| Location: Fort Smith,AR,USA Member Since: Jan 01, 2008 Gender: Male Goal Type: Boston Qualifier Running Accomplishments: Dec. 5, 2009 -- St. Jude Memphis Marathon, 3:31:56. Boston qualifier for 2011. Two-time Boston finisher. 19 marathons so far in 10 states, Canada, Germany, England and Sweden. Next up: London (4/25/17)
5K -- 21:57; 10K -- 45:54; 20K-- 1:42:39, Half -- 1:39:30. All subject to improvement. Maybe. Or maybe not. Short-Term Running Goals: Short-term: Just get my motivation back and go from there Long-Term Running Goals: A lot of marathons, and other distances, slowly. Personal: Physician assistant/hospitalist, divorced since December 2010, one child (son). Ran high school track, took 10 years off, ran a 15K on my 25th birthday, took off next 21 years. |
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| Miles: | This week: | 0.00 |
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Year: | 0.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 1606.96 | 187.41 | 72.70 | 32.94 | 1900.01 |
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| Night Sleep Time: 1109.42 | Nap Time: 33.00 | Total Sleep Time: 1142.42 | |
| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 |
| Going back retroactively to update the blog for all of 2008. No run on New Year's Day to start the year. Still two months away from my first marathon attempt. |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 4.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 4.00 |
| First run of 2008 is a fairly hard four miles in 34:31. |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 4.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 4.00 |
| Another fairly hard four miles. |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 10.18 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 10.18 |
| First long run of the new year. Took just over an hour and a half to run 10.2. |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 |
| Sunday off. Eight weeks to Little Rock now. |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 4.50 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 4.50 |
| No time recorded for this run. |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 3.10 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 3.10 |
| Basically a 5K on the treadmill at 9:00 pace. |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 4.34 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 4.34 |
| Since last night was a 5K, it appears this one was a 7K. Took just over 40 minutes. |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 3.06 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 3.06 |
| No time recorded here. Take Friday off before a 14-miler on Saturday. |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 14.03 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 14.03 |
| A bit over two hours for 14 miles. |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 4.17 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 4.17 |
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| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 3.10 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 3.10 |
| Two-mile tempo run in 15:32 |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 1.50 | 0.00 | 3.50 | 0.00 | 5.00 |
| First attempt at a Yasso run -- 800 X 7 at 3:56 pace. |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 15.98 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 15.98 |
| Sixteen long, slow miles in 2:44 |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 4.25 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 4.25 |
| Recovery run |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 4.12 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 4.12 |
| GA run in 39:00 |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 3.16 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 3.16 |
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| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 18.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 18.00 |
| First 18-miler in 3:07. Julie was right -- getting over 17 miles is a whole new world. |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 4.10 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 4.10 |
| Recoery run |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 0.00 | 0.00 | 3.00 | 0.00 | 3.00 |
| Tempo run in 25:25. |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 4.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 4.00 |
| Hill run |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 3.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 3.00 |
| |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 14.38 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 14.38 |
| One month to go... |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 4.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 4.00 |
| Recovery run |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 0.00 | 0.00 | 3.00 | 0.00 | 3.00 |
| Tempo run in 23:47 |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 3.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 3.00 |
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| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 20.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 20.00 |
| Very tough day, 20-miler from the state Capitol up into the Heights and back along Cantrell. Mileage is an estimate; I brainlocked and deviated from the assigned course and then tried to make up the difference with extra blocks downtown. |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 4.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 4.00 |
| Recovery run |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 0.10 | 0.00 | 3.00 | 0.00 | 3.10 |
| Tempo run in 22:50 |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 4.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 4.00 |
| |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 3.10 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 3.10 |
| Hill run on the TM |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 12.38 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 12.38 |
| Taper for Little Rock begins in earnest. 1:53:52 for 12.4. |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 3.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 3.00 |
| Recovery run |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 0.00 | 3.10 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 3.10 |
| MP run, such as it is, in 26:32 |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 3.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 3.00 |
| Hill run on the TM |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 0.00 | 3.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 3.00 |
| Three in 27:01. |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 6.01 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 6.01 |
| Last Saturday with the Crackheads before the race. |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 3.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 3.00 |
| Really tapering now |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 3.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 3.00 |
| |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 3.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 3.00 |
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| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
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| | Race: |
Little Rock Marathon (26.22 Miles) 04:46:15 | | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 0.00 | 26.22 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 26.22 |
| Condensed version: Started with 4:30 pace group, felt good, left pace group behind at about the 3-mile aid station. Big mistake. Temperature warmed quickly; felt thirsty at about 10 miles even with taking fluids. Trouble. Had to start walking even before reaching 13.1 at the Capitol. Kavanaugh Hill also a bunch of walking. Hoped to make up time on Lookout downhill. Nope. Hamstring cramped very quickly. Tried to resume running at bottom of the hill. More cramps. Run quickly settled into pattern of run a little-cramp-walk a lot-repeat. Pace group finally caught and passed me at about 20 miles. Next pace group caught and passed me. No chance of running on ANYTHING resembling a hill, but I was going to finish no matter what. Saw Tyler on course about .75 mile from finish; how did he get up here, he doesn't walk that far ever. Finally, at Statehouse Center about quarter mile from finish, Julie, who has been waiting for me for 2.5 hours after finishing her half, jumps the wall and runs with me. I'm hurting seriously, but I'm going to finish. Pam is there too and I never even saw her. As I turn off LaHarpe to the finish, cramps hit again, but I run/limp to the finish. Exhaustion, disappointment, pain, but tears of joy too. This old guy has finished a marathon. Zero to marathon in 34 weeks. Dick Beardsley said in "Spirit of the Marathon" that once you've finished 26.2, you'll never be the same again. I suspect I'm going to find he's exactly right. |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 |
| No way I can run today, or work (took the day off), but I went back and totaled up my miles. Ran 728 miles from July 7 to yesterday. Probably hadn't run 72 miles total in the 21 years preceding that. It was hard, but I did it. |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 1.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 1.00 |
|
Raining like heck yesterday when I took Julie to the airport. That later turned to snow. First attempt at running today, a very slow mile on the TM. Didn't feel too bad today returning to work either, and my coworkers made a big deal out of it. Put a picture of me wearing my marathon medal (which is HUGE) on the bulletin board in the patient waiting room. Boss also told me he'd pay me $1000 if I keep going and run another marathon. I was going to do that anyway, because I'm POd at my poor performance Sunday, but a little financial incentive doesn't hurt. Not sure where I'm going to run next, maybe Memphis in December. |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 1.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 1.00 |
| Another slow recovery mile. Legs not TOO bad... |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 2.11 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 2.11 |
| When I got off work it was snowing -- hard (this after 70 degrees Sunday afternoon; it's snowed TWICE this week). Changed clothes immediately and went for a run. I've never run in the snow before, but I looped around the neighborhood behind my apartments. Probably went faster than I should have, took 19:36 to run 2.1. Fun. Have to do this again when weather permits, which doesn't happen much around here. Maybe during my vacation in a couple of weeks. |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 1.50 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 1.50 |
| No Crackhead run this weekend, our only weekend off of the year. Took the whole weekend off, ran today. |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 3.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 3.00 |
| Hill run today |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 2.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 2.00 |
| Easy treadmill run. |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 8.02 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 8.02 |
| Eight-miler on the River Trail with Pat Koss. Felt pretty good. Actually able to push the pace a little and put on a bit of a kick. Legs not too excited about that kick; hammy tried to cramp up again as I finished. |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 2.50 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 2.50 |
| Recovery on the TM |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 3.10 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 3.10 |
| Recovery on the TM |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 3.10 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 3.10 |
| Another recovery run on the TM |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 6.04 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 6.04 |
| Six-mile run on the Rahling loop, meaning BIG hills. Leaving this afternoon for St. Louis, Chicago and Wisconsin Dells. |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 4.03 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 4.03 |
| Spent Saturday night in the St. Louis suburbs, drove through the snow to Chicago and got in some great sightseeing. Today drove from my downtown hotel over to Lincoln Park and ran four miles along the lakefront. Bitterly cold (21 degrees), but a beautiful morning and a very pleasant run in spite of the cold. We're heading for Wisconsin this afternoon. |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 4.01 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 4.01 |
| Another four mile run today, this time around Christmas Mountain Village outside Wisconsin Dells. This is a ski area, and the slopes have plenty of snow, but they're closed. Too bad. I would have liked to give it a try. As you would expect for a ski area, it's fairly hilly around here. My loop went from the village out to the main highway (not much traffic) and back up hill into the village. We have a nice little cabin, not real plush but comfortable, looking out on the golf course (which is also snow-covered and closed). So we have skiing and golf here and I can't do either one. Oh well. |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 6.20 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 6.20 |
| Back home from Wisconsin, and it's a lot warmer and more humid here. Six miles on the treadmill today. Only 74 miles this month, INCLUDING the marathon, but that's the key -- it did include the marathon. I know my training for Little Rock was inadequate, and I'll correct that situation for the next marathon. |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 3.10 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 3.10 |
| 5K on the treadmill |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 4.12 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 4.12 |
| Hill run |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 0.00 | 4.12 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 4.12 |
| Pace run on the TM |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 6.01 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 6.01 |
| Crackhead run in downtown LR |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 4.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 4.00 |
| Recovery run on the treadmill |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 0.00 | 3.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 3.00 |
|
GMP run, with this goal pace a smidge under 4-hour speed. |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 4.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 4.00 |
| Fartlek run outside in 36:24 |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 7.93 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 7.93 |
| Eight miles from the Arts Center, including the Central High loop. Took 1:13. |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 4.26 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 4.26 |
| Recovery run, accelerating for the last mile or so. |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 0.26 | 5.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 5.26 |
| GMP run. Leave tomorrow for my CME meeting in Dallas. Hopefully I can do some running down there. |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 4.32 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 4.32 |
| Did a 40-minute run on the TM at the hotel in Dallas. Turned out to be 4.32 miles. TM had a built-in TV, which was nice, but horrible picture, which wasn't. |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 3.40 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 3.40 |
| Another TM run at the hotel. I think there's a junior college campus a mile or so away. I'll try to run over there and maybe run through campus tomorrow. |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 4.80 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 4.80 |
| As planned, ran over to the campus. Some company was doing an outdoor crawfish boil for its employees in between, and I could smell that wonderful smell for most of the run. Unfortunately, they didn't invite me to partake. Boiled crawfish is definitely an acquired taste, and boy, have I acquired it. Course was mostly flat with some undulations; better than the treadmill with the snowy TV screen. |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 6.40 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 6.40 |
| Ran an extra loop around the college campus tonight, or as best I could; there is a jogging trail but some of it is blocked for construction. Tried to go around the construction and found a creek there. There is another PA here at the conference that is not only a marathoner, but an ultramarathoner. Maybe I should have run with him, or maybe I'm not ready for that yet. |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 0.00 | 0.00 | 5.00 | 0.00 | 5.00 |
| Approximately five miles on the TM at tempo pace. Estimate is because the treadmill reset itself, which is quite infuriating. Dallas meeting just wore me out -- 9 hours of lecture, plus nightly homework, plus running, and as usual, I don't sleep well in hotels. Glad to be back in my own bed. |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 0.00 | 4.50 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 4.50 |
| GMP run on the TM |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 3.50 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 3.50 |
|
Treadmill recovery run |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 3.60 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 3.60 |
| Four hill repeats on Fairway. man., that's a long hill... |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 7.58 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 7.58 |
| My first run at the Arboretum at Pinnacle Mountain State Park. Very hilly. Threw in some fartlek to spice things up. |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
|
| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 3.10 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 3.10 |
| Recovery run on the treadmill. |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
|
| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 4.40 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 4.40 |
| Outdoor run after work at Burns Park, interrupted by watching my old high school play in the state soccer tournament (they lost). Total of about 4.4 miles. |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
|
| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 3.25 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 1.25 | 4.50 |
| Intervals on the treadmill, 5X400 with 400 meters recovery. |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
|
| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 |
| No run today. A little under the weather, plus I'm backing off just a tad for my first 10K race in Conway on Saturday. |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
|
| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 3.25 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 3.25 |
| 4:1 progression recovery run. |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
|
| | Race: |
Toad Suck Daze 10K, Conway, AR (6.21 Miles) 00:51:27, Place overall: 129, Place in age division: 14 | | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 1.04 | 6.21 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 7.25 |
| My first 10K on the road. Overall went very well. Warmed up for a mile at the Conway High track; warming up was needed, because it was very cool and windy (wish marathon day had been this cool). Plan was to run 8:00 miles. Had a little bad patch midway through and walked 100 yards or so, but was able to resume 8:00 pace at that point. I had hoped to run around 52 minutes, turned out I finished in 51:27 even with walking. Fourteenth in my division, 129th overall. |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
|
| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 4.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 4.00 |
| Recovery run on the TM. Very happy with my PR yesterday, although I needed to pace better and/or push through the discomfort a little harder. |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
|
| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 1.25 | 0.00 | 2.25 | 0.00 | 3.50 |
| LT intervals tonight, maybe a little ambitious so soon after a hard 10K, but got through them OK at paces in the 7:30 range. |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
|
| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 3.50 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 3.50 |
| Recovery time |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
|
| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 2.93 | 1.50 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 4.43 |
| Hill intervals X 3 at GMP, which by now, by the way, is 8:00; after my run in Conway, I'm seriously thinking about shooting for a BQ in Memphis, and Memphis is definitely my target race. |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
|
| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 1.15 | 0.00 | 2.25 | 0.00 | 3.40 |
| Pfitz and Hal Higdon both call for doing your long runs on tired legs to try to simulate the strain of the last six miles of the marathon. I have been generally taking off Friday and running on Saturday morning, but I decided to try it this time. So a tempo run at right around GMP tonight, then run at Maumelle in the morning. |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
|
| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 9.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 9.00 |
| So I did a tempo run last night, finishing around 9 p.m., and nine hours later I'm on the road at Lake Willastein. Uh, no. Did. Not. Work. At all. Legs absolutely dead. Had to walk within the first three miles, and the last six miles didn't go any better. Even Hobbit asked me if I was all right. Truthful answer would have been no, but I said I was OK, just feeling the effects of a hard run last night. That part was true, anyway. Don't think I'll do that again for a while. |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
|
| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 4.86 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 4.86 |
| Recovery run today, making up in part for yesterday's bad run. |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
|
| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 0.55 | 4.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 4.55 |
| Hard GMP run of four miles in 35:55 plus a cooldown. |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
|
| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 0.00 | 4.05 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 4.05 |
| More GMP tonight. I'm distracted. My 91-year-old grandmother, the last grandparent I have left, is on the brink of death. I kinda thought this might happen after her sister died around Christmas; thought she might not have the strength to live much longer. And it appears that's the case. |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
|
| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 3.87 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 3.87 |
| Recovery run. Grandma has died. Funeral will be Saturday morning. I think it will work out where I can run, shower, change and get to Hot Springs for the funeral. And I think I need that run to help get me through a difficult day. I spent a lot of time with her; we had Sunday dinner with her seemingly three out of four weekends when I was a kid. |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
|
| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 3.46 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 3.46 |
| Decided to give the Friday-Saturday back to back runs another chance, getting up early for a fartlek run around the neighborhood. Then another Friday slam at work, then go to Hot Springs for visitation at the funeral home, then tomorrow's run and funeral. Yuck. |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
|
| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 10.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 10.00 |
| Showed up at the River Trail, turned on my Garmin, started running and never looked at the watch again. Spent the whole 10 miles thinking about Grandma, and all those Sunday dinners, and all the other family members I've lost. I'm lucky in that my parents are still alive and well; not every 47-year-old can say that, but I'm all out of grandparents now. The visitation was not easy last night. I know it's hard on my dad to finally lose his mom at age 69. And there's the family tension between the Merle/Brandy faction and Dad and Mom, with Robert on the fringes. Anyway, I just ran and remembered, and when I got back to the car, I'd averaged 9:00 on the dot. Now hit the showers and put on my suit and go to Bryant to join the family for the trip to Hot Springs. This will be Tyler's first funeral, and not sure how he'll handle it. |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
|
| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 4.50 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 4.50 |
| Recovery run. I need emotional recovery now as much as physical. Nice service, but tough on me, especially to see my dad in tears and my son struggling with feelings he's never had to confront before. |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
|
| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 3.12 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 1.13 | 4.25 |
| Decided to do some all-out hill intervals to find out what my real MHR is. I've been operating with the lame 220-age formula, which only has a 95% chance of being in the ballpark, much less being accurate. So did a warmup jog on the treadmill, then set it on about 6% and hauled butt, with the Garmin HR monitor in place. Turned out the old lame formula is pretty accurate in my case. The MHR I got is within three beats of the formula number. |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
|
| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 5.15 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 5.15 |
| Tried out a new course outdoors, from the apartment down Fairway to the Old Mill, around the lake and back up here. Very hilly, but a nice run. Took it easy on the pace. It's late May now and starting to get quite warm and humid. |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
|
| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 4.60 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 4.60 |
|
Recovery from yesterday's recovery. My plan now is to build my mileage up to 30 or so MPW and then start a 24-week training plan based on Pfitz 24/55 in late June. In the meantime, at the suggestion of Jim2, I'm kinda doing a training plan for 5Ks and 10Ks based loosely on Higdon's Personal Best program. I hope to run the Firecracker Fast 5K on July 4 and that will give me a benchmark for where I am starting the marathon program. |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
|
| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 3.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 3.00 |
|
Despite taking Thursday off, legs were DEAD this morning. Lot of walking. I think this Friday-Saturday combination just doesn't work well for me. |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
|
| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 7.20 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 7.20 |
| A humid Saturday morning with the Crackheads. Murray Park is such a boring place to run, even when you go over BDB. Kept the pace around 10:00, which is OK. |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
|
| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 4.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 4.00 |
| Four slow miles on the TM. |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
|
| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 2.50 | 0.00 | 2.50 | 0.00 | 5.00 |
| Tempo run at just under 8:00 pace tucked into a five-miler on the TM. Not bad, considering how dead my legs have been lately. |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
|
| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 3.75 | 1.25 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 5.00 |
| Pretty tough 3:1 run. Good pace on the TM, then put the hammer down for last 1.25 miles. |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
|
| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 4.37 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 4.37 |
| Recovery run. Wore the HRM and got average HR of 141, which is OK for me; tells me I'm not overdoing it. |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
|
| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 4.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 4.00 |
| Fartlek run on the TM, just throwing in surges of various lengths. Time was 38:25. |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
|
| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 11.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 11.00 |
| Back on the River Trail with the Crackheads. About a 9:15 average for 11 miles. Not too bad to cap off the month. |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
|
| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 4.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 4.00 |
| Recovery run on the TM |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
|
| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 5.13 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 5.13 |
| Another Lakewood loop, which means lots of hills. Averaged about 10:00. |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
|
| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 |
| Had planned to run tonight, but the GI tract had other ideas. My running was to the bathroom. Maybe I'll feel better tomorrow. |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
|
| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 3.75 | 0.00 | 1.25 | 0.00 | 5.00 |
| Hill intervals on the treadmill -- 400X5 at about 7:40 pace. Fortunately the digestive tract behaved itself. |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
|
| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 5.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 5.00 |
| Recovery on the TM |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
|
| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 0.00 | 4.00 | 0.00 | 0.62 | 4.62 |
| On the TM for marathon paced four miler, then out to the church parking lot for strides. Hard to do strides after an MP run. |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
|
| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 10.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 10.00 |
| Back at Maumelle with the Crackheads. It seems like I never have a good run at Maumelle, and today is no exception. Very humid, dead legs, walked a LOT. Started out running with Pat and just told him to go on ahead, I was not able to keep up. Not encouraging. |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
|
| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 3.77 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 3.77 |
| 30-minute recovery run covering 3.77 on the TM |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
|
| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 0.50 | 0.00 | 3.00 | 0.00 | 3.50 |
| Today's my 24th wedding anniversary, so had to keep this one short. Tempo run of 3 miles and a short cooldown run in 31 minutes. |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
|
| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 3.75 | 0.00 | 1.25 | 0.00 | 5.00 |
| 3:1 run on the TM. Overall average about 9:11. |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
|
| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 3.75 | 0.00 | 1.25 | 0.00 | 5.00 |
| Hill intervals on the TM, stepping up the pace from 7:40ish to 7:20 as I went through them. |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
|
| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 3.79 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 3.79 |
| Fartlek run through the neighborhood. |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
|
| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 10.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 10.00 |
| Back to the Capitol for our little trip up Kavanaugh into the Heights. |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
|
| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 4.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 4.00 |
| Little recovery run. Only a week to the start of my marathon training program. Yikes. |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
|
| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 4.50 | 0.00 | 1.50 | 0.00 | 6.00 |
| Little 3:1 run on the TM tonight. Averaged 9:07 |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
|
| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 4.35 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 4.35 |
| TM recovery |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
|
| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 3.02 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 1.00 | 4.02 |
| Actually a track workout today. Jogged over to the track at East Campus, ran 8X200 intervals at splits ranging from 41 to 47 seconds, then jogged home. Almost felt like track practice used to feel, although no threat of technicolor yawning this time. |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
|
| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 1.00 | 0.00 | 4.00 | 0.00 | 5.00 |
| Tempo run at MP - 10% for four miles, then cooldown. |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
|
| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 11.16 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 11.16 |
| Routine Saturday morning on the River Trail. Marathon program starts tomorrow with a scheduled off day, so I'll crosstrain or something. |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
|
| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 7.50 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.63 | 8.13 |
|
My first day of training under the Pfitzinger 24/55 program. Goal race: Memphis St. Jude on December 6. Hit the treadmill due to temps in the 90s for 7.5 General Aerobic miles in about 69 minutes, then went outside for 10 100-meter strideouts. The strides felt better than previous strideouts I've done; whether that was better conditioning, better technique or pure coincidence, I have no idea. Still 166 days to go to Memphis, but a good starting point. I'm glad I built my base up to 33 mpw before I started this program.
I thought long and hard about putting off the start of the training program until August, going with Pfitz 18/55 instead. The reason is the summer heat; running outside in July is not going to do much to prepare me for a December marathon, and there is a real risk of heat-related problems. But I decided to go ahead and start now. I don't want to look back after Memphis and wish I'd done more to prepare. If I put in the work and still don't get the goal, so be it, but I'm gonna put in the work first. Plus the extra weeks give me more cushion in case of injury or illness.
Speaking of looking back, I think that looking back on my prior running lives is why I'm so committed now. I was pretty mediocre as a high school distance runner (undertrained) until back surgery at age 15 shut me down. Nine years later, I decided to lace back up and go for a 15K on my 25th birthday, which happened to be sponsored by my employer. I trained hard for three months, finished the 15K in 63:00 or so (if there had been chip times in 1985), and then shut it down for another 20 years. What if I had continued to train then? The calculators say a 63:00 15K correlates to about a 3-hour marathon, but I never gave a thought to continuing my training, much less to running a marathon.
But I just think that the ability to run semi-fast is still in there, somewhere, and I want to unearth it. So far, so good; running decent distances at decent paces is getting easier and easier. Can I string together 26 miles at 9:08 pace? Can I go lower and maybe get into BQ territory? That's what I want to find out.
My "failure" in my first marathon was due to poor tactics, poor hydration and inadequate training (30 miles per week tops, mistake #1). I started out with a 4:30 pace group, but ran off and left them after 3-plus miles (mistake #2) at the second aid station and didn't start drinking soon enough (mistake #3). Felt really good for 11 miles, then started to get really thirsty. Still finished the half in 2:12, which would have been good enough to get my goal if I had enough miles in the bank, but I didn't. And when I started cramping in mile 17, the goal shifted from breaking 4:30 to just finishing. The last nine miles were run-cramp-walk, run-cramp-walk. Never mind any time goal, I wasn't sure I could get there, but I was going to finish if at all possible, and I did.
