sunday, a day of exercise

wake up heart rate was 47. not good or bad- but while usually a sign to keep an eye out i knew i had a long workout planned and headed out the door to get started. ran south down to the oxford rugby stadium through north hinksey village. gardens really in bloom now. already 64 degrees and warming up fast and not many people out this early on a sunday morning. we must not be partying late enough. passed some horses in the south pasture and a few rabbits running back and forth across the trail. toyed with the idea to run a hill workout, but passed on it quickly enough. not without a bottle of water and i hadn't brought one with.

legs felt better than i thought they would though and i reminded myself that i really have to plan some time off to recover. not today though as i headed back along the trail behind the "fishes" restaurant and ran along the creek bed. stopped for a minute and stretched on the bridge over the small waterfalls in what felt like the middle of nowhere. completely surrounded by over grown park land here and the only noise was the waterfall and some birds chirping. funny that i was about a mile from our house.

headed back over towards osney road and turned into the park field there. at this point i had about 3 miles in and i did a series of paced 100's on the makeshift track. ran 6 sets of 5 cut downs, meaning each 100 would be faster than the one before it for 5 in a row. the key is not to run the first one too fast of course, but the minimum pace was 8:00. this is a good workout to work on pace and stride. i wanted to work the right leg today. it is getting to be more useful, but for now it would have to be used in spurts rather than just use it all of the time. the days i try to use it more it gives out later in the run and then the next few days after it is useless.

but today it was ok for the short striders. i could tell it was tightening up after the third set and i kept an eye on it to be sure. i also knew that when i used it i ran 2 seconds faster every time. that would be 32 seconds in a mile and 3 minutes in a 10k. it is worth the effort to try and re-teach it to run. with some extra therapy when i get home it should only get a little better. that's the hope.

the last set was the hardest, but i managed it ok. nice to know i had no more to do. didn't bother with the "relaxed" striders i like to do at the end. had run hard enough and it was over 70 degrees now. i wasn't as tired as i was thirsty. but forced myself to do a warm down. the lst few years i just hadn't done this as well as i should as i just wasn't in strong enough shape to force my mind into doing it. but if anything the 57 miles a week for the last almost 9 months has changed that.

the sets of 100's would be just under 4 miles of running as i was jogging the 00's back for recovery. so sixty 100's in total. so i headed back down the bike path and back down to the rugby stadium. a nice quiet little village when there were no cars around and it was still pretty early for them. the dog walkers were up and a few other runners and an occasional bike rider was also on the path. almost a year now and still don't see a pattern to what side of the path people run or ride on. i still do the usa version so i make everyone pass me on the left. the bikes hardly ever give warnings of passing here and i don't have to worry about them this way. don't even mind being the stupid american as long as they don't hit me.

headed home now. a good workout over with three miles of warm down. almost a 70 mile week and enough. a fast shower and breakfast and off to the driving range for a quick bucket of balls. gail was working on her book and i had enough time for something there. am working on the swing i want and i am getting there. it may not be much but i will "own" it as they say. and hit ok mostly and worked up to the five iron today. the longer irons didn't go as well, but rather than go crazy about that i could see the progress and knew they would come around. two good five irons went about 170 and i would live with that. met some guys from des moines, iowa and boston today. was fun talking to them and the iowa guy-steve- told me to play "honey creek" when i was near des moines. have to love golfers. he was trying to teach his girlfriend how to hit golf balls and she was doing ok for a first timer.

the pro came by and gave me some free balls to hit which i shared with a kid of about 12 who had run out of balls. i had run out of time and he really wanted to hit some more and was trying to sneak out on the range an pick some up. not usually a good idea and was way too crowded for that today. nice last ball as i hit a gap wedge to the 107 green and it landed on the green and then bounced into the flag. good ending.

and back to the tent house. gail wrapped up her paperwork and we headed out and over to the university park, going up the oxford canal and through the village of jericho. the park was packed. really warm now and there was a lot going on and the park was really pretty. i just love the gardens here and everything was in bloom. we did a big and short loop and headed back through town around several colleges, and walked all the way home. wouldn't have minded taking a bus at this point but we never saw one and none passed us while we walked. another 6-7 miles of exercise. enough for one day.

wrapping up another week. off to cambridge for a couple of days this week. should be good. happy mother's day to all of the mom's out there.