238 miles on the month with about 20k of gain.
Struggled a bit to build the volume the first couple weeks after getting back from Costa Rica, but the volume feels easy enough now. 50-plus miles every week in 2023, and no injuries or niggles, knock on wood. Only a few doubles this month.
Track coaching duties are in full force for me right now. I’m running five days a week with the kids. I’m mostly running with our two sub-16:30 guys and our 17-flat guy. This time of year I can usually keep up. It's the Vo2 max type work when I get dropped and we're not doing anything like that just yet.
Mostly standard base stuff. Easy days, long days up to 13 miles, hills, and lots and lots of tempos. Some light injections of speed. I can tell that the lead kids are developing fitness to a degree where I am going to start getting dropped soon enough even on their moderate days. Such is the life of a high school coach.
Our 800 kids’ training will deviate from the 1600-3200s shortly. So that complicates my ability to mix my training with theirs. From Feb-May, there’s a lot more holding of the watch and less running alongside them. I'll probably only be able to do 50 mpw if I can sneak in more doubles.
We had a 1:58 kid last year, and I strained a hamstring trying to run a 27-second 200 alongside him. This year, we’ll see if I can avoid being so stupid.
We’ve got one girl this year that is going to run D-I next year. So this might be the first year where one of the girls I coach starts kicking my butt. Fun stuff.
Today it was 38 degrees at practice. Downright balmy compared to what we’ve been dealing with.
Looking forward to spring.
