NAME DROPPING

I was pretty excited about dropping a couple of names in this post but then I read Alison’s recent post and I knew I couldn’t compete. But I’ll still tell my story.

As I started walking the mile from the parking lot to the course yesterday at the state meet I saw a group of people, including Dana Coons and Matt Gabrielson of Team Minnesota fame. While the thought I just walking behind Dana was very inviting, I got up the courage to talk to her. Since she just ran her first marathon 5 weeks ago, it was easy to come up with at topic. She’s still in recovery mode which doesn’t surprise me. She was very nice and we probably spoke for 5 minutes or so. We didn’t get around to exchanging phone numbers or email addresses – yet.

Today’s run was a family affair. First I took Bailey for a mile and then I pushed Kinsey in the stroller for 5 miles. When we got back Katie was just waking up, so I threw her in the stroller and went another 2 miles. It was nice to take Katie last since she’s so much lighter than Kinsey. I can’t imagine trying to push them both at the same time.

STATE MEET

First off, I need to correct what I said yesterday about my friend Eric’s daughter, Sal. This is Sal’s 4th trip to the state meet. She finished 100th, 50th and 88th the last 3 years. I should have remember that because after finishing 50th, Eric and I predicted 25th last year.

There were 4 races today; boys and girls AA (big school) followed by boys and girls A. I just recap them in order.

Boy AA
From 2002 to 2004, Garrett Heath had a stretch where he was undefeated in cross country running, cross country skiing and track. Garrett is at Stanford now, but he has a younger brother, Elliott who’s a junior. While Elliott wasn’t undefeated this year, he won the “big one” by just over 2 seconds with a time of 15:32. Garrett has the course record of 15:11.

Girls AA
Speaking of course records, a gal named Carrie Tollefson owns the 11-year old girls record of 14:09. That was broken today by senior Elizabeth Yetzer with a time of 13:59. Two years ago Yetzer broke Tollefson’s 1600 mark and last year she broke Shannon Bergstedt’s (who’s now at Stanford) 3200 mark. I don’t know about other states, but Minnesota allows kids to run varsity from the 7th grade on. Yetzer has now place first twice, second, third, fourth and fifth at state.

At this meet her last 800 meters was amazing. She was with another gal at 3200 meters and went on to win by 18 seconds – that’s like covering the last 800 meters while the second place gal only covered 700 meters. Wow.

One final thing on Yetzer, she’ll be heading to the University of Minnesota next year.

I’m happy to report that Sal ran an awesome race. We saw her at about 800 meters and she was probably in about 50th place. Then the runners do a loop in the woods and come back by us again around 1800 meters. During this time Eric and I said she needed to really move up and be in good position by the time we saw her again. Well, she did just that as she ran passed in 9th place. Eric and I ran to another spot and during that time it looked like she made it all the way to 7th place. A different loop through the woods and we see Sal in about the same position with 400 meters to go. She’s looking good but within 15 seconds of her are about 20 other girls. We sprint to the finish in time to see Yetzer’s sub-14 and we start counting places. Sal ends up coming in 10th with a 14:45!!! What a great way to end her high school cross country career!?

Boys A
In this race report I mention the winner being a 17-year old kid (Mike Torchia) who’s won the race 5 years in a row. He also happens to be the defending class A champ. Now he’s fastest boy in the state as his 15:28 was the fastest time of the day. He also had the largest margin of victory, 39 seconds, on the day. Torchia is looking at Minnesota, Dartmouth and Princeton for colleges.

Girls A
Oh, that record that Yetzer set, it lasted about 3 hours as senior Bria Wetsch (who’ll run for Oregon next year) turned in a 13:54 to win her race by 21 seconds. Wetsch was the only girl able to defeat Yetzer during the season. A week later Yetzer avenged that loss. I guess the “rubber match” will have to be at Footlocker.

As for my own running, there were 2 hours between the AA and A meets, so I managed to get in 8 miles. That gave me 53 for the week. I’m feeling good and have been reminding myself to be patient.

SOMETHING DIFFERENT

Okay I figured out the header. I’m done tinkering with it for now. I have a few color changes left (I’m going for this look) but that’s it.

I’m only 10 days into my training and I’m already noticing that I’m “worrying” about pace and splits way too much. So today I decided to “leave my watch at home” (actually I wore it, but I didn’t use it – but “leaving it at home” sounds so much better). I can’t remember EVER doing that before. I also decided to “only” run 6 miles today because I don’t want to increase mileage too quickly. I’m at 45 miles now and I’ll figure tomorrow’s run will give me 53 for the week. I haven’t run that much since the last week of JULY. Man, what the hell was I doing all summer? No wonder I raced so poorly.

