Run Hard, Lose Anyways

Some time later

2011-09-12T20:12:00.002-04:00

Mon 9/12/2011 - 2 Hours Moderate around Belmont, Lexington, and Winchester in the AM!!! Was supposed to lead a skills ride but I broke my valve and was late. I chased into belmont, apparently passing the team who had pulled off into a parking lot. Wandered into hills after making a ride on Spring St and over Mass Ave. Feeling pretty good given the riding yesterday.
Miles: 26

Sun 9/11/2011 - Did the Allison Loop for the time, alone. Drew a map on a slip of paper which melted fairly prompted. Was actually pretty nice. I tried to keep the effort level high and it worked fairly well. 2 Hrs 45 min
Miles: 41

Sat 9/10/2011 - Drove out the HUCA skills clinic. Mostly easy riding and dicking around with Stuart. Did some Madison throws, bike death, etc. Also did one 3 minute interval hard. I sat behind stuart and he still pulled away from me right at the end.
Miles: 15

Fri 9/9/2011 - The rain finally broke!! Super restless from many days of riding on the trainer. 5x10 min on x 6-8 off. Awesome, although I'm not sure I was getting quite over my LT on the ons. Made it to Concord and back, barely.
Miles: 37

Thurs 9/8/2011 - 45 minutes easy on the trainer
Miles: ?

Weds 9/7/2011 - 45 minutes easy on the trainer
Miles: ?

Tues 9/6/2011 - 1 minute intervals. I think I managed 6 or so while watching Serenity. 75 Minutes.
Miles: ?

Monday 9/5/2011 - 1 hour easy to lexington
Miles: 15

Sun 9/4/2011 - Off

Sat 9/3/2011 - Collegiate Track Gran Prix. Third Overall in the Men's B! Did okay in the scratch race and the matched sprints. Hot
Miles: 25

Fri 9/2/2011 - 45 Minute easy around Mystic with Stuart.
Miles: 10

Thurs 9/1/2011 - Easy to Concord and back through Walden with Ian on his first ride back after the summer. Was pretty fun, left pretty early 7 am or so. 2 Hrs 40 min
Miles: 43

Weds 8/30/2011 - ?

Tues 8/29/2011 - Mixed intervals at Mystic. I think I did 5-4-3-2-1 (not the XC kind sadly, although I was reminded of the pleasant memories).
Miles: 20

Mon 8/28/2011- Something easy.

Sun 8/27/2011 - Can't remember, probably off

Sat 8/26/2011 - Rode to Concord with the H2H ride. It was hammered all the way, and hard. Then, everybody was too tired and gave up and went home. I was pissed. Idiots. I rode to Carlisle and around on my own aftwards. 3 and a half hours.
Miles: 50 (?)

My memory fades after this point. There were some 1 minute intervals with stuart, another ride to Concord and back through walden.

Summer Week 5

2011-08-07T21:28:00.002-04:00

Mon 8/1/2011 - A nice, slow run in the morning with Dorea and Allison down to the river and around to the first bridge west. 45 min.
Miles: 4.5 or so

Tues 8/2/2011 - Raining so I did my LT intervals on the trainer. Were pretty solid, actually. I was able to get my HR way up (peaked at 186) with ease and a nice high cadence. HR monitor stopped working halfway through, so my last intervals were in the dark, but were good efforts nonetheless. 80 minutes total. Call it
Miles: 25

Weds 8/3/2011 - Interesting route through Woburn to Lexington trying to retrace the path I took with Nate last Sunday. Crummy cloudy weather, alone, easy-ish. Time unknown. http://www.gmap-pedometer.com/?r=4701846
Miles: 20

Thurs 8/4/2011 - 2 hours with 4x 10 on 10 off with Stuart out to Concord and back. Glorious weather, great workout. First one a bit too hard and rather cream crackered by the last one. Really feeling good. It's a shame we had the 5 Cutler summer night out that night, got nice and drunk and didn't really recover from it.
Miles: 36

Fri 8/5/2011 - Lexington easy with Stuart up the minuteman trail. Feeling ok.
Miles: 16

Sat 8/6/2011 - Easy long ride to Carlisle from Concord. Feeling ok for the first bit, then flat, then bonking by the time I was heading back through Lexington. Just wiped from the week I think and the lack of proper recovered. Immediately left for a fun half day of climbing at Crow Hill.
Miles: 48

Sun 8/7/2011 - Nice and off. Tired and Hungry.
Miles: 0

Summer Cycling Week 4

2011-07-31T23:43:00.004-04:00

Mon 7/25/2011 - Off. Went to top of the hub with Dorea and Justine instead.
Miles: 0

Tues 7/26/2011 - An OK workout. 5x 5min LT intervals as usual at Mystic Valley Pkway with long warm up around the lake. Had a tough time getting HR above 180 this time, not sure why. Generally I could do it by the end of the interval but i would spend much of the interval right around the LT in the low 170s. Ok. 93 minutes.
Miles: 30

Weds 7/27/2011 - Lexington and back on the minute man trail, easy. 1 hr.
Miles: 16

Thurs 7/28/2011 - A tough workout. Concord and Back 10 on (HR 165) 10 off (HR 150) for 1 hr 40 minutes. Total ride time 2hr 5 min. Felt pretty good but was nice and trashed after I got back. Solid.
Miles: 36

Fri 7/29/2011 - A.m. Went for a 25 minute run in the morning with the ENTIRE HOUSE to fresh pond. About 10 min/mile pace, super easy. Foot felt fine. Cool. P.m. Rode Critical Mass Boston. A bit rainy but still 300 people in the ride. Was more of a parade than a ride, but fun nonetheless. Maybe 10 miles of riding total including riding into downtown and then around and back.
Miles: 12

Sat 7/30/2011 - 4 hrs easy. It was pretty warm and windy, but a beautiful. Went out with the intention of doing the Carlisle loop from Concord. I took is slow getting to Concord, and when I pulled up to the water fountain/cyclist hangout spot, I spotted a guy in MIT kit who I would late learn to be the president of their cycling club, Nate. I was wearing my full Caltech kit and I got a nice stare from him. We struck up a nice convo and he mentioned he would be interested in heading up to Carlisle as well. We took it quite easily up there, had a stop a the Fern, a nice but expensive cyclist hangout store/deli, and then headed back to cambridge, also easy. When we got back to Mass Ave, we took a detour into Winchester for some very nice riding with surprisingly decent hills. We popped out on Mystic River parkway. Rough route://www.gmap-pedometer.com/?r=4685553
Miles: 51

Sun 7/31/2011 - Stu's back! Medium-easy-ish Cambridge resevoir. 90 minutes or so. http://www.gmap-pedometer.com/?r=4685561
Miles: 24

Wow, not a shabby week!

Summer Cycling Week 3

2011-07-19T21:21:00.003-04:00

Mon 7/18/2011 - Off, other than biking to work. Legs not feeling that bad. Awesome Hmart trip for dinner, followed by a thorough bike wash and full readjustment of both derailuer cables and the brake cables. Rides like a dream upon a fluffy cloud of delight in an azure sky of velvet smoothness once more.
Miles: 0

Tues 7/19/2011 - A great LT workout at mystic river! Legs felt good so I decided to go for my workout today. 5 x 5 minutes with 5-7 recovery. Had no problems actually getting my HR up to the low 180s and maintaining that for the full 5 minutes, even on the 4th and 5th intervals. No cramps or anything. Legs must be starting to come around. 90 minutes.
Miles: 30

Weds 7/20/2011 - A nice easy ride to Lexington up the Minuteman trail. Starting to get warm, but still feeling good after yesterday. Time ?
Miles: 16

Thurs 7/21/2011 - Warm and humid. Maybe 90 when I left for my ride at 630. I have spent the last week doing autocad (well Autodesk inventor) drawings for my 2 Kelvin Dewar and 300K vacuum can for my experiment and I think I'm being driven ever so slightly mad by just measuring and drawing on the computer 8 hours a day with no breaks. I was going to try for a long ride today but it was hot and I got out of work late. Rode to Concord and back, actually feeling very good. The way out was warm and I took it easy-ish, but as I got to concord the sun had just set and I started feeling really good. The way back I was mustering some strength but managed to push to a HR of 155 by Minute Man NHP and as I came to Mass Ave I was easily doing 165-170 ( LT is ~175 as measured by Ian in a conconi test 6/2008). The whole way down Mass ave I was flying, hitting lights, feeling great, and suddenly I realized what this reminded me of. Lower Arroyo's. I haven't felt that feeling in at least a year. We would cruise down through South Pas, taking it easy for 4 miles. Once we hit the arroyo, which was slightly uphill, we'd pick it up a bit, and by the time we crested the hill at the west end of California at maybe 6 miles in, with all the hard work behind us and our legs fresh from taking Sunday off, we'd proceed to fly back along california for the last 2 miles with the sun setting and maybe a snowy Mt. Baldy in the distance. Sometimes we'd run way too fast (e.g. for me going 6:45 pace), but it didn't matter because we just felt great - endorphin high and all. This ride brought back glimpses of that feeling. It was great. 2hr, 5 min,
Miles: 33

Fri 7/22/2011 - I got back from TGIF late (it was a double header - first the Physics Dpt Happy Hr for Pizza, then the Chemistry Dpt. one for beer), so I rode the abbreviated Mystic River Pkwy loop. It was still 95 when I left but the humidity was only 25%. It felt like your average hot summer day in Pasadena. Ride felt good.
Miles: 15

Sat 7/23/2011 - Woke up early to thunderstorms, which I waited out until 10 am, then left for 5 Cutler - Boxborough ride. Only made it to West Acton, but I think I'm still just one leg shy of Harvard - Harvard! Felt good during the ride but started to get overheated on the way back. Quite humid from the thunderstorms earlier in the morning, but I still made it farther than ever, but also kept a decent HR the way back (t to Concord was maybe ~130, from then on ~150s). 3 hrs 20 min. I think I'm overstating my long ride mileage just a bit as this came out to be 52 miles. URL for this route is: http://www.gmap-pedometer.com/?r=4666641
Miles: 52

Summer Cycling Week 2

2011-07-19T21:11:00.002-04:00

Mon 7/11/2011- Off, just biking to work and back. Legs are tired.
Miles: 0

Tues 7/12/2011 - A nice ride up to Lexington and back. 50 min. Feeling a bit restless, like my legs were almost itching for some sort of hard ride.
Miles: 15

Weds 7/13/2011 - 4x 5 minutes LT intervals at Mystic River Parkway. Felt pretty good, but legs got pretty tired pretty quickly. I really had to pump myself up to push up to a HR of 180 on the last one. Started late so I only rode about 71 or 72 minutes. A decent workout, but legs still have a ways to go.
Miles: 25

Thurs 7/14/2011 - I can't for the life of me remember where I went, but it was easy and an hour-ish.
Miles: Call it 15

Friday 7/15/2011 - To the top of strawberry Hill Rd again out of Concord. A good ride, although I had a hard time getting the HR up to 150, even with my new wave hits of the 80s playlist rockin. I think I got the HR up to 160s on the hill itself but on the way back I was doing more like 140. Pretty tired afterwards! Legs getting that 'hard to walk down stairs' feeling! 2hrs 40 minutes.
Miles: 50.

Sat 7/16/2011 - Easy ride to lexington along the minuteman trail with roommate Mike, who ride my yellow and blue Masi. Nice and Slow! Felt ok on the way back. 1 hr 20.
Miles: 17

Sun 7/17/2011- Got back quite late from climbing at Rumney due to terrible traffic on the 93 S. So much for another long ride. Hot! Mystic River loop at a decent clip. Got the worst chain derailment of my life. Somehow I managed to twist my chain around my crankshaft with a winding number of 2! It took my at least 5 minutes to figure out the friggen topology of the thing. I guess I should finally tighten up all those loosening cables.
Miles: 15

Summer Cycling Week 1-epsilon

2011-07-09T21:00:00.008-04:00

Sun 7/3/2011: Ran down to the River and over the pedestrian bridge and back with Brian. First run in a month or so. It was very humid and my legs felt like jello. Hmmm.
Miles: 4

Mon 7/4/2011: First 4th in the US in 3 years! Got up late and had to get ready for our BBQ, so I did the Cambridge-Belmont-Spring St. - Arlington - Cambridge loop today. 80 minutes. Walked to the Fireworks by the MIT bridge that evening and back. Foot was sad by the end. So much for running 2-3 times a week. Seriously, this thing has been so closed to healing at least 4 times now.
Miles: 20

Tues 7/5/2011: Mystic Valley Loop. Not too bad. 1 hr.
Miles: 16

Weds 7/6/2011: Legs kinda tired today. Mass Ave. up to Arlington HS and back. 40 minutes.
Miles: 10

Thur 7/7/2011: VO2 max intervals at Mystic River with Mikey, Chewie, and Eileen. 4 x 3km. Each one in about 4 minutes. HR at 180-185 max. No problem compared to track workouts! Felt easy, but legs were pretty toast at the end. Got a little lost on the way back through Slummerville and was 5 minutes late to group meeting. I then couldn't stay awake during the group meeting. Woops. The couch was too comfy! Oh well.
Miles: 30

Fri 7/8/2011: Raining. Nice but no riding, aside from the 3 mile commute to lab and back.
Miles: 0

Sat 7/9/2011: Out to concord and up to the top of Strawberry Hill Rd. 3 Hrs. Beautiful day, still hot but giving way to blue skies! Riding into the wind on the way out with a 20 mph tailwind on the way back. Feeling much stronger and was able to keep up HRs of 150+ for the last hour. I think I'm ready to do two endurance days next week. Went sailing with Rosen later on the Charles and nearly capsized a couple times in the wind. Lawl.
Miles: 43

Sun 7/10/2011: I was bored and it was a beautiful day(California beautiful!), so I decided to go for a ride again. Cambridge resevoir loop easy. 1 hr 55 minutes. Wow, that was a lot slower than when I do it with Stuart. Oh well. It was wayyyy too beautiful to pass on a that ride
Miles: 25

Cycling Summer Training Week 0

2011-07-03T00:32:00.003-04:00

I suppose I haven't updated for a while so I can recap the last few month. After my very pesky hip/sciatia problem in the fall, I managed to begin running in late December. I spent much of my winter break in California running with the Caltech team. Unfortunately by the end of the stay in late January, my lack of preparation(i.e. bone density) and aggressive jump back into runnning left me with my 3rd metatarsal stress fracture in my running career. Enough was enough. With my ankle healed I decided that the only long term solution for me was cycling. I got my bike out to Massachusetts by March and even managed to catch the last half of the collegiate season out here. I may try to run seriously again in the future, but for now I think cycling will be the dominant sport here.

Stuart "Third at Nationals" McManus wrote me a training program to turn me into "a cycle-biking machine." I will begin this program starting on Monday. I spent much of the last month traveling, and while I didn't get in much cycling, I'm in OK shape from all the hiking/climbing I'd been doing. Last week, the Doyle group traveled to southern Vermont for a week long conference. One of the senior members of the group, Colin Connolly, is a former HUCA racer and was bringing his bike along, so I decided to throw my bike on his car and get some rides in the Green Mountains (Vermont, Ver-Mont, Green Mountains, get it?). So, here goes.

Sat 6/25/2011 - 5 Cutler - Lexington and back via the Minuteman trail up, Mass Ave back. 55 minutes.
Miles: 18

Sun 6/26/2011: Off to Gordon Conference, forgot my shoes (D'oh)
Miles: 0

Mon 6/27/2011: No Shoes, slept through the afternoon break session. Great Science! Drove back to Cambridge at night.

Tues 6/28/2011: Mt. Snow to Grout Pond (Green Mountains NF). Several shortish climbs but steep climbs (3 miles with a mile at 10% grade and another at 11% grade) and a 7 mile climb at 5-6%. 2000 feet total climbing. Light rain. 1 Hr 40 min.
Miles: 24

Weds 6/29/2011: Mt. Snow south to Jacksonville with Colin (!). Good pace, three flats in between the two of us. Hillier than we expected but nice weather and good riding. http://www.gmap-pedometer.com/?r=4613527 .
Miles: 32

Thurs 6/30/2011: Colin took the bike back :(. Partying late and early talks are starting to take a toll on me. Slept through the afternoon break again.
Miles: 0

Fri 7/1/2011: Back to Cambridge, what would have been an afternoon run turned into drinking beer around lab and then an impromptu trip with the remaining beer and rental van to the beaches in northern MA. We made it up to Marblehead and spent a few hours hanging out by the lighthouses, drinking beer, and relaxing. It was great.
Miles: 0, Fried Clams eaten: 22

Sat 7/2/2011: Out to Concord via the HUCA loop, a bit of exploring, and back. Bonked a bit plowing through the wind on the way back, but otherwise a nice ride. Superb weather. I tried to keep a decent pace (HR 140-150) but this isn't quite sustainable yet. 2 hours and 40 minutes. http://www.gmap-pedometer.com/?r=4619718
Miles: 40

I ran 5 minutes today

2010-12-07T21:23:00.002-05:00

It felt great. It might be the start of a comeback. For future reference, my current PT routine (~3-4 times a week) is:

15 min elliptical
5 min running
full stretch
lower back rotator machine- 1 set
groin machine thing - 1 set, weight lvl 3
hip abductor machine - 2 sets, weight lvl 5
leg press - 1 set 100 pounds
lower back raises 1 set of 12 w/ 10 lb weight
side raises 1 set of 12 w/10 lbs each side
ab machine
various upper body weights
crunches - 30
side crunches - 20 each
leg raises - 15
1-legged air hump - 10 each side.
fire hydrants - 12 each side.
half-superman plank thingies - 8 on each side
side planks with leg raises - 8 on each side
full stretch

Also it's cold.

So, uhhh. what had happen was

2010-11-05T10:53:00.001-04:00

Monday, 10/18/2010 - Off, still hurts, in the butt. QFT
Miles: 0

Tuesday, 10/19/2010 - Off, QM
Miles:0

Wednesday, 10/20/2010 - Met with the running club for the normal Charles Riv West loop, easy. Butt was pretty tight.
Miles: 4

Thursday, 10/21/2010 - Butt quite sad from yesterday. I clearly need some more time off. A brief trip to the climbing gym, but this also made it sad.
Miles:0

Friday, 10/22/2010- Butt still sad.
Miles:0

Saturday, 10/23/2010 - Zilch. However,Tchaik 5 at the BSO plus wandering around downtown Boston, followed by crazy birthday party at MIT overlooking the Charles. It was molecule themed. That's right, we are so cool.
Miles: 0

Sunday, 10/24/2010 - Climbing Gym. I can do some of the V1s by now.
Miles: 0

Monday, 10/25/2010 - QFT
Miles: 0

Tuesday, 10/26/2010 - QM
Miles: 0

Wednesday, 10/27/2010 - A beautiful warm day. Out to Cambridge commons for a a short jog and abs.
Miles: 2

Thursday, 10/28/2010 - Climbing Gym at Lowell House. Moving up on those V1s.

Friday, 10/29/2010 - The whole lab moved the Dr. Octopus pulse tube coils throughout the labs and this seemed to me lower back/Butt directly below top of hips a little sad. Busy getting ready for the Rally!
Miles: 0

Saturday, 10/30-2010 - March to Keep Fear Alive down at DC with Rosen and Tim Curran. Up at 445 am, eating pancakes with the family by 9 am, in a crowd of over 200,000 by noon.
Miles: 0

Sunday, 10/31/2010 - Zomg tired. Some laps at Cambridge commons and core. Butt feels good!
Miles: 2.5

Monday, 11/1/2010 - Cold! A quick jaunt down to the river with Janine before heading back. Nice to show the cold who is boss.
Miles: 3

Tuesday, 11/2/2010 - Ran down to the MAC and met with the running club peeps and ran a mile with them before turning back.
Miles: 3

Wednesday, 11/3/2010 - Lovely run at sunset along the Charles with Janine. Butt was pretty tight towards the end of the run. Ran into the Harvard running club along the Charles and made up some excuse about why I didn't run with them. When the sky is clear and blue, New England can be quite a nice place even in November.
Miles: 4

Thursday, 11/4/2010 - Butt was sore this morning, but felt better later in the day. An hour at the Climbing gym. Can do most of the V1s in the gym, most V2's are still well out of reach.
Miles: 0

Close your eyes, cross your fingers, and say "I will be fast. I will be fast. I will be fast"

2010-10-13T18:25:00.005-04:00

I don't know how it has happened, but a number of things have come together for me this week. I got really inspired to run a few days ago. I think it was gradually building for a while, but I finally glanced through Ian's training logs on Monday and that tipped the balance. I was so inspired, it actually reminded me of how I felt about running for the first 2-3 years at Caltech. I suppose last year, with the end of Caltech in sight, injury problems galore, and a variety of other things, I had lost a lot of the motivation I had for running. I'll always be a runner and enjoy running. The dream, however, that if you run enough miles and training hard/smart enough, you can improve by leaps and bounds beyond what you imagined, has revisited me once more. It's incredible. I don't see it too often in other runners, but for some people it's there and you can just see that glimmer in their eye when they talk about running and getting fast.

And then, as though the stars had aligned. I get an email on the dormant Dudley house running club list from a fellow G1 saying that she is hoping to restart the Harvard running club and was holding a meeting on Wednesday. I called up Dave and we showed up on Wednesday to a small gathering of people. There are only 8 in the Harvard running club now, but I'm sure the numbers will climb. There was talk of going to club XC nationals in CT. Life is kinda exciting again.

Monday - 10/11/2010 - Nice moderate/easy run east along the Charles to BU and across the BU bridge. I found the outdoor exercise station and did some light abs and balancing stuff. I could feel the last 3 days of running, but otherwise it felt good.
Miles: 6

Tuesday - 10/12/2010 - Easy run west along the Charles, I think. I actually remember frighteningly little from this run, except that I was going quite easy.R achilles a bit sore, left shin muscle thing tight.
Miles: 5.4

Wednesday - 10/13/2010 - First meeting of the hopefully restarted Harvard running club. Dave, myself, Athena (she's fast!), and some guy name will or jim or ryan or something. Ran west along the charles to the arsenal street bridge and back on the otherside, finding some very nice grass. Dave was pushing the pace and none of us had the courage to slow down, so it ended up being 5ish miles at tempo pace, which for me now is around 7 - 7:15 pace. Tired but excited. Some post-workout glow going on. Also, ran by my adviser escaping lab at 4:30 pm.
Miles: 7.3

Thursday- 10/14/2010 - Showed up to the Malkin Gym right as the church bells were chiming 4 p.m. I was so impressed by my timeliness that I was shocked to see no one there. I waited for around ten minutes, and figured either they already left or they were actually meeting at 430. I left on a short easy run East along the Charles to that park thing and back. Then I saw Dave and Athena just leaving when I got back, right around 430. Turns out they met at 415 and waited 15 minutes for me. Oops. Well, a step in the right direction. Later in the evening, I joined the Doyle group: http://www.physics.harvard.edu/people/facpages/doyle.htm .
Miles: 4.8

Friday - 10/15/2010 - Cold and rainy. Ran the longish way to Cambridge Commons and did 5 laps. Felt fairly good actually once I warmed up.
Miles: 3.2

Hints of being in shape.

2010-10-10T21:48:00.002-04:00

I think it might actually be happening, just maybe.

10/4/2010 - Homework is stressful. I should fix that.
Miles:0

10/5/2010 - Some Laps at cambridge commons in the rain. Running again is not too shabby. Tired though.
Miles:2.5

10/6/2010 - 5 Laps at Cambridge commons in the mist. Felt okay, kinda crummy.
Miles: 2.7

10/7/2010 - Mid day run with Janine just as the weather cleared. Was pretty nice actually.
Miles: 4.1

10/8/2010 - An nice easy run along the river. Somewhat sleepy but feeling pretty good. I finished one of the loops and decided I wanted to run fast, so I did two 400m intervals at 1500m pace along the river. Felt good!
Miles: 5.2

10/9/2010 - Beautiful morning long run with Rosen west along the Charles. The weather was perfect January in Pasadena weather, with bright sun sparkling off the river. Somewhat sleepy after having trouble falling asleep last night , kinda sick, faded some mid run, but finished feeling good, quite good in fact. Then an afternoon escape of civilization for some climbing in western mass. A great day!
Miles: 7.8

10/10/10 - Regretfully off, but probably for the best. Had a good chat with Chieffers.
Miles: 0

Weekly Miles: 22

Perhaps some more even mileage this coming week, pending sleep of course.

The last days of summer

2010-10-04T10:06:00.002-04:00

9/27/2010 - Foot still hurting a bit and homework.
Miles: 0

9/28/2010 - Raining today, so I couldn't hold myself from getting out and running some laps under the oak trees at cambridge commons. Running in the rain is our reward for putting in the miles all those other days. It will never cease to be pleasent, enjoyable, cathartic, and confidence inspiring.
Miles: 3.5

9/29/2010 - A nice short run with Jeff around cambridge commons, keeping the foot happy.
Miles: 3.5

9/30/2010 - It didn't look like I'd get around to running, but I was feeling pretty shitty, so I took off for the closest >20 story building I could see. Getting out felt great and for a once in a while I felt like exploring. It was a great warm day, perhaps the last of summer. Made it down into the BU campus, crossed the river at MIT and back. No foot pain either.
Miles: 6

10/1/10 - Rain looming all day. Started out almost 80 degrees, the last hurrah of summer. Wore my blue on white flower print shorts from Thailand and flip flops. The day ended up below 40 by the evening. Kinda felt like running, but didn't get around to it. QFT makes more sense now, though.
0

10/2/10 - A day so nice, I couldn't get any work done. Cool, but bright and sunny. Reminded me of January in Socal. A nice run west along the charles in the afternoon, moderate.
Miles: 6

10/3/10 - A bit hung over and feeling slightly sick, quite cold and windy. Went to the climbing gym. It was worth the hour long trek out there, but I wasn't left for any time for running.
Miles:0

Weekly Miles: 19

I think California is a mindset, not really a place that actually existed. It's a place that's so big and geographically diverse. It begs exploration. Every valley, every mountain, every mile of coastline is different. From Caltech, if you head 100 miles in each cardinal direction, think about where you land. To make it more dramatic, make it late Februrary. Drive 100 miles to the south and you are in San Diego, forever warm and sunny. Drive 100 miles to the North and you in one of the most beautiful high deserts in the US with poppy fields about to bloom and turn the horizon orange. Drive 100 miles to the East and you could be in idyllwild, having a cup of hot chocolate as giant snow flakes fall on towering evergreens. 100 miles to the West, well, you stop somewhere north of Malibu, where rolling green hills dotted with yellow flowers meet the ocean with white sand and palms. This February, if you are in L.A. with a car, try this, one day a weekend for a month.

Meh

2010-09-26T21:47:00.002-04:00

Some similarity is nice, even if it's the kind that doesn't involve too much running.

9/20/2010 - QFT

9/21/2010 - QM

9/22/2010 - A few laps easy around Cambridge commons at night with Jeff. Foot felt fine, although legs felt like shit.
Miles: 3.5

9/23/2010 - 4.5 miles kinda fast to the Charles. Foot didn't really hurt, but it was clearly too fast. Then Berklee center jazz concert and college night at the museum of fine arts with Gugs, Janine, and Margie! Felt awkwardly old at a college night for the first time ever. Foot clearly sad from today.

9/24/2010 - Stress. Wrote a song, built a confocal microscope, and lost a cell phone in a NYC cab. Foot is sad again.

9/25/2010 - It's hot in New York. The 4 hours south makes a big difference. Columbia to central park to the Met to Rockefeller center to Lincoln center (NY phil with Itzhak Perlman!) to Times Square to downtown rooftops. Saw Guglielmo, Ed, Joops, Amy, Peter Liu, and Domenic. Foot kinda sad but seems to tolerate the walking.

9/26/2010 - Traveling back to Boston. Pretty sleepy from the weekend. I'm not cut out for staying up to 4 a.m. every night anymore. I guess I'm getting old or something. Maybe I should have stayed an extra few hours to watch the 5th Ave. mile. I watched it online on the bus back. It got me pretty excited, reminded me of the days when I could spit out 25 second 200s and out kick any distance runner. Got some good piano practice in and was generally productive upon returning. Foot is a bit sad but not terribly so.

