Friday

Another planned early morning run.  Another extinguished alarm clock and a blown off early morning run.

I can get myself up and moving when I have a commitment to keep; but when it's just me deciding whether or not to stick to a personal schedule, it's so much harder to roll out of bed and get moving early. 

I was also surprisingly stiff after yesterday's activities.  The racquetball can't have been the culprit, but the evening easy run, I'm sure, was.  We kept a very slow 9:00-ish pace over 5 and 1/2 miles, and I was happy to keep my HR to a 140 average.  But I was working on form, and even at the slow pace, the quads and calves got a decent workout.  It just goes to show that these slower runs, while not being as taxing on the cardio-vascular system, are still good workouts for the legs. 

I'm not sure yet if I'm going to do anything today.  I want to try an 8-minute/mile pace 10-mile run tomorrow.  Art mentioned that, upon starting up training for the Carlsbad marathon, I'll want to be able to run 10 miles at that pace comfortably.  I'm not sure what constitutes "comfortably," but I think I can do 8-minute miles now for 10-13 miles.  My half marathon is better than that, although I'm feeling it towards the end.  Maybe "comfortably" means easy and no "feeling it."  I'm going to give it a test tomorrow and see where I stand.

Haven't entered the 4th of July 10K yet.  That's two weeks away.  Need to take care of that.  I've not been doing any training preparations for that.  I've been trying to ease back into my running and establish some sort of plan.  Most of my focus has been on cross training, with this week's bootcamp sessions being the central activity.  I haven't had the energy yet to incorporate the spin class AND swimming sessions.  I'll see how I feel next week.  It will have been 14 days since the marathon.  I ought to be pretty well recovered by then.

Still not sure about these new shoes.  Still in the courting period.  I want them to work.