Week 23: Slow week with a great finale

Slow week. Monday off, then on Tuesday CrossFit, followed by a steady run, which went terribly. I assumed it was because I was tired (from CrossFit), plus there was a really strong wind (hardly unusual on this route but this time it seemed particularly annoying).

On Wednesday just an easy run and then another CrossFit training on Thursday. I wanted to also go running on that day but I felt very tired and moreover I started developing a cold. I was wondering if perhaps my bad performance on Tuesday was not caused by the first symptoms of the cold. In any case I only had three days to get better, so no exercising until Sunday, because on Sunday I had the Big Basin 50K race to run!

If you read the report from Big Basin then you know that I did well and am super happy with my performance. That means that I deserved to take things easy in the upcoming San Francisco marathon next Sunday and I plan to do just that.

What else. As you can see I managed to extend my weekly summaries with a small map of my weekly runs. I have very concrete plans of improving that even further but it'll take me a while to get there.

Also: I just signed up for the 100-miler! I was long hesitating between Rio Del Lago (advantage: close-by) and The Chimera (advantage: true 100 mile loop, instead of 50-miles back and forth) and in the end settled for the latter. The time of both races is far from perfect and to be honest I'm not sure I'll be able to run them but I'd rather be registered and not run because I cannot, than to want to run but miss registration. So that brings me one step closer to my big, big dream.

As part of preparations I wanted to run a 100km race before but cannot find any feasible one (location and time-wise). So it's very likely that instead I'll run a 50-mile San Francisco Endurance Run, with Coastal Trail Runs. The course is a 25-mile loop and one that for the most part I already did (Coyote Ridge 50K), but it will have to do.

Also I just realized that running-wise I am keeping myself very busy this year. I did four 50K races (Steep Ravine, Montara Mountain, Horseshoe Lake and Big Basin) and two marathons (Los Angeles marathon and the upcoming San Francisco marathon). That makes an average of more than one marathon per month ;). I once thought that a membership in the 100 Marathon Club is an awesome but unachievable feat; but at this rate I could do it in less than a decade ;).

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