Sets and Feet

2010-09-20T20:28:00.004-04:00

So there is thing, you know, that you do when you go to school. Yeah, homework, that thing. So you stay up most of the night for a couple night solving physics problem, and then you feel really tired. How bout that? Getting used to problem sets at Harvard, and in grad school in general, will take some getting used to, especially with running involved. Not sleeping much this week, combined with that run that was too long last week, led to some interesting complications.

9/13/2010 - Exhausting day of class with 2 big sets looming. Would have ran but had class until 7 pm, so that was that.
Miles: 0

9/14/2010 - Nice run to the river, to the Harvard track, and around back with fellow G1s in the Chem dept. Janine and Juan Pablo. Still beat up from Friday - a bit of pain in the left hamstring tendon.
Miles: 4.5

9/15/2010 - A rather nice run out west along the charles. Still nagging hamstring tendon pain, but felt very good during the run.
Miles: 5.5

9/16/2010 - Legs, for some reason, completely out of energy today. Absymal jogging. around Harvard square. This was entirely made up for with a trip into Boston to see free live jazz at Berklee college of music with Janine, Guglielmo, and Margie.
Miles: 2.5

9/17/2010 - Went out to Boston commons for an easy run, legs still beat. 4 laps. A bit of frightening foot pain reminiscent of the demons that plagued my collegiate career. I guess a few days off are in order. No biggie, as I don't have any seasons or races looming over my head!
Miles: 3.5

Weekly Miles: 16
9/18/2010 - 9/20/2010 - Off. Some walking to Central square made my foot sad but otherwise pain free. Strange since I've been running for 4 weeks now and only 30 miles per week. I caught it early, it'll heal up in no time.

Some running.

2010-09-12T11:17:00.003-04:00

9/8/2010 - Easy run to Danehy Park. Static contraction again in R leg, making the run kinda miserable. Today's sign of the apocalypse- yelled by 14 year girls by the local high school. 2 laps around the park and back, trying with futility to relieve the calf pain by stopping every so often.
Miles: 5.4

9/9/2010 - Jeff mentioned last night that he wanted to run a sub 6 mile, and that he had never ran faster than 730 in a mile for time before. I told him that today we'd go out and break 7 for the mile. Nice warm up to Danehy park, which has a pretty nice community track, and some striders. Despite a 3rd lap fade, Jeff surged strongly at the finish to finish in 7:03. Next week, we'll go for 6:40.
Miles: 5

9/10/2010 - Met Rosen at the statue of John Harvard and we headed off to the Charles for a nice, easy run out. After an epic bathroom stop, and 3 or 4 "well why don't we just go to the next light/corner," and some solid 7:30 miles, we ended up turning around at Charles River Rd. and Mt. Auburn. The trail was superb quality with 30% possible on grass and another 30% on gravel/dirt and with little historical markers, "European colonist first landed in Boston at this spot at 1630." Started bonking on the way back pretty hard. Initial estimates for the distance of the run as 6-7 vs. 8 were way off: http://www.gmap-pedometer.com/?r=4030571 Felt wonderfully tired for the first time in months.
Miles: 10.7

9/11/2010 - Holy smokes I'm tired. Visiting the campus bar last night(Queenshead) was fun but didn't exactly facilitate recovery. Short recovery jog East of Campus with Jeff.
Miles: 2.5

9/12/2010 - Delightfully off.
Miles: 0

Weekly Miles: 33 or so.

My life is modal

2010-09-07T23:39:00.002-04:00

The ancient Greeks used a modal system of harmony, i.e. a system based on different sets of scales. This is in opposition to the classical western theory of harmony, in which music could be understood via progressions of triads - simple chords. The ancient Greeks believed that each mode evokes certain emotions and it was through emotion that sense could be made of music. While modal music fell out of use during the baroque era, it has re-emerged in modern music from Debussy, to jazz, and even some of modern rock music. That is not to say modal music was not extinct for some several hundred years - folk music has always been based on modes. Today, I finally sat down and played every mode in every key on the piano, and I realized that what has ended up being the biggest discriminator for my enjoyment of music is how many modal harmonies it uses. Pop tunes with canned ever-fresh harmonies are typically more classically based. Classical harmony is smooth and easy to listen to (particularly that in major tonalities). If you were going to make a song that was agreeable to the most number of people possible, why stray from classical western harmonies?

But the ancient Greeks, they had it right. Modal harmonies couples music to emotion. When you listen to "Impressions" by Coltrane - in the Dorian mode, you feel unbridled freedom. When you listen to "L.A. Woman" by the Doors, in A mixolydian, you can feel the restlessness and playfulness so much so that you don't even need to know the lyrics to figure out what kind of energy is being conveyed, although "driving down your freeway" is pretty clear. For me, there is no other reason to listen to music. I've recently run into a problem where I cannot hardly listen to any of my favorite songs anymore. Many of them are so strongly correlated with particular periods in my life, that I fear that over listening to them will destroy this correlation. For instance, when I listen the the Talking Heads' Once in a Lifetime, memories of Fall of 2009 come to my head so strongly, I feel transported back to that time in an instant. I can remember watching "stop making sense" with Jordan in the shed on midterm movie night, I can remember Ed and I working on Stat Mech sets in the afternoon a few hours before they were due, I can remember doing laps at Central Park for 3 on- 2 off workouts, and for some reason, driving down a stretch of Western Del Mar Ave. with the most distinct and bright autumn-in-Pasadena smell in the air. When I listen to Dancing Days by Led Zeppelin, I am transported back to a fall of my senior year of high school, while if I listen to Radiohead's lucky, I can feel my life falling to pieces just as it felt on the afternoon of one June 12th 2010. As far as I can tell, the only solution is to simply find more music to listen to so that I can associate this radically different period of time in my life with something a bit more concrete. In the mean time:

9/2/2010 - Last day of the heat wave. I give up, it's too hot to run. You win this one Boston.
Miles: 0

9/3/2010 - Hurricane Earl moving in, to not much effect. Ran to Fresh Pond and around Danehy Park with Rosen (!! :) :) ). Started at 8:00 pace and down to 7:30 pace at times, feeling pretty good. What was I saying about feeling distant from being in shape?? Rather taxing but felt great.
Miles: 6

9/4/2010 - Various wanderings around the Charles with Jeff Lee and Kevin Ma (downstairs). Started slow, felt great at the end. Finally did 2 barefoot laps around the grass field next to my dorm - Conant. Had dim sum in downtown Boston today none other than 8 tech alums, followed by exploring a bit of downtown Boston and Boston commons.
Miles: 4.5

9/5/2010 - A bit tired. An easy 3 miles up to and past Porter square on Mass Ave. A nice day, although the sun seemed worryingly low in the sky for this time of year. Watched Dr. Stangelove for the first time. Great movie!
Miles: 3

Weekly Miles: 25

9/6/2010 - Lost my ID and was locked out of everything all day. No run. IT band felt a bit tweaked near the knee. "It is atoms and stars. It is the nakedness of earth before the first human being, and the burnt cinder after that last." Any guesses to what this beautiful poem is describing?
Miles: 0

9/7/2010 - Relaxed nighttime run to the Charles and west. Nagging static contraction in my right Soleus, but still felt ok. Ran in progression with slow early pace and finished around 8 flat pace. Also, I used "via orthochronality" in a proof today. My life is pretty much complete.
Miles: 4.5

I'd start with the manual

2010-09-02T19:31:00.002-04:00

Research and classes started, faces are starting to become familiar, names are becoming etched in memory, I can find my way around campus and Harvard square, and things might be settling into a rhythm.

8/27/2010 - Run at night, easy, heading west along the Charles. Got a bit disoriented and ended up turning around and retracing. The river at night is peaceful and pretty, illuminated by various soft lights along the banks. Met Rosen for beer at John Harvard's afterwards.
Miles: 4.5

8/28/2010 - Afternoon run out towards fresh pond. Hot but windy. I was trying to find Duhaney Park, a rumored land with miles of grass fields, but visions of shimmering sun off the lake water drew me to the loop around fresh pond. The path around the lake is mostly asphalt with options for up to 50% on dirt trail. Did a lap and came back. The route there/back, while on brick and concrete sidewalk the whole way, is actually somewhat charming. The heat and distance got to me though! Being in shape never felt further away, especially when I remember night time winter runs along the Huntington median in December of 2009- cruising along at 7:30 pace, mist in the air, grass between my toes, and the moonlit shadow of a snowy Mt. Baldy in the distance.
Miles: 6

8/29/2010 - Off. Hot and bored(!). Watched arrested development on Hulu. One of the little muscles nestled deep against the outer edge of my left shin was pretty sad. I guess my ankle still has fundamental biomechanical problems.I will try to be more careful.

Weekly Miles: 23

8/30/2010 - Quite Hot, afternoon run with Jeff Lee (across the hall) and Helen Hou (down the hall) to the Charles and east. Very relaxed. Being out of shape means I can go for jogs with fitness runners, enjoy it, and get something out of it athletically.
Miles: 4

8/31/2010 - Midnight laps around Cambridge commons. Bums and black guys on single speed bikes laughing and cheering me on, running by cannons and revolutionary war barracks. The main statue in the center is surrounded by trees filled with those white Christmas lights that are also on the trees on Green street.
Miles: 3.5

9/1/2010. Very hot - 98 degrees today. Miserable evening run with Jeff along the Charles. Felt like hurling the whole way. I can't wait until the heat wave is over.
Miles: 4

Cambridge is a pretty funky town.

2010-08-26T20:18:00.002-04:00

That's what I've decided recently. It has street performers, it has hecklers like those from the third world - except selling bank accounts, and it has a vibrant air to it that draws from more cultures than I expected. It also has a lot of runners. Most of them seem to be recreational, although I probably haven't yet found the spots where the Harvard XC team work out. Today, the rain broke for the first time in 4 days. I awoke to a sunshine filling my room reminiscent of California. On my short little run today, I passed over 50 other runners enjoying the cloudless blue sky. While it lacked the humidity of MD - enough so for the sky to be blue - you couldn't quite feel the wind rippling across your body, cooling as it spirals around your legs and arms. I think that's something I won't ever quite get here. But for now, today was pretty nice.

8/24/2010 - 4.5 miles (time unknown) in the heavy rain. Ran south along JFK to the river, across to the Harvard athletic facilities. Ran by the large and industrial looking stadium and around some deserted and water logged fields before returning. Stopped at a small park on the N side, but it's too small for workouts. Reminded me of miserable east coast winter runs where I zone out and dream about being fast the whole time. CCB orientation was today. I think I'm the only person going to work in the physics department with funding from chemistry in my year. A little awkward, until my host G2 (Chem Ph.D. student in the Walsworth group[physics]) explained to me that it wasn't so bad at all and that it's win win for both sides.

8/25/2010 - Forced Day off. GSAS orientation today, in the pouring rain. Felt rather collegiate and scholarly. Went to the HMC and found journals from 1979 with my Dad's name all over it. Kinda neat.

8/26/2010 - First blue sky sighting since I left Pasadena. Nice 40 or so minute run along the Charles heading towards MIT. Was pushing a bit too much. Didn't quite make it to MIT but turning around at a nice vista of the river. The grass there isn't that bad, even the use trail is arroyo quality. It lacks, however, mountains, dry western air, coyotes, and techers.

I can run barefoot laps on grass 30 seconds from my front door.

2010-08-24T00:40:00.002-04:00

Moving into grad school is nothing like moving into college. For one thing, the 8 moves I did at Caltech have really streamlined the process, even when you have to buy new stuff. More so, most of the things that were really tough about going to college, like finding friends - and yourself- are already sorta taken care of. Cambridge, despite a somewhat foreboding drive in, has, in a few hours, turned out to be much nicer than expected, despite the constant rain for the last two days. What struck me most, was the 400-500m perimeter grass field right next to Conant hall, my dorm, and the 1000m perimeter grass field of cambridge commons a 1/2 mile away. Things don't look so bad after all...

8/22/2010 - Long drive to Boston. 12 hours, made worse by the constant rain and continual accidents. No run.

8/23/2010 - Obligatory run around campus after spending an hour effortlessly moving in. Ran with Vadim for some nice, familiar company. First we ran through Harvard yard, then through the law school, then a lap around the beautiful cambridge commons - home of many future tempo runs -, and then through harvard square. Dinner and drinking with 4 techers afterwards. I'm actually really looking forward to this place, so long as I can say radical, tubular, far out, or gnarly once a day without forcing it. 25 minutes.

A new chapter in my running career.

2010-08-21T21:55:00.002-04:00

The first realizations really set in on a 19 hour bus ride from the Malaysian border to Bangkok. No more structured seasons that don't line up with injuries, no more races I don't want to run, and no more workouts I don't want to do await me. On the other hand, no more endless stretches of green grass, no more tan and green mountains, no more consistent blues skies, no more erin and andres, and no more team - no more kids. I think it's pretty unremarkable to have a lot of mixed feelings about a major change in my life, but nothing makes me happier than knowing that I can always use running as a stalwart vehicle of progress and enjoyment in my life. Sure, the humidity, the cold, the wind, and the concrete will make things a bit tougher than the idyllic, almost utopian promised land of the southern California. But to dream once more of being fast not only gives me an optimism I haven't felt in almost two years, but gives me a way of adjusting to a new life. Thoughts of nighttime runs through the snow with boots and a scarf, sunny summertime runs through green forest trails, and thoughts of shattering my PR during a road 5k in the driving spring rain keep alive that little space in my soul created when I first set foot in the Brown Gym. Without further ado, a new chapter in my running career.

8/18/2010 - 24 minutes easy with Chief, barefoot on the south field and then an Arden loop. Saw Kim at the desk, "Aren't you done with this place yet?," and regaled Chief with stories of SE Asia from monkey attacks to crazy beach parties. First run in 2 months.

8/19/2010 - 30 minutes with Stephanie and Ryan Keeley. Around campus, then to Lacey and back. Quite slow. Stephanie and Ryan are in good shape and I forsee good seasons ahead for the two.

8/20/2010 - Off. A very sad trip home to D.C. My last memory of Pasadena is flying over it listening to the first song I listened when I touched down in August of 2006 - Aeroplane by the Red Hot Chili Peppers. The smell of eucalyptus trees, Lloyd house, and the morning summer air in Pasadena still all rush to mind when I hear that song. Very sore in calves and groin (I hope that injury isnt still there). Achilles a bit sad, but I think it will pass with careful training.

8/21/2010 - Back home and great to see my friends. 26 minutes, 3 miles easy with Shof around my house and a lap around the circle drive park. Not as miserably muggy as I was expecting. Also, memory of high school acquaintances not as good as I was expecting. Used gmap-pedometer for the first time in what must have been 7 months - it has been too long away from that good friend. www.gmap-pedometer.com/?r=3980152 . Alas, I remember when the route numbers were in the low 2 millions. What a sentimental old man I am.

More to come, regardless of injury, work, or failure, this blog will continue to be updated for as long as I can.

Track Week 2

2010-01-17T22:54:00.000-05:00

1/11/10 – Huntingson nice and easy with the team. I gathered a large following telling my stories of drunken debauchery from ski trip. Abs, and light upper body lifting – shoulder a bit sore, we’ll see how it feels tomorrow. Late so no icing.
Miles: 7.5

1/12/10 – 40 minutes at Lacey. Felt pretty crummy actually. I had to TA and it was pretty draining, as was Monday. 50 minutes total, drills at the end.
Miles: 5.5

1/13/10 – Huntington Reverse with Chieffers. Felt okay, pushed it a bit going up, not too tired.
Miles: 6.75

1/14/10 – Great day of running. 2 mile tempo at Garfield. Felt good during the warm-up, felt good during the workout (skeptical at first but I’m glad we did it). 4 laps in Garfield in 14:10. Decent run back. Felt really good all evening.
Miles: 8

1/15/10 – Late from group meeting, did variation on Huntington up Virginia reverse. Felt not too bad.
Miles: 5

1/16/10 – Cool Trail run for N. end of the Rose Bowl up to the beginning of the Brown Mountain Fire Road with Chief and DChun. Felt pretty good, started out nice and chill, speeding up a bit on the way down at times. Legs okay, but still a bit tired. Too bad the road up to the waterfall is completely trashed. Ran around all the drainage ponds south of JPL for a cool effect. A good run, legs could benefit from a good day off. 64 minutes.
Miles: 7.2

1/17/10 – Despite awesome rain, no run. Got new pair of Brooks Defyance from run with us for too much money. Did the first round of shoulder exercises and stretched it. That’s about. I also had a really disgusting but delicious dinner at popeyes.
Miles: 0

Weekly Miles: 40

Winter Training Week 6 and first days of track

2010-01-06T23:15:00.000-05:00

12/28/09 – Feeling muuuch better today. 1 hour on the trails behind the nature center. The water has receded much and all frozen up. Temperatures were around 35 F with 10-15 mph winds in the woods. Felt okay, but my left anterior compartment swelled shut between minutes 20 and 45 of the run. Loosened up later. Ended up being 60:17.
Miles: Around 7

12/29/09 – Very cold and windy today, wind chills near 10 degrees F. Ran Frost Loops plus some exploring by the stream trails by Wotton. Very slow start but felt surprisingly good after about 25 minutes. 57 minutes total.
Miles: 6.6

12/30/09 – Still quiet cold today. Wind chills in the low 20s. I made the mistake of running with my chin exposed. Oh well. Churchill to CJ Trail to river and back . The last 2 miles of the trail was pretty unrunable, solid ice with old footprints in it, turned around just before the last hill as I wasn’t going to make it up it without crampons. Felt okay, dehydrated. R knee a bit tight things holding together otherwise just fine. 82 minutes.
Miles: ~9

12/31/09 – Fresh snow on the ground, cold light rain, 33 F. Another Frost loop with different explorations. Felt okay, very slow start, picking up to a decent pace at the end. Not a bad run over all. 57 minutes.
Miles: 6.6

1/1/09 – Kinda hungover, also cold again. 45 minutes nice and slow.
Miles: 4.7

1/2/09 – Way too cold to run, wind chills near 5 F.
Miles: 0

1/3/09 – Traveling.
Miles: 0

Weekly Miles: 34

1/4/10 – Warm up too fast around the track for 3 laps. Then to Lacy via the long way too fast (7:30 pace). My left anterior two compartments both locked up. Had to message them out. Then came back at a more reasonable pace (8:15s) along Monterrey to Garfield and back. Total between 55 and 60 minutes. We have a big group of guys, we’ll see how things pan out. One thing is for certain, Ian will be missed.
Miles: 7.5

1/5/10 – Late from Ph 6 OM and missed warm up. Moderately tough to Garfield, then more chill but still moderate long long way back around Huntington gardens. Light drills and strechting and icing. Felt a bit tired, especially after today. R Achilles a bit achey and stiff. Will need to take care of that one.
Miles: 7.2

1/6/10 – Quite tired and feeling banged up. Achilles a bit better, heated before hand. IT band a bit sore before run. Nice Tu Madre with Anton and Justine. Went plenty slow (830 pace avg), but was decently tired by the end. IT pretty painful after I stopped, I will def have to work on that. 56 minutes total including warmup. I also need to sleep more. Rolled out, did one set of Anton core, iced.
Miles: 6.5

Winter Training Week 5 (December week 4)

2009-12-28T12:27:00.000-05:00

12/21/09 – Okay I promise to be more diligent about my running. A medium run to Wotton Parkway and back. Felt okay – all on pavement as usual for this run. I’m impressed with how my right metatarsal is holding up. I still need to be careful. One of these days I will get out on the snow while it is still soft.
Miles: 6.4

12/22/09 – Nice Hadley’s park run. Took a while, navigating snowy sidewalks and even a cross country adventure. Saw Bettis and Dave clearing the track and talked for 30 minutes afterwards. Fun. The run felt real good.
Miles: 6.2

12/23/09- Went to RnJ and splurged. I got Asics gel-cumulus-nice,soft neutral shoes and nike lunar racer (they were on sale for $50 so I had to get them), two pairs of running shorts, 3 pairs of socks, and heat-moldable inserts for everyday wear. Later ran along Wotton parkway until past the jail and back. Very icy, had to go very slow at times. Felt good the whole way, I’m getting more in shape. I can’t wait until the start of the season. It’s also great to be healthy, although groin was a little sore today. Will stretch more.
Miles: 4.6

12/24/09 – A bit tired, was doing last minute xmas shopping most of the day. The chaos that is an American mall on Christmas eve rivals even an Indian trainstation! Frost loop nice and slow, legs feel a bit sluggish, holding together okay. I can’t wait for some snow to melt so I can run on something other than pavement.
Miles: 5.4

12/25/09 – Xmas day, cool, foggy, rainy, windy. Got a Garmin Forerunner 305! This thing is incredible, it provides information on basically every step you take. It plots heart rate, pace, speed, elevation, grade against distance and time, in addition to recording exactly where you go. It even breaks down how much time you spend in aerobic training, threshold training, and anaerobic training zones. Incredible. I ran Tuckerman from Churchill to old Georgetown road in 53 minutes. Very hilly, felt okay. Apparently I was working too hard, though. Here are some stats from the unit: Avg. heart rate 155 bpm, max of 180, avg pace 8:55 (including a few stops), total ascent: 1200 feet, calories: 700. 31 minutes in aerobic region, 20 minutes in threshold region (I think due to the steep hills – why I say too fast). Will look into uploading straight from software.
Miles: 6.1

12/26/09 – Nice long run. Warmer (44 degrees), still rainy, still a few inches of snow on the ground but low enough that I could run through it. I decided to brave the trails down in the Cabin John glen today. It turns out they were flooded in many places but I just ducked through the thorns and ran on water-soaked snow to get around it. Lots of going rather slowly (but not easily!) interspersed with periodic stretches of good running at 7:45 pace. Tried to go behind the nature center but was thwarted by a 100 meter stretched of knee deep water with little icebergs of snow floating in it and rapidly receding light . 76 minutes, probably about 8 miles, thoroughly tired.
Miles: 8

12/27/09 – Quite hungover. It was my friend’s 21st birthday so all of the ‘friendlings’ as well call ourselves (13 of us) pregamed heavily, took the metro to Adam’s Morgan and went bar hopping. It was like the 21st birthday party I never had. I also managed to consume at least 10 drinks over the course of 9 to 2. Felt better by the evening but no run.
Miles:0

Weekly Miles: 37

Winter Training Week 4 (December week 3)

2009-12-21T17:47:00.000-05:00

12/16/09 – Flying home to Maryland, running errands and packing in the morning. No run, oops.
Miles: 0

12/17/09 – Home is nice, cold. The Robert Frost loop. Use to think it was much longer: http://www.gmap-pedometer.com/?r=3370901 . Cold air (below 30 F) will take some getting used to, otherwise felt great. Boston tomorrow, hopefully a run with Cameron.
Miles: 5.4

12/18/09 – In Boston for a visit to a prof at Harvard. Ran with Cameron. It’s very very cold here, but we ran at 9:30 p.m. around his neighborhood Newton. Felt good till 45 minutes, tired for the next 15 – 61 min total.
Miles: 7.5

12/19/09 – Another day in Boston while D.C. is busy getting snowed in. Another medium-easy 45 with Cameron.
Miles: 5.6

12/20/09 – Traveling. Didn’t get back to D.C. until evening, too lazy for run in knee deep snow.
Miles: 0

Weekly Miles: 18.5

12/21/09 – Okay I promise to be more diligent about my running. A medium run to Wotton Parkway and back. Felt okay – all on pavement as usual for this run. I’m impressed with how my right metatarsal is holding up. I still need to be careful. One of these days I will get out on the snow while it is still soft.
Miles: 6.4

Winter Training Week 3 (2nd Week December)

2009-12-17T17:32:00.000-05:00

12/7/09 – Moderate Lacy Long way with Riley. Felt surprisingly good. Meanwhile I’m procrastinating on finals. Ooops.
Miles: 4.1

12/8/09 – In Ph 5 Ta meeting all day, early to bed, no run. Still procrastinating on finals.
Miles: 0

12/9/09 – Huntington up los Robles with Riley, felt unusually tired in the legs given the day off. Now I have to a big stat mech final. Hmm… On the bright side, things are surprisingly exciting on the correspondence front with some profs at Harvard.
Miles: 7.6

12/10/09 – Rough final. I’ve come to the conclusion I should study more. Didn’t sleep too much. Easy quick run around arden and part way down to Lacy park. With all the finalling, there has been lots of music. New favorite song: John Adams’s Harmonielehre: III Meister Eckhart and Quackie.
Miles: 2.7

12/11/09 – Run in the rain on the arroyo with Clara and Perrin. A chance encounter at the very beginning with the big D, Dennis, brought him along with us too! Felt really shit for the first half of the run, compartments swelled stiff on the sides of my lower leg again. The way back was decently better and even feeling decent by the very end. Need to catch up on sleep on finals.
Miles: 6.3

12/12/09 – A nice run in the pouring rain, felt much better today. Running was definitely slowed by soggy ground, but it was very enjoyable, thoroughly soaked. Some sort of Madre/San Gabriel to Huntington up Virginia connection. Pretty tired by the end.
Miles: 6.3

12/13/09 – Run with Clara part way up brown mountain road. We were going to try for the waterfall, but that was definitely closed, so we went up brown mountain. Limited by daylight, a nice shorter run with some steep climbing. http://www.gmap-pedometer.com/?r=3365888
Miles: 4.5

Weekly Miles: 31.5

12/14/09 – Road trip to Baja got lost and ended u spending the night in rural farmcountry from 300 pesos.
Miles: 0

12/15/09- Epic epic day – San Quitin to Ensenada to San Felipe to Mexicali to San Diego to Pasadena. Fish tacos and coronas on the sea of cortez. Doesn’t get much better. Saw a guy running that morning, inspiring.
Miles: 0 (600 driving)

12/16/09 – Flying home to Maryland, running errands and packing in the morning. No run, oops.
Miles: 0

12/17/09 – Home is nice, cold. The Robert Frost loop. Use to think it was much longer: http://www.gmap-pedometer.com/?r=3370901 . Cold air (below 30 F) will take some getting used to, otherwise felt great. Boston tomorrow, hopefully a run with Cameron.
Miles: 5.4

Winter Training Week 2 (1st Week December)

2009-12-07T03:18:00.000-05:00

11/30/09 – I hope I don’t fail my classes this term. I least I have my letters of rec, at least I have them. Lacy Long way moderate with Cam, Ryan, and Andy.
Miles: 4

12/1/09 – Huntington up Virginia with Clara moderately easy.
Miles: 5.2

12/2/09 – Just tired, lots of work (127 set.., senior thesis).
Miles: 0

12/3/09 – Would have done a more substantial run, but elaborate long dinner plans had me pre occupied. Lots of time in lab. Legs felt pretty dead. Something involving California, sierra madre, and Orlando.
Miles: 4.2

12/4/09 – Senior Thesis presentation was terrible, got rocked. Maybe I’ll run tonight, nope, coaches gift shopping with Justine and then helping the frosh put the tree up until 430.
Miles: 0

12/5/09 – Huntington to Viriginia then St. Alban’s with Kangway, nostalgic, saw the xmas trees on st. Albans. Nice, felt slow though. Later we got 9 people together to go to the SCIAC XC party at Claremont. We got there at 11:15, which was a huge mistake. They had said the party starts at 8 and we figured we’d show up around 10, didn’t end up leaving Caltech until 10:45. Booze all gone, most of the people that were left wasted. Riley went up to Alicia Freese and asked if this might be the XC party. I saw a few Oxy people I recognized. Was in general awkward, we tried to find other parties to no avail, left after 1.5 hours.
Miles: 5.5

12/6/09 – Very nice and chill (and chilly!) Lower Orange Groves at 730 in the evening. Felt great, relaxed the whole way, legs stiffening up towards the end (longest run in a 3 weeks or so). Feels great to be able to run a solid hour now. http://www.gmap-pedometer.com/?r=3356934
Miles: 7.5

Weekly Miles: 26.5

Running Log Restart

2009-12-01T00:58:00.000-05:00

Senior Year Winter and Track Training Log:
I haven’t been keeping a log for the past season because running was going poorly. Shout out to Justine for the inspiration to start it back up again.
I have a lot of mixed feelings about my last cross country season. I’m very happy to have been able to run it at all, but my racing felt like a shadow of last year. I have 6 months left to be a competitive NCAA runner, and there’s a lot you can do in 6 months. It begins here.
11/23/09 – The end of about 2 weeks off. I would have waited one more day, but Cameron and Andy sent an email out about running, so I was game. 32 minutes easy and exploring around San Marino, 8:45s, super chill. I felt quite out of shape, especially my lungs, and my patellar tendon started to hurt by the end a bit. Light abs afterwards, physical therapy afterwards. Ankle getting better, a lot of improvement in range of motion. Ice bath afterwards.
Miles: 3.5
11/24/09 – Heated, 2 Arden loops, a mile on the track easy with Supriya, and 2 laps moderate on the south field with Ian. Knee felt good, especially once I slowed down. I predict only a few more days of any sort of injury. What a difference from yesterday, I also felt much better running. Talked about random stuff with Ian, kangway even showed up at the end.
Miles: 5.5
11/25/09 – My brother Tim is visiting to go climbing, I was busy showing him around Caltech today and packing, didn’t get a chance to run. I did show him around the gym area and his one comment about the training room was ‘so ghetto’, he runs for a DI school.
Miles: 0
11/26/09 – Good day of climbing at Tahquitz. Did the approach, an hour of steep hiking with a 20 pound pack, and a solid day of climbing. Climbed coffin nail (5.8) to traitor horn (5.8). Sore but things holding together. Thanksgiving was turkey chili at 30 degrees at a campsite in Idyllwild followed by a beer and “Vertical Limit.” Good laughs, with a hint of suffering, and plenty to be thankful for.
Miles: 0
11/27/09 – A day of rest and work back in Pasadena. Apps mainly, 4 miles moderate.
Miles: 4
11/28/09 – Nothing, Some climbing in JTree and lots of driving on snowy mountain rains and through desert rain showers.
Miles: 0
11/29/09 – Huntingson moderately easy with Clara. A good run, we talked a lot. Very nice running weather too. Feel a bit stiff.
Miles: 6.6
Weekly Miles: 19.5 (a bit stacked towards the end, feeling healthy though)
11/30/09 – I hope I don’t fail my classes this term. I least I have my letters of rec, at least I have them. Lacy Long way moderate with Cam, Ryan, and Andy.
Miles: 4

Running Log Update Bonanza!