So I'm correcting these issues. Doing Pfitz 24/55 will give me a much better preparation. I know a lot more about hydration and carb-loading now. And I'm working in my training runs on fighting my urge to start faster than I should. Will 55 mpw get me ready for a sub-four? We'll find out in 166 days. |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
|
| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 7.35 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 7.35 |
|
Not a good day on the Riverfront Trail. After a really hard day at work, I decided to go straight from the office to the trail. The idea was to finish the run early to spend time with my wife before her knee surgery tomorrow morning. I got there at 6 p.m. to find 93-degree heat, plenty of humidity and plenty of Canada geese along the trail -- plus the things that Canada geese leave behind them.
Again, I tried to restrain myself as far as not starting out too fast and I started drinking early and often. Nice try, but not enough. Thoroughly miserable run, most of which I spent saying "I'll never run in this kind of heat again," when I wasn't stepping over and around goose guano. I'd like to say I ran all the way, but I didn't. Just not a good day. Plus my wife got impatient waiting on me to finish.
One of those live and learn days. I've had bad training days before and will again. Oh well, off to the hospital in the morning. |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
|
| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 4.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 4.00 |
|
All in all, a good day. My wife's surgery went well, when it finally happened. We got to watch the DVD afterward, and the torn meniscus was big and obvious. It's all smoothed out now, and the damaged articular cartilage isn't as bad as I thought it might be. Hopefully she'll be pain-free and able to straighten that knee out, which she hasn't done for quite a while.
Mother-in-law Lil came up as well, which freed me up to go run tonight. In fact, I walked about a mile with Lil to show her a walking path around the neighborhood, then went to the TM for four recovery miles which went well.
Friday will be crush day at work again, so it was better to get the TM work done tonight than wait until tomorrow. |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
|
| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 7.00 | 4.35 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 11.35 |
| Starting point from the Arts Center. Starting temperature 75 degrees at 6 a.m. The usual Central High/Capitol/Heights course, turning around at Hillcrest and Kavanaugh. Definite negative split -- 48:14 for the first five miles with Pat K., 57:19 for the last 6.35 after I left Pat. Sub-9:00 pace for the last 3.35. Finished just before a major thunderstorm hit, so quite windy for the last half hour. Overall very good run. |
| Night Sleep Time: 7.00 | Nap Time: 0.75 | Total Sleep Time: 7.75 |
| |
| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 4.00 | 3.00 | 1.00 | 0.63 | 8.63 |
|
One of those days where, if I weren't in training for a marathon, I probably would have come home from work, eaten something, and gone straight to bed. I got pummeled at work, and will again on Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday (holiday weeks are always like this). Instead, I came home, changed clothes, and put in a darn hard workout: Four miles of warmup on the treadmill, three miles at marathon pace, the last mile at something approaching LT pace, then go outside for 10 100-meter strideouts. This time the strides were HARD, probably reflecting that I was less than five minutes off a tough 74-minute training run.
Which brings me to pacing questions. I'm not sure where to go with this. I'm basing my MP for training off what I ran in the 10K two months ago, which gives me an MP figure of somewhere in the 9:00 to 9:10 range depending on whose tables I use. It was a good 10K, PR by six minutes, but I'm pretty sure it wasn't an optimal run (I walked for 200 yards, a temptation I always find hard to overcome in mid-run or mid-race). But when I base my pace off heart rate, like recovery runs, for instance, my HR at 9:00 pace is barely out of the recovery zone. And following Pfitz's advice to do longer runs at MP + 20% then MP + 10% is frankly too darn easy; I have a very hard time running that slow. My 11-miler on Saturday averaged MP + 3%, and the last three miles were well UNDER goal pace.
Not that there would be anything wrong with running four hours at recovery pace if that got me a sub-4, but I'm not going to unearth that hidden potential I'm trying to find by running at less than 70% of my heart rate reserve. Specifically, I'm not going to get to Boston that way -- unless there's a helluva lot more hidden potential there than I think. And yes, I have to quit the Gallowalking if I'm gonna maximize my ability.
So I'm now officially in mini-taper for the 5K. Take tomorrow off, an easy four- or five-miler on Wednesday, maybe a light jog Thursday, bust the 5K Friday morning, then a SLOW long run on Saturday (I know, I always say that and then end up busting it). But if I can get in the 22s or low 23s Friday, I'll deserve a bit of a break. And if I don't, I still need to take it easy on Saturday. |
| Night Sleep Time: 6.50 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 6.50 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 0.00 | 1.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 1.00 |
| Hadn't planned to run today, at all. But my wife's car was in the shop, and my son's car wouldn't start, and he had an interview for a volunteer job at an area museum this afternoon, so he took me back to work after lunch and then took my car to the interview. Which left me with how to get home once I finally finished work. I could have called and waited for someone to pick me up, or I could run home. So I ran. Didn't have my Garmin, or even a watch, but my cellphone has a stopwatch feature and I clicked that on as I left the office, which is almost exactly a mile from the house. Got home and looked at the stopwatch, and it was my exact GMP for a four-hour marathon: 9:09. Spooky, huh? Or maybe I just have my body tuned in to 9:09 miles. |
| Night Sleep Time: 7.50 | Nap Time: 0.17 | Total Sleep Time: 7.67 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 4.00 | 1.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 5.00 |
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This is one of those days I got through on pure adrenaline, after next to no sleep (not because I stayed up late, but because I couldn't turn my brain off once I went to bed, which was actually at pretty much my normal time). So I'll be crashing early tonight...
In taper mode for the 5K, for which I picked up my bib after work. Ran 5 miles on the treadmill, the first four at just under 10:00 pace, then cranked up to just under 9:00 for the last mile. I'm getting really tired of the treadmill, especially as my mileage builds upnder Pfitz (tonight was scheduled for 9 miles), but crack-of-predawn every day or running in the evening heat outdoors just doesn't work for me. So until the weather is more favorable, I'll continue to do most of my Mondays and Wednesdays on the dreaded TM, and drag myself out of bed before dawn on Saturdays for the long run. Come to think of it, with a 7:30 start Friday, the 5K will be an early alarm clock day as well. Tomorrow's a rest-and-finish-the-work-week day.
Probably fortuitous that I cut back on my running this week, as big a crush as work has been. Next week, fortunately, will not be nearly as hectic between 8 and 5, because I'm scheduled to ramp up the mileage quite a bit and add the fifth day of running back in. |
| Night Sleep Time: 4.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 4.00 |
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| | Race: |
Firecracker Fast 5K, Little Rock, AR (3.1 Miles) 00:22:27, Place overall: 212, Place in age division: 16 | | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 1.55 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 3.10 | 4.65 |
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My first 5K. I really wanted to run a good race today, so much so that I ran the race in my head over and over last night, and consequently didn't get much sleep. The fact that my cat just came back from the vet and is audibly NOT happy about the disturbance to her routine didn't help either. But I ran a marathon on four hours' sleep, so I figured a 5K wouldn't be a big issue (and I could nap afterward).
The Firecracker is 250 feet downhill from the area of Little Rock known as the Heights down to War Memorial Stadium, looping around the stadium past the golf course and the Little Rock Zoo to finish on the east side of the stadium. The big downhill starts at about 1.8 miles and goes probably three-quarters of a mile down Van Buren Street to the stadium itself. My plan was to run a good, steady pace on the first 1.8 miles (which goes slightly downhill), let gravity accelerate me somewhat down Van Buren, but try to have something left for the loop around the stadium, which includes an uphill stretch past the Zoo.
Well, the plan almost worked. I ran the first mile in 6:54, the second in 6:53. But I didn't have much left when I hit the bottom of the hill, and that little uphill through the zoo (with the accompanying aroma of elephant dung and a distressed skunk) was REALLY difficult; mile 3 was in 7:47. But when I got to the top of the little hill at probably 2.9 miles, I was able to pick it up and brought it in at about 6:00 pace.
The goal was to break 23:00. I clicked my watch at the line: 22:27. Official time (no chips) was 22:31.02, which is about what I would have expected; I lined up near the front and got on course very quickly. I finished 178th among men, 16th in my age group and 212th overall out of 1008 finishers.
I did a test a couple of months back to try to figure out my maximum heart rate, and I got a result of 168. I did better than that this morning: 170. Both of which correlate pretty well with the old estimated MHR formula of 220 minus age, which for me right now is 173.
Sasha told me the other day that I have enough speed to get where I want to be. After this morning, I now believe him. And this morning's performance, for those familiar with Jack Daniels' work, bumped my VDOT number from 38 to 43 -- and correlates to a sub-3:40 marathon on both Daniels' and Greg McMillan's calculators. Now, Sasha, it's just time to put in the miles. Lots of miles. |
| Night Sleep Time: 4.00 | Nap Time: 2.00 | Total Sleep Time: 6.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 12.63 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 12.63 |
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You want to define this morning's run by pace, then it qualifies as 12.63 "easy" miles. However, there was nothing easy about it.
After Friday's race, I tried to take a nap, only to be thwarted by the other cat (not the one who yowled much of Thursday night) who insisted on snuggling up next to me and then taking a bath. I can sleep through a lot of things, but not through a cat bumping into me while licking his fur. So no nap (ignore that two hours on my Friday blog), and the beast just would not stop, or go away. Then it was time to go to the parents' for the Fourth; we stayed there six hours (and through two thunderstorms), and drove back home. By the time we got back, I was exhausted, and sore, and just went straight to bed at 8 p.m.
Slept pretty well, but the alarm clock at 4:45 alerted me to two things: It was time to get up and get ready for my Saturday run with the Crackheads, and my thighs hurt just about as much as they did after the marathon in March. Tried to stretch them out before I left home, and when I got to Pinnacle Mountain State Park for the run, but they just weren't going to stretch. Or stop hurting.
So the smart thing to do would have been to cut the run short, maybe try again Sunday. But I didn't do the smart thing. I did the obsessive/compulsive/Crackhead thing: Run my 12 miles. Plus. Tom and Hobbit sent me on an unfamiliar route (by myself -- none of the other runners were going 12), I wasn't sure about the turnaround, and 12 became 12.63 according to the Garmin. Twelve-plus painful, slow miles; not sure if the emphasis is on painful, or slow, because they were equally both. DOMS, hell. Nothing delayed about this soreness.
One thing I did get out of today. Before the run, Tom and Hobbit handed out a little surprise for the Crackheads: Little rubberized bracelets, similar to the Lance Armstrong "Livestrong" ones, but these are engraved "Crackhead -- LR Marathon". If I weren't an official Crackhead before, I am now. |
| Night Sleep Time: 8.67 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 8.67 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 6.00 | 0.00 | 3.00 | 0.00 | 9.00 |
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I looked at the calendar this morning and realized it was July 7. So what? Because July 7, 2007, is when I made the commitment to be a runner again, with the simplest of starts -- lacing up the old adidas and running two miles around the neighborhood on a hot Sunday evening.
Since then, there have been 1138 miles, and who knows how many hours on the treadmill and the roads to complete that many miles, a lot of Advil and Celebrex and ice baths and stretching, seven pairs of shoes, a 5K, two 10Ks and one very painful marathon. There have been 27 pounds lost, never to be found (I hope), several pairs of pants I can't wear any more, several more I can wear again that I couldn't then. Some of my patients are actually worried that I've lost TOO much weight.
Was it Dick Beardsley who said in "Spirit of the Marathon" that once you cross the finish line in a marathon, your life has changed forever? I couldn't agree more. I'm not the same person I was last July 7, not by a long shot. I committed to achieve a very difficult, time-consuming goal and I achieved it, and as a result, I don't look at myself the same way I once did. Now I'm committed to doing it again, better and faster. Before I was husband, father, medical professional, proud Arkansan, Razorback fan. I'm still all of those things, but I'm also an obsessed Crackhead, and a marathoner, and proud of it. Finishing 26.2 is something I can be proud of for the rest of my life. Ditto a sub-four-hour, when I get there, and a BQ, when I get THERE.
OK, enough of this retrospective. Year Two began with a nine-mile run with a lactate threshold run tucked into the middle. It was supposed to be 4 miles of LT at just under 8:00 pace, after a three-mile warmup run. The warmup went just fine, but I realized shortly into the LT that my legs still haven't recovered from the back-to-back whammy of an all-out 5K and a 12-miler in 100% humidity on consecutive days. Three miles of LT at that pace was all I could coax out of my legs, and getting in three more miles at 10:00 pace to finish the 9 was not much easier. Tomorrow is down for an easy 5-miler, and I do mean EASY. I think I'm still a bit dehydrated/glycogen-depleted as well, and I need to really pound down the fluids, and the carbs, for the next 48 hours or so. But at least I've caught up on my sleep, somewhat. |
| Night Sleep Time: 8.50 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 8.50 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 5.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 5.00 |
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Routine five-miler on the treadmill. Legs seemed to bounce back after last night's attempt at a tempo run; maybe a tiny twinge in the left hamstring but not as much as I frequently have after a hard run or two. Was able to gradually pick up the pace during the run until the final mile was at 9:00 pace -- and the heart rate barely crept above 140.
Kinda have a few distractions for the next few days. My son turns 18 on the 17th, and that's not even the major distraction that day. I have to take my recertification test that day, the every-six-years pain in the gluteus I need to keep my PA-C title. I don't HAVE to pass it -- I won't lose my license or my job -- but if I don't pass, I either have to retake and pass the test or I lose that title. Nobody really knows what that certification means except for another PA, but I still don't want to lose it.
The bad thing about that test is that it's going to cover a whole lot of things I never deal with. Imagine if you were a chemist working in, say, the oil industry, and you had to pass a test every six years about organic chemsistry -- stuff you absolutely never use in your day-to-day job. That's what I face next week. I have to be up to speed on treating high blood pressure and taking care of surgical patients and a whole lot of stuff I'll never use again -- until I have to take the test again in 2014.
Oh well, get through the next 10 days, and then I can hopefully zone in on family, job, and running -- in some order :) |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 4.00 | 5.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 9.00 |
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Not quite sure how to classify tonight's run. Started out as a routine 9-miler on the treadmill at 10:00 pace, but as I went on, I felt better, so I kept cranking up the TM. By the 4-mile mark, I was at 9:00 pace (AKA sub-four), did two miles there, then cranked it to 8:34 pace for 2.5 miles and ran the last half-mile at 8:00 pace.
Run started late. My boss decided it was time for everyone in the office (including him) to recertify in CPR. In my case, it was loooooong overdue; my CPR certification expired in like 1996, and the guidelines have changed a lot in the last 12 years. So a nurse came over after work and we all took an hour and a half giving mouth-to-mouth to mannequins and doing two-finger chest compressions to baby dolls. But I still think if somebody hit the floor in front of me and I had to do something, instinct would take me back to what I learned in 1994, not what I learned today. Anyway, because of that, my nine-miler started at 7 p.m., not 5:30. Yet another incentive for me to start getting out of bed at 5, not 7, and running early. But still not enough incentive for me to actually DO that.
Actually, it poured this morning around 10 and temperatures dipped into the low 70s. That would have been as perfect as Arkansas running weather gets in July -- cool and rainy. But, unfortunately, I was seeing patients and filling pumps, not putting in miles in the rain.
So this week will mark two milestones in my running -- Monday's one-year run-iversary, if you will, and my first 40-mile week. So far, so good. I've done 23 miles in the last three days and feel pretty good. Recovery (4) run tomorrow, take off Friday, 13 on Saturday. I think I'll adjust my schedule for a recovery run on Sunday instead of what I've done the last three days; when 23 in 3 becomes 30-plus in 3, I may not handle that so well. |
| Night Sleep Time: 8.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 8.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 4.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 4.00 |
| Easy 4-miler on the TM at 9:40 pace. A little bit heavy-legged tonight after two nine-milers in three nights, so a good night to do a recovery run. Take tomorrow off, then 13 around downtown LR on Saturday to finish my first 40-mile week -- then take my kid to the theme park for his 18th birthday. Fortunately, I don't have to take him around by the hand any more. I don't know if I'll be up for a major hike after a 13-miler. |
| Night Sleep Time: 2.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 2.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 10.50 | 2.70 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 13.20 |
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Capped off my first 40-mile week with a very good run in the company (most of the way) of Pat Koss. Pat's a good influence on me in that he helps me keep from going out too fast. We started at the River Market, crossed the Broadway Bridge, did the reverse Karrot loop, came back across Broadway, then turned up 3rd and headed for the Heights. Pat twisted his ankle in front of the Blind School both coming and going, got a piece of glass inside his shoe (it looked like someone had gone down the street for about 100 yards breaking out car windows), didn't bring enough water or any carbs. I finally left Pat in the last 2.5 miles; Tom saw him when he came in and said he had the wild-eyed look of someone with low blood sugar. And a twisted ankle, no doubt.
Anyway, after going up Kavanaugh all the way to the Van Buren split, and thus retracing a good part of the Firecracker course in reverse, we turned around and headed back down Kavanaugh to 3rd and back to downtown. As usual, I picked up the pace on the Kavanaugh downhill. We stopped on the Promenade to refill Pat's water bottle, and I left him shortly thereafter, or actually when he stepped on another rock. So my splits for the last three miles, including on the downtown flats, were sub-9:00, which is pretty much what I was hoping for. And I felt much better once I got a gel down around the 9-mile mark. Those things are complete yuck, but they work. I'll take yuck under those circumstances.
Weather was no bargain; it was about 80 and very humid when we started. Saving grace was an intermittent breeze which was particularly helpful as we descended Kavanaugh from miles 8-10.
So, in a training run, I ran 13.2 six minutes faster than I ran 13.1 in the marathon in March. So I guess I could count this as my half-marathon PR, but I won't. I'll save that for Soaring Eagles in October, when hopefully I can knock another 13-15 minutes off my time.
However, the sleep issue has to be resolved, somehow. I went to bed at 10:15 and got up at 4:45, but that does not mean I got 6.5 hours of sleep. I think the five hours I listed above is overly generous, frankly. I just could not get comfortable, I had to get up to visit the loo several times, the room was too warm even with the fan on, etc. I think I finally got some solid shuteye after I got up for the last time at 2:30 or so.
So on to another 40-mile week, after I take Tyler to the theme park for his birthday. I think I'll spend my time at the water attractions getting wet. But first, it's nap time. |
| Night Sleep Time: 5.00 | Nap Time: 1.50 | Total Sleep Time: 6.50 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 4.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 4.00 |
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I was scheduled to take today off, but the legs felt good after yesterday's 13.2 and I figured I'd get a recovery run today and take off either Tuesday or Thursday instead. Easy, routine treadmill run at 9:42 pace. No muss, no fuss, not even much perspiration (a lot cooler around here today after a front came through this morning and dumped a bunch of rain).
I'm starting to think really seriously about what my goal for Memphis should be. I still want to break four hours, obviously, but beyond that? Maybe 3:50, maybe 3:40. Maybe even BQ. I don't have to decide just yet; my performances in training and in the three planned races between now and then will decide a lot. Especially the 13.1 in late October. That is where I'm really going to find out where my fitness is and thus decide what the ultimate plan is. I do plan to hook up with the appropriate pace group on race morning -- and stick with them this time. I do better running with a group of people, or even with one person (AKA Pat). I'm more accountable, less likely to slack off/walk, and manage my pace better. For now, IMO, a pace group is the way to go. And if things go well for the next four months, the pace group I may be with is the 3:30 group.
The reason I'm starting to think about the ultimate goal is that training is going so well. I'm handling higher mileage and faster paces, together, better than I had hoped I would. Frankly, I'll be really disappointed with "only" a 45-minute PR if I don't break 4:00. And I may be disappointed if I don't go quite a bit lower than that.
Pat won't be in Memphis, BTW. He's going to jog Omaha in late September and then seriously run Detroit. I looked at the Detroit website this morning and it looks like an interesting race. Something about running from the U.S. to Canada and back (including the tunnel from Windsor to Detroit) intrigues me. I may have to put Detroit on my future wish list, along with Chicago, Toronto, Athens and, of course, Boston. And at some point, I'd probably go run Houston if only because I lived down there so long. |
| Night Sleep Time: 9.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 9.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 9.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.63 | 9.63 |
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Nine miles on the treadmill tonight, followed by 10 striders. Weather was cooler and drier today and I probably could have run outside semi-comfortably, but since I was on call, it's easier to have my phone with me on the treadmill than on the road. So I ran on the TM, watched the Home Run Derby while I ran, and it seemed to be a nice distraction. Turns out I got called twice in the half-hour AFTER I finished my run -- and the cellphone didn't ring either time. I really need a new phone -- or a new carrier, but Verizon is buying my carrier, so we'll see if that makes any difference.
It feels strange to say that a nine-mile run which ends with three miles of sub-9:00 running was easy, but it was. My pulse never got up to150 and I was barely winded after nine miles. Now the striders, that's another story. Maybe I'm still approaching them as I did wind sprints in junior high school football, except I'm probably running them faster than I did then (and I know I'm in better shape than I was then).
Got caught up on my sleep somewhat over the weekend, although last-minute studying and my reunion will probably cut back on that through this week. |
| Night Sleep Time: 7.50 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 7.50 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 4.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 4.00 |
| Short and sweet. Four easy miles at 9:30 pace after a bad day at work and not much sleep, thanks to a mysterious call from a patient at 2:30 a.m. with a psychiatric problem (I don't do psychiatry). A little bit of studying for Thursday's test, then early to bed. Probably 9-10 miles tomorrow, unless I get pummelled again at work. |
| Night Sleep Time: 5.50 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 5.50 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 9.00 | 1.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 10.00 |
| Not sure easy miles is the right way to describe most of this run. I ran nine miles at 9-minute pace, which until 2 weeks ago WAS GMP for me. Felt smooth too. Then did last mile at NEW GMP -- 8-minute pace. |
| Night Sleep Time: 7.50 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 7.50 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 3.25 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 3.25 |
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Kind of a mixed day. I had a miserable morning taking PANRE for five hours (bad), my son had a very nice 18th birthday and we had an excellent family birthday dinner (good), and I decided I needed to run off some of that dinner, so I went for a nothing recovery run. That probably falls into the category of junk miles, but an easy day is an easy day whether I spend it on the couch or doing three slow treadmill miles.
True to my OCD tendencies, because both Pfitz and Daniels recommend not running under a certain amount of time, I added in one more "lap" of the treadmill to get me up over 30 minutes. I noticed a little twinge in my left hamstring tendons as I got going, but it felt like something that I could work out as I ran, and sure enough, it eased off.
I guess I'm getting old now. The hair (what's left of it) is gray, I'm just as (or more) likely to turn the car radio off as crank it, I have just about zero interest in pop culture or movies or why Brangelina went to France to have their brats, and the kid is now an adult. But I have my running again, and on the road, I can still dust a lot of young whippersnappers and I'm working on getting past more of them. Gray hair or not.
I'm really pleased with how I've adapted to higher mileage so far. I'm sometimes sore when I go to bed, but the soreness is virtually gone by the time I get up the next morning. That bodes well for me as I build up the MPWs through the summer and fall. I still have to be careful, though. I still have the tendency to do too much -- too many miles, too fast, not enough rest. It's a tendency I'll have to fight as long as I keep running, I guess, unless I finally get that impulse to overdo tamed. |
| Night Sleep Time: 6.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 6.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 |
| Off today. Full day of work, then into the car and down to Arkadelphia for my class reunion (#30 for those scoring at home). I'm not the most successful member of the Class of 1978, but I bet I'm the only one who has run a marathon (well, I can think of one other possibility). But that's all right. I'm not going to impress people. I'm going mainly to see Mike, whom I haven't seen in 20 plus years after I spent much of my childhood at his house. Have to cut it off early tonight; the 6 a.m. Crackhead session looms Saturday. |
| Night Sleep Time: 7.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 7.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 11.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 11.00 |
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Bit of a setback today. I got in bed by 10:30 and got six hours' sleep, but I was not well rested. Once I started running from Surgical Hospital, I realized the legs weren't rested either. Plus there were some GI issues left over from last night's food at the reunion. Once those were resolved, the legs continued to feel heavy, plus I sped up quite a bit to catch up to Pat. Then on the loop around the Burns Park ballfields, I started to have pain in my feet and particularly my toes, related to the wrong choice of socks. I can't wear those socks unless my shoes are a full size too big (which I may need to consider anyway). A bit of walking (OK, a lot of walking) from miles 7-9 helped the legs, but the feet still hurt until I finally got rid of the socks entirely.
