Summer catch up Boston build prep

 Back at it with some running posts. Starting to prep for my Boston build up due to the BQ I got from queens. 

A little context where I'm coming from at this point. After queens I played ball through March once a week while running 30-50 MPW. Really struggled over the winter due to not eating enough if I were to guess. I was trying to avoid living off junk food at the new year but I can't seem to find a way to sustain high calories on healthy foods. Problem for another time I guess, I went back to stuffing my face and it seemed to fix a lot of my issues. 

    After indoor ball I was a bit better throughout the summer, still played ball once a week every other week or so and lifted Mon / Wed / Fri and really never got locked in all summer but still felt like I was in Okay shape. Couldn't decide on a fast 5K so I ended up shooting for Lone Gull 10K again and ran 33:4X off pretty bad training. I was happy with the results all things considered and had a group of 5 friends running. Defended my title at the local 4.6 Miler I did last year but unfortunately had no competition. One kid went out fast and died on the steep hill about 1.5 Miles in. Lesson learned for the young fella. 

    I followed this up with two 5K wins that I did for fun. One with my old man and another with a work buddy. 5:16 pace and 5:17 pace for each. First 5K was flat and hot as hell for October standards (75 and sunny) and I had no competition after the first 1/4ths mile. The second 5K was about 35 degrees and very hilly. Typical New England November Weather. I actually had 2 highschoolers go out with me the first two miles but the hills wore them out. I actually felt horrible on the second 5K and both were during 70 mile weeks so I was very pleased. That's my PR pace but both "5K"s were not actual 5Ks. First was short and the second was long. Still happy to win.

Summer Vacation Favorite Training Spot

    That brings me to now which is about 7 strong weeks of base building and doing some fun workouts with a young guy training to be a navy seal. He hit me up to see if I could guide him on some workouts etc...and it happened to be right as I was building up for Boston prep before I do any legit workouts. Seemed like a really fun way to get some track work in with no specific goal and make sure I don't burn out to early. Essentially took my 10K plan and pulled the speed stuff adjusted volume for him and let it rip. He's been killing it and set a new 1.5M PR (5:53 pace) after a few weeks of dialing in the runs. He was pretty fit before just lacked the structure and volume of a real running program that I helped out with. 

    Last 4 weeks of Strava activity has me at 73 MPW and that includes a few of those weeks with basketball, 3X lifting and racing mixed in there. I haven't felt this strong since my last Lone Gull block and really excited to see where a strong Boston build could take me. Looking at 2:40 but trying to be more realistic as I get closer to the race versus forcing it and hoping for the best.

    Real Boston Training starts in about a month so I'm hoping to get up to 75/80 in the meantime and then start adding some quality mixed in while maintaining lifting 3X a week. I also helped coach a few friends of mine with running and lifting and found I really enjoyed it. Feel free to leave a comment with any questions if you need help with training.