8 Weeks from Bataan - Thursday

Duration = 1:00:14
Distance = 3.41
Calories = 403
Max HR = 137
Avg HR = 127
Running Index = 41
Max Cadence = 98
Avg Cadence = 69

Thursday: mid-week, sorta-long session
Equipment: Boots, shorts, tech shirt, & backpack (26.5 lbs)

Warm-up: 5:00 @ 3.0 mph
Main: 50:00 with HR in 125-135 (Peak 4.0; finish 3.5)
Cool-down: 1:00 each 3.0, 2.5; 3:00 @ 2.0

Another good session. The first 35 minutes today covered the same distance as the first 35 minutes last Friday. The pack today is 5 pounds heavier and I still had 20 minutes to go before the cool-down. I even ran at 4.0 for a minute. I may cap my speed at 3.8 on the treadmill while wearing the pack for the rest of this cycle as I really don't expect to run any during the March.

One thing I'm having to curb is my desire to push the plan. I want to up the weight in the pack mostly, but sometimes I want to increase the length of the sessions. I designed a plan that I thought was as aggressive as I could realistically expect to complete without significant injury risk. Most of the increase in weekly volume is in the long run. After that is the two mid-week sorta-long runs. I have a step-back week where I increase the three short days from 40 to 45. This peaks with a long run of 4 hours, sorta longs of 90 minutes, and 45-minute short sessions, all at full pack weight of 50 pounds. This will have me short on miles, but otherwise as prepared as I can be. I figure what I would have gained with a longer cycle would be a bit more strength for the climb and a bit more speed overall.

Data:

Lap    Time    Lap Time  Max Avg Min Dist  min/mile  
A 1. 0:09:13.4 0:09:13.4 134 105  84 0.497  18:23  
A 2. 0:17:12.9 0:07:59.5 137 132 127 0.503  15:54  
A 3. 0:25:29.3 0:08:16.4 135 133 128 0.502  16:28  
A 4. 0:34:07.3 0:08:38.0 136 132 126 0.502  17:12  
A 5. 0:42:50.3 0:08:43.0 135 132 124 0.503  17:19  
A 6. 0:51:31.8 0:08:41.5 136 132 128 0.502  17:19  
1.   1:00:13.9 1:00:13.9 137 127  84 3.409  17:34