph SSW wind at gun time. I ran about a 3.7 mile warmup on the first part of the race course, rather than my customary course preview, because I was cutting back as Coach had advised. The warmup was predictably challenging, but I felt better by the time I got back to the shelter. And the race went pretty much as planned.

The ideal was to run at about T pace, win my age group, and cement my age group lead in the Freezeroo series. Set out in my new-ish Peregrine 7 Ice+ shoes for the uncertain surface, and in 600m there were only 3 runners ahead of me. Huh? That didn't last. By the time we got to a mile, there were 5 ahead of me. Then 6. By 2 miles, 7. And I heard footsteps. For the last 3 miles of the race, positions shifted between the extremes of 9 people ahead of me with 2 I might catch, to 7 people ahead of me with 2 who might catch me. Got to the last half mile with only 7 ahead of me, but youth and downhill running skills triumphed. I finished 10th overall, out of 129 runners. I was 1st of 9 in the M 60-64 group, but winning the age group was expected.

Mile 2 of the course is a soul-crusher if you don't know what's coming. It's all uphill, but not so steep as to be obvious all the time. The first time I ran this course, I looked at my watch about mile 2 and thought I just didn't have it. Mile 2 was slow! This year, someone posted on the GRTC FB group about negative splits. So I looked. Yes, it was that kind of day, that kind of course, and that kind of challenge in the last 3 miles. Mile 2 was slower than mile 1, but otherwise I ran negative splits:

Finished healthy, skipped the cool down. I'm happy with this one. Then yesterday evening was the GRTC awards banquet. Lots of fun, talk to other runners, new inductees into the GRTC Hall of Fame, get awards from the 2018 RROY series. Pint glass for finishing at least 6 of the 12 Runner of the Year race, mug for finishing in the top 5 of my age group, shirt for winning my age group in the 2018 RROY series, patch for racing over 200 miles in 2018:

This is the gold patch. They come in bronze (50 mile), silver (100 mile), gold (200 mile), and platinum (300 mile). Highest mileage for this year was 608.9 miles of races. This is the first year I've got the gold patch; I won't be challenging for the platinum level any time soon.

2019 Races:
January 1, 2019 Freezeroo #2 (Resolution Run 7.5 mile) (Mendon, NY) finished in 50:55
January 5, 2019 Winter Warrior Half Marathon (Gates, NY) finished in 1:30:48
January 12, 2019 Freezeroo #3 (Pineway Ponds 5 Mile) (Spencerport, NY) finished in 33:10
January 26, 2019 Freezeroo #4 (Hearnish 5 mile) (Victor, NY) 4.9 miles, finished in 32:28
February 2, 2019 USATF XC Championship, Masters 8K (Tallahassee, FL)
February 9, 2019 Freezeroo #5 (Tom Brannon 8 mile) (Greece, NY)
February 23, 2019 Freezeroo #6 (White House Challenge 4.4 mile) (Webster, NY)
April 13, 2019 BAA 5K (Boston, MA)
April 15, 2019 Boston Marathon (Hopkinton, MA to Boston, MA)
November 3, 2019 TCS New York City Marathon (New York, NY)

Welcome back to the group @simcon1. Looks like you've been busy traveling from A to Z - Alaska to Zanzibar. How cool! Good luck on your goals. Maybe signing up for a half marathon in the fall would be a great motivator and give you plenty of time to build up to it?

@orphia congrats on your 30k!

@Fitatelo great job getting to 5k and reaching your monthly goal. Well done.

@MobyCarp - always enjoy reading your detailed reports and getting into your mindset for these races. Congratulations on your race and the runner of the year awards. Hope you are feeling on track with your Boston training.

@Elise4270 I ordered some new socks last night - supposed to be waterproof, I got them in preparation for the winter spartan race. I will report back with photos now that we have a new rule!

I'm also going to use you all as my accountability (whether you want to be or not) for my new goal of being able to do a real, actual, unassisted, non jumping pull-up 31 days from now. By the end of February (well that's 32 days from now but I'll take the cushion). That's also about 10 days before my Spartan race. Must survive! I may have ordered a pull-up bar along with those new socks (and gloves too if I'm being honest). Late night Amazon is a dangerous thing.

I'm going to use this plan as a rough guide - may vary depending on what my trainer has me doing (just in case anyone wants to join me):

2019 races:
1/13/2019 Chilly Chili 5k, Cazenovia, NY 33:00 on very tired legs
2/24/2019 Lake Effect Half Marathon, Syracuse NY
3/10/2019 Greek Peak Winter Sprint Spartan Race, Cortland NY
5/5/2019 Mountain Goat Run (10 mile), Syracuse NY
6/2/2019 Niagara Falls Women's Half Marathon, Niagara Falls, ON

@orphia great job getting a HM and a 30k this month!
@MobyCarp - congrats on your 1st place AG finish and all the other awards! Those are blazing splits (as always).
@katharmonic I have no doubt you will be able to do a pull-up in 30 days. You are stronger than you know.

louubelle16 wrote: »

Did the Orangetheory class today that I missed on Tuesday to round off the week. I’ve never done more than 4 consecutive days of running before and this takes me up to six, as life meant I’ve had to swap a couple of sessions and miss a double-workout day. I won’t be making a habit of this, not only because my body needs a rest, but mainly because I can’t be bothered washing my hair this often! What a faff.

