Ironman Training Diary - May 9, 2026

I was up around 5:15am today, and spent some time noodling around on the laptop before heading up to Glacier Ridge South for the Saturday group run. Relatively small group today due to some people being out for OSU graduation weekend. This was one of those days where I could immediately tell I’d be running strong; I’m going to chalk it up to the three large pieces of homemade pizza I eat last night.

About 30 minutes in the pace picked up significantly, and I noticed two things: first, my footfalls were very light. I wasn’t plodding at all, and almost felt like I was running on air. Second, I wasn’t out of breath at all which really felt great.

Unfortunately about 50 minutes in we unexpectedly took a sudden break which according to Apollo (my custom built AI training agent) lasted 9 minutes 13 seconds. Apollo calculates that had we not stopped running and instead continued at a 9:45/mi pace then the projected 6-mile finish would have been ~58:56. Coulda-woulda-shoulda, I guess.

It was a great run, and my running partner mentioned the book The Courage to Be Disliked: The Japanese Phenomenon That Shows You How to Change Your Life and Achieve Real Happiness, by Ichiro Kishimi and Fumitake Noga. He also mentioned a book that he was currently reading for the second time, but for the life of me I can’t remember the title and so will text him so I can write it down.

After the run I had the opportunity to talk to a very accomplished runner and Ironman competitor. Among other things she managed to run 50 miles at Leadville! What an incredible accomplishment. Her advice regarding Ironman training was to hire a coach, and she subsequently sent me the name of hers. I think I’ll give her a call in a few weeks just to understand a bit more about how that would work.