Week Starting 9/2/2019
Running: 13.7 miles
Biking: 34.9 miles
Steps: 113,348 (56.74 miles –  43.04 walking)

Impression: This week turned out not to be quite what I expected, but overall it was fine. I knew I had a big pacing gig this weekend and so I kept my running and biking mileage low all week. Thursday afternoon we headed up north for the Superior 100. I was supposed to pace a friend overnight on Friday, but they had some serious injury struggles and couldn’t make the cutoff at one of the earlier aid stations. Therefore, I ended up only running when we got home on Sunday afternoon, which was fine.

When I look at my walking numbers though it’s kinda crazy. I had as many steps as most weeks, but it was almost all walking. That’s mostly due to this weekend when I was captaining an aid station for 9 hours. The next day we also went for a hike, and hung out with people all up and down the Superior 100 course. Needless to say I got my time on feet.

This Thursday we head to Tahoe to pace a friend at the Tahoe 200. Because of that, there might not be an update next week. We’ll see what type of signal I end up with.

Week Starting 8/26/2019
Running: 30.6 miles
Biking: 70.8 miles
Steps: 113,267 (57.65 miles –  29.42 walking)

Impression: Due to a crazy work schedule of my youngest kid (working the State Fair) I ended up not getting in nearly as much activity as I would have liked to earlier in the week. I got my first bike ride in on Wednesday with 28 miles of Beer & Bikes riding down to St. Paul.

I then crammed all of my running in to 4 days (Th-Su). I decided to head out to Afton to do a full 25K loop on Saturday because I knew if I stayed local I’d bail early. I needed to get some serious time on feet and Afton (with Mike) is the best way to not wimp out. In fact we actually worked really hard, and I set a new course PR of 3:13, albeit we ran the course backwards. Because of how that changes the different climbs and descents I’ll consider this it’s own PR, but it’s really darn close to my forward-PR of 3:16, so I’m happy.

Sunday was a run with Radek and Lisa to cap out the weekend. However, this was not the end of our adventures. Because my wife recently got a new bike she really wanted to get some time on it over the long holiday weekend. Both Saturday and Sunday runs were followed up with solid bike rides. We did a local loop around to a couple parks on Saturday for a 12 mile ride, and then drove out to St. Joseph, MN to spend 22 miles on the Lake Wobegon Trail (with a stop at a brewery). We’re also planning a gravel ride tomorrow on our day off from running.

Needless to say things get crazy and annoying when schedules are not standard. September is going to be crazy and wild, so it’s going to be a lot more broken up training schedules. However, I’ve got some wild stuff going on in September, and I won’t be taking it easy by any stretch.

Week Starting 8/19/2019
Running: 19.0 miles
Biking: 65.2 miles
Steps: 97,710 (48.42 miles –  29.42 walking)

Impression: Back to recovery week. My legs were feeling pretty trashed after Marquette, so this week was minimal running to try and keep things on the mend. I got in a mid-week run with the wife, and then on Saturday met up with Mike and Pat for a pretty decent and quick run around Medicine Lake. This Saturday run actually felt really good, and by the end, Mike and I were cranking out some 8-9 min/miles, feeling awesome. Finally, on Sunday the wife and I did a little running along the river in St. Paul, with some hill reps thrown in for good measure.

A lot of this week was spent biking. My Wednesday night ride was a 20 miler into Minneapolis, followed up by some long overdue commuting to work on Friday. On Saturday the wife bought a brand new bike, and so Sunday turned into an awesome brewery bike ride with a bunch of our friends, so she could try it out. Overall, I’m finding my pace getting stronger, and I’m experimenting with more gears, but I think that at some point in the not-too-distant future, I’ll be getting something a bit better for myself.

Week Starting 8/12/2019
Running: 36.6 miles
Biking: 23.4 miles
Steps: 127,019 (60.14 miles –  23.54 walking)

Impression: Another race week! I got so wrapped up in the return travel that I completely forgot to post my weekly recap. So I’m doing it a couple days late, in lieu of my weekly “review” post.

This Saturday I did the Marquette 50K race, which was a completely different race than the Badger 100K. Whereas Badger was flat and non-technical, Marquette was some of the most technical terrain I’ve run on. There were large swaths of easy running, but when it got rough, it got really rough. I’ll post more in my race report later.

Apart from the race I’ve tried to keep it low key last week, and so I only did a couple of runs and bike rides. The technical terrain at Marquette hit my legs harder than Badger, so I’ve probably got some slower recovery ahead of me before I’m back to 100%. Overall though, I’m feeling good and moving well. So far, the majority of the rest of my year is pacing duties until I get to Tuscobia. That means that training will be more general fitness and not targeted towards anything specific. I might toss in another race, but I haven’t decided yet.

Week Starting 8/5/2019
Running: 12.3 miles
Biking: 34.1 miles
Steps: 77,168 (37.05 miles –  24.75 walking)

Impression: Recovery week! I kept it really low key this week for two reasons. One, I had just run 62 miles. The second reason being that I have another race, the Marquette 50K, next weekend. These two weeks are going to be nice and simple.

I kept away from running until Friday to give my body time to heal. However, even by Tuesday I discovered that I was feeling almost back to normal. If there’s one thing I can take away from this entire training cycle and race, it’s how well I was able to bounce back. I feel like my weekly mileage was really strong, and I kept my pace slow and steady, and didn’t push for speed. That meant my body was able to do incredible things, but at the same time, recover from them much quicker than when I did my 50 mile.

I managed a bit of biking this week as well, including a beautiful epic, nearly 30 mile, ride on the Gateway Trail on Sunday with my wife and friend Abe. I did experience fatigue a bit quicker than I normally would, so it’s obvious that things are still not fully 100%. Plus, we were pushing the pace quite a bit, and that was probably more difficult on my body than it was ready for. It was still a great day on the trail though.

Next week… 50K on the bucket list.