88 miles, 20 hours of training + Racing on the track tomorrow!

Yesterday I finished up my highest week of mileage since exactly one year ago, which is funny because it was not planned in any way and I had to look at my 2009 running log to see when the last time I ran a pretty high mileage week. Yesterday I wrapped up the week with a total of 88 miles and almost 20 hours of training! woo hoo! The next few weeks are going to be the most consecutive high mileage weeks I have ever done, hitting 90, 90, 100, and 90 before my taper! I used to take about one day off per week and I don't do that anymore; instead I run one day really easy but still a pretty long run, or one short really easy run. I take a day off here and there for traveling or after a few really hard weeks, yet not once per week anymore. I worked really hard this weekend and this morning I definitely felt it on my 13 mile run. I ran very easy and didn't pay attention to my pace because I could tell my body needed a mindless morning run :)

Saturday I woke up nervous, frustrated, angry and negative. Right before I have to do hard workouts by myself super early in the morning, I tend to ask myself "WHY am I doing this all alone?!"..yet I don't really have any other option right now, so I spend my time waking up, drinking my coffee and warming up talking myself into a more positive, upbeat mindset, HA. After warming up, I ran 10x1k around a loop near the house, all in 3:20 or faster with about 90 seconds recovery. They felt challenging toward the end yet never incredibly strained; I had 100% confidence I'd hit my goal times...it was just a matter of wanting to be DONE and have a smile on my face, lol :) I did my drills and cooled down barefoot in the park. It felt so good to be done. Yesterday I woke up after struggling to fall asleep for almost 2 hours Sat night! I definitely felt half awake the first few miles of my long run, which showed when my splits hovered around 7 minute pace, yikes. I quickly dropped the pace and then really pushed my last few miles to end up averaging 6:45's for the 19 mile run. Later I did my core and ST work and enjoying lounging around most of the day to recover!

Tomorrow evening I am racing an open mile race on the track at Scottsdale Community College and I am pretty darn excited :) Although I know my body is tired, I look forward to doing something new and getting my legs turned over. I'll do a run tomorrow morning, go do the race in the evening, do some fast 200's after the race, cool down and my total for the day will be 15 miles. The rest of the week I have some challenging workouts and another race on Saturday, but I know with this higher mileage and 99% of my running all single runs, I'm bound to feel fatigued. I'll reap my rewards on November 7th :)

Quote for today: "It’s faith in something and enthusiasm for something that makes life worth living." -Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr