Fri 10/24 - off

No time to run as my free time was crunched between the kiddie meet all afternoon and an early bedtime in advance of tomorrow's pre-dawn wakeup call. It only would have been a 20 minute shakeout anyway. Nor'easter finally gone but left gloomy overcast in its wake with a fairly nasty NW breeze.

Thu 10/23 - PM 50 minutes easy

Area 51. Basically the same route as Tuesday, with similar results. Feeling tired and flat all week, just trying to steer the ship into the weekend in one piece at this point. Calf somewhat better than yesterday, with the help of compressions last night and during the day at work. Remnants of the nor'easter still in effect with gusty winds and spitting drizzle at the start.

Wed 10/22 - PM 80 minutes easy

Area 51. Bordering on the very easy, mostly thanks to the right calf feeling terrible from the first step to the last. I suppose this is payback for the weekend double dip but I would have thought yesterday would have been the day for it to feel truly crappy. Who knows. Nor'easter blew in with plenty of rain and wind, overdressed for it but better than the alternative.

Tue 10/21 - PM 50 minutes easy

Area 51. I had wanted to go for a longer run but a late start forced me to curtail the length of the run. Legs feeling somewhat better than yesterday but still clunky. Also quite flat in general, tired and not making much headway in feeling awake. Something was screeching in the woods that I couldn't recognize, added to the ambiance for sure.

Mon 10/20 - PM 35 minutes easy

Brief out and back along the aqueducts. Took a good long while to get going, warmed up with about 20+ minutes of walking and talking with my assistant coach. I perhaps should have kept walking as the legs are certainly feeling it from the past two days. Right calf in particular is feeling how I thought it would feel yesterday. Some compressions after the run helped but the run itself was a slog. From a recovery perspective, today would have been a great day to use the elliptigo although the cool conditions with a somewhat biting wind would have made that less than fun.

Sun 10/19 - AM 70 minutes incl. 5k road race

What could easily have been one of my dumber ideas in a long time (which is saying something) ended up working out reasonably well. After getting in around midnight after spending a good 6 hours standing around in a windy field in Falmouth watching an endless parade of kiddies run past, slept for not long enough and woke up to make the trip to Swampscott for a return to a race I last did four years ago. An enjoyable course, nice spot to spend a morning but my main motivation was of course far more acquisitive and venal. After yesterday's slog I had no confidence whatsoever that I'd be able to manage much faster than 6 minute pace. Warmup didn't do much to dispel this, nor did the gusty NW wind that was raking along the water's edge. However, once the gun went off and I settled in to what seemed a sustainable rhythm, found to my surprise that 5:30 pace actually felt ok. Gapped the only competition (sorry Titus) soon after the mile mark and from then on out it was mostly a game of keep away. Checking the watch the last four minutes wondering how much longer there was to go but still under control. Right leg held up fine which was the biggest surprise of them all. Cooldown was a leisurely drawn out 35 minutes or so on the nearby railbed into Marblehead.

Sat 10/18 - AM 65 minutes incl. 10k road race

Second leg of the Wayland mini-sandbag series. Felt absolutely terrible, strung out and tired from the jump. More worrisome was how bad the right calf felt, frayed to an alarming degree. Apparently I overdid it with the bodyweight single leg half squats last night, first time doing them in months will have that effect. Rolled through 2 miles in 12 minutes, then a sparkling 6:30 followed by the next two in about 12:30 combined. Shut it down from there on in, last mile no faster than 7 minutes. In fact I would say the 10k as a whole was more like six miles. I wish I could say this was a threshold effort but it certainly wasn't, much more strenuous than that. Very nice course that included parts of north Wayland and south Lincoln. Still warm and sticky conditions. Despite all of this the race was totally worth it.