I ended up with early-morning work meetings today, so I decided to just decided delay my run until the afternoon. I guess I could have started at 5:00am but knew this would not be smart based on how things went yesterday. My run yesterday morning was less than stellar, and for some reason I just felt tired all day. With this in mind, I didn’t want to compound my fatigue by having to get up super-early.

With all that being said….I hate, hate, HATE it when I can’t get my run done in the morning for at least three reasons:

(1) It usually means that my run will cut into family time (in this case I was not able to eat dinner with them before we had to be ready for mid-week worship)

(2) It almost always means that it will be a solo run, without my friends Nathan or Paxton (again this was the case today)

(3) During the Spring and Summer it is often very warm in the late afternoon

The only good thing about today was that it gave my body a little more time to rest, and I could really tell the difference from yesterday. My schedule called for 60 minutes at easy pace, and I decided to make this a Hattori run through the streets of Bellevue.

Even though it was hot, I knew immediately that things would be better than yesterday. My legs felt pretty fresh, and the aches and stiffness I felt on the trails yesterday were mostly gone. After a first mile of 9:02, I settled into a very comfortable rhythm in the low 8:00s (and even one 7:58) for the remainder of the run.

As I was finishing mile two on Sawyer Brown Road, I saw an older gentleman riding a bicycle headed my way. I gave him a courtesy wave just as we were about to pass, and then he yelled “Wanna Run Together Sometime?” I had never laid eyes on this man before and was a little taken back by this question. Stammering for an answer I blurted out “maybe” and just kept running. I turned my head briefly and saw that he also kept riding. No idea what that was about.

Anyway, for 60-minutes I completed 7.29-miles at an average pace of 8:15 per mile.

Beast Mode….ON!

On a side note, I have now put 240 miles on my Saucony Hattoris. Since the Hattori has a mostly foam outsole (as opposed to rubber), I really thought it would wear down very quickly. The irony is that today my big toe finally wore a hole in the sock-like upper, but the outsole is still going strong. The hole in the upper is fairly uncomfortable, so I guess this means it is time for a replacement. I’m really curious about the new Hattori LC (with laces), but these do not come out for another three weeks. Not sure how many more miles I can get out of my current pair before they become unwearable.

Some days you’ve got it….some days you don’t. Today was clearly one of those days where I did NOT have it. However, I’m not down about it all, because before this I’ve had the longest string of days where I DID have it in my running life.

The schedule for this morning called for 45-minutes easy with 6 x 100m stride outs at the end. Nathan and I decided to meet at the Edwin Warner Nature Center and run 22 1/2 minutes out-and-back on the Candy Cane and Red Trails between Edwin and Percy Warner Parks. I could tell from the outset that my body was just not going to cooperate. The humidity was still very high and my legs felt heavy and achy.

I spent the whole run trying to maintain pace with Nathan, especially going up the steep hills on the red trail (still had over 1,100 ft of elevation gain even though it was just a 45-minute run), but eventually just let him go. It didn’t help that three times during the run I had to stop and re-tie the laces on my Saucony Peregrines. I love these shoes, but the stock laces have got to be the worst ever included on a pair of trail shoes. I absolutely cannot keep them tied, even with double knots. Any of my trail-running friends out there have a recommendation for a good pair of replacement laces?

Love the symmetry of the out-and-back on the elevation chart

Anyway, I started to feel slightly better on the way back to the Nature Center, but coming back was mostly downhill and much easier than going out. At the end of the trail portion my total was 4.5-miles completed at just under 10-minute pace. We finished up with stride outs in the parking lot of the Nature Center. Recently Nathan has been blowing by me on the strides, but today I was able to keep up with him through the first 3 reps. However, for the final 3, he again blew past me like I was sitting still. My average pace for the strides was 5:48.

Final total was 4.9-miles completed at 9:40 average pace per mile.

Beast Mode….flickering…..flickering……flickering……ON!

Running Warehouse has just posted a sneak peak of the upcoming Saucony Peregrine 3 trail shoe, which is set to drop in March 2013. I am currently running trails in the first Peregrine and will probably not need a new pair until the first of next year (perfect timing)!

