David Taylor Gonzales

10/12

It’s Sunday! Unfortunately the kids are still sick so we decided to stay home from church. We got a great night of sleep last night so I feel really good as I continue to recover from yesterday’s long run. A buddy from high school is driving through Springfield today with his wife so he’s going to stop by for some coffee later this morning around 11. I am excited to see him.

I watched football for most of the afternoon. Lane and I took the kids for a walk around the neighborhood after the noon games (cowboys lost) which was the perfect low impact cardio to keep my body active without adding fatigue to the legs. I noticed a little soreness in my right ankle but nothing too alarming. I plan to run 3-4 miles easy tomorrow so it’s important I continue to keep things easy and get good sleep tonight.

10/13

John had some trouble staying asleep last night. He leaked through his diaper around 2 AM so I didn’t wake up with my alarm. Despite the night time interruptions, I actually got decent sleep so I’m going to take advantage of that and try to complete this workout tonight after the kids go to sleep.

Lane texted me asking if she wanted her or I to workout before dinner. I said she should do it before dinner so she can have a break from the kids and I’d workout after bedtime. I always miss them when I’m at work and I know her job can be exhausting (Joy is going through a toddler meltdown phase right now). I got home and finished up making dinner and hung out with them while she did her strength training. I haven’t done any weight training in two weeks so I decided I’m going to do a hybrid workout tonight. 2 mile shakeout, then 20 minutes in the gym.

My legs felt incredibly heavy during the run. I experienced no pain but wow, that was a strange feeling. I don’t think I’ve had “heavy” legs like that in awhile. I ran 2 miles at 9:55/mi pace. Here’s the workout I did after:
Barbell Skullcrushers x 5 sets
Pull-ups x 3 sets
Trap-bar Deadlift x 2 sets
Candlesticks (core workout) x 3 sets
Dumbbell Hammer Curl x 2 sets

Even though it was two workouts, this was pretty low volume for me and didn’t mess up my recovery. I plan to do my threshold run tomorrow morning around 6 (assuming I can get good sleep). I’m drinking magnesium on the couch while watching The Office with Lane.

10/14

Well, last night was another night of poor sleep. John is having tummy trouble. Lane is taking an antibiotic and we think that it’s causing him an upset stomach since he’s breastfeeding. We’re bummed. I slept through my 6 AM alarm and decided to do my speed workout tonight. I am fully recovered from the weekend and last night so I think I’ve set things up to have a good run this evening. Here’s the structure:
1.25 mile zone 2 warm up
5 x 800m @ 5K pace (6:15/mi pace if I’m feeling fast, 7:45/mi if I’m feeling sluggish)
1 min recovery in between
Unstructured cool down (10ish minutes)

This should be approximately 5 miles, no more than 6 miles maximum. My training readiness is 100 according to Garmin so we’ll see how I perform today.

Okay, I’ll be honest that was one of the best workouts of my life. I feel really good. My goal was to run a negative split across all 5 half mile intervals and we were able to accomplish that this evening.
Interval 1: 7:27/mi pace
Interval 2: 7:04/mi pace
Interval 3: 6:51/mi pace
Interval 4: 6:41/mi pace
Interval 5: 6:20/mi pace

My heart rate peaked at 174 BPM so we got plenty of aerobic work in without overloading my body with fatigue. I could’ve done a few more intervals if this were a typical training week but in my taper, my goal is to feel like I had a little more to give after each run. I don’t need to waste myself after every workout. That’s what peak week was for.

Lane made walnut pasta and homemade sourdough so refueling after the run was easy tonight. Most of my runs have taken place either before everyone wakes up or after everyone’s gone to sleep the last few weeks so it was nice to actually get a run in with the afternoon sunshine (even though it took 40 minutes away from time with the kids).

I was able to do part of bedtime routine for both kids though so that was a nice ending to the day. Joy really enjoys singing and we started singing worship songs as part of her routine after we read books together. She likes when I sing You Are Holy by Michael W. Smith and We Delight by Caedmon’s Call (shoutout to 90s worship music).

10/15

I woke up at 6 AM feeling really good so I think we’re back to our regular scheduled programming. Today is a marathon dress rehearsal. 5 miles at marathon pace. No warm up, no cool down, no fuss. I brought a gel with me to test my gut and wore my full kit. The run felt pretty good and the pace is really easy for me to settle into. I can listen to my body and my legs pretty well when I’m in this pace range. I took my Honey Stinger gel at the 35 minute mark to see how my stomach handled the last 10 minutes of running. Unsurprisingly it gave me a little bit of juice for the last mile and little to no discomfort. I’m feeling confident in using those for race day. Total stats for this one: 5.07 miles, 8:53/mi average pace, average heart rate of 133 BPM.