So, with all that, I decided the planned 14 miles was just too much. So instead of turning left when I got back to the soccer complex, I turned right and returned to Surgical Hospital. It still ended up as an 11-mile morning, which I finished in a touch over two hours. Pat thinks I may have ramped up the mileage a tad too quickly, and he may be right. Next week is a bit of a backoff anyway because of the 5K next Saturday, so hopefully that will help get the legs back. |
| Night Sleep Time: 6.00 | Nap Time: 3.50 | Total Sleep Time: 9.50 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 4.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 4.00 |
| Routine recovery run at 9:30 pace. No problem with the feet today, although they both look like hamburger after yesterday's sock-free last 3 miles. I'm tweaking the schedule again to allow a better taper for Dam Night Run. Recovery tonight, run two hard nights in a row on Monday and Tuesday, a recovery run on Wednesday, off Thursday-Friday, then an easy jog Saturday morning before going to Arkadelphia. I just realized this will be my first race in (OK, near) my hometown since, oh, April 1976. This was going to be a back-off week anyway. I think yesterday showed me I really needed a back-off week right now, so now's a good time. Then I go back to hammering next week. The goal for Saturday is sub-22:00. I'll try to run the first two miles at right around 7:00 pace, then hopefully put the hammer down on the downhill third mile to get under 22. Maybe, if I can carry out that plan well enough, quite a bit under 22. |
| Night Sleep Time: 8.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 8.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 8.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 8.00 |
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Just a routine 8 mile GA run, as Pete calls it -- one mile of warmup, 3.5 miles at 9:22 pace (roughly MP + 20%), then 3.5 at 8:41 (MP + 10%). Also had strides scheduled for tonight, but skipped them. I'll do enough fast running Saturday night for one week.
I'm a little concerned about my weight. Weighed this morning at work, fully clothed with my walkie-talkie in my pocket, and I weighed less than 160. That means probably 155-156 if I'd weighed after my shower, for instance. I know I haven't been eating enough (and I also know why), and I need to correct that. I think 155 is probably a good weight for me to, say, take to Memphis, but I want to stabilize there and not do a lot of fluctuating. Can't fix the problem right away, but hopefully that situation will resolve itself soon. The sleep situation seems to be working itself out pretty well; I'm feeling more rested after getting caught up Saturday.
Another 8 miles tomorrow, most likely, then mini-taper for the 5K. I REALLY want to bust this one, and I'll be pretty disappointed if I don't get under 22:00. Wouldn't rule out 21:00, either; that would take 6:45, and I was running around 7:00 pretty comfortably at Firecracker. |
| Night Sleep Time: 8.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 8.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 5.75 | 1.37 | 0.50 | 0.38 | 8.00 |
| Very pleased with this run. Started out as just a boring treadmill GA at 9:22 pace: I wasn't even sure if I was going to run four miles or eight. But I decided to throw in some fartlek -- MP, then some faster surges, then back to MP for the final mile. Handled it very well, even a 200-meter segment at 6:00 pace, which is probably darn near all-out for me right now, and obviously it became an eight-miler. So, with all those surges, the average pace wound up at 8:52. And max HR was 157, with average HR in the low 140s (didn't exactly start and stop the Garmin at the right times, so the average may be a little off). But it was a good workout going into the mini-taper for the 5K. Thank goodness for the TM. It's been either 100 degrees or very close to it for the past five or six days, and it's not cooling off any time soon. I still sweat profusely on the TM, but heatstroke is not an issue. |
| Night Sleep Time: 6.50 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 6.50 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 4.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 4.00 |
| Routine four-miler on the TM. Started at 6.0, slowly advanced to 6.5 during the run (I get bored and want to get it over with; my road runs tend to be the same way). Really no trouble with the legs after back-to-back 8-milers; if I'm gonna get DOMS, it hasn't happened yet. |
| Night Sleep Time: 7.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 7.00 |
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| | Race: |
Dam Night Run, Arkadelphia, AR (3.1 Miles) 00:24:03, Place overall: 144, Place in age division: 15 | | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 6.36 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 3.17 | 9.53 |
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It's race day and ... it's just ridiculously hot. Car thermometer read 86 degrees at 7 a.m. and I didn't even park in direct sunlight.
Took the last two days off to taper for the race. I don't feel much stronger, but at least I got a solid night of sleep last night after several nights of flipflopping and not sleeping much. Got through work yesterday on pure adrenaline and I think the adrenaline ran out about 2:30 in the afternoon. I think I was asleep within five minutes of saying good night to Pam, which is a nice change.
Got up this morning and went down to the state Capitol to run with the Crackheads. It was the usual route up into the Heights; I decided to cut it down to 5 miles, so turned around at Palm Street and retraced my steps. As usual with Tom's courses, the Garmin says it was more than 5. All the stragglers thought I was hauling-A because I was on the way back so early, but I really was running slower than usual (9:40 average including the downhill return leg), I just ran less than most people. Pat left an hour earlier on his 14-miler; his car was in the lot when I got there at 5:30.
So the plan now is to go back to bed for a while, take it easy this afternoon and head for Arkadelphia somewhere around 5:30. Pam wants to attend a going-away party for one of the psychiatrists at her hospital at 5, so I'm not sure how this is going to work out, but she knows I want to be at the race site no later than 7 -- about the time the temperature goes back below 100.
Update after the race. But no sub-21. Or 22. Or 23. Or 24. It was still 95 or so when I got to the site an hour before the scheduled start (notice I said scheduled; more on that later). Got my packet and bib easily enough, then lined up to get a ride up the hill to the start. The vehicle of choice was a lumber yard truck, stacked with 2x12s to serve as benches. That ride scared the HELL out of me. Thirty mph, twisting road, nothing to hold on to. I think my HR got as high on that truck as it did during the race.
So we get up to the top, the truck disgorges us and goes back down for another load (this pattern would continue for the next hour-plus; I got to the top 35 minutes before the scheduled start). Went for a mile jog to loosen up, then stretched. So far so good. Still hot, but the sun's behind the trees so not too bad. Around 10 til, went to line up. Then I see the trucks unloading again up the road. Then again, 15 minutes later. Then again. Finally, with me standing in the mob for 45 minutes in 90-plus degree heat and nothing to drink, they start the race at 8:35 or so.
Despite the large number of people on a narrow road, it was not too difficult to get my pace going. I hit the first mile in just about what I had hoped. But the legs are not feeling good. Is it dehydration, is it tightening up standing on the road, is it the effects of running five miles this morning, all of the above, or something else? Anyway, I keep pushing, for a while. Then the walk monster jumped on me. Then jumped on me again. Then again. I've gone fast enough early that I didn't get passed by too many people even while walking. I can't see my Garmin (it's completely dark by now), but I have a pretty good idea my sub-22 is out the window. Then I realize I'm on the final downhill and pick up the pace, then as I turned off the downhill and into the parking lot where the finish is located, I'm hauling-A and passing all kinds of people. Got to the line and click off my timer: 24:03; gun time is 24:08 or so (no chips here), maxed out at 170 HR, same as at Firecracker.
Mile splits, from the Garmin: 6:58 (good), 7:09 (not too bad), 9:00 (yuck), and the last 0.17 at 5:30 pace (registered as more than race distance, as usual). Official results: 144th among men, 15th in my age group, time 24:04.70.
Obviously, I have to work on my discipline. I give in all to easily to the walk monster, even on flat parts of the course, and the walk monster is not going to get me to Boston. And I should have paid more attention to hydration; I figured it wouldn't be a big deal in a 23-minute race, but it was the hour-plus before the race that got me. And I have to remember that I haven't been training for 5Ks; I haven't done a tempo run in weeks, and haven't done intervals in longer than that. I'm trying to run 5Ks off marathon training, hoping that better endurance would substitute for lack of specific training.
Oh well, my 5K season is over. Next race, a 20K in two months, by which time I'll be up to 60 mpw if training goes well. If I run the same overall pace then as I did tonight (including the walk monster), I'll be very pleased. But there's a lot of work to be done to be able to run 12 miles at 7:36 pace. |
| Night Sleep Time: 7.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 7.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 4.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 4.00 |
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Decided to run tonight to get out the kinks from the 5K. Just a routine 4 on the TM at 9:30 pace. It poured this morning, which only succeeded in making it MORE humid.
For now, I think I'll do a recovery run on Sunday and reduce my other weekly runs except for Saturday to keep my weekly mileage unchanged. That may change when Wednesday starts to become a 14-miler, but for now it works, and we'll see how I tolerate six-day weeks at slightly lesser mileage. |
| Night Sleep Time: 9.50 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 9.50 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 4.00 | 0.00 | 4.00 | 0.00 | 8.00 |
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(Written Tuesday morning -- our DSL, and the phone line that goes with it, crashed Monday evening, right in the middle of my son's online final for his summer school class. No stress around my household from THAT, no sir.)
Back on the treadmill Monday for a tempo run. Warmed up for 2.5 miles, then cranked it up to 7:41 pace for four miles, then warm down for a mile and a half. Which means I ran 5K faster last night on the treadmill than I did in the race Saturday night <shrugs>. The run itself went OK, but then about three hours later the pain arrived in full. The quads were howling. Ibuprofen and stretching controlled it enough to let me get SOME sleep Monday night, but they're definitely still very sore this morning. I guess the second hard 5K in 48 hours was a little more than I was ready for. Pleased with the run overall, though; that's the kind of workout I need to get to my goals. Get that lactate threshold up a little higher.
As the heat wave continues (another 100-degree day expected today), I asked Tom and Hobbit to e-mail me the route for Saturday's run so I can start at 5 a.m., before the rest of the Crackheads. They asked me where I wanted to run, since they haven't decided on a site. I think they'll probably put me on the River Trail loop, which will be the first time I've done the entire loop (about 14 miles) on both sides of the river. Four tonight, nine tomorrow, four Thursday and 15 Saturday would give me 44 miles, my new weekly high. I could just maintain that level, which is equal to the max in Hal Higdon's Intermediate plan, for four months and probably run a decent 26.2 at Memphis, but I'm not interested in decent. I want fast, or at least fast for me, so we'll keep working on the Pfitzinger/Necessary 24/60 plan. |
| Night Sleep Time: 8.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 8.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 4.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 4.00 |
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Four routine miles at 6.3/6.4 on the TM, followed by a refreshing (?) dip in the pool with Pam. The water temperature was about 90, I think, so the cooling factor was zero, and there wasn't even enough breeze to cool you after you got out.
One thing I've noticed. When I first start runs, especially on the TM, my lower abdominals really hurt for the first 400 or so, as if I'd just done about 150 situps. Once I get into the run, or maybe once I get my core muscles activated, the pain subsides, but it's weird to have my abs hurt more than my legs on a run. Yes, I'm still working on core strengthening, including doing planks for 150 seconds. |
| Night Sleep Time: 7.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 7.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 10.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 10.00 |
| I REALLY needed a good run this evening. Work was highly frustrating (an underling who acts completely unprofessionally and tries to undermine me, and I can't do a damn thing about her attitude, because I'm not her supervisor), and I needed to burn off a lot of steam. It took about eight miles to get me to stop cussing her and focusing on the run. The run itself was a standard Pfitz GA -- warm up slow for 3, go to MP plus 20% for 3.5, then up to MP plus 10% for 3.5. Took an hour-33-plus to do it. It was tough, but not horribly so, and my legs feel pretty good now, two hours later. Maybe the busted 5K on Saturday served as a springboard, or a motivator, because I've had good runs this week so far. The real test, though, will be that predawn 15 on Saturday. Which, by the way, will cap off a 45-mile week. Fortunately, it's supposed to cool off -- a little -- for the rest of the week. Doesn't mean it won't be 75 with high humidity at 5 a.m. Saturday, but at least it won't be 80 with high humidity. |
| Night Sleep Time: 7.50 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 7.50 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 4.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 4.00 |
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Wrapped up my best month of training with an easy 4 on the TM. It was one of those evenings where I could have easily come home at 5:30 and gone straight to bed, but no. Went out with the family for a nice dinner, then after letting dinner settle/digest for about 90 minutes, I did my run. Monthly total: 168.89.
Took the bull by the horns a little bit and I think the problem with the underling at work is settled for now. As usual, there was some fault on both sides. Yesterday wore me out, but not because I was stressed over this situation. |
| Night Sleep Time: 6.50 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 6.50 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 15.66 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 15.66 |
| What a way to start a new month of running! Five a.m., temperature above 80, heat index above 85 -- and dawn is still an hour-15 away. Six of us really deranged Crackheads showed up, only to find our meeting spot occupied by a fishing tournament. So we moved a quarter-mile down and set out from there. Pat and I really tried to go out slow, drink a lot, walk occasionally. Pat set out his cooler where we would run by it twice, and we raided it for ice-cold water both times and stopped to rest. And even with all those precautions, and our gels and my four water bottles, we all crashed in the heat. My 15.66 miles took just about three hours. And all of us looked like we needed an IV when we finished. Thus ends my 45.66-mile week, my most ever -- until next week. Now, back to bed. So I finally get back up at 1:30 p.m. It's already 102 degrees outside. That ain't right, y'all. |
| Night Sleep Time: 5.00 | Nap Time: 3.50 | Total Sleep Time: 8.50 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 4.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 4.00 |
| Decided to shuffle the schedule once again -- the Monday run gets pushed to Tuesday, with another recovery run moved into the Monday slot. The Wednesday sorta-long run gets moved to Thursday. Friday is still the off day. We'll see how that works, and if my legs are able to snap back between a Thursday night 10-miler and a Saturday dawn 16-miler. Might end up doing 19 miles back to back some weeks -- 9 on Tuesday, 10 on Wednesday -- or might go back to the Monday-Wednesday split. Anyway, peripherally connected to all that, did four miles of recovery on the TM. Could have done it around noon when it was cloudy, windy and (relatively) cool -- about 90. But I didn't, and by 5 p.m., when we went to see my brother in the hospital, it was back up to 100 degrees. Scott's doing better, but seems to be quite subdued after getting zapped (zapping does tend to do that). Hopefully he'll be discharged by midweek. The legs were a little bit rubbery after yesterday's 15.6, but no real pain. Certainly not as bad as yesterday -- I tried to get out of bed during my post-run nap, and the left hamstring cramped up massively, even worse than during the marathon. I was able to push my knee back out straight which got the cramp to subside, and went back to bed for another two hours' snooze time or so. There was a new twinge tonight, though -- after about a mile, my left heel began to hurt, kind of an intermittent, stabbing type discomfort. I shifted my stride a little bit and it soon went away. Kinda reminded me of the Sever's disease I had as a kid, although not exactly. Is it due to shoes that need to be replaced? Possibly. I bought this pair of shoes in January; not sure how many miles they have, but quite a few. I need to work in a couple more new pairs in the next 2 months, for sure. |
| Night Sleep Time: 8.50 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 8.50 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 3.00 | 0.75 | 0.00 | 0.25 | 4.00 |
| Not quite the routine recovery run. Three miles at 9:22, then 0.75 at MP, then cranked it up to 8.2 mph for the last lap. Felt the need to run somewhat fast tonight, even if not for very long. Tomorrow, nine miles of more of the same. Legs felt fine, no more twinges in the left heel. |
| Night Sleep Time: 8.50 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 8.50 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 6.50 | 1.88 | 0.62 | 0.00 | 9.00 |
| Tonight is what it's supposed to feel like, I think. After 3.25 miles at MP+20%, and roughly 3.25 miles at MP+10%, I decided to let it rip and cranked the TM up to MP. And I was cruisin' at MP -- not straining, not pushing, just maintaining a steady pace without much difficulty. Then for the last lap, I cranked it up another mile an hour and basically sprinted. Capped it off by going over to the parking lot and doing my strides as my cat, Max, stopped by to watch. That pace took its toll a litle bit during the strides, as my right groin felt a little sore -- not strained, just unusual-level-of-exertion sore. Hopefully over the next 17 weeks, that level of exertion will be neither unusual nor cause discomfort. |
| Night Sleep Time: 7.50 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 7.50 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 5.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 5.00 |
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Amazingly, the problem after last night's 9 is not the legs. The legs are fine. What hurts like heck are my abs. It feels like I did 3000 situps. Sometimes the abs are a little sore early in a run, then I settle in. Not tonight. They never did settle in. The best way I could get through the run was to almost feel like I was leaning backwards as I ran; that at least reduced the discomfort. Was I running leaning forward last night? I don't think so, but the abs seem to be telling me otherwise. I think I'm going to ice down my abs tonight (boy, that sounds strange). But with sore abs, no temptation whatsoever to push the pace (but a whole lot of temptation to turn the TM off and leave).
Good night's sleep last night, which helps, and work was not bad. But the abs were sore even at work, which probably should have tipped me off. |
| Night Sleep Time: 8.75 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 8.75 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 10.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 10.00 |
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So here I am in another first -- my first marathon-equivalent in 36 hours during training. Tonight, 10-mile progression run on the TM; Saturday morning, 16 on the road. I am pleased to report that the abdominal discomfort, while not completely gone, is much better, The legs, well, not so much. Not painful, but just lackluster. I was able to maintain a good pace, all right, but the energy wasn't there. Of course, a little session of, uh, marriage maintenance before the run might have had something to do with that :)
Started the run at 10:12 pace and just gradually bumped up the pace, spemding about .75 miles at each level before speeding up again. Finally got it to 8:20-something for the last two miles and left it there. Overall average for the 10 miles, right at 9:00. Since Sub-Four remains Plan B, that's kinda sorta MP-B on average, and the last half of the run was faster than MP-B. Never quite got to MP-A level, though, so I'm not going to count any MP miles on the log.
Saturday will be interesting. In my favor, the weather is supposed to be much cooler, maybe even in the high 60s when we depart pre-dawn. Working against me is an extremely hilly course -- Arts Center to Central High to the Capitol, up Kavanaugh, loop around Cammack Village, back down Kavanaugh and Markham to the River Market, then work back to the Arts Center. After this one, though, Memphis, even with cambered streets, should be a snap. And the last probably 6-7 miles is essentially downhill. Hopefully, I'll handle this 16 a lot better than last Saturday's almost-16. |
| Night Sleep Time: 7.75 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 7.75 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 16.29 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 16.29 |
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All sorts of firsts for me today.
* First 48-mile week.
* First time to run the equivalent of a marathon in a 36-hour period in training.
* First time I put the hammer down in the second half of a long run.
Finally got a break from the weather. It was 71 when we started at 5 a.m., and 73 when I finished two hours, 38 minutes later. Ran with Pat and Anna for the first 3-4 miles, then Anna peeled off. Pat kept trying to slow down, which I went along with for the first 10 miles, but once we headed back down Kavanaugh from Cammack, I just put the hammer down and pushed about four sub-9 miles. Water stop and traffic interrupted the flow, and I also stopped to eat a gel at about 12 miles, but overall very pleased with the run (9:43 avg. even with the blips).
I think I've finally determined that my left foot must be a little bigger than the right, or else my left shoe on the adizero CS pair is smaller than the right. That's the one that's going to give me trouble if I have any trouble during a run. I definitely like the weight savings with those shoes, though, and will just order a 9.5 next time.
No problems with the abs, although abs have not been a problem anyway on the road runs, just the TMs. Maybe my body is telling me to get off the treadmill and go outside, and if we start getting a lot more weather like today, I can do that.
Slept well last night, but a nap would work too. So I'm gonna go take one. |
| Night Sleep Time: 6.50 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 6.50 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 4.31 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 4.31 |
| Pretty much took it easy most of Saturday and today after the 18-miler, helped in large part by the fact it rained a lot. Went to the grocery around 4, then after that decided to get my run in before Pam and Tyler got home from Camden. Only then did I discover that the abs, or the iliopsoas or whatever the heck is hurting, are back with a vengenance. Hurt during the run, hurt a lot more after it. It was still raining, or misting, as I ran, which succeeded only in washing skin oil down into my eyes, so I was basically running blind. Not a comfortable run by any means, between the abs and the eyes. Kept it to a 10:00 pace. Then got home, iced the abs, which helped for a while, did some core strengthening (which probably made it worse), watched a little Olympic swimming, then went to bed. Around 2, the muscles had stiffened again, so I got up to take something and decided to update the blog. I'll ice some more at work, I think, but may h ave to put off the 10-miler I'm supposed to do Monday night. |
| Night Sleep Time: 8.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 8.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 9.37 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.63 | 10.00 |
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After ice and some core work last night, the abs felt better today, both at work and on the treadmill. Took it a little bit easy on the run, in that I extended the warmup period to get up to MP+20%, then kinda cut short the MP+10 period -- but that last one was because I decided to do my strides on the treadmill instead of going outside. So for the last five laps I'd stride 100 meters, jog 100, stride 100, etc. Worked well except the speed control didn't want to slow down from stride a couple of times (seems to happen when my sweat's been flying for 75 minutes or so).
Overall, a good 10-mile run, and the abs were a minimal issue, hardly noticeable at all, especially when I started having to concentrate on maintaining the pace of my legs. I still have to become more willing to slow down on my runs; my tendency to run too fast, which can get me in trouble on race day, also can get me hurt in training. Pat is a good influence in that way, but he won't be with me in Memphis and in a few Saturday runs before then.
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| Night Sleep Time: 8.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 8.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 5.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 5.00 |
| Routine five-miler on the TM. Still some residual soreness in the rectus (recti?), but that's mainly an issue when I sneeze, not when I run. For now, anyway. Just kinda cruised the five at 9:22 pace; took about three miles to really get warmed up, then the legs felt stronger the last five miles. I'm really trying to take advantage of the TM to work on my cadence, pick it up instead of loping, which is my tendency. If I really focus on cadence, I'm in the mid-170s at a slow pace, better at a faster pace. Even got over 180 last week for about four minutes. I know it's not supposed to be that way, your cadence is supposed to be the same at any speed, but it's not for me, at least not on the TM. |
| Night Sleep Time: 7.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 7.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 8.25 | 1.75 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 10.00 |
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I could pretend that the acceleration in today's run was because my legs felt so great. That would be a load of bull. I cranked up the TM because I wanted to finish and get the heck off of there. Period. I was supposed to go get an errand done this afternoon and thus left work an hour early. Couldn't do the errand, and knew it beforehand, but left anyway (I'd seen all my patients), and thus got to start the run an hour early. Not entirely good (it was the warmest in the fitness room I've ever seen), but got it over with and finished before Pam even got home from work (although she DID stay a little late).
Having said that I just wanted to get that run over with, the legs did feel a little better once I got to about MP+5%. Feet didn't feel that great though; wouldn't say they hurt, they just felt weird, almost like I was running barefoot. Abs were mildly bothersome, but again I forgot about them as the run went on and other physical issues intervened.
This puts me at, what, 29 miles for the week, with another 22 or so to go, so on track for a 50-mile week. I remember a year ago, looking at training plans that topped out at maybe 47 mpw and saying to myself "I can't possibly run 47 miles in a week, nor do I want to." Well, here I am -- 48 last week, looks like 51 this week, on my way to 61 in a month or so. |
| Night Sleep Time: 8.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 8.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 5.20 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 5.20 |
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Had dinner with Mom and Dad, so debated waiting until Friday morning to put in this five-miler. As usual, my dislike of the alarm clock won out, and I ran tonight. Went fine, except that I triggered the shutoff switch on the TM somewhere around 0.20 miles (thus this mileage figure is an estimate). Since I wasn't sure exactly how far I'd gone before the TM shut down, I just ran the whole 5.0 once I restarted. Easy pace, went well.
