Recovery Week

Backed down on the miles last week following an experiment to see if I could handle several contiguous days of hard efforts... Twilight Trails 7.4 (8:12), Pawcatuck Lions 5K (7:28), Montville Lions 5K (7:35). Somewhat disappointed to not yet be feeling that gliding, effortless, floating runner's high, LOL. Actually, feeling pretty good physically. Better than I've felt for years. No niggling aches, soreness, pulls... No post-op complications following surgery. Five years' worth of it. All in the rear view mirror, thank goodness.

Took Monday off to stretch. Needed it. Tight, but not unexpected. One of the hard lessons of being a self-taught runner is learning how to cope with failure and learning pretty much everything the hard way through lots of trial and error. I do a lot of reading and invariably have to weigh conflicting advice on subjects such as stretching, form, technique, equipment (shoes), injury prevention, strength training exercises, speed workouts, hill repeats, cross-training do's and don'ts, etc.  I've learned over the years that I don't have the "genes" and I never will, that I have 2-day delayed-onset muscle fatigue and there's no way around it, and that I need to back off after hard efforts even if I feel like a million bucks because if I don't, I'm going to pay for it later by being over-trained and sore. The payoff is that with hard work, common sense and (god willing) good health and a little bit of luck you can establish a base and work to perfect the things you do have control over. So far, this is my best running year since 2007, when I established my 5K PR (21:05) at age 54 while running the Battle of Stonington race that year.

Tuesday evening I ran my 1st ever fun run: The Dog Watch Stonington Summer Fun Run Series, an in-town self-timed double loop that follows the current 5K course used for the Battle of Stonington 5K. I was undecided as to whether to run the thing as a hard tempo on 1 day's rest, give it a hard race effort, or jog it. I didn't want ruin a good year by injuring myself by doing too many hard efforts without proper recovery. I felt, however, that the tightness was gone, I was feeling loose and after a brief 5 minute warmup about 5 minutes before the start, and although I knew I didn't have the juice for one of my better efforts, I felt I was strong enough to hold a decent pace for 3 miles. After the 1st pass through downtown, I found myself about 20 yards behind Al Philips, whose pace seemed just about right for what I felt I was capable of holding without disintegrating into positive splits. And that's how it ended... Turned out to be a satisfying effort that my cheap GPS suggested was around a 7:30-7:35 something. After the run, I soon learned why they are called "fun" runs. Heather Bessette passed out popsicle sticks to all finishers to be used as tokens for free beer out back on the dock. It was a mob scene. Suzan & I had a wonderful time talking with a number of folks, and after a couple beers we decided to stay for dinner. It was a good decision. Excellent food. A great evening.

I took a walk with Ro DiRoma at lunchtime on Wednesday, followed by a jog around Eastern Point, Avery Point and back to the fitness center at work. Thursday I did another very light jog around the points. Friday was a complete washout, with rain coming down in buckets. Suzan emptied the rain gauge in our back flower garden to see if the predictions of 4-6 inches of rain panned out. They did... Just about 4. Predictions for the progression of the storm were changed during the day. It was now being suggested that rain would end before 7am Saturday and that we might now be looking at a pretty good day. I had written off the possibility of running the inaugural Winthrop Magnet School 5K in New London after the original predictions of bad weather through the morning, but decided to play it by ear Saturday morning to see how things unfolded.

Saturday morning was as predicted. I told Suzan I'd make up my mind about running Winthrop after a couple cups of strong coffee. I felt good. The roads were dry, humidity had dropped measureably, there was a nice breeze. I decided to go for it and was out the door at 9:05am, figuring I'd be at the school with plenty of time to race day register, pin on a bib and warm up for a few minutes. Thankfully there was no traffic. Plenty of parking in front of the school. Very well organized registration. Lots of people showed up, including Mike Passero, the New London councilman who would later that day have his head shaved for "Go Bald for a Brother" an annual benefit sponsored by Mohegan Tribal firefighters and the Eastern Connecticut Emerald Society to raise money to help with the expenses for firefighters with cancer. But other than Mike and Bill Ghio (who I've seen at just about every race so far this year... and all over the State), and Larry James, a Pfizer colleague now working in Cambridge, not too many familiar faces. Surprising, considering it was an inaugural race, which usually brings runners out of the woodwork in droves. Platt Systems was timing with D tags on the bibs.

The race start was a little odd, with the pack well back of the marked Start and no chalk markings. I don't recall hearing anyone actually starting the race. People just started running and the timing clock was moving, so I took off. Very strange. Almost immediately, the race course proved to be what Larry mentioned he'd heard it was: FREAKING HILLY. The 1st leg was a screaming downhill on Grove Street, all the way down to Williams Street, then South on Williams, up the hill to Vauxhall Street, UP, then DOWN Vauxhall, then UP Vauxhall to the halfway turnaround at Colman Street. Then back to the start on all those hills in the opposite direction. I found myself fighting for air, but was determined to try to hold a negative split race. I wound up passing a number of runners on the uphills but once the race was about 3/4 over the pack had thinned to just a few who were well out in front of me and one kid who looked around 30 years old who was about 20 yards ahead. I tried to glom onto him as a rabbit to see if I could mentally pull myself forward against the usual mile 3 fatigue. Then came that crushing UPHILL on Grove Street to the finish. Killer. I had to walk about 10 yards to the Crystal Avenue intersection to be able to have the air to make it uphill the rest of the way to the finish line, but in walking I lost almost no ground to the guy in front of me. It was everything I had to push on over to the end. OMG. An absolute, freaking crusher of an uphill finish. Ughhhhh...

Turns out, I was 8th overall with a 23:46 (7:38), taking 1st in the 60+ division. In all honesty, the toughest 5K I have ever run... and I'm not kidding. Great awards and raffle after. I celebrated by driving back home and mowing the grass. Next race on my list: Niantic Bay 10k Friday evening, back after a 1 year hiatus. Looks like it's going to be well-attended. Looking forward to seeing a few friends there!