June 26 - swam 750 yards
June 28 - swam 500 yards

July 1 - 5.1 miles
July 2 - 4.2 miles (hills)

Went six days (June 25-June 30) without running last week. Wasn't injured or anything; just simply had a lot going on and opted for extra sleep instead of waking up early to beat the 90-95 degree heat (not that I want to turn these excuses into a blog...log not blog). All is good though.

Without that 6 day stretch, I've been averaging ~25 MPW (91 miles between June 1-June 24). That includes a 14-mile run, which can easily skew averages, so I find that it can be easier to track (and plan) with graphs:

Blue line = weight in lbs [left axis]
Red line = miles ran during previous 7 days [right axis]
Green line = 0.5*(miles ran during previous 14 days) [right axis]

[in other words, the green line is a weekly average of the previous two weeks; it basically smooths out the red line]

July 5 - 4.0 miles (speed work)
July 6 - 4.0 miles (easy pace)
July 7 - 5.0 miles (easy pace)

I've been inconsistent recently. I think this is everything since my previous post:

July 13 - 4.1 miles
July 15 - 4.1 miles
July 16 - 5.0 miles

July 18 - 5.8 miles

July 20 - 4.5 miles - solid workout of hills that kicked my ass. Feels good.

Past few days I've stepped on the scale and saw 169.x. Haven't been below 170 since 2016. Don't tell my former fat self, but the only significant difference in my diet these past few weeks has been a lot of diet soda. I'm usually a 2x/day coffee drinker, but I've been getting headaches from coffee, so I switched to soda for the caffeine to get me through the afternoons headache-free. Ugh, but the soda has made me feel bloated. I won't need it today, and I have no reason to drink it during the weekend, so hopefully I can keep the cold turkey going through Monday.

nice weightloss and consistency, keep it up!
what's the goal weight?

Thanks man. 170 has been my goal for a while; I've been floating at 175-ish for what seems like a long time, and I know I've posted a few times something like "I know I could be a tad faster if I weighed slightly less." I'm not as hung up on that sort of mindset these days, but I'm planning to "float" at 170-ish for a while, if that makes sense.

July 21 - 5.0 miles

July 23 - 4.3 miles

Miles 1-2: 9:20/mile
Mile 3: 7:30
Mile 4: 7:55
final 0.3 mile: easy jog

70 degrees outside at 6am, but it's still too humid to do any legit speed-work - I had almost no energy remaining after mile ~3.75. Gonna visit a nearby track and do intervals for whenever my next speed-work session is.

~72 hours since I've consumed any diet soda. Feels good.

July 25 - easy paced 4 miles

July 28 - 3.8 miles
July 29 - 4.6

July 31 - 4.1 (ben franklin bridge hills)

Barely 70 miles for July, but I feel good.

Aug 6 - 630pm - 86 degrees - 4.0 miles
Aug 8 - 445am - 77 degrees - 8.0 miles

Aug 9 - 12pm - ?? degrees - 4 miles

Someone in the LC thread recently wrote something to the effect of "this forum is a graveyard of abandoned fitness and weight loss blogs".

I've only cracked 51 miles for August. I had lower mileage months in the summers of 2016-2017 too (my OP bemoans my subsequent laziness following the summer of 2016). Good news is that I'm 171-172 lbs and I feel good; hooray for not spiraling back into bad habits.

Recently I've been more cognizant of my stride length and when I'm moving my quads/thighs versus, say, phoning it in with mostly lower leg movements. One effect (who knows if it's legitimately causal) is that my "easy runs" have been getting faster (even in the summer heat) - i.e. I'm surprised when I see an 8:55-9:05 pace when it feels like I'm going at a ~9:30 pace.

I roll my eyes at the title of this thread, because I know I'm not going to crack 26.2 anytime soon. That's fine. I'm happy for the motivation that it sparked. I've got it in my head that I'll do it sometime in my life, but let's take it one step/workout at a time. I am starting to get hungry for a legit running goal, and I've got a few ideas, but I figure I'll flesh those out after I get a few more weeks of more consistent workouts under my belt.

f*ck it, I'm going to turn this back into a log. I'll be logging everything I do in September:

Aug 30 - 4.0 miles
Aug 31 - 4.3
Sept 2 - 3.9

Update: set a new 13.1M personal best. Really wanted to break 2 hours, but that was not in the cards. Next time for sure. Still feels good.

Goddamn, beat my 13.1 PR today. 60 degrees outside in PHL, so I broke out the short shorts, intending to do a nice easy 7-8 miles (1st two miles were ~9:45 pace) on a popular route. After about mile 4 I realized I was in a good groove and figured, eh, why not 10? Well, 10 became 12, and then 12 became: eh why not 13.1? Still haven't cracked 2 hours (and this wasn't a timed/chip race, unlike my previous post) - but my apps clocked me at between 2hr1m45s-2hr2m10s, so that felt good.