On my way back to my car the trail I run on crosses a road about a half mile before my run ends. I thought I’d be “wild and crazy” and take the road back. It turns out there’s a nice little hill along the way. Since there aren’t any hills on the path I think I’m going to run this hill 1-2 times during the work week, just to make sure I don’t “go soft” by just running on the flats.

A few weeks ago I wrote this post about my anniversary of running and how I thought it was earlier in October. It turns out I was right. Last night I was reading through my old log book and way in the back it says “Started running Oct. 2nd, 1979. There was also more info on my first “race.” There were 3 people in the race. I came in 2nd, one second behind the winner. I hope he felt good about sprinting to beat a 10 year old. I also found my dad’s time from the 1983 Grandma’s marathon. He was 43 at the time and ran 3:12 – not too shabby.

Tomorrow I’m going to watch the Minnesota State High School cross country meet. My friend Eric’s daughter has qualified 3 years in a row. As a sophomore she finished 100th. Last year she probably ran her worst race of the year and only managed to finish in 88th place. This year she’s running awesome, having just won her conference and section meets. She’s currently ranked 12th in Class AA. Good luck to her. I always liked what Mark Wetmore (Colorado’s coach) said in “Running with the Buffaloes” it was something like “I don’t ask my kids to run Herculean-efforts (in the big meets). I just want them to run as they’re capable.” Good advice for anyone prior to a race.

WHAT A DIFFERENCE A DAY MAKES

As I was typing yesterday’s post last night, my computer re-booted itself. Of course I was on the last paragraph and I ended up losing everything. Rather than re-typing it, I went to bed. This is the same computer that won’t read the software for our digital camera. We have to take the camera in, get prints made and then scan them into the computer. So I should have Halloween pictures back by Thanksgiving.

Here’s a quick recap of the post I lost. I’m still working on my header. I’m not sure why the image got squished. I have some theories that I’m going to explore tonight.

Yesterday I ran 7 miles in the morning at 8:25 pace. Towards the end my legs were really heavy and I was beginning to think that maybe I’m doing too much after having 10 days off. I made a mental note to really pay attention to my next run and be prepared to cut back on the pace and/or distance.

Well, 24 hours later I felt great. I started easy and after awhile it felt like I was moving faster than normal, however, my breathing was still very relaxed. As I got closer to my turn-around point I looked at my watch and figured I could get in another mile and still make it to work on time. I ended up running 9 miles with the last 8 just under 8:10 pace – the last 4 of that were sub-8 pace.

DO YOU SEE ANYTHING DIFFERENT?

As you can probably tell, I have a new header. I was going to say I updated my header; but Susan did all the freelance work for me. The emphasis is on “free” however if by some miracle I have a 3rd daughter, I have to name her Susan. Anyway, I was going after an image that reminded me of the trails I love to run on. I need to do some more tweaking with the size and colors, but it’s getting there. Thanks Susan!

I didn’t mention this yesterday but Evan and I had lunch with Nobuya "Nobby" Hashizume yesterday. If you’re not familiar with Nobby, hopefully you will be soon. He’s in the process of organizing the Five Circles foundation which will be designed to carry on the Lydiard name and training philosophies. Here’s another article I found written by Nobby.

I had an easy 8 mile run this morning. I did the same course as yesterday and it took a minute longer. My quads were sore, probably from running pretty hard during the Big 10 meet.

There’s this gal I see on the trail quite a bit, but haven’t had a chance to talk to her because we’re usually going the opposite directions. I saw her this summer too because she worked out with the Minnesota Distance Runner’s Association at the Macalester track on Tuesday nights. This morning I caught up to her with about ½ a mile to go in my run. We only ran together for about 4 minutes but still had a nice conversation. It was the highlight of my otherwise uneventful run.

NEW FAVORITE PHOTO

Here's my new favorite photo. I love the expression on Katie's face and the way she's lying on Amy. I wish I could take credit for taking the picture but I can't. Kinsey, who's 4 1/2 years old, took it. I'll have to ask her for some tips.

HAPPY HALLOWEEN

Now that I tried my headlamp out last week, I don't need it due to day light savings ending. It looks like there are 2 sides to every story. The morning runners are happy because they can see again, while the evening runners are upset because now they have to run in the dark. Oh well, in a month we'll both be running in the dark and we'll be envious of those day-time runners.

