Consistency

The lack thereof in my training has been my achilles' heel for oh, about my entire running life.  Looking back on logs from college, I notice my weekly mileage progressions followed a dreadfully predictable pattern:

• 50, 60, 55, 65, 60, 75, 0.  
• 55, 60, 55, 60, 55, 60, 65, 0.
• 40, 40, 40, 40, 40, 60, 0.
• 65, 70, 65, 75, 80, 75, 100, 0.

Whenever I tried to mix high mileage with high intensity, it was just a matter of time until something broke and I would shut down.

Since I began running seriously again in 2007, I feel like I've become somewhat more consistent in my mileage, albeit at a much lower and less intense level.  In the first 18 weeks of 2011 - week 18 was Collegiate Peaks and weeks 19-20 were planned weeks off - I was able to log between 45 to 70 miles in all but one of them.  The following 13 weeks, which were spent ramping up for Pikes, saw me below 45 only once as well.  That's 30 out of 32 weeks in the 45+ range.  While 45 mile weeks are hardly the recipe for success at the highest level, putting in that base level of mileage has definitely paid dividends for me over the past year.  It came to me a little later in life, but the lesson here is that consistency is key.

I essentially have 30 weeks until Pb.  Assuming an easy week after Old Goats and another one after Lake City, that's 28 weeks in which to put in the time.  The miles will be a byproduct of many other factors, but I hope to look back and see results that look like this:

• 40+ miles - 28 weeks
• 50+ miles - 28 weeks
• 60+ miles - 20 weeks
• 70+ miles - 10 weeks
• 80+ miles - 5 weeks

I hope to live in the ~60 mpw range throughout much of the spring.  It seems to be a level I can sustain without burning out, breaking, or dropping the ball at any of my other personal endeavors - you know, pesky little chores like family and career.  If I can sustain that volume through May, stepping into the 70's for the summer should be doable.

Easy, slow 17 around the west side of town yesterday.  55 for the week.  I put in two 6:30's on Gold Camp Rd mid-week, and picked my 16th mile yesterday up to a 6:55; otherwise it was just a lot of slow distance.  I'll start adding in more marathon-plus pace work into my routine this month.

A lot of talk regarding the right "way" to view a big race.  Some folks obsess over it for months; others walk into it loosey-goosey.  Not sure if the results point to any one method being more effective than another.  I've got to think a lot of it depends on a person's natural disposition.  I've always been one who benefits from careful, deliberate planning as I'm naturally inclined to spacecase.  Dwelling on Pb for the next eight months will likely leave me in much better shape come August than convincing myself it's simply another race.