May 7th, Monday

Stay on schedule!

After swim on Friday, bike on Saturday and run on Sunday, it was time for a rest day.  I chose to stop by the meet this afternoon between Jackson Liberty and Barnegat High School to catch up with some of my distance runners from cross-country season. Coach Engle immediately put me to work on your finish line, but I was able to speak with a number of the distance runners before their race. I was honored that they were asking me for some pointers about how to approach the race. I did give him a few ideas which turned out to be very successful and they all had a good day. The distance team scored 23 out of 27 points, not bad.  I really enjoyed the day!

I decided that I would do a little bit of work since I was at the track. I ran about a mile and a half with some pickups on the straightaways, felt okay. In retrospect it was not such a great idea since my legs are very sore this evening: probably will need a day off again tomorrow.  Maybe the pool will be ok.

Stats –

I-Mad and I-Mid and I-Mhd all on upswing.  2/3/4. Have to slow down some.

Weight =#153

Sleep =9 hours

HR= ?

May 6th, Sunday

 4 mles on the Jackson roads in 46:24

Today my legs felt pretty good as I started my run. That is something that is always a  positive sign. So I expected to be able to complete a full 4 miles.I did complete 4 miles in 46 minutes. The time went by fast as I worked on making some adjustments to my summer time speech at the Push Your Pace summer camp.  That accomplished the goal I set for today which was a comfortable, moderate run.

May 6th, Saturday

After sleeping until almost noon today, I managed to get in a 30 minute bike ride before watching the Kentucky Derby.  I had an interesting revelation today reading my watch.  I have been reading Pace per mile has miles per hour in previous bike rides. It was becoming so much stress reading 6 minutes per mile as 6 miles per hour. That led me to believe it would take me almost 2 hours to write 11.5 miles triathlon. But reading 6 minutes per mile means that I will be riding 10 miles per hour, which makes a big difference. One would think that having worked with stopwatches for over 60 years I could have figured that out sooner. OK, moving on.  Just trying to keep on a steady work schedule to improve fitness.

May 4th, Friday

Solid 60 minutes in the pool this afternoon. Pretty serious 30 straight minutes of swimming. I am alternating 3 stroke, 4 stroke and 5 stroke breathing techniques to see which is most efficient and most comfortable.  The five stroke series raises my heart rate and puts pressure on my aerobic system, which I think is a good thing. I’m hoping that will help me become stronger both in the water, on the bike and at the 5k.

Next I ran in the deep end for 30 minutes interspersing five x 75 /50/25 stride segments.   That combination of work usually gets me pretty fatigued.

Stats –

Weight = #155

Sleep = 7 hours

Foot indexes  are still low to moderate.  But surely they spike whenever I run faster. I have begun to golf ball roll, stretch and do the foot exercises.

HR 5 hrs after workout at 11pm = 62 bpm

May 1st, Monday

Walked on the beach in early afternoon. Then tried to run a little on the cinders in early evening. Could not get going because of sore and heavy  quads. Jogged and stopped to stretch for 1 and a half miles to no avail. Just gave up and went home.  I may have underestimated the draining effect of the long pool workout yesterday or the residual effect of the interval work on Friday. Tomorrow is another day.

Status update;

Maintaining 8 to 9 hours sleep daily which is pretty good.

Experiencing minimal lower leg discomfort upon rising in the morning which is also good.

Weight is staying in the mid 150’s which is a little higher than I would like but not bad.

Base heart rate remained steady at 54 beats per minute. Remarkably consistent.

May 2nd, Wednesday

Legs feeling better today.  I visited the Jackson Liberty boys at track practice this afternoon.  I was made very welcome by the boys and coaches as usual.  I always enjoy my time reconnecting with those guys.  During my hour-and-a-half visit I did run about 3 miles including ten 100m strides at 26 seconds.  It was good to feel the soft surface of the track under my feet and to run at a quicker pace.

Steady stats…

April 30th, Monday

The last two days were used as rest and recovery time after a particularly difficult workout on Friday. I was definitely experiencing Delayed Onset Muscle Soreness by Sunday. While I have been walking and stretching and doing strengthening workouts for my legs and feet, I have not been running biking or swimming.  I have also been doing household chores including repainting a table for our kitchen plants on Saturday.  As a result of these activities my lower back has been quite sore for the last 2 days. Despite that I decided to head to the clubhouse and swim tonight.  I swam leisurely and sporadically using a variety of strokes for about 25 minutes. Then I committed to try swimming 500 meters Non-Stop and see how long it would take.  I completed 25 lengths of the pool, which I believe is 500m, in 22 minutes.  I was encouraged by my stamina  during the last part of what was essentially a 50-minute swim. Then I ran in the deep end for 10 minutes just to loosen up the tight muscles in my legs.  I think the swimming helped to relieve the pain in my back also. I guess we will find out tomorrow.

The next few days are predicted to be summer-like. Sounds like an opportunity for some running and biking workouts.

Stats remained steady and sound.

April 27th, Friday

Penn Relay weekend always inspires me to go for some quicker stuff on the cinders.  Yes, I ran on the Franklin Field cinders for the first time in 1958 as a high school frosh.   (60 years, Really?. REALLY!  Really.)   Two years later I ran the third leg on the DMR, which was at that time 3/4 of a mile. I ran 3:18, which was considered pretty good in those days, because John Gibson from Seton Hall told my coach that day he would give me e full scholarship to Seton Hall University.

Sad story…..I passed the baton in second place to our anchor,  Kevin Hennessy, one of the best milers in the East at the time, with full confidence that we were on the way to a Championship of America. Kevin blew up with a 4:35 disaster, the only bad race I saw Kevin run in 8 years.  (We also ran at Seton Hall together.)  Two weeks later Kevin won the Eastern States Championship Mile in 4:23!   Ahhh, memories!!!

Workout:  on cinders.

2 mile warmup including 6 x 50 stride and 6 x 25 stride pick-ups

3 x 800m + 1 x 400m with equal recovery

3:57 – 3:54 –  3:47 – 1:46

1000m cool down

Too much fun for 50 years:-)

Stats –

Indexes are all good.

Sleep = 8 hours

Morning HR = 54 bpm

Weight  = #154

April 26, Thursday

Today I  biked for 5.2 miles in 33 minutes. Than I tried the transition to running. It worked better today.  I was able to work quickly into a more comfortable pace than last time which I maintained for a full mile.  Learning to use the 21 gears on my bike in a more efficient way helped me to cover the last hill with less impact on the thighs.

We also visited Mercer County Park today to check out the venue of the triathlon I am planning to run in August.  The lake looks a little scarey, but the bike and run paths are flat and well marked.  Still have a lot to learn about how to prepare for event day though.

April 24th, Tuesday

Ran 5 miles in the FSML neighborhood in 62 minutes.  Trudged on with heavy legs at 12:30 pace with a few walking breaks of 30 seconds determined for some unknown reason to reach 5 miles and 1 hour.  Log says I have worked out 5 day in a row.  Nothing fast, but I think I am getting a good base.

Stats-

Sleep = 10 hours

Weight = #153.5

I-mad = 1/2

I-Mid = 1

Morning HR = 55bpm