2009-02-05T23:33:00.001-05:00

It's because I'm putting off Group Theory and a my Ph 106 midterm:

11/17/08 – Bad air quality from fires. No run.

11/18/08 – Same/ kind of lazy

11/19/08 - Easy Garfield long way from Lloyd with Dennis and Riley, at least it felt easy since my legs were very rested. I hope Dennis gets some good plans and hopefully will rejoin us.
Miles: 6.5

11/20/08 – Nice dusk time Pasadena sidewalk run starting at a slow somewhat labored pace, accelerating to a nice comfortable upper 7 minute pace down Green and Lake.
http://www.gmap-pedometer.com/?r=2405447
Miles: 5.5

11/21/08 – Huntington Virginia at night. With someone perhaps? Probably alone.
Miles: 5.5

11/22/08 – Hiking up Mt. Baldy from the bottom of the ski lifts (4000 vertical feet and 10 miles)
Miles: (10)

11/23/08 – Easy shakeout run from yesterday, concrete Pasadena run through old Pas. Ended up being a bit quick because I felt good.
Miles: 5.5

Weekly Miles: 23 (+ 10 hiking)

11/24/08 – Nathan’s back in town!! Easy Garfield long way.
Miles: 6.5

11/25/08 – Nighttime reverse lower arroyo (street version) in the absolutely pouring rain. A very nice run, a bit cold and quite soaked.
Miles: 8

11/26/08 – Drove up to Lone Pine and made it (barely) up to Whitney Portal in the snow. Basically an off day.
Miles: 0

11/27/08 – tough hike in poor conditions from whitney trailhead to Upper Boy Scout Lake with 55 pound packs. Very dehydrated and hypoglycemic, didn’t feel very good. About 3000 feet. Very cold night at 0 degrees.
Miles: (5)

11/28/08 – Made it up to the Carillon-Russell Saddle at 13,300 but moving slowly and a bit sick to my stomach, made it part way up Mt. Carillon on easy 2nd class terrain (13,500 perhaps). Way down was tough.
Miles: (4)

11/29/08 – Ice climbing on Boy Scout Falls and then down by late evening. Made it back to Tech that night.
Miles: (5)

11/30/08 – “Shake Out” run, Garfield Long way. Went fast, kind of unpleasant. Probably still exhausted and a bit messed up from the climb.
Miles: 6.5

Weekly Miles: 21 + 14 hiking/climbing

12/1/08 – Old Pas run. Tried to have this be an easy shake run after yesterday’s failed attempt but this one went rather poorly as well.
Miles: 5.5

12/2/08 – Off for whatever reason.
Miles:0

12/3/08 – Off again.
Miles: 0

12/4/08 - Easy 3.5 miles and then interhouse swimming.

12/5/08 – Nice Huntington up Saint Albans to check out the Christmas lights. Felt good and relaxed for the first time in a while.
Miles: 6

12/6/08- Less than quality run Huntington Virginia perhaps (?). I don’t remember what I did but I remember feeling displeased with it. Proceeded to bruise my knee during broomball.
Miles: 5(?)

12/7/08- Knee okay. Was going to meet with Daniel for a run but we missed each other. Ran upper arroyo. I wanted this to be the beginning of my easy Sunday long run but it ended up being neither easy or long. I still have shape I need to get into!
Miles: 8

Weekly Miles: 28

12/8/08-Huntington out California. Was going to go up St. Albans but felt good.
Miles: 7

12/9/08- Easy Old Pas run with Matt Grau. Nice and chill and he seemed fine.
Miles: 5.5

12/10/08- Awesome Upper Arroyo with Dennis just after dark. Nice and chill for the first part of the run, picking it up to near threshold the last mile or two. Felt good and strong.
Miles: 8

12/11/08-12/13/08- Solid moderate length runs every day minus one, I would say average of 6-7 miles each.

12/14/08 – Traveling to Mexico City
Weekly Miles: high 30s

12/15/08 – Traveling to Orizaba
Miles: 0

12/16/08 – Took acclimatization hike while Hamik was sick. 11,000 feet to 12,500 feet and back to town. A few miles of running on the way down, at a slow pace.
Miles: 14 walking/jogging

12/17/08 – Rest Day, Hamik really sick.
Miles: 0

12/18/08 – Up to Piedra grande huts and then easy scouting hike from 13,900 to 15,200 feet.
Miles: 0 (3)

12/19/08- From the huts to the base of the glacier and back (13,900 to 16,500 feet)
Miles: 0 (5)

12/20/08 – Summit day! Out of the huts by 3:30 a.m., summit before 11 a.m. (18,500 feet), and back to the huts by 3 p.m.
Miles: 0 (8)

12/21/08 – Traveled back to Mexico City and played tourist around town and in the museums, no running due to pollution/rest
Miles: 0 (2-3)

Weekly Miles: 14 (19 hiking/walking/climbing)

12/22/08 – Visited the pyramids at Teotihuacan, a few miles of walking/pyramid climbing
Miles: 0 (3)

12/23/08 – Traveling back to Chicago
Miles: 0

12/24/08 – Easy 42 minutes with Tim and Em in Willmette
Miles: 5

12/25/08 – Rather sick from some sort of stomach bug from Mexico
Miles: 0

12/26/08 – Drive back and still recovering
Miles: 0

12/27/08 – Easy 35 minutes with Tim around the neighborhood
Miles: 4

12/28/08 – Another easy run?
Miles: 4

Weekly Miles: 13 (2-3)

12/29/08 - easy 4 at night from our house to Scott’s
Miles: 4

12/30/08 – Something easy, perhaps 40 minutes.
Miles: 5

12/31/08- Off. It was really fricken cold and we were getting crunk at a mad New Years party at UMCP
Miles: 0

1/1/09 – 60 minutes easy in the afternoon from home past Wotton to Falls, starting to feel stronger.
Miles: 7

1/2/09 – Medium 42 minutes with Tim around the neighborhood
Miles: 5

1/3/09– Cabin John Trail run to course, up to the Mall and back. Patella tendon tweaked, a bit swollen after the run.
Miles: 8

1/4/09 - Off to let tendon heal a bit
Miles: 0
Weekly Miles: 29

1/5/09 - More off, traveling back to school.
Miles: 0

1/6/09- Track Practice begins. 1 mile warm-up, drills and striders, Garfield and back medium-easy.
Miles: 6

1/7/09 – 1 Mile warm-up, out San Pasqual to San Gabriel and back on Lombardy, 1 mile immediate cool down around the track.
Miles: 6

1/8/09- 1.75 mile warm-up, down to Lacy for 12 striders, back the long way, ½ mile
cooldown on track with Leslie and Sam Barnett.
Miles: 7

1/9/09 – To Lacy and a few laps easy. Dave showed up!
Miles: 5

1/10/09 – House Ski Trip at Big Bear. Tons of fun as usual.
Miles: 0

1/11/09 – Nice easy Lower Arroyo from Braun to Lloyd. Push-ups (45) pull ups (8,6) and a bit of ab stuff.
Miles: 8.5

Weekly Miles: 32.5

1/12/09 – Orange Groves medium easy with the team. A bit tired from yesterday. Abs and ice bath afterwards.
Miles: 7.75

1/13/09 – Easy 5 lap warm-up and down to Lacy for 16 striders (~125 m every 75 seconds) and then back Garfield long way reverse. Pretty tired.
Miles: 8

1/14/09 – Easy Huntington up Virginia.
Miles: 5.5

1/15/09 – 4 Lap time trial at Garfield in 12:52. A shock at the start but relaxed and opened up, esp at the end. A surprising performace given how I felt. Long way back.
Miles: 8.75

1/16/09 – A few miles easy, can’t quite remember what. Hot and late to practice, I remember that much.
Miles: 5

1/17/09 – In Bishop for Avy course, off.

1/18/09 – Up pre-dawn for 1 hour long run. 25 degrees outside and only brought short shorts. Everything else was fine. Ran towards the Sierras for 35 minutes, 25 minutes back. All easy, huffing and puffing from altitude.
Miles: 6.75

Weekly Miles: 42

1/19/09 – Back Country Skiing/Avy course at Mammoth Lakes now. Climbed up 2k feet to Earthquake Dome, did field exercises, skied down some nice sugar powder. I have to get myself an AT set-up!
Miles: 0 (3 ski climbing)

1/20/09- First track workout of the year! 6x400 going every 2:30. 83,84,81,81,79,78. Felt decent, strong.
Miles: 6.5

1/21/09 – Huntingson easy with Daniel. A very nice and relaxed run. Quiet humid, probably will rain tomorrow. Abs and lifting and icing afterwards.
Miles: 7.75

1/22/09 – 3 on 2 off at Lacey by 8. Tried to keep 6:20 pace on the ons and sub 8 minute pace on the offs. Very long and exhausting workout. Big mileage today and really feeling it.
Miles: 10

1/23/09 – Easy Pre-Race extended in the rain, feeling surprisingly good.
Miles: 4.5

1/24/09 – Awesome Rose Bowl to JPL to Gould Mesa run in the rain. Cool and damp down by the Rose Bowl. Had to ford thigh deep water under the 210. Saw a coyote in the huahahomga watershed area. I could see it was raining hard orographically up in the hills so I made it my goal to go until It was pouring and I got drenched. New bridge on the road, forded 3 streams turned around just before gould mesa. A bit tired by the end but holding a good pace the whole way back.
Miles: 8.5

1/25/09 – Junior Frosh Trip/Climb with Hamik at Joshua Tree. Fun time!
Miles: 0

Weekly Miles: 37.5

1/26/09 – Nice moderately chill Lower Arroyo with the team. Cool and pleasant outside. Legs a bit more tired than I would have thought.
Miles: 9

1/27/09 – 6x800s going every 5 minutes: 3:00, 2:57,2:57,2:55,2:49,2:47. The 2:49 is at my goal 5k pace. It seems tough but doable. Only time will tell. 1 mile track and allen and back warm-up. (1+1.8+3.6+2.3= 8.7) I tried not to go too hard on these, although the last one I felt a twinge of stomach uneasiness. Iced afterwards.
Miles: 8.5

1/28/09 – Nice relaxed Huntington with Dan and Ryan. 8 minute pace on that run feels so different than it did on my first run as a freshman, it is just amazing. Abs and light lifting afterwards. No icing this time, things feel pretty good.
Miles: 7.9

1/29/09 – Nice 6 on 2 off x 4 at Lacey. Was hitting something like 6:40, 6:30, 6:20, 6:40 pace for each on period with the 2 minutes at 8 minute pace roughly.
Miles: 8.75

1/30/08 – Garfield long way. Hot outside. Kiesz is back. Normally the two in combo would mean asses a plenty but today Scott the honors for the comment “Matt Kiesz likes his burritos wet, like his women.” I’ve been waiting 3 years for Scott to finally bring out the 20 year old in him. Props. The only con for the day was everyone going too fast on the run. Oh wells.
Miles: 7

1/31/08 – Super Spontaneous Sunset San Marino South Pas Special coming down on oak knoll instead of sierra madre. Felt great for the first 6 or 7 miles but after I got back to California I was quite exhausted and the last 2 were a bit miserable. I think the mileage from this week is simply catching up to me. Tomorrow will be a good off day. Also I’m either dropping body fat from the higher mileage or doing abs and pushups and stuff everyday is working, or both, as I now have a 24-7 eight pack. Awesome.
Miles: 9

2/1/09 – Well at least my achille’s wasn’t too stiff this morning
Miles: 0

Weekly Miles: 50  That’s what I want to see!

2/2/09 – Lower Arroyo again, feeling same as last week, but it’s hotter out. Why am I so tired after my day off?
Miles: 8.5

2/3/09 – Now that its February, our Tuesday track work outs can start getting tough. 2x 800 going every 5 minutes and then 4 x1200s going every 6 minutes (90 sec rest). 2:59, 2:55, 4:30, 4:31, 4:27, 4:25. Tough! Nice cool down to Lacy fountain and back. Knee a bit swollen and R Achilles tendon is still a bit inflamed.
Miles: 9 ish maybe more

2/4/09 – Nice and easy Tu Madre, felt nice to ease up a bit. Ran with all the guys too. Good times.
Miles: 7

2/5/09 – 6-5-4-3-2-1 at Lacey in the heavy rain at pretty constant tempo pace. A great workout. I love running in the rain!
Miles: 7

Some Down-ish Time

2008-11-19T00:10:00.000-05:00

11/3/08- 11/8/08 – off

11/9/08- Biked to and around the Rose Bowl with Julian, mostly in the dark. Nice to be back on the bike.
Miles: (12)

11/10/08 – Easy Huntington up Virginia with Daniel. Talked about the season and his goals. I think he has a lot of potential if he can take care of himself. Weights with the team afterwards.
Miles: 5.5

11/11/08- Easy Huntington up Virginia with Hamik.
Miles: 5

11/12/08 – Chevy Chase Drive Loop, nice to get back up there for the first time in quite a while. I really like visiting these old places. I feel like part of me is out there on the asphalt, maybe my sweat, maybe my blood and skin, and when I don’t visit them for a while I lose it. It’s like I keep getting fractured bit by bit whenever I go somewhere. Anyways nice to be back.
Miles: (16)

11/13/08 – Ran with the team down to Lacey. I’m goina miss this team during the off season. 5-4-3-2-1 but I ran it more like an easy tempo.

11/14/08 – Sleep wise this was actually the same day as 11/13 so I didn’t do anything. In fact by 4 I was crashing rather hard. I place the blame on Ph 106 and society.
Miles: 6

11/15/08 – Yummy sleep

11/16/08 – Chantry flats with Hamik, Dennis, Ben Kurtz and Ben Reinhart (sp). It was very hot and Hamik blasted the pace. Up the first part of the climb my I was quite maxed out and combined with the heat I got rather nauseous. After some shade and water at the top I was feeling okay and the way back was much better.
Miles: (23)

Weekly Miles: 16.5 running ( 52 cycling )

A SCIAC Duo: Multi-Duals and Conference Champs

2008-11-03T06:26:00.001-05:00

9/29/08 – Casting pond. Would have gone longer but needed to get back for Rotation. Hot and humid and I felt it. Still ran it at a good clip.
Miles: 8.5

9/30/08 – Mile repeats at Lacy. It was 103 degrees outside as we left. Felt okay on the warm-up and surprisingly held it together throughout the whole workout depite being in quite a bit of discomfort. 6:38, 6:50, 6:45, 6:54, 6:45, which is pretty good given the course and the conditions. I don’t how much fitness I can gain now, but I hope to really sharpen up and be able to hold it together for 5 miles as well as I would like to by Nov. 1st. I was pretty out of it by the end of the workout, amazing so actually. At least I feel better now.
Miles: 8.5

10/1/08- Garfield long way plus a lap at Garfield park easy.
Miles: 6

10/2/08- 15 minute tempo at Lacy (2.5 miles total maybe a bit longer than 15). Felt good actually, maybe because it was cooler. Really holding a good 6:10 pace rather comfortably, right behind Daniel and Ben. Long way back. Later, esp at night foot hurting… not good. It has been growing for about 1-1.5 weeks now very slowly. First it hurt getting out of bed but would go away. Then it started to hurt at the end of runs, more generally, and at night. I’ve started icing but I will definitely need to keep a very close eye on it.
Miles: 6.5

10/3/08 – Foot hurt last night, decided it is time for time off. Some treatment in the training room and then 30 minute swim.
Miles: 0

10/4/08 – Day off, slept in and rotation stuffs
Miles: 0

10/5/08 – Day off, lots of squatting on fore-foot in hyper space, oh well. Cool frosh.
Miles: 0

Weekly Miles: 30

10/6/08 – Foot better, still a bit bother. Treatment and then running around the fields and Arden, perhaps 5 miles. Felt weird, straining, trying to go fast to compensate for being out of shape, or something.
Miles: 5

10/7/08- Foot better still, 800s at Garfield. Hot outside. Did 5/8 with the team with slight, intermittent foot pain. Had a nice run back.
Miles: 7.5

10/8/08 – Huntington medium easy. Ran the whole thing with the team. Felt good, still warm.
Miles: 6

10/9/08 – 3 on 1 off by 6 at Lacy. Ran with Andrew, Daniel, Ben, and Travis. First few easy, 4th one was just below 800, then 5 and 6 faster than 6 pace with Travis dropping us. Felt tough but good. Foot getting better.
Miles: 6.5

10/10/08 Lacy plus 3 loops easy plus 6 striders. Nice and easy, foot feeling very good, cool outside.
Miles: 4.5

10/11/08 – My first real workout back. Cold this morning (50 degrees, possibly 45), very sleepy feeling. Ran to the arroyo on a blustery and brilliantly clear and cold morning. 3 tempo loops in a total of 31:30. A bit of foot pain but feeling great! Lots of sprinting at frosh picnic ultimate egg later.
Miles: 10

10/12/08 – Off
Weekly Miles: 40

10/13/08 – Lower arroyo. Got to the gym late and had to book it to catch people, which I made excellent time doing. Ran the rest of the run slow and relaxed with Riley and Dan, but felt a bit flat, perhaps due to minor frosh plague.
Miles: 8

10/14/08 – 8x800s at Lacey. Hot, easy there, and ran along mile loops. Had times for the first few but forgot about them after a bit. Going pretty hard, harder than I would have liked, perhaps. A punky looking mid 20s guy with an air of PCP about him started harassing angrily during our repeats, trying to trip us, then chasing after us (luckily we used our super speed to get away), then threatening to beat us up. Finally he approached us during the rest of our last one and wanted to fight Daniel. Are you serious?? said Ben, and then we just took off on our last repeat. On the way out he said we were “lucky” that he didn’t kick our asses. Punk.
Miles: 7

10/15/08 – New run! To Garfield park, where a couple of “amorous teenage girls” as Scott put it chased us for a bit, to Orange Groves R and California and back. 6 striders and light weights (push ups, two sets of pull ups, fly, and dips). Ran with Dan and Riley the whole way.
Miles: 7

10/16/08 – 5-4-3-2-1 at Garfield. Didn’t have a watch so ended a bit early by mistake. Oh wells.
Miles: 6.5

10/17/08- Pre-race easy.
Miles: 3.5

10/18/08 – Good Multi-Duals at La Mirada. New course PR: 33:20. First mile fast but held on well, eventually catching a number of people and dueling it out with some people from CMS and La Verne.
Miles: 7

10/19/08 - Off

Weekly Miles: 39
10/20/08 – Lower Arroyo easy, picking it up a bit by the end in our normal fashion.
Miles: 8

10/21/08 – 10x400 at Central Park. Shins hurting, hot, went out too hard but held on again, called it quits 2 early for shins, just jogged a lap. Long workout, iced afterwards.
Miles: 9.5

10/22/08 – Med-Easy Huntington while team did rosemead.
Miles: 6

10/23/08- Very sick, awake only 4 hours of the day, ate like 400 calories the whole.
Miles: 0

10/24/08 – Still sick, no running of course.
Miles: 0

10/25/08- Feeling better but missed morning practice. Lacy Long way easy in the evening.
Miles: 4

10/26/08- Should have ran but work got me down, still a bit sick.
Miles: 0

Weekly miles: 27.5

10/27/08 – Feeling better, upper arroyo with the team pretty chill and fun.
Miles: 7.5

10/28/08 – 8x400 at Central. Went a bit easier than last week but similar hot and dry conditions. Rather tired from the previous day, perhaps not fully recovered
Miles: 8.5

10/29/08 – Huntingson up Los Robles easy with Daniel. Still hot, but chill the whole way.
Miles: 6

10/30/08 – Sick again =( but still got out and did the easy workout. 5-4-3-2-1 at Lacey.
Miles: 5.5

10/31/08- Feeling a bit better, especially after finishing 106 midterm what a relief to a stressful week.
Miles: 3.5

11/1/08 – SCIAC championships. A great race and a nice end to the XC season, including a great battle with my arch-nemesis Junior aka Gil Nelson from CMS. I had no splits the entire way but I assume it was pretty even. I started out in last, as usual, and slowly picked off people. I caught the CLU guys in the first ½ mile, then the whiter guy, then Jake the La Verne kid around mile 2 ¼ . I finally caught Junior and Marcus (from La verne by mile 4 and ran with them for 800m while we gained on an Oxy guy. With 800 left, Marcus and Junior put a surge that dropped me and they caught up to the Oxy guy. Maybe if I hadn’t been suck I could have responded but oh it was still much better than I hoped for. The three of them pulled away slightly over the last 400 and had a great sprint battle and I sorta jogged it in in 32:28, a new course PR (down from ~34:00 last year in the rain I think).
Miles: 7

11/2/08- NFTC shake out with the B===D (big D aka Dennis aka Denis the Penis aka Penis). Chill 30 minutes on the south field.

Miles: 4

Weekly Miles: 42

Season Miles: 437

The Pre-Seaon Chronicles

2008-09-29T01:39:00.000-04:00

8/27/08- Preseason begins! Time for the summer to begin paying its worth in gold. A large pack of good frosh, all seem strong and good natured. Rather excited! Huntington medium/med. hard. Mar k and Matt were both there and pushed the pace (and Dennis/Chief) despite my specific directions to run no faster than 8 minute pace. As a result we dropped half of the frosh, on the first day. Bad! Hopefully we will be more careful tomorrow.
Miles: 6

8/28/08- a.m. Full Arroyo at a much more controlled pac, still medium exertion level. People packed up and ran smart. Ran with Travis, Andrew and Daniel today, the baller fast frosh group. I am excited, as all of them are cool guys and seem to have a lot of potential.
Miles: 10

8/29/08- a.m. Cannon’s. Easy 1.5 mile warm-up, then a practice, then 6 repeats going hard (3:15-3:20) most of the way. Knee feeling sore and stiff. The pain didn’t go away through the workout, so I called it a day after 5 and jogged back easy. Iced and contemplated being injured on the 3rd day of practice.
p.m. Knee still stiff after icing and US, did a slightly painful mile warm-up with the team. While they did 25 minutes easy around the south field, I did 25 minutes of aqua jogging and laps.
Miles: 7

8/30/08 – Knee better but still stiff. Andre thinks I pinched my meniscus and that the swelling should go down in a few days. Hopefully! Ran to the arroyo with the team and then while they went on to Patrician, I went back, around by the health center, and jogged on the N. fields until kangway got back, about 9.5 miles for me. Knee stiff but much less painful. Running 9 min miles doesn’t seem to bother it. Iced
Miles: 9.5

8/31/08 - Day off, slept in, went climbing at Point Dume with Natalya, Kimchie, et. al. Some hiking around the dunes.

Weekly Miles: 47

9/1/08 – a.m. We were going to do RB aquatics center to JPL, but there was a UCLA game in 12 hours so they had everything shut down. Parked up the street in the N.E. corner, ran down to the trail head, and then to Gould Mesa Hwy on the JPL trails. (75 minutes total). Knee was stiff at times but on the whole a big improvement.
Miles: 9
p.m. off

9/2/08- a.m. Oak Groves. Knee much better, still went a bit easy to be on the safe side. 5x Oak groves in 4:40-4:55, feeling good and consistent, ran with Andrew. Then a Shennendoah in 4:4x high. Knee holding up, feeling decently tired.
p.m. Lacy and back plus a loop at Lacy + abs.
Miles: 11.5

9/3/08- a.m. Huntingson easy. I got the whole team (minus Chief and Dennis) to stick together. Awesome.
p.m. 25 minutes easy on the south field plus abs and lifting.
Miles: 10

9/4/08- a.m. San Marino Hills. Took it a bit tougher than I would have liked, although we all went too hard up the hills and too easy in between. That’s okay, but knee a bit stiff and R knee now starting to hurt some.
p.m. 2 mile easy around the north field plus abs.
Miles: 10

9/5/08- a.m. Garfield long way easy.
p.m. playing in the pool and trying underwater running with a 40 lbs Pb brick.
Miles: 6

9/6/08- UCI Asics Invitational. Late start to the race (10 a.m.), hot and 60% humidity. Good 2 mile warm-up plus striders at and above race pace. Went out comfortably in 6:20 around the athletics field. First time over threshold on small uphill at 1 mile. Second mile, held back before and up the hill, coasted down, 13:18. I suppose I held back too much..? Solid effort but over threshold again on the uphill, 3 miles in 20:20. Really struggling to recover and keep pace back on the athletic field and up the little hill. Didn’t cross over threshold but heat and stomach getting to me, but I still managed to catch a few guys. Mile 4 in 27:58 (!). Began to accelerate up the hill medium hard, caught one or 2 more guys, but backed off on the finish, letting one pass me. Finish in 34:40. Cooled down about 2 tough miles, pretty wiped.
Miles: 9

9/7/08 – Nftc with Dennis, Chief, and Matt, easy 30 minutes
Miles: 3.5

Weekly Miles: 59
9/8/08 – a.m. Full Arroyo starting easy and then finishing in a very comfortable medium. Tired at first but felt great by the end.
p.m. Warm up to SMA and back and then plyos. Legs sore already and knee a bit stiff
Miles: 13

9/9/08 – a.m. Shenendoahs. First three in around 4:50-4:45 pretty comfortably, falling back to 5:00-5:10 for the last 2, knees pretty stiff. Felt good otherwise.
2+ 1.35*5 + 1.1 =10
p.m. Lacy and back
Miles: 12

9/10/06- a.m. Rosemead easy.
p.m. San Marino bridge run
Miles: 8

9/11/08- a.m. 5 on 2 off x 5 really nice fartlek-y tempo. 6:15-6:10 during the ons, 5 miles in 34:00 including rest, ran with Daniel. Felt good and encouraging.
p.m. 3 easy
Miles: 11

9/12/08 – 6 easy
p.m. drove to camping trip.

