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This morning’s scheduled workout was new territory for me. It called for a 20-minute warmup at easy pace, followed by 35-minutes with my heart rate between 165 and 175 bpm, and then a 15 to 20-minute cool down at easy pace. To my recollection, this was the first time I’ve ever done a run based on a target heart rate range.

John’s specific instructions were “DO NOT WORRY ABOUT PACE,” so to that end I removed the pace and distance fields from my Garmin, and only left Current Heart Rate, Average Heart Rate for Lap, and Elapsed Time for Lap. I also turned off the “auto-lap” function so that I could manually make each segment its own “lap” for tracking elapsed time and heart rate.

Nathan and I met at the Forrest Home Church parking lot on Old Natchez Trace, and then completed our warmup through the Montpier Farms subdivision. After grabbing some quick fluids, we set out on an out-and-back down Old Natchez and Del Rio Pike for the 35-minute tempo segment. At first I had a really hard time getting my heart rate up above 165, and did not hit that mark until at least 3/4 of the way through the first mile. As a matter of fact, my primary focus for most of the way out was trying to keep my heart rate UP into the target range.

For a while I was thinking that John must have gotten my heart rate target mixed up with someone else he coaches. Even though I didn’t know my specific pace or distance, I knew that we were moving pretty fast. I almost never hear Nathan breathing heavy during our runs, but even he was laboring a little, and there was almost no conversation during this segment. As a side note, even though this part was very hard, my legs felt better than they have in a couple of weeks, and that was VERY encouraging.

Once we turned around at the halfway point my focus turned to keeping my heart rate DOWN into the target range, and I had to progressively drop my pace to keep it from rising too high. Before we started the tempo segment, Nathan told me he had set an alarm on his Garmin if his heart rate went above 187. I figured if he tried to stay with me the whole way he would be pushing that limit. This says nothing about his level of fitness, just that he is almost 10 years younger than me, and has a crazy high maximum heart rate. Sure enough, after about 25 minutes the alarm went off and he decided to back off a bit, though he never fell much behind.

From the moment during mile one that I reached 165 until the time I finished, I never left the target zone. One time I noticed my watch showed 175 on the dot, but it did not go any higher. Once we finished, we again grabbed another quick drink and then did our cool down out-and-back on Old Natchez.

Looking back now after the fact I noted that my average pace for the tempo segment was 6:58, though the first two miles were closer to the 6:30s. My average heart rate for this section was 167, with a maximum of 175. Overall we completed just under 9.75 miles with warmup and cool down at an average pace of 7:50 per mile. As I mentioned earlier, my legs felt fantastic throughout this run, and I’m very pleased to have bounced back from being so tired yesterday.

Beast Mode…ON!

Today the schedule called for 60 minutes at easy pace, so Nathan and I met at the Edwin Warner Nature Center for an out and back route to the model airplane field via the park roads and the Harpeth River Greenway.

Back when John started coaching me at the first of May, he told me not to worry too much about a target pace on my scheduled easy runs, but to just go with how I felt on that particular day. Well today I felt TIRED, and for the first time in a long time all of my mile splits were over 9 minutes (especially when I wasn’t wearing my Hattoris).

I guess this was to be expected after a full day of travel on Saturday, followed by a 15-mile run at 10:30pm and preaching the next morning for a church that is an hour away. I didn’t feel bad, just felt like I was low on energy. Recently my easy days have turned into progression runs because I continue to feel better throughout the run. Today, however, that didn’t happen.

In total we finished just over 6.5-miles in the 60 minutes with an average pace of 9:15 per mile. Hopefully the energy will be back tomorrow for my scheduled tempo run. This will be my first ever run with a segment based on a target heart rate range. Should be interesting.

Beast Mode…ON!

