Week 3: Review

The weather this week was pretty nasty, with ambient temperatures staying down in the -20C range. While there wasn't a lot of snow until last night, the road salt used around here becomes ineffective below -16C so the roads and sidewalks were in pretty bad condition. Fortunately, the wind wasn't too bad on most of the days so the windchill only got down to about -25C - cold, but not as bad as some of the days in December. With that said, I skipped a few of my scheduled walks on account of the cold as it's more difficult to stay warm at lower intensity levels.

Things did warm up significantly last night, however along with the increased temperatures came a huge load of snow. While the forecasts were only calling for about 10-15cm, we got a little over a foot of snow up here. Mix in drifting and material plowed off of the roads (and onto the sidewalks), and significant portions of my trails had much more. This naturally made my 13 mile long run quite difficult this morning, as pretty much all of my route was pretty slushy and I had to charge through 3' of snow for a 4km stretch (couldn't safely switch to the road due to the 80km/h speed limit in that section).

As such, I forgot about trying to maintain a set pace and simply ran by heart rate. Naturally, this meant that I was going slower than usual. My overall pace was a pretty sluggish 5:46/km, and I only averaged a 6:49/km pace through that 4km section. Either way, my average heart rate was about 155bpm (67.5% HRR) which put me in about the right area for this type of run. Given that I usually average about a 4:50-5:00/km pace at this intensity, however, that gives you an idea of the conditions of the roads ;)


Regardless of the weather, I managed to get in all of my runs including an extra session on Wednesday as I wanted to get in a run with the group. While I had intended to do a 4mi recovery run, the showing wasn't quite as good as usual so we joined another group doing hill repeats (7x400m@7%). Fortunately, the higher intensity didn't seem to hurt and it was likely good preparation for the Around the Bay race anyway ;)

With respect to the cycling sessions, I had to shorten a couple of them (Mon 50->30km, Wed 30->20km) due to time constraints, however it's likely a good thing as it allowed me to ease back into the mileage on that front. I'll have to focus on getting these miles in as much as possible, as with the weather getting more and more hostile the utility of this training will likely become more significant (especially if I have to miss some running sessions).

Weekly Totals:
Running: 65km (40mi)
Walking: 12km (7mi)
Cycling: 100km (62mi)
Total: 177km (110mi)

Year to Date:
Running: 197.6km (122.8mi)
Walking: 70.0km (43.5mi)
Cycling: 275.0km (170.9mi)
Total: 542.6km (337.2mi)

The weather for the upcoming week is likely to be much warmer, however we're likely going to get a good deal more snow. Fortunately, it should be spread out enough that the city can keep things reasonably clean (assuming the forecasts are correct this time). Either way, not much that can be done other than simply deal with what mother nature throws at us ;)

Aside from that, this week is also going to be breaking new ground as it calls for a 14 mile LSD run on Sunday. Up until this week the longest distance that I've run has been a half-marathon (21.1km/13.1mi), so this signals the beginning of escalating my mileage once again. I've made a good deal of progress over the last few months getting myself prepared for sustained high mileage, however it is good to be exploring new territory once again ;)

Upcoming Week:
Mon 50K Cycle
Tue 8mi (12.9K) w/4mi (6.4K) @ 15K pace
Wed 30K Cycle + 4mi (6.4K) Recovery
Thurs 10mi (16.1K) Steady
Fri 50K Cycle
Sat 4mi (6.4K) Recovery
Sun 14mi (22.5K) LSD