9/13/09- Mountain run at Idyllwild, climbed Tahqtuiz peak(8830 ft) from Humber park, 9 miles, 2500 v feet gain. Lots of fun on the way down.
Miles: 9

9/14/08- Hiking and scrambling. We managed to find some safe 5th class stuff, although not much. Camping trip continues to be epic.
Miles:0

Weekly Miles: 53

9/15/08- Full Arroyo plus a bit extra. Came late to practice after rush moving out of room.
Miles: 11

9/16/08- Missed morning practice due to moving all night. 3x 1.5 miles at Lacy, 2 repeats with Tommy. It was nice to cruise on some threshold intervals for once. Hot out.
Miles: 8

9/17/08 – a.m. A bit tired, huntingson backwards, easy.
p.m. plyos. My patella tendon acting up a bit.
Miles: 9

9/18/08- a.m. Patella rather sore. 6 on 2 off by 4 at Garfield, took it pleasantly moderate at what turned out to be a nice pace.
p.m. 15 min easy around N field and abs.
Miles: 12

9/19/08- a.m. pre race nice and easy.
p.m. two easy loops of the course, patella stiff but loosens up after a minute or two of running.
Miles: 6

9/20/08- Westmont Invite 8k. Before the race: moderately nervous, legs tired but not unusually so. 20 minutes of warm-up plus stretching and striders. No team chant this time, oh well. Took it easy from the very start, especially around the track, and never got passed once. 1st mile in 6:33, on target, felt very easy, with Daniel. Miles 2 we held the pace, which at times felt too quick but most likely this was do to my trying to preserve the easy feeling. 2nd mile in 6:52 at 13:25. Too slow, Daniel too off and so did I. It wasn’t fast enough however, despite passing several people and running a 20:00, or 6:35 again, Daniel got away. Fourth mile was strenuous. I had people to track the whole time but they were really crashing an burning. While I was hurting a bit and felt good a bout passing them, I really should I have been blowing by them. 4th mile in 6:50, 26:50. The last mile featured part of the hill at the beginning, which I didn’t really work, and the last hill near the soccer field at the end, which I worked hard. I was chasing a quick guy for much of mile 5 and as we crested the hill with 250 meters to the finish we caught a 3rd guy. We all took off down the hill and the first two of us started breaking away. At first I was going to give up but I realized I could catch him. I started accelerating to top speed (perhaps 13.5-14 sec 100 pace) as I closed he responded in the nick of time and beat me to the line, completely bowling over the cute chick given out place cards, which btw was completely unnecessary. Douche. Last mile in 6:21 for 33:11, not half bad, but I have a ways to go for Riverside.
Miles: 9

9/21/08- Beautiful Day completely off. First day completely off in several weeks.

Weekly Miles: 55

9/22/08- Delicious full arroyo today running with Ben, Daniel, and Riley(!) who is getting much stronger. Typical progression of awesomeness, slow opening, working it in the arroyo and then float on home. The day off yesterday really helped. I only hope I don’t get sick and Riverside will be very good.
Miles: 10

“ girl1 "you sure do run fast." me "thanks" girl2 "how far you run?" me "4 miles" guy1 "4 miles! holy shit!" girl1 "i bet you`re gonna win, whatever it is"”

From mark’s training log: http://www.therunninglog.com/Data/viewrunnerlog.asp?passuserid=meichenl

9/23/08 – 15 minutes tempo at Lacey. Chief took out the pace very fast, first 800 for me in 2:58, then 6:07, then 9:17, 12:27, 15:16 for 2.5 miles. Can I sustain at Riverside with a slower first 800? Only time will tell. Long way back. It was hot and with the hard effort I felt like hurling almost the whole way back, but I eventually got it under control. Low mileage day.
Miles: 7

9/24/08 – Late to practice for some reason, probably SURF related. I got there as first guys getting back, ran Huntington up Viriginia, not feeling particularly good. Worried I’m getting sick from kangway perhaps.
Miles: 6

9/25/08 – Lacy exteriors x 5. I cruised them, essentially as a tempo run. I think during the intervals I stayed below 7:30 but rarely exceed 7 minute pace. Oh wells I want my legs to be fresh for the big day.
Miles: 8

9/26/08- Neighboors moved in last night walls in Braun are hollow. DIdn’t get to sleep until past 1 a.m., slept in until 9:30 and ran pre-race. Apparently the team did something longer. Maybe that would have been a good idea since the mileage this week will be so low.
Miles: 3.5

9/27/08 – Riverside. Course conditions, generally good, warm (er than last year), perhaps mid 80s by the end o f the race. Big field this time. Mile 1 very easy in 6 flat. Mile 2 in 12:27. The usual mile 2 slow down but an unusual mid race cramp was affecting me. Mile 3 in 18:50. Slower than last year!! I think cramp still a factor, but I recovered better on the down hill. Mile 4, slow at 25: 30 but I felt good. At this point in the race I was swimming up through a stream of people dropping off of the pace, but the 5th mile took it’s toll and soon I was in equilibrium. Stomach really hurting and again the cause of much slow down, except it was still a 6:10 . Very little finishing kick, slowest in a long time. Time: 31:41 or so. A moderate sized drop in PR but I was honestly hoping for much more. Maybe it was the drop in mileage or heat or having people to run with was an excuse for slowing down? Don’t know, but I was pretty satisfied with the relief.
Miles: 8.5

9/28/08 – School starting when? Tomorrow? Psssh. Climbing at Tahquitz with Hamik. His first trad climb. We did the Trough (5.4+) in 4 long pitches. On the second (crux) pitch I spent almost an hour on lead, placing almost 20 pieces on the 170 foot pitch. A middle-aged free soloer asked us at the top if we had any herb. When we said sorry, he said he thought we were moving so slow because we had the herb. No mister, not quite, we just suck at climbing.
Miles; I hesistate to call this zero since I’m so damn tired. Maybe 2 for good measure.

Weekly Miles: 45 <- Hey that’s not bad!

Pre-Preseason and The Beginning

2008-08-28T14:01:00.000-04:00

8/11/08- Back way to Churchill. Saw the last band of CHS runners I will ever have known. Felt kinda weird, kinda sad. Kevin Levine told me the Wash U wasn’t letting people walk on unless they could run 16:30. That’s BS, you can walk onto any DIII team in the country (except possibly Williams) with under and 18:30 5k/sub 18 3 mile. I hope for the best for him. I ran many a race side by side with him my Senior year (he was a soph). At my PR race, the Pages run 5k, we battled it out over the course of the last 2 miles, at the hill past Shusaku’s house he put in a big surge to drop me back 5m, but on the 3rd mile flats I caught him. As we entered the stadium, he put in another surge with 300m left. We both blew by several quick older folks but I was unable to catch him. Goof times. Easy out, medium back. Still a bit tired but decently rested.
Miles: 10.5

8/12/08- No run =( climbing at Seneca all day, see facebook for pics. Too tired to run when we got back, but I got to see Atul for the first time in 2 years.
Miles: 0

8/13/08- a.m. 4.5 easy in more typical D.C. weather with Tim. 36 minutes
p.m. 15 hours and 2 plane flights later, S.S.S.S.S.S (10.2 5miles) medium easy with iPod for 1st time. Man it makes a big difference. Too bad only one of my shorts will fit it. I’ll have to ration. Dream Theater and Black Mages made up an excellent spontaneous playlist. 1: 24 minutes.
Miles. 14.75

8/14/08- Tempo day. Kangway and I headed to the Arroyo for 4x2.5 km at tempo pace with 2 and half minutes rest. Arroyo in 21 minutes, so quick warm-up. First loop in 11:05 (6:58 pace) easy as a warm-up, second loop in 10:05 (6:18 pace), 10:20 (6:27 pace), 10:10 (6:21 pace). The last three laps would yield a 31:50 5 mile if held continuously. Kangway ran the last lap in 9:30 or so, which is rather impressive. I think he will be competitive this season. Easy back, but starting to get dehydrated.
Miles: 11.5

8/15/08 – Easy Huntington up Virginia at midnight. Should have run sooner but eh. Not feeling amazing, real slow. 46 minutes total
Miles: 5.5

8/16/08 – Nice medium intensity Trail run from N. end of RB up almost to water fall. Got a late start so couldn’t make it all the way up. Ran at a good effort level on the way, pretty good clip (7:30 pace) on the way down. Last 10 minutes from Devil’s Gate and south in complete darkness. Note to self: It is impossible to run after 8:05 these days. Total time: 1:35 minutes
Miles: 11.5

8/17/08- Climbing a Tahquitz rock, 1:30 of hard hiking at 8,000 feet but no running. At least my hill running muscles will be in good shape.
Miles: 0

Weekly Miles: 54

8/18/08 – Shortened S.S.S.S.S.S. medium. A pleasant run.
Miles: 9
http://www.gmap-pedometer.com/?r=2189797

8/19/08 – I created a run I like to call the “Drayna Grassy Special/Sierra Madre Express.”
http://www.gmap-pedometer.com/?r=2189780
This beautiful run is known for endless and verdant grass fields of the North Sierra Madre Highlands. It climbs up from Pasadena to a stretch of grass so paradisic, with the panoramic San Gabriel’s as a backdrop, it is almost too good to be true. Descend down into the quaint and nostalgic town of Sierra Madre whose picturesque setting is reminiscent of times of yore. Took is real easy, 1:42 minutes (almost 2 hours total due to stoplights =( ).
Miles: 13.5

8/20/08 – Late run, easy hour with Kangway around the Huntington area.
Miles: 7.5

8/21/08 – Full S.S.S.S.S.S backwards plus exploring around South Pas. I saw the South Pas water tower and decided I had to get to it. I almost made it but ended up 50 feet below it unable to continue. I think it’s only approachable from the South side.
Miles: 12

8/22/08- Morning JPL to the waterfall with Kangway, also accompanied briefly by Ian and Keith from Oxy. A very nice run, as the JPL trails always are, beautiful morning. Pre-season is going to be awesome.
Miles: 9

8/23/08- Was going to try 5 mile race-effort, but legs were feeling flat, so I mustered up the strength to do a 5 mile progression run instead, still clocking 35:22 for the 5 miles, a good sign. California to arroyo around the RB and back down Orange groves to California.
Miles: 11.5

8/24/08- Again climbing at Tahquitz, quicker approach and descent on better trail. Got some quality climbing in with Jeff today.
Miles: 0 (3)

Weekly Miles: 65

8/25/08 – Easy Huntington at night. Very easy. Practiced running with my eyes closed and focusing after being inspired by Mark’s stories from Buddhist meditation camp.
Miles: 6

8/26/08- Lower Arroyo night time edition (up Orange Groves) with Robet Kaspar, who is progressingly nicely.
Miles: 8

Summer Miles: 756 (+ 70 cycling + 20 hiking + 2000 yards swimming)

8/27/08- Preseason begins! Time for the summer to begin paying its worth in gold. A large pack of good frosh, all seem strong and good natured. Rather excited! Huntington medium/med. hard. Mar k and Matt were both there and pushed the pace (and Dennis/Chief) despite my specific directions to run no faster than 8 minute pace. As a result we dropped half of the frosh, on the first day. Bad! Hopefully we will be more careful tomorrow.
Miles: 6

8/28/08- a.m. Full Arroyo at a much more controlled pac, still medium exertion level. People packed up and ran smart. Ran with Travis, Andrew and Daniel today, the baller fast frosh group. I am excited, as all of them are cool guys and seem to have a lot of potential.
Miles: 10

Base Week 13: Surprisingly Good Running at Home

2008-08-11T12:15:00.000-04:00

8/4/08 – Solid Medium run with the Tim, aka the bro, aka Vag boy, aka the other Drayna. Nice hilly run at sub 8 min pace 5 miles out, then 2 miles of 200m hill pick ups (x10) medium, then 4 miles back. Cruising at 7:45 pace the whole way felt great, low humidity too.
Miles: 11.2

8/5/08- a.m. – very easy morning run to the pool house and back in 16 and change minutes.
Miles: 1.8
p.m. – medium easy capital crecent run with Jake. Inside sources say Florian and the top CMS guys are doing 90 mile weeks. Yikes.
Miles: 8.5
Miles: 10.3

8/6/08 – Woke up this morning to some specific swelling on the inside of my lower right tibia. Interesting. Iced a few times, cancelled morning run, got my new shoes (finally) from RNJ. Saucony Ride Cushions, a nice, lighter cushioned shoe with a really good heel cushioning. Did the standard RR trail with the bro (joined halfway) and pain in shin was negligible. A good run. ice bathed in a trash can later, felt great!
Miles: 9

8/7/08- Tempo day. Easy 30 minute warm-up. Then 6.5 miles at threshold pace. 5 miles in ~34 minutes and the total in 45:30 or so. Felt real good except throat started to close up (scarily) in the last 2 or 3 miles. Bodes well for the season. Small square cool down.
Miles: 12

8/8/08- a.m. easy 2.5 miles to Glen Hills Park and back. Nice and slow.
Miles: 2.5
p.m. Easy Big Jungle with the bro. Breathing again starting to bother me a lot.
Miles: 6.5
Miles: 9

8/9/08 – Long Run. RR trails to Churchill, then Big Jungle, then back with Bradley and back cool down. Slow and easy the whole way, breathing again bothersome between 30 min and 60 min in. Starting to tire by mile 12, drank some Gatorade and it really helped. Total time 1:58 minutes.
Miles: 14.5

8/10/08- Easy 31 minutes around da hood, just dicking off. Rather tired.
Miles: 4

Weekly Total: 70

Base Week 12: Traveling= another down week

2008-08-05T12:04:00.000-04:00

7/28/08- Nice nighttime Marengo-huntington especial with Robert K. His first 8 miler. We went rather slow the for the first 7 miles, thanks to a very filling and super fancy dinner at the President’s house with the Faculty board and the board of trustees. Put in a ‘surge’ in the last mile down to 7:40-7:35 pace to drop Robert for a bit. Stomach kept acting up, heart burn, not too bad.
Miles: 8

http://www.gmap-pedometer.com/?r=2125550

7/29/08- RB tempo time, but a bit different than usual. Wasn’t planning on doing a tempo originally, but Ian caught me while he was cooling down from the RB ride and the pace started to creep up as we went up the hill, and eventually turning into 6 min and then 5:45 pace down hill with Ian pacing. Easy, but lengthy cool down through pas.
Miles: 12.1

7/30/08- Traveling home. Shouldn’t have been a day off but I planned poorly.
Miles: 0

7/31/08- 6 easy and very sweaty miles on the RR trails. Sooooo humid!!!
Miles: 6

8/1/08- 6 easy at the beach. It is still really really humid even in Delaware at the beach. Much much worse than West coast beach running.
Miles: 6

8/2/08- Long run. Got up early, i.e. 10:15 to find a rainy, 100% humidity, 85 degree rehobeth beach. Pretty good luck. Ran up to the board walk and then to Cape Henlopen State Park. Ran around some trail that closed a mile in, but we kept going. It descended into the swamp and was very overgrown. Now 90 degrees, the ground almost lost into the bog, we entered an area that looked more promising, until Tim tells me, “Garrett you are covered in bugs” Soon we were swarmed by biting flies, literally swarmed. A quick look at my watch revealed 50 minutes and a quick sprint the opposite direction ensued. We just went straight back, pushing the pace a bit. Soon we were both incredibly dehydrated and slowed down, falling off the pace. Total time was ~1:40. My legs weren’t tired, just felt pretty shitty.
p.m. walked 4 miles along the beach to the next town up. I won’t count this as running, but my legs were feeling it a bit.
Miles: 14(?)

8/3/08 – 5 miles medium easy around da hood. Humidity was shockingly low at 50% so the run was rather bareable. I promised I would do 1 mile for every drink last night and low and behold I successfully did so. In other words DH’s 21st party was a success and Alex managed to streak across the beach at 2 a.m. in front of all the girls. kudos. Also I went to the Nike outlet store where I bought 2 pairs of running shorts, two pairs of running socks, and a pair of Nike zoom waffle spikes for 49.96. Amazing.
Miles: 5

Weekly Miles: 51

Week 13: My goal for this week is return to peak mileage and get in some quality running. 70 shouldn't be too hard, but hopefully we can avoid anymore 100% humidity runs like the delaware long run nightmare. The goal for the next 3 weeks is 70,70,80, down/start of XC. Sounds good and reasonable.

8/4/08 – Solid Medium run with the Tim, aka the bro, aka Vag boy, aka the other Drayna. Nice hilly run at sub 8 min pace 5 miles out, then 2 miles of 200m hill pick ups (x10) medium, then 4 miles back. Cruising at 7:45 pace the whole way felt great, low humidity too.
Miles: 11.2

8/5/08- a.m. – very easy morning run to the pool house and back in 16 and change minutes.
Miles: 1.8

Summer Base Week 11: Down week plus Sierra Climbing

2008-07-28T14:43:00.000-04:00

7/21/08- Lower Arroyo medium easy from gym to Lloyd. Quite nice.
Miles: 8

7/22/08- Tempo time! Ran from Lloyd direct to the Arroyo, 2 mile build up to the Rose Bowl (probably 7:20-7:00 pace), then tempo around the RB in 20:20 (6:31 pace). Felt sluggish heading up and loosened up quite nicely on the way down, including about the last ½ mile at 5:50 pace. Holding that for a hilly or grassy 5 will be tough. Came back on Green.
Miles: 12.1

7/23/08- Easy Huntington with excursion to Los Robles and back with Robert.
Miles: 7.8

7/24/08- Went to Dave’s house in Torrance and we ran up into Palos Verdes and did one of his old high school XC courses and back. This run being with Dave, it was no slower than 7:15 pace ever. Basically a tempo. It was a really nice run though.
Miles: 8

7/25/08- Driving up to Big Pine.
Miles: 0

7/26/08- 21 hour High Sierra Epic. Car to car Venusian Blind Arete (5.7, IV) on Temple Crag (13,000 feet). Story to come later. 13 miles and over 5000 v. feet. Exhausted. Slept in a parking lot, bathed in a mountain stream.
Miles: (13)

7/27/08- Sore. Did easy 45 minutes with Kangway mostly around the south field. He seemed interested in doing XC this fall. I was very happy. I hope he can work something out that allows him to run with us.
Miles: 5.5

Weekly Miles: 41.5 + 13 hiking @ altitude =~55

Summer Base Week 10: Doubles Starting

2008-07-21T04:16:00.000-04:00

7/14/08- Bad news: Pops bailed on the climbing trip and my stomach and intestines are rather upset. What did I eat? Softball game with some good sprinting plus Huntingson medium, stomach hurting but manageable, then a mile easy on the track with Kangway and badass/ 14:30 Duke Alum Alex Ramero. Legs feel great, let’s see what happens to the stomach.
Miles: 8

7/15/08- Stomach slightly better, legs kind of sore actually but feeling fine. I now have my sights set on a Peruvian Andes Expedition with Alpamayo (19,500 feet, WI 4) and Quitujara (> 6000 m, WI 3) for early next summer. Sounds amazing if I can convince my old man/doesn’t negatively impact running too much. Decided to do a 5 mile tempo today and even with my stomach, it went surprisingly well. Ran at an easy feeling 8:25 pace down California to the Arroyo. I took a few minutes to stretch and get ready, and then started off at a rather relaxed but solid pace. During the decent, my breathing slowed almost to a normal run speed, as I came through at 11:13 (7 min pace) I decided I would push a bit harder this time on the way up but cool it off on the way in prep from the uphill last two miles. I came through in 22:10 (6:50 pace for that lap) and, surprised with how easy that felt and how my stomach was holding up, I started to push up the arroyo towards the Rose Bowl. I powered through (except the steep little climb under the freeway which I took rather easily) and upon passing the aquatics center with under 800m to go I glanced at my watch and was surprised to see 31:1x. Realizing that I might lay down a great time, I began to push above threshold to a race feeling pace. I turned the corner, doubled back, and ended at the planned tree in 33:40! meaning that last two miles were run at 6:25 pace, uphill and in the sand. Awesome. I slowly cooled down around one of the RB fields and headed back slowly to campus through old pas. 97 minutes, 12.5 miles total, man my legs are going to be sore but this is a great sign for things to come. If I can break my PR in a tempo run in August (32 minutes, holding the last 2 miles pace for all 5 which now seems quite doable) , as well as lay down 4 x tempo loops at 6 minute pace, I will be all set to break 30. Yay.
Miles: 12.5

7/16/08 : A.m. 2.6 miles very slow with Kapsar at 7:45 a.m.. man I’m going to have to get used to this early morning thing again.
p.m. Huntington medium quick. Felt much better
Miles: 9

7/17/08- Really nice Spontaneous San Marino-South Pas Super Sunset Special. Awesome run. Too bad I started prairie dogging on Orange Groves and hobbled to the bathroom at Singer Park for an epic dump. Astronaut General Thomas Stafford held his shit for 14 days on Gemini IV to say freedom from the communists and I pussed out after a mile and a half. I need to man up.
Miles: 10.5

7/18/08- a.m. 3.5 miles easy with Kaspar
p.m. Huntington Virginia from Lloyd.
Miles: 9

7/19/08- Morning Devil’s gate run from Caltech, but not all the way to JPL for time considerations. Nice run, rather tired. Saw Jasper and Phyllis running up by Devil’s gate. Old school right there. 1 hour, 48 minutes
Miles: 13.5

7/20/08. Climbing at Echo cliffs, 4 miles of strenuous hiking with 30 lbs pack. Some great climbing, did my first 5.10 . Also did a nice multi pitch 5.8. I lead the 5.6 pitches.
Miles: 4

Weekly Miles: 67

Base Week 9: Down Week plus Encouraging Signs

2008-07-16T02:41:00.000-04:00

7/7/08- Huntingson easy. Legs felt energetic but it almost deforms my stride. I can’t believe my legs are responding so well!
Miles: 7

7/8/08- Planned conservative run and ended up feeling great. Reverse exterior lower arroyo plus Garfield longer way at a medium clip, legs energetic the whole time. Not a trivial run either.
Miles: 9.5

7/9/08- I guess this is for sure going to be a down week, just not sure how much. Huntington up Virginia medium to medium hard. I took a page from Lydiard’s book and did my short run at a good clip, perhaps 7:25 pace or just under. Had a nice spring in my stride the whole way. It felt like those nice medium hard Monday arroyo runs during track where I would routinely go sub 7:30 pace the whole way. On the down side a rather short run.
Miles: 5.5

7/10/08- The Great Eaton Canyon Adventure, minus turn-around ridge as I shall call it (perhaps disappointment ridge, or stupid-people-blocking-off-public-roads –that-are –supposed-to-connect-through ridge). Legs were feeling the burn up the climb, which I wasn’t expected and were noticeably tired mid way through. Large cramp struck descending next to the canyon. But in the end dissipated and made it back tired but not exhausted. I also did not get sprayed by a skunk this time, or mauled by a pit bull, but coming around a corner on Altadena drive in the complete darkness I noticed two dark shapes and started to freak out a bit. I shortened and silenced my stride, moved to the other side of the road, and as I went by there were two people in camo walking along the road with large rifles in their hands (I’m pretty sure there is no hunting in suburban L.A. allowed). I stayed in the shadows, then ran like hell, and didn’t look back. This run never fails to freak this shit out of me.
Miles: 10.8

7/11/08- Legs very tired. Easy 45 minutes around San Marino, un measured. Also, finally crossed that creepy bridge over Virginia. It’s nothing special.
Miles: 5?

7/12/08- Taking it easy. Easy 30 minutes with Robert Kaspar among all people. Also saw Kangway met up with us for a bit. Cool. Very slow and easy.
Miles: 3?

7/13/08- Climbing at Malibu Creek. Did my first sport lead of a 75 ft 5.6, along with some 5.9 top rope on planet of the apes wall. I am getting really excited about summer climbing. I hope it doesn’t detract from running. Mmm Swiss Arete with pops will be so good. The hike in was aprox 1.5 miles each way with a heavy pack in the hot sun. I’ll def give that a running equivalent of 1:1.
Miles: 3

Weekly Miles: 44 ---- I was worried this was going to be lower but not so bad. A solid down week and my legs feel better than every.

7/14/08- Bad news: Pops bailed on the climbing trip and my stomach and intestines are rather upset. What did I eat? Softball game with some good sprinting plus Huntingson medium, stomach hurting but manageable, then a mile easy on the track with Kangway and badass/ 14:30 Duke Alum Alex Ramero. Legs feel great, let’s see what happens to the stomach.

7/15/08- Stomach slightly better, legs kind of sore actually but feeling fine. I now have my sights set on a Peruvian Andes Expedition with Alpamayo (19,500 feet, WI 4) and Quitujara (> 6000 m, WI 3) for early next summer. Sounds amazing if I can convince my old man/doesn’t negatively impact running too much. Decided to do a 5 mile tempo today and even with my stomach, it went surprisingly well. Ran at an easy feeling 8:25 pace down California to the Arroyo. I took a few minutes to stretch and get ready, and then started off at a rather relaxed but solid pace. During the decent, my breathing slowed almost to a normal run speed, as I came through at 11:13 (7 min pace) I decided I would push a bit harder this time on the way up but cool it off on the way in prep from the uphill last two miles. I came through in 22:10 (6:50 pace for that lap) and, surprised with how easy that felt and how my stomach was holding up, I started to push up the arroyo towards the Rose Bowl. I powered through (except the steep little climb under the freeway which I took rather easily) and upon passing the aquatics center with under 800m to go I glanced at my watch and was surprised to see 31:1x. Realizing that I might lay down a great time, I began to push above threshold to a race feeling pace. I turned the corner, doubled back, and ended at the planned tree in 33:40! meaning that last two miles were run at 6:25 pace, uphill and in the sand. Awesome. I slowly cooled down around one of the RB fields and headed back slowly to campus through old pas. 97 minutes, 12.5 miles total, man my legs are going to be sore but this is a great sign for things to come. If I can break my PR in a tempo run in August (32 minutes, holding the last 2 miles pace for all 5 which now seems quite doable) , as well as lay down 4 x tempo loops at 6 minute pace, I will be all set to break 30. Yay.
Miles: 12.5

Summer Base Week 8: Topping out the singles mileage

2008-07-07T13:29:00.000-04:00

6/30/08- Hot Huntingson medium-easy, didn’t feel particularly comfortable or relaxed but I’d blame that on the heat.
Miles: 7

7/1/08 – Excellent 1st tempo run. Two medium hard but relaxed Ian’s arroyo loops(3.2 miles) inside a lower arroyo at dusk (no coyotes this time). 1st loop (1.6 miles) in 11:10 and total time in 22:20. This is 7 min pace almost exactly. No coincidence that during my Concordi LT test, my predicted LT was 7 min pace. Felt comfortable and relaxed the whole way, working for it a bit towards the end of the second lap. Total time: 47.5+ 22.5+23.5 = 92.5 minutes. 8 min pace average, slow cool down back.
Miles: 11.5

7/2/08- Easy, slow modified Eichenlaub grassy special (up oxford to Orlando). Legs seems okay but a bit tired and really seemed to drag the last few miles. 73 minutes.
Miles: 8.2

7/3/08- “That little bitch says I owe her money.” “Whaddaya do to ma daughter this time””……she too young to be getting money fer that….take her innocence….” 12 a.m. shouting argument in Altadena. Five minutes later nearly mauled to death by pit bull, also almost stepped on at least 3 skunks. Ran to the park at the top of lake. Steep. On the way back, legs pretty tired and took a pounding. 85 minutes.
Miles: 10

7/4/08- Easy 30 minutes to and around Lacy. The biked to RB to see fireworks 30 minutes later. I’ll call that 6.5 total
Miles: 6.5

7/5/08- Epic Full Devil’s gate from Lloyd to JPL and back all trails. Cruised steady and constant and felt decent the whole way. Got pretty tired towards the end but surprisingly held it together quite well, enough to even pick it up a bit the last two down California. Excellent progress, not to mention my longest ever run. 2:06. Did I mention the trials are awesome. Go Will!
Miles: 15.5

7/6/08- Approx. 1000 yards easy swimming. Also OMG Mr. Will Leer. Representing the SCIAC. Very impressive run ( I think mark called it). I’m hoping he can really drop some good times in Europe this summer and maybe put his math degree on further hold. As for Alan Webb, perhaps this will finally motivate him to get a real coach. He still has at least one more Olympics in him (only 25), so this isn’t the end of him. Yay Olympics. Note: a bit of a cough and runny nose, I think I’m coming down with Kangway’s cold.