Well, my week (8-days) of crazy runs continued last night with an effort that started at 10:30pm and continued well past midnight. Since we were traveling back home from the beach early Saturday morning, I either had to get in my scheduled 14 to 16-miles last night or early this morning. Early this morning was less attractive, because I needed to be in Lebanon, TN (about an hour away) by 8:45am to preach.

I decided to head out about 10pm to try and avoid the heat as much as possible (It was 104º when we got home late yesterday afternoon). I reached out to Nathan via text, and unbelievably he was also interested in getting in a run. We ended up meeting around 10:25pm at the start of Old Natchez Trace, and planned to run a little over 7.5-miles out-and-back on Old Natchez and Del Rio Pike.

Even at 10:30pm it was still almost 85º, though fortunately the humidity was not very bad. However, there was absolutely no breeze stirring at all, which made it feel like running with a blanket wrapped around you. We started out very easy and by mile 6 had worked our pace down to 8:08. I honestly couldn’t believe how good I felt considering the heat and a full day of travel.

However, sometime during the 7th or 8th mile, Nathan asked if we could back off the pace a bit, because he was having trouble keeping his heart rate down. We took a short break at the turn-around spot, and then headed back at about an 8:45 pace. After two more miles, Nathan said that he just didn’t have it tonight and needed to walk. Unfortunately with an out-and-back route there isn’t much opportunity to take a shortcut back. I told him that I would run out the remaining 6 miles and then head back in the car to pick him up.

Even though I was already feeling pretty good, this gave me a little bit of an extra push to pickup the pace so I could get back and pickup Nathan. I was honestly a little worried about him, but knew that he was smart enough not to push himself too hard, and it would be better for me to go grab the car than to stay with him and walk.

For those remaining 6 miles I did two in the low 8:00s, two in the 7:50s, and two in the 7:40s. All of these miles felt very comfortable, and other than being really HOT, I continued to feel really good all the way to the end.

I headed back down the route in my car to pickup Nathan and found him after about 3-miles. He said that his heart rate had come back down, and we both agreed that he was probably dehydrated. I hate that Nathan had a bad evening, but am grateful for his willingness to come out there with me, and that I felt so good on a very warm night.

In total I finished 15.36-miles with an average pace of 8:16 per mile. Since this was the last run of June (and technically the first one of July), this marked the completion of my biggest mileage month ever with just under 213-miles completed.

Beast Mode…ON!

When John gave me my schedule for this week he told me to feel free to move the days around as needed to accommodate my vacation. This morning I swapped out the scheduled 14 to 16 mile run for the 30 to 40 minute run which was down for Sunday. Our family planned to go out for breakfast today instead of eating in the condo, so I didn’t want to have to either get up super early or make everyone else wait on me to get back. Also, Olivia’s schedule called for a 40-minute run, so it worked out perfect for us to go together again.

We planned to both do a 20-minute out-and-back route along the ocean on Front Beach Road. While it wasn’t as hot in Panama City today as it was back home (new record high of 109 degrees in Nashville!), it again felt pretty toasty with no shade and little breeze. I also think that all this running in concrete sidewalks this week has started to take its toll. I felt terrible on the way out for the first 20 minutes. My legs felt tired and achey, and I just couldn’t find a rhythm.

Once I turned back for the second half my legs started to loosen up and I finally found a good running rhythm. Because of this I ended up getting back to the start a full two minutes before I had completed my planned 40 minutes. Olivia had finished just ahead of me at the condo, so as she waited I ran another minute down Front Beach and then headed back. After 40 minutes I had completed just over 4.7-miles with an average pace of 8:30 per mile.

Even though we technically haven’t been running together I have very much enjoyed starting and finishing with Olivia a couple of times this week. I think that is one of the things that helped with the second half of my run this morning….knowing that if I stopped and took a break she would have to wait on me at the end.

Tomorrow morning we pack up and head home to Tennessee fairly early, so no run on the docket for me. I do still have to get in my 14 to 16 miler sometime either late Saturday or early Sunday before worship. Either way it has to get done.

