Training Log

7 am - 61 mile bike ride with co-worker Mike.  Nice morning to ride.  We added 20 miles to last week's route and rode on some different roads up into Tipton County.  It was fun to ride somewhere different!

5:50 am - 7.8 mile loop around the lake near the town hall.  Legs felt really good until near the end of the run, when then felt a little tired from the ride yesterday and the race on Sunday.

5:00 am - Started out early in the dark so did not run around the lake but ran through Schilling Farms instead.  Felt pretty tired because I stayed up until 10:30 the night before working on a class assignment that is still not finished.  The run went well until about 1/2 mile from home, it had started raining and after I crossed a side street, my foot must have slipped or hit the curb, (although I didn't feel it), and suddenly I am falling forward, and fell really hard on the sidewalk, kind of rolled toward the left and hit my head on the sidewalk (that's how fast it all happened - not time to try to break the fall) and finally landed on my back.  Fortunately, I didn't hit my head too hard, but it did hit on the temporal side.  I got up and surveyed the damage - very badly skinned knees, skinned side of left hand and wrist, skinned back of left shoulder, and a bit of a headache on the left side, but I was still good to run, so I continued home. Feels like I'm gonna be sore tomorrow!

6:30 am - It's raining quite hard, but I need to get out there, so waited until 6:30 and headed the opposite direction from the high school where all the traffic is.  It started raining even harder for the first 2 miles of the run, then let up a little.  Did the 7.3 mile loop because I am still a little tired also sore from falling yesterday.

No chance to run today.  Stayed up late yesterday - helped my son look for a used car afer work, which took a really long time - going to several dealerships, trying to find something affordable and, hopefully somewhat reliable.  It is sometimes difficult to take some of the games the car salesmen play - I totally dislike buying a car!  I always feel taken advantage of.  We went home with a couple of possibilities and one quote, and once home, went through all the insurance paperwork, some of which requires extensive documentation and notorized forms, so we were all up pretty late.  Yes, the remnants of hurricane Fay did us the "favor" of destroying his car when it dumped 6 inches of rain on midtown in the matter of 15 minutes and flooded his apartment complex.  It was a blessing in disguise, in a way.   Thank God for insurance.   

Today (Friday)  I took part of the afternoon off to once again help him find a decent deal on a car.   One of the credit union employees was extremely helpful, explaining the NADA retail and trade values of vehicles, printing out information on various cars we had looked at, and even called a friend at a dealership who had a car in our price range.  Thank God for her - she is a blessing, too.  To make another long story short, we did get a pretty good deal at the dealership she suggested, and it helped that she put us into contact with her friend who is a manager there.  The "new" car is a 1999 Saab with 102,000 miles, 4 -cylinder engine, and one owner who took good care of it.   Affordable.  Home at 9 pm.

6:45 am - 70 mile bike ride with Mike.  The MS 150 bike tour is next weekend.  We are as ready as we're going to be.  Good ride.  Tomorrow is the MRTC first 10k at Shelby Farms.

7 am - MRTC 1st 10K race of the road race series - Shelby Farms Park.  Felt rested, even after the 70-mile bike ride the day before.  Went out a little fast at first, then tried to pace better based on perceived effort since I ran this race without a watch.  There was a guy at mile 1 calling out the time, which I think I heard him say was 7:27 as I passed.  Shelby Farms Park is my favorite place in Shelby County.  It is a huge, beautiful park with mountain bike trails, horseback riding, paved running trails, a rustic visitor center, rolling hills, several small lakes, lots of green areas.  We ran out around Patriot Lake near the visitor center, then across the bridge and up the hill to the Chickasaw Trail, down into the woods and past two more lakes.   In the last mile there is one very steep hill that goes up around the playground - that was a little tough but not as hard as I remember it from other races there.  Then you run down and around the other side of the playground hill, up another gradual hill, down the other side, and uphill again to the finish - just a few rolling hills at the end.

I was really happy with my time, which is a PR.  Waiting for the "official" results.

8:30 am - got home, changed out of racing shoes and headed out for the 7.8-mile loop.  Kept a steady pace, and felt really good.  Legs started to hurt a little at the end, so I walked a couple strides 3 times in the last 1.5 miles.

5:50 am - 8.3 mile loop with the downhills.

6:15 pm - mountain bike riding at Herb Parsons Lake park with my daughter, Jessie.  This is a very technical trail.  I was really proud of her - she had not done the trail before and did very well - was not scared at all.  There was a LOT of poison ivy, however.  We washed down with poison ivy soap afterward and hope we will not get any, but there was so much we both expect to get a little.

6:05 a.m. - 7.8 mile with the lake loop.  Overcast, humid morning.  Feeling a little tired.  Legs were heavy.  Better the 2nd half of the run.

6 am - 7.3 miles

5:44 am - 17.6 miles - 2 hours 45 min. Had to finish up quickly to get to work. Wanted to do 20 - legs still felt good after this distance and felt I could have done more.

6:30 pm - ran the 7.8 mile loop around the lake near the town hall.  Legs still felt pretty good.  Just a little tired at the end and front of left ankle hurt just a little.  Soaked in a cold bath and stretched.

