What am I thinking about this morning?

Today is the Falmouth Road Race, while I have never run the race, I have run the course several times. I lived in Falmouth, while stationed at Air Station Cape Cod and even worked part-time at the local McDonalds back in the day. Then later I lived on Otis ANGB and commuted to Boston, until I retired. So, while I had multiple opportunities to run Falmouth, but never did. Which is something that I now regret, but like so many other things I can’t change. Perhaps one of these years after COVID has wound down it will be one of those races that I finally do. Yes, I will watch some of the live stream this morning. 

It seems that lately, I have been going down memory lane more and more. I guess that is what happens as we get older, we look back at our lives more. Thinking about all the things we have done and the stuff we should have done. Sometimes it is too late to do them and while for others there is still time, but the opportunities are becoming fewer or less realistic with each passing year.

I have a feeling that I will be focusing a little more on the things that I want to do moving forward.

The cooler weather has come back, and I am looking forward to this morning’s run. I do want to figure out the Deviate’s and how I can get the heel counter to work for me when I am not running in them. The skin on the outside of my heel/Achilles area is a bit sensitive this morning from where they rubbed after the run was over on my cooldown. I have a feeling that I might have to get them soaked and then wear them dry, since they have more of a fabric heel cup. I have a few ideas on what I can do, so we will see. Yes, I like them enough that I am willing to put some time into getting them right for me.

Today’s Planned Stryd Challenge Description: 

20:00-minute easy run. I will probably do 30 to 40 minutes instead, depending on how I feel once I get going.

Per Stryd: “Easy runs are an important part of balancing training intensity and recovery. Your target for this run is 65-75% of your Stryd Auto-Calculated Critical Power. You are encouraged to start out at the lower end of your prescribed range and progress to near the top of your prescribed range by the end of the run. While going above your prescribed range might feel easy in the moment, it is important to remember the purpose of an easy run is to promote recovery without adding additional fatigue.”

Today’s Running Focus

• Enjoy the run.

What I Did Today: 

• Course: HC-Troy Trail-Philbrick-Upper Gate
• Location: Sidney

Primary Workout – 20:00 minutes — Easy

Target Range	Duration	Distance	Power	Heart Rate	Pace	Cadence	Stride Length
154-178	30:00	3.37	222	143	8:54	169	1.04

Unplanned 

Target Range	Duration	Distance	Power	Heart Rate	Pace	Cadence	Stride Length
None	10:17	1.20	225	151	8:34	170	1.09

Well, I shot that easy run plan all to hell. Before the run, I was looking at my Stryd Power Duration Curve and noticed that a few need to be updated fairly soon. As I was walking down the driveway, in weather we haven’t had for a while, I figured it wouldn’t hurt to go do a lap around Howard Circle to warm-up and then push a little harder down to Blake to see if I could update a couple of areas. The weather is about as nice as it get in the summer, the legs are feeling about as good as they have in a while and I am learning more about how the Puma’s perform each run.

So, why not?

I did the warm-up and started picking it up at SD2’s mailbox. I sort of pushed, but I didn’t do anything crazy or close to max effort (yes, I know that these are supposed to be max efforts), but I am still not willing to push at full-out quite yet. I ran what I would call comfortably hard with another couple of gears left I had wanted or needed to push harder.

I did shut it down on the little bump and ran easy down to Troy Trail. Coming back is always uphill and a little bit of a push to get home. No issues going up the hills and I didn’t push the pace either. I wanted to get in the 40:00-minutes, so I went to the top of Philbrick and then ran back down to the upper gate. I may have picked it up a little again on the way back down Philbrick, but nothing beyond comfortably hard.

Did the workout go as planned?

Not really, I had a couple of sections that I ran comfortably hard, but the rest of the run, was closer to what I was looking for in an easy run. It was the first time in a while that I have run at a sub-9:00 minute pace for over 4.0 miles. That part was nice to see when I finished. I felt good during the run, and it is amazing how much lower humidity makes a difference when you are running. 

Injuries/Niggles: When I was putting on my socks to run, I noticed that I had blisters on my right Achilles from yesterday’s cool-down walk. I had felt some irritation but didn’t realize that it had blossomed into blisters. Oh well, that is the way it goes sometimes. However, I do like the Deviates enough to keep working through this issue to see what the solution will be. Otherwise, nothing other than the usual aches and complaints.

Weather: Clear sky, 70°F, Feels like 69°F, Humidity 66%, Wind 8mph from N

Shoes: Puma Deviate Nitro – During the run this morning they felt fine. I had put some white athletic tape over both Achilles and that was fine until I started sweating and the tape stopped sticking. Even then, the shoes didn’t bother me much during the run, it was again more when I was walking during my cool-down. Weird – right. When I got home, I started looking closely at the design of the heel cup.

As you can see there is a seam sewn across the top of the heel counter, when I rubbed my thumb up and down that seam, I could feel a ridge. It was slight, but it was there, and it might be just enough to cause the irritation/blister issues. So, I took out my trusty Leatherman and took the thread out of that area. Which now feels much smoother, although that darker orange taped area around the outside of the ankle well and heel area does feel as though it might be another part of the problem in the heel. I decided to do one thing at time and got rid of the horizontal thread on the upper heel cup to see if that resolves the issue. If it doesn’t, I will look closer at that tape to see if it is a problem area.

Yeah, I think the Deviates are worth the extra time to get the heel cup comfortable for me. They feel like a special shoe underfoot and once I get this figured out…well if I can get it figured out, they will be a running shoe that I want to keep running in.

This is what we usually had to do back in the day to get a good fit on many of the running shoes back then. A little shoe surgery and minor modifications were necessary for a proper fit to my feet. It wasn’t like today where you could simply grab a pair of running shoes and typically take them out for a 10 plus mile first run, without having some major problems before the run was over. I don’t miss those days, but at the same time if I like a pair of running shoes a lot, I am less likely to give up on them for minor things like this. A few small blisters are worth chancing, for what I believe will be a very nice running shoe for me. IF I can get the heel section to work for me.

Although I did pick up a pretty good-sized rock in the cut-out to show-off the carbon plate. Nothing serious and I didn’t even notice it until I took the shoes off to look at the heel counter.

What did I learn today?

That I do want to run Falmouth someday. It is one of those bucket list races that I have thought about for a few years now. Yes, I watched the live stream, but it was not that great a quality, the view of the port-a-potty was great though. The only live video coverage was of the finish line, which was a shame, because I know how beautiful that course actually is and there is more to covering a race than a stationary camera at the finish line.

Sometimes running shoes do funny things. Running in the Deviate Nitro’s doesn’t seem to bother my heels too much, but walking in them does the blister routine, especially on my right heel. While I think I may have pinpointed a couple of reasons why the shoes do this, I will have to experiment and only do one change at a time to see if there is an improvement or not. In other words, be patient and not make wholesale changes to the shoes, because I do love the way that I run in them. Now to just get the heel section under control and I will be very happy.

With the cooler weather this morning, I ran better. This is how it is every summer and I like most runners live in the moment and can’t believe how much we slowdown in the heat and humidity when it becomes oppressive. Then we get back to normal when the temps become more bearable. Although it was nice to have a day when my paces were a bit faster than they have been this year.

No, I didn’t run easy for the entire workout this morning, but I felt good, the weather was nice and while I didn’t update any of the sections on the Power Duration Curve, I had fun pushing myself a little harder than I have been lately. Nothing stoopid, but enough to show myself that I am making progress in my fitness.