Sitting here watching Michael Phelps go for/win gold medal #6 as I type. I'll never be in the Olympics, or the Trials, may never even attend an Olympics (ATL may have been my last best chance), but I have my own gold medal dangling in front of me. It's called Boston. And I think if I cross the line in Memphis in, say, 3:30:05, I'll have the same feelings of accomplishment and goal-reached as Phelps or hopefully Tyson Gay, Deena Kastor, Amy Yoder Begley or any of my other fellow Razorbacks in Beijing. |
| Night Sleep Time: 7.50 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 7.50 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 16.83 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 16.83 |
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Only 70 degrees this morning, but man, there was zero evaporation. I kept hoping that those clouds would start dropping some rain, but never saw a drop. Saw three screaming sirens though; apparently something happened at or near Big Dam Bridge when I was crossing it on the way back to Allsopp Park, and the sirens soon followed up Rebsamen Park Road. Did somebody jump off? Maybe.
I don't know if the humidity or the state of my hip flexors was the bigger problem (and they may well have been connected). They never loosened up. Since the stretching study ended, I haven't been as diligent about my stretching, but I wasn't doing any stretches of the hip flexors anyway, so I'm not clear as to the connection. I guess I definitely need to identify and do some focused stretching in that area, though; it is becoming a recurring issue.
As tight as the HFs were, though, I got my 17 miles (roughly) done in less than three hours. Not great, but could have been worse. Probably went out a little too fast; I felt comfortable at about 9:00 pace for the first six miles, but that along with the humidity may have caught up with me.
Now nap time, then take my son shopping for school stuff and new New Balances, then watch the women's marathon tonight. Go Deena!!!! Sooieee!!!! |
| Night Sleep Time: 6.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 6.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 5.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 5.00 |
| A routine, pain-free, slow five-miler on the TM. No ill effects from my first 50-mile week, yet, although we'll see how Monday's tempo run goes. |
| Night Sleep Time: 8.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 8.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 5.00 | 0.00 | 5.00 | 0.00 | 10.00 |
| I keep having runs like this, I might start to think 3:30 is actually doable. I started tonight's 10-miler basically dreading it, especially that little five-mile tempo segment in the middle. I didn't feel like my legs were recovered from Saturday's 17. Did the three-mile warmup, then accelerated to LT pace (in this case, 7:35). I kept expecting the flexors to lock up or the hammy to cramp or the abs to explode or something. But they never did. So I just kept going and before I knew it, the five miles were done and I was backing off to recovery pace. Then, even better, the pool outside was (a) empty and (b) actually cool, for once, and I had a nice, refreshing 10-minute swim/underwater stretch before I headed home to finally eat dinner at 9 p.m. |
| Night Sleep Time: 8.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 8.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 5.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 5.00 |
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Not much to report today. Just cruised an easy 5 on the TM. Kinda achy this morning after the LT run last night, but no ill effects on tonight's recovery run.
It occurs to me that my sleep reports on this blog are largely works of fiction, or at best extremely rough estimates. I wake up SO many times every night -- because I'm cold, because I'm hot, because I've been in one position too long, because the cat is crowding me, because Pam just came to bed, because I have to go to the bathroom or get a glass of water -- that merely doing the math between the time I turn off the lights and the time I turn off the alarm clock doesn't tell the true story. |
| Night Sleep Time: 7.50 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 7.50 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 10.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 10.00 |
| Hard time with the 10-miler -- not my legs this time, just general exhaustion, as though I were going to fall asleep on the TM. Actually backed down the pace the last 0.75, but I'd done the Pfitz progression the first 9.25. Then showered, ate and went straight to bed. Hopefully that will recharge the battery somewhat. |
| Night Sleep Time: 7.50 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 7.50 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 5.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 5.00 |
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Pretty routine 5-mile recovery run tonight on the TM as it rained outside (again). Had a little twinge around the left heel, which subsided as the run went on. But there's now a little rough spot or kink in the lining of my right insole in the LRM shoes (which I REALLY need to replace) and it's rubbed a nice blister on my right instep. I'll have to put one of those mondo Bandaids over that puppy before Saturday's 18-miler.
Legs felt good, and I overall felt much better after a solid nine hours of sleep.
Meanwhile, I'm getting ticked off watching the Olympic track team screw around. I blame the coach, who was selected by politics instead of on merit, and then pointedly cut out the single greatest track coach in American history (that would be John McDonnell if you haven't paid attention to American track for the last 30 years). John only has about 40 more national championships than that clown they took from Texas. |
| Night Sleep Time: 9.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 9.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 13.12 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 13.12 |
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OK, I need to figure this out. Either I've pushed too hard, too fast, or my nutrition really is inadequate right now. Or both. Probably both, in fact. But this morning was a struggle. So much so, that I bailed on my run. The 5 a.m. start brought us 75 degrees and 100 percent humidity, and I did not adapt well at all. By the three-mile mark, I could tell it was going to be a really long run, and by 4.5, I told Pat to go on ahead. The legs never did have any life, and finally at 9 miles, I got back reasonably near the starting spot and faced a choice: Turn left and take a seven-mile loop, or turn right and go back to the start. I took about five steps left, then said "don't be stupid" and turned around and went toward the start. Getting back to the start was about 10.5, then I ran a lap around Lake Willastein, left the start area for a Club Manor-Audubon loop, then did another lap around the lake. All of that got my total up to 13.12 -- almost exactly a half-marathon. I actually managed a decent pace on that last lap around the lake, but all in all this morning was a bonk, to be honest. Even though I know cutting the run short this morning was the right thing to do, I'm still torn between that and wanting to slap myself upside the head for being a wuss. But I think I could have/would have gotten into serious trouble if I'd pushed another five miles: injury, or heat stress, or both (why is it that every time we run at Maumelle, the weather is unfavorable -- usually ridiculously humid?) Now the true test of my obsessive-compulsive nature -- will I go out tonight for another five miles to get my 18 for today? Depends on how the legs feel in five or six hours. Maybe I'll run on the TM while I watch the men's marathon tonight. Next week was already scheduled as a back-off week, possibly a week too late for my legs; I think I'm down for 42 with another 13 next Saturday, but I may back that off some more. I'll try to make sure my nutrition improves during the week to restock the glycogen stores.
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| Night Sleep Time: 7.00 | Nap Time: 2.50 | Total Sleep Time: 9.50 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 5.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 5.00 |
| No treadmill for me; they changed the access code on the fitness room and I don't have the new one yet. So I just went down to the river and ran from the I-30 bridge to the skateboard park and back. Very warm and humid, but a nice breeze made it almost tolerable, especially as the sun set. Ran the five in less than 9:00 pace, which seems right now to be what my body wants to run if I'm not conscious of exactly how fast I'm going. Wasn't a great run, but better than yesterday. That blister on my right foot is still bothering me; it keeps getting rubbed. Put a bandage on it for the long run which slipped off within the first three miles (big help there). |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 2.62 | 4.75 | 0.63 | 0.00 | 8.00 |
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Hmm. Starting to develop some theories about last week's case of dead legs. Did I need a stepdown week? Absolutely. But was that the only issue? I doubt it. Seems like I had gotten into a rut -- running the same types of workouts at the same speeds, recovery/GA/MP+20/MP+10. Needed to do something different. So last night I did my whole recovery run at basically MP plus 10, and tonight I turned my GA run into an MP run, first one I've done in quite a while.
I think my nutrition and hydration is still not where it should be, although I'm working on them, so tonight was probably tougher than it should have been. But I managed to hold MP for more than four miles tonight, then did some strides at the end at MP-minus speeds. Then I got in the pool, which felt REALLY good (oh, I got the new fitness center code today, so back to the TM).
Tomorrow I'll do a slow four, then another eight on Wednesday, four more on Thursday, then 13 Saturday before I go to Fayetteville. |
| Night Sleep Time: 7.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 7.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 4.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 4.00 |
| Just cruised four miles on the TM tonight (and retrieved the t-shirt I left up there last night). No muss, no fuss, just put in the miles. It was harder getting through work today (given the unshakable desire, all day, to curl up and take a nap) than running, by a long shot. |
| Night Sleep Time: 5.50 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 5.50 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 6.75 | 1.67 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 8.42 |
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Good progression run tonight, starting from 10:00 pace all the way up to MP-6%. Ran for exactly 72 minutes. Energy level was good, thanks in large part to a huge lunch that had me fighting off the urge to nap all afternoon, but not starving six hours later. Then the pool afterward felt REAL good.
Saturday's a stepdown day, only 13 miles, but we go back to Oucho's -- the West Little Rock Alps. You Utah people on this blog would feel right at home on the Oucho's run -- all they'd need is snow and some chairlifts and you'd have at least a medium difficulty ski run on much of this route. |
| Night Sleep Time: 8.50 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 8.50 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 4.22 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 4.22 |
| Cruised for 40 minutes, which wound up being 4.22 miles. Felt easy, didn't even sweat much (got away with a cotton t-shirt). Legs feel a little stronger after backing off this week; I guess Saturday's 13 will be a better test. Saturday will also test some psychological things I need to work on, like not letting myself take walk breaks. |
| Night Sleep Time: 6.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 6.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 13.23 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 13.23 |
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Now that's more like it. Solid 13-miler today, no walking, good pace, even picked it up the last four miles on an EXTREMELY hilly course. Only three miles run at more than 10:00 pace, all of those on the big hills, and none slower than 10:30.
Which tells me two things: Poor nutrition has been part of my problem, as well as the legs just needed a break after five weeks of continually mounting mileage. Weather was not much help today (75 and humid pretty much throughout), but it didn't clobber me like it did last week, even with a less than satisfactory sleep last night (I don't sleep well anyway, but particularly it seems when I'm going to be getting up at 4 a.m. to run). So weather didn't bother me, lack of sleep didn't hamper me, but lack of fuel in the tank and tired muscles did.
So now for a recovery bar, a shower, a nap, then get up and get ready to drive to Fayetteville. One more reason for the nap: I'll probably get back from Fayetteville around 1:30 or 2 a.m., which makes this a 22-hour day. Good thing I don't have to work Monday. I'll need most of that day to do the laundry and other things I won't get to today or Sunday.
Oh, one more thing: Today pushes me over the 200-mile mark for this month, which I'm pretty sure is a PR for me (even counting high school track, for which I did very little base training; that's probably why I was so mediocre. Oh, if I'd known then...). |
| Night Sleep Time: 5.50 | Nap Time: 2.50 | Total Sleep Time: 8.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 5.00 | 0.00 | 5.00 | 0.00 | 10.00 |
| After (unintentionally) taking Sunday off, right back at it with a 10-miler including five miles at LT (7:35 pace). Felt a little easier than my last tempo run, maybe because my legs are relatively rested after taking two of the last three days off. Warmed up for three, did the LT run, then warmed down for two. Got in the pool afterward, maybe one last time before our apartment management closes the pool for the winter (in September?). Wind starting to kick up a little bit from the outer edges of the Gustav system, which felt pretty nice. Amazing how a 10-mph breeze can improve your mood when there hasn't been much wind for, oh, about two months. Back to work tomorrow for another post-holiday pummeling. Maybe we'll hire a nurse soon and get that load off my desk (I hope). |
| Night Sleep Time: 9.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 9.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 6.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 6.00 |
| Added a mile to the recovery run tonight to make up for part of the run I missed Sunday. I'll add another mile tomorrow and then do a 3-miler Friday night. Routine treadmill run tonight as the rain pelted down outside and the wind blew 30 mph (Gustav is definitely here, and will be for the rest of the week). Had a little interruption at 3.75 miles, but picked up the pace from then on and wound up at about a 9:30 pace for the entire run. Started real late because we had a 21st birthday dinner for my niece -- for me, a small steak and lots of carbs: sweet potato, wild rice and a big dessert. Got pummeled at work even worse than I thought; Ginny's daughter shattered her arm (humerus?) over the weekend and she stayed home, so I had to see 26 patients and handle about 100 refill requests, including some from people Ginny was supposed to see in person today. I sure hope she's back tomorrow... Twelve-miler tomorrow; I'll have to decide how to handle it -- slow and steady, 3:1, progression? I haven't done a 3:1 in a while, so that may be the approach, with the last three miles at MP. |
| Night Sleep Time: 7.50 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 7.50 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 10.00 | 2.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 12.00 |
| About four miles into tonight's run. I wouldn't have bet a plugged nickel on my chances of finishing 12 miles. Or nine miles for that matter. The legs just didn't want to loosen up, I was dripping water like a shower head, and I just didn't feel good. But I kept plugging, and suddenly at about 7-8 miles, I felt better. Had to take a bathroom break at 9 miles, but after that cranked up the TM and actually ran the last two miles at MP and a little faster. Was still a tough run, though, and I may have to reassess the plan to run five tomorrow at three Friday. Might just run six tomorrow and skip Friday, for instance. But chalk one up for perseverance. My wife thought I'd run 11 miles (which is what I told her I was doing) reasonably fast. Even with the MP, I ended up at about a 9:40 average, which is not great. But I finished. |
| Night Sleep Time: 7.50 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 7.50 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 5.50 | 1.13 | 0.50 | 0.00 | 7.13 |
| Good progression run on the TM; started out thinking 5 and wound up running more than 7 in about 64 minutes. Last mile and five-eighths was at MP or faster, and really felt unusually comfortable at that pace. Maybe I need to do more running after getting clobbered at work, just to release the frustration of a bad day. So now it's a day off, then 17 or 18 on Saturday. Forecast is for clear skies and temps in the LOW 60s. I'm going to be practically shivering at those temps -- but boy, it will feel good after about 10 miles. |
| Night Sleep Time: 7.50 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 7.50 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 18.72 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 18.72 |
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The 18 miles is an estimate. Thanks to Gustav, the River Trail was blocked off, although apparently the trail was not completely flooded and you could get through. But I didn't know that until the return trip, and I had already taken the Campbell Lake detour to get around the barricades on the outward half, so I did Campbell Lake again on the inward run. Pat is out of town, but I ran the first five miles with Anna, who was a good companion, if a tad bit slower than Pat. But Anna gave up when we got to the second barricade on Isabella Jo and headed back to Allsopp Park, so I was on my own.
Weather was wonderful -- clear, low 60s. Right around dewpoint, so high humidity and a little fog, but it was so cool it didn't matter.
Ran into a skunk at the base of Big Dam Bridge, but he was running away from me faster than I was running toward him. Then right after I got back on the river trail off Campbell Lake, I saw another skunk, and this one wasn't running. He/she was raising the tail and preparing to let loose a blast. I slowed, gave him a wide berth, and he didn't fire his shot. Thank goodness. I don't think I could have run another 11 miles smelling like skunk.
This was my first 18-miler since the marathon in March. I'd forgotten how hard 18 miles is. You think back and remember you did it, but you don't remember how hard it is. I remember now. The last six miles was brutal. Even so, I think I finished in less than three hours (forgot to charge my Garmin, so had neither a timer nor GPS capability). Mapmyrun says I ran 18.72, but that's purely an estimate because many of the trails are not marked on the map (neither is BDB). But I'll go with that estimate. |
| Night Sleep Time: 7.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 7.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 4.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 4.00 |
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Fairly routine four-miler on the TM. Still a little stiff from the 18-plus on Saturday (plus plenty of time on my feet at the football game), but got through the run without much issue. This week will be very interesting, in that it's my first week with a VO2 max run on Tuesday. Seven tomorrow (I think), then VO2 on Tuesday. I think I should be OK for VO2 (I'm probably better suited for speed runs right now than a marathon), but we shall see. |
| Night Sleep Time: 8.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 8.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 7.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 7.00 |
| Seven miles of progression on the TM. Didn't really get comfortable until I'd bumped it to about a 9:13 pace. Maybe that should tell me something: Run faster, foo'. Had a good night's sleep and not too bad a day at work. Went back and double-checked my VO2 max pace for tomorrow night: 3:31 for the 800-meter intervals. About what I thought. I think I can handle that OK, although the fifth and sixth reps might be interesting. Maybe some real speed work will bump me up to another level; I think I've kinda stagnated as I've built mileage without much major speed work. Jog a 400 in between, I think, which leaves me about a three-mile warmup and roughly two miles cooldown to get the total of 9. |
| Night Sleep Time: 8.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 8.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 6.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 3.00 | 9.00 |
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Tough VO2 run last night. Decided to run on TM even though weather was reasonably cool because it was getting dark and likely to rain; now I wish I'd run outside. Got through the run OK, and hit the goals for the six 800-meter intervals; now (written Wed. morning) I'm paying for it. Think I may have to shuffle my order of runs this week; the Wednesday 12-miler may have to move to Thursday and do a recovery run Wed.
VO2 pace was 3:31; the TM wouldn't exactly go that pace, but it was like 3:31.5 (close enough). |
| Night Sleep Time: 7.50 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 7.50 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 10.00 | 2.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 12.00 |
| Easier progression 12-miler than I expected. I'd initially planned to take it easy, almost a 12-miler recovery run, after my legs ached through most of work today. But I felt more comfortable as I bumped up the pace early, and decided to speed up every mile from 4 to 10. That progression took me to about MP+5%, which is close enough to MP in my book to qualify, then I ran the last 400 at actual GMP. This, of course, takes into consideration the lesson I described earlier in the week: "Run faster, foo' ." Apparently my legs do not take well to an overly leisurely pace. Too slow is as bad as too fast, plus takes a lot longer. Not for nothing did Bill Rodgers say that he could not imagine what the back-of-the-packers went through in running a marathon in five hours. Faster pace equals longer stride length equals less pounding on legs and feet for the same distance. If I had maintained the original pace tonight, I would have been about 10 minutes slower, and probably also would have been even more tired from about 16-1700 more footstrikes. |
| Night Sleep Time: 8.50 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 8.50 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 7.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 7.00 |
| Cruised 7 tonight. Little tougher than usual due to lack of sleep, but again felt better once I got the pace into the low-9 range. Sets me up for a 59-mile week if I can do Saturday's planned 20-miler from the Capitol. Funny how I used to look at those 45-mpw training plans and think those were so outrageous. Now I passed 45 mpw a month or so back. Yikes. Looks like Ike will blow through Arkansas on Sunday after hitting two of my former residences, Galveston and Pearland. The old house on Campeche looks like it will be under water some time Saturday. This weekend is what I feared the whole time I was living down there and never actually went through. Now I'm gone, and they're getting hit. I don't feel guilty for leaving, but I feel bad for the people I worked with and knew who are going through this. Seeing Arkansas hit by a tropical storm, which I HAVE been through, will be interesting. |
| Night Sleep Time: 6.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 6.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 19.72 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 19.72 |
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Words fail me at this point. Bonk. Crash and burn. Where's my IV bag? This run was harder than the marathon last March -- and took almost as long.
Tom called me last night and asked me to run with a woman from Conway named Christina. Fine, I said, and called her to let her know I'd be there in my Prius. Then I went back to bed.
Then I got up at 3 a.m. to watch the Weather Channel. Yes, I hated living in Galveston, but it was my home for 11 years, and I wanted to get some idea what Ike was doing to that little island. At that point, the eye was over the San Luis Hotel -- a place I drove by twice a day for the bulk of those 11 years. Then the south eyewall came on shore. So I made breakfast and ate while I watched the report, and headed for the Capitol for the run.
I knew it was going to be warm and muggy, and it was -- maybe the warmest Saturday morning all summer, and not a hint of wind. Christina and I set out at a decent pace, and it went OK for the first six miles or so. Actually, I was still OK after 11. I tried to keep the pace moderate, took an occasional rest and drank a lot. Christina was getting blisters, so we stopped at the Capitol at mile 11 so she could check her feet. She thought she could continue, and we did. But I soon realized that my legs pretty much shut down during that break. Christina turned around at 13.5 to go back to the Capitol to finish her 16 miles, and I was on my own. And walking. And walking. I'd try to run, and couldn't manage a decent pace. My legs weren't cramping -- yet -- but they hurt like hell. The wind had picked up some, which made it more comfortable from a heat standpoint, but too late to help with my dehydration or hyponatermia or whatever it was. So I'd jog a little, walk a lot. Down Cedar Hill, along Riverfront, up Dillard's Hill, down Markham. Still walking. Tried to jog the last mile, and managed -- sorta, run 200 meters, walk some more, run 100 meters. Did manage to jog the last two blocks, and finished in roughly 4:20.
Finished, drank everything I could get my hands on, stopped and got a cold drink on the way home, got chocolate milk when I walked in the door, did an ice bath, then went to bed -- and started cramping. Not horrible cramps, certainly not what I had in March, but cramps nonetheless. Managed to find a comfortable position to lie where I didn't cramp, and got some rest.
Think I'll definitely have to revise my plans for next week unless the legs respond quickly -- and need to get more carbs, more fluids and more sodium in my diet for a while (like the next three months). I got my PR week, but I paid for it. |
| Night Sleep Time: 4.25 | Nap Time: 2.00 | Total Sleep Time: 6.25 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 5.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 5.00 |
| Routine 5-miler. Legs felt much better than I expected after a good night's sleep; barely any ache at all. Try to do another 20 Sunday after I get back from Fedvul, and hope the weather cooperates as expected. |
| Night Sleep Time: 9.50 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 9.50 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 6.62 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.38 | 7.00 |
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Seven-mile progression run capped off by six 100-m strides. Strides felt nice and smooth at 8+ mph. Probably started out too slow, but legs were a little achy and I thought it prudent to ease into the run. By the time I got to the strides, I was running at 7.2, which is, what, 8:25 pace or so.
My week's mileage is going to be skewed by the fact that I won't be running my LR on Saturday. I may do a quick run Friday night just so I don't take off two straight days; then again, two days off might be just the ticket before another 20 on Sunday. Then I'll probably take the rest of next week fairly easy before running the 20K on the 27th. |
| Night Sleep Time: 7.50 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 7.50 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 7.20 | 0.00 | 0.80 | 0.00 | 8.00 |
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So this was supposed to be a good, hard 11-mile run with six miles of LT. Uh, no. About a half mile into the tempo portion, I started getting new twinges I'd never had before -- right groin and inner thigh. Quickly decided five more miles of tempo, even if doable, was not worth a big muscle pull or something similar, and shut it down. And the 11-miler became basically an 8-mile jog.
Another new pain I need to figure out. Low on my left calf, posteriorly. Pretty sure this one is my soleus. It responds when I do a soleus stretch, but it continues to ache. Doesn't hurt when I run, but it does afterward (especially the next morning).
So this stuff brings into question the planned 20K next weekend. Do I need to push that hard? The 20K basically replaces a scheduled marathon pace run, so if I'm going to stick to the schedule, I might as well run it. Or do I just want to back off to a 16-miler? Assess for the rest of this week, I guess, and I can just sign up later. |
| Night Sleep Time: 8.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 8.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 3.00 | 0.00 | 4.00 | 0.00 | 7.00 |
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Felt a lot better today, even though work was considerably more demanding. So I turned a scheduled 4-mile GA into a 7-mile tempo run. The right groin twinge of last night reappeared during the warmup run, but only for a few seconds, and never returned. If it had acted up, I would have shut down the tempo run just like last night. Instead, I did a little progression on the tempo (as I took the initial pace down just a tad because of last night's twinges) -- 0.8 miles at 8:00 pace, 0.8 at 7:53 pace, 0.4 at 7:47 pace, 1.0 at 7:41 pace, then a half-mile jog, then 1.0 at 7:30 pace.
So now I'm caught up on my training schedule for the week, with the exception that I've done 4.8 miles of LT instead of 6.0. I guess I could throw 1.2 miles of LT into tomorrow night's MLR. Or not. We'll see how I feel. Then I probably need to do a quick 5 Friday night so that my two-week total will come out right, since I'm doing Saturday's LR on Sunday (that 5 will replace the Sunday recovery run). Five on Friday would bring this week's total to 38, which leads me to the topic of next week.
I've still gotta figure out how to adjust next week to allow me to have some kind of decent run on the 27th at Benton (I mailed in my registration today). I gotta have some kind of taper. The whole purpose of Benton is to prove to myself that my training enables me to hold goal pace for a prolonged period, and thus build my confidence, and I can't do that with dead legs.
Currently the schedule calls for 9 with strides on Monday, 6 on Tuesday, 13 on Wednesday, 5 on Thursday with strides, then 16 with 12 at MP on Saturday. Maybe 5 on Monday (recovery from Sunday), 8 on Tuesday, 6 on Wednesday with strides, then the 20K with some warmup and cooldown. With 20 on Sunday, that's still 53-55 miles in the week, depending on how much warmup-cooldown I do. Hard to imagine a 55-mile week including some taper, but that what I have. Besides, my biggest running week to date before I got into this plan was a taper week -- four light jogs and a marathon, totaling roughly 38.5 miles.
