Average - Above or Below?

What my week was like?

As I have said before on this blog, I plan to be running the 52 km event as part of the 1^st ever Bangalore Ultra Marathon.

I have been training as regularly as possible for the same event. This week was supposed to be my landmark week as I had planned to hit 70+ km as part of my cumulative mileage for the week. However some irregular sleep combined with stomach cramps due to the lack of a toilet break before I started the race, washed away my plans for the week. So what started out as a 20 mile race for me, ended up being a 15.5 mile with me walking the last mile so as to not disturb my fragile stomach. The frustrating part of the entire race was that I had reached the starting lineup 6 mins late, run 3 miles at 7 minutes a mile pace, each and caught up with the leading group and abandoned on the 3^rd of 4 planned laps. And I was feeling only marginally tired even on the 3^rd lap with my legs staying as fresh as one can be after 10 miles+.

Still, I ran about 44 (43.91 to be precise!) miles this week. This is the highest I have run in a week in recent times although I have run 70 km in a week before. This is also the first time in over a year when I have run on five consecutive days. From the beginning of the training plan I am using, I have run on four or five days a week, with rest days on Mon and Fri. However the arrival of a dear friend from the US pushed me to more running in the week and the holiday on Thu also helped.

This week I ran 5, 10, 5, 8 and 15.5 (and some decimals) miles from Wed to Sun.

So the net takeaway is that in addition to wearing good shoes during the race, make sure you take a toilet break before you leave for a long distance race. It also helps to wake up in time!

In other news, my dad had been unwell for the past two days creating some anxiety about whether to hospitalize him or not. We finally had a doctor at home, let him rest and he is better now. That also ensured that I took two holidays from work, trying to sort things out at home. It has been a crowded week.

It has been some time since I posted anything on the blog, mostly due to my doing mundane stuff at work, not getting any reading done and running taking away most of my time.

Also saw Loins of Punjab, which is a must watch for Bollywood buffs and offbeat enough to skip a lot of regular Bollywood. Go see this really colorful movie for an entertaining evening.

But then, everything passes.

In two weeks, I shall attempt to break the 45 miles a week barrier when my club runs along the banks of the Cauvery on Nov 18^th.