Week Five Complete: Good week with family, turkey, and open road

Week number five is complete.  This week also encompassed Thanksgiving and a trip home to be with my family.  In spite of a short work week and the holiday weekend, I’d say training went pretty well.   Unfortunately, I did not get any swimming done.  The weather was too bad early in the week and the latter was too hectic with travel and Thanksgiving activities.  That being said, I did get all my runs and rides in this week, to include a fun little Turkey Trot on Thanksgiving morning.  I did have to rearrange some workouts, but all in all, most of them felt pretty good.

Besides all the great family time and awesome food, the highlight of the week was the annual Ft. Worth Turkey Trot.  They estimated 30,000 runners and spectators.  I’m not sure how many actually made it, but it was a pretty good turnout.  They also let dogs run, which is pretty cool too. Loki loved it! The race consisted of a 1k, 5k, and a10k, all starting on or near Camp Bowie.  I ran the 10k, which I felt wasn’t a bad course.  The first mile or so ran west on Camp Bowie and then north into a residential area.  From there it zigzagged around a neighborhood, with some small hill, but nothing too bad.  The water stations were not quite every mile, but it was a relatively short race, so no biggie.  The end, which is always the best part of any race, had the typical music and hordes of people.  Oh, there was also a nice little car chase between a Mustang GT and three FW Police cars. It was on the opposite side of Camp Bowie from the runners, luckily they must have turn before they hit the main race area, blocking the street. As they screamed by, I wondered: It’s 8:25am, Thanksgiving morning and you’re running from the police. How crappy is that guy’s life right now?  Pretty crappy I’d say.

For this race, I used it for a fun replacement of one of my run workouts.  I didn’t break any land speed records, but I did have a good run.  I ran the 6.2 miles in 58:43, which was about a 9:21 per mile pace.  Like I said, not exactly fast, but that is the longest I’ve run in the last five weeks and the best per mile pace for any run over 30 minutes. I’d call that progress! 

I also invented a new game. It’s called: Slow Runner Bingo! 

Runs slower than 9 minute miles:                   Check

Passed by person 10 years older:                    Check
Passed by person 20 years older:                    Check
Passed by person 30 years younger:               Check
Passed by six month pregnant woman:           Check
Passed by guy pushing baby buggy:               Check
Passed by guy in goofy costume (turkey):      Check

BINGO!!!!  I Win!!!

It’s an honor system game, which actually works out pretty well.  Who’s going to lie about being passed by a guy in a full turkey costume… feet and all?  It’s embarrassing enough just to admit it.  I think it’ll be a great stocking stuffer for friends or family members who are running challenged, like me.

 

Monday
Rest Day

Tuesday
S - 300wu, 8x50 dr, 1x300 @40sec, 3x200 @30sec, 1x300 @30sec, 8x50 dr, 200cd
R - 0:45 Z2

Bad weather all day. Ran at gym.

Wednesday
B - Trans: 0:30 Z2 (QC)
R - 0:15 Z2

Bad weather all day. Gym workout.

Thursday
S - 2500m
B - 0:45 Z1 (100+ RPM)

Added R- 10k Turkey Trot

Moved bike to Friday

Friday
R - 1:00 Z2
B - 0:45 Z1 (100+ RPM)

Moved run to Thursday

Saturday
B - 1:45 Z2
R - 1:00 Z1 to Z2

Moved bike to Sunday

Sunday
R - 1:00 Z1 to Z2
B - 1:45 Z2

Moved run to Saturday

Scheduled Total Hrs: 8:00
S: 2:00
B: 3:00
R: 3:00

Actual Total Hrs: 6:00

S: 0:00
B: 3:00
R: 3:00

These next few weeks of training should go pretty smoothly.  No more travel until Christmas and work will be relatively slow.  My pool will probably close down for two weeks, sometime this month.  They are adding a giant bubble over it for the winter, which will be cool, but I lose two weeks of swimming.  The next closest pool is about an hour away and I’m not sure if that’ll work with my schedule.  We will see.

Have a great a great week and thanks again for reading all my ramblings.