The great thing is that Saucony did not change the awesome platform between the initial offering and the Peregrine 2 released earlier this year. According to Running Warehouse, the same thing will be true for the Peregrine 3. All of the changes will again be focused on the upper, which will gain the same flexfilm overlays used in the Kinvara 3. While they don’t list the weight specs, I’m hoping this will result in a lower total weight from the previous two versions.

I’m somewhat intrigued by the upcoming Kinvara TR because it weighs just over 8 ounces. However, I’m not sure that it would be a great shoe for the types of trails we typically run. If the Peregrine could lose a little weight, I could have the best of both worlds!

In addition to all of this, the new color in the picture above is SICK! What do you think?

Update: Per Matt with Running Warehouse, the Peregrine 3 will be 9.9 ounces for Men’s size 9 which is a few tenth’s lighter than the Peregrine 2.

With the rainy weather moving through Middle Tennessee came the return of the nasty humidity this morning. This was probably the worst humidity I’ve run in since the 500 Festival Mini Marathon back in May.

There was a slight variation to my normal Monday workout this morning. For the last three weeks it has been 70 minutes total with 20 minutes easy, 30 minutes at tempo pace, and 20 minutes easy. Today it was 60 minutes total with 20 minutes easy, 20 minutes at tempo pace, and 20 minutes easy, with 6 x 100m stride outs at the end. During the previous three weeks, my goal pace for the tempo portion has been 7:15, 7:15, and 7:10. Today that goal was was dropped to 7:00 flat, though it was 10 minutes shorter.

Nathan and I again met at the Forest Home Church on Old Natchez Trace and ran our 20-minute warmup through the Monpier Farms subdivision. Before we started our loop, Nathan suggested that we run it backwards to mix things up a bit from the previous weeks. Very early on in the loop we realized that running it in reverse was a LOT harder with two fairly steep climbs…

There are two things funny about this… (1) We didn’t realize how sharp the downhills were when running it the “normal” way, and (2) Even with the climbs we still ran the loop faster than the previous weeks. For the 20 minute warmup we completed 2.45-miles at an 8:14 average pace, and by the time we got back to the church building I was already dripping with sweat.

For the tempo portion we ran 10 minutes out-and-back on Old Natchez, Old Hillsboro Road, and Del Rio Pike. It is interesting to me how different my Garmin 405 is from Nathan’s 305. My watch showed that we ran the entire 20-minutes almost dead-on 7:00 pace, while Nathan’s showed that we ran both of the first two miles several seconds too fast. Anyway, the pace definitely felt faster than last week’s 7:10, especially with the humidity, but I felt pretty good throughout.

I figured the humidity and faster pace would make my heart rate increase significantly during the tempo portion over the previous 3 weeks, but it wasn’t too bad. The first week my average heart rate was 164 for 30 minutes at 7:15 pace. The second week it was 160 for 30 minutes at 7:15 pace. Last week it was 158 for 30 minutes at 7:10 pace. Today it was 160 for 20 minutes at 7:00 pace.

For our 20-minute cooldown, we ran another 10 minutes out-and-back in the opposite direction down Old Natchez. By the end of this section my legs were beginning to feel a bit heavy, but we still completed 2.41 miles with an average pace of 8:22.

The last thing on the agenda was the 6 x 100m stride outs, and both of us knew these were gonna be tough on tired legs. Nathan suggested that we use this long, flat driveway beside the church building for the strides. It was definitely the perfect spot, with no traffic, but it did have a sign that said “Private Drive: No Trespassing!” With our experience at Ensworth High School at few weeks ago, I half expected a security guard in a Hummer to jump out and tell us to get lost.

Needless to say that never happened, and the strides were indeed challenging on tired legs, but my average pace was around 5:45. However, Nathan repeatedly blew past me like I was standing still.

Overall it was another good workout with Nathan. In total we finished 8.12-miles with a 7:43 average pace per mile.

Beast Mode….ON!

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Jeanne Robertson “Don’t send a man to the grocery store!” – I haven’t posted a humor related video in a while and was recently reminded of this great story from Jeanne Robertson. Very much worth a watch!

Jeanne is a nationally recognized humorist and professional speaker. In 1963, at age 18, she was named Miss North Carolina. I regularly hear her on Laugh USA on XM Radio, and she has become one of my favorites. Enjoy!