I have been doing all of my easy run/long run race prep in Brooks Ghost and Brooks Ghost Max shoes up to this point. I’ve used Brooks Hyperion Max 2 for my speed training. I don’t feel like a carbon plate is necessary for my marathon goal but I do want something that’s a bit more aggressive and after watching literally dozens of shoe review videos, I’ve landed on the Brooks Hyperion Max 3. From what I’ve seen, it’s a good race shoe for “bigger” runners (men who weigh more than 155 pounds) and it has a plastic plate and a rocker profile that’ll give me some extra pop. It’s still a comfortable shoe from what I’ve seen. I’ll do an easy mile or two in them on Friday and then 13-15 miles with them on Saturday as some final race prep.

10/16

I woke up a bit later than usual which my body thanked me for. I’m continuing to absorb all the training I’ve done up to this point and shedding fatigue from the last few big weeks. I wasn’t planning on training at all today but my shoes shipped a day earlier than I anticipated. I will do a 1 mile trial in them tonight after the kids go down to see how that goes.

I ran 1.3 miles at easy pace with 2 strides to see how they performed. First impressions: they’re fast. I purposely didn’t look at my watch during the first quarter mile. I felt like I was running around 10:10/mi. I looked down after 2 1/2 minutes and I saw that my pace was closer to 9:30/mi. This is definitely a race/speed shoe. I like the feel but I had some minor toe aching in my left foot and I’m not sure if that’s shoe related. I’ll monitor that during the long run Saturday.

10/17

This morning I woke up for a short run Friday morning. It wasn’t a workout, just an easy aerobic shakeout to keep the legs fresh for tomorrow. Sometimes, these runs are the best because I end up having no fatigue but I feel really alert and ready for action when I head to work. The other great thing, since this is my first taper week, I don’t have to check the mileage box like I so often had to throughout August and September. Total stats: 3.56 miles, 9:38/mi pace. I ran in my Ghost Max’s for this one, I want to keep my race shoes as fresh as possible.

We had friends over for desert and drinks after the kids went to bed. I had some apple cider, strawberries with cream, and muffins. It was a really wonderful evening with some friends from church. They didn’t leave until 10 PM and it may rain tomorrow morning so I’m not sure if I’m going to run in the morning or push it a day. I’m gonna try to get as good of sleep as possible and evaluate in the morning.

10/18

When I woke up, I wasn’t motivated. I told myself I’d get up and treat my routine as if I was running. I allowed myself the out if I needed it. I took a look at the radar and saw that the storm wasn’t going to start until around 8 AM. It was 6 when I looked at the weather app. “Either get out there now or it’s gotta wait until tomorrow,” I told myself. I decided to get out there. Ironically, the weather was perfect. It sprinkled on me for about five minutes but after that, it was clear skies and I got to watch the sunrise as I so often have throughout the late summer and early fall. It was a purple haze today, not as foggy as last week so thankfully I wasn’t running blind on the sidewalks for long. Because of the sketchy weather, I stuck close to home and ran my usual neighborhood 10k route twice instead of running to the Greenway.

I felt good today. I don’t think I would’ve had the motivation or the juice to complete a longer run but since I was able to get this one done in under two hours, I was able to keep my cadence up and my mind in a healthy place.

I almost forgot to discuss the shoes. As I said after my short run a couple days ago, these are fast shoes and that continued to be the case on this run. I ran my first four miles easy which is usually a 10:10-10:30/mi pace. With these shoes, my easy pace was 9:35/mi or so. At one point I tried to intentionally run slower than that but it felt unnatural. My heart rate confirmed that I was running the right pace. My heart rate hovered around 125 BPM during that four mile warm up. After that, I picked up the pace to see how the shoes felt and ran 7 miles at 8:38/mi. They’re definitely not as plush as the Ghost Max’s which I knew going in but they’re still pretty comfortable. I had no toe pain this time around. I will monitor how the legs feel throughout the day. I’m going to watch college football and do a family walk so there shouldn’t be a ton of activity or anything stressful to throw off my recovery. I am off tomorrow, maybe I’ll do a strength training session if I feel really good tomorrow morning.