Red River

 This week had me dreaming about the upcoming Ice Age 50 miler.  Not only in real time dream action, but also when laying awake and pondering.  In the dream, I was telling myself to get out to the transmission tower right of way and start running the downhill portions over and over.  It is Florida, so the hills are gentle declines, but the dream version of me was adding two of these sessions a week to prepare the quads for Ice Age.  

 Now this is not a bad idea.  I put the idea to some thought as I lay awake at 1:30am.  Eventually it works out that I can't start adding workouts without compromising the present course.  Beside, there really is no plan to freewheel downhill like in years past.  Just straight bombing down the hills.  In the day we practiced this at Lapham which had some big long descents.  It is quite possible to crush your quads at Ice Age.  I should be okay.  Who does damage at 12 minute miles.

 So the dreams did not end there.  I pulled the logbook out from 2018 when I finished 20 seconds behind Robert in 8:28:21.  I chased him for about 12 miles.  That is 10:10 pace.   When you look at logs you look for similarities to present times.  Sometimes you are honest with yourself and other times one sorta sandbags.  I don't like to sandbag too much and there are other issues we all deal with.  How could I go from just getting a finish to laying out a plan in my head to shoot for 9:30 weather permitting?

 Well, here are the optimistic views.

- I don't know a lot about much, but I'm pretty fair in knowing about what I could run a marathon in.  I'm pretty certain 4:00 flat is obtainable.   2 x 4:00 = 8:00 + 1:30 = 9:30.

- 2018 average road pace for general runs was around 9:30-9:40.  I averaged 10:10 at Ice Age.  Today the plan is a bit different, but on general long runs like today the average was 10:32 for 17.2 and 10:18 for 23.2 last Saturday.  So roughly 8:30 + 1:00 = 9:30.

- As I lean more towards mainly running now, work on driving down my cruising speed (I do little trail running to achieve this), lower my weight, and run in warmer weather, I ask myself this question.   If you went out conservative like on a regular training run and walk most of the inclines, what pace is top end weather permitting?  My gut feeling was 11:30.  11: 30 x 50 = 575 = 9:35 finish.

 These are all big ideas.  It is difficult to train diligently, see progress and not ponder what the limits are.  Most everyone reading this is just like me.  Like Jim McMahon for the Bears.  Jim could not just slide, or tip toe out of bounds.  He threw his body around always seeing if he could get past another guy.  Eventually you get your head handed to you.  Maybe I will as well, but I wanted some of you out there to know.  You might turn around and I'll be there.

 Pack a lunch.