I usually write these on Sundays, but I'm going on a short 3 day trip with my family starting this Sunday, so I took a day off work to do my long run and have completed my runs this week to write this post.

This week's stats:

Box step up+down (18 inches high bench): Monday - 32 pounds weight - 25 minutes Wednesday - 32 pounds weight - 25 minutes

Runs: Tuesday - 9km - 6:05/km pace - 76m elevation gain Thursday - 6km - 6:07/km pace - 31m elevation gain Saturday - 26km - 6:46/km pace - 211m elevation gain Total: 41km - 318m elevation gain

Alcohol consumption: Last Sunday - 1 can of 355mL beer Wednesday - 1 can of 355 mL beer

How it felt this week: Lower back pain is the theme of this week. I think I might have worn too much weight while doing the step up + step down exercise, causing too much stress on my back muscles. Having a weak core doesn't help the situation either. Need to strengthen my core muscles. Also going to try doing the step up + step down exercise without weights, using only body weight, this coming week. Also need to stretch more for better muscle recovery, flexibility, and injury prevention. Otherwise, the runs felt pretty good. I have not felt that I've been going fast enough to hit my cardio wall yet, and I'm being held back by muscle pain. So, if I can fix the muscle pain issues, I can theoretically go a bit faster than the current snail pace. Oh, and I gave into the temptation and drank 2 cans of beer. Weak. Will improve on that and try not to drink alcohol at all before the race.

Weeks before race day: 6 weeks