This week's stats:
- 74 miles
- 12M MLR
- 12M with 10x800m @ 238-235 with 2:00 rest
- 18M with 5KM @ 600-555
- 2 doubles
- 1 lift day
- 1 day off
This week the BURN guys were recovering from an ultra, so JOB and I were left to do some 800m repeats solo at the track. Fortunately, school still hasn't started which means that we're able to still use the Whisman Sports Complex track, which is nicer than both my high school and college facilities.
After warmup, we met up with Rachel, who recently relocated from Boston and was also coached by Terry, and started our workouts. Since Rachel was doing 400m repeats, we were able to run together on every 3rd repeat for one lap. It was great! However, I felt like complete doo doo. While the goal was to go from 2:40 --> 2:30, we hovered around 2:37/2:38 and squeaked out a 2:35 on the 10th interval. Considering how killer my workouts had been going up to this point, surely something had to be off. Since the sky looked a little hazy, we wondered if the air quality was bad from the fires. When I got home, I immediately checked the AQI, and was disappointed to read a number so low as 35. So, that didn't explain it.
After slogging through some more runs the rest of the week, my legs still hadn't recovered by Friday's long run with Yu and Jay. We kept it easy for about 10 miles, and then eventually dropped down to 600's for a little 5KM tempo. I felt like absolutely death, which was odd because the 800m repeats weren't anything out of the ordinary for me. After this, I began to wonder if my ferritin was low or if I was about the cross the line into overtraining syndrome territory. Those two issues would definitely explain why there was a sudden drop-off in my performance, not just on workouts, but also on easy runs. In response to my body's reaction, I decided to take Saturday off since we left early to check out a venue in Big Sur. Instead of going for a run in the evening, Peter and I drove to Paso Robles for dinner and a date at the brewery. The next day, I did an easy six miles along the California coastline. My body didn't feel like it had just enjoyed a day off; rather, it felt like I had done another 18 miler. Something definitely wasn't right....