Beast Mode…ON!

This morning I slept in a bit later than I had the first few days on vacation, and ended up paying for it on my morning run. The schedule called for 45 minutes at easy pace with 6 x 100m stride outs at the end. By the time I started the temps were already well over 80 and there was no breeze to speak of and absolutely no shade.

This made for a very warm run, but my legs still felt pretty good throughout. Also this is the best my right shin has felt in the past two weeks. I didn’t even feel a twinge until I started my stride outs at the end.

In total I finished just over 5.7-miles with strides at an 8:18 average pace per mile.

Beast Mode…ON!

This morning Olivia and I did something that we rarely get to do…..we did our training run together. Well, I guess it would be more accurate to say that we did them at the same time, in the same general location. Both of our schedules called for 60-minute runs, so we each decided to do an out and back route on Front Beach Road along the ocean. This meant that we got to start together and finish together. Since my parents are with us on vacation they were able to watch the kids while we were running.

Now that we are completely clear of the tropical storm, the climate has returned to normal for this time of the year. The temps were around 80 when we started with very high humidity and a steady breeze throughout. The breeze felt pretty good since there is absolutely no shade, but it does make it harder to find a rhythm and maintain good running form.

As has been the case every day this week, my “easy paced” effort turned into somewhat of a progression run with every mile, except for one, faster than the previous. Here’s a rundown of my splits:

I also progressively felt better throughout the run which is always encouraging. I knew that my pace was progressively increasing, so I decided to make the outward half 31 minutes before turning around, thinking that it was more likely to take me 29 minutes to get back than the full 30. With about 5 minutes to go I passed Olivia heading back toward the condo, and I knew that I was still going to have time left when I finished the route. It actually only took me 28 minutes to get back after taking 31 minutes on the way out.

To make up this extra time, I turned around and ran back to Olivia and then we walked together back to the condo. She commented about how hot it had been, but was encouraged that her shins had not bothered her after having some pain earlier this week. All-in-all we both had successful runs this morning.

In total I finished 7.29 miles with an average pace of 8:15 per mile.

Beast Mode….ON!

Now that we are mostly clear from Tropical Storm Debby, this morning’s run was WAY different than yesterday. While it was still windy (though not as bad), about all I got today was full sun, full heat, and lots of humidity. In other words, about what you’d expect from a morning run on the gulf in late June.

My schedule today called for 45-minutes at easy pace with 6 x 100m stride outs at the end. Other than sweating like a dog, I again felt pretty good throughout the run, and my splits got a bit faster with every mile (9:16, 8:27, 8:20, 8:12, 7:55).

I did my stride outs across from the condo in what used to be the parking lot of the old Miracle Strip Amusement Park. I went there a bunch as a kid, but there is absolutely nothing there now. The pace for my strides was right at 6:00min pace. In total I finished 5.74-miles with an 8:14 average pace per mile.

Beast Mode…ON

This morning I checked another item off of my running bucket list (not really)…..Running in a Tropical Storm. With tropical storm Debby bearing down on the gulf coast, I took off along Front Beach Road for my scheduled 70 minute run at easy pace. Nathan….would this also be considered crazy?

I’ll have to say this was one of the strangest runs I’ve ever experienced as far as it relates to conditions. For most of the 70 minutes I faced constant strong winds with gusts of 40+ MPH. Sometimes it felt like I was being shoved forward, sometimes it felt like I was running in place, and other times my feet were landing way left or right of where I took off. When the run was finished I was covered by a nice layer of sand from all of the wind. The weather would also go from cloudy with no rain, to periods of pelting rain, to periods of full sun.

As for the run itself, I felt pretty good throughout, though I did get fatigued from constantly fighting the wind. I tried to maintain a consistent effort even though the conditions made my mile splits bounce all over the place. In total I finished just over 8.5-miles in the 70 minutes at a pace just under 8:15 per mile.

