Weekly Log 16-Jul-12 to 22-Jul-12

Monday:
0 miles.  First day not running in 14 days.  My legs thanked me.

Tuesday:
2 miles.
Bottone Track Mile.  Results here and here.  5:11, one second off my PR!
Westerly Sun article and photo here.

Withering in the heat

Final strides to finish

Normally I finish a race and if a less than expected performance, I let it go, but this one I was really disappointed with.  Maybe it was because I thought a sub-5:10 [PR] in the bag, or maybe it was because I just missed it by a second.
Splits:  74, 80, 81, 75
What didn't go well:

• Heat (86 degrees at 6PM):  parched going into the 2nd lap; not much I can do
• Headwind:  some reduction factor going into each lap; again out of my control
• 2nd & 3rd laps:  the plan and natural tendency was to run these slighter slower than 1st lap, but not by that much!  What happened?  I'm guessing if I didn't have Mike G pushing me at each lap, my 3rd would have been even slower.
• Pace awareness:  I didn't realize my splits (other than 1st that announcer called out) until after the race.  I hit the "lap" button on my watch each 400; should I have taken the extra fraction of a second to view the split each 400?
• Solo run:  Elise told me afterward how hard it is to run solo (the next guy was quite a ways behind me), and asked why I didn't run Elite instead of Masters.  Would it have helped if I had someone ahead of me (presumably Justin looking at stats)?  At the same time, I was asked if I could put on a Masters heat, and want to be responsive to others.

What went well (short list here):

• Form - more than 1 told me after the race that my form looked good throughout.  (Feel free to comment otherwise).
• Organizationally, this was another good event put on by the WTAC.  Although the turnout is small, I'm happy to keep help putting this on.  It's a good group of people.

Mike G hammered it with an impressive 4:29 finish.  Spectators remarked how they were enjoying watching him run.  Muddy may have missed his 5-flat target by a second, but still had a huge PR.  Both my boys ran solid runs, but were bummed out how far off they were from their PRs.

Wednesday:
10+ miles.  Slow (8+ pace) pensive run on Misquamicut Beach loop, including 3 miles beach.  Reflected on last night's race, then I have to move on as likely won't be running a track mile again for another year.  Time to look forward to the rest of the summer races, and thinking about fall plans (marathon?, half Iron?).
3+ miles.  Westerly Fun Runs, week 5.  18:39.  Four teenagers bolted out at the start.  Three of them were done 1/4 mile in; I was impressed with the remaining teen, Nick, who led the run for 3/4 mile and ran a smart run this time to PR in 19:11.  Pushed reasonably hard, but the legs were feeling sluggish and not up to it, presumably after previous day's Bottone in the heat wave.  Thinking of taking a zero tomorrow, and a double Friday.  Was glad we were able to get this off with the thunderstorm threats.  Thanks to Tom B for stepping up and filling in as starter and timer for Coach McCoy away this week.

Thursday:
0 miles. 

Friday:
6 miles.  Parked my car at the entrance to Wahaneeta Preserve, Westerly Land Trust's newest property.  Did some exploring in here, mostly double-track, and then ran through parts of Woody Hill Management until I ran out of time before morning meetings.  I'll be back...
6 miles.  Groton Fun Runs.  64^o, light rain.  Bluff Point State Park.  Cool weather was a nice contrast to recent heat.  Amazing how many more people will show up at fun runs in oppressive high 80s than a cool low 60s with just a drizzle.  Ran warm-up with Matthew, and cool-down with Glen C.  Ended up pretty muddy on this trail run!

Saturday:
12 miles solo.  Had planned out a grandiose long run the night before, from home through Woody Hill and then beach all the way to Watch Hill.  Slept in, lost the time window and interest, threw the plans out the window.  Meandered around Champlin trails before back roads towards Dunn's Corners and finally down to Weekapaug before hitting the beach.  Tough going on the beach as it was just about high tide.
Picked up our Blessing packet; still not sure if I'm running solo or with Matthew, but leaning towards the latter.
Spent the afternoon with the family at Beavertail State Park picnicing, walking/running/jumping the rocks, and Matthew and I found an area cleared out of enough rocks to go in swimming and float the waves back in to shore.  Cheap family outing that's a lot of fun.

Sunday:
9 miles with Matthew, 7AM.  A new distance PR for him.  Ran local backroads of Avondale and Watch Hill.   On the way back on Ocean View Highway, ran into the WTAC Sunday late morning running gang just heading out, with John a/k/a Pard and Paul leading the way, along with Les, CarolAnn, Buddy, and crew.  Good to see local runners.
12 miles with the family.  South County Bike Path from Kingston train station to Wakefield and back.  Matthew still getting used to his first ever road bike, before the three of us face Crabman next Sunday.
Beach with Mark.  Short solo swimming.  Ran into Steve and Polly, tried to talk them into joining us and other WTAC'ers (Mike B, Elise, etc) at the Crabman.

Weekly totals:
Run:  48 miles
Bike:  12 miles
Swim:  not much

Week wrap-up.  Decent mileage week, especially given I took 2 days off and only ran 2 miles Tuesday.  Bottone Mile was disappointing to me, but I'm moving on from that.  I've got a busy and fun schedule coming up, with back-to-back 2-race weekends.