Road Racing and Training Thread - Week Ending 2/21

The Internet summons me, and, like Beetlejuice, I appear! I don't have time for a full update right now, so I'll just give the Coles Notes version:

- I'm running about 120k a week right now. It's been a winter of lower volume for me, as is my custom (I live in Edmonton, the nothernmost city in North America with more than one million people), but I'm still up on my past two winters of about 75k per week.

- My longterm goal remains breaking 2:30 in the marathon. I'm not sure I can realistically take a run at this in 2015, but I intend to at least get under 2:35 this year.

- I am definitely ready for winter to end by now. We've had tons of freezing rain and other fun traction conditions. If you've got good bare ground to run on, I am jealous.

- I've found a pretty good track group to run with. Most of the guys are 1500/5k/10k guys just out of university, so doing track workouts with them is pretty humbling, but when we do tempo or LT or hill workouts I hold my own in the lead group very credibly. We workout Tuesday and Thursday.

- Running with this group entails running under the guidance of a coach. He's a former 2:20 marathoner, which is great, and he's also really dedicated to his group. On the other hand, he's got like 30 or 40 people to keep track of, so I sometimes get the impression he doesn't care about my goals like I care about my goals.

- I can't post a full week's log right now, and probably won't have time until April, but I'll mention that my next race is the Vancouver half marathon on May 4. My coach tells me I'll need to run a 1:12 or 1:11 to make our team's "A" squad for a big relay race that happens in June. I'm not sure I can to actually run the race, but it seems like a good goal nonetheless.

- I read through this thread intermittently, and I'm awed by the talent and inspired by the dedication on display each time.

Matthias - it looks like you're really getting back in good shape! Nice!

Forcerunner - great week in hard conditions. We had some rough days over here but in the US it seems like the winter overall is really tough this year. Keep it up - spring will come soon (I hope :D).

Oedipus Rexing - seems like your over the health issues. Fine :)

Xenonscreams - get healthy soon!!

KriKeK - I'm a bit curious how your training will develop. In summer I'd like to hop into a 1500 and a 3 or 5k just for fun and try some similar time in the 1500... :) I find it pretty fun to see how an MD runner runs sub 3:50 and how a marathoner tries to run a fast mile/1500 :)

back into it - I said it: Props for gutting it out. You showed serious guts - I like that! Recover well, we might see in Berlin in fall... ;)

Slartzio - respect for the hard stationary bike ride. I'd be bored to death with 35' straight. When I do stuff like that I usually break it in intervals. Yeah. I'm a little sissy :D

Kendo - congrats for SMASHING your PR!

pewow - with that kind of speed you'll keep improving in the mile for sure... 29 - 32'' for 200 is no walk in the park.

Niceguy - nice that your healthy again :)

NOP200 -forget about the 3k. Stuff like that happens to everyone once in a while.

Hereford - your tempo and LR look really good for now... great job.

tortoise - that half is a GREAT base for an assault on 2:55 in April. Really.

Working harder - that sucks... Get healthy soon!!

Distance Fan - I hope you get rid of the PF soon...

Odysseus - some serious stuff. Looks good!

RunnersFix - recover well :)

lest - haha, I had a good laugh bc of the cyclist story :D

Bonham - I know you trained super well with Pfitz... You'll get to 2:30 I believe :)