Then I need to adjust the following week to allow some recovery time from Benton. Current schedule: 5-9(VO2)-3-11-7-off-13. Maybe 5-5-9(VO2)-7-11-off-13 would be adequate. Or maybe 5-5-5-9-11-off-13. Or just play it by ear and how my legs feel. |
| Night Sleep Time: 7.50 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 7.50 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 12.51 | 0.60 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 13.11 |
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Sometimes I really surprise myself. Didn't sleep worth a darn last night, pretty worn out when I got home from work, had to cook dinner because Pam went to visit a friend, could have easily cooked and gone to bed. Instead I waited my hour or so for dinner to settle, then went for a little 13-mile run. And darn if I didn't run it faster than any 13 I've ever run, including the first half of Little Rock.
I got off to a stutter-start, running 0.11 miles before realizing I needed to stretch and, uh, do some other stuff. Once I got that taken care of, I got back on the TM and was going to finish the last 12.89. Then I realized if I did the full 13 after the interruption, that would give me a half-mary -- 13.11. So I did. As I usually do on TM runs, I did it in progression format, starting at 9:40 pace and working my way up. I ran the last two laps at MP, but most of the second half of the run was at 9:05 and 8:57 pace. Wound up finishing in 2:02:10, including the minute-10 of the stutter start, a 9:19 average. Not bad for being tired before I started. Now I'm REALLY tired. Off to bed. |
| Night Sleep Time: 5.50 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 5.50 |
| |
| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 4.12 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 4.12 |
| Quick four miles around the neighborhood at 5 a.m. before leaving for the football game. Through the mall parking lot, down McCain to Fairway, up Fairway through Somers, then take the McClanahan loop and back to the hacienda. Left soleus is a little achy, and it was misting and thus humid, but not a long enough run to get into any heat problems. Just basically wanted to shake out the kinks before going to Fayetteville -- and, OCD here, not take off two days in a row. Still plan 20 tomorrow. |
| Night Sleep Time: 7.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 7.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 17.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 17.00 |
| About 17 this morning. I think. Not sure. Tom was supposed to send me a route this week, and didn't. I tried to tweak one I found on the LRRC website, and I thought I'd added at least a couple of miles to what was listed as a 16-mile route. But I measured it in the car after I finished and got 16.8 or some such. Not sure I got all the twists and turns right, though, so I'm rounding off to 17. It was a better run than last weekend; cut way back on the breaks and didn't feel like I needed an IV when I finished (a breeze and 10 degrees cooler helped). Don't really mind that I may not have done 20; I think I need a bit of a break anyway. So I'll taper this week for the 20K on Saturday, and try to get this left soleus thing under control. I don't think it really bothered me much today, but not sure what it will do Saturday when I'm actually trying to race. So taper and stretch and ibu and ice and maybe some ultrasound, and we'll see if it's better in six days. Fortunately, yesterday's sunburn didn't bother me either, thanks to a good bit of cloud cover. |
| Night Sleep Time: 7.50 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 7.50 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 3.00 | 5.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 8.00 |
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Back on the run tonight after taking last night off. I had planned at least a recovery run last night, but I had to go fill a pump at Baptist and then my son had an induction ceremony for the National Honor Society starting at 7. Which meant no time for dinner, or a run, before the ceremony. So, after the ceremony, I chose dinner and bed over a run. Chalk it up to my taper for the 20K.
So tonight, I decide to do my first extended MP run in quite some time, kinda practicing for Saturday. Warmed up with 2 miles, then ran 5 at 7:53 pace, then cooled off with a mile. Felt comfortable, probably more comfortable in the last two miles. Hopefully I can stretch that out for another 7.4 Saturday morning. But this run was a confidence builder, not only for Saturday but for December -- I can hold a sub-8 pace for at least five miles. |
| Night Sleep Time: 7.75 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 7.75 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 5.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 5.00 |
| One more reminder that I do better at a decent pace than at a semi-jog (the "Run faster, foo'" rule). Did a 5-mile progression run, my last run at any speed before the race, and felt much better once I got warmed up and got up to about a 9:00 pace. Ended up at MP+10, maybe a little faster, over the last 0.75. Getting pummeled at work, as Ginny is having early contractions and has stayed home all week. Which makes me wonder what it's going to be like once she's on full maternity leave (which for all I know, may have begun this week). Am I going to have the strength to train like I need to train and work that hard every day? We shall see. Anyway, a brief RR tomorrow and then the 20K. |
| Night Sleep Time: 6.50 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 6.50 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 4.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 4.00 |
| Pure tape-type easy job, four miles at 10:22 pace. No muss, no fuss, little sweat. |
| Night Sleep Time: 7.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 7.00 |
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| | Race: |
Arkansas 20K (12.43 Miles) 01:42:38, Place overall: 26, Place in age division: 23 | | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 4.60 | 12.44 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 17.04 |
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Hilly, out and back course. My first 20K, or anything in the half-marathon ballpark, so I'm not quite sure what to expect. I know the first/last two miles are quite hilly, because I drove in over that part of the course. Not sure about the other 4.2. Temps around 60 as we get started, low humidity, hint of a wind, zero clouds, so favorable weather (at least as compared to what we've lived through since, oh, mid-May around here).
My approach for this one is as the long MP run required in Pfitzinger 24/55, so I settle in at a smidge under 8:00 pace. The first two miles are net downhill and, as it turns out, miles 3-4 are flat, so I settle in at a good pace. I have a couple of guys to run with at my pace (no guarantee considering there are only about 100 people entered and most of them are already behind me). Cross over Interstate 30 at 2 miles, hit the flat section, and I'm cruising. Ah, but then we come back to the I-30 frontage road just as the hills begin. Up and down for two miles, then get to the turnaround. Look at my watch: I'm almost two minutes under my 10K PR. Very encouraging. Gulp down some Gatorade and head back through those hills. Still maintaining a good pace, but it's taking its toll. By the aid station at about 8.2, I'm starting to drag. The pace is just not there even on the flat section; those 8-minute miles are now 9-minute miles. Back over the freeway and back into downtown Benton, where I'm going UP those rolling hills. I'm starting to cuss myself, don't be such a wimp, etc. And for the last 1.25 miles, I'm back under GMP.
With such a small field, I was able to estimate that I was in 24th place at the turnaround (counted 23 people headed the other way). I got passed by four people on the inward 10K, didn't pass anyone, but that still leaves me in 28th unofficially (we'll see if the official results agree when they're posted). When I hit the finish, the digital clock reads 1:42:39. No chip time, but then with such a small field I didn't need a chip time. Not quite GMP, but still 8:15 average -- and the average of BOTH 10Ks was less than my previous 10K PR. I'll cut myself a little slack for a hilly course, and it's a learning experience to try to run that kind of pace for 100 minutes. In four weeks, a half-mary, and then six weeks after that, the real thing. (Official results say 26th in 1:42:38.07).
Oh, there was also a marathon in Benton this morning. I arrived 1:15 early for my race to make sure I didn't run into marathon runners, and saw a guy warming up as I arrived who had a good, efficient, rapid-turnover, shuffle-type gait. I said "that guy looks like a marathoner." Fast forward three-plus hours, I'm leaving after my race, no marathoners had finished yet, and the first marathoner I see on the course is that same guy. Very hilly course for the full 26.2, I'm told, and it's a very small field (only 37 finishers last year), so not likely to have elite runners; thus, a slow pace. Last year's winner ran 3:13:25. Looked like this guy was on about that same kind of pace.
So I've already topped my monthly PR this month with three days left. Hard to tell what October is going to bring, since I know I'm going to taper again for the half in Conway on the 25th; just don't know how much (although this week's taper seemed to be OK, with the exception of running 17 on Sunday instead of Saturday). One 20-miler in October, one more four weeks out from the race, then back down from there. One advantage of this 24-week plan -- it allows me time to tweak, taper a little more, even taper for these two races, and still get in semi-adequate preparation.
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| Night Sleep Time: 7.50 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 7.50 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 5.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 5.00 |
| Weird night's sleep. In bed just after 9, asleep by 9:30, awake at 11:30, couldn't go back to sleep thinking about my race, got on the computer, up until 2, went back to bed, still couldn't sleep (brain still wired, cold, and sore). So I took a hot bath at 2:45, which addressed all three issues well enough that I fell asleep pretty quickly. Then I slept until 9 when Max the cat woke me up. Pam the wife was in Camden visiting her friend Debbie, so she was not involved in all this. Still no official results on the 20K, unless they were posted within the last hour. Nope, I checked; still not there. One of those five-mile recovery runs where the legs were fine but the rest of me was half asleep. I think sometimes I could snooze while running, and maybe have from time to time. Kept the pace around 10:00 to give the legs a little break. I'll do another easy run tomorrow to recover from the 20K before I get back into GA runs and strides and stuff. Do have one more race result from this weekend. My long-run partner Pat was doing the Omaha Marathon this morning as basically a training run before Detroit next month. Pat ran a 4:13:44 on his training run. Attaway Pat! If he can do better than that in Detroit, more power to him. Now I have one more target to shoot for -- if I can't break 4, I still have to beat Pat. Unless he breaks 4 in Detroit, which he just might. |
| Night Sleep Time: 8.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 8.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 7.50 | 0.51 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 8.01 |
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Having been duly chastised by Coach Sasha, tonight's run changed from five miles recovery to eight miles GA-progression, winding up at MP for the last half-mile. (Sasha didn't suggest a progression run; what he did suggest is more miles, less speedwork). I threw in the progression on my own. I've got ten weeks to get ready for a BQ, and if more miles are the ticket, then I'll do more miles. Tuesday night was supposed to be a nine-mile run with VO2 intervals. I'll probably do 11, no intervals, but maybe some strides.
Anyway, the run went well. I again seemed to get more comfortable as the pace increased; whether that's because I finally got warmed up or just run better at a more aggressive pace (or both) is uncertain. The weird distance is because the TM refused to let me shut it down when I finished the run for a few seconds, hence an extra .01 mile.
Now I need to find time to sit down and tweak the schedule for the next few weeks to reflect the change from speedwork to miles. Under pure Pfitz, this is when the heavy speedwork starts. |
| Night Sleep Time: 7.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 7.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 10.35 | 0.00 | 0.65 | 0.00 | 11.00 |
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Scrapped the VO2 max run tonight in favor of more miles, with strides thrown in at the end so my legs don't forget how to move fast. :) Ran the 11 miles in almost the exact time Saturday's 12.4 took me, including strides and recovery jogs at the end.
September ends up with a training PR of 232 miles. I figure October will be closer to 300 before I start the prerace back-off. Intuitively, I know I need more miles; what I have to do is spice up the extra mileage to prevent complete boredom. I figure I'll leave in some of the speedwork in October just to add variety, although I have to be careful that the variety doesn't put me on the DL. To work this hard, this long, and get a stress fracture in late October would REALLY suck. Thus, I'll really have to be aware of what my legs are trying to tell me about the load I put on them in the next seven pre-taper weeks. |
| Night Sleep Time: 7.75 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 7.75 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 8.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 8.00 |
| Eight-mile progression run, ending the last two miles at MP + 6%, roughly. Averaged 9:05 for the whole run. Legs felt pretty good overall. |
| Night Sleep Time: 7.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 7.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 4.64 | 2.25 | 0.75 | 0.38 | 8.02 |
| Looked at the schedule tonight: ho-hum, another eight. Hmm, what can I do to spice this up?One word: Fartlek. So I warmed up for about a mile, then started throwing in bursts. Two laps. Three laps, accelerating into four laps even faster. A few 200 m strides thrown in, then the last mile and a half at about GMP. Which meant a very interesting run, no boredom, and less than 69 minutes needed to cover eight miles. And the legs feel better now than they would have if I had jogged the eight in 78 to 80 minutes. I think fartlek is going to be a key for me in the next nine weeks as I try to boost my volume and keep things interesting at the same time, plus improve my speed without injury or burnout. |
| Night Sleep Time: 8.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 8.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 14.14 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 14.14 |
| Back with the Crackheads this morning, all 150 or so (first day of the LRM training schedule). Pat was back too, and I ran with him for the first four miles at a nice slow pace. Picked it up from there, and finished my 14 miles at a nice 9:25 clip, even with a couple of breaks. Weather was great -- about 60, a little bit of breeze, clouds. Didn't even go to the third headband until the final two miles, and probably didn't have to do that. I definitely feel stronger now that I'm not getting crushed by the heat and humidity on every run. If the goal of running Benton was to build my confidence, well, mission accomplished. It's just a matter of taking it to the house now over the last nine weeks and getting ready to hammer Memphis. Off for a shower and a nap now. Might even wake up and watch the football game. Or might not. |
| Night Sleep Time: 6.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 6.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 7.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 7.00 |
| Got caught up on some sleep, a big pasta lunch, then a 7-mile recovery run. Wore the HRM for the first time in quite a while to see how I did on a recovery run; average HR was only 130 at sub-10 pace. Guess the ol ticker shows my improving fitness as well. |
| Night Sleep Time: 10.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 10.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 8.62 | 0.00 | 0.38 | 0.00 | 9.00 |
| Good, hard progression run tonight with strides tacked on at the end. Averaged a little under 9:00 pace for the whole run. So far, getting crunched at work has not affected my training. Hope that trend continues. |
| Night Sleep Time: 8.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 8.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 5.00 | 0.00 | 7.00 | 0.00 | 12.00 |
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Interesting day for both running and my cellphone (and the two are linked): Left the phone at the fitness center last night after my run and didn't realize it until after 10 p.m., when it was pouring AND the center was closed for the evening. Had to go retrieve the phone after 8 a.m., which made me slightly late for work. Went back to run tonight after dinner, when it was again pouring. During the run -- a 12-miler including seven miles of LT work at 7:35 pace -- my water bottle apparently sloshed significantly from the treadmill vibration and the phone, parked behind it in the treadmill slot, musta shorted out. So now I have a nonfunctioning cell, two more nights of call, blah blah. I hate carrying a cell, always have, but unfortunately, I need one.
The tempo run went better than I thought it might. Warmed up for three miles, cranked it up to 7.9. After about 2.5 miles at LT pace, the treadmill decided to quit (OK, I might have knocked the safety key out of place with my finger). Started it back up, got to the halfway point of the tempo run, then needed to make a pitstop. After that little break, warmed up again for two laps and then did the second 3.5 miles more easily than I did the first half, then jogged a mile and a half to complete the 12. Because of the stops and starts, not sure exactly how long it took me to do the 12, but I know the tempo part was about 53 minutes. So now I'm well on my way to a 68- or 69-mile week. (See that, Sasha?)
The remaining question for the week is will I do the 21-miler Saturday night or Sunday morning. The time I get back to town Saturday will decide that in part. So will how I feel, the weather, and the fact that Sunday is Pam's birthday. But I'm gonna run 21 somewhere in there. |
| Night Sleep Time: 8.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 8.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 8.00 | 1.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 9.00 |
| Another nine miles of fartlek tonight on the old TM (kept the cellphone well away from any possible sloshing water bottles; my cellphone remains quite dead, and I took Pam's just in case I got paged through the home phone). Ended up with just under 9:00 pace for the nine after all the fartleking. Also spent the last mile or so fighting the urge to toss most of the evening meal (this is why I wait an hour and a half to run after eating if I'm using the old noodle, but didn't have time to wait that long tonight). Twelve tomorrow, probably 8 Friday, Fayetteville on Saturday and 21 Sunday. The two-week total will be what it should be, but, hey, I guess I can calculate a Monday-Sunday week to get my 70-mile total. Now off to bed to make up for all that tossing and turning last night. |
| Night Sleep Time: 6.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 6.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 11.38 | 1.00 | 0.62 | 0.00 | 13.00 |
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Proving once again my high threshold of boredom, or my unwillingness to run outdoors at night and get either mugged or run over, I set out on a 13-mile treadmill run. Yes, nearly two hours on the TM, which consisted of half of the ABC news, the local news, Wheel of Fortune, and a quarter and a half of Wake Forest-Clemson. Fortunately, I had control of the TV remote. If I had been forced to watch, say, Hannah Montana for two hours, I might have intentionally run out onto the freeway.
Pfitz style progression run, with the last four miles at 8:41 pace, and some fartlek thrown in during the early miles just because I was bored out of my skull on the damn treadmill. Not sure of the exact time, because the safety key again got knocked loose at the 8.5 mile mark, but it was somewhere around 1:55, I think. I know the last 4.5 miles took 39:30.
Oh, lest you think I worry too much about running outside at night, may I point out that there have been numerous shootings, fatal and otherwise, in the parking lot of the mall which borders my apartment complex. Not all of those shootings have been at night, but you get the idea. I do not live in the safest neighborhood in Central Arkansas, put it that way. |
| Night Sleep Time: 7.50 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 7.50 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 6.00 | 0.50 | 0.50 | 0.00 | 7.00 |
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Another 7 tonight at about 8:45 average pace. No biggie. Until I looked at my written log after I finished. Fourteen miles last Saturday, then 57 miles Sunday-Friday. That, ladies and germs, is a 71-mile week. Or almost the distance from my home now to the house where I grew up. If you'd told me 15 months ago, when I started running, that I'd ever do 70 miles in a week, I would have thought you were completely nuts.
One more thing. I'm really starting to believe that a BQ can actually happen. I can run eight minute miles when I'm tired and sore. I cranked up tonight to sub-MP pace for the last mile or so after 13 last night, after not much sleep and after a very difficult, draining day at work. And after 69 miles since last Saturday, too.
What's it going to be like when I get back into downtown Memphis, late on the morning of December 6? Am I going to have a chance to get under 3:31? Am I going to be in great shape and cruising, or have to put the hammer down for the last mile, or just have a good time in range but not a BQ? And what am I going to feel like when I enter AutoZone Park to finish the race? Exhilaration, disappointment, or just exhaustion? |
| Night Sleep Time: 5.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 5.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 |
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No running today, just hiking all over the campus in Fayetteville with Tyler. He's really enthusiastic about college, which I'm glad to see, but the walking on campus is really going to be problematic. I think at the very least he's gonna need a bicycle to get around; his feet will not tolerate the amount of walking he'd need to do, even living on campus and riding the bus whenever possible. He really likes the new Maple Hill dorm as well, which has suites and semi-private bathrooms (shared with suitemates not the whole wing). Which is OK with me, although quite expensive compared to other dorms. The privacy is the big issue.
On my part, I discovered that even with the amount of running I do (or perhaps in part BECAUSE of the amount of recent training), hiking those hills on campus wasn't particularly easy for me either. Which didn't come as a huge surprise. |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 21.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 21.00 |
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Pam's birthday, but needed to get in the long run anyway. So I drove over to run the route Tom e-mailed me, and realized almost immediately that I forgot my gels. Came up with a plan, though, and set out. After about six miles, I called Tyler on his cell (which woke him up, of course) and asked him to bring a couple of gels and meet me in Burns Park. He got there a little quicker than I expected, so we moved the meeting spot from the boat ramp to the concrete bridge. Sure enough, there he was in his van, in his housecoat, with my gels. Thanked him and told him to go home and go back to bed. Which he did.
OK, back from birthday lunch, where we ran into Scotty Thurman and Corliss Williamson, stars of the 1994 national championship basketball team, but that's another story. Back to the run.
So I'm moving along at a decent clip but not overdoing it, kinda cruising. Took a gel at nine miles, took another one at about 15. Then I get to about 18 and, gel or no gel, the gas tank needle is bouncing on E. I kept going pretty well, probably better than any other long run I've ever done, but the legs were dead. Then I got to the top of the hill leading back down to the Surgical Hospital, my starting point, and I'm running dead into about a 15-mph wind. I had forgotten how much trouble I used to have in my long-ago track career running into the wind; the wind around here is so rarely strong enough to be a factor. But today it was, especially after I'd already run 20 miles. But I chugged it home anyway and finished the run in just a couple of minutes over GMT (goal marathon time). Pfitz said a good 22-mile long run should take you just about as long as GMT. I didn't do 25, but I did 21 and probably some change, depending on how accurate the Garmin is.
Overall, definitely my best LR ever. Another source of confidence with 55 days to go to Memphis. Not perfect, but then yesterday wasn't really a rest day with that hike around Fayetteville, so if I'm supposed to do my LR with tired legs, today should qualify. And I have decided that for right now (maybe carb loading and tapering will fix this), my wall isn't at 20 miles, it's at 18. |
| Night Sleep Time: 0.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 0.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 7.62 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.38 | 8.00 |
| Pretty routine 8 on the TM tonight. Cruised in the mid-9 range, then threw in seven strides at the end. Surprisingly little aftereffect from yesterday's 21. By the way, last week's post on why I'd rather do TM runs than go outside could have easily been misinterpreted. There is danger around here for runners, IMO, but it's not from flying bullets, it's from flying cars driven by people who aren't looking for runners. The hills and curves around here look more like a rural area, but the traffic level isn't rural. I'd much rather run in downtown Little Rock at 5 a.m., or even the Central High neighborhood which is frankly semi-ghetto, than run on these blind curves in North Little Rock at 8 p.m. And the trusty blinky light isn't that much help. |
| Night Sleep Time: 8.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 8.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 7.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 7.00 |
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The aftereffects of the 21 miles on Sunday hit today, I think. Decided to swap days and run Wednesday's 7-miler today, and quickly decided that was a good choice. The soleus was really barking on the right leg (first time I've had any soreness there) and it took extra stretching plus about 2.5 miles to get it loose. Nothing wrong with tonight's run, just a routine 7-mile recovery run ramping up to just under 9:00 pace.
Now at 53 and counting, with 11 or so miles tomorrow. |
| Night Sleep Time: 7.50 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 7.50 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 9.75 | 1.25 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 11.00 |
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Hauled a new pair of Asics Gels out of the box tonight and broke them in on the treadmill -- 11 miles. Not top of the line Asics, but Gels nonetheless, feel pretty good on my feet and PLENTY OF TOEBOX ROOM. I also found a shoe that's a candidate for my Memphis race shoe, a good lightweight adidas model. I'll probably go get a pair in 2-3 weeks in time to get a couple of good runs in them before the race.
Good progression run in the new shoes, ramping up to MP + 6%, then MP, and finally MP plus for the last 400 meters. Finished up in about 98:20 for the 11 miles. No blisters, even though the sock drawer was kinda bare of running socks due to lack of laundry diligence.
Put in my entry tonight for the half-marathon in Conway on the 25th. I'll be able to run, then go back to NLR, shower, rest up a bit and then go to Fayetteville for the football game, and we'll spend the night up there afterward (I think driving three hours back home beginning at 11 p.m. might be a bit much after a 13.1 and a football game). |
| Night Sleep Time: 7.50 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 7.50 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 5.25 | 1.25 | 0.50 | 0.00 | 7.00 |
| Another shopping trip tonight, for good, cushioned running socks to replace the pairs that hundreds of miles (and unattended toenails) have shredded. Then a good 7 on the TM, 3/1 progression, Arthur Lydiard style. Had intended to run the final 1.75 at GMP, but felt so good that I cranked up the final 0.50 to well below GMP, probably somewhere between LT pace and VO2 max. Final average pace, 8:42ish. That'll work. I feel like the mileage base is now built to where I can really pound some speedwork in the next seven weeks and accomplish something. First test, of course, is the half in Conway in nine days. I think I'll do the VO2 max workout Monday, push it pretty hard, then ease down the rest of the week until the race. |
| Night Sleep Time: 7.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 7.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 18.18 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 18.18 |
| Got a good night's sleep before I headed out to join the Crackheads. Unfortunately, I think I left my legs in bed. Took for-freaking-EVER to get going. Really didn't get going until 11 miles or so, when the only other Crackhead doing 18 miles caught up with and passed me. I pulled back up beside her and we ran the last six miles or so together, which REALLY helped (so did the extensive downhill in that section, but I ran well with her after the downhill ended). Yet another reason to hook up with the pace bunnies in Memphis: I need someone to run with, talk to, distract me from the pain in my legs, etc. Ended up taking nearly 3:13 to do 18.2, which is slower than I had planned but a lot faster than I feared when I was stretching my hip flexors at the time Christy passed me on Kavanaugh. But I think (and Coach Hobbit agrees) that I've gotten to a back-off point. I need to cut the mileage or I'm going to get hurt -- not a good option with 49 days to go. This week was a bit of a backoff anyway, I'm gonna cut it a few more miles. Probably will still do Conway, but may skip or reduce the VO2 max run on Monday. |
| Night Sleep Time: 8.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 8.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 5.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 5.00 |
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Hmm, thought I'd posted a blog entry for Sunday earlier, but I sure don't see it. Anyway... routine 5-miler on the TM. Pretty well recovered from Saturday's 18, I thought. Just routine recovery miles.
