Last Week of 2006

74¼ miles for the last week of 2006. This week had a few less miles as the taper starts for Houston. Saturday and Sunday's runs were a challenging combination. The schedule had Saturday as a 10 mile run with 5 miles at Lactate Threshold pace and Sunday as a 17-miler. I've always had trouble with the LT runs. The desired pace is about a 10-mile race pace. I seem to always have trouble running this fast in training. I wish the Angleton 10K race was still still held this weekend (it's scheduled for the last weekend in January now). I can run much harder in a race. My 10K PR is from the Angleton 10K back in 2003 when it was held two weeks before the Houston Marathon. I ran the LT workout on the Lake Jackson Firecracker 4 course. The mile markers are accurate and they're still easy to see on the street. From my house to mile 2 on the course is 1.5 miles, so I decided to use the run to mile 2 as a warmup and then run 2 to the start and the start to the finish as a 6 mile LT run and then use the next 3.5 as a cooldown. I ran the first mile pretty strong, the second mile on pace, but then cratered in the 3rd and 4th miles. They were all the way back to marathon pace! I stopped for a second and tried to re-focus to bring the last two miles in at least faster than marathon pace. I ended up running the 6 miles in the exact same time (37:46} as two years ago when I was using the same schedule. Very disappointing.
Sunday's long run went better. My arms were tired from Saturday's LT run, but I was able to speed up throughout this run and ended up with some miles near marathon pace that felt much easier than the ones on Saturday.

M AM – 9¾ Miles recovery run at 8:34 mpm average pace, 52*F at 4PM
M PM – I combined the scheduled 6 AM and 4 PM into one run: No way was I going to go out running twice on Christmas Day!
Tu AM – 6¾ general aerobic 7:08 mpm 39*F at 4AM!
W AM – 6¾ general aerobic 7:31 mpm 38*F at 4AM no wind and very nice with a carpet of stars!
W PM – 8½ average pace 8:04 mpm, Nobody wanted to do an interval workout this week. 58*F at 7PM
Th AM - 4¾ general aerobic 7:51 mpm 61*F at 4AM This was supposed to be a 7 mile recovery run but I woke up to late and had to run this fast to get my 4¾ mile loop finished in time to get to work.
F – 9¾ recovery run at 8:30 mpm, 70*F at 10AM with occasional showers and sun
Sa – 11 with 6 at LT pace (almost) 6:44 mpm overall average, 61*F at 1PM
Su – 17 at 7:02 mpm overall average, several of the last few miles in the 6:30s, 65*F from 2PM sunny and very nice dry air with the dewpoint in the low 40s.

The first week of 2007 cuts the mileage all the way back to 57 and has NO DOUBLES scheduled :) :) :)