I’m back! What an amazing summer!  I spent the last 8 weeks in Peru leading two incredible sessions of STRIVE-Peru. It was a great time, with lots of meaningful service work, getting to know tons of awesome people, and getting in some great running up in the Andes. I couldn’t have asked for a better summer, so I mostly just want to say THANKS to everyone who helped make it such a rewarding experience.

But now, I’m back in oxygen-rich (but sweltering!) Arlington, VA where I’m beginning my Fall build-up. I know I’ve been pretty much MIA for the last two months, but I’m going to get back to regular weekly postings here and daily postings on Running2win.com under the username “STRIVE” and I’m also trying to get an account set up on STRAVA (after many suggestions).

For those wondering what my plans are for the Fall/Winter – you’ll have to stay tuned for just a little longer! My coach, manager, sponsor, and I are all talking about various plans and we should have a public announcement in the next few weeks. The one thing I do know is that I’ll be at the US Olympic Trials Marathon on February 13th in Los Angeles.

Finally, don’t forget to follow me on Instagram and Twitter @TylerCAndrews. And, of course, don’t forget to check out STRIVE’s home page, where (by the end of this week), we’ll be announcing our 2016 programs. You can come do service work and train with me in Peru and for 2016, we’ll once again have programs for both High School AND College students, so be sure to take a look if you’re interested in an amazing summer experience!

 

Weekly Summary – 109 miles in 6 days of running. A real serious medical problem (a concussion) on Sunday made this a weird week. Seemed to recover very well and was able to resume basically normal training by the end of the week. Two moderate “rust-buster” workouts. Hoping to stick in a rhythm now!

I generally start my weeks on Monday, but since Sunday’s entry is pretty relevant to the rest of the week, I’ll start there.

 

Domingo, 16 de Agosto, 2015 – What a nightmare day. I’ll copy from an email to Jon, Nic, and Rob:

Sunday morning around 5am, I got up to went to the bathroom in and was either sleep-walking or got up too fast or something and ended up passing out hard and hitting my head on a wall on the way down. Classic, I know.

Luckily, Mariana was there and took me to the ER as at the time I had no short term memory of where I was or what was going on (I didn’t remember getting back from Peru) and couldn’t really speak coherent sentences (I couldn’t answer the question “is Richard Parker black?”. Pretty freaky stuff; brains are weird.

They did a CT scan and did some other basic test at the hospital and then kept me there until the early evening yesterday. Luckily, by the early afternoon (around 2pm), my cognition/memory was basically fully back and I just had a rough headache. Again, brains are super weird.

I’m actually feeling almost 100% fine today and slept for 12+ hours last night (in addition to the many hours I was out yesterday during the day), so I’m hoping that my body is strong and resilient and I’ll be moving on just fine.

The worst part – Mar and I had tickets to go see Phish last night! Ugh! haha

Needless to say, no exercise today.

Lunes, 17 de Agosto, 2015 – 11am: Got home from the hospital last night in once piece. Head much better and memory/cognition seems to be 100%. Slept for a lot yesterday and over 12 hours last night. Felt pretty good this morning and was cleared to exercise as long as I listen to my body, so did 60’ on stationary bike. A frustrating situation but definitely a lot better than it could have been.

XT: Backs/hips strength.

PM: OFF, rest.

Martes, 18 de Agosto, 2015 – 10am: Felt almost 100% today and so ran on the treadmill under Mariana’s watchful eye while she was working. Felt normal. Ran from 10’00 pace down to about 6’30 pace. Total run 13M in 1h30.

5pm: Easy run on treadmill again to be supervised. Felt fine again. Ran 5M in 37’.

XT: Hips

Miercoles 19 de Agosto, 2015 – 10am: Slept late again after planning to get up and run with Matt early. Oops. Listening to my body, though. Ran on treadmill again since I’m a five year old and have to be supervised. Felt fine just getting really bored of the gym. Total run 12M in 1h22.

XT: Back/hip strength.

4pm: Ran on treadmill again. Hopefully only another day or so of this. Felt fine. 5M in 34’.

XT: Core, 12’.

Jueves, 20 de Agosto, 2015 – 10am: First more focused run since the concussion. Head has been feeling fine so wanted to try a longer run (this was the original run I had planned for sunday).