However, with 48 days to go, paranoia's setting in. Is that twinge in the lower right leg just a little soleus soreness, or is it a tibial stress fracture? Let's see, doesn't hurt all the time, putting weight on it doesn't add to the pain, pain's maybe a 3/10; that ain't no SFX. But still... |
| Night Sleep Time: 8.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 8.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 4.89 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 3.11 | 8.00 |
| First VO2 max run in a really long time. I was a little apprehensive -- maybe too soon after an 18-miler, a few twinges in the right leg, plus I really don't trust myself on the treadmill at a high speed: one stumble and there's a big plate glass window two feet behind the TM. But off I went tonight. Warmed up for 2.5 miles (during which the safety key disconnected itself once), then started on 1000 meters repetitions at 7:03 pace, with 600-meter jogs in betweem. Safety key came out again during a rep, and almost came out another time (if I ever see who's wrapping the cord up so tight on that safety key, I may garrot them). But managed to get all my reps in at the prescribed pace, no crashes through the plate glass, and the twinges behaved themselves. At least for now; we'll see how the LRE feels in the morning. |
| Night Sleep Time: 7.50 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 7.50 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 6.25 | 1.75 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 8.00 |
| A little fartlek at GMP thrown into tonight's 8-miler. Ended up with 1.75 at GMP in a 73-minute run. This speedwork continues to get easier. Will it get easy enough? Stay tuned, Saturday and six weeks from Saturday. I can say one thing: I learned a long time ago that no matter how much my wife loves Mexican food, and she could eat it at least 10 meals a week, I have to say no, or I pay for it. But I keep ignoring that often-reinforced lesson. Ignored it again tonight, and it almost forced me not to run (for reasons I think you can deduce). |
| Night Sleep Time: 8.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 8.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 5.50 | 0.50 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 6.00 |
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Six miles progression tonight (TM as usual). Started off at 10:00 pace but ran the last 0.5 at GMP and a smidge faster. Once again, I feel more comfortable at higher speeds. Is that because I am more comfortable or because I run faster once I'm warmed up? Dunno.
Been reading with interest the stories out of San Francisco about the fastest finisher in the Nike Women's Marathon who was not declared the winner because she didn't start with the elite group. Nike decided to name her "a" winner and also decided to eliminate the separate start for the elites. Sounds like this woman must have had the race of her life, but you wonder why, if she even dreamed she had that kind of ability, she didn't start with the elites. I can't remember exactly, but I don't think it's like she ran a 30-minute PR or something. Oh well.
Speaking of which, I registered for Memphis last night and listed my projected finishing time at 3:35. Hopefully that extra five minutes doesn't get me seeded into a later wave where I can't run with the 3:30 pace bunnies. I also listed my age on race day as 47, which was my second case of cerebral flatus of the application process. This Sunday is the day I'm no longer 47, if you're scoring at home -- the 23rd anniversary of the infamous 15K in Tulsa which marked the end of my running career #2. I am now in career #3. |
| Night Sleep Time: 7.50 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 7.50 |
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| | Race: |
Soaring Wings Half-Marathon (13.11 Miles) 01:40:29, Place overall: 43, Place in age division: 8 | | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 1.05 | 13.20 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 14.25 |
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Proof once again that sleep the night before a race is overrated. I was up and down all night -- and then nailed a 31-minute PR in a half-marathon. OK, so the previous PR was at the 13.1 mark of a full mary where I was on the verge of a full-bore bonk, but hey, a PR is a PR.
Goal today was to string together 13 miles at somewhere around 7:45. The even pacing was not there -- splits ranged from 7:32 to 7:49 until I kicked in the last mile and a quarter -- but the overall pace was pretty much exactly where I wanted it. I was fortunate that there were runners just ahead of me that I could lock on. Didn't care if I caught them, but I wanted to keep up with their pace, and I did. Then I ended up passing most of them in the last two miles anyway. The final downhill (more on that in a bit) really seemed to slingshot me toward the finish and I passed several people in the last half-mile to finish 43rd overall out of 496 entries. Average pace based on chip time: 7:41. Not bad for an old dude who couldn't run around the block in June 2007.
This was a brand new race, and I'm not that familiar with Conway, so the course was a bit of an open question. I was told beforehand that there was a decent sized hill at about mile 3. That info was correct; there were a couple of other semi-significant inclines, but also some good downhills. I was able to shorten my stride and rest some on the downhills until the last one at about 12.3 miles, which I pushed pretty hard. Overall, the course was challenging, but not brutal. And the weather was ideal -- 45 at the start, warming into the low 50s during the race, no wind, no clouds. Some cloud cover would have been nice (I hate squinting into the sun), but there was a fair amount of shade along the course, so that helped. The course was kind of a lopsided figure 8 -- four miles on the first loop, eight plus miles on the much bigger loop, with the start and finish about three quarters of a mile from the intersection of the two loops.
The reason I picked the pace I did is that I figured a 1:41 or 1:42 finish correlated pretty well with the pace I'll need to BQ in Memphis. Think I don't have some confidence now? Yes, I tapered more than Sasha would recommend, but I figure the added confidence is worth more than 10 or 15 miles of routine training, and I still have three weeks to bust it before the real taper begins. Especially now that I KNOW that my hard work is paying off in faster times. |
| Night Sleep Time: 5.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 5.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 8.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 8.00 |
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It's my birthday, I'm an even older geezer...
Spent the night in a hotel in Van Buren after the football game. Bed was a rock, as usual, so didn't get much sleep. Came home, had birthday dinner with the family, took a nap, then ran eight miles. Legs didn't feel too bad, was able to ramp up to 8:45 pace on the run. I think I'll juggle the week's schedule to push the VO2-max run back a day or two, but I may add some miles overall to the plan for the week.
If you're into Jack Daniels stuff, Saturday's half-marathon time pushes my VDOT figure up to 45, the best I've done in running life #3 (my high school VDOT, based on my 2-mile PR, was 57). A 45 also corresponds with a BQ time for me in the marathon, so I'm right on track. Doesn't guarantee I'll get it, but it does tell me my training has put me in position. Just have to keep working for the next three weeks and even into the taper. |
| Night Sleep Time: 6.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 6.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 8.25 | 1.75 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 10.00 |
| Ten miles of fartlek on the TM tonight. With temps in the 40s, it would have been a good night to run outside, instead of inside with the heater on(?) That ended up dehydrating me more than sweating in the summer; found myself taking sips of water purely for cottonmouth. Anyway, good run once I got loose after 2 miles or so. Surges lasted from 200 to 600 meters; I think I surged seven times. Wound up taking about 93 minutes for the 10 miles. |
| Night Sleep Time: 7.50 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 7.50 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 8.21 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 8.21 |
| Rarity tonight -- an outdoor run in midweek. But the weather was just so perfect -- high 40s, no wind, clear sky -- that I couldn't do another TM run in a heated fitness room. So I drove six miles to run on the old familiar river trail, where at least my chances of getting flattened by an automobile are minimized. Getting flattened by a bicycle, that's another story -- and it easily could have happened a couple of times, especially since I forgot my blinky light. Fortunately, all the cyclists had their headlamps and could see me anyway, and a couple were even courteous enough to yell out a warning, although I heard all of them coming anyway (an advantage of not wearing an iPod). Wore the Garmin, but it was too dark to see it much anyway (started about 15 minutes before it became completely dark). So I just tried to keep a constant, comfortable pace. Turned out that pace was a smidge under 9:00. I used to think sub-9 was hauling-A, now it's comfortable. Total distance: 8.21 miles, which equals roundtrip from the boat house to the Burns Park boat ramp and back through Alligator Alley. Took 72 minutes. I guess I'll do the VO2 max tomorrow, but may wait until Thursday. We'll see how I feel. |
| Night Sleep Time: 8.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 8.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 7.45 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 1.88 | 9.33 |
| Think I did that math right, if it adds up to 9.33. VO2 max run on the TM, 5X600, with enough warmup/cooldown to get me up to 9.33. Pace was good, not too difficult. Probably could/should have run a tiny bit faster; I was at slightly sub-7:00 pace. But still a good tough run. |
| Night Sleep Time: 7.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 7.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 7.75 | 0.75 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 8.50 |
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Perspective is a strange thing. A year ago, I looked at marathon training plans calling for 45 miles a week and thought that was way more than I can handle. Right now, I feel like I'm taking this week kinda easy, and I'll do 60 miles this week. Next week, near 70; the next, over 70. But I know I can handle that, because I've already done it.
Tonight, back on the TM for an 8.5-mile progression run, topping out at GMP for the last 0.75. I stepped up the pace a little more quickly than usual, and the result was an average nicely under 9:00 pace. Almost had a TM mishap of the type I've been fearing; no stumble, but I wasn't quite paying enough attention to my cadence and the belt almost took me off the back of the TM until I realized what was happening and scrambled back to the middle of the belt.
Off tomorrow, then 16 on Saturday, and then I'll go do my civic duty Saturday afternoon and vote early with my family -- including my 18-year-old son casting his first official ballot. So, since I'm not running on the last day of October, I end the month with a new monthly PR of 244 miles. |
| Night Sleep Time: 8.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 8.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 16.22 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 16.22 |
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Routine 16 miler today from Murray Park to downtown and back to the park, but that's not the point. Today's point was about being there for someone.
You guys may have seen the news reports about the beautiful young TV anchorwoman who was beaten to death in her home recently in Little Rock. I never knew the late Anne Pressly, but one of her fellow reporters at Channel 7, the local ABC affiliate, is one of my running buddies. I saw Michelle last Saturday before the half-marathon, while Anne was still clinging to life, and she told me she had a lot of things to run out that morning. She, too, ran a PR in that race. A few hours later, Anne finally succumbed to her injuries.
This morning, I wasn't sure if Michelle would be out there for the Saturday Crackhead run. I hoped she would. I had e-mailed her earlier in the week to express my condolences and had not gotten a reply, which was completely understandable, and it also would have been completely understandable if she decided not to run. So I was glad when she pulled her car into the parking spot next to mine at 5:50 this morning at Murray Park. Then she told me she was also running 16 miles today, and that her normal Saturday running partner was out of town. That's it, I said to myself, I'm running with her. I bet she doesn't feel like being alone right now. Turns out I was right. Not only was she a friend and coworker of Anne's but she's also young and single, and she's still more than a little frightened that the perp is still at large.
So we set out together and ran four miles into downtown Little Rock, which was the first extended conversation we've had. We talked about Anne, and my time working for the same TV station 30 years ago as a statistician on basketball telecasts, and our performances in the half at Conway, and her feelings in the past two weeks since Anne was attacked. And she thanked me for the e-mail. Then, as we got into downtown, three cars pulled alongside us. It was Coach Tom and some of the other Crackheads, who drove down to join Michelle for the final 12 miles of the run. They parked and got out, and I could have gone on ahead, but I decided to stay with the group. And we ran 12 miles together.
When we finished, we walked around a bit to cool down, and Michelle again thanked me for the e-mail and for running with her. I told her that Crackheads look out for each other. My wife texted me to ask about the run, and I told her about running with Michelle, and she asked me to give Michelle her love and a virtual hug. So I did, along with a real hug of my own.
I feel much better about being there for a friend than I do about the run. I know Michelle appreciated it, and I know she and Tom and the other Crackheads would be there for me if I were in need. Crackheads really do look out for each other. I'm not a very social guy, but I value my membership in that band of nutcases. We're connected by a common obsession, but that obsession also connects us at a deeper level. We're linked by shared suffering, I guess, sort of what war veterans who faced death together share; obviously not to the level of those who have faced enemy fire, but those who have battled themselves and the frailty of their bodies and their desire to do anything except continue to put one foot down in front of the other. |
| Night Sleep Time: 7.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 7.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 8.50 | 0.50 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 9.00 |
| Hadn't intended to run quite this late (finished around 10 p.m. local, which I guess would have been 11 p.m. LAST night), but here I am. GA/recovery on the TM, 9 miles, with a 400-meter surge thrown in every fifth lap largely to break up the monotony, then the last two laps were a surge at GMP. The electronic leash went off at the 5-mile mark; patient calling with yet another non-emergency, so that forced me to stop for five minutes and return the call. I don't see an emoticon button on the toolbar, but if there were, I'd be looking for :rolleyes:. Since I won't have a Saturday long run this week due to another trip up the Hill with Tyler, I'll bump a few more miles onto the week's shorter runs to semi-compensate, maybe get the week up to 62 or so. Then next week will have a 22 on Sunday and 17 on Saturday, so getting over 70 won't be much problem before the taper begins. Dadgum, are we already that close to tapering? Yikes. Speaking of which, good news from the marathon people in Memphis. I was worried about being assigned to the wrong corral or wrong wave and not being able to run with the 3:30 pace bunny. No problems, according to the St. Jude people; I'm on my own in finding and lining up in the right corral for the 3:30 pace. |
| Night Sleep Time: 8.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 8.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 9.87 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.38 | 10.25 |
| Discovered tonight that a 10.25 mile run roughly equals one NFL first half. Began the run as the Steelers tried their onside kick to start the game, finished as the teams trudged toward the locker room at halftime. Those two events were 92 minutes apart. I'd planned to go 10, but kept running after the 10-mile mark until the halftime whistle blew (I do weird things like that sometimes). In between, lots of bad offense, and a progression run to 8:41 pace with six strides thrown in at the end. Had a queasy patch in the middle as tonight's buffet dinner began to disagree with me, but got through that unscathed. Will try to get 60 miles in by Friday and then next week will be in the mid-70s before taper madness begins. Didn't get to vote Saturday, so have to get up early tomorrow and get over to the polling place when it opens so I can vote on the way to work. Not going to share my politics with you, but I will say I think this is an extremely important election in a lot of ways. My son has already cast his first ballot and was proud to do so. Unlike my mom and dad, our family will not cancel out each other's votes. |
| Night Sleep Time: 8.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 8.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 7.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 3.00 | 10.00 |
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Tough time on the VO2 max run tonight. The legs did not want to loosen up, the heater was on in the fitness center, I'm sweating like a cochon, etc. But I forced the legs to keep turning over through four 1200-meter reps at about 5K pace. Overall, the 10 miles took 88 minutes, even with longer jogs in between than probably Pfitz or Jack Daniels intended. But, hey, I did what I needed to do to get through it; if I'd taken shorter rests, I may not finish four full reps.
I'm probably going to be overtrained by the time I get to next Saturday, I suspect. Fortunately, I'll have 21 days to get over that. |
| Night Sleep Time: 8.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 8.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 10.30 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 10.30 |
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Stayed up way too late watching the election results last night and had a very sluggish day as a result. Sluggishness carried over to the run. Can't recall when I took a walk break on a treadmill run, but I did tonight. I've decided I hate standard time. Dark at 5:30 stinks. Virtually no chance of doing an outside run due to the pancake factor (i.e., a car turns me into one). And running inside right now, even with the ceiling fan on full blast, equals mid-July levels of perspiration.
I'd have to go back through my training diary, which would take way more energy and concentration than I can manage right now, but I'm 95% sure without looking that this is the first time I've ever run 10 miles three consecutive days. I'm supposed to do another 10+ tomorrow, but not sure I can manage it. |
| Night Sleep Time: 6.50 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 6.50 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 12.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 12.00 |
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Slow steady 12 on the TM tonight; just put it on 9:22 pace and ran and ran and ran some more. Then on 9:13 and ran some more. Total of 111 minutes for the 12 miles. Tomorrow's 8 is likely to seem SO easy. Sunday's 22, on the other hand, probably won't.
The kid is lobbying me to go to Fayetteville tomorrow night. I suppose I can run my 8, then change, pack and go. But I haven't quite given in yet. May have to see how I feel after work tomorrow. |
| Night Sleep Time: 7.50 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 7.50 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 5.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 5.00 |
| Five miles on the TM at 9:00 pace, just to get in some miles before driving to Fayetteville. Then I'll do 3 or 4 in the morning at the hotel before we go to campus. This will be my first 7-day running week in memory, but hopefully doing Fri-Sat easy will help the legs recover before Sunday. Also ordered tickets to see Spamalot next month. As a confirmed Knight (pronounced kuh-NIG-uht) of the Holy Grail, can't resist. |
| Night Sleep Time: 7.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 7.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 22.46 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 22.46 |
| Well, the hay's in the barn, as they say in Lower Arkansas. The last long run before Memphis, which went great for 16 miles, then... Now 27 days to sharpen, taper and worry. First, about yesterday. For some reason, the hotel workout room was closed. Tried twice. Could have run outside, but didn't know the area or have my Garmin. So I decided to skip the little 4.5 mile jog I'd planned and just take my kid to his tour of the UA engineering program. It was fun watching him. He's excited and apprehensive at the same time. I think it's sinking in just how much college is going to be outside his little comfort zone. Also had a little surprise for him: I'd almost forgotten that my dad was named to the Arkansas Academy of Mechanical Engineers, almost a hall of fame for MEs in the state. Less than 100 members from what I could see, and he's one. His picture is on the wall along with all the other academy members at the ME building, and I got to show it to Tyler. So we got home around 7:45 p.m., and I hadn't slept well for two straight nights, so I started a load of running clothes in the washer, stuck them in the dryer when they finished and went to bed. Alarm goes off at 4:50, and I've got a splitting headache. So I reset the alarm, rolled over and went back to sleep for a half-hour, hoping the HA would subside. It did, a little, and I got up, did my usual waffle pre-run breakfast, and headed downtown to run. Got on the road a little before 6:30 and just decided I'd run how my body told me to run, not looking at the Garmin or anything, just run. The headache was gone by now. And that went real well until the 16-mile mark, which I reached at probably 9:20 pace, when I stopped at my stash of Gatorade to refuel and stretch. The stretching didn't help, and from then on, I was in pretty much pain -- hip flexors, IT band, ankles, butt, knees, you name it, they all alternated. I probably ran 21.5 plus of the total, which came out to 22.4 on the Garmin. Then I walked around downtown for 20 minutes eating and drinking, drove home, drank some more, did an ice bath and then sat down to do this blog. So the taper begins tomorrow, although I'll still total 70-plus this week due to long runs on Sunday and Saturday. Back off from there, and try not to get too paranoid about the twinges and aches. Now, I'm going to bed. |
| Night Sleep Time: 7.50 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 7.50 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 9.45 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 9.45 |
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Good, solid, uneventful 9.45 on the TM tonight. I was surprisingly unaffected today after pounding out 22 yesterday; very little pain, not much limping. My back was a little stiff, but that has nothing to do with 22 miles.
Anyway, the run tonight was just a recovery run, ramping up to 8:30ish pace for the last two laps. No major twinges. The Asics are doing all right now that I have thicker insoles to keep my lateral malleolus from being jammed into the edge of the right shoe. But the new adidas, which I wore yesterday, will definitely be my race shoe, especially with use of the toe condoms to protect the old hammers from blistering.
So another 9 tomorrow with 5X600 of VO2 max intervals thrown in. I probably could have done the intervals tonight, but I said "Nah, let's give the legs a bit of a break." |
| Night Sleep Time: 8.50 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 8.50 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 7.62 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 1.88 | 9.50 |
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VO2 max night on the treadmill tonight -- 5 X 600 at about 6:50 pace, mixed into a 9.5 mile run. Not sure if it's really getting easier or if I'm just getting better at blocking out the pain. Maybe a little of both. I know one thing -- 6:50 may or may not be my optimal VO2-max pace, but it's definitely a solid side-stitch pace. Had a couple of those tonight. Again was able to deal with that by adjusting my breathing pattern, but I'd rather not have to do that.
IIRC, only two more VO2-max sessions before Memphis. The days really are ticking away; 25 and counting. |
| Night Sleep Time: 6.50 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 6.50 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 7.72 | 0.30 | 0.00 | 0.31 | 8.33 |
| Progression run to MP + 5% on the TM, then 6 X 100 strides, then a lap of "warmdown" at MP. Total exactly 75 minutes, or exactly 9:00 pace average. Felt pretty easy, and not really tired afterward. |
| Night Sleep Time: 7.50 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 7.50 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 8.19 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 8.19 |
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Routine recovery run, 8.19 miles in 74:59, spiced up by new paranoia as I felt a couple of new twinges along the left tibia (stress fracture?) Frankly, it will take more pain that that to sideline me now, and the twinges subsided.
Running 17 on Saturday with Michelle, my TV-reporter friend. There's a benefit Friday night in honor of the murdered anchorwoman at Michelle's station, and I figured Michelle would attend, so I was surprised to hear she planned to run at 5 a.m. Saturday instead of 6. Maybe she's skipping the benefit after all. Might be too soon for that for her. And no, they still haven't caught the killer. |
| Night Sleep Time: 7.50 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 7.50 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 17.29 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 17.29 |
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Did the Cammack Village loop from the state Capitol today. Not an easy run, as Cammack is about 150 vertical feet above the Capitol and you go up and down a lot of hills once you get up there. Took it fairly easy for the first 8 miles or so, then kinda put the hammer down once I headed back down Kavanaugh; miles 11-14 were all under 9:00, as were 17-17.29. I can always seem to pick up the pace at the end no matter how good or bad the run was. Early miles were slow in large part because I ran with Michelle and Michael. They're getting faster, but they're not there yet :) . After mile 10, they stopped for a water break and I kept going and accelerated. Anyway, the taper has now begun. Three weeks from this moment (8:45 a.m. CST) I'll be on the course at Memphis, and hopefully on my way to Boston.
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| Night Sleep Time: 6.50 | Nap Time: 1.33 | Total Sleep Time: 7.83 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 6.00 | 0.50 | 0.50 | 0.00 | 7.00 |
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I'm gonna run later but decided to put a few thoughts down this morning.
First of all, I've been sleep deprived for some time. Don't think it's because of running; I get stiff lying in one position whether I run or not, and have to wake up and reposition, then there's the old BPH rearing its ugly head (if you're not familiar with BPH, and you're a male, count yourself lucky, but know it's coming your way). And I do need more sleep than a lot of 48-year-olds might, always have.
Anyway, yesterday I kind of hit the wall. Took a nap from 9:30 to 11:00 after my run, then took another one from 4:30 to 6, then went to bed at 10:30 and slept until 8:30 a.m. That means I slept for 13 of the 23 hours. When I stay in bed that long, I wake up with a headache. Don't know why, but I do. And I realized it had been a LONG time since I woke up with a too-much-sleep headache; the headache I had last Sunday morning wasn't one of those. But now that I caught up on my snoozing, I do feel better.
I think I will take advantage of the week off before Memphis to make sure I'm well rested. That may be a key for me. Instead of getting up at 7 to get ready for work, get up and do a morning run, maybe take an afternoon nap, then I can go to bed earlier instead of having to do an evening run. My schedule would be much different if there weren't the little issue of having to work for a living...
I think if I were among those who didn't have to punch a timeclock five days a week, I would actually be able to pursue BOTH of my obsessions -- running and golf. Run, hit balls, maybe play nine holes on a regular basis, an occasional 18, maybe go do some intervals in the evening. Right now, there's just not enough energy (or daylight) to run 50-70 mpw and spend any time on golf.
