July 14th-July 20th: 76.5 miles total. Long run, 17 miles, 6:44 pace, progression, closed 6:06.
July 21st-July 27th: 82 miles total. Workouts Tuesday and Thursday. Long run Sunday, Lake Placid, easy with pick-up mid-run.
July 28th-August 3rd: 91 miles total. Workouts Tuesday and Thursday. Long run Saturday, 20 miles (6:44 average pace).
August 4th-August 10th: 81 miles total. Workout Wednesday. Bridge of Flowers 10k Saturday. Long run 16 miles easy on Sunday.
Overall I am tired. At first I felt great, now I think it's finally catching up and I have been napping when I can.
Saturday, August 9th
Bridge of Flowers 10k
Shelburne Falls, MA
Well the hill lived up to it's name! I woke up around 4:45 Saturday morning and met several of my teammates at 5:15 to carpool to the race. The drive was a little less than 2 hours and we arrived in plenty of time. Packet pickup was easy, as was getting the start. The sun had already made its way out that morning and was intense. I warmed up as normal and got to the start. The first mile was a gradual uphill with a little downhill as well. I went through the first mile in 5:55. The second mile started downhill, then started to climb a bit. The just before the mile 2 mark came the hill. It was huge! I knew this was going to be the case. The positive side of this climb was that it was mostly shaded. My pace dropped significantly, but it wasn't worth trying to kill myself on this hill, I wasn't going to be making up that much time. I was happy I ran the whole thing, although I heard power walking up this was more effective, so I may try that another time :). Around 2.7 the hill was over and it took another quarter of a mile to get my legs back. I thought I would make up more time on mile 4 going downhill, but I didn't. Mile 5 was tough and seemed to get warm. There's one last hill around 5.5 and then you head downhill to the finish. The crowd was fantastic, especially around the bridge near the finish. I finished in 38:49, which was a little slower than I had anticipated, but still finished first by over a minute. My splits from my watch were as follows; 5:55, 5:55, 8:15, 5:40, 6:05, 5:45. Below is a link that has the course elevation.
After the race and cool down were awards. The post-race food was pretty good and the awards were great. I didn't even know anything about the awards/prize money going into this race, so it was a nice surprise :) Our open team finished second and our master's/master's+ both won! We went for ice cream afterwards at a local shop, which was fantastic. Overall, it was a great day with great people.
