Weekly Log 16-Jan to 22-Jan-2017: Big Mileage Week

My Vazee Summit trail shoes when new.

The same shoes three months and ~300 miles later.
As opposed to my prior New Balance shoes, where the materials
had ripped and separated before 300 miles, these along with my
Vazee Pace have just held up so well with very little visible wear.
They certainly look dirty, which I think trail shoes are supposed to!
Still, my next pair will be dark color, but the same model.

Monday:  21!
MLK Day. Longest run since Sugarloaf Marathon last May. Started out with 9 solo up to and through a small portion of Woody Hill, with a few miles of trails.  Wound up at Tom's house in time to run with Tom and Mike.  A mix of dirt and asphalt roads before we hit the beach at mile 15 of my run, for two miles of soft-sand running.  I was doing well and feeling well up to this point, but this is where I met my Waterloo.  I was dragging behind the other two the whole beach portion.  When we exited back onto the road at Misquamicut State Beach, we rejoined for a bit, but otherwise I pretty much dragged behind the remaining four road miles.
Glad to get this one in, but it also showed my endurance needs to be upped a bit.

Tuesday:  0
Very sore from yesterday's run.

Wednesday:  11
AM:  5 miles.  Morning run at North Camp, Burlingame, with tacking on Schoolhouse Pond Trail.  Rainy but warm.  Legs gradually came to life.
PM:  6 miles.  Burlingame again, but this time in the dark and from Kings Factory Road.  I had packed my headlamp, so no nervousness about running out of daylight, which was imminent from the start.  Ran VG, Schoolhouse Pond, and Sammy C's.  Slower, but a lot of fun.  Spooked myself coming up on a rock structure covered with lichens in the mist, which looked a little freaky at first.  Otherwise, forgot how much fun headlamp runs can be.

Thursday:  6
Noanet Woodlands, Dover, MA.  Was very surprised to get up here and find a light covering of snow from overnight.  Slowed the run just a little, as the ground was pretty crunchy.  Yearning for a major snowstorm in RI, but unfortunately nothing in the forecast.

Friday:  8
Richmond / Hopkinton country loop from Arcadia Y.  Was meeting there at 8:30 on a BRR planning meeting, so I decided to get there at 7 and run someplace different and still be able to shower and not show up at the meeting all sweaty.

75% of my route was Skunk Hill Road to Dye Hill Road to Woody Hill Road to Fenner Hill Road.  Yep, this was going to be hilly.  It was also going to be winding and rural.  Really a fun run!  I should plan to incorporate this plus a little more at the next meeting in late Feb.

As to the meeting itself, I pitched several options but highlighted the idea of a point-to-point race ending at Camp Watchaug.  After some healthy devil's advocate type of discussion from both fellow committee members and Y management, the next move was a request for me to clean up a tentative route map for referring next to DEM for approval.

Saturday:  6
Not much time before headed out for a day at Yale, where I would watch Matthew crush his 3K PR with an 8:44.  Easy hospital loop.

Sunday:  16
Got an invite to join Seth and Muddy for an Arcadia group run.  Sounded good, but after a long day away at Yale, I decided to sleep in and run closer to home. 

Went to Burlingame about 9am with the intention of running about 10 miles. Parked on Buckeye Brook at the intersection of the road going down to North Camp and ran Lenny Lane (thanks Jonny for showing this to us!) and the VG CCW to the campground before running the Burlingame Trail and parts of Brrr-lingame course before rejoining VG CW to return.  I was already in about 11 miles at this point and starting to fatigue, but was really enjoying the now 53-degree weather and continued on Sammy C's and Schoolhouse Pond, where I was getting really tired and hungry and fell.  What a great day to be out on the trails.  I feel if I had packed a sandwich in a cooler, I could have gone on longer.  One of my longest trails runs ever.

29 mountain bikers counted.  1 hiker.  No other trail runners.

Weekly mileage:  68!

Weekly synopsis:  Thrilled with 68 miles.  Biggest mileage week in 11 months.  A rare 2nd on the WTAC weekly leaderboard.  (Caveat that it was a holiday week with bookended long runs.)  My 21-miler on MLK was tough on me and left me quite sore, but I felt great after the 16-mile trail run.  Will continue to mix it up to keep myself motivated and engaged.