Goal as to do 32-35km total with the first 20km moderate, then 5km pick-up at around 50k pace or 90-95% of MP, then 5k mod, then another 2-5k pickup.

Run went very well. No breakfast, just coffee so was depleted. Also only took water during this run.

Ran first 20k even from about 3’50->3’40/km and felt quite good. First pick-up felt tougher than I expected but not crazy and ran 16’39. Slowing down back to 3’40 pace after that felt very good and was able to accelerate again for pick-up #2, running 4km in 13’19 (same pace) and then jogging in the last km easy. I think I could have finished that second 5k, but I just didn’t feel like pushing it in my first harder effort yet.

Total run 35k in 2’05’58 (5’47/M, 3’36/km avg).

5 km 18’51.0 (18’51.0)
10 km 37’31.0 (18’40.0)
15 km 55’50.0 (18’19.0)
20 km 1’13’59.0 (18’09.0)
25 km 1’30’38.0 (16’39.0)
30 km 1’48’42.0 (18’04.0)
34 km 2’02’01.0 (13’19.0)
35 km 2’05’58.0 (3’57.0)

5pm: Very easy shakeout with Mariana around CC. Total run 3M++ in 27’.

XT: Off.

Viernes, 21 de Agosto – 7:15am: Up way too early to run before MD apt. Ran first 20’ very slow with Mar and then with Matt to his parking lot and then home solo. Felt pretty awful. Very tired. Total run 10M in 75’.

5pm: Very easy shakeout around CC to the turf fields and then barefoot for 20’ and then back. Felt good to run barefoot. Did a couple strides to open up the legs. Still pretty sore from long run yesterday. Total run 5M+, NT because watch died.

XT: Back/hip strength.

Sabado, 22 de Agosto, 2015 – 10am: Ran solo on Matt’s loop. Felt pretty tired at first but much better by the end. 5’00/km down to 4’00 by the end. Total run 11M in 76’.

6pm: Lazy afternoon so ran late. Nice though, only in the upper 70s and more shade. Ran at first with Mar very slow and then a bit quicker. Felt surprisingly decent. Total run 5M in 39’.

XT: Back/hip strength.

Domingo, 23 de Agosto, 2015 – 9am: Up at 7am, no breakfast, just black coffee.

Workout was 10x1000m on CC road loop with 400m jog. I bought a measuring wheel because I wanted to be sure of these workouts, so I had every 200m marked which was very nice.

Warmup was 3M+ and full drills and 4x strides.

Ran consistently 2’56-59 for most. On #5 I tried to go out harder and died pretty hard the last 600m going out in like 33. Slowest rep at 3’01.4 Oops. Other than that, they all felt pretty reasonable. Muscularly hard, but this is the first sub-3’00 pace I’ve run in over 2 months, so not surprising.

Last one I ran well and accelerated running the last 400m in about 66 for 2’55.

The rest was consistent about 1’40-55 for 400m. Total workout was 14km in 46’34 (3’19/km, 5’21/M avg). The total work was 10km in 29’44, 2’58.4/km avg.

Cool down very short about 1M to gym for legs. Total run 13M+.

Splits: 10x1000m @ 2’58.4 avg w/ 400m jog
1000 km 2’58.3 (2’58.3)
400 km 4’49.8 (1’51.5)
1000 km 7’48.0 (2’58.2)
400 km 9’39.2 (1’51.2)
1000 km 12’37.4 (2’58.2)
400 km 14’19.9 (1’42.5)
1000 km 17’16.2 (2’56.3)
400 km 19’01.8 (1’45.6)
1000 km 22’03.2 (3’01.4)
400 km 23’55.8 (1’52.6)
1000 km 26’54.3 (2’58.5)
400 km 29’01.0 (2’06.7)
1000 km 31’59.3 (2’58.3)
400 km 33’50.8 (1’51.5)
1000 km 36’50.4 (2’59.6)
400 km 38’43.9 (1’53.5)
1000 km 41’43.8 (2’59.9)
400 km 43’38.8 (1’55.0)
1000 km 0’46’34.4 (2’55.6)

XT: Legs at the gym. 3 sets of [15x step ups, 20x overhead lunge, 24x dynamic lung, 12x squat (bar)]. No weight other than bar for squats to get muscularly used to these again.

5pm: Easy run to the fields and barefoot for about 10min and then down to harris teeter to get peas. Total run 5M++ (9k) in 40’.