Week 2: Welcome to the Twilight Zone

 What a difference a week makes.  I capped last week with 36 miles feeling great, ready for the nice weather, track was starting up and I had a race coming up Saturday in Duluth to test out some speed...things would get a bit interesting...the weirdness of it all resembled that of the hours and days post 9/11.  It’s just the vibe you know....so boom here we go driving up to my cousins place in Esko MN.  We had 3 hours and 30 minutes to listen and read all about things getting shut down.  New vocabulary would enter our minds “social distance” being a big one.  I checked my email repeatedly through the night and then it happened....race cancelled.  Unfortunate??? Sure did we panic? No!  Did we respect it enough to make sure we did our best to stay clean and healthy?  Yes and no.

While we were not able to enjoy the race, we did take a night on the town in Duluth but things were quiet yet active at the same time. We did some axe throwing, went to a supper club, a tap room, and a high end drink lounge.  People were very respectful all doing the responsible thing we should have been doing already, but here we are.  

Love the Grandmas organization for trying to hang on to all hope to the last minute but things happen.  Training would not go to waste and still found a way to get in 40 miles.  Here’s how I did it.

Monday was the first day of track and after a long run Sunday at a solid marathon goal pace I went easy with the Hatchet track squad on a warmup and cooldown.  Tuesday was a bit of a push with 10x500m around Ralph Rd.  100m jog rest and pacing around 10k to 1/2 marathon pace.  Felt amazing!  Wednesday and Thursday were easy distance runs.  Friday off.
Saturday with the race cancelled I found a loop around Esko and noticed the track had some clear lanes which was crazy but they blew the snow off all winter and lanes 5-8 were open and fast so I did a 10 minute 100m on/off run.  Sunday after we got home I got out for one more long run of about 10 miles and it still felt good.  Weather was colder this week but manageable.

Lifting was up to 4x10 on legs and arms and my dips and pull-ups were bumped up to 4x11.  Core was 250 crunch variations and 100 reps on the bands.

The virus wins if you let it.  Be healthy, be safe, be mindful and get outside and just get away from all the crap on the news.

Races are getting cancelled but that doesn’t stop you from training or just playing outside!