Since Dan and Marc were both out of town this weekend, the task of organizing the group’s Saturday run fell to me. My schedule called for 14-16 miles at an easy pace with a few miles at a slightly quicker pace in the middle of the run.

With this in mind, my plan was to start at the Percy Warner Park main gates and complete three loops in Belle Meade of 4 to 5 miles each. The temperatures and humidity were expected to be higher than the past few days (which they were) so each loop ended back at the cars to allow everyone to grab some fluids. The plan was to run the first loop fairly easy, pick-up the pace slightly for the second loop, then do the final loop fairly easy again.

We ended up with a bigger group than I was expecting, which was great. For the first loop we did a version of Ed’s famous “Zig Zag” loop in reverse, which had a total distance of just over 4.5-miles . I ran most of this loop with Kelly and Aine, and we kept the pace very chill with splits of 9:17, 8:50, 8:46, and 8:40. Everything felt very comfortable.

Loop #1 – The famous “Zig-Zag” loop (in reverse) – 4.61 Miles

The second loop was just over 5.3-miles and was a little more challenging with regard to elevation change. My goal for this section was to drop the pace down around 8:00 min per mile, and again I was joined by Kelly for most of the route. We finished the fifth mile (started during the first loop) with a time of 8:22, and then reeled off splits of 7:59, 7:54, 8:19, 8:03, and 8:00. On the 8:19 mile, we ran backwards a couple of times so the following group would know where to turn, and this slowed us down a bit. Everything still felt very good, and I could have run faster, but I didn’t want to push anything today.

Loop #2 – 5.32 Miles

Our final loop was a little more challenging than I expected when I drew it up earlier this week, but the visual interest of running through the Belle Meade Mansion and Temple properties made for a fun route. We took the pace back down a couple of notches, and I ran this one with both Bob and Kelly. Our splits were 9:02, 8:32, 8:45, 8:32, and 7:33. I got a little carried away on the last mile back on Belle Meade Boulevard. Even though I started feeling the increased heat and humidity during this section, my legs still felt fantastic, and I broke away a bit at the end. I just ran what felt comfortable, and was pretty surprised when 7:33 poped up on my watch.

Loop #3 – 5.18 Miles

Normally at the end of a run I feel a rush of endorphins after I stop. Today I felt much worse after I stopped than when I was still running. Strange, but I think it had a lot to do with the increase in heat and humidity this morning. Overall, it was a fun run with lots of good conversation, and I felt pretty great throughout. My final total was just over 15 miles completed with an average pace of 8:27 per mile.

Beast Mode…ON!

Wow, are you scared? I can’t imagine what it must be like to be behind the pulpit!

Not at all….I usually end up preaching a dozen or so times a year at various congregations in the area. Something that I love to do. Starting next week I will be helping another church as a “fill-in” until their new pulpit minister starts in August.

The irony about this is that I was originally scheduled to preach for another church on Sun PM, which is also in Wilson County. That ended up getting cancelled last week, but today my good friend Andy, who is the preacher at Center Chapel, called and asked if I could be a last minute fill-in for him. Funny how things work out sometimes 🙂

Anyway, I’m excited to visit with this congregation on Sun, and plan to preach from one of my favorite chapters in the Bible, Ecclesiastes 5. If you’re in the area please come and join us.

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Our track group has been temporarily displaced by the Nashville Strider’s Track Series which is being held at Vanderbilt on Thursday nights in June. Fortunately, Jenny from our group is a teacher and the cross country coach at Harpeth Hall, so with her help we received permission to use their awesome track facility in the interim…

Tonight I felt really good during the workout, and I’m sure the continued mild weather conditions had a lot to do with it. The temperatures were around 80 degrees at the start with clear skies and low humidity.

Here’s the rundown…

• 2.5-mile warmup
• 6 x 100m stride outs
• 600m f (200m recovery)
• 400m f (200m recovery)
• 800m straights and curves (400m recovery)
• 2 x 400m f (1-min standing recovery / 200m recovery)
• 2 x 400m g (1-min standing recovery / 400m recovery)
• 1000m f (200m recovery)
• 1-mile cool down

Beginning with the second interval, John split us up into groups based on our pace, and I ended up running the entire workout by myself. The thing that made tonight’s workout challenging was the relatively short recoveries between intervals. However, I felt good enough that even with the short recoveries I ended up running faster splits than normal.