Miles: 59 (+ 1000 yards swimming)

Summer Base Week 7: some great running

2008-06-30T02:50:00.000-04:00

6/23/08 – Nice Huntington after group softball game. I was on my feet all day and so they seemed really tired at the start of the run, but seemed to loosen up nicely.
Miles: 6

6/24/08- Awesome dusk Full Arroyo from Lloyd in 85.5 minutes. Started out nice and easy (actually was 8 min pace!) and then gradually picked it up feeling really strong the whole way. I have forgotten how smart it is to start easy and gradually pick it up, and how much I love the arroyo at dusk. The whole thing averaged 8 minute pace, which is good for the hill. Quality running. I have also decided that I can pull of 75 mile weeks with smart double days. R Achilles a bit tight, but things looking good.
Miles: 10.6

6/25/08- A nice chill evening huntingson. Note chill, not chilly. It was quite humid and really reminded me of home. I actually miss home and my friends quite a bit. I need to work out plans for going back.
Miles: 7

6/26/06- Eichenlaub grassy special with Dennis, started out slow, ended up medium. Late, not feeling super good. I hope Dennis will be around next year.
Miles: 9

6/27/08- Group softball practice at 4 p.m. and then very easy night Lacy long way from Lloyd. Very easy and relaxed. 38 minutes for 4.5 miles
Miles: 5.5

6/28/08- Very nice half marathon progressions run. I was bored and I decided it was time to put my plans into action: I did the Penis run (slightly modified as shown below). Much better than the last 13 miler I did, plus I did over 2 miles of walking around campus earlier in the day. With 4 miles to go started to accelerate until I was running a very nice 7:45-7:30 pace or so in the last stretch down California/campus. Knees a bit swollen at times but in quite good shape. Man this was a good week.
http://www.gmap-pedometer.com/?r=2030745
Miles: 13.2

6/29/08- Was going to swim but missed the pool hours. Decided to fix up and get back on the bike. Nice easy 11 mile ride to and around the Rose Bowl with Todd. Bike still needs work and will definitely take it to Steve’s. Legs feeling surprisingly great!
Miles: (11)

Weekly Miles: 51 + (11)

Summer Base Week 6: A jump in mileage

2008-06-24T22:16:00.000-04:00

6/16/08- Legs still kinda tired. Hot 5 p.m. Huntington Virginia down Canterbury and then to softball. Ran into Ian and Katherine and ran a mile with them easy.
Miles: 5.6

6/17/08- Awesome summer full moon midnight lower arroyo (night variant) with Dennis. Started out easy, slowly picking up the pace to a comfortable 7:45 pace by the end. Excellent run.
Miles: 8.5

6/18/08- Medium easy Huntington backwards from Lloyd, to san Pasqual. I thought I was going pretty slow but apparently it only took 46:48. That’s a solid 7:11 min pace. I don’t believe I was actually going that fast I think I must have forgotten to start at a light and forgot to stop at a later one. Probably more like 8-8:15 pace.
Miles: 6.5

6/19/08- The great Eaton Canyon midnight adventure. Legs were feeling un injured and pretty good through the day so I decided I would go for an epic long run. Unfortunately I choose something a bit too demanding. N hill was fine but felt a little too hard. I still felt pretty good once I reached Altadena Dr. and had descending down to the base of Eaton Canyon. Once I started the climb up the ridge, I really started to feel it. Once of the fire roads was blocked off as private, which I think is wrong, so I had to back track all the way around. Once I had made it down to Sierra madre my legs had already crashed. I slowly made my way back but really bonked on San Pasqual. Somehow made it back alive and I think uninjured. 1:45.
http://www.gmap-pedometer.com/?r=2004999
Miles: 13

6/20/08- Easy Huntington Virginia. Legs better than I was expected but stomach was bothersome.
Miles: 5.1

6/21/08- Afternoon swim of 500 yards. Lower Arroyo. Tired, not so much the legs, just overall tired. 68 minutes.
Miles: 8.2

6/22/08- Awesome day vacation to Malibu-El Matador Beach with some ocean swimming (~2-300 yards off shore and back) and some barefoot walking to Malibu Seafood to Solstice canyon for a 2.5 mile hike.
Miles: 3 walking

Weekly Miles: 47 + 3 hiking

Summer Training Weeks 4&5: The wrath of finals

2008-06-17T22:23:00.000-04:00

6/2/08- Huntington + medium easy,legs feeling a bit tired but generally good.
Miles: 7.3

6/3/08- Nice Lacy slightly longer way reverse with Dennis. Legs tired but feeling okay. Finals tough.
Miles: 5

6/4/08- Concordi LT Treadmill test with Ian, Chief, and Dennis. Max HR 202, LT at between 178-184 at 8.5-8.6 mph (7 minute pace) That seems about right but hopefully we can lower this to 6:30 or 6:20 pace by the middle of the season. Later we will do a treadmill workout and I might bring my HR monitor along on some runs. 4 laps N field warm-up and Lacy and back cool down.
Miles: 5.75

6/5/08- Nice huntingson variant medium-easy with Chief. 53 minutes for 6.7 miles at 7:55 ish pace. Legs getting tired!
http://www.gmap-pedometer.com/?r=1964797
Miles: 6.75

6/6/07- Slow, easy Huntington Virginia plus warmup across campus. If my legs are tired and getting better/not hurt, that’s a very good thing. Now that my legs are healing up, I can add in some more variation into my runs.
Miles: 5.5

6/7/08- Very tough full Arroyo. Legs were fairly tired but not ridiculous. Really felt labored for the beginning, but kept going, got really bad the last 2 miles. This shows two things, one that I’m in pretty horrible shape, and the other that I need to listen to my body more and do things when they feel right. Also this has been 49 miles in 7 days, too much.
Miles: 10.5

6/8/08- Very homework filled off day. Legs tired in the morning but not horribly so. A bit of swelling in my L knee but much less than I expected, went down during the day. Still iced. I think I will do my long run mid week, but I will have to do it much more by feel, but 12-14 is hard to do solely on feel. Possible options are a grass extravaganza, epic trail run from RB to the damn, run to the hills, or chief style out and back. I would like one run to be a trial run and climb some, regardless. Also I must break out the ice bath.
Miles: 0

Weekly Miles: 41

6/9/08- Legs feeling much better, still tired. Medium Huntington with Dave at 5 p.m., warm out, at least much warmer than 1 a.m. Need to get used to heat, but a good run.
Miles: 6.4

6/10/08- Really outstanding run. Headed N on Hill to end, then Holliston, and back and Lake/Michigan/Hill. Was originally going for time but ended up going a bit longer. I thought my legs were going to be dead or hurting but instead they were full of energy. A nice surprise. A nice quick pace on the way down, averaged 8:15 pace. 74.5 minutes.
http://www.gmap-pedometer.com/?r=1980020
Miles: 9

6/11/08- NFTC beer mile championships, 2nd place 18 minutes DFL. Ow my stomach.
Miles: 1.5

6/12/08- I should have stretched and warmed up properly yesterday. Nice medium easy run with Chief Huntington to los Robles back up by Lacy. 66 Minutes
Miles: 7.5

6/13/08- Hungry Tu Madre, legs, self out of energy. Tripped over a big water main thing in grass, foot a bit bloody and bruised but seems okay.
Miles: 5.5

6/14/08- Moving day, exhausted. Day off is good.
Miles:0

6/15/08- Legs still tired from moving. Garfield long way plus a bit extra slow. 62 minutes.
Miles: 7

Weekly Miles: 37

6/16/08- Legs still kinda tired. Hot 5 p.m. Huntington Virginia down Canterbury and then to softball. Ran into Ian and Katherine and ran a mile with them easy.
Miles: 5.6

The Aftermath of Beach Trip

2008-06-02T05:48:00.000-04:00

5/26/08- Ugh my feet hurt. Blisters better, cuts still hurt, knee pretty stiff but doesn’t hurt

Miles:0

5/27/08- Blisters much better, cuts still bothersome. 11:30 p.m. Easy Huntington Virginia. Knee started hurting at 3.5 miles once on the uphill. Lower knee, seems like patella tendon but could be more deep. Iced afterwards.

Miles: 5.2

5/28/08- Same as yesterday, 5 p.m., legs feeling crappy, knee slightly better but still began hurting a bit by the top of the stairs. Slow.

Miles: 5.2

5/29/08 – Knee much better, blisters and feet better. Reverse hunting + extra north at 11:00 p.m.. Feeling good the whole way, working at a moderate clip. Knee stiff but never hurting. Awesome.

http://www.gmap-pedometer.com/?r=1942955

Miles: 7.1

5/30/08- Knee fairly swollen from yesterday but no pain, blisters still better. Short Pre-race from Lloyd to keep it easy.

Miles: 2.7

5/31/08- No run, orchestra concert, busy didn’t get around to it. Ugh. I can’t believe one stupid run has put me out for a full week or more.

Miles:0

6/1/08- Cross Country Season unofficially begins today. Legs feeling good, knee okay. Medium Lower arroyo at 8 p.m. from Lloyd, but got dark so I had to cut out a bit early. Knee stiff, a bit achy, but not hurting. Iced afterwards. A good run.

http://www.gmap-pedometer.com/?r=1951070

Miles: 8.5

Weekly Miles: 29

Summer Base Week 2

2008-05-28T15:24:00.000-04:00

5/19/08- Nice solid run. Supposedly the long run of the week. Huntington Long way medium. Felt quite strong, like I was moving decently the whole way, maybe 7:50-8:00 pace. Nice evening with full moon.

Miles: 7.4

http://www.gmap-pedometer.com/?r=1911813

5/20/08- Lacy Long way medium at 3:30 in the afternoon. Warm and humid, lots of gardners out, reminded me of home. R little toe tendon quite achy later that night.

Miles: 4.5

5/21/08- Ditch Day Wooo! Did Dave’s stack. Massive power outage at 5 till 7 basically trashed the stack thanks to dumb Page boys ( who apparently are also now involved in animal cruelty charges (felonies!) for a goal of theirs that they let loose and got hit by a car). Legs quite tired, foot still sore. I’ll call this one a day off.

Miles: 0

5/22/08- Long pre-race with Anton medium-easy.

Miles: 4.5

5/23/08-Garfield Long way medium from Lloyd in the cold rain. Amazing run, felt like ’24 in the rain’ . Lost track of time and was late to Ascit movie but who cares?

Miles: 6.5

5/24/08- Extended pre-race in the cold evening easy.

Miles: 4

5/25/08- Medium hour run at Lloyd beach trip with Chief and then watts. Bare foot on the sand chariots of fire style. I started feeling blister formation only 3 miles in but continued. Bad idea. Also stepped on glass. I now have 4 bad blisters and two moderate cuts. Hmm perhaps wearing shoes would have been a good idea. I’m calling this run ‘Lloyd beach trip blisterfest 08’.

Miles: 7.6

http://www.gmap-pedometer.com/?r=1929168

Weekly Miles: 34.5

5/26/08- Ugh my feet hurt. Blisters better, cuts still hurt, knee pretty stiff but doesn’t hurt

Miles:0

Miles:5.2

The Beginning of the Best Summer Ever: Down Time + Summer Base Week 1

2008-05-20T05:09:00.001-04:00

So it begins. If I can get through the plans I have laid out for myself, I will not only be in the best shape ever, I will made considerable progress towards my full collegiate potential. Awesome.

4/28/08- Lacy long way very easy with Dennis.
Miles: 4
4/29/08 – Medium Lacy long way with Dave and Chief.
Miles: 5
4/30/08-5/2/08- Off
5/3/08- 1000 yards swimming easy late.

Weekly Miles: 9

5/4/08- 1000 yards easy, 100-250-350-250-100 with Prof. Rob Phillips, cool down. Total 2500 yards
5/5/08-5/7/08- Off
5/8/08- 4 miles medium on south field with chief in Free’s.
Miles: 4.5
5/9/08-5/11/08- Off. On 5/10 sharp pain in L ball of foot upon toe-off when walking. Disappears after a few minutes of walking. Erin believes minor nerve damage from crouching work during Interhouse party construction.

Weekly Miles: 4.5

5/12/08- 25 minutes easy on N. field with Chief. Cold and drizzly. Foot feels fine.
Miles: 3
5/13/08- Ran after orchestra (11 pm) with Anton. Cool and damp. Medium-Easy E. California, S. Sierra madre, W. Euston, N. Oxford, W. Orlando and back to school. 37 minutes, 4.25 miles. It felt a lot quicker than 8:40 pace but it was all soft grass and a bit hilly.
Miles: 4.25
5/14/08- Ran late again today due to option tea (11pm) with Chief. Warm and damp. Medium Garfield Long way. I am pretty sure we weren’t going that fast and I could tell that, while it felt like we pushing hard. I guess it’s just humid and I’m out of shape.
Miles: 5.75
5/15/08- Pre race easy again at 11 pm.
Miles: 3.5
5/16/08- Cool easy city run with Dennis to old Pas on Del Mar and back on Green. Feeling stronger/more comfortable pushing a bit again. 40 minutes. L Foot feeling better, R knee still stiff.
http://www.gmap-pedometer.com/?r=1905756
Miles: 4.7
5/17/08- Late dinner and casino night mean Huntington will have to wait until tomorrow.
Miles: 0
5/18/08- Ian, Katherine, Kangway, Dennis, Megumi, Peter and I went to the 08 Addidas Track classic in Carson. Awesome meet. Leer ran a PR in 3:38. I also confirmed that indeed, Kara Goucher is the most attractive women on the planet. Track banquet that evening. Got first Caltech Varsity Letter! Very tired afterwards, skipped again.
Miles: 0

Weekly Miles: 21

5/19/08- Nice solid run. Supposedly the long run of the week. Huntington Long way medium. Felt quite strong, like I was moving decently the whole way, maybe 7:50-8:00 pace. Nice evening with full moon.
Miles: 7.4
http://www.gmap-pedometer.com/?r=1911813

The End of Track

2008-05-14T05:07:00.000-04:00

I'll skip the essays about my season. Well maybe I'll leave one in there. Enjoy!

3/28/08- My favorite home run feeling pretty good. Medium CJ trail almost to River Road.
Miles: 8.5

3/29/08- Eichenlaub grassy up Virginia, picked up tempo from Virginia to Los Robles and then pushed hard back, accelerating to 5 min/mile pace by the end. Feeling good, except for a bit of Achilles/Plantar to work on.

Miles: 7.5

3/30/08- NFTC with Kangway, Mark. 25 minutes medium, 5 min cool down. Lifted afterwards. Feeling stronger, but it was still disturbing how surprisingly not easy that 25 minutes was.
Miles: 4

Weekly Miles: 25

3/31/08- Feeling better today. Medium-hard Arroyo to casting pond. Kept 7:30 pace (at times less) the whole way. Going to be a bit tired tomorrow though!
Miles: 8.7

4/1/08- 10x400 going every 2 min at 5k pace. Did a 2 mile warm-up. Then went 90,89,91,90,89,87,88,87,88, 87,86, bonus in 72. Felt good and relaxed the whole way, a great workout for the first hard workout in 2 weeks, and track workout in 3. I think I could have gone faster for the workout. Lacy fountain and back cool down.
Miles: 7

4/2/08- Huntington medium easy. Legs a bit tired but feeling otherwise fine. High mileage for track (47 miles in the past 7 days)
Miles: 7

4/3/08- Had 4 p.m. class so went at 12:30 instead. I went Lacy long was as a warm-up, but cramped up very badly after only ½ a mile. I tried to relax a bit at Lacy but I couldn’t shake a lingering feeling that I would throw up. Jogged back easy.
Miles: 4.6

4/4/08- Easy Pre-race. Stomach still feeling out of it, cramped up again.
Miles: 4.2

4/5/08- Skipped out of the race due to orchestra concert, lingering concerns about stomach. I later found out the a stomach flu was going around campus. Later that evening after the concert Dennis, Chief, who was upset about his race and wanted to run more, and I drove to the Rose Bowl for a midnight interval workout. We parked at the closest residential street south ran to Lot K and did ~1000,700,500,300 at 1500m race pace with Dennis and Chief pacing me. First 1k in about 3:30-3:35 uphill. 700 in 2:40 again uphill, 500 in 90 rolling, 300 in about 48 slightly downhill (Lot K sign to Savlia Canyon Road, Salvia Canyon to service building, service building to N. bridge and N bridge to dirt path form perfect intervals. A great workout and feeling good. Afterwards we got In N Out and Dennis told us he is enrolled again! Good times.

http://www.gmap-pedometer.com/?r=1765272
Miles: 7

4/6/08-I was planning on attending NTFC but was busy doing math homework.

Weekly miles: 39 (Between Thursday to Thursday 48)

4/7/08- Medium Lower Arroyo. Foot bothering me in old injury area. I am a bit worried about this, although it seems to have not gotten too much worse since the run. Tomorrow morning will tell if anything serious has happened. At least for tomorrow, I may have to scale down the track workout.
Miles: 8

I stopped recording around here. My computer bit the dust hard the next day. I was able to save a lot of data files, including the log, but the rest was trashed. It took a while to figure out the problem and to get everything back up and running again. I’ll fill in what I remember. Because of my foot I remember taking this week a bit down. I ran the whole week with a metatarsal pad on my foot. Maybe a total weekly mileage around 30.

Sat- Multi-duals at Redlands 1500m in 5:00. Very hot, breezy. It must have been 95 degrees or so and very bright sunlight. Strangely enough, there was still a good deal of visible snow up in the San Bernadinos. We got to Redlands around 1:30 p.m. and sat in the heat for 3 hours. Warm-up around campus, foot feeling okay, dipped my head in the steeple pit 5 min before the race. There were several people entered at very similar times to me so I took the race out in an easy 80 while I was immediately dropped by the pack. At this point I noticed some guy was sitting right behind me. Ian kept telling me to listen for him. I was very constant with the pace and about 300 to go the guy made a big move. I shifted gears but the guy still blew right by me. Almost threw up at the end. Long cool down with Chief afterwards, ran through the big campus fountain. Chief PRed in the 5k in 16:59.76.

Weekly Miles: ~30

This next week I decided to put in one last hard week of very solid effort.
Mon- Medium hard Lower Arroyo. Stayed with the whole team until half way down California. Still hot but pushed hard and kept up.
Miles: ~8
Tues- 12 400s going every 120 seconds in 88-87 consistently the whole way. Ran alone because I got there late. Chief timed me.

Wed-Garfield long way.
Thurs-med not sure what run
Fri- 3 on 2 x7 off hard(~3k pace) at Lacey with Dennis. Went anaerobic after the 2nd one and held on for an okay finish.
Sat-RB lot K to JPL with Watts medium. Watts is a surprisingly strong runner. It doesn’t surprise me his brother is a top member on the Williams team.
Miles: 7
Weekly Miles: ~40
Mon- Super easy Lower arroyo.
Tues- 8x400s going every 120. 87-86s the whole way.
Wed- Lacy long way super easy with 2 laps and back.
Thursday- 5-4-3-2-1 with Dennis
Fri- easy jogging around Pomona with Dennis. Very hot.My 1500 got moved straight to finals.
Sat- SCIAC finals 1500m-4:59 12th. Very hot and windy again! This time I sat behind that mofo that did the same to me last time. With 250 to go he did the same thing but again I couldn’t respond. I kicked it in real hard and barfed all over the field. Part of me wanted to run the 5k but I just wasn’t feeling it.
Driving back, there was a huge fire in Sierra Madre. It lit up the whole mountainside with 200 foot flames. Then Black interhouse. I drank for the first time in several months. Basically the entire team showed up to the party which was hella cool. Dennis kept trying to think of a crazy adventure which would involve us using our super speed to escape security or the Po-Po. I promised we would streak through the houses at some point.
Weekly Miles: ~30

Totals:
Wk 1: 36
Wk 2; 38 (37 cycling)
Wk 3: 45
Wk 4: 43
Wk 5: 40 (12 backpacking)
Wk 6: 26 – no long day from backpacking
Wk 7: 40
Wk 8: 23.5 – Groin Injury
Wk 9: 37
Wk 10: 39
Wk 11: 23.5- Spring break skiing + sick
Wk 12: 25 –sick
Wk 13: 39
Wk 14: 30-foot thing
Wk 15: 40
Wk 16: 30

Season Total: 516 ± 20 ( ≈ 505 is my guess)

I have mixed feelings about this season. On one hand it was my first complete track season as a distance runner. I ran three PRs, stayed quite healthy, and gained valuable racing experience, albeit not in the main pack. However some part of me is quite disappointed by the season. This was supposed to be the season where stuff started happening. Little glimpses of future speed would show through and the fruits of 8 months continuous running would be realized. That never happened. I thought that, hey, if I ran 5:01 at interhouse last year in trainers with a fairly brief winter off-season, I could definitely hit 4:40 this year, maybe even 4:35 in the 1500. I hit 5:01 again at interhouse this year off a much bigger winter base. I did PR in the 3000 and 800 slightly, but my 1500s never got that good. Even after Oxy, where I ran a 4:57 alone and a bit sick, I was still a bit hopeful. But it never came. It just…didn’t. Maybe I wasn’t running hard enough. Maybe I was backing off instead of attacking and not having people around me kept me from being motivated. But at SCIACs I ran behind someone the whole way, still only in 4:59, and proceeded to hurl afterwards suggesting that I did indeed run almost as hard as I could have. This will still be my first XC season off of a full base with a solid summer of training, but I am a bit doubtful. I could just run Scott’s plan and come in and hope for the best. Or instead of just sitting there and being sad that I’m not fast, I could go out and work my ass off. I could get up to 75-80 miles. I could drop 800 miles this summer. I could see what happens. If I get horribly injured and drained all season, well I have one more season to not do that. If I break 30 or 29, well then I will know I did something right. To do this I will have to be very careful to take excellent care of myself and my legs. I’ll have to dedicate myself. If that’s what it takes, I’ll do it.

4/28/08- Lacy Long way very easy with Dennis. Dave met us above Lacy and we went 6:45 pace back to school.
Miles: 4
4/29/08- Lacy long way plus laps medium-hard with Dave and Chief.
Miles: 5
5/3/08- Easy 1000 yards
5/4/08- 2500 yards plus a ladder workout med. Hard.

I added up the miles for this year:
Summer Training: 300
XC: 435
Winter: 235
Track: 505
Total: 1475-1500 Miles

Spring Break and Sick

2008-03-31T04:30:00.001-04:00

My season seems to be unraveling very slowly. First a bit of injury, then sickness. I don't feel like I'm improving anymore and my fitness/basic aerobic ability is feeling disturbingly lacking. I have some loose plans for the rest of the season but they lack direction and certainty. I also feel like I am loosing touch with running and a lot of the runners I know. At this point it just feels like I'm just waiting for summer and still waiting for some magical season where I suddenly break through.

3/17/08- Medium Huntington up Virginia with Julian after finishing 95.
Miles: 5

3/18/08- 15 Minute tempo with Scott at Lacy. 3:07, 3:03, 3:05, 3:00, 3:00 for each lap. Pretty tough by the end, warm out.
Miles: 7

3/19/08 – Pulled all nighter for Ph12b exam. I wish that course was better taught. A good thing to start with is not giving 15 hour sets. I hope I can pull out a good grade in that class. So glad this term is over. I really need to figure out how to be more constructive during the term and I think it begins with less units and less living set to set. I also think lowering the stress will greatly help my running. 35 minutes easy on N field.
Miles: 4

3/20/08- Heading to Mammoth
Miles:0

3/21/08- Skiing at Mammoth.
Miles: 0

3/22/08- Skiing at Mammoth. Ran down main road to campground and followed some trails in the snow. Kept post holing in shorts. ~50 minutes total. Altitude kicking my butt. Also sad I didn’t see Ryan Hall.
Miles: 6
3/23/08- Skiing at Mammoth. Feeling a bit sick.
Miles:0

Weekly Miles: 22

3/24/08- Sick, really bad sore throat. Driving back from Mammoth, miserable plane flight back to D.C.
Miles: 0

3/25/08- Feeling horrible, cannot swallow without extreme pain, 101.5 fever. Went to the doctors, strep throat, started penicillin.
Miles:0

3/26/08- Still feeling pretty out of it, still can't swallow anything.
Miles:0

3/27/08- Finally feeling better. Drove to Churchill H.S., ran around it medium easy. Legs felt like they hadn’t ran in ages but felt good.
Miles: 5

3/28/08- My favorite home run feeling pretty good. Medium CJ trail almost to River Road.
Miles: 8.5

3/29/08- Eichenlaub grassy up Virginia, picked up tempo from Virginia to Los Robles and then pushed hard back, accelerating to 6:00-5:45 or less pace by the end. Feeling good, except for a bit of Achilles/Plantar to work on.

Miles: 7.5

3/30/08- NFTC with Kangway, Mark. 25 minutes medium, 5 min cool down. Lifted afterwards. Feeling stronger, but it was still disturbing how surprisingly not easy that 25 minutes was.
Miles: 4

Weekly Miles: 25

Totals:
Wk 1: 36
Wk 2; 38 (37 cycling)
Wk 3: 45
Wk 4: 43
Wk 5: 40 (12 backpacking)
Wk 6: 26 – no long day from backpacking
Wk 7: 40
Wk 8: 23.5 – Groin Injury
Wk 9: 37
Wk 10: 39
Wk 11: 22- Spring break skiing + sick
Wk 12: 25 -sick

Season Total: 415 ± 20 ( ≈ 405 is my guess)

Must...Update...Log!

2008-03-15T23:36:00.000-04:00

2/25/08- L groin still very sore. I think it may be pulled. Lower arroyo to the casting pond moderate, picking up at the end. Took at least 4 miles for groin pain to go away. Hmm..

Miles: 9

2/26/08- Pretty beat up. Groin thing, R patella tendon, R Achilles and plantar faschia. I gotta hang in there. Did a modified track workout with a bit less mileage and long rest. 4,8,12,12,8,4,4 going every 3:00/lap. 84,3:01, 4:29,4:26,2:56,86,69. It was good to get on the track without killing myself. I need to recover! Warm-up to Allen, cool down to Lacy stairs.
Miles: 8.5

2/27/08- Huntington up Virginia easy. Took about 1.5-2 miles for groin to warm up. Hurdle drills
Afterwards for possible Steeple. R patella tendon, groin aggrevated. Iced full body.
Miles:6

2/28/08- Talk to the trainers about the groin thing and they want me to take some time off. Plus didn’t really sleep too much due to Ph 12 last night. Heated, did 25 minutes on the bike, iced.
Miles:0

2/29/08- Another day off for the groin. Swam 600 yards, aqua jogged 100 yards, did some exercises and U.S. and iced full body afterwards again.
Miles:0

3/1/08- Nada.

3/2/08- Nada.

Weekly Miles: 23.5

3/3/08- Ran 30 minutes on the North field, feeling better. Than swam 500 yards.
Miles: 5

3/4/08-feeling a bit more sore than yesterday, ran 30 minutes on the inside of the N. field.
Miles: 5

3/5/08- Feeling a bit better. 30 minutes or so to Los Robles on Arden/Filmore.
Miles: 4.5

3/6/08- Feeling much better! Did the workout, Hella tight! Warm-up to Lacy, 10 on, 2 off x3, first was consistent 3:20s, than ~3:17, 3:23, 3:20 then about 3:20, 3:10, 3:00. Even though I was a bit sick, this workout was alright and it was very nice to run with the guys again.
Miles: 8.5

3/7/08- Feeling a bit more sick but groin better. Garfield long way easy, although not feeling so well.
Miles: 6

3/8/08- Ran from RB aquatics center to the parking lot at JPL. I really like this run. I was still feeling under the weather so it took 3-4 miles to get into it. Put in a 1+ mile tempo feeling surge from the Golf Course entrance along the side of the RB. Coughing a bit afterwards.
Miles: 8

3/9/08- Swam 1000 yards in the morning, not feeling so good at night. Coughing a lot more.
(1000 yards)

Weekly Miles: 37

3/10/08- 400, 6x600, but I pulled out and jogged after 4 600s because my groin was feeling tight. 1 mile warm up. 400 in 80, then 1:59(79), 2:00, 2:01, 2:01, jogged. On the infield for the rest. Hot and windy and still feeling kinda sick but I think I’m getting better.
Miles: 5

3/11/08- Garfield Long way. Legs felt really heavy, going slow and uncomfortable. Still sick.
Miles: 6.5

3/12/08- 5-4-3-2-1 at Lacy. Throat very sore.
Miles: 7

3/13/08- Pre race with longer warm up. Throat still sore.
Miles: 5

3/14/08- Oxy Distance Carnival. 1500-4:57. Went out in 74-75, dropped time slowly from there (lost contact with pack after 300 meters). Need to get better, need to pace better.
Miles: 4

3/15/08- Legs a bit tired and beat up. Feeling less sick though. Nice slow and easy Eichenlaub grassy special with some variation.
Miles: 8.5

Weekly Miles: 36

A Great Week-Track Week 6

2008-02-24T02:26:00.000-05:00

This week last year was one of the worst in my life, mostly due to my foot breaking. This year was a stark contrast.