This made me laugh because I do the same thing. My running schedule is partially designed around washing my hair! Don’t need or want to wash it every day, but I have to after running more than a couple miles because I sweat so much. It’s also one of the reasons that my Sunday or Monday run is short and easy. Don’t want to wash my hair 2 days in a row. I just don’t have it in me to style my hair every. Single. Day.

@martaindale I have definitely planned my plans around my hair washing in the past! I’ve given up now and just don’t bother to style it most days, but it’s a consideration in all my planning. I’d love to cut my hair short for this reason, but running already controls everything else, maybe cutting my hair off for running is a bit extreme

1-1 Rest
1-2 7k intervals
1-3 7k easy
1-4 Rest
1-5 7k slow
1-6 5.5k slow
1-7 7k easy
1-8 Rest
1-9 7k slow
1-10 7k slow
1-11 Rest
1-12 7.5k easy
1-13 7k slow
1-14 7k easy
1-15 Rest
1-16 7k slow
1-17 7k easy
1-18 Rest
1-19 10k slow
1-20 Snow Day
1-21 Snow/cold day
1-22 7k slow
1-23 Pouring rain on top of slush
1-24 7k slow
1-25 Rest
1-26 7k easy
1-27 10k slow

January Total: 124k
January Goal: 100k

Next year when you pop in here claiming your December 2019 mileage, what accomplishments will you have made?
Run at least 4 5k races.
Get under 30:00 and a PR for 5k.
Average at least 135k per month, which would put me over 1,000 miles for the year.

Run the Year Team: Five for Nineteen.

Snow flurries and high teens F today, courtesy of an Alberta Clipper that left about three inches of fresh snow behind. Some good footing and some not so good footing. I think those Sally pushups are for the under 60 crowd...

My first run in 10 days this morning. I originally intended to just walk the dogs for a mile, as I'm still coughing. Once we were out there, I decided to double that, and after half a mile thought, "Maybe I can run today". I was overdressed for it and had my old running shoes on, but it was worth a try. I could walk if I had to.

I didn't have to. There is nothing like a cold to keep you honest about running easy though! Still, I felt great, so I took the longer route - and doubled that! Altogether, we ran about 3.4 miles. My longest distance in years. I know I won't make my goal for the month, yet again, but right now I don't care.

Marathon #2 ✅! Thanks for the welll wishes.

My time sucked (5 hours 18 minutes). It was SO hot and humid! I guess Miami is know for that. 😂

Anyway, my everything hurts and I am exhausted from catching the 4am shuttle bus. Race report later.

Morning all. Its Monday today and a public holiday here which means no work! I slept in a bit, strapped on my shoes and immediately noticed pain in the outside of my rt ankle. I continued my warm up and started my run, but half a km in the pain was just getting worse. So I stopped. Walked home with a slight limp and googled. Looks like peroneal ligament? I know someone else gets this. What's the solution? New shoes (that's usually the answer haha). I've massaged it which seems to have helped and will rest it today. Could it be from a lot of barefoot walking? I have relatively flat feet.

Long run for Sunday Runday! I had a wave workout scheduled for Tuesday, but Tuesday looks gross and rainy and cold, so I moved it to today. I did 2 miles to warm up, then 3 sets of 1/2 mile HM pace, 1/2 marathon pace, 1/2 mile HMP, 1/2 mile MP, 1/2 mile easy. That came out to 7.5 miles. Then I did 2.5 miles easy to cool down. The workout went really, really well. I wanted to do 7:15-7:30 pace for the HMP and 7:45-8:00 for the MP, and I ended up pacing more like 7:05-7:15 for HMP and 7:40-7:50 for MP. Really pleased with how easily I dialed into the different paces and switched between them. I haven't done this kind of workout in quite a while, or a workout this long, and I ended up having a blast!

I was a little worried to start because I hit my shin really hard when I tripped on a heavy wooden stool at work yesterday and I scraped it up through a layer of jeans and a compression sock. When I started running it was a bit tender but only because my leggings were rubbing on it, I think. I could put pressure on it, and I don't think it altered my gait much, if at all. I iced it when I got home, feels ok still. Not going to worry about it too much.

January runs:
(12/31: NYE 4 mile race )
1/1: 8.2 trail miles
1/2: Rest day
1/3: 5 miles
1/4: 6.8 miles
1/5: 6 miles
1/6: 12 miles
1/7: 4 miles
1/8: 9 trail miles
1/9: 5 miles
1/10: Rest day
1/11: 16 miles
1/12: 8 miles
1/13: 6.5 miles
1/14: 5 miles
1/15: 5 miles
1/16: 7.5 miles
1/17: Rest day
1/18: 9 miles
1/19: 6 miles
1/20: 18 miles
1/21: Rest day
1/22: 5.4 miles
1/23 7 miles
1/24: Rest day
1/25: 5.2 miles
1/26: 5.7 miles
1/27: 12 miles

January total miles: 172.3

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2019 Races
March 24: Caesar Rodney Half Marathon (Goal: PR)
April 7: Cherry Blossom 10 Miler (Goal: Sub-75)
April 28: New Jersey Marathon (Goal: BQ)
July 6: Finger Lake Fifties 50k (Goal: Finish)