Buttsweat Towel© season has begun

76F, 98%.  8:04 AP.  Last sweat slog in Houston, headed back to SA in a couple hours.  I only brought 1 pair of running shoes and they were still soaked from yesterday.  Eewwwww.

AM:  78F, 80%.  8 @ 8:27 AP.  Will probably attempt some AT tomorrow.  Probably.  Maybe.

PM:  4 on the TM w 5k strides 

AM:  79F, 85%.  11 @ 7:58 AP.  No decent running days this week, but I tried to do my 13 w/8 @ AT anyway.  It turned into 11 w/2.  The 2 tempo miles were about 7:20 each.  Once I got a side cramp, after not being able to even approach 7:00 pace, I just said screw it and slogged back.  If I didn't have to be at work, I probably would've walked the last 4 miles to my car.

PM:  4 TM 

AM:  75F, 98%.  6 @ 8:37 AP.  Dutifully slogging away.  I'm dependent on caffeine pills to get through every run now.  Can't quit, even after watching this important Saved by the Bell clip.

PM:  4 TM with vicious strides

AM:  76F, 94%.  8 @ 7:45 AP.  Pouring rain for the first 3-4 miles!  It was great.  I had the trail to myself too; I saw one other runner but he was sheltering under a little pavilion.  A city of sugar cookies, can't get wet!

PM:  nope, ran out of time.  

76F, 96%.  8:23 AP.  A rare Saturday run to make up for the miss yesterday.

75F, 89%.  2 goals today - get in a 14-miler and get in ~6 miles of HMP effort.  Still clinging to summer here in Texas, although this was actually the mildest morning in awhile (DP of 72).  I elected to do some shorter cruise intervals as that's about all I was confident enough to pull off in The Death Zone.  8 x 1200, 400m active rec.  I averaged 4:38 (4:41, 4:40, 4:41, 4:39, 4:39, 4:38, 4:37, 4:27).  That's about 6:13/mile pace avg.  I switched directions and did right-hand circles for the last 3 reps.  Pretty conservative workout for HMP, which let me keep plenty in the tank.  This was more of just a stand-your-ground day; cooler weather will bring tougher workouts.  Feeling very smart about this one.

AM: 72F, 91%.  8:51 AP.  Felt great outside, but I had one of those weak, low-blood-sugar feeling runs.  It hit about mile 4 and my pace went to about 10:00.  Man I hate that feeling.  Makes sense though, I pretty much just ate meat yesterday after burning a lot of carbs in my workout.  Chinese buffet in my very near future.  Or possibly Indian.  I'm hungry already.

PM:  went with Indian buffet, as Chinese likes to sit in my gut for longer.  4 TM miles

AM:  74F, 88%.  8 @ 7:45 AP.  Felt very good in the last few miles.  It's been awhile since I had that kind of spring in my step for just a filler run like this.  What does it mean....?

PM:  4 TM miles w/ 3k-paced strides to prime the pump for tomorrow.

AM:  77F, 81%.  7 mi.  Last session of 5 x 800m @ 3k pace, 2 min rest for a couple months.  Solid result today, averaged 2:44.1 (2:44.8, 2:46.0, 2:43.8, 2:45.3, 2:40.9).  Workout history:

PM:  4.5 on the TM, with a fast mile toward the end, mid-6's or so.  I only had the A5s in the bag and they get insulted if you use them for just a recovery/shakeout run.

AM:  78F, 81%.  6.5 @ 8:09 AP.  The UTSA team is ruining the uncompetitive side of the trail for me.  Had to run the last mile in 6:50 to avoid getting caught by the girls.  Might have to take my recovery runs the other direction again where I only have my fellow hobby joggers to deal with.

PM:  4 TM; vicious stride day

AM:  76F, 84%.  8 @ 8:29 AP.  Feeling really fatigued today.  Combination of a busy work week, some sleep debt and a crappy diet, I think.  On the plus side, that Canadian cold front (what little is left of it) is finally arriving down here tonight and should get us some lows in the upper 60s this weekend.

