Are we there yet?

It's Friday of week 9 and I've completed four challenging runs this week.
Mon 5pm 20.85, 3:00:43, 3625' of vertical in Wilmington
Wed 9am 25.55, 4:00:33, 7999' vert on the trails at FH
Thr 4:15am 11.6, 2:00:40, 4471' vert (9.1 Wilm + 2.5 trdml @11%)
Fri 4am 13.8, 2:20:09, 8994' vert (8.8 Wilm + 5 trdml @11+%)

In addition to my normal 3 hard days in a row, I'm adding a trail race of ~15 miles at Fair Hill on Saturday morning. I'm telling myself its just a training run, but I'm sure I'm going to end up running it harder than I should.

Wednesday's 4 hr run was the longest amount of time I've ever run in my life. Only once before had I even run more than 3:30 (a 3:50 NYC marathon that I ran with friends that I trained). The effort put forth on Wednesday is probably as great as anything I'll be required to do in the Rockies. The hardest Rockies stage is going to be ~26 miles with 7000' of elevation gain. I pretty much matched that on Wednesday and I did it while temperatures rose from 75 to 89 degrees and I consumed <32 oz of fluids. (WTF happened to the 70% chance of thunderstorms?!?!) So, I pretty much feel great about accomplishing anything I'll encounter out in CO. The key now is that in CO I'm going to have to string together 6 days of challenging runs.

Thursday morning's run was miserable. But, I kept telling myself "It's only 2 hours. Just do it, wuss." (Did you call me a wuss?) Yes, I've gotten to the point where 2 hrs seems like an easy day. And not just mentally, either. Thursday was bad. But, Friday morning I went out for 2:20 and my legs actually felt rested...like they, too, agreed that 'just' running 2 hrs on Thursday for them was no big deal. I felt great and could have continued running today but with tomorrow being the 4th hard day in a row, my 5th hard run of the week, and with my weekly total approaching 90 miles, I played it safe and stopped.

As week 9 concludes, that means I have completed 5 weeks of my training program. Its time for a 'break'. Beginning Sunday, I'll take it easy for the next 7 to 10 days, try to recuperate, gain some weight, take a mental break, etc. Half way through week 7, I'll then ramp up my training again for 5 more weeks. Then the last two weeks will be a taper. So, I'm kinda half-way there!!!

Crap! I'm only half-way there!