training with a little over two weeks to go

Today was a gut buster.  We threw down some pretty solid times on K repeats out on the Minneapolis side of the River Rd. right near the St. Paul border.  The wind helped to make reps 1,3 &5 ridiculously faster than reps 2 and 4.  In fact, I remember thinking I might not be able to finish the thing after the first one as it was a screamer.  AC got it started off on solid footing.

Yesterday, Lehm and I met up with a 5 or 6 young lads (mostly Edina alum) for a nice 10+ miler out at Hyland.  We are going there again tomorrow as being able to run on the dirt trails here in Minnesota right before the start of the new year is damn near impossible.  Just a reminder that anything within reason is possible.  I will be using that mantra coming up shortly.

One last hard workout before the Trials will be a marathon pacing session on Friday totaling 10-11 miles with an easy jogging break at the halfway point.  I am guessing it will be a reasonable session as I have dropped my miles a bit this week plus the tubes will be blown out as a result those fast Ks.  

I have always done well off of a significant reduction in volume before a big race.  Some call it the 'taper.'  I do not as I think that word is really stupid.  Let's just call this part of the cylcle the leg/mind freshening period.  Anyway, some folks do not prescribe to this practice and that is totally fine because everyone is different.  I just know that for me, I need to drop the miles a bit in order to get the most out of myself on raceday.

Thanks to my sponsor Saucony, I have in my possession 4 new pairs of the Fasttwitch racing flat without the stability post.  These suckers are awesome and I will be racing in them on January thee 14th.  The Fasttwitch have a perfect amount of cushioning for 5 minute miling over 26.2 miles and they are the ideal weight.  I have run the longer workouts in them as well as a few longish runs of 20 miles or so....couldn't be more delighted to be wearing them.

Finally, I have hopped on the Timberwolves bandwagon and am hoping I remain on board through the shortened 66 game NBA season.  Ricky Rubio can pass that rock.  Even LeBron tweeted that last night. I have a hunch he will get carried away some nights, but for the most part he will be exciting to watch.  My prediction for the season: 33-33.