PM - nope.  what kind of people are these that keep scheduling meetings on Friday afternoon?  4 tomorrow maybe

65F, 85%.  Took advantage of the cold front today.  8 mile warmup, then hit the track for some CV work: 8 x 800, 200m active rec.  Average rep was 2:54.0 (2:57, 2:56, 2:58, 2:57, 2:55, 2:50, 2:52, 2:47).  Average recovery was ~65 sec.  Then a 2 mi cooldown to hit 15.

Pretty good!  Held back a lot in the first 4 reps; I've never run this workout this fast, and I've done it a lot.  I'm glad I decided not to sit around and get fat again this summer.  Should be a very fun season.

AM:  69F, 88%.  6.5 @ 8:32 AP.

PM:  4.5 on the TM

AM:  75F, 85%.  8 @ 8:08 AP.  Legs felt tired/cruddy until the last couple miles, which is also when there was finally a little daylight.  I'm already ready for DST (Daylight Stealing Time) to be over.  See what I did there?  I changed "savings" to "stealing," because it "steals" daylight from my morning runs.  That's the joke.  Daylight STEALING Time.  Get it?

PM:  5 TM miles, with 6 x 1 min @ 5k strides.  I think I'll bail on my HMGP workout tomorrow with the DP back up to august levels.  Will be replaced with a longer slog and I'll slot the HM workout in next week which is looking better/cooler, I guess.  This will still give me 3 goal-pace workouts before the half.

AM:  77F, 91%.  12 @ 7:54 AP.  When I stepped out of my font door it felt like a warm fart cloud outside.  So I'm glad I decided not to attempt a workout.  Instead, I drove to the trail, slogged around for 95 minutes, and when I came back I had a parking ticket on my windshield.  Whaaaa?  Apparently you can't park at any parks/city trailheads before sunrise.  I've parked there a hundred times, and I don't think I've ever arrived AFTER sunrise.  So, a $35 training run.  Fortunately there's a Walmart parking lot a quarter mile away.  If I had more spare time in my life, I'd devote it to getting that city ordinance revoked.  But since I don't, I'll just write a smart ass comment on the memo line of the check when I mail it in.

** Never mind, I'm fighting it.  I researched the ordinance.  Curfew hours are 11pm to 5am and my ticket was written @ 6:55.  The ordinance allows individual parks to set more restrictive operating hours, and this one does, but they may not change hours of curfew violations.  My ticket quotes "park curfew" hours violation.  I go to court in 2 weeks.

PM:  snuck in 30 min / 3.5 TM miles at the end of the day.

AM:  76F, 93%.  6 @ 8:38 AP.  Apologies to the family of gnats that I massacred by running through your cloud.  I tried to brush you all off together so you could decompose as a family.

PM:  4 TM miles with wussy strides.  I need to attempt some kind of workout in the soup tomorrow, no matter how pathetic.

AM:  75F, 91%.  Decided I might be able to handle some 600s, but my legs were tired, it was miserable outside and I couldn't.  I ran a 2:10, 2:15, then quit on the third rep, almost involuntarily.  Usually I weigh the pros and cons for awhile before pulling the plug but this was instantaneous...weird.

So this week was pitiful for workouts, but with a 16-miler on Sunday, it'll be my highest mileage week in about 18 months.  Next week our weather will move from "really crappy" for running to "kinda crappy," so I'm pretty excited; should be able to do some stamina work.  Here's the scale:

65 and humid -- meh

70 and humid -- kinda crappy

75 and humid -- really crappy

80 and humid -- just shoot me now and get it over with

I can't wait until it's "meh" outside...hopefully the week after next.

PM:  mini-workout on the TM.  Kinda complicated to detail, I was pushing buttons every 30 sec or so!  Short story -- 2 fast miles around 5k average, 5 mi total.

Stomach bug going around the house.  Now I feel it coming back again, like a rollin' thunder chasing the wind.

Today is stomach bug recovery day (yesterday really sucked).  Rehydrate, eat, lay around and hopefully run tomorrow.

AM:  69F, 83%.  6 @ 7:49 AP.  Felt amazing outside.  My innards are still doing a few cartwheels but I'd say I'm 95% or so.  Hoping for a workout on Wednesday or Thursday.