Also, I would like to incorporate more crosstraining if I had time, particularly weightlifting. If there's been something I thought I needed to do in this training cycle and didn't, that's it. Our little fitness center has been invaluable (free access to the TM seven days a week), but it doesn't have much in the way of lower body stuff. I do a little upper body work, which helps some. I would have killed for access to a leg press machine and a hip extension machine -- but I wouldn't pay for it or drive several miles to get it, I guess. I think that's what I have needed to incorporate in my training, to get my glutes and hamstrings as strong as my heart and lungs are. I very rarely get out of breath, except when I'm running intervals, but my legs tend to give out. If I had a bicycle (or a place to keep one), all the hills around here would probably have helped me develop those muscle groups as well.
We keep talking about getting a family membership to a city-owned fitness center in Little Rock which has weights, an indoor pool, an indoor jogging track and a basketball court. Perhaps we'll finally pull the trigger on that and I can include that in my training program for Boston....
Finally, the run. Started off really slowly, legs felt good, so I cranked it up pretty good, got to MP with a mile to go, then with 0.5 to go, blasted it up to MP - 10%. I'm trying out a little mantra, sort of a phrase to mentally crack the whip over my head, and at least for a 1600-meter surge, it worked pretty well. Seven miles in 64:11 overall.
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| Night Sleep Time: 10.00 | Nap Time: 1.50 | Total Sleep Time: 11.50 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 6.55 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.45 | 7.00 |
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Originally scheduled to do a slow 12 tonight, but I didn't get home from work until after 6:30, then had to make a store run, make dinner and THEN run. Twelve miles was just not going to work under those circumstances, especially since the TM room closes at 10. So instead of a slow 12, I did a fairly quick 7, progressing to 8:20 miles and then with seven strides at the end. The 12 now comes tomorrow, when I won't have to go do a pump fill at a hospice. She says she has about six months left; I don't think I believe her. But I've had quite a few patients pass away in the last couple of years. Cancer, heart attacks, mainly. This one is cancer too. Hopefully none of them died because of something I did, but you're never quite sure in this business. I know every time I fill a pump I could kill this patient if I screw up.
Now that I'm thoroughly depressed... |
| Night Sleep Time: 8.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 8.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 12.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 12.00 |
| Don't know if I can really describe tonight's run as 12 "easy" miles. Did I get to marathon pace? No. Was it easy? Not a chance. Ran the last 10 miles at better than 9:00 pace, and averaged 8:50, which is MP + 10%. Push, push and push some more. If the goal of tapering is to decrease mileage but not intensity, well, tonight had the intensity. |
| Night Sleep Time: 7.50 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 7.50 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 6.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 6.00 |
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Ah, the joys of being on call. After my wife kept me up an hour longer than I wanted watching reruns of "According to Jim," the medical exchange decided to become my alarm clock at 6 a.m. Then again at 6:30, in case I wasn't completely awake. Seems our schedulers forgot to notify the hospital that we planned to do a procedure there at 7 a.m. today, and when the patient arrived, they're like "who is this guy and why is he here?" So to answer those questions, they called me. Poor guy did not get his procedure, and the boss had the scheduling girl in his office when I got to work this morning. No pink slip, alas.
Anyway, decided on a recovery run tonight with tempo run tomorrow. The legs were a little slow to respond, but did better as I stepped up the pace later in the run. Finished up 6 miles in exactly 56 minutes, which is a good recovery pace for me. |
| Night Sleep Time: 6.50 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 6.50 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 3.00 | 5.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 8.00 |
| Good solid MP/LT run (pace was just a touch faster than MP, so I guess you could stretch it to LT) for five miles, with two warmup and one cooldown. Last significant tempo run before the race. I thought it would be more difficult on me than it was, since I was kinda dragging after work and did not have anything to eat for more than 5 hours before the run. It took the warmup and a mile at MP to really get going, but after that it went pretty well and I really didn't have to push all THAT hard to maintain for 40 minutes. Ordered a pair of red RaceReady shorts, which I may or may not wear in Memphis. Hopefully they arrive by Monday and I can try them out a couple of times to decide if they make the raceday cut. |
| Night Sleep Time: 7.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 7.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 11.50 | 3.64 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 15.14 |
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Very, very good run. Nice shot of confidence with two weeks left in the taper.
Easily the coldest morning so far this morning, cold enough that my wife questioned my sanity in running with the sniffles I've had this week. It was 25 degrees when I met Michelle and Michael at the Surgical Hospital. A friend of Michelle's from Dallas was supposed to meet us there but didn't make it, and we left at 5:10 or so (she showed up later, I think, and ran with the Crackheads). Clear, no wind, just cold. And we set off slowly, well over 10:00 pace. Legs felt good. Through the hills, around the Joe K. Poch Loop, back down to the river, still generally a slow pace with a little bit of surge on the loop.
Then, shortly befre I was supposed to turn around and leave those other two (they were going 18), Michelle and Michael both slowed to a walk, and I just kept going. Then I accelerated up the hill past the wooden bridge, hit the turnaround at the quarry, and kept going, hard. Michelle said stuff like "nice run" when I saw them again a few hundred yards later. Michael said "have I told you how much you suck?" which made me crack up. I suck to him because I'm a lot faster than he is, and he knows it, and I know how hard I worked to get this fast. In his abusive way, that was a heckuva compliment.
Anyway, back down the hill to the wooden bridge, over the bridge, past the golf course and the concrete bridge and the dog park and the soccer field, and I'm still running fast. At the soccer fields, the 12-milers come back from their Poch loop, and now I'm passing them left and right. Past the field where the Boy Scouts camped and the skunk was ready to blast me a few weeks ago. Turned on to Campbell Lake, still passing people left and right, and still going hard. But a comfortable hard. I'm not straining at all, just smoothly running at MP, maybe a little faster. Turned off Campbell Lake, up the path to the back of the hospital, around the hospital and back to the car. Last four miles plus at marathon pace. And it was still 28 degrees when I got through, after 2:33 and 15.14 miles.
About 45 miles this week as the taper really kicks in. I can definitely feel the difference now. My legs do not feel like I ran 15 this morning, much of it hard. |
| Night Sleep Time: 6.00 | Nap Time: 2.25 | Total Sleep Time: 8.25 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 |
| Took today off. Orthopedically, I was fine after yesterday's run, but two and a half hours running in subfreezing weather for the first time in eight months seems to have done a number on my sinuses. I went to bed a little early last night and went straight to sleep, but then the drainage kicked in as my bedroom cooled off (the single HVAC vent in my bedroom is at the other end, and there's a large window by my bed, so we get a lot of solar heating in the summer and the room gets really cold in the winter). Then the drainage triggered my asthma, which has not bothered me for months and months, but I was really having to make extra effort to breathe and I was audibly wheezing. It got a little better when I sat upright, so I spent much of the night on the Internet instead of in bed. When I finally went back to bed at 6:30 a.m., I "napped" until 10:00. But the drainage continued off and on all day, and I just decided not to run today. Maybe I'll make up the 6 miles I had scheduled by spreading them out over the rest of the week, maybe I won't (it is taper time, after all). |
| Night Sleep Time: 8.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 8.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 8.13 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.37 | 8.50 |
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Strong progression run to MP + 8%, then seven strides at nearly 9 mph. Nine would have been an all-out sprint a year ago, maybe six months ago. Tonight it just felt strong, like I might put in a mid-race surge. Could have gone farther -- or faster -- without much difficulty. I added in a mile and a half of the run I skipped last night, and will probably do the same for three other runs this week. Took me 75:50 to go 8.5. Sub-76 used to be a good 7 miles for me, then 7.5, then 8. In the half at Conway, it was probably my 9.5 split. Hopefully it will be my 9.5 split in Memphis.
Twelve days and counting... |
| Night Sleep Time: 7.50 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 7.50 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 7.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 7.00 |
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Started out as a recovery run, but kept cranking up the TM as I went and the last mile was darn near MP. I'm getting more and more comfortable at that speed, which is a good thing with 11 days to go. Wound up with seven miles in 62:56.
Wednesday's my last day of work before the race. I'm hoping that not being on my feet at work for nine days before the race will be another source of rejuvenation, if that's the right word. |
| Night Sleep Time: 7.50 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 7.50 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 5.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 3.00 | 8.00 |
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Last VO2 max run of the cycle -- 3 X 1600 at 6:45 pace, which is faster than my present 5K PR pace. Legs did OK, but for some reason the sweat glands decided to let loose. Last two miles or so I couldn't see for the sweat, which is another reason I like TM running -- I don't have to see where I'm going. Being blinded by sweat when running on Little Rock's infamously uneven sidewalks/streets is a recipe for sprained ankles or worse.
The local Road Runners Club is having a Thanksgiving morning fun run tomorrow. I may go, or I may not. I'll run tomorrow, sometime, but that fun run starts nine and a half hours from now and that just may be a little too soon, even for a light five-mile jog. I have to remind myself that the important run now is 10 days away in Memphis, not a crack-of-dawn trot around the Heights. |
| Night Sleep Time: 7.50 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 7.50 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 7.45 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.50 | 7.95 |
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Happy Thanksgiving to all in the blogosphere!
Didn't get up for the 7 a.m. fun run, so I took advantage of the fact that our family dinner will be this evening to accommodate my med-student nephew to get in a midday run -- OUTSIDE! No treadmill for me today, nosirree.
Had the River Trail to myself from a running standpoint, although I got buzzed by plenty of cyclists as usual. Weather was nice, if a little warmer than I would have liked (around 60), sunny with a bit of a breeze. Ran from the bike rental shop past the quarry and halfway down the hill, then turned around and returned. At the Main Street bridge, I took advantage of the flat grassy area between Broadway and Main and ran my strides there on the grass, eight of them in all, then jogged back to my car. Total 7.95.
It had only been about 14 hours since my VO2 max run, and the legs were still a little tight (lack of prerun stretching didn't help either). But the legs loosened up as I ran. In spite of the early soreness, I maintained sub-9 pace for all seven miles of the initial run without any undue strain. |
| Night Sleep Time: 8.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 8.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 12.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 12.00 |
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Want time on my feet in training? Spent nearly four hours on my feet at the football game yesterday. And well worth it. The looks on the LSU fans' faces across the aisle after we scored the winning touchdown were priceless. Tyler got worn out at work and didn't go, and Pam didn't go because it looked like (and did) rain. Didn't matter. Had a blast.
Weird to think, though, that the next college football game I attend, I'll drive to, and my son will WALK to from his dorm.
Now to today's run. Rain was gone, but was cold and kinda blustery. Ran in my track pants and neon green tech shirt. Just tried to maintain a steady pace, but once we got about halfway and I noticed that there was a pack of about 10 runners a block ahead of me, I set the goal of catching them. Caught all but one of them, too, once we got over the Broadway Bridge into NLR. Gradual progression wasn't really the plan, but that's how it worked out, and the last mile was in 8:12. I might take an 8:12 final mile in seven days in Memphis. Average 8:56 for 12 miles.
Hard to believe now that the training is about over and I'll be on course in exactly seven days. If I'm not ready to run a good race now, I'll never be. BQ? Well, I'm gonna take a shot at it. |
| Night Sleep Time: 6.50 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 6.50 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 5.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 5.00 |
| Cap off the month with a five-miler recovery run on the TM. Don't know if I would have run today without the treadmill -- it was cold, wet, blustery and nasty today. If marathon day turned out like this, I might think twice about running. But I finished the month over 250 miles for the first time. |
| Night Sleep Time: 8.75 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 8.75 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 5.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 5.00 |
| GA/progression run on the TM. Did OK despite not much sleep (helping teenager finish long-put-off assignment for chemistry). Marathon dress rehearsal tomorrow. |
| Night Sleep Time: 6.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 6.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 5.00 | 2.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 7.00 |
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Had the marathon dress rehearsal. Put on the whole gear -- cap, headband under it, neon green tech shirt with white singlet over it, tights with RaceReady shorts over it, tucked my car key in the car key pocket, carried a water bottle in Tyler's fanny pack, and headed for the River Trail. Stretched when I got there, but the legs did not want to loosen. Weather was clear and sunny but temps were around 45, I guess. Even after my three-mile warmup run down to the FOP clubhouse, the legs were still tight, and I stretched some more before heading back.Once I headed back, had a little trouble with my pacing; the planned 8-minute miles became 7:39 and 7:42 (that, ladies and germs, is why I need a pace bunny); darn near a tempo run instead of MP. Anyway, once I slowed to the cooldown pace, I jogged back and forth across the Main Street Bridge, and reminded myself once again why I don't like the MSB; that walkway is awfully narrow and that steel railing, combined with my acrophobia, gave me the willies. I could just imagine falling over that rail into the river below, and people who fall into that river tend to be carried out in bodybags. Yikes. Anyway, got back and forth with no incident and finished the run.
I guess the hay really is in the barn now. A couple of short, slow jogs left, maybe some strides on Friday, and then show up at the starting line Saturday morning in Memphis. I guess the good part is, if I had trouble slowing down to an 8:00 pace, the real thing maybe won't feel difficult Saturday. If I actually ran a marathon at 7:40.5 pace, that would be about a 3:21.
Just got an interesting piece of information. It seems active.com has a database which ranks times in races all over the country, so you can look up how your marathon time ranks among 24-year-old females in Utah if that's what you happen to be. Since I happen to be a 47/48 year old male in Arkansas, I looked up the rankings in all five distances I've run this year -- 5K, 10K, 20K, half and full marathon. Turns out I'm in the top 100 in all of them for 45-49 year old men, except for 20K, where they do not have any results at all recorded for Arkansas. My crash-and-burn marathon is 71st. My Gallowalked 5K is 92nd. My Gallowalked 10K is 39th. And my half-marathon time -- gun time, not chip -- is 19th. NINETEENTH. I don't think I've been 19th in the state in anything since my PSAT score in 1977 was third in the state, or so I was told. Nineteenth doesn't get me anything, whereas that PSAT got me a National Merit Scholarship, but it's still surprising and a bit gratifying. And for 47-year-olds only, my time was SIXTH. The first-place time? A guy I went to high school with, who was born the same day I was (the half marathon was the day before our 48th birthdays) and didn't even run track in high school. Of course, he beat my butt by 17 minutes at Conway (and his marathon best beat mine by an hour and a half, although I expect to close that gap considerably on Saturday). |
| Night Sleep Time: 8.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 8.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 3.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 3.00 |
| Easy jog at 10:10 pace just to work the kinks out. Starting to carb-load now. |
| Night Sleep Time: 7.00 | Nap Time: 2.00 | Total Sleep Time: 9.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 0.10 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.10 |
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Had a twinge in the middle of my left hamstring; it's been there for several days, dating back to when I was stretching my quads Tuesday morning for my dress rehearsal. But it hasn't gone away. Finally, today, I started to panic, when I realized it was in exactly the same spot as the spasms that shut me down at mile 18 at Little Rock in March. Stretching hasn't worked. Warm baths, ditto. Used electric massager to no effect. So I called John at work and he told me to come in for some treatment. First 10 minutes of ultrasound to the spot, then 20 minutes of iontopheresis. Maybe it's a little bit better; I jogged up to the apartment office a half hour ago to take my rent check in (and test the hammy) and felt no pain, although it still felt tight.
John told me to come in tomorrow for another treatment if I want to. I'll see how it feels in the morning. Maybe I'll get a treatment. Maybe I'll go for a short/slow jog as I had originally planned for Friday. But if it's no worse, I can run with it -- with my fingers crossed that it doesn't do what it did on Lookout Hill in March. Can I run 3:30 with it? That's the unanswerable question until Saturday morning. |
| Night Sleep Time: 8.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 8.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 |
| Hamstring feels much better today. Maybe it just needed a rest, or maybe John's ultrasound and iontopheresis did the trick. As long as it holds up for 3:30 tomorrow, I'm good with it. We'll be leaving for Memphis in a couple of hours. Tyler signed out early from school, and Pam's leaving work at noon. We'll hit the expo as soon as we cross the bridge, then go check into our hotel. Tonight, spaghetti with some of the RWOL forum crazies at the Spaghetti Warehouse, then early to bed. I'll be up at 4 Saturday to go find an open IHOP. BQ is a big undertaking, I know, but I've worked too hard for the last six months not to take a shot. If I fail, there's always the other goal -- sub-four. |
| Night Sleep Time: 9.50 | Nap Time: 1.00 | Total Sleep Time: 10.50 |
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| | Race: |
St. Jude Memphis Marathon, Memphis, TN (26.22 Miles) 03:33:42, Place overall: 337, Place in age division: 51 | | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 0.00 | 26.42 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 26.42 |
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Aw man, this thing ate my RR. Knew I should have saved it. Cliff's Notes version: Below BQ pace for 22 miles, right calf threatening to cramp for last 10 miles, cold, windy, and worst, directly into the wind from about miles 18-25. Pacing not the best in the early miles, but I gave it everything I had, and if I run the same time next year at age 49, it WILL be a BQ for 2011. Finished 337th out of 2213 finishers, at least posted so far, and 51st in male 45-49.
Temp in mid-30s, cloudy and blustery at the start. Early traffic keeps the first mile pace down to 8:13. That's OK. Mile 2, 7:47. Whoa horsie. Slow down there. Mile 3, 7:57. More like it. Mile 4, 7:33. I know we had a little downhill here, but TOO DARN FAST. Mile 5, 8:02. More like it. Average through 5 miles, about 7:54.
Mile 6, 7:50. Back off a touch. Mat at 10K, time 49:36. Mile 7, 7:45, make that two touches. Mile 8: 8:03. That's better. Only physical issues to this point are some twinges in my right plantar fascia. Mile 9: 8:00. Perfect, and two good miles in a row. Mile 10: 7:59. Three good miles in a row. Average through 10 miles: 7:55. I wanted 7:57 or so, but this isn't too bad.
Mile 11: 7:59. FOUR good miles in a row. My online friend Bill from Georgia, who offered to help pace me, drops back at this point, so I'm on my own. I pick out a blonde 20-30 yards ahead of me who seems to be running a consistent pace and lock on to her, just trying to maintain the spacing.
Mile 12: 8:02. Still all good. We're back downtown now. Wind is picking up from what it was at the start.
Mile 13: 8:05. Still OK. Hit the halfway mark in another quarter-mile, so my Garmin is about 0.14 miles ahead of the course measurement at this point. Shouldn't be an issue as long as I can maintain an 8:01 or 8:02 average, and my average at 13.1 is just a smidge over 8:00. Chip time halfway: 1:45:08. Just about right if I can run even split.
Mile 14.1: 8:09. Need to pick it up just a tad. Mile 15.1: 8:02. That'll do. Mile 16.1: 8:07. Giving back a few seconds here and there, but still OK. Mile 17.1: 7:54. Better. But I have a sneaking suspicion when we turn and head west toward downtown again, Old Mr. Wind is gonna slap me upside the head. Plus I have a new physical issue: the right calf keeps twitching like it may go into full spasm at any time, and the quads and glutes are screaming at me (OK, that's two physical issues). Above the waist, I'm fine.
Mile 18.1: 8:05. Yep, I'm running dead into the wind now. Yuck. I bet it's blowing at least 15 mph. Mile 19.1: 8:08. Still giving back a few seconds, but I'm pushing against the almost insurmountable urge to slow down. Mile 20.1 (Garmin): 8:04. Still good, and according to the Garmin, I'm still under BQ pace. I don't feel any pianos dropping on my back, but boy do my legs hurt. Mile 20 (course): There's a mat at the 20-mile mark, so I click the lap button on my Garmin here. According to the Garmin, I've run 20.24. This is now officially the longest I have ever run in my life without walking even a single step. Chip time: 2:42:40. Didn't know it, but I was already well over BQ pace here (8:08 average).
Mile 21: 8:11. I'm still OK. If I can find the energy to maintain this pace for five more miles, I might just get that BQ. I start using my mantra now: "Do you want it? Go get it." Oh, yeah, that blonde chick I picked out 10 miles ago is still up there, although it's more like 150 yards than 20. I think she made a portapotty stop at one point because she passed me and kept on going. I tried to lock on again, uh, no.
Mile 22: 8:20. I get to this point in 2:59:15. Four miles and change left to run in 31:44. I'm not up to that kind of mental math, but I do know it's slipping away. Mile 23: 8:26. It ain't slipping now, it's slipped. I know Boston won't happen this time, but I also know that sub-four IS happening, even if I walk in from here. And I am not going to walk. Mile 24: 8:17. Downtown buildings are in sight now and that gives me a boost. The calf is still twitching and the quads and hip flexors are screaming, but I'm chugging. Blonde is long gone, but one of my 3:30 pace bunnies dropped back and is now in sight. I'm going after him.
Mile 25: 8:55. The good news is, we finally turned south out of the direct headwind. The bad news is, the right calf finally decided to cramp. Fortunately, it let go after 5-10 seconds of jogging and I was able to pick up my pace somewhat. I'm just gonna try to break 3:35 now.
Mile 26: 8:40. My family greets me at about 25.8 miles, at the bottom of the ramp from Danny Thomas Blvd up to downtown street level (who decided to run us UP A RAMP at 25.8 miles?). I'm struggling up the hill, but pace bunny is struggling more, and I passed him. YES! Now the ballpark (=finish) is in sight.
Mile 26.2: Didn't stop my Garmin right at the line, so don't know my final split for that last 385 yards. I know I was going to run as hard as I could get my legs to run into that ballpark, and I did. Then we had to walk UP THE STANDS to get to the concourse. Rode the elevator down to take a shower and change clothes, came back up, still no time posted. Met my family, handed them my clothes bag, headed back in to get food (hot soup after a December marathon is WONDERFUL). By the time I stuffed my face, my time is up: 3:33:42. Missed my BQ by 163 seconds -- less than seven seconds a mile. But it's in range to BQ next year when I'm 49 for 2011. Good for 337th place; I bet I moved up a few dozen spots in the active.com rankings for Arkansas marathoning geezers in 2008 with this one. I'm very pleased with it, but I have no idea when I'm gonna want to put myself through this kind of torture again. It may be a while, because I am in PAIN 10 hours later.
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| Night Sleep Time: 6.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 6.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 2.45 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 2.45 |
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Back home from Memphis. Wife and son wanted to see some of the sights, many of which I ran past yesterday (and some of which I didn't even notice). So we went to the old Lorraine Motel, where MLK was assassinated in 1968 (and which I missed during the race), by Sun Records, where Elvis recorded his early hits (I did notice that during the race; it was very close to the timing mat at 13.1 miles) and a few other downtown landmarks.
My wife liked Memphis and wants to come back sometime when I'm not distracted by a marathon or a football game or something. Works for me.
So we get home, and I veg out watching football and doing laundry and stuff, and then, as the evening goes on, I notice my thighs are hurting more and decide I need a little workout to get the blood flowing. So I go for a very... slow... jog of 2.45 miles in 40:27. You may deduce from the pace that most people would have described what I was doing was walking, and you would be correct. But the legs felt better as I went on, and I was actually able to pick up the pace. The hills around here on the Fairway loop were no issue at all.
Where do I go next? Dunno. A spring marathon? Maybe. Chicago? Could be. Mid-South in November at Wynne? Possibly; I've heard good things about that race, and I could actually drive over there that morning. Just run 5 and 10Ks through the spring and decide later? That's an option too. Maybe San Antonio in November; I hear it's a good flat fast course, ripe for BQ picking. Not ready to decide.