I signed up for another half marathon on Sat March 2. It's time to finally break that 2 hour barrier. As long as I keep up a reasonable mileage (~23 MPW), get in one reasonable longish (~12) run in mid Feb, and avoid injury, it's going to happen.

Splits from today's 8 miler:

1 - 8:37
2 - 8:23
3 - 8:50
4 - 7:39
5 - 8:24
6 - 9:04
7 - 8:11
8 - 8:10

Wed Jan 16 - 4.2 miles in 38:20
1 - 9:41
2 - 9:35
3 - 8:54
4 - 8:09
0.2 - cool down

Two more easy paced runs:

Sat Jan 19 - 3.9 miles
1 - 9:53
2 - 9:20
3 - 8:42
0.9 - 8:46

Sun Jan 20 - 5.0 miles
1 - 9:08
2 - 8:49
3 - 9:00
4 - 9:29
5 - 8:35

Stealing this from ibavly's log because I really like it -

Using this framework, my tentative training goals until March 2nd race day are:

(1) Do "easy paced" runs at RPE5-6, such that my weekly mileage for all runs (including harder runs) is ~23MPW

(2) Sometime in early/mid-Feb do a long (~11-12 mile) run at goal pace (~9:00-9:05/mile). Given my current state/shape (which is the best shape I've been in since I've started this log), I shouldn't really be doing a "long" run more than 1x/2weeks, so this would technically put the "session RPE" at 10. (and if I ever decide to get on the 14+ mile wagon again, I'd need to modify the scale to include "Could do 1 workout this intense every month")

(3) Final ~8 days before the race, nothing harder than RPE ~5.5


Recent sessions:
Sun Jan 20 - 5 miles "easy" - RPE6
Sat Jan 19 - 3.9 miles "easy" - RPE5
Wed Jan 16 - 4.2 miles "easy" - RPE6.5 (did the 2nd half too fast, but it was cold...)
Mon Jan 14 - 8.0 miles at ~8:30 pace - RPE9.0-9.5

seems to me that you are very close already...that 8 miler at 8:30ish is almost 40 secs/mile faster than you need. you should be able to do at least two, if not three longer runs in the remaining time you have. maybe just slow down a bit, and even up the splits some.


good luck

This makes sense. Thanks. Looking back, I've been doing a 7 or 8 miler about every 10 days, which, for my ~23 MPW, is a long enough "long run". Yay terminology. Still want to do a slightly longer (~11-12) run in about 10 days. I figure that my final "long run" before March 2nd will likely be 7-8 miles about 9-10 days before the race.

Thurs 1/24 - 7.0 miles (9:04 avg pace) RPE 6.5-7.0
1 - 9:27
2 - 9:09
3 - 9:48
4 - 9:01
5 - 8:51
6 - 8:38
7 - 8:44

Sun 1/27 - 5.5 miles - RPE 5
1 - 9:15
2 - 8:44
3 - 9:05
4 - 9:00
5 - 7:35 [don't think this was right -- GPS can be funky around tall buildings]
5.5 - 8:50

Mon 1/28 - 3.1 miles - only had ~4 hours of sleep, so by mile 3, I was at RPE ~7.5-8.
1 - 8:08
2 - 8:30
3 - 9:13
3.1 - cool off

Tues 1/29 - OHP, curls, BW squats, KB swings

Wed 1/30 - 4.1 miles (9:20 avg pace), RPE 6.5 (this pace is usually RPE 5 for me, but I'm slightly sore from yesterday, NBD)
1 - 9:04
2 - 9:02
3 - 9:39
4 - 9:16
4.1 - cool off

Sat 2/2 - 5.1 miles, RPE 6 - trail running on a few areas that were still covered in ~2 inches of snow, nice change of pace, a few 10+ minute miles, felt good.

Sun 2/3 - 10.5 miles (9:10 avg pace) RPE 5.5 during first half, RPE 9 by mile 8-9-10
1 - 9:28
2 - 9:27
3 - 9:43
4 - 8:25
5 - 9:31
6 - 9:17
7 - 9:27
8 - 9:35
9 - 8:51
10 - 9:28
10.5 - 9:24

Pretty happy with progess so far. Splits could have been better / more even, but eh, this is why we train. Obviously I'm not planning to run a 5 mile RPE6 the day before my race. Got humorously emotional during today's run -- last year I did a training run on SB Sunday, including running up the Philly Art Museum steps a few times...it was a helluva time, the city was FACKING alive...today, one year later: eh, let's go Pats I guess.