2/18/08- Full Arroyo from Lloyd in 78.5 minutes. http://www.gmap-pedometer.com/?r=1636194. Anton and Chief booking it as usual, tough work trying to keep up. Once in the arroyo they pulled away as I backed off a bit. We met up at the aquatics center and then ran together back through Old Pas. Felt pretty good. Worked on being relaxed and keeping solid form. Averaged 7:30 pace. Again perhaps a bit too fast.
Miles: 10.5

2/19/08- 400 at 2:30 , 5x1200s on 6:30, 400, 3x200 with 200 active recovery, Lombardy to Allen cool down. 1200s in 4:30, 4:30, 4:29, 4:27, 4: 26, felt okay, not working too hard, but still pretty hard. Going to be tired tomorrow.
Miles: 9

2/20/08- Crazy tree slow with Nathan. Tired but hanging in there.
Miles: 7

2/21/08- Lacy for 8 on 2 off x3. Had some good energy, ran with Julian the whole way. Perhaps consistent 6:20 pace. Upper left leg feeling kind of crampy, perhaps from lunges yesterday. Good workout in general, XC will be awesome next year if I can hold out.
Miles: 8

2/22/08- Pre race easy with lots of guys here today!
Miles: 4.5

2/23/08- Rossi Relays. Just an 800 today for the SMR. We were in 5th place so I went out a bit hard (66) and paid for it (74) . Actually not a bad time, but it could have been like 2 sec. faster if I had paced better. Anton ran under my name in the 3000 while I left early for a Jazz concert and ran a 9:23.
Miles: 5

Weekly Miles: 40

Track Week 5-Tech All-Comers

2008-02-13T02:44:00.000-05:00

2/4/08- Lower Arroyo plus casting pond. Medium, fairly quick pace, but felt good the whole way, Chief and Anton finished in 59 minutes (6:50 pace), I must have been about 64ish (7:24 pace). Hmm perhaps I should have gone a bit slower. But it’s cool that I can keep this pace up for 9 miles!
Miles: 9

2/5/08- Legs surprisingly tired after yesterday. Down to Garfield for 2.5 mile tempo. Scott cut me short after 4 laps (3:29, 7:00, 10:34, 13:49). Legs just didn’t have it today. I’ll take tomorrow super easy and get some rest for track work on Thursday and meet on Sat.
Miles: 8.5

2/6/08- Huntington up Virginia, feeling okay, a bit beat up, took it easy.
Miles: 6

2/7/08- 400, 2000, 1600, 1200, 800, 400-96,7:33,6:07,4:33,2:59,87 starting with full jogging recovery for first, decreasing rest. Hot, feeling it in stomach after 2k, feeling better for 8 and 4. 1 mile warm-up, lacy and back cool down.
Miles: 8

2/8/08- Pre race very easy with Julian.
Miles: 4

2/9/08- Caltech All comers, hot and windy at least for this early in the season. 4xmile in 5:40 (in trainers), ran by myself in big spread, 4x800 in 2:33 (in trainers), also alone. Heat got to me, ran like a workout, very similar to last year. Hopefully we will see another big improvement at interhouse. Also awkward encounter with Ian. I miss seeing him around but I’m really happy is running and coaching again. Perhaps I’ll email him about running or lifting or riding.
Miles: 4.5

Night: Winter mountaineering trip up baldy, hiked several miles (2.5 hours) up 2000 vertical feet in snow with 45 lbs pack + full winter gear on.
Miles: (4)

2/10/08- Climbed to summit of baldy + mountaineering skills stuff, from 7700 to about 10,000 and back to the car. Pretty tired.
Miles: (8)

Weekly Miles: 40 (+ 12 backpacking)

2/11/08- Very sore, well deserved off day.
Miles: 0

2/12/08- 20 minute tempo at Lacy. Ran slower than last lacy tempo but consistent hard work, 6 laps and a bit, maybe 3 miles total, so 6:40-6:35 pace. I think that last one was a bit over the top, and I was pushing just for time/pace. I need to be more relaxed on these. Came back, left hamstring tendon very tight, otherwise feeling good. Ran 400 tt for interhouse prelims, 63 sec in trainers, 32,31. Ugh lactic acid…Iced tendon afterwards.
Miles: 7.5

Track Week 4

2008-02-04T02:17:00.000-05:00

1/28/08- Huntington long-Kiesz’s way : http://www.gmap-pedometer.com/?r=1585256 . Started slow, the pace picked up, including the guys pulling away from me. Actually got up to a pretty good pace. Felt much better than yesterday.
Miles: 8

1/29/08- Interval workout Tuesdays have begun. 4, 4x800, 4 (bonus). The 800s had a slow lap of recovery (3 minutes ?). 84, 2:50, 2:51, 2:48, 2:45, 68. Felt pretty solid, could have perhaps gone faster? Worked with Julian, could have perhaps gone faster? Warm up Allen and back, cool down to lacy and back.
Miles: 8

1/30/08- Tu Madre very easy.
Miles: 6.5

1/31/08- 20 minute tempo at lacey. Wore DS trainers. Pushed pretty hard but kept fairly good pace. 1 mile in 6:10 2 miles in 12:18 3 miles in 18:35. Started to feel it around mile two, backed off a bit, felt better, and kept pushing. Was fairly tired to begin with but okay. Otherwise felt good.
Miles: 7.5

2/1/08- Lacy Long way plus 2 Laps at the park easy.
Miles: 6

2/2/08- Phys lab write up again. I hope I can break the habit.
Miles: 0

2/3/08- Garfield xLong way from Lloyd with Chief, easy.
Miles: 7

Weekly Miles: 43 Shins all better but Plantar Faschia acting up a tiny bit, wore the sock a few times this week while doing sets. Will need to keep an eye on it.
Also, read Ian and Mark's log again and realized how boring mine is. Will need to work on it :)

Getting Fast, Track Season Week 3 and more

2008-01-29T03:30:00.000-05:00

1/20/08- Clear Creek with Kangway and Timbo. Felt rather good for the first time on the bike in a while. Wonderful ride. Chilly near the top.
Miles: (37)

Weekly Miles: 38 (37)

1/21/08- Full Arroyo medium. Had bad cramp entering the arroyo and new metatarsal pad was blistering a bit. Ended up feeling better once onto Green Street.
Miles: 10

1/22/08- First track workout of the year. Wore DS trainers. Shins felt fine during the day, good after heating. Used a disposable metatarsal pad. Lombary to Allen warmup. 7x400 going every 2:30 in 80,84,83,83,82,80,74, then bonus in 66. Felt relaxed the whole way, could have possibly gone faster? Lacy and back cool down. Shins hurt a bit during, iced, sore a bit at night but not bad.
Miles: 7

1/23/08- Raining, 50 Degrees. Legs not sore but a tad tired from yesterday, shins okay. Crazy tree. Shins hurting after/during the run. Felt pretty good, quick pace, tired by the end.
Miles: 7

1/24/08- 15 minute tempo at Lacy. Jogged down easy in the pouring rain/hail, stretched a bit, and went. Was hitting 3:05 per lap for the standard loop (~0.48 miles) in soggy conditions. Did 5 laps total, feeling pretty good, starting slow, keeping with Scott the whole way except for the end, where I fell off a bit. Long way back, ½ mile cool down on the track. Shins feeling okay again today, a bit tight during the run, after icing, but fine otherwise.
Miles: 7

1/25/08- Pretty tired and a bit sick. Huntingson up Los Robles, pretty slow. Shins and stuff feel pretty good today.
Miles: 7

1/26/08- Working on Physics
Miles: 0

1/27/08- Easy Huntington. Legs very tired for some reason. Guy in a pick up truck cat called me by the ritz. Shins better, sesamoid almost unoticable, plantar fascia a bit prickly afterwards. I should wear the strassburg sock around a bit.
Miles: 6.5

Weekly Miles: 45

1/28/08- Huntington long-Kiesz’s way : http://www.gmap-pedometer.com/?r=1585256 . Started slow, the pace picked up, including the guys pulling away from me. Actually got up to a pretty good pace. Felt much better than yesterday.
Miles: 8

The Start of Track (Read: Don't Break This Time)

2008-01-20T02:14:00.000-05:00

Ahh the start of track. The glorious days of medium run-outs, ending runs in the dark, snow in the mountains, and wistful hope of fast times to come. These two weeks saw some healing and good runs, but also some old injuries being aggravated and missing practice due to Ph 6. My goals for this week: Run first track workout smart, Run 6 full ~8 mile practices, get shins and Neuroma down to negligible levels by careful and smart running and icing. Goals for from now until first race: Clear up all old injures and keep new ones at bay, bring mileage up to 50 and hold, get smart track workouts and a good tempo run of 3 or more miles(good fartleks also thrown in cannot hurt), begin to get into racing shape.

12/31/07- 0, New Years party

1/1/08- Nada

1/2/08- Went to pool. Did some core and minor lifting, jogged ½ mile on the treadmill at 7:00 min pace, shins still pretty sore, stretched out. Did 30 minutes of light swimming.
Miles: 0.5

1/3/08- 0,Worried about shins, pretty sore. I don’t think I have a stress fracture but we’ll see when next Monday comes around.

1/4/08- Squat, as in 0, not the leg exercises

1/5/08- Going back to tech!, 0

1/6/08- Cleaning, errands, running not one of them, 0

1/7/08- Got Nike Frees this morning. Awesome. Classes seem okay this term, which is important. Heated shins, ran ½ miles warm-up, Lacy long way down to monterrey and up Virginia. A bit out of shape, lungs have weird almondy tastes, everyone went very fast. Scotticus and I had to hold up the rear at 7:30 pace. Shins didn’t hurt that much! Orthodics a bit weird but I’ll get used to them.
Miles: 5

1/8/08- Shins much less sore when I woke up, although they started to work in there on the run, although not badly. Crazy Tree medium with Scott and Julian. Legs felt heavy again, especially after lunges, but feeling a bit better. Sesamoid sore from pavement, but not bad.
Miles: 6

1/9/08- Lacy long way, 12 striders in lacy, 1 lap, then back. Legs sore from yesterday, haven’t ran quick in a while. Shins continuing to get better slowly, might have blister from orthodics, which still aren’t sitting right in my shoes.
Miles: 6

1/10/08- Garfield long way, didn’t have time to warm up due to getting out gear. Not as quick or stressful as the past two days. Everything slowly on the mend.
Miles: 5.7

1/11/08- Tu Madre pretty chill. It was nice to go at a bit slower pace.
Miles: 6.5

1/12/08- Skiing at Big Bear
Miles: 0
1/13/08- Huntington Sunday Run. Went for the first 4 miles with Chief and Anton. Calfs sore and legs tired from yesterday. Not feeling so hot today. Speaking of which, at least 78-80 degrees outside.
Miles: 6.5

Weekly Miles: 36

1/14/08- Lower Arroyo medium with quick finish. Tired by the end! Ran with Scott and Julian.
Miles: 8.5

1/15/08- Stucking in Ph 6 lab until 5:45, too busy to run. Ugh work
Miles: 0

1/16/08- Lacy long way, 16 striders, 2 laps and back. Fairly chill. Foot felt a bit weird after icing.
Miles: 7.5

1/17/08- Neuroma aggravated, not too bad though. Iced before practice, used metatarsal pad. Felt pretty good as the run progressed. Garfield, 3 laps at tempo pace (6:40 pace) plus a medium warm-up lap. Felt strong, breathing very labored, but was able to hold the pace with relative ease.
Miles: 8.5

1/18/08- Ph 6 consuming my life. Worked on Lab report until 4:30 where I went to practice and did Lacy long way pretty easy, foot was a bit sorer today but again went away during the run. Shins still sore.
Miles: 4.5

1/19/08- JPL run with Chief. Really fantastic run, working at a medium level the whole way, quite comfortably. Stream was at a good level to just charge right through. Shins still quite sore, will have to watch. Should do that run more often.
Miles: ~9

1/20/08-

Weekly Miles: 38

267 Miles Later

2007-12-31T18:14:00.000-05:00

Here is my full winter training log. I have finished 8 weeks of solid winter off-season base training. I am not injured but am I bit beat up, so I will take the final week before track starts off.

Sophomore Winter Training Log

10/28/07- 11/4/07- Off. Physical Therapy every day. Friday I ran 15 minutes on the N. field and it went pretty well. I still took the weekend off

11/5/07- Heated, stretched, and did a very nice relaxed 20 minutes around the N. field at just under 8 min pace. Heel felt fine. It was very cool and moist outside, which made for great running conditions. I think I will start slowly and carefully returning to training. Ultrasounded and Iced bath.

Miles: 2.5

11/6/07- Fairly sore, but not painful. Didn’t run, did the usual physical therapy.
Miles: 0

11/7/07- Felt a lot better today, a good sign. Ran 8 laps around the N. field at a moderate pace. 20 minutes total.
Miles: 2.5

11/8/07- Aside from a weird soreness near my 5th digit (R foot), felt good. Ran 7 laps of N. field at a quick pace.
Miles: 2

11/9/07- Foot felt pretty good. Ran ~30 min near campus and on N. field, mostly on grass. Started slow, was able to pick it up very comfortably. Foot felt fine afterwards.
Miles: 3.5

11/10/07- Huntington girl’s way with Julian. Took it slow, worked up to a nice moderate pace. Foot seemed fine the whole way. I guess we’ll see tomorrow. Played some ctf.
Miles: 5.5

Weekly Miles: 16

11/11/07- Off.
Miles: 0

11/12/07- Huntingson reverse. Took it out easy, accelerated to a medium pace. Between miles 1-3 5th digit R side of foot thing acting up, but it subsided. Heel felt a bit aggravated by the end but not bad.
Miles: 7

11/13/07- Huntington short way reverse medium.
Miles: 5.5

11/14/07- San Pasqual out to San Gabriel, N to Colorado, W to Sierra Madre, S to Lombardy back. Heel feels tingly, Achilles’ tight. Medium.
Miles: 5.5

11/15/07- Achilles a bit irritated at the insertion on the heel. Backing off a bit. Ran to Lacy, did 2 laps with Nathan easy.
Miles: 3.5

11/16/07- El Molino to Monterey back up by Lacy and the stairs. Medium.
Miles: 5

11/17/07- Huntington girls way with Julian. Wasn’t feeling too good, I think I was dehydrated and a bit sick. Slow.
Miles: 5

11/18/07- Off

Miles: 32

11/19/07- Huntington with J.R. Medium, not particularly comfortable. 47 min, so about 7:40 pace. Heel okay. “Do 8 miles at that pace every day.” Probably pretty good advice, if I'm healthy and in shape.
Miles: 6

11/20/07- Garfield Long way (up Virgina) easy. Took it chill from the start, couldn’t go that fast in the dark, still 8:15 or so. Foot getting better.
Miles: 6.5

11/21/07- Plane home for thanksgiving.
Miles: 0

11/22/07- Big Jungle Long way (back up gainsborough). Okay.
Miles: 6.5

11/23/07- 6 Miles on the canal, windy and quite cold (40 F), lungs very tight. Not that fast, hamstring tendons sore.
Miles: 6

11/24/07- Big Jungle plus 1 mile on the track with Tarik (=hard). Not a good run, colder (37 F) Tarik pulling away from me in miles 4 and 5. Lungs pretty tight.
Miles: 6

11/25/07- Off. Achilles' stiff this morning.

Miles: 31

11/26/07- River road trail much better. Easy first 3 miles, much warmer, 55 degrees, lots of energy and good speed coming back. Also doctor says that in addition to my high arches being terrible for shock absorption, and thus need orthodics, for some read my right ankle has a very limited up and down range of motion, which my be the cause of all of my right foot and lower leg injuries the past year.
Miles: 7

11/27/07- Good to be back in Pasadena. Garfield long way home, felt pretty good but pace was slow. Erin worked on my ankle for 15 min, very sore but already noticeable more flexible. Also sesamoid was swollen.
Miles: 6.5

11/28/07- Feeling good. Lower arroyo with a bit of exploring and cool down on N field with Anton. Averaged 8:15 pace, at times slower, accelerating once in the arroyo, down to 7:40 pace down California.
Miles: 8.5

11/29/07- Legs a bit tired. good. Huntington girls way pretty mellow. Swam for 45 minutes afterwards, prep for interhouse.
Miles: 5

11/30/07- 6 wonderful miles in the rain. Huntingson modified backwards,, got hit by car on los robles, kicked starting at the entrance to Huntington gardens, felt great.
Miles: 6.5
12/1/07- Upper Arroyo with Julian. Started out pretty chill, accelerating down to 7:30 pace or less like usual, julian with me every step of the way.
Miles: 7.5

12/2/07- Off. Lots of work

Weekly Miles: 41

12/3/07- Beautiful Day! Drove to Wedny's for epic lunch in paradisic weather. Parked in lot K of the Rose Bowl and ran to JPL with Anton. Out in 8:20 pace, back down to 7 min after Devil's Gate, Avg 7:45. One day will run from there to the Dam.
Miles: 7

12/4/07- Interhouse Swimming. A few hundred yards than 50 fly. Got second! Not sure about time. Lacy and back with Nathan and someone in my class who had flamed out. Shins stiff and sore.
Miles: 3.5

12/5/07- Huntington Girl's way. Was going to go longer but weird pain in left shin got me worried. Erin said I need to watch my shins as they are inflamed at the insertion of the tendon/where stress fractures commonly happen. Sesamoid sore as well. Going to tone it down this week.
Miles: 5

12/6/07- Interhouse swimming finals. Gave my shins and a sesamoid rest. Swam some fun 50 frees.
Miles: 0

12/7/07- Huntington Girl's way with chief. Shins feeling better. Quick pace, feeling good.
Miles: 5

12/8/07- Went to Mt. Baldy Ski resort to go sledding, ended up climbing Mt. Baldy in hurricane force, -10 F wind chill winds and white out conditions. Pretty cool, good workout!
Miles: (6)

12/9/07- Sesamoid pretty irritated.
Miles: 0

Weekly Miles: 26

12/10/07- Would have ran but Ph 5 project not looking so hot.
Miles: 0

12/11/07- Hunt ington Girl's way with Stef and Perrin.
Miles: 5

12/12/07- Some more huntington action with Julian. Got up to pretty quick pace, felt okay.
Miles: 6

12/13/07- Fantastic Run on huntington up to Los Robles and back through Lacy. &7:30 or less pace with ease, sesamoid okay. Where did this energy/speed come from!? Finals a lot of work.
Miles: 8

12/14/07-Huntington backwards with mr. horikoski. Legs like bricks from yesterday. A bit depressed.
Miles: 6

12/15/07- I was grudgingly paying some bills and tying up some loose ends before leave when a voice out in the hall caught my ear. I walked out into the hall and sure enough it was Kangway, arriving completely unannounced. I was completely at a loss for words. Man I miss that dude. Him coming back really showed me how different this place is without him. To make things better, we went running this morning. Legs still sluggish, probably also a result of the early morning hour. Ran thus usual but came back on Euston to Lacy for old times sake. Good Luck Kangway, do not give up running! Give Tech another shot.
Miles: 4.5

12/16/07- Went lifting at the P.C.C (Potomac Community Center) gym, jogged a bit with the A-rab.
Miles: 1

Weekly Miles: 31

12/17/07- Went to H.S. Track practice. 1 mile warm-up plus 7 miles of various running through the woods . At first chill pace, than pushing to aerobic limit. Cold, 35 degrees, but lungs held up okay.
Miles: 8

12/18/07- Again at H.S. Track practice. 3 Mile warm-up, did part of a ladder workout 1 on, 1 off, 2 on, 2 off...5 on at 6 min pace before peeling off to do a side 2.5 miles. For some reason this workout was somewhat harder than I had expected, I wasn't feeling very comfortable. Also I ended up cutting my toe pretty badly. I'll hold off on any sort of track or speed workouts for a while I think.
Miles: 9

12/19/07- Toe cut very painful. In other news Caltech guys were in D.C. went with John Shen to visit Dave, Jon Tsai and others, walked around a lot, but not much running.
Miles: 0

12/20/07- Ran on C.J. Trail from River Road up to the baseball fields and turned around. Pretty chillax, nice run.
Miles: 7

12/21/07- Not sure what I did but I am pretty sure it involved the C.J. trail again.
Miles: 7-8 ?

12/22/07- Drove to Chicago. As soon as we got to my Aunt's house in Willmette, I set off for a medium tempo workout. 3 mile warm-up, 3 mile at tempo (maybe starting out at 6 min pace, slowing to 6:30 pace), 2 mile cool down. Raining, at night, 44 degrees, slushy snow and grass/sidewalk most of the walk. Not a half bad workout.
Miles: 8

12/23/07- Very Very Cold in Chicago after cold front passed (-5 degrees with bad wind chill). Day off!

Weekly Miles: ~40

12/24/07- Close to dusk, Matt Wiesbard (close cousin who runs for Willamette) and I hit the trails by his house in Willmette, I.L. Very icy, about 20 degrees but okay. Ran to his old HS and back with some extra by myself to make a good 10.
Miles: 10.

12/25/07- Christmas morning run with Matt. Started in the same place as yesterday, head out in the other direction on the trails. Had a small hangover from way to much wine last night, but the run wasn’t half bad.
Miles:7

12/26/07- Early morning run in Mequon W.I.. Ran from the cousin’s house out to Lake Shore drive to Vermond Park. Running through the ankle deep snow and ice, I came upon the bluffs and stared out upon a perfectly calm Lake Michigan in the early morning winter sun light. Made two loops around the park and back. Pretty chill the whole way.
Miles: 5-6

12/27/07- Very nice long run along the CJ trail. Started out River Road, up to Tuckerman through the old HS XC course, back along 7 locks to the trail again. Moderate, relaxed pace, feeling good the whole way, a bit tired by the end.
Miles: 10

12/28/07- Close Calls: Cheating Death 3-The Drayna Aougab run. Drove to Berkeley Springs W.V. for a weekend away. We ran out from the cabin along some really creepy dirt roads which turned into loose dirt ATV tracks which turned into abandoned fire roads in the middle of nowhere. Started out 7:40 pace, down to 6:45 pace as we got steadily more and more freaked out. Tarik broke off after 8 to run into town. Very solid run, pretty tired.
Miles: 10-11

12/29/07- Nice day in W.V. Ran to the top of the Cacapon overlook and to the top of prospect peak and back. Climbed 1200 feet or so. Shins and feet sore, took it slow.
Miles: 7-8

12/30/07- Quite sore. Shins, sesamoid tendons, forefeet all fairly irritated. Going on NSAID therapy, cross training, light running for one week until track starts.
Miles:0

Weekly Miles: 51

This is the off season I should have had last year. I do miss cycling, but there will be plenty of time for that in future. My runs were fairly consistent with a good build up in mileage and a nice progression. I wish my shins and sesamoid were feeling better but 8 days off should help with both of those. Being consistent and staying (relatively) healthy, my two goals were accomplished. Plus I do feel a good deal stronger. I have now been training for 6 months almost straight (3 total weeks off, in seperate segments, by the start of track). We have almost one month of track for long base runs. I hope to quickly work up and sustain a mileage of 45-50 miles per week while lowering my base pace, then working in tempo and fartleks as we normally do. At this point though, I am optimistic and very pleased with my choice to focus heavily on running for the next 2 and a half years.

Total Off Season Miles: 267

From thanksgiving break

2007-12-13T23:16:00.000-05:00

So my windows partition died so it has been hard to keep continuity in my log, but here is thanksgiving break and onwards.

>11/21/07- Plane home for thanksgiving.

Miles: 0

11/22/07- Big Jungle Long way (back up gainsborough). Okay.

Miles: 6.5

11/23/07- 6 Miles on the canal, windy and quite cold (40 F), lungs very tight. Not that fast, hamstring tendons sore.

Miles: 6

11/24/07- Big Jungle plus 1 mile on the track with Tarik (=hard). Not a good run, coolder (37 F) Tarik pulling away from me in miles 4 and 5. Lungs pretty tight.

Miles: 6

11/25/07- Off. Achilles' stiff this morning.

Miles: 31

11/26/07- River road trail much better. Easy first 3 miles, much warmer, 55 degrees, lots of energy and good speed coming back. Also doctor says that in addition to my high arches being terrible for shock absorption, and thus need orthodics, for some read my right ankle has a very limited up and down range of motion, which my be the cause of all of my right foot and lower leg injuries the past year.

Miles: 7

11/27/07- Good to be back in Pasadena. Garfield long way home, felt pretty good but pace was slow. Erin worked on my ankle for 15 min, very sore but already noticeable more flexible. Also sesamoid was swollen.

Miles: 6.5

11/28/07- Feeling good. Lower arroyo with a bit of exploring and cool down on N field with Anton. Averaged 8:15 pace, at times slower, accelerating once in the arroyo, down to 7:40 pace down California.

Miles: 8.5

11/29/07- Legs a bit tired. good. Huntington girls way pretty mellow. Swam for 45 minutes afterwards, prep for interhouse.

Miles: 5

11/30/07- 6wonderful miles in the rain. Huntingson modified backwards,, got hit by car on los robles, kicked starting at the entrance to Huntington gardens, felt great.

Miles: 6.5

12/1/07- Upper Arroyo with Julian. Started out pretty chill, accelerating down to 7:30 pace or less like usual, julian with me every step of the way.

Miles: 7.5

12/2/07- Off. Lots of work

Weekly Miles: 41

12/3/07- Beautiful Day! Drove to Wedny's for epic lunch in paradisic weather. Parked in lot K of the Rose Bowl and ran to JPL with Anton. Out in 8:20 pace, back down to 7 min after Devil's Gate, Avg 7:45. One day will run from there to the Dam.

Miles: 7

12/4/07- Interhouse Swimming. A few hundred yards than 50 fly. Got second! Not sure about time. Lacy and back with Nathan and someone in my class who had flamed out. Shins stiff and sore.

Miles: 3.5

12/5/07- Huntington Girl's way. Was going to go longer but weird pain in left shin got me worried. Erin said I need to watch my shins as they are inflamed at the insertion of the tendon/where stress fractures commonly happen. Sesamoid sore as well. Going to tone it down this week.

Miles: 5

12/6/07- Interhouse swimming finals. Gave my shins and a sesamoid rest. Swam some fun 50 frees.

Miles: 0

12/7/07- Huntington Girl's way with chief. Shins feeling better. Quick pace, feeling good.

Miles: 5

12/8/07- Went to Mt. Baldy Ski resort to go sledding, ended up climbing Mt. Baldy in hurricane force, -10 F wind chill winds and white out conditions. Pretty cool, good workout!

Miles: (6)

12/9/07- Sesamoid pretty irritated.

Miles: 0

Weekly Miles: 26

12/10/07- Would have ran but Ph 5 project not looking so hot.

Miles: 0

12/11/07- Hunt ington Girl's way with Stef and Perrin.

Miles: 5

12/12/07- Some more huntington action with Julian. Got up to pretty quick pace, felt okay.

Miles: 6

12/13/07- Fantastic Run on huntington up to Los Robles and back through Lacy. &7:30 or less pace with ease, sesamoid okay. Finals killing me

Miles: 8

The Off Season Begins

2007-11-18T21:34:00.000-05:00

10/28/07- 11/4/07- Off. Physical Therapy every day. Friday I ran 15 minutes on the N. field and it went pretty well. I still took the weekend off

11/5/07- Heated, stretched, and did a very nice relaxed 20 minutes around the N. field at just under 8 min pace. Heel felt fine. It was very cool and moist outside, which made for great running conditions. I think I will start slowly and carefully returning to training. Ultrasounded and Iced bath.

Miles: 2.5

11/6/07- Fairly sore, but not painful. Didn’t run, did the usual physical therapy.

Miles: 0

11/7/07- Felt a lot better today, a good sign. Ran 8 laps around the N. field at a moderate pace. 20 minutes total.

Miles: 2.5

11/8/07- Aside from a weird soreness near my 5^th digit (R foot), felt good. Ran 7 laps of N. field at a quick pace.

Miles: 2

11/9/07- Foot felt pretty good. Ran ~30 min near campus and on N. field, mostly on grass. Started slow, was able to pick it up very comfortably. Foot felt fine afterwards.

Miles: 3.5

11/10/07- Huntington girl’s way with Julian. Took it slow, worked up to a nice moderate pace. Foot seemed fine the whole way. I guess we’ll see tomorrow. Played some ctf.

Miles: 5.5

Weekly Miles: 16

11/11/07- Off.

Miles: 0

11/12/07- Huntingson reverse. Took it out easy, accelerated to a medium pace. Between miles 1-3 5^th digit R side of foot thing acting up, but it subsided. Heel felt a bit aggravated by the end but not bad.

