Record Week

It's been a few days since I last posted, but I haven't been slacking.  If fact I logged a record 64.2 miles last week beating my previous best by about 15 miles.  Once again I'll point out that I include my cycling miles in these numbers, but I've always have.  Cycling made up 27 miles so I still had a very solid week.

Physically I'm a little tired now.  I have a 10 day streak going on and I do feel a little fatuged.  It's not too bad, but I've run a few of my last runs a little too fast.  Getting home tongight and checking out my log for my last few runs, I'm noticing that my pace is about :15 seconds faster per mile than I really want.  Now this doesn't sound like much, but over a 5 mile distance, and after 10 days the quicker miles do tend to sneek up on you.  This week I'm really going to try to cut back a little on my speed.  (I'm planning speedwork at the end of the month anyway.)

Sometime this week I'll be signing up for my planned 10k - my acutal traing schedule starts next Monday (the 18th) so I do have this week for a little 'freestyle' training.  I'm actually looking forward towards a structured 8 week schedule that includes some track work.  I haven't done any track running in about 15 years so that should be fun.

A couple other notes; first I'm closing in on a streak goal of 18 days.  If everything go to plan that will happen on the 18th.  Hard to believe that in the first 18 days of the new year I could reach one of my quartely goals.  Second, I may revise my 10k time goal.  Right now I'm just shooting for a sub 60 mins, but I'm going to have to put a stretch goal on that because in some of my tempo training runs I'm beating this time already.  Yesterday I ran 5.9 miles in 57:15 or a 9:43 pace on a tempo training run without really trying too hard.  A 10k race I should be able to beat this by about 3-4 mins.  To get a better feel for this I'm scheduling a 10k run this next weeked before I start my actual 10k training.  I want to see how close I'm actually to breaking that 60 min goal.  This will put a slight crim in my distance plans because I wanted to put in a long run of 9 miles (a personal best) this upcoming Sunday.  We'll just have to see how the week pans out.  Finally I've set a goal of a sub 2:15:00 for my half marathon in May.  I have no idea if I can do that - the 8 miler I did mid December really took a lot out of me.  And if I'm not going to run a 9 miler this week, my next scheduled 'longest run' won't occur until early March.  I'm sure I can finish that distance, but without attempting it I can't really get a good grasp on an accurate time.  Anyway, I'm going to focus on running a strong 10k first then I'll worry about the half distance.

Today the whole family dicided to hike up the dreaded ridgeline by my house.  It's a good hike and I had Cade on my back.  I've included a few pictures this time so you can get an idea of what I'm talking about;

Abby on the backside of the ridge

Our house second row back dead center (grey-blue 2 story)

Abby again on top of the ridge

Close-up of our house

Cade - always smiling.

Looking towards Big Bear (East) - just a little snow.

Our little model - her print ad for the Montage will be out next Christmas.

It's a great workout with a 40 lb kid on your back - I was sweating bad.

Finally I wanted to point out that I'm on pace to destroy my monthly record in distance; currently it stands at 108.6 that I did in September last year.  Right now as it stands I'm sitting at 81.6 miles for the month ad on pace to do 127 miles for the month.  Personally I'm pretty sure that I'm going to reach this number in fact I wouldn't be suprised to see a 160 mile month here.  I just want to be careful and make sure I don't hurt myself though.

Keep Steppin'

Bob