For example, lately I’ve been running my 400m “fresh” intervals around 84 or 85, and my 400m “good” intervals around 80 or 81. Tonight my three “fresh” 400m splits were 83, 81, and 80. My two “good” 400m splits were 76 and 77. On a side note, that second “good” 400m repeat was a mistake. The workout actually called for a “good” followed by a “fresh” on the second 2 x 400m repeat, but I misread it.

Final total for the night was 7.6-miles completed with warmup and cool down. My daughter Kate came with me to track tonight and ended spending most of her time playing on the school playground. After track we had a little impromptu daddy-daughter date night with dinner at Pei Wei and dessert at Sweet CeCe’s. Fun times!

Beast Mode…ON!

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Happy “National Running Day” everybody! After several weeks of really nasty weather, the past 6 days in Middle Tennessee have been AWESOME. Much lower temperatures and humidity. I could get used to this!

Anyway, today’s schedule called for 60 minutes at an easy pace, and I decided to run in my Saucony Hattoris. Nathan and I devised a 7ish mile route beginning at the Bellevue United Methodist Church parking lot and winding through the streets of Bellevue, Edwin Warner Park, and the Harpeth River Greenway. 

For this run we kept everything very chill with regard to pace. Our first mile was 9:24, followed by 5 miles between 8:55 and 8:42. For our final full mile we slowed a bit to 9:02.

Overall this was a very comfortable and enjoyable run with lots of good conversation with a dear friend. Our final total was 7.45 miles completed at an 8:58 average pace.

On another note, today my total mileage for 2012 crossed the 1,000-mile mark. This is well ahead of pace for my beginning of the year goal to complete 2,000 miles in 2012…

Just for comparison I ran a report on my total mileage as of June 6 in 2011 and came up with just over 638 miles…

That’s a difference of 367.3 miles year over year! When I look at the first half of 2011, my mileage was very inconsistent from week to week, month to month. For 2012 I haven’t had any massive mileage weeks or months, but have consistently landed between 175 and 210 miles for each month so far this year. I know that with my training for the Milwaukee Lakefront Marathon in October those monthly totals are only going to go up (if I stay healthy).

Beast Mode…ON!

What do you do? Are you an attorney?

I’m actually an IT Consultant. Our consulting group is a subsidiary of a public accounting firm here in Nashville.

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Today’s schedule called for 40 minutes at an easy pace with 6 x 100m stride outs at the end. I really wanted to run trails at least once this week so Nathan and I decided to hit the Blue trail in Edwin Warner park (plus the smaller Orange and Yellow to add some distance).

Our running friend Susan Johnson always says that she hears at least one woodpecker on every run. Well, today Nathan and I heard at least three while running on the trails (unless there was one that kept moving around). One of the awesome things about running trails is being enveloped in nature and getting away from the distractions on the road.

Just as we started on the flat portion of the Blue trail we came across a lady who I see quite frequently in the park. She was standing in the middle of the trail by one of the bridges, pointing at the ground. She said something to the effect of “there’s a snake right there, be careful!” Neither Nathan nor I saw anything on the trail that resembled a snake, but she kept standing there and pointing. Not exactly sure what she was looking at, but Nathan and I just kept running.

On the flat and downhill portions of the trail our average pace was between the mid 8:00s and mid 9:00s. For the steep climb(s) we fluctuated between 10:00 and 10:30 per mile. As I’ve mentioned before, the Blue trail is fairly short, but does have one significant climb right in the middle that will get your attention…

Even after the fairly hard tempo effort yesterday, and P90X Legs and Back last night, my legs felt pretty strong on the climbs and throughout the run. Before we started our stride outs, Nathan and I had completed just over 4 miles at around a 9:30 average pace per mile on the trails.

We did our 6 x 100m stride outs in the parking lot, still wearing our trail shoes. This felt a little strange with the big lugs on the bottom of my Saucony Peregrines. My pace for the strides was around 5:55. I don’t know what Nathan’s pace was for these, but he absolutely blew past me on the last few to the point where I felt like I was standing still.

Final total was 4.5-miles completed with a 9:18 average pace per mile. Great run!

Beast Mode…ON!

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