Alright so let's see, I've had two really, really long posts now, so I should probably cap the volume of words in this one.
As I continue to replay last week's race, I feel pretty good about a number of things. For instance, I feel like it was the best I've done with nutrition in any race I've ever done, and as a result I'm sure that helped me not feel totally wrecked at the end of the race or the next day. I also feel good about the effort level, as in I didn't get ahead of myself and try to get after it too hard. In the future, that will change, but for this time, I think it was the best move. Of course, that didn't really help my time at all, but that's the breaks.
Following my 5 miler on Friday, I headed back down to MD for rehearsal dinner/wedding. This week is another rehearsal dinner/wedding. While I would like to just be able to chill out for a minute, I suppose it's better than them having been prior to AZ, and at least they're immediately following the race so I don't feel as bad about taking some time off.
I think doing that race may have set my recovery back a few days. I have been tired, and haven't really been in the mood to do any "training." Maybe that's just what happens when doing a big race so late in the year. Even though I only started preparing really in July, it's still the farthest into the year I've ever gone, with NYC Marathon 2008 the previous mark. I took Sunday off and went to watch the #2 Terps men's soccer beat #15 Penn State on a goal in the 88th minute to advance to Friday's NCAA Semi-final.
Monday I made it to FHR and did the 6 miles. We ran together for a mile, then the pace picked up and I got left behind. Fortunately, Zero was okay with running my slow pace and eventually we picked up a few others to run with us. Tuesday, the last day of November, was rainy and windy. The temperature, though, was mild. A fairly large group met at the track to do a workout, which was surprising because there were weeks when it was nice that we didn't have that many people out. I ran the warmup and cooldown, and that was enough for me.
Today I finally made it back in the pool, after swimming just 1500m last week. My goal is a lofty one, to make it to 400 miles. After today I'm at 350, so I need to swim another 80,000m this month. Normally I wouldn't think that's too bad, but I'm going to miss a bunch of days due to traveling this month. I'll see how I feel after a few days of this, it's a less-than-significant goal, but I'd like to get there. I'd also like to get to 5000 miles on the bike, currently I'm 570 miles away. And I'm at 770 miles of running and would like to get to 900. I think that's reasonable.
For the month of November, I ended up with 36,500m of swimming, 455 miles on the bike and 131.5 miles of running. I was a little disappointed with the bike, as I could have just gone out for one 45 mile ride and had a cool 500 for the month. But then, I just didn't feel like doing it last week and didn't have time over the weekend.
I have one more goal this year - the Celtic Solstice 5 Miler on December 18. The first two years I ran it, I ran 30:46. Exactly. Both years. I wasn't "racing" either of those years, so in 2007 I tried to see what I could do. I managed a 29:06, which was a pretty decent time. In 2008 I hadn't run much following NYC Marathon but managed a respectable 29:28. Obviously didn't get to race last year, but this year I'm hoping to take a crack at getting under 29. I think it's reasonable, but I'm not going to beat myself up if I don't hit it - I won't do anything but easy running between now and then anyway.
I've started to think about my goals for next year, as well as my race schedule, so I'll get to that next.
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