Training Log Archive: iansmith

I parked at the school at about 7:43, but I already was dressed and had my bib on. I warmed up enough to break out a sweat - which wasn't enough, but better than nothing. The temperature was pleasantly cool, perhaps 15 C.

In a word, glacial. But this is about what is reasonable to expect of my running right now; this is a PR, though the two 10ks I have run had monstrous climb. I haven't raced much at this distance, and I was wary of going out too fast. I decided to run a conservative first two miles, then ramp up and push; there wasn't much of a difference between my initial effort and my ending paces apart from the downhill. I did have a little difficulty breathing despite my cetirizine, so I might find a little time in a non-allergy race. The climb was very mild.

About 5 km into the race, I started hearing a guy chatting with a child; I figured he was on a bike. Shortly thereafter, a man pushing a stroller pulled up beside me and gradually edged ahead of me. He looked speedy and strong. I stayed within about 10m of him until the last km, when I kicked ahead of him. After the race, according to a friend of Stephen Petrikalis, the guy is legit, though I think he was just out for a morning tempo run + munchkin and wasn't entered into the race. I finished tenth out of 487. The pace quartiles were 7:44/mi, 8:38/mi, and 9:31/mi.

Graceful like a charging hippo.

Cool down with Alex + scoring some swag. We had a fail later in the morning: after some delicious waffles at Chez Alex + Ed and Brendan joining us, we set out for Earl's Trails. We were inhibited by two traffic episodes: one residual one from earlier in the day when a bus went partway over the edge of a railing on a bridge by I-90 exit 17 in Newton and some unknown collision which stopped traffic on I-90 near I-84 for about an hour. We decided to turn around after 12:40p, when we were still 40 minutes away. A disappointing expedition, though we had good chits and chats in the car.

Easy longish run around the river. I ran in intermittent rain, and my glasses were quickly rendered useless. I threw in 6x45s reps and 4x15s reps at the end to get my legs moving fast. I need more short, quick speed work to get my legs turning, as they are ponderous and sluggish.

I'm disappointed with my Cat Rock performance - my margin of victory over Giovanni was largely due to my route choice to 12. On the other controls, I was sluggish and ineffective.

Event: Boston Park Series: Cat Rock Park
 

I'm leaning towards attending the Canadian Champs in British Columbia in August for my summer O.

C • Do it! 8

CSU Park-O at Cat Rock. After battling through Cambridge traffic, I arrived at about 7:05. I didn't want to keep everyone waiting, so I rushed through my pre-race routine of dressing and warming up. I felt stiff from my tempo workout yesterday. I had acceptable flow today, though my run had plenty of avoidable hesitations and time losses 10-20m from the controls. Cat Rock could use a revision, as it took some work for the quickroute to match the terrain. There also has been some recent construction.

I was very confused at 1 after I left the trail from a poor mental picture of the circle. I left 2 in a weird direction and ran along the trail to reestablish a clear picture. 5s of "qua?" in the circle at 6 and 7 when I didn't see the flags. I ran low to 9, which was a bit longer near the end; I hesitated at the stone wall before the circle. I was stabbed by my right eye by red briar in the circle at 10 - hence the blood on the map scan by 7. I was very confident on my route choice to 12 via the trail after seeing the swampy vegetation. I almost overran 14 on the trail; I expected the swamp to be much more visible from the trail. I missed 15 right, but that may be due to the map, as my line is parallel to the leg. Some hesitation leaving the trail into 16. Quickroute. All splits were ranked 1-3, lost 49s to Superman. The field wasn't that deep, so those statistics are somewhat misleading.

C • qua 2

Cat Rock - Splits

2x20 minute tempo workout. I felt unusually labored, possibly from pollen allergies. The evening was beautiful, with a radiant sunset and a temperature of about 18 C. I warmed up for 16 minutes, ran my out-and-back with a 3 minute rest, and cooled down. I deliberately ran the second bout at a reduced intensity, as I felt like I was killing myself on the first bout. Instead of trying to hit a particular intensity on the second bout, I concentrated on keeping good form with upright posture and consistent foot (ball) strikes.

5.1 km splits: 19:29 (wee bit too fast), 21:19.

Tennis with Wadz and Luc. We played 2 on 1 and rotated; total playing time was about 75 minutes. Pollen allergies are destroying me despite cetirizine.