During my mile run with my dog, my legs felt like lead - probably because I was running only 8 hours after my last run ended. That's like doing a two-a-day and my body is not ready for that. But then I was surprised by how good I felt during the main portion of my run. I went another 7 miles with the first half at 8:30 pace and the second half at 8:00 pace.

BIG 10 PHOTOS

Here are some photos that my college coach took at the Big 10 X-C meet yesterday.

TOTAL DOMINATION

The Big 10 Cross County meet was in town today and if you haven’t heard, the Wisconsin Badgers (rank 2nd in the nation) totally dominated the meet.

• They scored 16 points (15 is a perfect score).


• Each team runs up to 9 guys. Of the first 9 guys across the line, 8 of them were Badgers. Their 9th guy finished a “lowly” 25th place.


• They’re young. Their top-7 look like this Senior, Junior, Freshman, Freshman, Senior, Freshman, Junior.


• For 8K, their top-5 averaged 24:01 (the next closest team was 25:06), top-7 averaged 24:08, top-9 averaged 24:18.


• Word is they held 2 guys out from this meet that they run at Regionals.

I’m speechless; 8 of the top 9 guys in the entire conference. Just think about that in terms of another sport. For example, in basketball, their 2nd team would win the Big 10 conference title. Wow.

Ever see the Seinfeld episode where Jerry is “even-Steven”? He loses $20 and then finds $20 in a coat he hasn’t worn in awhile. That was me at the meet Sunday. I put my car key in my jacket pocket but forgot to zip it up. 2 hours later while standing around waiting for the awards I realize I lost my key. I tell the guys I’m with and they say that 20 minutes ago they announced that someone found a Subaru key. I go up to claim it and sure enough it’s mine. What luck!?

After 3 days in a row, I took yesterday off. Today kicked off the first full week of my new training program. You can look at this program in one of two ways; 1) I have 7 weeks to get my miles up before following Lydiard’s “standard” 12-week conditioning phase, before adding hill, anaerobic, sharpening, etc. or 2) I have a 19-week conditioning phase before adding that other stuff. I’m not sure there’s really a difference between the two. Anyway, I managed to hop on the treadmill at 8 PM and get in 7 miles.

AUTUMN CUTIES

Here are Katie and Kinsey playing in a pile of leaves recently. It probably triples the amount of work because I have to keep raking the leaves back into a pile, but I don't mind.

On my way home from work today I noticed a lot fewer colors and a lot more bare trees. One of the trees in my front yard is still green (no it's not an Evergreen - I know that's what you were thinking).

BABY JOGGER

Here's Mike on a Muffin Run.

ROUTINES

Three days of running in a row and my little routines are already starting to appear. As soon as I get home from work and change my clothes, I get out both my work and my running clothes for the next day. After dinner I get my breakfast ready for the next day. When my alarm clock goes off at 5 AM I don’t even think about going back to sleep until 6. I think part of the reason I get like this is because I like base-building. Maybe I’m just one of those runners that likes to train rather than race. However, if I didn’t race I know I’d miss it.

I updated my log-book yesterday for my 10 days off. Wow, it felt weird crossing out an entire week and writing a big ZERO (then doing it again on the first 3 entries of the next page).

I ran another easy 7 miles this morning with the last 6 in 51:00 (25:53/25:07). Given my comments yesterday about not being able to see some of the people on the trail, I decided to try running with a headlamp. I bought it last year just as the days were getting longer, so I never wore it. I really like running with it. It produces a halo of light about 5 feet in front of me. My main goal in wearing it though is to scare the shit out of the rabbits before they scare me.

I don’t think I’m mentioned this yet, but I’ve been leaning towards running Grandma’s Marathon again in June. I was planning on just running a bunch of 15K-30K races, but I know I’ll kick myself if I don’t sign up. Besides, I’m going to be in such tremendous shape next year, why “waste” it on a 30K that no one cares about.

STILL AMAZED

Since today was only my second day back, I was a little worried about running 12 hours after my last run. But one of my goals is to get back into the routine of running in the morning, so I ventured out for another 7 mile run. My hip/groin ached a little during the second half, but it wasn't too bad.

I’ve mentioned this before, but probably have some new readers since then, so I’ll mention it again. When I run in the morning, for the most part, I jog with my dog for a mile and then I drive 25 miles across town towards my office. I park at a coffee shop and run out-and-back on 1 of 3 trails that are old rail road beds. Two are crushed limestone while one is pavement. They’re perfect for running in the dark because they’re flat with good footing. After the run, I grab a cup of coffee and head to work where I shower.