Now that it is later in the day, Debby has taken an unexpected turn to the east, which left us with clear skies and a beautiful sunset on the beach. Olivia and I along with Kate and Sara took the opportunity to enjoy a very nice walk together. While this is good news for us, it will be a tough couple of days for those in Central Florida.

Beast Mode…ON!

How bad do I want this? Bad enough to start my scheduled 15+ mile run at 3am this morning so I could get it in before our family left for vacation at 7am.

How good of a friend is Nathan? Such a good friend that he got up and ran it with me!

How CRAZY are we? INSANE!!

I honestly didn’t know when I was going to get my run in this weekend, but I knew one way or another it was going to get done. Yesterday Nathan texted me about running this morning with our running group. I said that we would be on our way to the beach while the group was running, and then half-jokingly threw out there that we could start at 3am! While I expected a “Thanks but no thanks,” he actually expressed some interest, and after a few more texts we had agreed to meet at the Edwin Warner Park Nature Center at 3am.

Because of packing, I was not able to get to bed last night until 11:30pm, so this was little more than a nap. Even though I was very tired when we started, it turned out to be a very good time to run since the temps were fairly mild (around 60 degrees).

With night-time reflective gear and head lamps equipped, we took off on a route that included Edwin Warner Park, the Harpeth River Greenway, and a very large section of the Bellevue community where we live.

After a very, very chill first mile, we settled into a nice rhythm with a pace in the mid to low 8:00s the remainder of the run. Even with the lack of sleep I felt very good throughout, and we just kept clicking off mile after mile.

A few highlights from the run…

About 3/4 of the way through the 5th mile I noticed a small object on the side of the road. I couldn’t really tell what it was, but assumed it was a piece of trash. As I stepped beside it I heard a sudden noise and then looked up to see a dove a few inches in front of my face flapping wildly. I jumped and screamed like a little girl, even causing Nathan to jump. This scared me enough that my heart went racing, and it took a couple of minutes to settle down.

A few minutes later we saw a woman standing in her front yard with a man laying down in the grass beside her feet. Even before we said anything, we assumed that one or both of them was very inebriated. Nathan made a comment that their reason for being outside at 3:45am was about 180 degrees different than ours. They were outside laying in the grass because they were plastered, and we were outside because we were in the middle of a 15+ mile run. Then he pointed out that we might be similar in level of craziness.

Near the end of the run, Nathan pointed out that we had set another “PR” this morning. He said the before today the earliest we had ever run together was 4am. He also said that our temperature “PR” for training was 9 degrees, which was two winters ago. Our previous 4am run was the day before the 2010 Marine Corp Marathon. Neither of us were participating, but our friend Paxton was going with some other members of our running group and needed a ride to the airport. In order to get our run in before I needed to pick him up we got up to run the Percy Warner 11.2-mile loop in the dark at 4am. That was a pretty interesting experience. The trees on that route are so dense that very little light can get through from the night sky, and taking on those massive hills in the dark was a much different perspective than running in the daylight.

As we finished up the run this morning in Edwin Warner Park, the sun was just beginning to come up over the trees. Nathan later posted this on Facebook…

There’s just something about watching the sun rise across the tree tops of Edwin Warner Park that makes you appreciate life and know undeniably that there is a creator. Praise God!

Couldn’t have said it any better myself. Even though it was early, it turned out to be a very enjoyable run with a really good friend. In total we completed 15.25 miles with an average pace of 8:29 per mile.

Beast Mode…ON!

With John (our coach) out of town for the next two weeks at the Olympic Track & Field trials, and not receiving an official workout from Jim Spivey, Dan suggested the group do 400m intervals at track tonight. However, our normal 400m workout is 3 sets of 3 x 400m repeats, but tonight we did 4 sets of 3 x 400m repeats! This is almost 4.5-miles of intervals, which is pretty long for our group. On top of this it was still 95º at 6pm, so needless to say it was fairly tough.

