Jan 10 - 23

Jan 17-23

Mon: 9M easy
Tue: 11.3M including 12 x 70" w/ 80" rec jog + 3 x 200 w/ 200 rec
Wed: 13.2M easy
Thu: 10.3M easy
Fri: 15.4M including 55' Steady State
Sat: 9M easy
Sun: 18M long run

Weekly Total: 86.2 miles on 7 runs / 7 days
More snow fell Tuesday morning in Boston so I ran my scheduled 400s (70") on the treadmill. I ran 12 repeats at 4:52 pace (simulating a track session of 400s).  Wed I ran 90' on the Lexington roads before heading back to the Netherlands.  On Friday I ran a Steady State run of 55', an increase of 10' from the last two weeks.  It was the best steady state run I've had in this train up to Rotterdam.  For the 55' I averaged 5:42 pace covering 9.6M.  Sunday was my first 2hr long run of this marathon training. I didn't feel all that great (had a little too much to drink the night before), but still managed to put in a good run as I averaged 6:39 pace for 18 miles.

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Jan 10-16

Mon: 8.7M easy
Tue: 12.4M including 15 x 1' fartlek on rolling course w/ 1' rec at brisk pace
Wed: 13.2M easy
Thu: DNR; travel to Boston
Fri: 13.6M including 45' Steady State on slightly rolling course
Sat: 9.3M easy
Sun: 16.2M long run

Weekly Total: 73.4 miles on 6 runs / 6 days
Training continues to go well. On Tuesday I ran a fartlek workout of 15x1' hard/easy. I ran this fartlek on a rolling course so that some fast running is done on up hill, some on flat ground and some on down hills.  This is a common workout for me, but the difference this time around was that I ran the recovery 1' at a brisk pace rather than easy jogging.  Thursday I DNR (did not run) due to my travel to Massachusetts to visit my gf.  On Friday I did a 45' steady state run on a 3.5M loop that was slightly rolling. The workout went okay. My legs were a bit tight from traveling, and I was tired probably from jetlag. On Sat and Sun I ran on the Minuteman Bikeway, a 10-mile bikeway that stretches from Bedford to Cambridge and passes through historical Lexington.

Running article

My hometown newspaper did a story on how I picked up running and my path to April's Rotterdam Marathon.  Read the article here.

Jan 3-9

Mon: 8.7M easy
Tue:  10M including 12 x 200m (32-33") w/ 200m rec jog
Wed: 13.2M easy
Thu: 10M easy
Fri: 15M including 45' steady-state run in the middle of the run
Sat: 8.4M easy
Sun: 15.8M long run

Weekly Total: 81 miles on 7 runs/7 days
I had three good quality sessions this week: 200s on Tue, a 45' steady-state on Fri and a steady long run today.  The steady state on Fri was a tough run, not necessarily because of the pace but because of the duration of the run.  The effort and pace was about right. I started out around marathon pace for the first 10 minutes and then settled in at close to half-marathon pace for the remainder of the run.  This morning's long run (6:38 pace) went very well as I ran practically the same route as last week and finished 3 minutes faster. I could certainly tell that my fitness is improving, especially when the pace for my easy runs are faster with the same effort.

Dec 27 - Jan 02

Mon: 8.6M easy

Tue: 12.2M including 6 sets of: 1' @ 5:42 pace & 6% incline w/ 1' rec + 1' @ 5:00 & 1% incline w/ 1' rec (treadmill)

Wed: 7M easy

Thu: 5.7M easy

Fri: AM - 3M easy; PM - Sylvesterloop Elsloo 10K - 5th Place 32:58 (PR); 14M total

Sat: 8.7M easy

Sun: 15.5M long run

Weekly Total: 72 miles on 8 runs/7 days

Running conditions early in the week were too icy, so I opted to run the scheduled fartlek on the treadmill.  Despite my dislike for treadmill running, I had a good workout and I think it set me up nicely for Friday's New Year's Eve race, which was a positive end to 2010.  Sunday was a long run of 108 minutes. My legs felt fairly good and with the exception of a little tightness in the calvesI wouldn't have remembered that I ran a race a few days before.

Sylvesterloop Elsloo

The Sylvesterloop Elsloo 10K was my last race and run for 2010.  It was also the only race scheduled until March when I'll run a half-marathon as a tune-up for Rotterdam.  I was certainly looking forward to this race, because it would give me a good sense of my current fitness leading into marathon training.  The 10K course consisted of 200 meters followed by 7 laps around a 1400 meter loop.  It is a farily flat and fast course, but the only problem was that by the 3rd or 4th round faster runners would have to weave their way through slower runners who were being overlapped. 

When the bull-horn went off I made sure not to go out too hard.  The front of the race developed within the first kilometer.  I counted 5 runners ahead of me, 4 of the 5 runners I knew (later found out the other runner's name was Vincent) .  By the 2nd lap I only had the 4th and 5th runner (Vincent and Patrick) within sight, about 20 meters ahead of me.  The first three runners pulled away and eventually went on to take the podium placing.  On lap 5 I began closing in on Patrick and Vincent.  The back side of the loop course is a very slight gradual incline, ~5m elevation gain over 600 meters, and it is where I picked up my pace and caught Patrick.  I was now in 5th place and approximately 10m behind Vincent.  I thought that somewhere in the 7th and final lap I would be able to overtake Vincent.  That never happened as the freezing cold got the best of my lungs and had to settle for 5th place.

I was happy with a 5th place finish, but even happier and shocked when I crossed the finish and saw the time on my watch read 32:58, a 17 second PR.  I couldn't believe it!  I had no idea during the race that I was running somewhere close to low-33 or sub-33 10K pace.  And even if I had looked at my watch during the race it would be extremely difficult to see my running time, because it was dark and there was only limited lighting on the course (night race).  Here are the results and a sports news coverage of the race (wearing a green singlet w/ black arm sleeves).

I'm thrilled not only to have ended the new year with a 10K PR, but also to go into 2011 and Rotterdam marathon training with a good level of fitness.