July 5-11: 100 Miles/Week

Record high mileage week for me. 100 is a lot for me, so I am proud to run this much during a week. Considering a long time ago when I used to have injury after injury I was unable to run a lot. Actually, there was a time where I really believed I should stop trying to run since I kept getting injured and never got anywhere. I never really had a collegiate running career. I know some people are trying to make up for what they felt was their potential in college, but I felt like I barely scratched the surface. 2001 I was a freshman and just trying to get on the VT team was a challenge. In 2002, I began to show signs of potential by making the VT varsity XC Team but right before Conference I sprained my ankle pretty bad and was unable to come back. It all became downhill from there. In 2003, I started experience an injury cycle, due to overtraining and other errors in my training(not eating enough, lack of sleep, etc.). It only got worse. I got so injured by the time fall college xc rolled around, I was unable to run for even 20 minutes due to my body being broken down. I ended up quitting and did not run for VT again. I did not run again for a long time.

In 2004 I began to get into cycling. I started to shave my legs, and bought a really nice(for me) part carbon fiber road bike. I increased the distance and by the fall of 2004 I was riding centuries, and rode as long as 127 miles all by myself through the Blue Ridge Mountains. But then, the spark of running had returned and I started to run again during the winter of 2004 and decided to train for a marathon. I did not train the right way but I did my best, and ended up getting tendinitis issues 3 weeks before my marathon. I then used the elliptical machines for 2+ hours everyday to maintain my fitness. I ended up running the race of my life, a 2:38:48 time which is still my personal best to date from 2005. But something wasn't right. I wasn't training properly. My body barely held up for the race, and I really was running injured. I don't know how I finished it, honestly. I had tendinitis all over my body practically. And, I wasn't enjoying it. So the injury cycle began again, I tried to get into my training again, but it failed. Again, and again. The rest of 2005 my body was broken down and malnourished. I could barely run 8:00 miles. I was weak, and underweight.

So, I didn't run much for the rest of 2005, and 2006 was much of the same. But then, right around graduation, in February of 2007, I decided to start training right, and self evaluated what I wanted out of my running. I self coached myself and taught myself the do's and don'ts, taught myself how to recover, I began to learn my body. I learned how to train through myself. I ate more again. It took a lot of time and patience, but slowly, I began to get my strength back. And, I began to enjoy running again.

So, here I am now. I have run PRs from 8K-13.1M and have remained injury free since 2007, and now I have run my highest mileage week ever. It is a long way I have come. The only PR(besides my highschool mile) that still stands is that marathon I ran in 2005.

The week in summary:

Monday: PM: 10

Tuesday: AM: 8, PM: 6.5

Wednesday: AM: 3.5, PM: 11

Thursday: AM: 7, PM: 12

Friday: PM: 10.5

Saturday: PM: 11

Sunday: AM: 3.5, PM: 16.5

Total: 100 miles

Sunday evening was a nice medium-long run of 16.5 miles. I picked up the pace nicely the last 35 minutes- I want to say I worked down to 5:20 pace-but maybe that's a tad too fast. Either way it was a good run. Next week I will do some track stuff and it will be a little lower mileage week-Rockville Twilighter next Saturday!