BONK!

Today was not a good day. I did 17 miles this morning and it was a struggle. I just didn't have it from the get-go and the last 4 miles were just brutal. I guess it's safe to say now that I just don't handle humid weather all that great. For the most part I really like warm weather. If I had to choose between race day temps in the 80's or race day temps in the 30's, I would almost always choose the 80 degree temps (Except for maybe the marathon). However, this year it's just killing me. I've never been a follower of this dew point reading that I see referenced by so many runner's lately, so I have no idea what my breaking point is from a historical perspective, but I do know that today's 67 dew point was tough. The temps were in the low 70's which normally would seem almost cool at this point, but man that humidity. It just sucks the energy from you. Anyway, I finished the thing with an average pace right around 7:30, so while it certainly wasn't pretty, it is at least over.

This week almost seems like a relief. With no races, no vacation and no real commitments for the weekend, there is no juggling with the schedule or anything. I can do my three 27 mile pods and my long run on Friday, just like normal. Actually, I don't even know what normal is anymore. I just know that I'm running more than ever and I seem to be holding up pretty good under the stress.

I've been toying with the idea of trying to get up to around 120 miles for a 3 week stretch in August, just to see how my body would react to it. If I do it, it would have to be a three week experiment though. What I've found earlier this year is that anytime I significantly increase my mileage from one week to another, it takes me at least two weeks to adapt to the new stress. So I'm gonna guess that the first two weeks may not be too pretty, but the third week would be the true test. My main struggle with this is to try and figure if I would be better served trying to add some faster runs into the 100 mile week, or stay status quo with 2-3 faster runs a week but increase the mileage by 20%. I guess it's the old quality vs. quantity argument. I don't know what the answer is, but I know that mileage has been working for me so far.

My gut is to increase mileage in August and then begin cutting back a little in September but really increase the quality. So with plan A, I would do 120 miles in August, keeping 2-3 tempo type runs in there and then in September cut back down to 100 miles but try and do 4 marathon pace or faster workouts a week. With the Chicago Marathon on October 22nd this year, I have pretty much all of September to really train and then begin my taper somewhere in early October.

I think the increased mileage in August might make me feel stronger for the fast stuff that comes in September, but again, I just don't know. All this stuff is pretty new to me. Last year at this time, I was still running mileage in the 40's trying to force myself into actually doing a longrun.