This is the penultimate week of the training plan and the last one with any real training. As directed, I cut the volume by 50% from the previous week, resulting in about 35K of running. The only run worth mentioning was a Wednesday workout on my favourite hilly loop, which I also talked about last week. In future training blocks, my goal is to spend more time running in the hills irrespective of the profile of the race I’m targeting, since doing so is the path to happiness.

One of the lessons I’ve learned during this training block is not to worry so much about getting injured. It’s therefore ironic that I picked up an abductor issue that I’ve been unable to shake off in the past week. What’s more, I didn’t even develop the issue while running. Instead, I picked it up while doing some Peloton stretching classes with my wife–something I haven’t previously done during this block. Of course, running probably caused the muscles to be tight in the first place, but I’m still almost certain that I wouldn’t have developed any issues without the stretching regime, since the last time I’ve had a similar issue was years ago when I also decided to do an impromptu Peloton stretching class.

Luckily, the injury doesn’t seem to be aggravated by most running, and I can only feel mild pain while climbing. In Black Canyon 100K, the vast majority of climbing happens in the latter half of the race, which is when any pain in my abductor might not even make it to the list of top 10 most prevalent worries. Besides, in two out of three of my most recent races, I’ve had some pain in my legs leading up to the race, which has completely vanished before or during the event.