Training Log Entry 35

January 29 - February 11, 2024

Since I was moving to Vancouver at the end of January, I didn’t have time to write a log for that week. Therefore, I decided to combine the previous two weeks into this single entry.

Monday January 29

Off

Tuesday January 30

After taking four days off due to pain in my left foot, I was relieved to complete this run without any major issues.

A large amount of snow had accumulated on the trails over the previous few days, which made many sections difficult to run through and resulted in a much slower pace than usual. However, this was welcomed given the uncertainty of my foot’s condition. Fortunately, I experienced minimal discomfort in my foot, and my legs felt fresh from the extended break, allowing for a smooth and relaxed run.

In total, the run covered 10.2km."

Wednesday January 31

I traveled to Vancouver this day, so I didn’t have time for a run.

Thursday February 1

For my first run out west, I opted for a familiar route from my SFU days, a loop around Burnaby Lake.

After a day of travel, my body felt understandably stiff, and this run served as more of a shakeout than anything else. My stride being somewhat clunky, and taking the pace a little too hot, led to some breathing issues on this run. I took a couple of brief breaks early on and, luckily, managed to find a comfortable rhythm by the midpoint. The second half went by smoothly, finishing off the 9.6km run.

Following the run, I added on 5x100m strides, all of which also felt clunky. This brought the day’s total to 10.1km.

Friday February 2

This day’s run covered the same route as the previous day, but was a significant improvement in every way.

My legs still had some lingering tightness, but my stride was noticeably smoother and more efficient, allowing me to settle into a comfortable rhythm with ease. While my average pace remained slightly faster than usual, both my legs and breathing felt surprisingly comfortable at the pace.

Following the run, I again tacked on 5x100m strides, which felt significantly stronger than the previous day’s.

The 10.5km run and strides combined for total volume of 11km.

Saturday February 3

Considering the lack of workouts this week, my legs still felt completely fresh for this Saturday recovery run.

The run felt similar to the previous day, with both my legs and breathing remaining strong and relaxed. Although the pace was a bit quicker than ideal, I didn’t feel like I was over exerting myself, and I completed the run 6.1km run feeling good.

Sunday February 4

The plan for this long run was to do my first proper mountain run up and around Burnaby Mountain. With my inconsistent training recently due to my foot injury, I set a modest target of 15km for the day.

Starting the run, I felt fresh during the flat opening few kilometers. As the ascent began, I was pleasantly surprised with the amount of spring that my legs had. Despite the rugged trail with numerous roots and rocks, I found the majority of it to be runnable. A few steeper sections with 20-25% grades required me to power hike, but I did well at conserving my energy over the course of the ascent.

Upon reaching the top around the 10km mark, I enjoyed a brief flat section before heading downhill along a more buffed out trail. The descent was similarly steep, as I let legs go and bombed the downhill which lasted about 3km.

Near the bottom of the mountain, I got slightly lost and ended up adding around 2.5km to my planned route. Despite the extra volume, my legs still felt relatively good, allowing me to finish the long run strong.

In total, the run covered 17.7km with 510m of elevation gain and brought the weekly mileage to 55.2km with 637m of elevation gain.

Monday February 5

Off

Tuesday February 6

Despite still having sore legs from Sunday’s long run, this day’s run ended up being really solid.

Although my hips were quite tight at the start, I quickly fell into a comfortable pace, and my hips gradually loosened up as the run went on. My breathing also had no issues, which significantly helped with maintaining a relaxed effort level.

In total, the run covered 10.1km.

Wednesday February 7

For my first workout out west, I planned to do 5x2’ hills, 5x45" hills.

My legs were quite heavy from the start of the session, which made the 2-minute hills quite challenging. The hill was steeper than I had anticipated, but regardless of that, I didn’t feel like I was moving quickly and was exhausted after each rep. Surprisingly, however, was that my splits were faster than I had expected when I looked back at them.

Due to time constraints, I converted the 45-second hills into flat reps. My legs started to loosen up during these intervals, and they felt much stronger. I kept the recovery time short to around 1 minute, which I had no problem maintaining.

The total volume, including the warm-up and cool-down, was 12.7km with 270m of elevation gain.

Thursday February 8

I was still quite quite from the previous day’s hill workout, so I took this run nice and easy. Overall, it felt comfortable, but I could tell that pushing myself harder would have been a challenge.

I noticed some tightness in my left calf, but it didn’t cause any discomfort while I was running. However, it’s something I’ll need to keep an eye on to prevent it from becoming a bigger issue.

The run covered a total distance of 9.7km.

Friday February 9

I was feeling quite drained from my new work schedule, so I decided to take this day off to rest.

Saturday February 10

After the extra rest day, I felt completely recharged heading into this run. Since I was feeling really great, I accidentally picked up the pace a bit too much for an easy day, but I still felt controlled and relatively relaxed.

I decided to do my strides at the turnaround point instead of where I started, as the terrain there was more suitable. All of the 4x100m strides felt quick, despite the being a bit uneven.

I finished up the second half of the run feeling strong, to end with a total volume of 7.3km.

Sunday February 11

This week, I again did my long run up and around Burnaby Mountain, with the goal of reaching 1000m of elevation gain for the week. The route included the same initial climb as the previous week, with an additional long ascent near the end.

Compared to the previous week, this run proved to be far more challenging. My legs tired early on in the first climb, leading me to take multiple breaks and eventually power hiking a larger portion of the ascent. Even on the flat sections, my legs weren’t recovering well, making it a challenging to finish the climb.

Upon reaching the top, I diverged from the previous week’s route and descended along a different trail. Unfortunately, this path turned out to be a long series of slippery stairs, which had to descend very cautiously. While I did manage to recover somewhat during this section, I’m not fond of staircases and may avoid this particular trail in the future.

Following the descent, I had a final climb of approximately 150m over a kilometer. By this point, my legs were utterly exhausted, so I resorted to power hiking for the majority of the ascent. Despite the steep grade, I pushed through and eventually reached the top, leaving only downhill and flat sections until the finish.

I completed the remaining kilometers surprisingly strong and concluded the long run at 20.3km with 700m of elevation gain. This resulted in a weekly mileage of 60.1km and a new personal best total vertical gain of 1084m, surpassing my previous best by over 200m.