Wow, Most Monthly Miles Ever (or at least in 30 yrs) and The 2015 Old First Night Run

I don't believe that I have run (almost) 200 miles in one month since I was in my late 20s, and this lat month, well, I ran 198.  198 - and I can't really believe it.  Not only that, I finished the month with a day off.  Of course, it followed a solo 18 miler over hills, hills, hills, so I'm thankful that the temps were only in the low 60s when I started and low 70s at the finish, even if the humidity was in the 84% range.  I still did it, and I was very happy to finish in 2 hrs and 53 min since that was so on pace. Like I said, my goal was to slow down those long runs, and I definitely have accomplished that this summer.  I was not super happy with my running of the Presque Isle Half on the 18th, but I did maintain 12 miles at marathon pace which was really what that was to be all about.  I finished 4th in my AG after a series of placings, but it was ridiculously hot that morning (73F at the start) and 90% humidity, so I kept echoing in my head that it is a "B" race and not my goal, my goal race is in October!  

The final week in July started with a bang too (and ended with that 18 miler) in that I successfully completed a 10 miler with 5 @ LT pace (7:45-8 min per mile).  Now I have not had a bad time with these LT runs, but my last two had my pace fall off in the last mile - not going over 7:55, but still falling off, so since it was a relatively cool morning, I made it my goal to stay as fresh as I could and keep it in control for the first couple of LT miles hopefully reaching my fastest mile in the last one - and I did it!  What a great confidence booster to see 7:37 for that last mile of the 5!  Of course, I then barely made it up the hill for the last couple of miles of my cool down - lol. I never thought I would make it through those miles and I didn't even have the luxury of Chris or MP to help me through.

Running a good LT run and a good 18 miler though, I felt I was hardly ready for Saturday's Old First Night Run. They changed the course just a it this year - no, they did not remove the nasty uphill first mile, but they did add a brick path in the end to make the course 2.73 miles instead of 2.7!  On Friday after my 18 miler on Thursday, my legs felt pretty trashed.  I made it to yoga which felt much needed, but I decided to skip my weight session with Annie as my legs already felt like lead weights. Smartly, the race start time was moved up to 8 am this year partly to avoid he heat and to avoid the congestion at the gates as Saturday is a big turnover day here in CHQ especially between weeks 5 & 6.  In fact, my daughter asked why we have t-shirts from races that I never ran in the late 90s and early 00s, and it was because we usually drove here from Atlanta (then) and left on that Saturday.  Because of the 9 am start, I could never run as we had to get on the road.  Of course, the last few years I have run when I was injured ans she has done the "closet to the pin" walk with her friends all those years too.  

Last year, I ran 20:04 on the course and felt like I was in really good shape coming off a 1:44 at Presque Isle.  It was a hot and humid day like it always is, and I was happy that it was a successful run.  I also figured that my sub-20 days on the course were over.  The OFN run is a deceptively hard 2.7(3) miles with the first tough hill occurring at 0.5 miles and then the uphill basically continues until 1.7 miles where you get a bit of a reprieve, but of course, nothing like the steep uphill you just crested.  The finish is basically flat but tricky since you make a hairpin left turn and run over bricks for 0.3 miles of the last 0.5 miles.  This year has been cooler and I was happy to wake up to temps in the mid 60s with lower humidity, sunshine, and an hour earlier race start.  

Since I'm really not a terrific short distance road runner, I warmed up with an easy 2.2 miles followed by some striders hoping to get it going.  I was very happy when we lined up that the RD made those with walker numbers move behind the runners so that we wouldn't mow them down in the first half mile.  There are a number of young stud college and high school XC runners who get primed for this run as it is right up their alley and perfect timing to see if they are ready for those fall seasons, and it isn't fair to them (or to us oldsters) to have to trip over walking 10 and 80 yr olds (the oldest runners in the race were both 90! and they did it in 30 min). 

After a beautiful rendition of the National Anthem (after all there are voice students here), we were off and I round myself running next to this woman whom I figured was in my AG and we were going strong.  We hit the first mile in 7:19 and I was like, "alright that wasn't so bad", and then she surged ahead and I just tried to stay with her.  Our second mile was 7:10 and then we hit the final downhill and the finishing stretch.  I stayed right behind her until we got off the bricks and then I pulled next to her only to be out kicked at the finish.  Our chips were identical, but officially, she won by 1 sec. And of course, she is 51 (so in my AG, but I'm, 53.5!)  Our time - drum roll please - was 19:30.  19:30! I had not run the course that fast since 2004, and all the women in front of us (we were 6th and 7th respectively) were pretty much teens (one 24 yr old).  Woe, that was some serious kick butt performances by two old ladies!  I'm guessing the Tim Warren adage of "run slow to race fast" might be paying off thanks to the wisdom of Coach Bob.

Synopsis of my week then looks like this:

Mon -Day off, weights and core

Tues - 10 miles with 5 @ LT pace - last LT mile was the fastest

Wed - Easy 5 recovery miles; Yoga

Thurs - 18 hilly, humid miles @ 9:37 pace

Fri - Day off, Yoga

Sat - Old First Night Run (2.73 miles) 19:30 - fastest time since 2004, 2nd AG (lost by 1 sec), 7th woman overall - warm up and cool down miles to total 11.26 miles

Sun - 4.35 recovery miles

WTD: 48.6   YTD:1143

Now on to August and my first 20 miler of the cycle.  I need to get excited as I can do this - after all, the 18 wasn't so bad.  I am waiting for that bad run, but so far, I've held it together, and maybe I can say that Presque Isle was my bad run for the cycle.  That would make me nothing but happy.