Back in the Saddle - again

This seems to be the year of the non-running injury for me. On June 20, I fell at work while walking down some stairs. Smacked my lower back pretty hard. All extremities were functional at the time but I knew it would hurt the next day. It hurt a lot within the next hour. The next day added the pain of whiplash to the back pain.

Three weeks of mobility and strength exercises and no endurance training was the prescription. Boo. Meh, I survived it. I went for my first run on July 10. Oh did I ever lose my edge. MAF runs were in the 11-12 minute range. Pain was a 1 or 2 but I pressed through it with limited running and cycling. I even loaded the roadie for a trip to Cleveland to keep me from running too much.

I'm still recovering the fitness but my back is fine. I have to push really hard on my back muscles to find any pain. I don't have to push very hard on my pace to find zone 4. However it's getting better too.

Now I'll enjoy a weekend in Pigeon Forge with the wife and kids. Maybe a few miles of running too.

Ramping the Volume

It's that awesome time of year. Sun starts rising before 6 a.m. The temperature is still relatively cool. I just love ramping my training right now.

I have been adding a half hour every week for the last several weeks. I am now at a steady 6-7 hours of training.  However, this week we'll have me at eight hours. Eight hours is my happy spot for training.

Also with this great weather, I've been able to ride my bicycle. I bought a road bike last summer. Really enjoy a nice two hour ride even though I'm still not real fast. On a long ride my average speed is 13-14mph. I'm going to start adding some tempo workouts on the bike to get the speed increased.

Last week was a bit of a step back week. I did a 5k race on Saturday. So I dropped the volume with a short taper. I did really well at the 5k race. I was quite pleased with a second place age division and a new age group PR. I ran the race in 23:42. My only disappointment in the race was that I did not run the final mile and a half as fast as I could have. I felt like I had too much in the tank at the finish line.

The 5k race was also my wife's first 5k. She enjoyed the day and did a run walk for 38 minutes. I don't know if she's hooked but I do know that she had a good time. I think we'll do another 5k in the fall.

I have been traveling this week. Fortunately, I was able to bring my road bike. I had a great ride from Independence to South Chagrin reserve on Monday and a nice flat Rails to Trails ride on Wednesday near Elyria. Both of the rides were around 2 hours. Also got in a couple of runs one was a tempo with negative splits and then a really nice trail run yesterday that was definitely not the fastest thing I've ever done. Great day to enjoy the trails!

I'm headed home on Friday with plans for a half marathon distance on Saturday morning. I'm still trying to finish a half marathon every month. This will be an easy pace. Maybe. We'll see what Andre has on his training plan.

Keep moving forward.