Cool Week

Distance 44.2km [total: minimalist 264.6km: Barefoot 2208.6km] Week 6

Wednesday, 8-Feb, 11km.
Nice cool day for an afternoon run. I extended my road run another 500m or so past the caravan park at West Beach. The run went well but I noticed that my form was slipping in the last 2km, I didn't feel as fluid and lose as I was on the way out. I would say it is probably because it will have been the longest barefoot road run I have done since my injury back in mid September. Most of my longer runs have been on the sand so my feet weren't ready to handle the longer distance on the road. I didn't stop for the entire run and my feet were too sensitised by the end. I'm still putting too much pressure on the outer edge of my left foot, the area where I have developed the callus.

Friday, 10-Feb. 8km
The cold wintery weather is still with us, very unusual for it to hang around for this length of time. I did a beach run this evening, running into a gale force wind. It seemed to take me ages to get a comfortable pace, I was forced to take small strides as the force of the wind pushed me backwards. On the return journey with the wind at my back it was almost like running down hill, trying to stop taking too long a stride. I used to opportunity to try to boost my leg speed over 180 steps/min. The para sailors were out in force on the windswept beach getting some great speeds up in the rough water.

Saturday, 11-Feb. 18.5km
Another long run. I tried a different tactic on this run. Usually I set off from my parked car the run the long leg of the run, turn around and head back to the car then add the 4km bit on the end by passing my car and running to the next jetty and back. Only problem with this is that you can feel tired and then miss the last 4km as the car is close by. So I did the short loop first then ran the 7km north from the car so I had no choice but to run the distance back. Once again the weather was cold and blustery, I though at one point I was going to get a good soaking from the rain but it passed further north.
I was starting to get tired in the last few kilometres but I managed to keep one foot landing in front of the other. I was also trying to keep a steady 136 BPM heart rate which according to Dr Phil Maffatone is the optimum heart rate for my age and fitness level. It started to drop back to 132 towards the end as my pace slowed but on the whole it was fairly consistent.

Sunday, 12-Feb. 7.7km
A beautiful Sunday morning, 20C, blue sky in exchange for the dark rain clouds of last week. The lake was calm with only the rowing club boats out practicing in the early morning. I took it nice and easy this morning, a loop of the lower lake on smooth concrete for most of the way with brick making up the rest. I passed a few runners along the way, three serious looking triathlete types with matching gear, gotta look right. One guy who passed me commented that barefoot running looked too hard, I told him I was a professional, he wasn't convinced. I ran a time of around 45min keeping an average heart rate of 136bpm

Neil