Back at it

Well it has been awhile since I have been on this blog. Lots of stuff to do, and not enough time! I am getting ready to student teach in January so my time right now is focused on the rest of the classes I have right now. On the running front, things have been going well and hopefully will continue in that direction. I have raced a little more lately and even won some nice stuff like a flat screen TV and some cash at the Manitou Springs Mayors Cup. The big challenge this week is the Neilson Challenge Sub 10 Minute event that myself and some friends are trying to do. Now, I am sure most of you are saying 10 minutes for 2 miles isn’t that hard. Well let me tell you that in all of the years that this has been going on, not one person has done it, and were talking about past Olympic runners, and people of that caliber! Our goal is to have a good group and work together as a team. This is not going to be one of those races where everybody goes out like idiots and dies. We would much rather run even splits and get as many guys under 10 minutes as possible.
I think overall, this year has been ok for running. At this point in the year, I tend to re-evaluate what I did for the year and look for areas that I can improve for next year. One of the things that I am already trying to do differently is to add workouts back into my weekly running. I neglected this for long enough and have realized that if I want to continue to improve and possibly get closer to my running goals, I need to put the work in. I hit 3000 miles at least 3-4 weeks ago, and will most likely have another year at above 3600. I really don’t care what I end up hitting, but care most about being consistent with the mileage every year. I did a lot of things differently this year which taught me what to do and what not to do. The biggest thing that I learned was what the exact maximum of weekly mileage I can handle before becoming slower was. For me, I have concluded that 80-85 MPW is as much as I will let myself get to. I had the 90+ mile weeks this year and it did nothing but tear me down! I also realized that I need to train for myself. I know what works for me and need to stay with that.
The last thing I want to hit on here is about how erratic pacing ruins races. I was guilty of going out in about 4:28 at Manitou Springs. Why I did this remains a mystery! I sometimes wonder what could have happened if I would have ran 4:45, or even 4:50. Would I have died as bad in the third mile of the race? I commonly find myself going out crazy hard for the first mile of a race, and just kind of put cruise control on after that. I need to find a balance to fix this problem and become more efficient in my pacing. I lose plenty of time in races because I can recover after blazing a mile! I guess it is just another part of the process of figuring it all out.