Here’s a rundown of the night…

• 2-Mile Warmup
• 6 x 100m Stride Outs
• 4 Sets of 3 x 400m vf (200m recovery / 400m recovery)
• 1/2-Mile Cool Down

For a normal 400m workout we will do a mixture of “fresh” and “good” paced repeats within each set. However, with the very high temps tonight, and the longer workout, Dan advised us to do each one at “very fresh” pace which should be 3 to 5 seconds slower than “fresh” per interval. Recently my “fresh” paced 400m splits have been around 82 to 84 seconds, so tonight I was shooting for something between 86 and 88.

As has been the case for the past few weeks, I basically ran tonight’s workout by myself. While my legs felt pretty good throughout, I did have some difficulty dealing with the heat and this led to a little less consistency between repeats than I would have liked. This was especially true during the first one and last one. Here is a rundown on my splits per set:

• Set 1 (86, 88, 84)
• Set 2 (88, 88, 86)
• Set 3 (86, 88, 89)
• Set 4 (88, 89, 90)

By the last set I could feel the heat pulsing in my face, but tried to stay as consistent as I could until the end. I lost a couple of seconds during the final two repeats, but overall I’m pretty happy with the workout and how I felt. Just like last week I drank 64 ounces of fluid during the evening + a little bit more from the water fountain at the track, because it was HOT! Final total with warmup and cool down was 8-miles completed at 7:35 average pace per mile.

My daughter Kate came with me to the track tonight, so we got to enjoy another impromptu daddy-daughter date night after the workout. We had dinner at Pei Wei followed by FroYo at Sweet CeCe’s. Great night!

Beast Mode….ON!

This post’s title is one of my favorite Tony Horton quotes from P90X, and has very little to do with our run this morning except that we did see a Tin Man hanging from a tree (more on this in a bit), and we did talk about Tony Horton quotes (though not this one).

Today’s schedule called for 60 minutes at easy pace, so Nathan and I decided to run the reverse of a route we used for a 60 minute run a couple of weeks ago. We started off very, very conservative with an opening mile of 9:29. From this point forward every mile got progressively faster. This wasn’t planned, but just happened that way. You can see our splits below…

I was actually surprised at how good I felt, especially after the first 3 miles. At no time did the pace feel fast or forced. It just felt comfortable throughout. My shin continues to improve, and only felt like a slight twinge this morning. We completed the route in 60:57, which is almost 6-minutes faster than two weeks ago (though that was a Hattori run, and this was not). Our final total was 7.44-miles completed at 8:12 average pace per mile.

As for the “Tin Man,” during our second mile I looked over and noticed about a 3-foot tall tin man hanging from someone’s tree that was made entirely out of old cans. I’m guessing that it was a bird feeder, but looked kinda strange.

Anyway, it was another good run with Nathan in the books!

Beast Mode…ON!

Even though my right shin has been doing better than last week, I’ve been trying to be as cautious as possible. To that end, Nathan and I did today’s scheduled 40-minute, easy paced, run on the grass surface at the Steeplechase course in Percy Warner Park.

This course is a great surface for running and is the site of the annual Iroquois Steeplechase equestrian race, which is one of the oldest and most prestigious steeplechases in the country. The ground is very soft and consistent, with no rocks, roots, or holes. The only downside is that the grass is EXTREMELY thick, which forces you to work a bit harder than on the road.

Overall the run felt great, though we did have to deal with very humid conditions and soggy turf (from the dew). By the end of the run my shoes and socks were completely soaked through, but my Dry Max socks again kept me from getting any blisters. In total we ran just under 4.5-miles during our 40 minutes, with a pace right around 9:00 average per mile. At the end we did 6 x 100m stride outs on the grass, which felt a little strange in high grass with wet shoes. Our final total with strides was 4.81-miles completed at a 8:51 average pace per mile.

Beast Mode…ON!

