workin' for the weekend

Took today off from work. Got my speed workout in this morning, solo. Overslept by almost 2 hours this morning. Must have been tired, didn't even wake up when the storms blew through this morning. This afternoon I went for a bike ride out in the country. Great day for a ride. Temperature was about 88 degrees and it was sunny.

I've decided Highway 266 is just to narrow and not enough of a shoulder for the bike. I'm only on that section of the road for less than a mile, but I'm just not comfortable with an 18 wheeler 6 inches from my elbow.

Don't know if the driver who wouldn't pass me on the little country road was worse. He followed behind me up a hill and back down the other side and around a couple of turns, before he decided to pass me. No other cars where coming the other way. I was only going 25 mph down the hill and around the corners, on the white line with no shoulder. He had plenty of room to pass. Pain in the ass, I was afraid my tire would catch the edge of the road and I'd be off the side of the road. Thanks buddy.

Cold beer sure tastes good after a hot ride.

penny for your thoughts

Found a penny on the run the other day that had about a third of it broken off. It was one of the newer pennies minted after 1982 when the composition changed to mostly zinc. From the US Mint website.

In 1962, the cent's tin content, which was quite small, was removed. That made the metal composition of the cent 95 percent copper and 5 percent zinc.
The alloy remained 95 percent copper and 5 percent zinc until 1982, when the composition was changed to 97.5 percent zinc and 2.5 percent copper (copper-plated zinc). Cents of both compositions appeared in that year.

It made me wonder with the inflated prices of metal, especially copper: is a penny worth more than a penny? Yes, for pennies minted before 1982. Does that mean the government will start melting the older pennies? Or perhaps that's cost prohibitive.

Busy weekend. Took the boys fishing in the Stones River on Saturday and Sunday. Darrell was the only one to catch anything. They had fun though, we waded the river instead of sitting on the bank. I think the cooler water actually helped my legs recover from my long run on Sunday.

Saturday morning we did a training run on the RC Cola Moon Pie course in Bell Buckle. Pretty cool morning, around 60 degrees to start. Probably be closer to 70 degrees come race day. Very quiet morning, I saw more wildlife on my long run Sunday, than out in Bell Buckle.

Bell Buckle training run

Met a group to run the RC Cola Moon Pie course in Bell Buckle this morning. Nice cool morning, about 60 degrees to start at 7 am.

another rainy day

How about those abs?

Sure like to have abs like that when I'm 56 years old.

Looks like another rainy day. May set a record for the wettest month in 10 years or something. Even got rained on yesterday morning on the bike. Hate riding the bike in the rain. Radar showed the one little rain shower had moved out. Go figure.

Off schedule on speed workouts this week. Last night was the first speed workout of the week. EB and I did 16 x one minute at 3k pace with one minute recovery. Great workout. It was definitely hot and humid. Friday morning is the next scheduled speed workout, 40 minutes at adjusted tempo pace. I'll have to do that one alone. The guys did their tempo workout this morning.

Pet peeves. Nails and other sharp objects on the road. This mornings run was littered with sh*t on the road. First, right in our subdivision where they had just re roofed a house, a pile of staples. Then on the roadway, I picked up 2 handfuls of 16 penny nails from about the same spot on either side of the road. Jeez. I've gotten my fair share of flats on my bike from that crap.

I'll miss the gravel

Looks like the first new section of greenway from Old Fort Park towards Barfield Crescent Park is about to be paved. I started running on it around August of 2008. They've started to put the fill dirt on the sides of the sections which have already been paved or concreted. They are pouring some new concrete sections just before the I-24 overpass. This section is probably the lowest section of the new trail. It had been completely washed away by all of the winter rains.

No new progress that I could see on the section under Hwy 99/New Salem Hwy towards Barfield Crescent. This portion to just behind the World Outreach Church is still just a dirt path. Hopefully this section will start to be developed and turned to gravel once they've paved the other section. The new trailhead on the other side of the Stones River appears to be just about finished. The parking lot has been paved. No grass seed or sod has been laid, but everything else appears to be finished. Link to plans.

Found plans for another trail this morning. It's part of an existing horse trail from the Walter Hill dam. I tried running this trail last summer and got lost. I ended up using my Garmin to find my way back on the roads. I'll need to go out this winter and try it again. I did see alot of horses out last week, so perhaps its' runnable now. It was pretty overgrown or I wasn't actually on the trail.

Making plans for the next race after Moon Pie. Think I'll try for a fast 10k at the Chikin Run 10k. I haven't run a decent 10k, there just aren't that many around the Middle Tn area. Look forward to having one in Murfreesboro. Nice to have some local races in Murfreesboro, without having to travel to Nashville. The course is pretty flat, should be fast. Big plus that the loop around the Battlefield is where we've been doing tempo runs for the last couple of years.

99 days

Longest running streak ever, I'm on day 99.(only running streak) This morning was tough getting out of bed at 3:30 am to meet the guys for a run a 4:30 am. Seems like everyone has a different goal for the summer, so lots of different training programs. Though I think at least 3 or 4 of us will be racing at Moon Pie.

Still doing speed work to get ready for Moon Pie. Last night was 2 x 3 miles at tempo pace with EB. (that's what made it so tough to get out of bed after 5 hours of sleep) Pretty hot and humid for the first repeat and then rain for the next repeat. Times came in about where we wanted them. We started each repeat a touch slow and then sped up with each mile.

It's been almost 3 weeks since the marathon and my endurance seems to have disappeared. The tempo pace is coming easy enough. Tried to do a 13 mile long run in the hills on sunday but the last 3 miles were tough with the heat. Probably should have taken some water.

Still following the Giro on Velonews. Lance is getting stronger and Levi has slid back in the general classification. Next 5 days will be grueling mountain stages. Sure wish it was on TV. I'll have to watch some of the highlights on Universal Sports. Looks like even Lance is doing the compression socks for recovery.