Obviously, that BQ is not way out there in the distance like it's been for the last nine months; it's dangling right in front of me, ready to grab. I just have to decide how best to grab it. I think building my mileage base even further is the way to go, something like Sasha describes. Put in a whole bunch of 50-, 60-, maybe even 70-mile weeks, then do a marathon program from there. I don't have the time to do 90- or 100-mile weeks, I don't think, but I can do multiple 70s. Then again, with what I've put my family through for the last nine months, maybe I need to cut back on the running for a while and spend some more family time. My son will be in college in nine months, and he could use some dad time too. So I have to sort through all that and decide how to proceed. But for now, just kinda enjoy a 72-minute PR and let my legs heal for a couple of weeks. |
| Night Sleep Time: 5.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 5.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 |
| Once again, two days after the marathon is the day my legs decide to go on strike. I was able to go downstairs forward today (using the handrail as a crutch), but being on my feet long enough to see 28 patients in clinic pounded my quads to a pulp. I did not feel good at all by 5 p.m. Tomorrow may not be much better. I think I will really keep the running to a minimum for a week or so, but the legs may bounce back fairly quickly with semi-complete rest. Still thinking a lot about what to do next. I think I need to spend some more family time, so I may cut back to maintenance mileage of 30 or so for a while as I decide what race to attack next. Somebody suggested I look at Birmingham. One, Birmingham is in February (too soon), and two, I looked at the course elevation. Looks like a map of west Little Rock. In other words, nope. I'm going to be looking for something I can run faster than Memphis, not a race I need crampons and a rope to run. |
| Night Sleep Time: 7.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 7.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 3.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 3.00 |
| Couldn't stand not running for three days in a row (or five out of six days, since I skipped Thursday and Friday last week), so got back on the TM for three slow miles. No real pain to speak of, but legs definitely felt heavy, especially the left quad. Not a difficult pace (10:00). Probably rest tomorrow, run maybe 4 Thursday, then do 6 on Saturday with the Crackheads. That would give me 15.5 miles this week, counting Sunday night's brisk walk.Wouldn't be enough if I were turning around for maybe a January marathon like Houston, but I'm not gonna do that. May not even be ready (or want to) do one by March or April. |
| Night Sleep Time: 7.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 7.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 |
| Probably not going to run tonight (although always reserve the right to change my mind), but felt the need to put some thoughts down. As pleased as I am with a 72:33 PR, I'm frustrated that I got so close to BQ but couldn't close the deal. So I'm reviewing things in my mind that might have made a difference. * More peak mileage. Yeah, that could have done it. But I already added 20 miles a week to the original plan, and 45 miles a week to the plan I used for Little Rock, and there just wasn't a whole time of time left in the week to add more miles. Yeah, I could have converted 10-mile midweek runs into 12-milers and gotten over 80 that way. But I might also have gotten hurt that way. Ditto adding more miles to my back-off weeks. I definitely feel that there were a couple of times in the last 24 weeks when my body said it had had enough and I was right on the brink of injury, or at least overtraining syndrome, before I backed off. I think that the way I handled the weekend long runs, with six over 18 miles and three of 20 or more, worked well for me, and I would be reluctant to change that. * More crosstraining. This one makes sense to me. My weak link on Saturday was the quads and hip flexors, more so than the twitching gastroc. If I'd done more lower body weight work, the muscles might have been better able to withstand the strain of 8:00 miles even without more mileage. * Longer period at high mileage. Instead of two weeks of 70-plus, maybe four or five, without taking the peak up over 75. This is kinda how I read what Sasha suggested I do -- carry a high base. Basically, get my base built up to this level and then maintain more of it for a longer period. And this method would not put any more time pressure on me than what I did this time. To do that optimally, IMO, I'd need to start my program, whether I do an 18-week or whatever, at a higher MPW than I did this time. * Change my taper? Nah, don't think so. I think I needed three weeks to get ready to perform, and it also gave me time to get the hamstring issue resolved so that it didn't bother me at all on Saturday. I don't think I lost any fitness during the taper for sure. * Maybe the thing that got me was just a bad break -- that I was dead into the wind at my most vulnerable time of the race. Not sure about that. I'm sure the wind slowed me some, but not 30-plus seconds a mile over the period I was running upwind, which is what I would have needed to hit BQ. Maybe on a calm day I break 3:32, but that's still not BQ. * One more thing. The one aspect of Pfitz' plan I had the most problem with is his recommended approach to the long runs -- the progression to MP + 10%. I didn't have any trouble carrying MP + 20%, but that late acceleration below 9:00 didn't always happen. Maybe this part is the real key -- teach myself to run at that kind of speed with tired legs. Ditto the Friday-Saturday combo, to start every LR with tired legs, but I feel like doing a better job of getting to MP + 10% might have been what could have pushed me over the edge. I carried my speed for 20-21 miles, but I couldn't carry it for 26. I'm happy with how I did the speed work, happy with the fact that I got through a very challenging program without getting hurt, and obviously happy with a 72-minute PR. I don't need major changes. I need tweaks. I need three minutes. Seven seconds a mile. That'll get me to Hopkinton. |
| Night Sleep Time: 8.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 8.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 4.50 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 4.50 |
| Back on the TM from a slow 4.5. Picked up the pace just a bit. Still definitely stiff and sore; I have no difficulty remembering what I spent Saturday morning doing. Nothing hugely painful, though, but stiff in some new places, like the ITB is hurting at the left knee where it has not bothered me in the past. Probably will take my time building my mileage back up until I decide where and when to race again. |
| Night Sleep Time: 7.50 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 7.50 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 6.14 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 6.14 |
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Out to Two Rivers Park for six miles with the Crackheads this morning. People I don't even know were congratulating me on my Memphis performance. I know Hobbit had put the word out in the weekly Crackhead e-mail, but still, how they knew that was me, I dunno. But it's nice to get props from people outside your circle of friends.
Anyway, a slow, steady 10:00 pace. Just like in Memphis, the last two miles were dead into the wind, maybe even a stronger wind than last week. No significant problem with the legs. So the first week of recovery went well -- except that I now have to shower, change and go do a Saturday morning clinic. Yuck. Then I can take a nap. |
| Night Sleep Time: 5.50 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 5.50 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 |
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No running today as I recover from 26.2 eight days ago and 6.14 one day ago. But I've pretty much decided where to make my BQ try. I started a where-to-go-for-BQ thread on RWOL, and got a lot of good suggestions, including Newport, OR. So I look at the Newport race website and see the 2008 race winner is a fellow FRB blogger. So, because Newport works for me on several levels, I'm pretty sure at this point that's where I'm gonna go for BQ next:
* Scheduling. My son graduates from high school May 19 and has been wanting to take a graduation trip. He wanted to go to Canada, but that's gonna be hard to do, in part because none of us have passports right now. But he's OK with Oregon. And a May 30 date fits in well with his graduation.
* Course. Fast, and flat. Sean confirmed that to me; so did the guy who suggested it.
* Weather. As much as I hate running in the heat, that's a worry for a late May race, but if there's anywhere I can depend on for cool weather at that time of year, it's the Pacific Northwest.
* Accommodations. My wife's cousin owns a cottage or condo or something on the Oregon coast, about 70 miles from Newport, that will make a great base for a week of tapering/vacation before we move down to Newport for the race. And I've already found a great flight deal on Orbitz for that week (thank goodness that the price of jet fuel keeps going down).
If for some reason Newport doesn't work out (maybe we can't get the cottage), option #2 is Traverse City, MI. Northern Michigan is beautiful, the course at Traverse meets my criteria for terrain and weather, and it's not too far from the Canadian border so my son could get his Canadian trip. Either one would be OK with me. |
| Night Sleep Time: 9.50 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 9.50 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 5.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 5.00 |
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Finally, a good night's sleep thanks to a nice batch of NyQuil. Maybe too good. The stuff didn't wear off until after lunch, so it was a groggy morning.
While the meds were fading away, the weather was getting nasty. Yesterday it was in the 60s. Tonight, it's in the 20s, freezing rain, the grass is crunchy. Just the kind of night for which treadmills were invented. And I put it to its intended use. Five recovery miles while I watched the football game. No discomfort at all with the legs.
Tyler just learned (it's 10 p.m.) that he doesn't have to go to school tomorrow; freezing rain will do that around here, since chains are unknown and salting the streets almost unknown around here. But the temps are not supposed to warm up much at all (subfreezing all day), NLR is very hilly and I'd rather not my son have to drive that decrepit old van on slick, inclined streets (I saw a high school kid have an accident this morning near NLRHS when I went to drop off some Prilosec for his heartburn). Then again, the decrepit van is still in the parking lot at school; Pam went to pick him up after school because his windshield was iced over and she didn't want him driving anyway.
Heard from my friend Michelle, who ran her first sub-five-hour marathon yesterday in Dallas. It was very warm and humid, and many of the runners (including her) paid for it. She reports being dizzy after about 21 miles, and when she finished, she went to the medical tent where her BP was like 80/40. She recovered before too long without an IV or anything. Classic dehydration; hypovolemia from sweating too much produces hypotension which results in dizziness. Very proud of her running a PR despite adverse conditions; I told her my speed must be rubbing off on her. She feels that her late friend Anne Pressly, the murdered TV anchor, was cheering her on. Wouldn't doubt it. |
| Night Sleep Time: 8.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 8.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 6.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 6.00 |
| Six easy miles on the treadmill. It's still icy outside and the forecast is for freezing fog tonight, so tomorrow may be no picnic on the streets and highways either. Six of my 19 patients today actually showed up; only a couple of the others actually bothered to call and cancel. Perhaps they thought we would be closed like most of the doctors' offices in town. I've now run 27 miles in 10 days since the 26.2 in one day. It's still hard for me to think of myself as not only a multiple marathoner, but a successful (relatively speaking), goal-achieving marathoner. My athletic career, such as it was, tended to consist of bumping up very quickly against limits I could not overcome. Too small and not strong enough for football, too short and not quick enough for basketball, inadequate hand-eye coordination for baseball and golf, not enough training to do the job in track.One problem I think I had is that I didn't know what it took to succeed as an athlete. I didn't have the concept of hard work as a vital component; why my dad, who was an all-America high school football player and a Division I recruit, didn't try to impart that to me, I still don't know. I didn't lift enough weights and do enough drills to overcome my small size in football, I didn't develop other skills like ballhandling to compensate in basketball, and I didn't build my base enough to become more than a mediocre middle-distance runner in track. I probably would have done the same as a marathon-wannabe if I hadn't found good resources like Pfitz' book, and this blog, and the RWOL forums. There, I found out what other people who were succeeding did, and not only that, I got encouragement that I never got from my coaches as a kid. I never showed enough natural talent for them to really bother coaching me, and they spent their time coaching the kids who had the talent. But with all the help I got, nobody ran a single step for me. I had to push myself out the door six times a week, and put in the miles whether I felt good or not, do the LT runs and the MP runs and the VO2-max semisprints and run the hills, and make the effort to read the books and the forums and apply what I read there to my own situation. Much of it helped, some of it didn't, and I had to decide what applied to me and what didn't. So now I'm in uncharted territory for me. I've achieved two major athletic goals -- running a marathon, and breaking four hours. I'm now a better-than-average marathoner (in 2007, the average male finisher in an American marathon ran a 4:29:52, according to marathonguide.com, and only 15% broke 3:30; I'm a lot closer to 3:30 than 4:30 now. The average for my age group was 4:24:40). But now I've got to press on and see what else is in there. BQ, 3:15, 3:00 -- what is my limit at age 48-plus, and how can I get there? I ran a 5:05 mile and 11:02 two-mile in high school; how much of that speed is still there? Can I learn to run 26.2 at 7:24 pace? How about 6:51? Right now I haven't even run a 5K at 6:51, although I think I could do that now much better than I could last July. Is BQ going to be enough for me? Is 3:15 enough? Will my wife let me find out? Back to the icy weather: my TV-reporter friend Michelle, fresh off her first sub-five marathon, was doing a live remote tonight standing near an ice-clogged stretch of freeway. She was wearing a blue Brooks jacket and earmuffs. I cracked up when I saw her; I've seen those exact earmuffs and jacket at 6 a.m. on a Crackhead run. But her hair and makeup were a lot nicer than they are at 6 a.m. :) (I know you sometimes read the blog, Michelle; that's why I'm picking on you). |
| Night Sleep Time: 6.50 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 6.50 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 |
| XT today, trying to target the quads and hip flexors -- those muscles that fatigued first at Memphis and pushed me above BQ time. Half-hour on the recumbent bike with the resistance turned up, trying to maintain 90 RPM cadence (= 180 steps per minute running cadence, which is what I want). Pretty successful on both counts. Maintained a high-80s cadence average, and the hip flexors and upper quads are the muscle groups that were burning when I finished. Then capped it off with a couple of sets of upper body work; there were some twinges in my infraspinatus muscles during the marathon, although I had no trouble properly carrying/using my arms for 3:33. |
| Night Sleep Time: 7.50 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 7.50 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 5.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 5.00 |
| Back on the TM for five. Legs did not want to go. Neither did the rest of the body. Then I realized it was the old pattern -- I wanted to run faster. Turned up the TM decently, and I felt stronger and finished the run with some energy. I would still classify it as a recovery run, just a little more intense. At some point I have to get over this cold or whatever it is I have. My sinuses have been draining for two solid weeks. Yes, I'm aware a marathon batters the immune system, but somewhere I have to get back to normal. Sheesh. And taking stuff for symptomatic relief has just left me feeling dopey. |
| Night Sleep Time: 8.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 8.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 8.85 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 8.85 |
| You'd think I'd learn by now, but I keep doing it: Setting my alarm clock 12 hours LATE. Wanted to get up at 4:45 a.m. to go run with the Crackheads, set it for 4:45 p.m. Then woke up at 5:45. I was supposed to meet Sparky30 from RWOL this morning. Got to the Capitol at 6:06, just as Tom sent the Crackheads out on their run. Tom said no one had been asking for me, so maybe Sparky didn't show. So, with no stretching or warmup whatsoever, I headed out on the run. And just passed people left and right, first walkers, then joggers, then runners. Finally looked at my watch and I was cruising at 9:00 pace. And just kept cruising. Couldn't read my directions properly in the predawn light and went too far before turning around and heading back, so my planned 8-miler wound up as almost 9. Maintained a near-9:00 pace, then put the hammer down the last half-mile or so and ran it at about MP. Off to Fayetteville this morning to see Spamalot this afternoon and a basketball game tonight. Then spending the night, waiting for the latest Canadian cold front to arrive. It's supposed to be about 20 tomorrow morning up there, 17 tomorrow night down here when the front makes it to central Arkansas. It's 44 now and the temperature is already falling. |
| Night Sleep Time: 7.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 7.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 6.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 6.00 |
| Back on the TM tonight as Minnesota visits Arkansas for a few days -- temps around 25 and wind chill in the teens. Started out planning a recovery run, but again it felt right to crank up the pace as the run went on. Ended up at 8:34 pace for the last two miles, which would be interim-GMP plus 10% until I decide finally what GMP is going to be. For now, I'm going to work toward a 7:45 pace. I know I could hold 7:45 for 13 miles two months ago, the trick will be to double that in five months. My shoot for the moon goal is probably a 3:15 (7:24 pace); my fallback goal is just a BQ. Wow -- BQ as a fallback goal. Anyway, run went well. Had a weird twinge in the left glutes as the run began which I have not felt before, but it went away in the first 400 and did not return. Those last two miles at 8:34 felt quite comfortable. I did not turn on the fan in the fitness center because I wasn't sure I needed it, as cold as it was outside. Turned out I worked up quite a sweat without it. That's OK too; my race is in May, when it will definitely NOT be in the 20s, so I might as well maintain some degree of acclimation to "heat" so that I'm not caught unprepared when it warms up in the spring. |
| Night Sleep Time: 8.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 8.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 6.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 6.00 |
| New complication in the training routine. Boss wants me to work two Saturdays per month. He is convinced, probably correctly, that our nurse practitioner has no intention of returning from her maternity leave, now at three months and counting, and he does not want to have his weekday clinics loaded with followup visits. So we see followups on Saturday morning so he has more times to do the procedures that really pay the bills. He says he will pay me extra for the Saturdays, in addition to the raise I just got, but don't know what that will mean. And Saturday is, of course, my long run day. I suppose I can do my LR after the clinic, especially in the winter, or start my clinic after the LR (less likely, especially as the LR starts to creep back into the high teens, which it will), or do my LR on Sunday (I like that option least of all, but it may become necessary). Saturday clinic starts 1/3/09. Stay tuned. Anyway, back to tonight's run. Easy 6 on the TM (it's still raining and barely above freezing, not that I was likely to run outside). Wore the HRM for the first time in a long time. Average HR was 139, creeping up to 151. Last HRR figures I had, 139 was about 70% of my HRR. But then I really have no idea what my resting heart rate is now; haven't tried to check it in months, because rolling over to, say, grab a watch or turn the light on puts the heart in high gear. Is it in the high 50s like it was a few months back? Dunno, but kinda doubt it. Going to Camden tomorrow for Christmas. I'm supposed to do an 8 mile GA with strides tomorrow, but this may get in the way. Nana has a treadmill; I may do an easy 5 on the TM tomorrow night and do my strides when I get back Thursday night. Or do them Friday morning; that would work too. |
| Night Sleep Time: 7.50 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 7.50 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 6.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 6.00 |
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New complication in the TM issue. Went to the mom-in-law's for Christmas Eve. Mom-in-law has a TM she never uses, so voila, there's my run rather than trot around after dark in a town I don't know all that well. TM works fine. The overhead fan and the HVAC vent in that room don't. So I got zero circulation for an hour on the TM. Felt like I was running in a sauna. Otherwise, the legs did fine on a routine recovery run.
I think I'll wait until I get home tomorrow night for another run, or maybe a crosstraining session and run Friday morning. No more TM runs at the in-laws...
Ordered my copy of Pfitz' new book, or the second edition rather, this morning. Also ordered Noakes at the same time, so I'll have all sorts of new info to peruse on cold winter nights. |
| Night Sleep Time: 7.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 7.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 |
| No training today; spent today occupied with Christmas, and a good long nap after Christmas dinner that was much needed, then driving two hours home from the in-laws. As is typical with our long drives, my wife and son both dozed off and I had a lot of time to think. One of the things I thought about is that run in Memphis, and its timing. If I were seven months older, it would have been a BQ run -- I would be 50 before the 2010 Boston Marathon, and my time was a BQ time for the 50-54 bracket. But because I was born in October and not in March, I'm not yet BQd. Some people would probably send in their app for 2010, fudge the birth date by seven months, and get in. The BAA doesn't know. And I still would have been 48 at the time I ran in Memphis. It's tempting, I have to admit. But I'm not gonna do it. I'll do my spring attempt, probably at Newport, and if that doesn't do it, I'll do a fall race, maybe Chicago or Memphis again or Mid-South. A 3:30 in either one gets me in for 2010. A 3:35 in the fall gets me in for 2011, when I will be 50. I can get those 163 seconds for Newport, or I can run another 3:33 in the fall, and get in the right way. And if I can't get in the right way, it's my own darn fault. So now, having taken today off and with no work tomorrow, I can do a morning workout tomorrow, then take my son shopping for his college computer purchase, then go buy my wife's last Christmas present, then go open presents tomorrow night at my parents'. Then hit the road with the Crackheads on Saturday at Oucho's, in the West Little Rock Himalayas, and do a Friday-Saturday combo for the first time in a long time. When (not if) I am finally training for Boston, Oucho's will have a prominent role, because it's got killer uphills and killer downhills. |
| Night Sleep Time: 6.00 | Nap Time: 2.50 | Total Sleep Time: 8.50 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 10.11 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 10.11 |
| This one fits in the category of boy-yo-mama-taught-you-better-than-that. Despite fighting this cold or bronchitis or whatever the heck upper respiratory garbage I've had for the past week or so, I got up this morning and headed to Oucho's. Warm, muggy, raining intermittently. But at least there was a breeze so I didn't get overheated. Headed out on the hike of the mountains of west Little Rock. Became obvious very quickly that my body has not recovered from this whatever. Lot of walking. Lot of thinking I should be walking when I wasn't. Somehow managed to finish 10.1 miles and get back to Oucho's in less than two hours. And managed to run most of the big hills -- Rahling, coming and going, and Pebble Beach. I wondered where the Sherpas and the oxygen masks were, but I ran the hills. Then I went home and took a really long nap. I feel a little better -- emphasis on little -- but I'm still definitely not over this junk. Better now than in the middle of training for Newport, I guess. |
| Night Sleep Time: 7.00 | Nap Time: 4.00 | Total Sleep Time: 11.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 7.31 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 7.31 |
| Had planned to do 6 on the TM tonight, but got up there and the fitness center was locked up tight. No TM for me. I was about to give up on the run, it being 7 p.m., dark and pretty cold already, but I remembered that I had mapped out a 4.75-mile loop about a year ago on the USATF website that I had never actually run. So I came back, looked it up, noticed a couple of places I could tack on some extra mileage, and set out. First, I remembered pretty quick why I'd never actually run this route. It is nothing but HILLS. Actually, the uphills proved not too much of a problem, but the downhills were pounding my thighs pretty hard, especially after 10 miles of Oucho yesterday. Even with that, I felt pretty good, and I threw in another little detour later in the run to add some extra distance. Wasn't sure how far I had run (my Garmin was out of juice, not having been recharged after yesterday's run). So I got in the car and measured it, both with the odometer and the partially charged Garmin. The result: 7.31. Didn't sleep too well last night due to coughing, but I've felt better today. Hopefully the crud is finally subsiding, but I did get some Mucinex at the store this afternoon to help push it along. If the real problem with my BQ near-miss at Memphis was a lack of quad strength due to lack of hills, running this sucker a few times will help fix that. |
| Night Sleep Time: 8.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 8.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 5.01 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 5.01 |
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After pummeling my quads with 17.4 miles of hills this weekend, decided to take it easy on them tonight. Fortunately, my landlord cooperated by reopening the fitness room tonight, so to the treadmill I went. Standard progression run finishing at slightly sub-9:00 pace, getting faster every mile. Quads were really hurting early in the run, less so as I got warmed up. Discovered afterward that the glutes were kinda sore.
Plan right now is to run 7 tomorrow and 5 on Wednesday to finish the year at an even 1900 miles. That would be equal to running from my apartment to the outskirts of San Jose, CA. Or 450 miles more than running from here to Provo, for you Utahn bloggers (is that really what Utah people call themselves? Utahns? I remember seeing that in some stories datelined Salt Lake City back in my previous life as a journalist.). Or 437 miles more than running from my place to downtown Boston, to get to the real point of this blog.
I know that's chicken feed compared to the mileage Sasha and some of the other FRB bloggers put in, but compared to where I was two years ago, that's incomprehensible to me. And, barring injury, it's gonna pale in comparison to the mileage I plan to rack up in 2009. |
| Night Sleep Time: 6.75 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 6.75 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 6.50 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.50 | 7.00 |
| Great night. Strong 7-miler with strides on the TM -- and got to watch my Razorbacks beat the fajitas out of Oklahoma at BWA. Of course, if I lived close enough to Fayetteville, I would have been there instead of running, but that's OK too. Watched all of it while running, screaming at the refs, etc. So much for our being picked last in the SEC West. We'll be in the top 25 next week, unless we lay an egg Saturday against UNT. Five miles tomorrow to cap off the year at exactly 1900 miles. Then go celebrate my dad's 70th birthday with him on Thursday. Except for having to work Saturday morning, this is becoming a very good week. |
| Night Sleep Time: 6.50 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 6.50 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 5.01 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 0.00 | 5.01 |
| Probably shouldn't have run today (or any time in the past week), but I'm OCD, I admit it. I wanted that round number, and I got it. A nice, slow, agonizing 5.01 on the TM put me at 1900.01 for the year (so I could say I went OVER 1900). My sinuses are killing me, I'm producing all sorts of green stuff, I'm not sleeping, and I'm exhausted. Got my nurse to call in a Z-pak for the sinusitis, which I am now taking. So I'm going to call it a year -- literally. I'm going to bed as soon as I finish updating my log. My copy of Lore of Running arrived today and I'll read myself to sleep. Probably should not run a step until I'm completely over this (or at least until I get some sleep). But I bet I do anyway. Not tomorrow, though. Tomorrow's my dad's 70th birthday, and it's for him. |
| Night Sleep Time: 5.00 | Nap Time: 0.00 | Total Sleep Time: 5.00 |
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| | Easy Miles | Marathon Pace Miles | Threshold Miles | VO2 Max Miles | Total Distance | | 1606.96 | 187.41 | 72.70 | 32.94 | 1900.01 |
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| Night Sleep Time: 1109.42 | Nap Time: 33.00 | Total Sleep Time: 1142.42 | |
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