Sunday, August 26, 2012

Last week of Winter

Distance 52.2km [total: minimalist 285.6km: Barefoot 3482.2km] Week34

Monday, 20-Aug. 11km

Sore calves today. The speed work yesterday on the road and beach must have stretched my calves. Today, even though I was on an easy run day there was no way I could have run fast my calves would have cramped up.
A reasonably warm winter day with a strong northerly breeze. It did get chilly towards the end of the run but I managed to beat the sunset! I soaked my calves in the cold seawater for 5 minutes after the run, that felt cold. Hopefully my next run will be a bit better.

Wednesday, 22-Aug. 11km

Put in another 11km just on the verge of a cold wet changed heading in. During the day, while I was at work the weather was beautiful, a few clouds and 20C, that is when I should have been going for a run. As the time approached 4pm dark clouds were covering the sky, looking at the weather radar a rain bad was moving in, it was around 20km off the shore. I raced home in a bit to beat it. I got changed and headed to the beach as the rain started, as I parked, the wind and rain buffeted the car. I sat there for 10 minutes, relaxing before calling it a day and admitting defeat. Then the rain stopped and the wind dropped. The squall had passed. I went for my run on the wet slightly slippery concrete, there was still warmth in the ground. The calves were feeling much better tonight and I was back to running at my regular speed. I ran along the high tide line for the last couple of kilometres on the way back.

Saturday, 25-Aug. 22km

A cool windy day form my run, it started bright so I put sunscreen on my face but it clouded over about halfway through my run. The first third of the run was into a decent headwind which slowed me down, a few beers I had yesterday also didn't help, I'm not much of a drinker these days and my tolerance is well down. At Semaphore it was off the beach and onto the bitumen path. I chased down a runner in front who must have felt insulted to be passed by a barefoot runner so accelerated to pass me and stay in front. I turned his relaxed run into a race :-)
Now running back I had a tailwind and made up some time that I'd lost in the other direction. I felt much stronger in the last few kilometres of my run today, even when I was, once more running into a chilly headwind. I keep scouring the weather forecasts to see when we can expect some more days in the low 20's, we have only had 1 so far then its back to the low to mid teens. The winter seems to go on forever, its been very long this year.

Sunday, 26-Aug. 8.2km

Ah, a calm day, no blasting wind or rain, some weak sun shining through interlaced clouds. It was a great run today, the legs felt light and bouncy, I could have run faster but it was meant to be a relaxed run. I did a bit of trigger point roller massage before the run and I'm wondering if that helped with the relaxed feeling in the calves the running. I put in a good effort over the last section recording 5m 53.4s, not the fastest I've done that part but not too bad. I did a gym session after the run, lots of shoulder work, not heavy but lots of repetitions.

Neil

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