Well, I am more than halfway to my goal race. I am definitely feeling stronger physically and mentally and feeling like I will be able to manage the distance (and in a time I will be happy with). This week went as planned, but the end of it marked the beginning of a challenging time in my training plan – 2 weeks of vacation! I definitely plan on running while I am away, but my training plan will take a backseat to family stuff – that’s what the vacation is about. To that end, rather than trying to maintain a structured plan, I came up with a “wish list” of runs I wanted to get done. I will work towards getting them in, but won’t be too concerned about missing some of them. Lower mileage for a couple of weeks at this point isn’t going to kill me, and it’s not often I get two weeks to spend with my family away from our day to day lives. The other aspect is the fact that while we are away I will have access to much better trail running than I do at home. For that reason, if I have the option of a 10km run with 1000 metres of climbing, I will take that over a 30km flat session that I would be doing at home. I can’t miss those opportunities!  All of this should set the context for Weeks 7, 8, and 9 – definitely less structure than I would have at home. That will return in Week 9!

I ran a quick 8km run on the road Monday evening. I was looking for a bit of recovery from long runs on the weekend, and to save the legs for my trail race on Wednesday. I felt good so kept a faster pace that was sustainable without blowing up my heart rate.

Tuesday was a rest day and then Wednesday night was Race #6 in the Aktiv Trail Running Series. See my race report for more detail, but I was generally happy with the race. The finish ended up being pretty close (I won by less than 30 seconds I think) but I managed to hold onto the win.

Thursday was another 8km road run and I pushed the pace a bit (so I could get home to finish packing to leave on Friday!). It was another good effort and I was happy with the pace I sustained.

Friday was a traveling day (from hell!). After a 10 hour delay we finally made it to Vancouver. It was a much later night than planned and there was definitely no running – I did walk Terminal 1 in Toronto numerous times so that at least put some km’s on! Saturday was more of the same as we entertained some jet lagged kids, ferried across to Vancouver Island and settled into our cottage for the week.

On Sunday I managed to get out and explore some nearby trails and get the cobwebs out of my legs. I did 10km on some awesome trails right outside our (rented) door.

Saw this giant slug on the trail near Parksville – big enough to slip on!

Awesome bike/pedestrian bridge on Sunday’s trail run

As I said at the beginning I don’t have a set plan for the next two weeks. For week 8 on the island I have a couple of big climbing routes I want to tackle if I end up with enough time. I plan to get out for some shorter nearby runs when I can. Tune in next week to see how I managed to balance my time!

Thanks for reading!