Training - 09/24/12 - 09/30/12

12.19 miles on this final taper week.  Are my miles TOO low coming into the Bear Chase 50 on Sunday?  Feeling good and feeling pretty strong though.  Confidence is high.

Monday, September 24 - 5.56 Miles, 10:33 pace, 150 HR. 164.8 lbs.  Super easy effort (though it didn't feel super easy) at the Boneyard today.  Spent the whole run chatting with Chris about all things running, and mostly about the fueling/hydration mystery.  Fueling and hydration while training vs. racing, and, to fuel/hydrate a lot, a little, or somewhere in between?  That old chestnut...  Also noticed something with my MT1010's today, post-run.  After 140 miles in them, and being only a little over 5 weeks old, the uppers are showing signs of wear. It's not severe, but we'll see how they look after this weekend's race at which point I'll have almost 200 miles and 6 weeks in them.

MT1010's - 3 wear points - same on the other shoe.

The two upper highlighted spots seem to be 'pucker points' on the shoe.  You know, a place where the fabric bends and flexes a lot.  The seemingly stronger, honeycomb-like, material seems to be intact still though, and might be helping to reinforce and hold things together.  Another thing I've noticed is that now that my feet and toes have made their impression in the liner/in-sole, the ridge that has formed along my toes, has started to irritate the very ends of my toes.  The ridge is in both shoes, but irritates the right foot only.  Any long runs and I'll have to be taping the ends of my toes or their could be problems.  The Bear Chase 50 has 12 water crossings in total and so we'll see how things go with that.  The water will definitely throw a new variable in there.  I almost wish now that I had tested the MT1010's without socks for a period of time, but, based on my sockless MT110 experience (not good), I decided against it.  Testing them out wet would have been ideal too.

Tuesday, September 25 - .  0 Miles - Rest day. 161.2 lbs.

Wednesday, September 26 - 4.05 Miles, 9:03 pace, 158 HR. 160.8 lbs.  An out and back on the High Line Canal.  Faster pace for the first 3 miles and then and easy last mile.  Feeling good.  I ate a Clif bar before the run just to test the stomach a bit.  No issues.

Thursday, September 27 – 0 Miles - Rest day. 158.8 lbs.

Friday, September 28 - 2.58 Miles, 11:04 pace, 159 HR. 158.8 lbs.  Very easy, slow, taper run.  Running this pace seems like harder work and I'm feeling lazy today.  HR is high for such an easy run.

Saturday, September 29 - 0 miles - Rest day. 159.0 lbs.  

Sunday, September 30 - 159.0 lbs. Bear Chase 50 Mile Trail Race Today!  Here is the race report...

Nutrition - Stayed true to being gluten and dairy free.  Ate mostly carbs and easily digestible foods starting Friday to try and minimize GI issues on Sunday.  That's something I'm going to experiment with more in the future - eating more protein and healthy fats instead of just mostly carbs.