LET'S BE HONEST

Since I mentioned the Twins thumping of the Indians in my last post, it’s only fair to say that Friday night I ran an easy 5 miles while watching the Indians beat the Twins in 10 innings. What a goofy sport though. They put a guy on the mound with an ERA of like 36 while we put the Cy Young award winner on the mound – and they beat us. Go figure.

Saturday morning I joined the “old guys” – I haven’t come up with a better name for them yet – for a long run. We met at Fort Snelling and ended up running the Lake Street Bridge loop, back to the ranger station and around Pike Island. Since most of the guys are running TCM, we actually kept the pace controlled and stayed together for the most part. Usually we start out together on these runs, but then it’s every man for himself.

These guys make me want to run with a pencil and paper just so I can jot down all their stories regarding training, racing and life in-general. Granted, by this time next year, I’ll probably be sick of hearing “Back in the old days…” but for right now, it’s a lot of fun.

We ran for 2:32 and I called it 20. Not sure if we were going close to 7:30 pace, I say probably not. But let’s be honest, 20 looks better in the logbook than 19. It sounds better when I talk to people about my training (which is almost never). And it makes for a better blog entry. So 20 miles it is.

Seriously, whether I call it 19 or 20 doesn’t matter. I’m more “excited” that I got in back-to-back 80+ mile weeks (82 and 81) – that hasn’t happened since early March. I’m going to cutback this week, race a 10k Saturday, bump back up for 1.5 - 2 more weeks and then taper for 2 - 2.5 weeks.

Sunday I was planning a 10-12 mile run but woke up with heel pain. That’s the 2nd time that’s happened in the last month. If it’s plantar fasciitis I want to be extra cautious. So instead of running for 90 minutes, I biked for 90 minutes on the trainer while bouncing between the Vikings and Twins. The good news (other than both teams winning) is that the pain has gone away the next day on both occasions.

Speaking of injuries, I think I have some type of taper-induced injury mechanism in my body. Maybe it’s a fear of success thing. Looking back over my last few key races and it seems like something always flares up as the race draws near. Let’s hope that’s not the case this fall.

Quote of the day;

“Running is my meditation, mind flush, cosmic telephone, mood elevator and spiritual communion.” – Lorraine Moller