After four consecutive Mondays of 60 to 70 minute workouts with a 20 to 30 minute tempo section, today the schedule got cranked up a notch with 85 total minutes of running, including:

• 30 minutes easy
• 5 x 5 min repeats at 7:00 pace (1 min recovery)
• 30 minutes easy

Due to my work schedule this morning, Nathan and I started the workout from the Edwin Warner Park Nature Center just before 5am, when it was still quite dark. About 10 minutes into our initial warmup, Nathan was telling me about finding a Brown Recluse spider in their house last Friday. I was listening to him, looking slightly down, but looked up just in time to see a deer standing a few feet in front of me on the road.

It startled me enough to cause me to jump the side, which in turn caused the deer to jump in the opposite direction into the deep grass. There was another deer immediately behind that also ran away quickly when I jumped. That is the second time when running in Edwin Warner that I almost ran head-on into a deer (This one was a doe….the other time is was a many-point buck). Anyway, we completed the 30 minute warmup through the park with a total of 3.43-miles completed at a leisurely 8:47 average pace.

For the tempo intervals, we ran out and back on the Harpeth River Greenway, and things went very well. 7:00 min pace felt extremely comfortable and controlled. My Garmin “average pace” indicator did some weird things as we ran in and out of tree cover, but according to the distance reading we were very consistent between sets with .72, .71, .72, .72, and .72-miles completed. In total we completed 3.59-miles in 25:06 for an average pace of 6:59.6.

During the tempo intervals (and again during the cool down) we heard a couple of woodpeckers that sounded like machine guns going off. I was again reminded of my running friend Susan who always says that she hears at least one woodpecker on every run.

For our final, 30-minute cool down section we ran back in Edwin Warner Park on a reverse route to our 30-minute warmup. We were running through a short section right beside the Little Harpeth River, when I noticed a majestic looking hawk (I’m guessing red tailed) standing on the ground beside the path. We will occasionally see owls sitting in trees in the park, but I don’t ever recall seeing a hawk that wasn’t in flight. What a beautiful, beautiful creature!

We finished our run back at the Nature Center after adding another 3.5-miles at 8:36 average pace during our 30-minute cool down. Since our pace was a bit quicker than the warmup, we ended up doing a very short section on the blue trail to add a few minutes to our time.

In total we finished 10.51-miles for the morning at an 8:07 average pace with warmup and cool down. Another good morning!

Beast Mode….ON!

During the 6 weeks since my last race (500 Festival Mini Marathon in early May), John and I have been working on building my base in preparation for more intense training in July and August. Having just finished another week of running today, I was looking back at my log and noted that this has probably been the most consistent stretch of running I’ve ever had. See the charts below…

Beginning in the middle of last year I stepped up to running 6-days a week, with Sunday off. Following this same pattern with John as my coach, I have not missed a scheduled run for the past five weeks (red boxes are running days / dashed boxes are where I had 2 or more activities on the same day).

I’ve had bigger mileage weeks in the past, but never have I had 6 consecutive weeks with 43+ miles completed. I think there are at least three reasons for this improved consistency in my running: (1) Having a coach who monitors my logs brings a higher level of accountability. (2) I’ve been running a lot recently with Nathan, and it is always easier for me to get out and run when I’ve got somebody to go with me. Also, having a group to run with on Thursday nights and Saturday mornings is awesome. (3) I’ve been injury and illness free.

All-in-all I’m very blessed to be able to run, to enjoy it, to have friends to share it with, and to have a family that supports me.

Beast Mode….ON!

Friday

This morning I just couldn’t get myself out of bed early enough to get my run in. Nathan is out of town for the weekend, and sometimes it’s really hard for me to get up and get going when I know that no one is going to be waiting on me. I owe a lot to Nathan and Paxton for my running improvement/success over the past two years.