Getting ready for the 150-mile bike tour this weekend - got to work early so I can get home early to pack and get all the gear ready.

7:30 a.m. - First day of MS-150 bike tour.  Nice day, however the course was made more challenging by the very strong headwinds from hurricane Ike, which is on its way to this area after coming ashore in Galveston with lots of destruction.  Those of you in that area are in all of our thoughts and prayers as we ride today.

The MS Society will decide by tomorrow morning whether the tour can continue - forcast is for rain and sustained winds of 30-45 mph.  After the difficulties experienced today by just about everyone on the ride with the gusty winds, it looks like they might cancel the second day, especially if it rains and the pavement is wet.

5 am - The second day of the MS-150 bike tour is canceled. In Tunica, MS, where we stay overnight on the tour, it is raining and very windy.  Walking from my room to breakfast and back, it is hard to stand up in the wind, let alone stay on a bike. For everyone's safety, it is canceled.  Mike and his wife gave me and my bike a ride back to Graceland, which was really nice, and I was home by 8 am.  It is still raining and windy, and the sky has some dark, fast-moving clouds.

3 pm - went for a run, thinking maybe I could do a long run, but my legs were sluggish and I was still tired from yesterday, so only did 5.1 but tried a new route.  They've extended the sidewalk to reach an exclusive neighborhood way down Shelton Rd. east of the landfill.  So I followed it - the neighborhood is kind of hidden in the woods as you curve around and the road becomes Bray Station. There's a sign one one side that says it is private property and that jogging and lake rights belong only to the residents.  Oh well- no jogging on those streets.  I can run on the sidewalk that goes around the outside.

5:50 am - 9 miles. Took it a little slow - still feeling a bit tired.  It was 60 degrees and felt a little chilly starting out.  After the hurricane front passed nearby, some cool, dry weather is here for a few days.

4:50 am - 15 miles around Collierville.  Still felt a bit tired.  Will try for a "real" long run on Thursday.

6 am - 7.2 miles, easy run. 6 pm - road bike ride after with with a small group from walgreens on Houston Levee Rd.

6 am - shorter run today - early meeting at work.

4 am - finally! The long run.  Felt very good.  Had to rush toward the end to get to Jacob's school for grandparent's day at his kindergarten at 8 am.

7:15 am - easy 6-mile run

7 am - MRTC road race series 2nd 10K.  I decided to take this race very easy and treat it as a training run if I felt tired, which is why I'm not entering this as a race report.  During the first mile, I decided this would definitely be a "throw-away" race since I did really well in the previous 10K.  Still tired from the long run Fri and recovery run yesterday, then being on my feet all afternoon Sat helping with registration for the kid's triathlon which is today.  My time was somewhere around 1:01, and I did not hand in my race card at the end.

1 to 4 pm - run course monitor and water stop volunteer at the kid's triathlon.  What a great event - there were over 200 kids, ages 7 to 14 participating.  I ended up running another .8 to maybe 1 mile because of a situation where some students on the school campus where  the event was held were in an unscheduled review class and needed to leave from a parking lot onto the closed triathlon course.  My water stop was next to parking lot, and the security guard asked if the kids could drive their cars out, and I said, "No, there are 7-year-old kids on what is supposed to be a closed course on bikes."  One of the students apparently argued that it is their campus and we were guests just using it so they would do what they wanted. ( He turned out to be one of the race director's sons, and should know better).  I told them not to leave the parking lot, not to drive onto the course, and I would find the race director to find out what to do, so I ended up running back to the start area and found the race co-director who had the school headmaster's phone number. She was able to contact him (he was on the campus fortunately), and he was able to deal with the situation.  The students had to stay until all the bikers were off the course, which was the right thing to do for their safety.

6 am - beautiful morning!  7.8 mile loop around the town hall lake, watched the sun rise.

6 am - 8.3 miles with downhills.  Felt good, nice morning!  Very busy at work this week - hoping to do a long run Thurs or Fri morning.

6 am - 9 miles at a moderate pace.  Looks like the long run will be Friday.  6 pm 15.5 miles road cycling.

6 am - 7.8 mile around the lake; watched the sun rise. Felt a little tired, but overall a good run.

4:22 am - long run.  Felt pretty good - had to stop around 15.5 to stretch because my IT band on the right felt tight and a little sore.  About a mile after stretching, it felt better.  Ran the downhills on Peterson Lake Rd. twice by looping out to Collierville-Arlington and back around, then downhills on the wagon trail to Johnson Park. Felt good at the end, probably could have gone longer but it was 7:59 am, and time to get ready for work!  3 hours 37 min.  Getting closer for BQ but not quite there yet.

7 pm - 7.8 miles - around the town hall lake and back.  Nice evening.

6:10 am - 6.2 miles, easy.  Felt a little tired.

6 am - 9 miles with downhills on Peterson Lake Road.  Jessie and Jacob are sick - hoping I won't catch it.  Lots of upper respiratory illnesses going around right now with the change in the weather.