It has been a tough week with 4 straight days of 10 miles or more. I wanted to get in 12 more miles today, to hit 60 for the week. Then I could rest up on Saturday.
Earlier in the week, I messaged Emily to see if she was available and wanted to run the Super Bowl 10k course with me one afternoon. She told me Friday worked for her. I had a work order nearby, so it ended up working perfectly and we met up around lunch time.
The plan was to run the course and maybe add on a few miles too. I've run the Parkway many times, but never the race course. Emily had never run in the Parkway at all. I wish we could've run some of the stone path too, but it is snow covered.
The weather was pretty nice. It was in the upper 30s for a change. There was not really any wind. The sun wasn't out though, so it was still a little chilly. I wore a jacket, headband, gloves and a pair of pants. I didn't need too many layers.
The course starts off by the LVRR Clubhouse. Since it is a winter race, it is run all on roads. I was very familiar with the beginning of the race. The road out of the park starts off flat, but then begins climbing.
I knew it was a tough climb to get up to the neighborhood above the Parkway. It surely isn't an easy run at the start. After climbing for a bit, I was disappointed to see that Lehigh Parkway North goes downhill because I knew it would be an uphill later. The course then has another pretty wicked climb.
We were running a decent pace. This was good for me to get familiar with the race course and it was good for Emily because she needs to get stronger on hills. The pace was a fairly comfortable sub 8 minute pace for me.
I drove the course before we ran it, since I wound up in that area. I was surprised at how hilly the neighborhood is. I knew it was a climb to get there, but I thought the neighborhood would be flat. It wasn't huge hills, but there were definitely rolling hills.
The legs weren't feeling all that great. I went heavy with the KT Tape on both my left shin and left calf. I could feel some tightness in the calf, but it didn't hurt too much. My quads began to get worse too. That was a big problem last spring, so I really have to watch that.
The neighborhood section goes in and out on a bunch of different roads. I was glad that I printed out the map and carried it with me. Otherwise, I would've had no clue where to go. The course is mainly an out and back with a short loop at the end.
As usual, time flew by running with Emily. Talking and joking around makes things go quickly and the miles just click off. I love being able to run with someone.
I pointed out to her that at one point we were right above our cars, but had to run a couple miles to get back to them. The nice thing is that most of the second half of the course is downhill. If you can survive the first half, you should be good on the second half. There is one solid hill before the final big downhill.
I hope I can save something for that downhill into the Parkway. That is going to be awesome and super fast. I can't wait for that part of the race. It's a good way to finish with that and a long flat section at the end.
When we got back to the parking lot, Emily wanted to grab a quick drink. She said her ankle wasn't too bad, so we agreed to run a few more miles. I convinced her to run to mile 9.
We crossed the bridge by the LVRR Clubhouse and began running on the road on the other side of the creek. That doesn't go out too far. We ran out to the road and then looped back around to run through the Covered Bridge. It is kind of weird running over the boards there and I forgot about that and she made a comment.
We encountered a couple cars on this road back. There were some cars on the roads throughout the run, but overall it wasn't bad. We were just past mile 8 when we arrived back at our cars again.
We ran a short out and back on the main road to finish up. It was a nice 9 miler and a fun time. We even chatted for a bit after the run, before it got too cold standing around. It was fun all around afternoon.
I'm glad I previewed the course. I know not to push too much in the first half of the race on Sunday. Of course that is easier said than done, especially as people begin to take off. I need a strong second half of the race. I was hoping to break 40 minutes, but that might be very tough on this challenging of a course. I will at least PR unless something strange happens. I'm so much ahead of PR shape right now.
I had to run 3 more miles to get to 60 miles for the week. That meant another night run after a basketball game. I thought about driving into town for the 3 miler, but then I figured that is just wasn't worth it.
It was a very nice night out. I overdressed on purpose. I wore a fleece and jacket. I also went with a winter hat. I didn't want to waste any more of my running pants, so I put on sweatpants.
I decided that I would start with a loop around my neighborhood. I wore compression gear in between runs and I think that helped the legs recover. They still felt kind of funny in the beginning of this run.
This easy paced run was exactly what I needed. It was just under 9 minutes per mile and allowed for a good recovery. A dog chased me in the street in my neighborhood, but luckily didn't do anything and the owner called it back.
After this opening mile, I was going to simply run a few loops around the elementary school. When I got there, I saw a janitor had his car running. I didn't want him to call the cops if I was running on their property after dark, so I crossed the road into the other neighborhood.
I figured that if I ran the short loop, it would be about a mile and a half. I looked at my watch often as I cruised along. There wasn't much mileage to go and it ticked on by quickly.
Oddly, I saw a couple in dark clothes walking. At first, I thought maybe they were teenagers. I was surprised when they were just friendly older people. They weren't being very safe.
I actually ended up finishing the 3rd mile in this neighborhood. I never even made it back to the school while I was running. I walked a short distance to get back home. The legs felt great and I hope they are even better after wearing compression gear tomorrow and doing some foam rolling.
As I said, tomorrow is a recovery day. Sunday is the race. If I feel good and recover well enough from that, I want to run 15 or more miles for a long run on Monday. What I need to start doing is taking the day off after a long run. That's what I'm hoping to do on Tuesday. Maybe that will improve my recovery throughout the week. I guess I will find out next week.
Afternoon Run 9 miles - 1:10:29 (7:50 pace)
Night Run 3 miles - 26:38 (8:53 pace)
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