Smells Like Victory

Week 13: 3/7/11 - 3/13/11 (5 weeks remain)

Monday: Off day.

Tuesday: 15 miles, medium-long. Was going to do intervals today, but the track was closed when I got there because the women's lacrosse team was playing a game. Decided to swap today's workout with tomorrow's, so I ended up doing a medium-long run today. Turns out that was a pretty good decision; I ended up running into the MIT women's XC team at the start of Commonwealth Ave, and ran with them for about a mile until they crossed over the Mass Ave Bridge back towards campus, while I continued up the running trail on the far side towards Harvard. Turned around at the Eliot Street bridge, and ended up running into a men's club XC team from Northeastern at JFK Street. Ran with them for about three miles until we hit the BU bridge, when I turned up Brookline to head back to SidPac. Finished up with 3 miles on the treadmill to thaw myself out (it was only ~34 out tonight). A pretty good day; it was nice to have some company after having 3 months of > 45 mile weeks totally solo.

Wednesday: 6 miles, recovery.

Thursday: 9 miles w/ 6 x 1000 meters @ 80 seconds/lap. Meant to do this workout on the MIT track today, but unfortunately by the time I got out of lab, it was already 5:00, which meant that the track was closed so that the MIT lacrosse team could play... so I ended up doing the workout on the treadmill. I actually wasn't sure that the treadmill could even get up to that speed... (Tim informs me that the ones in the SidPac gym max out at 5:00 / mile, so I was pretty much redlining them the whole time :-P).

Friday: 10 miles, general aerobic.

Saturday: 6 miles, recovery. Ran around the Freedom Trail with Chief, who was visiting MIT as a newly admitted MechE Ph.D. student. Looks like he's going to come out next year :-).

Sunday: 18 miles w/ 14 miles @ target marathon pace. This was the last serious long run on the schedule; I have other long runs, but none of them include an LT or marathon-pace portion, so I went into this really focusing on making it count. Fortunately, we had SidPac's monthly brunch this morning, and by 3:00 PM the early-morning cloud cover had burned off to make way for a beautiful, sunny, 50 degree afternoon - perfect for fast running. Did the first 10 up around Fresh Pond, and then the 4-mile loop around Commonwealth Ave and Boston Common, back to Mass Ave and up the street to SidPac. By the time I got back to the dorm, my legs were definitely feeling it, but I feel like I did a pretty good job of keeping up the focus/intensity throughout the 14 mile MP section (of course, it also helped that I broke out the short shorts, technical tee and Dragonforce on the iPod - this was SERIOUS BUSINESS :-).

Finished up the last 4 on the treadmill at 7:30 pace so I could warm up the core/legs before a thorough stretch, then went back to my room exhausted and PTFO'd for about an hour. Smells like victory :-D.

Total weekly mileage: 64 <-- Nailed it!