Miles: 7

11/13/07- Huntington short way reverse medium.

Miles: 5.5

11/14/07- San Pasqual out to San Gabriel, N to Colorado, W to Sierra Madre, S to Lombardy back. Heel feels tingly, Achilles’ tight. Medium.

Miles: 5.5

11/15/07- Achilles a bit irritated at the insertion on the heel. Backing off a bit. Ran to Lacy, did 2 laps with Nathan easy.

Miles: 3.5

11/16/07- El Molino to Monterey back up by Lacy and the stairs. Medium.

Miles: 5

11/17/07- Huntington girls way with Julian. Wasn’t feeling too good, I think I was dehydrated and a bit sick. Slow.

Miles: 5

11/18/07- Off

Miles: 32

Sophomore Winter Training Log

2007-11-10T20:40:00.001-05:00

10/28/07- 11/4/07- Off. Physical Therapy every day. Friday I ran 15 minutes on the N. field and it went pretty well. I still took the weekend off

Miles: 2.5

11/6/07- Fairly sore, but not painful. Didn’t run, did the usual physical therapy.

Miles: 0

11/7/07- Felt a lot better today, a good sign. Ran 8 laps around the N. field at a moderate pace. 20 minutes total.

Miles: 2.5

11/8/07- Aside from a weird soreness near my 5^th digit (R foot), felt good. Ran 7 laps of N. field at a quick pace.

Miles: 2

11/9/07- Foot felt pretty good. Ran ~30 min near campus and on N. field, mostly on grass. Started slow, was able to pick it up very comfortably. Foot felt fine afterwards.

Miles: 3.5

The pitiful end of XC

2007-11-10T20:33:00.000-05:00

10/13/07- Multi-duals at Prado. Feeling good, mainly due to Steve’s American flag running shorts. Rained overnight, still raining when we arrive, rain broke just in time for our race, but the course was quite muddy with plenty of ankle deep mud and standing water. Went out easy : 6:30ish and held strong through the entire race, never dropping more than 20 sec off that pace. Went much better than I feared given my sickness. Nathan still passed me at 3 miles. Even though I wasn’t going for time, I got to race people, which was more fun and less painful. I passed one Cal Lu and a Pomona guy in the first ½ mile, knocked off two Whittier guys in the 3^rd mile, and caught an Oxy guy in the last 800m. Pretty cool. Time was slow, performance was mediocre, but it was pretty fun. Plus we got to get covered in mud! Time: 34:10 . Last man in for Tech: that’s right, no techers in the bottom 5. Note: after being inspired by Kevin Chaves’ mad ripped legs, I have decided to train pretty hard during the off season and commence getting fast.

Miles: 9 ( played lots of ultimate egg afterwards)

10/14/07- I tried to run, had too much homework.

Miles: 0

Weekly Miles: 35

10/15/07- Lower arroyo medium/medium hard. Still congested but had lots of energy, so I pushed a bit. Felt good afterwards.

Miles: 8

10/16/07- 400 on 400 off x12 at ghetto park. Kind of tired from yesterday. Made it through the workout surprisingly well. It seemed very long. Extended warm-up, regular way back.

Miles: 10

10/17/07- Huntingson but back on oak knoll (hunting baby). Medium. Pushing the pace, felt good Steve + Nathan.

Miles: 5.5

10/18/07- 2 on 1 off x10 at lacy. Felt much less sick today. Had plenty of energy. Just under race pace for most of the ons, tried to also work the offs but it didn’t happen. Ran with Steve.

Miles: 7.5

10/19/07- Garfield park and back. Legs kinda tired but feeling okay, sinuses infected.

Miles: 5.5

10/20/07- 5k+ tempo in the arroyo: two Ian loops. Missed morning practice, so we ran at night. Cool and perfect. Ran very fast, felt great, not limited by anything. 20:10 for the whole thing. 6:10 pace? Need to be able to sustain now for 5 miles.

Miles: 8

10/21/07- Being a physics major is a lot of work.

Miles: 0

Weekly miles: 44

10/22/07- Ran Lower Arroyo medium easy with Nathan, Chris S., and Ben Lin. Great run, legs surprisingly tired, pretty hot out.

Miles: 8

10/23/07- Big fires, air smokey. Missed practice due to lab (practice was riding on the stationary bikes). Ran to Lacy and back with Julian.

Miles: 3.5

10/24/07- 400 on at race pace, 400 off at central (ghetto) park x 9 (I only did 8). Felt okay, more tiring than r.p. should have been. Air still sucks, lungs hurt.

Miles: 8

10/25/07- Lacy and back with 6 striders and 2 laps. Easy, felt okay, not completely rested.

Miles: 4

10/26/07- Pre-race. Legs tired, felt like I was having a hard time keeping up with the team. I’m sure tomorrow will be okay though. Go out and race, have fun, push myself. The end of this season marks a new quest to get fast. It won’t just come to me, although I will get stronger with age. I have to have quality training in the off season and stay away from injury. This winter, I want to average 45 miles a week with lots of aerobic and lactate threshold running. I need to use my base to build upon, get my base pace down, bring my sustainable speed up. This summer I will get an extensive base to be able to hold that for a 5 mile XC race. This is my goal for the next year. Also, minor plantar faschitis developing, saw Andre, doing some PT for it. With diligence we can keep that at a minimum through finals and then have it heal up. My goals for tomorrow. Start out at 6:30, pass 3 people, stay with Nathan for at least 1 mile when he passes me.

Miles: 3.5

10/27/07- XC Champs at La Mirada. Conditions: Overcast, humid, low 70s, air still Smokey, wet grass and some mud. I felt okay during the warmup, plenty of energy, looking forward to the race. Everyone, especially the seniors, had been talking about “going all out” and such. It was my last race of the season, plenty of energy, not sick anymore, why not? The gun goes off, I knew I was breathing a bit hard, possibly due to the air quality, but I still felt like I was holding back, especially in lieu of last Sat.’s breakthrough workout. At 800m going up the sidewalk, some old asian women had found her way on the course and must have been completely oblivious to the horde of brightly colored runners coming at her because she was decked. Luckily she managed to avoid being trampled. As I ran by she seemed completely petrified and was being helped up by course officials. First mile in 6:20. My goal was to go out just fast enough to be in striking range of people, but I found myself in an unfortunate gap, but wow that was a bit too fast, but it didn’t feel like it. Going up the hills, tough but not horrible. Coming by the start and up in front of the school I could feel it. Suddenly my pace dropped 30 seconds. I made a big mistake, Nathan comes by me and I already know I can’t keep up with him and I let him go. I was recovering my but slowly. I knew the damage had been done and my chances of moving up were finished. Already I had given up. What I had recovered was promptly removed by the wall, which dropped my pace another 10 or 20 seconds. Chris is catching me. I slowly lose time, just waiting to get the race over with. I can feel my heel starting to hurt. As I come by the tennis courts again, I noticed Chaves is still 30 seconds from passing me. Well at least I’m quicker than last year. Coming by the finish area I had basically lost all will to fight. The four mile mark sees a renewed effort to push. My slowly trudgery had given me more energy and I push enough to keep up a constant 10 m behind Chris. I already know my time sucks : 27:40 for 4 miles. I have no drive to finish strong, it is just not there. At least I was under 35, but what a disappointment. This was a lesson in poor pacing and resignation.

What were my expectations going into the season. I knew I wasn’t going to be under 30 as Ian had predicted, just because of my foot, but I still hoped. After running 35 minutes at San Diego, how could I have done so? I still hoped for low 31s, but my poor pacing again got the best of me. Alas, 32 flat is not bad at all, and it surpassed my goal from Freshman year, to run 32:30. But still, I had hope that I would run faster yet. As my sleep declined, so did my energy level and times. It was sort of by chance that conditions were bad at the last two races, but my race at Prado was well paced and actually enjoyable. However, that involved me going deliberately slow. Did I meet my goals for the season? My hopeful goals, no, my realistic goals, almost. I keep telling myself that I’m just not cut out for 5 miles, I am a miler, but they are too one in the same to say something like that. I need a base, I have come into the last two seasons off of several continual months off. And yes, while cycling did help my aerobic capacity, and my legs eventually turned around, running would have done much more. The lesson? At first I would say run more, get a better base, more miles, build endurance. But realistically, it is to stay uninjured an hold a consistent training through the winter. If I can stay healthy through track, quite a feat, I can get a good base during the summer. Right now I have to deal with my plantar fasciitis. Getting’ fast.

Miles: 8

Weekly Miles: 35

Season Milage: 436

Happy Birthday Kangway

2007-10-12T18:43:00.000-04:00

9/9/07- Rode to RB and up mini chevy chase loop with Stephanie. Easy, left patella tendonitis hurting some, especially while cycling.

Miles: (20)

Weekly Miles: 55-56

Note: in reality we ran 86 over 8 in the first bit of preseason. This volume is significantly higher than anything I have ever done, and if my legs do come around this year (as opposed to last year when they didn’t), I might have a good shot as sub 31.

9/10/07- (Morning) Patrician. Started off easy, worked hard on the hill and pushed on the way back. Legs had decent energy at both the start and end of the run. Ran with Steve and Chris the whole way. Through old pas and down on Lake, we pushed up to race pace at times.

Miles:10.5

(Afternoon) – 2.5 miles easy on grass, knee doing alright.

Total Miles: 13

9/11/07 (Morning)- Oak Groves tempo loops x6. Legs have energy! Even after patrician. First 4 were excellent, 5^th sucked, last one decent. Doing well, knees appear to be holding up. Very tired afterwards.

Miles: 9

(Afternoon) – 3-4 easy miles around the Lombardy area. Ran with the girls, legs really really tired.

Miles: 3

Total: 12

9/12/07 (Morning) Very easy Rosemead. Ran 9 minute pace. Legs very tired.

Miles: 6.7

(Afternoon) Lacy and back + two loops. Easy, saw HS XC race, was a bit nostalgic. Kinda wish I could go back to the good ole’ days at times.

Miles: 3.5

Total: 10ish

9/13/07- (Morning) Intervals ( apparently a tempo workout) at Garfield. 4 on 2 off, 30 sec off race pace. Legs exhausted, but got them moving below 7 min pace at times. Ran with Steve, we are both tired as hell.

Miles: 9.5

(Afternoon) Ran around San Marino with girls Orlando to Lombardy and back. Easy.

Miles: 2.5

Total: 12

9/14/07- (Morning) Pre race very easy. Legs really tired.

Miles: 3.5

(Afternoon) – 3 mile around the course at Balboa park, the weather was great, course looks fun but hard.

Miles 3.5

Total: 7

9/15/07- Aztec Invite. Okay race, bad times, legs very tired. Went out controlled with Steve, Chris, and Nathan. We were together in the back through 2 miles, than Nate and Steve pulled 20-30 sec ahead. Legs start to die on 3^rd mile, 4^th mile was horrible: 7:50 pace. Legs totally gone. Last mile, pushed hard along the very slight downhill and had good finish, back down around 6:45 pace. Really pumping with the arms. Legs really need to come around. Time: 35:09.

Miles: 8

Total Miles: 62-63

9/16/07- Well needed off day.

9/17/07- (Morning) Medium-easy trail run from RB aquatic center to JPL through the Devil’s Gate. Took it out leisurely but working, legs still very sore, turned around at JPL, 35 min in, once back through Devil’s Gate really opened up and had a great last 2.5 miles at 7:40 pace, felt effortless. Overcast and 65 degrees, wonderful weather, good run. Hope to do it again next year.

Miles: 8

(Afternoon) Lacy long way + 1 mile of the mile repeat course at medium pace. Relaxed, came in last.

Miles: 5

Total miles: 13

9/18/07- (Afternoon) Mile repeats at Lacy, going every 9 minutes. A good workout, very exhausted afterwards. 6:30, 6:29, 6:27, 6:38, 6:18 = 32:21.

Miles: 10

9/19/07- (Morning) Crazy tree. Easy. Tired. Nuff said.

Miles: 6.5

(Afternoon) Huntingon up Virginia, around Virgina, not the stairs. Felt really good surprisingly.

Miles: 5-5.5

Miles: 11.5-12

9/20/07- (Morning) 3 on , 2 off x8 at Garfield. Ran with Steve and Nathan. Felt okay, good workout, exhausted afterwards.

Miles: 10

(Afternoon) 20 min easy on N. field. Real damn tired.

Miles 2.5

Total: 12

9/21/07 – Huntingson medium-easy. I was going at a good 8:30-8:00 clip, but everyone seemed to pull away. Felt decent actually, despite feeling a bit under the weather earlier in the morning.

Miles: 7

9/22/07- 10k+ (6.4 mile) pick up tempo run. 4x Ian’s arroyo tempo loop. First lap 1 min off race pace, 40 sec off, 20 sec off, race pace. Not even breathing on the first, not feeling it on the 2^nd, last two tough. On the end of the 3rd lap almost all the way through the end, a pit bull broke it’s collar and started to chase us, tripping us and going after our feet. No one was bit, but it kind of messed up the last one. High 43s for the whole run.

Miles: 11

Weekly Miles: 65

9/23/07- Well deserved off day.

9/24/07- Full arroyo medium. Ran with Steve and Chief. Started out easy at 8:45 pace, dropped down 7:45 pace by the time we got out of the arroyo. Felt pretty good the whole way.

Miles: 10

9/25/07- 3 Mile threshold run at Garfield (6 laps + 1 warmup). Hard, couldn’t really get into it. The heat and afternoon probably have something to do it. It was okay.

Miles: 8.5

9/26/07- 9 miles medium. Legs really fresh! Ran Huntington to Los robles, turned around, went around Lacy and back. Saw Ian on the N. field and did 1 mile with him. Feeling really good.

Miles: 9

9/27/07- 5-4-3-2-1 at lacy, long way back. Started out slow, picked up pretty nicely. A bit tired from yesterday, but still looking good for sat.

Miles: 6.5

9/28/07 pre race.

Miles: 3

9/29/07- UC Riverside. 32:09-PR, Very comfortable through 12:15 2 mile, oxygen debt on the hill in the middle near 3 miles, 3 mile 18:45, 4^th mile starting to slow, really hurting 5^th mile. Stomach, not legs, limiting me in the end. Could have gone under 32 but would have puked. Good race, need to keep mileage up, do long tempo runs/threshold stuff. Need to pace a bit better, as usual.

Miles: 8

Weekley Miles: 43-44

9/30/07- ½ mile barefoot on the grass with anton, did abs, swam a bit. Calves still very sore.

Miles: 0.5

10/1/07- Calves better, still a bit sore. Ran a very nice full arroyo medium. Easy first few miles, pushed a bit in the canyon, awesome runner’s high coming back through old pas. Legs feeling very good.

Miles: 10

10/2/07- 8x800 at Garfield. Medium hard, not all out. Race pace but it was still pretty relaxed. Hot. 3:18, 3:15, 08, 10,12,10,15,04.

Miles: 9

10/3/07- Huntington Long way (up Los Robles). Pretty chill, pretty hot. Not super easy, still working a bit. Eh.

Miles: 8

10/4/07- 4 on 2 off x5 at Lacy. Cool out, legs a bit tired but not terrible. Responded pretty well to the workout. Started out at 7:00 pace, slowly dropping to 6 min pace on the last one. Stayed with Steve, Nathan, and Andrey the whole way.

Miles:8

10/5/07- Tu Madre medium easy with Steve. Feeling pretty good. Contemplative on the run, worrying about rotation.

Miles: 5

10/6/07- 8k (3 Ian’s arroyo tempo loop, perhaps 7600m) in the arroyo from tech. First lap 30 sec off race pace, 2^nd lap 15 sec off. Ran with Andrey and Nathan, Steve was taking the GRE’s with Rosen. Felt okay, last lap I was feeling it. 33:20 Tired on the way back.

Miles: 9.5

10/7/07- 1 hour easy ride around the rose bowl. Getting sick… frosh plague.

Miles: (15ish)

Weekly Miles: 50

Note: Anton, Sachith, Stephanie, and Perrin all ended up Lloyd!!! Happy day.

10/8/07- Sick with frosh plague. Garfield long way while everyone else did lower arroyo. Felt pretty bad, but it was doable.

Miles: 5

10/9/07- Slightly better today, still pretty sick. Ran down to Lacy with team, jogged laps while they did 800s.

Miles: 7.5

10/10/07- Completed the workout, albeit slowly, with the team. Garfield long way. Easy. Had energy for the first time.

Miles: 5

10/11/07- 5-4-3-2-1 at Lacy. Feeling a lot better, still congested, high end performance still suffers. Local HS XC race was there. Fun to watch, some of the high schoolers are faster than I remember..

Miles: 5.5

Racin' and Chasin'

2007-09-09T20:46:00.000-04:00

9/8/07- First race of the season.

Conditions: Fairly hot, fairly humid, medium breeze from ocean.

Course: Constant gradual elevation change, mix of dirt, grass, and pavement. Moderate hilliness (somewhere between la Mirada and chino) .

Splits:

1: 6:00

2: 13:09 (possibly wrong)

3: 20:10

4: Unknow

5: 33:30

Well it was a PR but it felt quite slow. I went through the first mile with Steve. It was quite comfortable, and I thought my pace was sustainable. The 2^nd mile was substantially more hilly than the first, and while I approached and passed slightly into the oxygen debt right at 2 miles at the top, I couldn’t push too well on the downhill and after the next hill, I wasn’t able to achieve the pace of my first two miles. After this point, despite better than normal efforts to push back to the original pace, my body just could not respond. On my 2^nd to last lap, Dave passed me on his final and I was able to pick it up but this was not sustainable. Running with the two chapman guys really helped me to push while to catch them and made me feel as though I was racing. We did get into this unfortunate mentality of ‘just getting through it together’ and tended to fall of pace a bit. Overall an okay first race, so long as the legs come around and I can get them to respond during the latter portions of the race. Also Anton is awesome.

Miles:8

Hanging in there, barely

2007-09-07T18:13:00.000-04:00

9/2/07- Chilling at the pool.

Miles: 0

9/3/07- (Morning) Monrovia Canyon trail. Steep at the beginning, mostly pavement the whole way. Medium. 41 minutes out, ? back, maybe 30 minutes. Pretty slow pace out but calves burned, controlled on the way down, but legs and hips sore on the descent.

Miles: 7-8

(Afternoon) 500 or 600 yards lap swimming, sprained R pinky trying to do a dive.

9/4/07- (Morning) Shenandoah’s-Hard. R Knee a little painful the first mile, went away. Stomach not so hot but survived. Felt okay. 5:10, 5:15, 5:05, 5:10, 4:58.

Miles: 10.5

(Afternoon) Lacy and Back plus 2.5 laps at Lacy. Legs tired but moving, pain still there in R knee. Went to Erin afterwards, she says its brunt force damage to the patella from so many hills.

Miles: 4.5

Total Miles: 15

9/5/07- (Morning) Knees hurt more today. Exhausted, legs shot. Huntingson painfully slow.

Miles: 7

(Afternoon) 2 barefoot miles on grass plus 20 min on stationary bike. Knees a bit better.

Miles: 2

Total Miles:9

9/6/07 (Morning) – Achilles’ sore in the morning, R knee a bit worse than yesterday, L knee also now starting to feel it, possible Patella tendonitis. Ran with the team extended Lacy long way, than 4x 5 on 2 off medium. 3 at 7:30-7:15 pace, last one at race pace. Felt okay, knees hurting a bit.

Miles: 8

(Afternoon) Did some PT with Andre and then jogged 3 miles on the N. field. Knees felt okay actually. Still tired, still filled with tons of minor injuries.

Miles: 3

Total Miles: 11

9/7/07 (Morning) – Garfield long way real easy. Knees feel better, rickety. Legs very tired, but felt better after stick massage and ice bath.

Miles: 5

Camping

2007-09-02T17:25:00.000-04:00

(Afternoon): Went to see Erin. She thinks it is soft tissue damage, which I guess is good. Got new cushioning shoes that will help my foot roll the right way and all. Swam 700 or 800 yards plus 10 minutes of aqua jogging.

8/31/07 (Morning) – 6x Cannons, plus 1 warmup cannon, plus 20-25 minutes of warmup/cool down. Hard. Legs had energy and the weather was more tolerable. Stuck with Steve on all of them. Felt stronger than ever ( except on the 5^th one where I almost hurled). Foot sore this morning, but pain, as usual, went away during the run.

Miles: 7.5

(Afternoon) – 42 minutes medium-easy around the campground at Chilao recreation area-5000 ft. Steep trail running and very out of breath from altitude. Achilles’ a bit tight, but nothing sore, just a bit tired, stomach a little un easy.

Miles: 4.5

Total miles: 12

9/1/07 (Morning) – High adventures high in San Gabriel’s. Hard, 50 minutes out, 41 minutes back on the Silver Moccasin backpacking trail. Switchbacks climbing over 1000 ft., very out of breath, maxed out HR several times. Stomach bothering me.

Miles: 10-10.5

(Afternoon) – Down to the visitor center and back, medium-easy.

Miles: 4.5

Total Miles: 14-15

Weekly Miles: 45-46

Preseason Starts

2007-08-30T18:42:00.000-04:00

PRESEASON!!!!!

8/29/07- Huntington. Medium, pushed up the hill. Hot and humid, felt tingly Goosebumps at times but things seemed to be working well, in order. Foot felt okay during the day but during the run, the acheiness started to go away! Some of the foot muscles were sore from not being used while in the insoles, but it felt good the whole way. I think I can carry on as planned so long as I keep a very watchful eye on everything.

Miles: 6

8/30/07 ( Morning) – Full arroyo, medium-hard. Hot and Humid. Took it out a bit fast, worked hard in the canyon. The last few miles the dehydration and overheating really got to me. Other than that foot felt decent, passable, and legs felt good. Foot sore but okay later.

Miles: 10

Time to Run Hard (Losing follows shortly)

2007-08-29T15:06:00.000-04:00

8/26/07- Foot slight better again today. Went swimming and aqua jogging, about 1000 yards total.

Miles:0

Weekely Miles: 32

8/27/07- Foot again better. Preseason okay? We’ll have to see. Rode Chantry again today. Cycling legs felt much stronger already. Rocketed to the top.

Miles (bike) : 25

8/28/07- Foot about same, during the day it ached a bit when walking. Decided to try running a bit considering preseason is tomorrow. Jogged down to the track, but it still hurt. Shit. Decided to take off the shoes, run a bit barefoot to isolate the problem. This however, felt much better. The Insoles! Those were what killed me! Ran without insoles on the inside of the grass, foot pain almost went away. Good sign. 2.5 miles, did some aqua jogging and lap swimming too. The rest of the night the foot felt fine, a good sign I suppose. Ice, and later did some Achilles’ exercises.

Miles: 3 ish

Familiar Territory-Foot injuries

2007-08-26T18:23:00.000-04:00

Something in my right foot is sprained. Its not that same as my big injury from the Spring, and I think it is certainly less serious, but I am going to be really conservative. My legs honestly need the rest anyways. With any luck, Ill be back in action on day 1 of preseason. If it takes a bit longer, I'm not going to complain, so long as I have a healthy season.

8/22/07- Was going to do Lower Arroyo but foot felt kinda weird so I aborted. Not the old injury, just general funkiness. Went down El Molino left on Monterey, to Lacy and back up to tech. Did 3 miles on the grass with Matt and Ian, who were way too fast for me. Foot felt okay towards the end.

Miles: 8

8/23/07- Woah foot not okay. Can’t tell what exactly hurts, but it’s the very outside right two digits, closer towards the ankle than the forefoot. Walking around today was a painful at times. Swam 1000 yards.

8/24/07- Foot felt much better during the day. Ran Lacy park long way, but it still was bothering me. I have decided to take off as much time as I need until preseason until it gets better.

Miles: 4.5

8/25/07- Biked to Chantry flats. Left mid-day, it was hot as hell, sweated dripping off. My cycling muscles are out of shape, it was quite tough. Foot hurt a bit at first when out of the saddle but by the end of the ride it was pain free. Perhaps (and hopefully) it is a sprain or ligamental, as opposed to a stress fracture or something serious. I guess my foot was in a kind of fine balance. Once something failed, everything went to hell.

Miles (bike): 25

Also I found this really cool video about Matt Withrow's Senior year of HS XC. It is pretty ridiculous.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EPT9qTbaGH0&mode=related&search=

If you haven't watched the video of his win at 2003 Foot Locker you should see that first.

Preseason Approaches! - last hard base training before the season starts

2007-08-22T15:18:00.000-04:00

8/19/07- 35 min easy around campus+ N. field, a bit with Ian. Legs tired.

Miles: 4

Weekly miles: 58

8/20/07- How do you spell FUN? P-A-T-R-I-C-I-A-N! Went with Dave, moderate out- a controlled warm up, hard up the climb (need to work on climbing form), hard back through Pas, as low as 7:30 pace the last 2 miles. Felt quite good! Lots of energy, a little dehydrated at the end. Much stronger than last year, and it's not even preseason.

Miles: 11.5

8/21/07- Huntingson from Lloyd+ 2 laps at Lacy. Tiiiiired. Trudged through it in fairly painful and slow 65-70 minutes. On the plus side, no sign of injury, just tiredness. Saw Dave and Matt. Side note: Matt is a beast, I wouldn't be surprised if he runs consistently in the 25s, or possibly less.

Miles: 7.5-8

More solid training

2007-08-20T05:35:00.001-04:00

I wonder if I'll ever be fast...

8/17/07- Another awesome run. Matt, Mark, Ian, and I drove up to the chantry flats ranger station at about 6 p.m perhaps. Ran up to the helipad, where they dropped me and then up the gravel fire road for 34 minutes, 26 back. Made it up to a really good overlook. Legs felt quite good the whole way, and I kept a reasonable, medium pace. Achilles’ sore at first, went away soon. Beautiful run, felt like a real runner.

Miles: 7

8/18/07- California to the arroyo easy warm up. 3x Ian’s tempo loop: 11:50, 10:40, 11:20 with 30-60 sec active recovery. Pushed hard on 2^nd and last. Exhausted by the time I got home.

Miles: 10

8/19/07- 35 min easy around campus+ N. field with Ian. Legs tired.

Miles: 4

Weekly miles: 58

Possibly my best run ever

2007-08-17T04:40:00.000-04:00

Sometimes, you just have a run that feels amazing, is amazingly quick, and represents something wonderful to you. My twilight full Arroyo run today was quite possibly my best run ever, and at least in the top three, which already includes an upper arroyo from the winter off-season. Everything about this run was almost surreal and aesthetically amazing. Last night I had met Mark, Ian, and Matt cooling down after running a blazing full arroyo (Matt casually stated that they were down around 5:15 pace for the last stretch through old Pas). I was inspired. At some point in the 105 degree heat of the afternoon, I decided I would leave at 7 p.m., hoping to make it out of the arroyo just after it became too dark to discern the rocks and bumps on trail, and I would run it hard. I remember after reading Running with the Buffaloes, the Colorado guys do a hard 10 mile run at altitude. Combining hearing about Mark, Matt, and Ian's run last night and this story had an impressionable me ready for some work. I got really hydrated during the day, ate a 6 inch subway sandwich at 2 p.m., some pudding at 5:30, and some tortilla strips at 6:20, watched a youtube video of Haile G setting the 10k world record, and was ready to go. I rolled out of Lloyd at 6:57pm, and cruised out to the Brown gym.

Already by the time I got there, I could tell my legs were surprisingly fresh and filled with energy. No whining, no bitching, just a sudden full tank of gas. The temperature was already comfortably below 90 degrees, as I cruised over to El Molino. I held steady at my medium-easy base pace, maybe 8:30, at times 8:15 when descending the fault. I had also noticed, or failed to notice per say, my Achilles's tendinitis, which had been mildly bothering me the last 2 or so weeks. It just wasn't really there today, at all. I effortlessly made my to Garfield park, thinking about Alan Webb and Worlds, and Haile G. I stopped only for 1 or 2 minutes to stretch out the Achilles' and was on my Merry way. By the time I reached the Arroyo, the sun had already set, and it was at that nice and lazy summer dusk that just never seems to quite fade into night. As I ran by the horse stables, my legs brimming energy, I decided I would step it up to an easy tempo pace, about 7:30-7:15. Remembering Multi-duals, that fateful race where I was moderately sick, threw up between 7 and 10 times, filled my shoe with blood, and ran as slow as 7:30 pace at times, I figured tempo-ing at this pace was fine. As I accelerated into the twilight of a redder and redder arroyo canyon, I passed into a state of blissful runner's reveire. Everything about the arroyo seemed like that idyllic red rock desert river canyon, from somewhere in a picture when I was very little. All you could here were the birds, bugs, and the slight trickle of water. As I ran north of the casting pond, now at least more than a mile into my tempo pace, I noticed a dog up ahead with no owner. Then I realized it was no dog but a Coyote. I moved to the far side of the trail to give it way and it trotted right by me, no more than 10 feet away.

