WEEKLY SUMMARY (January 6-12): 50 miles (88% E, 6% M, and 6% 5k paces)
  Sunday: 2 E, 5k race in 17:58 (see below), 1.9 E
  Monday: 6 miles at 7:25/mi.
  Tuesday: off
  Wednesday: 7 miles at 7:20/mi.
  Thursday: 8 miles at 7:17/mi.
  Friday: 6 miles at 7:22/mi.
  Saturday: 16 miles at 7:18/mi.

The two main runs of this week were on the weekends, between which I spent the rest of the week recovering from a back issue. I've had an old man's lower back since I was a teenager, in part because my torso is bizarrely long (and perhaps in part because, when I was a teenager, I used to lift weights with bad form). When I was in Florida a few weeks ago, my mom paid for me to get a massage as a birthday present, and the first thing the masseuse said when she saw me lying on the table was "wow, you have a long back!" My lower back hurt during and after my 15-miler last Friday, and it may simply not have recovered before my 5k race on Sunday. It didn't hurt during the race, but it did start hurting the next day and got worse through the middle of the week. So I was content to run easy until that cleared up, having just run a good race in any case. I decided to push the track workout back to next week and to do the long run first whenever I was ready, which turned out to be on Saturday. It was another disappointing long run, though not as bad as the previous one. My plan was to run 10 miles around 7:20 pace (easy) and then to run 6 more at 6:45-50 (marathon pace). It was warmer than usual (50 degrees) and sunny, I ran at mid-day, and the drinking fountains I normally use are turned off for the winter except for one that I found about 6 miles from where I live. I averaged 7:19 over the first 10 miles and felt pretty good, stopping briefly at the drinking fountain twice but taking no gels. Then I felt strong running at marathon pace for two miles but was thrown off by a steep hill that I stupidly chose to run up, after which I managed only one more downhill mile at marathon pace (averaging 6:46 for those 3 miles). At that point, there's a short staircase on the course I normally run. I had to sit on the stairs and rest for several minutes (with my watch stopped) before jogging in the remaining 3 miles, which brought my average pace back up to my easy range. It may be that I simply reached the distance by which I need to drink more and eat a gel if I want to do any marathon pace running, since I did fall apart pretty quickly. My back was fine, though, and I didn't have the creeping fatigue (as opposed to a relatively sudden onset) that afflicted my purely easy paced run last time. I'm slowly getting stronger at bigger distances, but time is short to get strong enough for a marathon in two months. My plan for next week is to do a track workout, probably the 400m repetitions that I put off from this week, and some 1-mile tempo intervals. My next long run will probably be a purely easy paced 18-miler early the following week. The week after that, on January 27, I'm registered for a half-marathon on the towpath. I probably won't race that but, depending on weather, may run it at marathon pace with the option of speeding up a little later on if I feel good. Then, as we get into February, I'll decide whether a good enough marathon in mid-March is in the cards and what kind of long distance-oriented training to do in the remaining time. I'm still leaning toward doing the marathon, in spite (or partly because?) of my recent disappointing long runs. In other news, we're in a mini-heat-wave right now: it was in the 50's today (and felt Spring-like), and tomorrow is forecasted to approach 70! This is not right for January in the mid-Atlantic. But temperatures should quickly return to normal (highs in the low 40's) after that and then may dip a little below normal (bring it on!). My semester begins next week and, because of my schedule, I'll probably do at least most of my runs very early in the morning when temperatures are near their daily lows (around freezing on average, but often in the high 20's). For my trouble, I hope to be rewarded at least sometime this winter with some snow, not to mention the usual grit that comes with running through a (real?) winter.