Let's Go!

So I ended up not racing this weekend. My calf was sore after Thursday's strides and the trainers told me I had a micro-tear on it, which led to some bruising and soreness. We decided that since it was only mid-January, there was really no point to test the thing and make me miss more than I needed to. So instead we decided to just go for easy runs and get in some elliptical running on the weekend. I'll be heading back up to Penn State in two weeks to get after an 800 again. Being at a meet all day is a boring thing when you're not running, and I definitely found some reasons to get moving and racing again (Penn State had a runner go 2:19 in the 1k, he'll hopefully be in the 800 in a couple of weeks as well).

This week we'll do things a little differently in that I'll go over my training for the week first (since I thankfully didn't miss that much by not racing) and then I'll explain what "Let's Go!" actually means since I have used it a few times on this site. The week was a good one of training even though I had to take a few lighter days. Tuesday we did some 5k type work. This is the kind of stuff that makes me cringe. It's in between the tempo pace and the fast pace, so it hurts like a B. We did 4x (400, 800, 400) and each set had the pace of the 400 move down starting at 69 and moving down to 65. This is the kind of stuff where not one interval gets you, but they all start adding up and you definitely question if you'll be able to finish it up. Thankfully for us, we hit the times pretty perfectly and would only go a little too quick on the 400s.

Then on Thursday we did the old double workout trick. This isn't the most fun trick in the book, but it is one that I had seen before. I had to wake up and go run a 20 minute tempo on the treadmill in the morning. Then, we came back to the track in the afternoon and did 8x150 meters at a pretty quick pace. Neither of these workouts really gets you, but then when you're sitting at home that night you realize that you are pretty tired indeed. I like the two workout days though, they make you feel blue collar. Then, we had to take a few easy days to let the calf heal, and its definitely feeling better. In total I hit 65 miles for the week with some cross training mixed in there as well. And after the meet i'm feeling ready to go. Which reminds me: "Let's Go!"

My Uncle sent out an email wondering where "Let's Go" came from. Its origins I do not know, but I do know that my cousins Joe and Dan got me hooked on it. I have a small theory that everything in life that I think is cool comes from basketball (much more on that in future posts), and "Let's Go" came from exactly that. I originally started saying it when my cousin Joe and I were about to street race in downtown Boston after USA Indoors last year and he kept on talking trash to me saying, "let's go." The word quickly became a staple in my lexicon. After winning an early season 1500 at ASU (see video page) I was quite excited and kept on shouting "Let's Go!" to my teammates. One of them said to me, "Dude, the race is over, there's nowhere to go anymore." Fair enough.

However, This is a thank you to my cousins for letting me take some of their basketball coolness and bring it to the short shorts and tight tights world of nerdy track and field. And as always: Let's Go!