I emerged from the canyon just south of the Rose Bowl Aquatic center, just where you can see directly up into the mountains. The sky was a pastel smear of red, violet, and blue, and the lights of altadena dotted the hills. Perfect twilight. I stopped for a minute to get a drink at the aquatic center and take a leak. Feeling just amazing at this point; tired but not too tired, completely high on endorphins, I headed up the hill at a steady pace, and begin a series of sprints through old pas. I did my best to Jay-walk (Mexican style as we called it in High School), make as many lights, but at times I was limited to as little as 200m of running with little breaks in between. As I flew along Green Street, I pushed a controlled race feeling pace of 6:45 to 6:15. Now almost completely dark, the gentle white lights and deep green trees of old pas made a continually beautiful backdrop for the run. Pulling onto the Lake I flew at top speed through throngs of Thursday night Pasadena town-goers, now feeling the toll of more than 5 miles of fast pace. Finally arriving at the Brown Gym an hour and 1:45 min later, I was fairly exhausted. The North Field, dark and empty, seemed a bit anti-climatic to my rugged desert/urban promenade adventure, but I jogged 4 contented laps and jogged back to Lloyd.

I lost 6 pounds over the run, including a water break at the aquatic center and hearty gulping at the Brown Gym. This run has really shown me how I actually have progressed alot since August 16th of last year. Coming off of 7 months of basically not running, at this point last year I basically trying to be able to run 9 or 10 miles. And while I didn't run for 3 1/2 months this spring, I could tell today that a good season lies in store for. Everything just felt like it was falling together, working properly. No injuries, no pain, no sucking, just a very satisfying run. UCI invite is 3 weeks and 1 day from now. I ran 34:04 there last year for my first 8k. I think I can break 33 at least there barring any injury. We'll see where I go from there. Maybe Ian's inebriated but honest prediction of 30 minutes this year isn't quite as hopeless as I once thought (although I still don't think I'll hit it).

Miles: 12

2 weeks to go

2007-08-16T01:07:00.000-04:00

8/13/07- Easy Lacy long way with 2 laps at lacy and 1 mile cool down with Mark.

Miles: 7

8/14/07- Easy Eichenlaub grassy special out, tempo back to lacy, 5-4-3-2-1 at Lacy, easy back + cool down. Legs okay, Achilles’ a bit sore, felt good to run fast once again.

Miles: 10

8/15/07- Moderate Huntingson backwards with l mile a Lacy. Legs okay, Achilles’ decent, felt much better once the sun went down and the temp got below 95 degrees. Saw Mark, Ian, and Matt at cool down from their blazing full arroyo.

Miles: 8

Managing things

2007-08-12T21:48:00.000-04:00

This weekend ended on a somewhat lackluster note. While my Achilles is faring decently, my legs were still feeling pretty dead after about a 40 mile week. Two off days on the weekend will hopefully mean some refreshed legs, a much more resilient Achilles. Already after one day off, the Achilles feels much better, good deal. So what, I may not be as fast as I hoped this season, I may still be running off the back of the pack all by myself once more. Get some consistent training, be patient, and take it easy in school- get sleep. Who knows, maybe as soon as track this year, i might see some quick times.

8/8/07- Huntingson + lap at Lacy and 1.5 mile cool down. Felt great, quick pace, Achilles’s sore at times but otherwise okay. I think the faster pace is a result of 5 weeks solid training plus good rest last 4 days Achilles’ stiff/sore during barefoot cooldown.

Miles: 8.5

8/9/07- Achilles’ a bit more sore today, probably from yesterday. Still not terribly painful but being very careful. Easy Lacy long with 2 laps in Lacy. Lots of stretching. Legs kind of tired.

Miles: 5.5

8/10/07- Achilles’ pretty good today. Legs however, quite dead. Lower Arroyo. Legs weight over 300 pounds until climbing out of the Arroyo. Sleep not good?

Miles: 8.5

8/11/07- Went to El Pescador Beach 5 miles north of Malibu. Did some nice body surfing. Then celebrated the evening with some BEvERage. Achilles’ pretty sore, but not really painful.

Miles: 0

8/12/07- Achilles’ completely painless. Swam ~1 mile. 500 free warmup + butterfly drills and buttefly.

Miles: 0

Weekly miles: ~36

Easy does it

2007-08-08T04:10:00.000-04:00

8/5/07- Feels much better but I would rather be safe than sorry.

Miles: 0

8/6/07- No noticeable pain when walking, standing or sitting. Dave was is in town, so we ran Huntington to Lacy, did some laps there, and back. Felt a bit sore at times but didn’t really hurt. Iced. Note: Dave is fast.

Miles: 6.5

8/7/07- Achilles’ felt good today, ran out Lombardy and back plus barefoot cool down on track, again with dave, again pretty quick. Still sore but never hurt hurt. Iced a ton.

Miles: 6

Some unplanned down time

2007-08-05T00:09:00.000-04:00

So right now my Achilles' is bothering me a tiny bit. Nothing serious, but after seeing Kangway, Mark, and hearing about Ian struggle with it more severe Achilles' injuries, I am doing some cross training and hopefully taking no more than 3 days off.

8/2/07- Eichenlaub grassy especial, 74 minutes. Ran at 4 so it was hot as hell. Was late for SURF dinner so pushed hard. Getting below 8 min was harder than I thought, and the extra effort just made the heat problem worse. On the plus side, legs were feeling great and pretty good pace for soft grass.

Miles: 9

8/3/07- Eichenlaub grassy special medium to Oak Knoll with Ian. Good convo, showed me the lab afterwards. After shower and dinner, Achilles’ tendon feeling worse than in days past. Iced, probably will take tomorrow off to be careful.

Miles: 8.5

8/4/07- Day off. Achilles’ better but decided not to run on it. Heated, stretched, massaged, stretched, iced, swam 1000 yards of various strokes at the pool, and iced. Tomorrow probably off again just to be careful.

Miles: 0.

Back in West Side

2007-08-01T23:14:00.000-04:00

Even with 3 rest days last week, my legs are still tired and complain a lot the first 60% of my runs. I think I will begin "ascending to full volume" very gradually. I'll try to finish off the week in 55-60 ( right now at 26 so I need a long run later this week), take a slightly down week 2nd week of august, 65-70 3rd week, 45-50 last week of preseason, 3 rest days before the start.

I now kind of have two different, competing views of what the season should be like. One is the old Mark Wetmore season. Ascend to a high full volume, plateau out, and then speed up towards the very end. This would involve sitting out of some of the early speed workouts Scott has us do for longer steady state runs, i.e, doing a hard 7 mile run instead of those 400m Hills at the end of the first week. I mean, whats the point!?

The other viewpoint is the Ian Shapiro type summer. Lots of rest, pretty big flucations, relatively moderate mileage: 20-40-25-45-30-50-25-55-30-45...etc. This would leave me less tired and probably less injured. However, seeing as how I am coming off 4 months out, I think I need to do a good job of reestablishing my base, and then maybe in the fall/winter get my base pace down to mid-high 7s. Anyways heres the last 3 days.

7/30/07- Achilles sore from walking and standing in NYC, legs still kinda tired but much better. Last run in MD. On and off thundershowers, bright white clouds on a deep blue sky, reminded me of Hawaii. CJ trail from River road up to old high school XC course. Took it out medium, pretty quick on the way back.

Miles: 8-8.5

7/31/07- Huntington. Medium. Felt okay, was hoping for more. 51 min-2 min for stops=49 min.

Miles: 6.5

8/1/07- Full Arroyo from Lloyd. Still took a while to get into it, as usual. In the words of Dave, legs being whiny bitches. Finally started dropping under 8 min pace after casting pond with last 2.5-3 being excellent. Didn’t even feel that tired at the end. Hopefully I can get my base pace below 8 by the end of this month.

Miles: 10.5

Tired

2007-07-30T14:12:00.000-04:00

7/22/07- Day off. Wasn’t planning it but a lazy Sunday can be very persuading.

Miles: 0

7/23/07- Long Run. River road trail full + 2 miles more at the end. Minutes 10-45 burning pain in calves, feet numb at times, exacerbated by steep terrain. Pain almost unbearable at times. This always happens the day back! After topping out at school at 6.5 miles and massaging and stretching like mad, pain finally mellowed out. Last 6.5 miles at 7:40 pace, occasionally faster.

Total time: 1:47

Avg. HR: 163

Max HR: 185

Avg. Temp: 83

Max Temp: 93

Kcals: ~1600

Miles: 13-13.5

7/24/07- Extended Big Jungle plus cool down on track. Very tired. Calves not so sore, but still took 35 minutes to get legs really moving decently. After viewing Ian’s mileage for his time in college, I realized I don’t need to risk injury by ramping up from 0 to 70 in 4 or 5 weeks. Already having done approximately 0-20-40-50, I think ill call it a rest week after this, let the early miles go to work while I can still sleep 12 hours a day.

Miles: 7

7/25/07- Same run again today. Legs even more tired. I need some rest

Miles: 7

7/26/07- Swam a mile with intervals of free and IM.

Miles: 0

7/27/07- Got up early, sat around for an hour after drinking a cup of apple juice and went for a 4.5 mile run around the community. It was 12:30 and 90 degrees and humid. This probably was one of the most painful runs I have ever done. I trudged around at 9 min pace, dying from the heat. Thank god I’m going back to tech.

Miles: 4.5

7/28/07- A ton a walking in NYC, legs very sore.

Miles: 4 equivalent

7/29/07- Walked through the rain in NYC, soaked. Bough $23 Rolex in Chinatown.

Miles: 2 equivalent

Weekly Miles: 36-37ish

I 'recover' 13 hours a day

2007-07-22T13:54:00.000-04:00

7/17/07- Ran 7 miles from school, down to Bradley on CJ trail. Nice and chill. Mid 8s.

Miles: 7

7/18/07- Decided I would break out the ice bucket to help with the foot. Iced before I ran, felt much better. Did my first 10 miler since I don’t even know when, maybe a full arroyo around the beginning of track season, at least 6 months. Basically did yesterday’s run but when all the way down to river road, for 9.5 miles and then ½ mile cool down at school.

Total time: 1:22 for the 9.5. ß so pretty slow, exacerbated by steepness/technical nature of the trail. Felt gooooooood, relaxed the whole way, not too tired by the end, although on the cool down felt pretty drained. What can you expect from your first 10 miler in 6 months.

Avg HR 160

Max HR: 180 (final hill)

Avg temp 88

Max temp 92 ß this was a hot and sticky one

Calories: 1452 ß oh yeah

Miles: 10.5

7/19/07- I was planning for a easy run but Tarik called, and thus said idea promptly flew out the window. Ran extension of big jungle including lap at the campgrounds for a total of 8 miles at between about 7:20-7:45 pace. Started out fairly easy, surprisingly, and slowly picked it up. Was able to hold a good conversation for the first 4 miles, which, knowing Tarik, started out running related and ended up science related. After that, started pushing real hard on the climbs back up to the school. Every time I run with Tarik, I get a good workout. Unfortunately, I tend to be somewhat of a burden to him I feel, so I have to make sure I do it on his recovery days.

Miles: 8

7/20/07- Thanks to a cold front, the weather was very tolerable. I ran in the early afternoon with Ryan, nice and easy, big rectangle variation. Easy, but I didn’t feel too great… Mid 8s

Miles: 5.5

7/21/07- Ran extended big rectangle + small square. Very cool, dark. Good run. It took several miles to get into it, but after 6 or so, it settled in nicely. Some bad chaffing though hmmm. 7:50-8:00 pace

Miles: 8.5

I am a runner again, I think

2007-07-17T14:22:00.000-04:00

7/9/07: Huntington Jr. (girl’s team way) with Ali. Pretty mellow, legs tired, stomach ached a bit, cramped. Foot sore in beginning but basically went away. Didn’t wear watch or HR monitor. Prob just less than 9 minute pace.

Miles: 5

7/10/07- Plane trip home. Traveled all day.

7/11/07- Ran at midnight around the field of the Glen Hills. ½ mile loops about, 10 laps. Lights cut out with 1 mile to go so ran under the glow of the DC summer night sky. Good pace, ~ 8 mins.

Total time: 40:43

Avg. HR: 173

Max HR: 186

Kcals: 649

F. Avg. : 82

Total miles: 5

7/12/07- Morning: Swam 1000 yards at the local pool.

Afternoon:

Ran on Power lines 22 minutes out down Gainsborough, got as far as uncrossable stream. Old school XC running: 3 stream crossings total. Turned around, ran back to Tuckerman, finished hard, maybe 8 min pace including fence jumping, stream crossings, and knee high grass. 7:40-7:30 pace equivalent on good roads. Medium hard- hard. Maybe 5 ½ miles + mile of warm up/cool down

Time: 46:19

Avg. HR: 173

Max: 195 (not even all out, but I didn’t feel like I had a whole lot of energy left)

Kcals: 750

Ascent 300 feet (going down into the streams)

F. Avg: 85 degrees

Total miles: 6.5-7

7/13/07- Morning: Ran 4.5 mile loop around Clopper Lake with Shof. Pretty easy (8:30). Very humid, ran with shirt on, mistake.

Afternoon: Ran 4.5 mile on pavement with Tim, matched him step for step, then did 1 mile cool down on grass , 4 barefoot grass striders and 2 on track. Tired from running 5 hours earlier, foot felt great on pavement.

Total miles: 10

7/14/07- Pretty tired today. Ran on river road trail 2.6 out and back. Took it pretty slow, controlled. Over 9 min pace, but considering the difficulty of the run, not a bad recovery run. 48 minutes total. Foot a bit sore at times, nothing serious.

Miles: 5.2

7/15/07- Ran a fairly slow base pace 7 miles on the river road trails again. At times I would like at the HR monitor and it would show 154 or 156 and I would have to get myself to pick it up. Maybe I will stay around 160 for the next week as I up mileage

Miles: 7

Weekly milage: 39 <---hmm maybe that was a bit quick. This week more chill, all mileage in 1 run.

7/16/07- Foot a bit sore from the increase in mileage. Manageable, but decided for a day off.

Miles: 0

First Run in Forever

2007-07-09T03:11:00.000-04:00

I really had forgotten what running was like. Everything about it. Just going out and running, being alone with nothing but your body and mind for an hour, as Belle and Sebastian would say "wear terry underwear, feel the city air against your body." I listened to that song so much towards what would be the end of my track season. I first heard it on Ian's CD that he always has in his car, coming back from the UCLA road race in Palmdale. We were all wiped out and Kangway really wanted to drive, so we all fell right asleep. I remember, waking up for a brief moment in a sleepy haze, Ian and Matt completely passed out, Kangway hunched over the wheel, Stars of Track and Field playing as we came through Verdugo hills on the 210. A clear winter day, the sun shone bright in the very deep blue sky as we passed under the emerald green hills and I feel back asleep. I'll remember that for a long time. That moment sort of signified my becoming a true athlete for me, and I don't know why. Sure my 1500 time was just passing below 5 minutes, not that quick, sure I just finish in the middle of the pack of the Men's C race, but for some reason, this was the first time I felt like a true runner. From them on, Belle and Sebastian also meant running for me. Every time I listened to that song, their words really struck home. Something about the music and lyrics and my powerful new outlook on running really hit the spot.
Lately though, I couldn't really listen to that song. I know it seems corny to judge my running based on how I listen to a song, but songs in general become a million times better for me when their words and chords resonate with my state of mind. Today, I that song still doesn't quite mesh, but it has come a long way back. On my run today, I did wear my terry underwear and I did feel the city air against my body. It did feel like running once again. Maybe it will never be quite the same. Kangway is gone, Ian is probably leaving soon (I hope not), Matt will graduate. That car ride will of course never happen again, but soon I think, I will feel like a runner again. And who knows, maybe my times will reflect that. I mean, it sure would be nice to run against other people. Anyways here is my entry for this afternoon's run:

Afternoon: Huntington ! Awesome 6 miles. First real run in 4 months. Kept it controlled the whole way. Foot a bit sore the last bit after 2 miles on pavement but it went right away.

Total time: 48:22 (doesn’t include 2 stop lights)

Avg. HR: 165

Max HR: 183 ( I wonder where???)

Kcals: 766

Avg. Temp: 86 on wrist. (very dry and pleasant)

Pace: ~8:00

Felt amazing, like I never really got out of shape. The only stopping me was my foot.

Miles : 6

Weekely Milage: 20.5 running

40 biking

Some Biking

2007-07-08T15:21:00.000-04:00

7/6/07- Ran 8 slightly extended laps around the inside of the Lacy park, reversing direction after 4. Used HR monitor for first time. Felt controlled, moderate. Here are the stats:

Total time: 34:05

Avg. HR: 169

Max HR: 181 (quick finish)

Avg. Temp: 82 F on wrist

Kcals: 540

Miles: 4.1

Avg. Pace: 8:20

This is so cool.

7/707- Biked Chantry flats harder than normal. Total ride time: 1:52 minutes

Miles 22.2

Elevation gain: 2280 ft

Avg. HR 142

Max HR 179

KCals: 1433

Avg Temp 84 F

Max Temp 93 F

Avg Speed: 15.9 mph

Max Speed 41 mph

Felt pretty good, quads sore from first ride in 6 days.

7/8/07- Morning: Rode to Rose Bowl with Tim and Max and did 2 laps easy.

Ride time: 1:25

Miles: 15

Polar HR monitor + VO2 max test

2007-07-06T19:40:00.000-04:00

So I finnnnalllllly got my Polar S725X cycling computer/HR monitor in the mail today. Turns out pay pal refused to put MSCs on the packages, making them take ages to arrive here. So i put on speed sensor and got everything set up. I also noticed that the S725X model comes with a test for your " ownIndex ", apparently their best guess at your VO2 max based on only HR stuff. So I decided I would take the ownIndex test right now just to see what it was. I took at at about 4:30 pm, middle of the day, nothing special. My resting HR is 53 and my VO2 max is 67. Ill keep testing occasionally and see where it goes.

Getting Back Into It

2007-07-06T14:48:00.001-04:00

I woke up this morning and for about 10 whole minutes I completely forgot any part of me was ever injured. Maybe I'll try 4 miles today, sobre el asped, por su puesto. I think I spelled asped wrong. Yeah so good news. This is quite similiar to the start I had last year. Last year, I began running June 28th, every other day, with 3-4 milers. Of course last year, I had basically taken 4 months off without exercising at all, not to mention I didn't have two pretty solid seasons of long distance running behind. So, maybe I can't make good on Ian's prediction of getting down to the 30s or under, but I definitely think I can be faster than last year, especially with smart and efficient training. In the spirit of Ians drunken predictions, I want to make some predictions too, just for fun:

Matt K 25s-26s-- yea I think he can break 26 minutes if he gets his mileage up w.o injury
Dave R 26-27s-- He just needs to put in the milage, but I think a return to his frosh year 26:43 is completely plausible
A new Kid (anton or sacith) <29. Not sure which, but both new kids are quite strong.
Steve +Chris 29s The are certainly working hard now that its their last year and were getting pretty fast last year. I think its reasonable for both of them
Ben F- 30s If he trains, which is a big ? He might hold off the inevitable decline
Other new kid -30s
Jon T 30s- Seems to be working pretty hard. Althought injury ruined both his last seasons, he is pretty talented
Me- 30s-32s- A big ? considering the unpredictability of my performance in races and the yet again late start in my training. I think I can get into the 32s for sure. I think last year if I didn't oversleep Riverside I could have broke 33 there.
Ben + Paul+ Tommy?: 33s- Paul is pretty talented but his work level is pretty low and Ben seems to be try pretty hard. So same time for Paul, improvement for Ben

There are other people I am sure I am forgetting (including girls but ill steer clear of that one), including potential other frosh like me. From what I gather looking back, Kangway was the big recruit of our year, having run 16s for 5k along with, Ben Flora, with Jon, Paul, and Me being ?s. So one of the frosh could be a flake, although I would say Sachith, who I talk to a good deal, seems to be really working hard. Hopefully he won't get injured. Oh yeah here is my training:

7/4/07- Ran 3 miles around Lacy. Over a mile on pavement due to 4^th of july celebration. Felt alright.

Miles: 3

7/5/07- Ran 5 laps around the interior field of Lacy. Foot painless.

Miles: 2

More Training and Such

2007-07-04T16:34:00.000-04:00

6/26/07- Attempted Rose Bowl Ride. Got there 5 minutes late and missed the neutral 1^st lap. Got dropped 3 times, spent at most 3 consecutive laps with the pack. Pushed really hard in places.

Miles :40

6/27/07- Jogged 5 laps around the inside of the track. Foot felt a bit stiff and sore, seemed to be okay afterwards.

Miles: 1.25

6/28/07- Did Big Tujunga canyon again. Felt much better this time, had a lot more power this time. Still hot and low on water.

Miles: 50+

6/29/07- Morning: jogged 6 laps around inside of the track. Felt okay. Got a bit irritated afterwards, iced 3 times that day.

Afternoon: Bike to Rose Bowl + 3 Laps. Nice and easy

Miles 1.5 + 20

6/30/07- Was going to do Baldy, didn’t feel like It. Ran 6 Laps around the N field with Russell. Foot felt much better than yesterday.

Miles : 2

7/1/07- Mt. Baldy Village from GMR. Ride from Hell. Really bad heat exhaustion. Ran out of water, over 100 degrees. Made it but it sucked.

Miles: 80, 4500 v. feet

7/2/07- Ran 2.5 miles combined N field + inside of track. Felt completely pain free.

Miles: 2.5

7/3/07- Ran 3 miles inside of track. Felt some soreness between miles 1 and 2, but kind of went away. Felt fine afterwards.

Miles: 3

Training 6/4/07-6/25/07

2007-06-26T00:23:00.001-04:00

Basically I got really out of it. First injury took biking away from me, and then Kangway left, and then Ian broke his shoulder. Man I feel like everything is breaking down. Oh and did I mention my stress fracture has healed, only to reveal a deeper, possibly more serious problem: a Morton's Neuroma. It's when the nerves to your 2nd and 3rd toes gets repeated traumatized to they point that they swell and harden, forming a tumor like thing that gets pissed when ever you run too much. Basically right now I am trying to control it with anti-imflammatories and consistent icing. Soon I will try running, really slowly carefully. Sometime in the next 2 weeks I will get a cortisone shot. Hopefully this will bring it to the level where it can be managed until I am allowed to get my next cortisone shot. I don't want the surgery and will try everything possible to keep the neuroma manageable, but I have come to face with a problem that will be with me for the rest of my life. I just hope I can run competatively again...

I took of another week from the biking injury, got a new anatomical special male seat, lowered it slightly and began to bike again this past week. I rode about 100 miles last week, just getting back into it. The new seat seems to have fixed a lot of problems, which is very encouraging. Starting this Friday, I have moved aggressively back into cycling

6/22/07- Rode up Big Tujunga Canyon from Caltech. Wanted Easy 50 mile ride, got very hard 50 mile ride. First you have to climb over 1000 feet on Foothill into Verdugo Hills, and descend it all going into Sunland. Then the climb, which ascends to 3700 feet, is not direct, and descends over 1000 feet of it in various places. Did I mention it was 105 degrees. Went through 4 water bottles.

Miles: 51, ~5000 vertical feet
6/23/07- Went to Malibu, did some light open water swimming

6/24/07- Rode up GMR from Caltech, descended by way of E fork + 39. Ran into road closures from huge accident. A car went off the cliff on the 39 and into the damn. A 17 year old girl died. Scary... Otherwise excellent ride.

Miles: 63 ~3500 vertical feet

6/25/07- Went on the Chevy Chase loop except went up Mountain Street in honor of Kangway. It was super steep, climbed over 1500 steep vertical feet all together. Took just under 2 hours.

Miles: 26, ~1500 vertical feet.

Maybe I will run tomorrow morning on the North Field super easy. Ice like crazy take a least 1 day off afterwards.

3rd Week 'Training" if you can even call it that

2007-06-10T21:48:00.000-04:00

Week 3

6/3/07- Mt. Wilson with Tim. Legs felt fresh ( I wonder why??). Flated twice in the first hour, then broke shifter for front derailuer. Didn’t eat enough and bonked at the end. Otherwise okay. Need to put in more mileage.

Miles: 55

6/4/07- Decided to take some time off biking due to some ‘male’ soreness. Jogged 4 laps around north field. Felt fine. By the last lap maybe traces of pain, not sure. Swam 1000 yards. Felt fine that night

Miles : 1.3 (running)

6/5/07- Ran with Ali around the North field 6 laps + .5 laps cool down. No pain at all. Legs decently sore.

Miles: 2

6/6/07-Ran 3 miles on north field including the jog down from the house. Felt a the tiniest bit sore, but not swollen

Miles-3

6/7/07- Exam stuff. Foot feels alright. Went to doctor about gonads, said I have mild trauma and should lay off biking for a week.

Miles-0

6/8/07- Foot a bit sore, probably from mileage jump. Took the day off and iced, felt alright afterwards. Talked to Peter about how mismanagement of foot stress fractures led to the end of his professional career and running for life. Maybe I should be a bit more cautious

Miles-0

6/9/07- Swam 2500 yards. Foot feeling decently better

Total Mileage : 55 biking

6 running

More Training

2007-06-03T22:00:00.000-04:00

Week 2

5/27/07- Rode to beach trip. Pushing wind out of our way the whole time. 3:20 ride time, 4 hours total. 50 miles almost exactly.

5/28/07- Biked to Chantry Flat with Matt Kiesz. Kept asking me if I wanted to get down.. He rocked me on the climb, but I felt pretty good. Passed the fool on the descent, along with two cars.

Miles: 25

5/29/07- Busy with homework, got to the gym late. 8x50 m plus 8x25 butterfly plus some light warm up and cool down. Took 45 minutes.

5/30/07- Pulled all nighter and then went on Ge 1 field trip to Dunes. Hiked up a lot in the sand. Foot felt pretty good.

Miles: 0

5/31/07- Biked Chantry. Went at a pretty good pace, legs were rested.

Miles:25

6/1/07- Busy studying, was fat and lazy. On the plus side my Ge 1 final went okay

6/2/07- Was so disgusted with self, stuffed face with cookies for 7 hours. And by eating cookies I mean reading anthropology papers.

Total Miles:

100 miles

Week 3

Miles: 55

Summer Training as of Today

2007-05-29T01:17:00.000-04:00

Week 1

5/20/07- Rest Day. Foot fells okay

5/21/07- Woke up to 2^nd toe twitching uncontrollably, did so all day long. Feels fine though, will have to watch, ice less perhaps. Biked to River trails, south to Whitter, Rosemead back. Slow start, felt good by end. Not even that tired: ~41 miles.

5/22/07- Rt. 2 to cold creek. Legs tired first but climbed pretty quickly Foot felt alright, still twitches some but better, a bit sore by the end when out of the saddle.. Tired by end:
37 miles, 3000 vft.

5/23/07- Meant to go swimming but was late working on physics and then XC meeting. Day off. Foot twitching less. Miles: 0

5/24/07- Chevy Chase to top, descended through the school and redid half of the climb. Saw the rose ball ride getting started. Though I heard someone call my name. New goal-do rose bowl ride when more in shape.

Miles: ~20-25

5/25/07- Rode up just past start of 2^nd dam on Rt 39 with Tim. 2:45 for 41 miles. Tim pulled away from me on the climb but ran out of juice on the way back. Felt okay, a bit tired from increase in volume. Also plotted out ride from Hell: http://www.gmap-pedometer.com/?r=988884

Miles :41

5/26/07- Day off, went swimming. 2500 m easy.

Total miles

Bike: 141 miles

Week 2

5/27/07- Rode to beach trip. Pushing wind out of our way the whole time. 3:20 ride time, 4 hours total. 50 miles almost exactly.

5/28/07- Biked to Chantry Flat with Matt Kiesz. Kept asking me if I wanted to get down.. He rocked me on the climb, but I felt pretty good. Passed the fool on the descent, along with two cars.

Miles: 30