That's exciting skhill! Good luck on Saturday.

Yellow, yay for hill repeats! <wheeze, puke, trip>

I did downhill repeats yesterday, a workout I'd asked my coach for, since the descent out of Hopkinton threw me off so badly last year. It went much better than I was expecting. I think a lot because it turned out that some of the same form focuses I'd been working on, on the flats, turned out to be really useful with balance and leg turnover descending, too. Landing on all four corners of the feet (a cue from my yoga teacher that has been just IMMENSELY useful in regaining foot function), then bending my knees and lifting my heels behind me and "feeling the wheel" as in the Roadrunner cartoons (a Chi Running cue).

I got all the way through the workout before it occurred to me that at race start, I *will* want to be putting the brakes on and holding back my speed, and so biomechanically it might work out much different from what I was doing yesterday. Ah, well.

Five weeks out and I'm *finally* starting the mileage buildup in my long runs. So far it seems like this training plan is actually working. My longest run this cycle before Monday had been 14 miles, and on Monday I did 17, and not only wasn't it excessively hard, but it wasn't even hard the way 17 has often been a slog for me in the past. We'll see what happens with 20 miles this coming Monday ...