What am I thinking about this morning?

The showers have stopped outside, and the sun is starting to shine, all of which is good. I took a couple of days off from the blog as I was digesting some news we received, and I had to wrap my tiny pea brain around it. I don’t know if I have or not yet, but I am sure that I will at some point. 

Yesterday was also our quarterly trip over to Bryant Pond where we fill up 20 water bottles (4-gallon variety) from the spring over there and haul it home. Saves a bit of money, gets us out of the house for a while, but by the time we get back it has been three hours of driving and I am pretty well toast. Then I went and mowed the lawn for an hour and a half in the afternoon. So, I decided to take a “rest” day from running. I had run every day since July 24^th, and it was time for a “rest” day. I guess my rest days are different than a lot of runners – hee-hee.

I did lose out on a pair of Puma Deviate Nitro’s size 8.5 on eBay last night, I just wasn’t willing to go as high as the winner for the shoes. I like mine an awful lot, but at the same time, I must get the heel stuff calmed down a bit more, before I decide whether to get another pair. I am not a fan of their heel counter rubbing on my Achilles, otherwise I love the shoes.

Planned Stryd Challenge Description: 

Since I didn’t get to do a Track Tuesday, I will do a Track Wednesday today. 6 x 400 and 4 x 200 are the highlights of the plan and if I do anything more it will depend on how the left leg is doing. It is feeling better, but still too darn noticeable once I get over the 40–50-minute mark in a run.

Per Stryd: “400m are a staple in any track runner’s program. This workout targets your current 5k Power up to your current 3k Power. You will have equal distance recovery in between each repeat. It is important to start the first four to three repeats toward the lower range of your prescription to ensure you can finish the workout on target.”

Today’s Running Focus

• Run Fast

What I Did Today: 

• Course: Colby Track
• Location: Waterville

Warm-up – 10:00 minutes

Target Range	Duration	Distance	Power	Heart Rate	Pace	Cadence	Stride Length
166-190	10:04	1.09	209	136	9:14	166	1.03

Primary Workout – 6×400 w/400 recovery & 4×200 w/200 recovery

Target Range	Duration	Distance	Power	Heart Rate	Pace	Cadence	Stride Length
249-261	11:42	1.49	248	160	7:54	174	1.17
166-190	15:48	1.51	181	152	10:26	156	0.94
249-261	1:50	0.25	257	159	7:11	176	1.22
166-190	2:02	0.15	140	157	15:00	135	0.81

I shut it down after the second 200m. The heat/humidity got to me, I was starting to feel a little dizzy on the last 200 and that is a warning sign that it time to stop the workout. Especially, since this was a hard/fast workout and it had kicked my butt from about the second 400 on. 

In this kind of weather, I go more by effort than anything else and I slowed on just about all the 400s dramatically from the first one. 

Do I feel badly because I cut the workout short?

Nope, not at all. 

I know my body and how it reacts in these conditions. I am in this for the long haul and a few miles less on a workout is not the end of the world, especially when I came close to hitting my planned minimum Power average for the 400s (248 versus 249) and exceeded it for the two 200s that I finished (257 versus 249). So, the workout was still quality. If I had continued to push to get two more intervals in and then 15:00 more minutes of cooldown…well, it wasn’t worth taking the chance in those conditions.

Did the workout go as planned?

Almost. I finished the 6×400 intervals, although the quality of the last two were not where I wanted them, even though the effort levels were. I ended up only doing half of the 200s (2/4) and knew when I finished that it was time to quit.

Of course, as soon as I finished the sun went behind the clouds, which is something that could have made a big difference in the workout, if it had done so 5-10 minutes earlier. Just the way it works sometimes.

Injuries/Niggles: 

Weather: Few clouds, 74°F, Feels like 76°F, Humidity 92%, Wind 3mph from N. When I went by Fred’s Coffee on the way out it was 84*F and with zero shade up on Colby’s track I am pretty sure that the temps on that field were stoopid to begin with and got worse for me as I did my workout.

Shoes: Puma Deviate Nitro – Well, the thread theory didn’t fix the heel issues I am encountering. While today was more a little discomfort than anything else during the workout, it is not what I want to experience on a run. When I got home and examined my heels, I saw the blisters on my right heel…well just above the heel on my Achilles and on the left leg it was very irritated and red. 

Not what I wanted, to say the least.

Which is unfortunate because I love how I run in the Deviates. They have the right amount of cushion, pop, and snap that I am looking for in my running shoes. However, I am not really looking forward to having that level of irritation on my both of my Achilles just to run in them on a daily or even infrequent basis. I am sure if I run in them long enough, that my body will adapt to the, but that is not what I want or expect from running shoes in today’s world.

I am almost certain now that most of my issues with the heel area of the Deviates has something to do with darker rubberized strip that surrounds the ankle well of the shoes. So, I got to thinking and figured it was time to do a little surgery on the back of the Deviates. I cut on both sides of the heel tab to make it longer and more flexible, along with eliminating that harder rubber portion that was rubbing against my Achilles. If it isn’t there, the theory is that it can’t bother – at least that is what I hope.

Unfortunately, I won’t know for a few days if the shoe surgery works or not. I must let the blisters and irritation calm down a bit before I wear them again. I hope it does, because I like running in them more than I have any other shoe I have worn in quite a while.

What did I learn today?

That doing a hard workout in these conditions just isn’t a great idea. I don’t do well in high heat/humidity and as I get older, my ability to acclimate to weather extremes has gotten worse. 

I love how I run in the Puma Deviate Nitro’s, but with how much they irritate/blister my heel/Achilles area, the level of discomfort is not worth it. Hopefully, the shoe surgery I have performed will resolve the problems I am having and allow me to run comfortably in them.

That cutting a workout short in these conditions is smart and the correct thing to do. Even so, I was almost able to do the entire workout and still came close to hitting the minimum mark on my final averages.