PM:  4 TM, w/ vicious strides.  Legs and stomach were a little shaky afterward...in hindsight it might've been a little too soon for VS day.

AM:  74F, 74%.  9 @ 7:55 AP.  Still feel a little off but I need to go ahead with a HMP workout tomorrow, since I have to do a LR w/AT on Saturday...should be fine; temps will be relatively nice tomorrow.

PM:  4 slow TM miles.  Hit 1000 miles on the fastwitch; I'm thinking that'll be the next training shoe I buy - they have held up better than the kinvaras...I bet I get another 500+ out of them.

AM:  65F, 68%.  11 mi.  Today was goal HMP day.  I wanted to do a lot more with today, given the cool weather, but my legs have been really heavy since my illness this weekend; I shouldn't have tried to jump right back into my schedule, probably.  Anyway, I wasn't holding out much hope, especially after the warmup, but rolled into some mile repeats at goal pace on the track.  I ended up doing 5 x 1600, 1 lap recovery.  Through the miracle of mathematics, I found out that an 80-minute HM works out to about 91 sec/lap, so I aimed at 6:04 for these.  Averaged 6:02 (6:06, 6:03, 6:02, 6:00, 5:59).

I was headed for a much faster 5th rep, but kind of bonked the last lap and ran it in 94.  It was then that I decided a 6th rep would do more harm than good, so pulled the plug after 5.  Aerobically, these felt great.  My legs were just heavy and dead from the very first rep.  I think it's a pretty good sign that I was able to still churn out 90-91 sec laps.  I believe I'm close to having one of those breakthrough workouts when everything comes together.  Right now I probably just need to let the ol' body rest up a bit more than I'd planned this week.

PM:  30 min slow on the TM.  Legs liked the plodding...more of that to come the next couple days.

AM:  65F, 70%.  6 @ 8:54 AP.

PM:  30 min TM plod.

AM:  68F, 84%.  6 @ 8:19 AP.

PM:  30 min TM plod

69F, 95%.  17 @ 7:16 AP.  LR today - I did 17 w/ 8 miles aerobic tempo.  First, a 9-mile warmup @ ~7:45/mile, then right into 8 tempo miles @ 6:43 AP (6:47, 6:41, 6:47, 6:44, 6:43, 6:42, 6:44, 6:35).  Another effort-based run with the high dewpoint but pretty good, all things considered.  I'll be able to attack GMP when it cools off.  God, I sound like a broken record.

Our chocolate milk was expired, but I'd picked up a "mega protein" bar (30g of protein!) that was supposed to be PB&J flavored.  It tasted like solidified barf.

82F.  4 evening miles in the neighborhood, right after sunset.

AM:  69F, 78%.  8 miles.  Forgot my Garmin at home, but I have a finely-tuned Internal GPS that was able to pinpoint my pace somewhere between 7:00 and 9:30/mile.

PM:  4 on the TM with some short strides @ mile pace.  Tomorrow: 400s!

AM:  66F, 86%.  Track day - 8 x 400 @ mile pace, 90 sec rest.  I only made it through 5 reps before the XC team (maybe 40-50 kids!) came pouring on to the track.  I ran 74.3, 74.7, 75.7, 75.7, 75.0, then had to stop there.  I can deal with a few, and have in the past, but you gotta know when to hold 'em and know when to fold 'em.  Speaking of which, I'm off to court, probably for several hours, to fight my $35 parking ticket.  Stupid idea...

*****DISMISSED*****

So, parking ticket court was pretty painless.  I walked right into a room and up to a judge and explained my case.  He kind of dismissively said, "no, this park has different hours."  I was ready for that line of argument and pointed out a few spots in the code.  He read through it for about a minute, then kinda sighed and said, "ok, I'll do it this time, but not again."  That was good enough for me.  It could have gone either way, and the ordinance just leaves a lot of holes and room for interpretation.  Unfortunately I should probably still avoid parking there, but I got my small victory today.  This almost merits a race report!

PM:  5 with a mini-workout on the TM.  4 x (.25 @ 10mph, .25 @ 11mph, .25 @ 7mph). On the last time around I did the middle quarter @ 12mph instead of 11.  So I got one of my 3 missed reps back from this morning.