Building towards Boston!

In 12 weeks time I will be toeing the start line in Boston. Not exactly toeing the line, but maybe 100 yards behind the line in the first "normal person" corral. The last 3 weeks have been moderately consistent...46-52 miles a week with a couple of tempo runs, two interval workouts, and a very high volume of swimming. As my Boston plan begins to unfold, it is time to "kick it up a notch" as Emeril would say, a man who certainly shares the same fondness for food as this guy. In sticking to my guns, I am going to max out around 65 miles a week and keep the swimming and biking incorporated in the training. However I need to focus a little more on my running schedule and let the swimming and biking complement that when time allows.

The weekend long run wasn't exactly what I was hoping for due to the volunteering at the Charlotte Running Company Trail Race and then running the trails afterwards to clean them up, but it was fun and definitely worth the sacrifice . I was shooting for a third straight weekend long run of 16 miles, but only managed 13 on the trails as my hip flexors are never happy diving into a long run on the trails when I haven't run trails in while. After a good minuter workout on Friday evening, the trail run felt nice and relaxed until the last couple of miles as I was solo for the last 3 of the 13 and I couldn't convince my brain nor my legs for another 3 treacherous miles on the slick trails. My legs were getting heavy, my hips tight, and I didn't want to risk a fall or turning an ankle on the roots so I decided to cut the run short. It was a cold, early morning and a long day, but definitely worth the fun volunteering at the water stop and supporting Donny's race. The rest of the team was gathering for lunch at the WWC restaurant and if I had tacked on 3 additional miles I might have only gotten to clean up their scraps from lunch and I didn't want to miss out on the good food!

On Sunday James and I rode over the Bicycle Sport in the balmy sub-30 degree weather for a long, easy paced ride on the infamous 65-mile Spamerton Route with a good crew. There were some spurts of moderate effort once we all warmed up and seeing as it was my longest ride since Clearwater I felt surprisingly spry. Sunday afternoon James, Selle, and I had a good swim workout and I ended the day with a good deep stretch yoga class and dollar tacos with a fun group watching football.

This week will be a bigger mileage push on the run while still incorporating a high swim volume and a couple of bike rides. I am going to try and blow the rust out of the system with the Winter Flight 8k on Saturday. It's been a while since I have raced and even longer since I have done a stand alone road race so I am excited about pushing the envelope a little early in the training cycle.

On another note, Packers vs. Steelers in the Super Bowl in two weeks. I am conflicted on who to root for as the Packers knocked out my Falcons a week ago and my good buddy being such a huge Steelers fan, but I think I'm leaning towards the Packers and Aaron Rodgers. The guy is a hell of a QB and after being dissed on draft day by so many teams it would be nice to see him get some vindication.