Weekly Log 8-Nov to 14-Nov-2021: Rhody week

Miscellaneous rambling:

• I put my name in the hat for Laugavegur Ultramarathon next summer, and will find out in one week if I got lucky enough to get in or not.  In the past, it was similar to Beach to Beacon in that you were ready at the keyboard at the predetermined hour, and it sold out in minutes.  For 2022 they went to a lottery system, and for 2023, you'll have to have ITRA (Int'l Trail Running Association) points to even qualify to register for the lottery!
• I received an e-mail from Run Vermont saying that runners who had signed up for the full VCM this year (me) will be given a special discounted rate for the marathon ($99 vs $135) if interested.  Hmm, I did like the race and organization, just not thrilled about time of year (Memorial Day weekend).

Monday:  0

Interesting that in my training plan (which again, I follow loosely) every week until now the recommended plan for Monday is "Rest or cross-train", but the plan for today (penultimate Monday) and next Monday (final Monday) is simply "Rest".  Rest I shall.

Tuesday:  1 walk, 4 run

AM:  Weekly CCC maintenance.  Avondale Farm Preserve.  After two hours of operating a blade weedwhacker, and without my preferred shoulder harness available this time, my arm is more sore than getting the COVID booster shot last week.  Seriously!

PM:  Late afternoon easy run with Brady.  Mix of roads (mostly) with a bit of grass field and trail mixed in.  This was my debut Rebel run, or more specifically, first run in my NB FuelCell Rebel 2 shoes.  Wow, these shoes felt great!  I read good reviews on the shoes, met my criteria of fast and lightweight (7.3 ounces), but I am cheap and didn't want to spend full price ($129) on them.  When I found one retailer having a 2-day 20% off sale, I snapped them up.

So what did I like about them?  Well, let me compare to my current and first ever pair of NB FuelCell, the Speedrift.  Both shoes are in New Balance's "Fuel Cell" fast shoe category, and both feature a 6mm drop.  That's where the similarities end from my perspective.  For the first 3 runs at least in the Speedrift, the shoes were very uncomfortable and stiff.  The Rebel 2 is comfortable, springy, and responsive.  And comfortable from Day 1!  I don't know that I've ever experienced that with a running shoe being comfortable right out of the box.

I will still stick to my plans of running the Philadelphia Marathon in the Speedrifts, because:

1. That's the shoe I've been running my training long runs and tune-up half marathon in.
2. I follow tried-and-true advice of not switching things up this close (12 days) to race day.
3. I also follow the advice of having about 100 miles on your race shoes on marathon race day (the Speedrifts have 109 miles on them, the Rebel 2 four miles).
4. One single run, and a short one at that, is not sufficient observation data for making a judgment.

I've been looking for a longer-distance road shoe replacement to my 890v7, as I have loved my 890v7s  but I think I've already bought up and gone through the last pairs on the planet.  The 890v8 is a heavier and altogether different shoe.  Why do shoe manufacturers have to change and retire good shoes so often?  When I retire my final pair of 890v7s soon, the Speedrift will not be that replacement if for no other reason than it's already discontinued and hard to find, BUT the Rebel just might!

Let's see how the next few runs go,
but I'm certainly happy with the feel and
responsiveness in today's short run!

In addition to the new shoes, one other new to me feature during the run was the watch backlight "gesture".  Running as it was getting dark, I angled my watch to try to read it and then hoped I could figure out which button would turn on the backlight.  Oh, that's weird, it turned on by itself.  I read the time and distance, and resumed running.  Tried it one more time, and as I turned my wrist upward towards me, the backlight turned on again.  Cool!  Once home, I Googled this on Fenix 5 Plus and found indeed it is a feature.  Nice!

I feel there is so much on my new watch that I either experience accidentally (like this) or am not even aware of the functionality.  Kind of like my new car.  Last week on Route 95 I got a little closer to the car in front of me in my lane than I like to.  Not dangerously close, but still too close.  But as I went to apply the brakes, someone beat me to it and applied it themselves.  Gremlins?  No, autonomous braking!  Really cool!

Wednesday:  7

Training plan is now in taper mode.  Plan called for seven miles at a couple minutes slower than normal.  Ran 7 at Burlingame, with four on the Rhody 4 course with loppers (several of the usual places early in Kimball trails needed some work), and three from Kings Factory on a loop of Sammy Cs, Schoolhouse Pond, and Vin Gormley trails.  Warm.  Mid-60s in mid-November.

While clearing small branches, one snapped back
and gave me this nasty cut almost the length of my lower arm.
This is two days later, and the bleeding has long stopped,
but it has turned black and blue.  Nice battle scar, eh?

Thursday:  8

Veterans' Day.  Thank you to all that served, including my Dad.

Trying harder to hue closer to my training plan in this penultimate week before Philly.  Plan for today was an 8-miler with 3 x 1600 at 5K pace.  Given that I'm racing Sunday, albeit only a 4-miler, I opted to cut this down to 2 x 1600 (let's call it a mile).  That also fit nicely into a pattern of 2 easy, 1 hard, 2 easy, 1 hard, 2 easy.  Ran from the house on my 8-mile 'Round the Pond route.  Sunny and mid-50s.

I just ran hard instead of looking at my watch and trying to hue to a 5K pace, whatever that is for me these days.  5:5x pace?  Well, I didn't come close as my two fast miles were 5:23 and 5:18, closer to my Bottone Mile race pace this summer at 5:22.  To be fair, the 5:18 was wind-aided with a 9mph tailwind, and while this wasn't what I was supposed to run, I was pleasantly surprised with the end results.

Friday:  8

With Veterans' Day falling on a Thursday, I took today off to make a 4-day weekend!  Went to Tillinghast Preserve with Brady.  Very windy made it easy to decide to escape to the comfort and protection of the woods.  Alternating periods of no rain and periods of absolute driving downpour.  In November, that would sound cold, but the funny thing is it was 61° during our run!

Other than a few short exposed areas in fields and clearings, it was actually quite nice and enjoyable out there.  Just a little over a week from Philly, I made sure to take it slow and easy, and gave Brady plenty of time to jump into ponds and go under and fish sticks out of the ponds.  It's mentally cathartic for me to watch as well!

Saturday:  8

Marking 4-mile Rhody course.  Met up with WTAC colleagues Paul/Carol Ann team and Jonathan, who were splitting the marking of the 8-mile course.  This is the same thing we did last year, and it seemed to work well.

Except for me, who failed to bring enough pink flags to mark the 4-miler and ended up running back to my car to get more flags and do another loop.  Oh well, I wanted to get more than 4 miles anyway.  On established trails (such as Vin Gormley, 8-mile course), you don't need nearly as many flags, but on the 4-mile course, while a lot of run and actually more scenic running on the pond's edge, you need a lot of flags to make the course clear, especially much of it covered in layers of leaves.

Sunday:  7

30th annual Li'l Rhody Runaround.  Separate write-up to follow.

Weekly mileage:  43 run, 3 walk

Weekly synopsis:  I did pretty well in keeping relatively close to my training plan for the penultimate week, and surprisingly limited my fast miles to two miles pickup in the middle of a mid-week run, and opted to race the Rhody 4 Miler instead of 8 given the proximity to Philly.  All in all, a restrained but comfortable and good week.

Weekly highlight:  The Li'l Rhody 4 Miler!  

Weekly lowlight:  Nada.  Not even my rain and wind run counts, as it was warm and fun.