So, as punishment for my lack of morning motivation, I ended up running in the late afternoon when the temperatures were right at 90 degrees (nasty). My schedule called for 30 to 40 minutes at easy pace with 6 x 100m stride outs at the end. I started my run at the Edwin Warner Nature Center, and for two reasons did the first and last mile on the flat part of the blue trail instead of the road: (1) It always feels cooler on the trails with all of the tree cover (2) I’ve been feeling a bit of soreness in my right shin over the past couple of days and wanted a slightly softer surface for my easy run.

After a first mile around 9:00, I settled into a very nice 8:30ish pace for the remainder of the run, and felt pretty good considering the heat. I completed my stride outs in the parking lot of the nature center (in full sun) with a pace a little below 6:00. Final total was 4.86-miles in 40:36 with an 8:22 average pace per mile.

Saturday

Today’s planned group run was the 11.2-mile main drive loop in Percy Warner Park, which is quite challenging. Since my schedule called for 14 to 16 miles total I got there a little early and completed just over three miles in Belle Meade before joining the group in the park.

I mentioned on Friday that I had been feeling some soreness in right shin (shin splints), so this morning I decided to run in my old clunky and cushy Nike Vomeros since we would be doing so many hills in the park. This turned out to be a good decision and my leg felt pretty good. However, for the record, I now hate how these shoes feel compared to my Saucony Kinvaras. Gotta be diligent in my leg exercises so I can get out of these things as soon as possible on hilly runs.

Dan led our group run, and his strategy today was to run very easy on the downhill and flat portions, but push the pace on the uphills to build strength. Also, right at the start Dan told the group that he would be counting the hills we ran the loop today. This led to a persistent debate about what counted as a hill. As you can see from the elevation chart below, Percy Warner Park is not lacking in hills…

Even though the humidity was very high this morning after rains last night, I felt fantastic throughout the run today. I pushed pretty hard up most of the hills, even the daunting, named ones like 3-mile-hill, 7-mile-hill, and 9-mile hill (miles 6, 10, and 12 on the chart above). This was very encouraging after my miserable trail run earlier in the week in the same park.

When we came to end Dan and the group had counted 21 total hills in the park (very unscientific), which is pretty good in only 11.2-miles. For my entire route (including warmup miles) this equated to over 2,000 ft of cumulative elevation gain. My final total was 14.29-miles completed with an 8:48 average pace per mile.

Beast Mode…ON!

Thursday night means track workout with the JSRC. Tonight was the second of our three week stint at the Harpeth Hall while the Nashville Strider’s Track Series is being held at Vanderbilt. After having great weather last Thursday evening, the heat was back tonight with temps around 90 degrees at the start.

With the heat I was nervous about how I would feel considering I’ve already had one bad run this week. Also, my calves were REALLY sore from my Hattori run yesterday. I didn’t run any more mileage in my Hattoris than usual, but my pace was a bit quicker than I normally do in them.

Here’s the rundown…

• 2+ mile warmup
• 6 x 100m stride outs
• 4 x 200m f (100m recovery) [400m recovery]
• 600m g (400m recovery)
• 4 x 250m f (150m recovery) [400m recovery]
• 600m g (400m recovery)
• 4 x 200m f (100m recovery)
• .8 mile cool down

While I did notice a slight slowdown in my pace from last week due to the heat, I otherwise felt fantastic! Don’t get me wrong, it was very hot, but for some reason the heat did not seem to get to me tonight (though I did drink 64 ounces of fluid during the workout). The only issue I had at all was that my form felt a little sloppy in the curves during the first set of 4 x 200m. This got much better as we went along, so I’m guessing it had a lot to do with my sore calves.

Overall I was very pleased with the consistency of my splits. The two sets of “fresh” 400m repeats were 44, 44, 45, 43 and 43, 42, 42, 42, and my two 600m “good” intervals were 2:08 and 2:07. My final total with warmup and cool down was 7.39-miles completed at a 7:43 average pace.

Beast Mode…ON!

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!

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!

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!