Sunday, April 11, 2010

Tuesday-Sunday & Up- Coming Races

Did some more flatter type running this week, and alot of MAF, back to some more base-building type stuff. The flatter stuff is definately improving my turnover and stride length. My pace at a recovery effort is noticably faster than it was a few weeks ago. This is a much needed type of training that I got away from about 5 years ago and I've definately seen the slow-down from just hamming out long climbs all the time.
Tuesday - 7 miles with some strides. Felt good.
Wed - 11 miles, about 90 minutes, all on a track, oh yea, a 200 meter out-door track, that's 88 times around! Was doing doing some product testing and this was the closest available track. Time actually flew by as I needed to save data every mile. I can't say I didn't enjoy this run...
Thursday - 5 miles. Wanted to do alot more today, but schedule was just to hectic.
Friday - 3 miles easy, just loosened up went back to work.
Saturday - 10 miles, with a 6 mile fixed HR test all on a track. Kept HR at 145 and went 7:41, 7:46, 7:50, 7:50, 7:54, 7:54. I never really felt any different ant any time during this sub 47:00 test. Felt good.
Sunday - 2:15 on rolling trails. Wanted to do this on a lightly rolling trail, but there's really no such thing here, even on roads. Did the first hour at about a 140 HR, then tried to keep the same pace for the last 1:15, actually went a little faster, but was pretty comfortable. To my suprise I ended up with 2,600' of vertical on this run.

I'm sure that I will be doing alot more base-building type stuff in the next 10 weeks. Since I didn't get into MW, I decided to choose a different race on the same weekend, a stage race in Chatanooga, TN. This looks like a good one and I think the family and I will pitch a tent somewhere and make a cool little camping trip out of it. I'm also keeping this race on my radar. I think I still have a couple months to decide. If I start to make imporovements on the weakest link in my fitness puzzel, I hope to be there in August to run on Saturday and watch on Sunday.




Recovery - The Master of Recovery called me out on recovering with a tall, skinny can of Michelob Ultra that I can hold with my thumb and index finger, so I felt the need to respond with my Friday evening Belgain Style of recovery. The Gouden Carolus is an Easter ale from this brewery and I won't even try to explain the taste. I liked it alot, but have never tasted anything like it before. The Oude Kriek is made with fruit and is very sour. Another new beer taste to me and I liked it. Both were good and I'll drink them again if they're available. My 6 mile test on the track went well on Sat. so I'm sure I recovered well on Friday evening.



6 comments:

  1. Looks good. Base building is awesome. Based on Lucho's detailed advice and my own experience, Base is just intelligent (for endurance, injury prevention, fuel efficiency). And especially for these longer events it's almost all one needs. Nice MAF test.

    That Chatanooga race looks pretty BIG. Log miles, home-slice.

    Of course, this post also tells me you're drinking a lot of michelob ultra, or miller genuine draft. Come-on, Rick!

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  2. Nice Matt! I've updated my blog with the recovery photos I actually took Friday and forgot to post this morning. Also, I'm going to try and find a bottle of this local DIPA and send it to you for your next showdown to represent to east coast. Some of your readers will have to trust you on the east vs west DIPA debate ;-)

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  3. 11 miles on a 200 meter track? Wow. That is a probably harder than a treadmill.

    When do you think you will have up to on PPA to determine if you are in or not.

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  4. The 11 miles on the track was weird, I hardly noticed it since I was actually "working." If it had to do it again I'm sure it would be drudgery.
    I'd like to decide on PPA at the end of May, but as soon as MC notes that it's 90% full I'll need to make a decision right away.

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  5. Dude - you've got some good stuff in there. Got to love running in the mountains.

    Fingers crossed that you decide to do Pikes. If you do and have some bonus time on the trip, I'd love to take you on a brewery tour up here in the Fort. If you enjoyed that sour fruity Belgian number in Utah, then you'll love - in a woh-that's-a-funky-beer kinda way - New Belgium's La Follie.

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  6. Hey Nick - Yea, I don't want to leave these mountains, I'm lovin' it, even though it's all in the snow. I will not pass up an opportunity for a brewery tour in FoCo. Perhaps I fly in to CS and out of Denver, we'll see. We have a Lips of Faith at the Thirst Monk, just not sure if it's the La Follie - I will check it out next time I'm recovering.

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