Different Thoughts/ Whatever # week of training my last week was

Summer running? A novel idea for me I guess. In high school it really never occurred to me that maybe it would be a good idea to run during the summer. Coming to college and starting to run with you guys enlightened me on so many different aspects of running that I had never seen before. I never used to run long on sundays, look at running blogs, track my runs, challenge myself to do more than expected, run during the summer, take it easy on weekends etc. But now my mindset has changed. When asked this year by Jesse why I ran my answer was because it kept me and good shape and from getting ( more) fat but now after looking back on the past year I really feel like I keep running to see what I am actually capable of. I need to stop looking at our sport in the short run and look for how to imporve the long run.
I feel now like I had a long year of let downs and after every race I was dissapointed and just wanted to put every saturday in the past as if it were some fluke. But the dissapointments continued. Were my expectations too high? Was I doing something wrong. I tried many different things that I thought would help me race faster but nothing seemed to work. However, looking back on all the days this year that were not saturdays a lot of them showed massive improvement on my part that makes me feel better. Every workout was several times better (longer, faster, more consistent) My mileage was more consistent, I was able to push mileage to higher levels than ever before and I felt good, until saturday. So lets forget about that now. Now we all look to build a store of miles for the next 2 months before we have to get back into the competitive modes where we worry about how well we perform.
This will be new for me, running consistenly over the summer. Last year I tried, but was unable to bring my self to sacrifice other things like sleeping or seeing friends. It seems weird however, not having that competitive drive. I am working but the ends are not really in sight right now. However, I have been looking torwards to XC 2009 since the beginning of Outdoor this past season where after a season of sprinting and middle distance workouts like I had never done before I all the sudden came out and started doing distance. At first I thought this will be a drag and I wont see any good times, but right out of the gate just in tempo work out I saw amazing results. After a year and a half almost of being on the team and fighting to break 30 minutes in the 8k race or even a long lakes tempo, all of the sudden 2 weeks into outdoor distance training I had dropped two minutes on the 5 mile long lakes hovering just about 20 seconds over 28 minutes.
This is were I get my drive from, the thought of what level I could perform at after really establishing a strong base of miles this summer for the first time ever. While I dont neccesarily strive to be on the top 7 or second 7 for that matter just wanting to be the best I can. Not setting specific time goals for where I think I should be will hopefully save me from another year of dissapointed yet at the same time I hope to be pleasantly surprised with how I will improve. I guess I sort of now have the same feelings as corey does on this subject.
I feel as though I have also begun to ramble and as Im sure we have all seen we all have lots of feelings about training that are hard to place on the blog. Long story short I guess is that I guess I wanted to thank everyone for bearing with my lack of real running experience and that I hope in trying new things e.g. summer base I will eventually catch up.

On a lighter note, does anyone know detailed information about this 2 mile time trial cut that people have been talking about?


Last week was an interesting week.

Sunday- Super Sprint Triathlon (2.01)
Just a reminder for how much I suck at swimming and biking.
400 m swim 10min
12K bike ( on a mountain bike that was too small) 25 minutes
3k run - 12min.
I was so happy to be running after the swim and bike but by the time I realized I could open up I was already 2k into it.

Monday- Sick for the second time in a month, wonderful (16.01)
a.m.ish-Today I decided during my 830 am art history that I wanted to run for long time after words. So I ran about 1hr and 55min not too fast, and felt great, until I had to sit through a 3 hour class afterward. (Unsure of distance, gmaps has messed up routes out here i think 14.5 - 15ish probs)
p.m. - Got home and ran barefoot for 1.5 miles.

Tuesday (6.5)
Nice little hilly loop felt sick still and fatigued from yesterday

Wedsnesday (6)
Feeling better, but still heavy legged

Thursday ( 10.75)
Went out thinking only 8 or so but felt good and decided to keep on going.

Friday ( 4)
Woke up early to run before a 4 hour train to Paris. Planned on running at night but had no time after touristing with my class

Saturday (0)
Again had to do stuff with my class and ended up walking for about 5 hours throughout paris so ended up not running...

Overall 45 plus some extra on sunday. Felt pretty good and had planned to kick it up a notch this week but then I twisted my ankle 3 miles into a long run yesterday so I may have to rethink depending on how I feel tomorrow. Sorry for such a long post.