Training Log Archive: RLShadow

Morning run on the Hojack Trail with the dog, Homer. From Klem; NW on trail to just a little past Vosburg, then back to Van Alstyne. The trail was very muddy in lots of spots between Klem and Van Alstyne, so we detoured around that part by going on roads (Van Alstyne to Klem, back to car). Homer didn't like the road portion, in the direct sun; but I really didn't like the mud portion either, so we kind of compromised by going through the mud one way, and on the roads on the return trip.

I managed to wear the shoes that I had intended to wear in the race yesterday, and can confirm that they are far more comfortable than the ones I actually did wear.

I actually felt pretty good; no major after-effects from the 10K yesterday.

Irondequoit 10K. I had a loose goal of breaking 50 minutes, and I did accomplish that. I also finished 3rd in my age group and got a trophy. I saw Tom Lamme there prior to the race, and knew that with him in the race, there was zero possibility of winning my age group, and I was certainly right about that. His time was around 40:30 (6:35/mile), about a minute and a half per mile faster than my pace. He's amazing, for anyone, but especially for being 62 years old.

The course is reasonably tough, in that the first 3 miles are generally downhill (dropping around 150 feet), then the 4th mile is a significant uphill (around 100 foot elevation gain). And there is a fairly short but quite steep hill at around the 5.8-mile mark.

My mile paces were:

1st mile: 7:37
2nd mile: 7:52
3rd mile: 7:57
4th mile: 8:54
5th mile: 8:15
6th mile: 7:47
from 6.0 to finish: 1:24, or 7:00/mile pace.

I accidentally wore the wrong shoes. I had intended on wearing Asics Gel Nimbus, which are my favorite shoes for road running. Instead, I grabbed my Nike Pegasus, which I find substantially less comfortable in general. Fortunately, it was after the race when I realized the error, or I would have been totally psyched out, and mad at myself. As it was, I noticed right away that the shoes didn't feel all that comfortable, but I didn't know why, and I put that out of my mind after about the 1-mile mark (although they were still bothering me, I didn't obsess about it). Blame the mixup partly on getting home at 1 am last night from our band playing at a private party in Sodus Point, and therefore me being very groggy at 6:30 am this morning as I was getting my race stuff together.

C • Great job! 2

Late morning road run. From home; to Maple, Ridge, Gravel, Rt 104 path, Maple, and back home. Started out slow for the first half mile or so, then picked up the pace to where I must have been averaging under 8:00/mile for the last 3.5 miles. My first run in 3 days.

I'm doing the Irondequoit 10K tomorrow, so I didn't want to go into the race with 3 off days in a row. I decided a fairly short but reasonably fast run was what I needed today; whether that's really the case or not, who knows.

I haven't done a road race in quite a while, and haven't done a road 10K in even longer, so I'm not sure what to expect. (I did do the Jan. 1 Freezeroo which is a road race, but I don't really count that because I consider it a victory just getting myself out to do 7.5 miles on New Year's morning.) A couple of decades ago my goal was to break 40 minutes in a 10K, which I managed to do on two occasions. Now I think a reasonable goal is to break 50 minutes. If I don't, I won't be all that disappointed or surprised, but it seems like I should be within a couple of minutes of 50, either way.

Some more Seneca Park mapping. Got rained out after a short time, but I checked out a couple of specific things that I was interested in, so it wasn't a total loss.

C • Maps 3

Glen Edith hill workout (the road leading to the bay from the corner of Ridge Rd and Bay Rd). Four hill repeats. First one very slow, 4:47 (for 0.41 miles), when I wasn't warmed up. Fastest was #3, in 3:47. Other two were 4:04 and 4:08. Ran a longer way down, about 0.9 miles.

Morning run in Ohiopyle, PA, prior to driving home. Ran on the Allegheny Passageway rail-trail; ran in the downstream direction, which was about a 100 foot drop over 3.5 miles, then returned. Had trouble getting going at first, so my return trip was faster (8:30/mile) even though it was slightly uphill, than the outgoing trip (around 9:15/mile).