Week 10

Another week comes to a close. During the week I managed three 10 mile runs all on my hilly route. I was feeling good and kind of off track from my training plan, workouts didn't have purpose, so I took a chance and did a tempo workout. It went exceedingly well. I felt awesome and it was good to go fast. As I kind of expected my shin pain came back a bit so I've been managing that. It's not bad, but there, and still better than before. I'm not overly concerned as long as I keep on top of it. Speed work is probably over anyway, not only because it's time for longer runs, but just to be safe.

River Severn

 Saturday was an odd day of training. I woke at 430am and ran 7 miles. Ran 2.5 miles commuting from my car to work. Then ran 6 miles on my lunch break. I wanted to run commute back to my car but not only was I exhausted but I had an odd pain in my right foot that was forcing me to limp a bit.

grainy single track

So here I am now Sunday afternoon waiting to get out to hopefully cover 15 plus miles. The wife was out last night so been in bed hungover all day recovering. This doesn't bother me, I'm happy she got out with friends, something she rarely does! I was hoping for a daytime run but no big deal. I'll be putting my headlamp on charge in a minute and trying to stay positive for a 2.5 hour night run. Ugh. But I will do it because it's the time I've got. My foot pain from yesterday is much better today and I'm hoping it's not a problem tonight. 

I was planning on racing Malvern Hills Ultra in a couple weeks. I wanted to use it as a training run to not only focus on going out slow but also practice feeding. Unfortunately I missed the entry so I'm not in. I attempted to message the race director to see if I could get in but then deleted my message. Why? Well in the past I've done a 50 miler leading up to a 100. Post 50 I've been exhausted and unable to train properly, taking sometimes 4-5 weeks off from normal consistent training. I figured I have experience now, I know how to feed. I felt it would be more beneficial to not risk injury and exhaustion by doing a 50 but instead run three consecutive days of 15 - 30 miles. A friend said the same thing, and that running a 50 really won't have much of a fitness benefit. It can give confidence if you've never ran that far and practice feeding but it definitely won't make you faster at 100 miles. So i'm confident I've made the right decision.

moon in there somewhere

Sleep is running thin again. I had a solid night last night and felt great this morning but feel I'm in the hole again. Running tonight probably won't help. Also my food intake has been too low. I eat insanely healthy but I don't think I get enough calories so I'm trying to improve on that also. It's very difficult to deal with kids, whom never eat it seems, and keep up with my own food intake. I really need to plan ahead and have things like potatoes premade in the fridge.

Severn Way singletrack

This week starts the big final push. According to reputable coaches in order to finish a 100 miler in decent condition, within the final 9 weeks an athlete should run a minimum of 9 hours each week for 6 weeks leading up to the final taper. So for the next 6 weeks my goal will be 9 hours each week which is about 70 miles a week! I have a plan. I can do it. I just need to be able to sleep. Fortunately in two weeks my mother in law will be here so fingers crossed I'll get a week of daytime running options! I can then maximize sleep, even hopefully put some sleep in the bank. 

Here we go. And let's hope my run tonight goes well!