Some people probably wouldn’t count the mile jog with my dog, but I do. I consider it a warm-up mile, even if I’m cooled down before I start my “real” run. With some of my newly measured routes, I think I’ll start posting my time for that stretch. Hopefully I’ll be able to see the pace go down as my aerobic conditioning improves. So today I ran 7 miles with the last 6 in 50:47, 8:28 pace (25:37/25:10).

It still amazes me what some people will wear while running, walking or biking when it’s pitch black outside. Sure these trails are closed to motorized vehicles, but you still have other people exercising and you have to cross roads. One gal this morning was walking by herself, dressed in all black without any reflective vest or light. I’m not positive, but I think she had on headphones too. I suppose if I was going to get run over by a bike, I wouldn’t want to hear it coming either.

BACK IN THE SADDLE

Today I ended my run-less streak at 10 days. What a great day to start running again. I met Mary at Lake Harriett just after 4:30. It was about 50 degrees, sunny, and calm. I told Mary I could handle 6-8 miles. We did a lap around Lake Harriett and one around Lake Calhoun in 59 minutes and called it 7 miles.

You know how you take a couple days off in a row and your first run back feels like you’ve never run a step before in your life? Well I didn’t feel that way at all. The pace was nice and easy and I felt smooth the whole way. Let’s see how I bounce back tomorrow.

During my break I was going to sit down with Daws’ book and a calendar and make up my plan for next year. After reading some of the recent comments on the infamous Lydiard or Daniels thread, I think I’m better off just having a general idea of what I want to accomplish with each phase and then listening to my body along the way. I don’t think it makes sense for me to write down 70 miles for a week that’s 2 months away. How do I know how I’ll feel at that point?

Since I seem to race well just on mileage and strong aerobic runs and since that’s the emphasis in Lydiard’s conditioning phase, I’m going to focus on taking my time building mileage. If I need to push the hill phase back 1-2 weeks or cut my anaerobic work down by 1-2 weeks, that’s fine.

The last time I probably wrote about my training I was struggling between two things regarding my upcoming conditioning phase; 1) keeping my mileage around 70 mpw and adding more, stronger aerobic runs or 2) trying to get my mileage in the 85-100 mpw range even if it means sacrificing those important stronger aerobic runs.

I emailed Nobuya “Nobby” Hashizume, who studied under Lydiard and he said;

The balance between mileage and the effort, or speed, is very much individual thing. Some react better when it's slower and just pile up mileage; others respond better with higher effort and, therefore, less mileage. You will need to experiment yourself. Natural progression should be such that you just run a lot at whatever the pace you can manage (slow at first) and, as you get fitter, the pace quickens…My suggestion would be; try 85-100 at comfortable speed--meaning quite slow at first. Then see how much stronger/faster you'll get. If you feel absolutely stuffed and can't keep up the effort, you should cut down the mileage down to where you started, say, 70 or so.

So, 85-100 mpw it is. Right now my goal is just to build up my mileage with all easy runs. I’m going to “jump in” around 45-50 mile this week and see how that feels.

YOU KNOW WHO YOU ARE

Everywhere I look lately it’s the same story; people have just finished their season (many with marathon PRs) and they’re jumping right back into training. Some are getting hurt, some are getting depressed, some say they feel fine but they also say getting in the mileage is a struggle (Hmm, sounds like me after Grandma’s).

Why are we so reluctant to take time off?

I have a friend who’s got a nagging hip injury. I’ve hounded her over and over – now is the time to rest and let that heal. Why keep tweaking it in September-November (or longer) when your next race isn’t until April? Last week she sent me an article from Active.com on none other than taking time off at the end of the season.

Ron Daws recommends taking 2-3 weeks off after the season. I mentioned Tony Schiller, the stud triathlete that spoke during our Wellness week. He says;

TAKE ONE MONTH A YEAR (NOVEMBER OR DECEMBER) TOTALLY OFF. NOT ONLY IS THIS A RECHARGE (BODY, MIND, SPIRIT) OF THE BATTERY, IT'S THE BEST WAY TO EXPERIENCE MOMENTUM LATER. ATHLETES WHO REFUSE TO REST NEVER EXPERIENCE LOWS NOR HIGHS...JUST PLATEAUS.

I find that last sentence interesting – and true with regards to my running over the last few years. Looking back I can’t remember the last time I had a really crappy, “man, am I out of shape” race. Nor can I remember any “holy cow, where did that come from” races either.

Last year I took 1 week “off” at the end of my race season. “Off” meaning, I biked 4 times during that period. No I haven't convinced myself to take a month off, however, today is my 9th day off in a row (I did bike once, but only 8 miles to measure a training route). Tomorrow will be my 10th and final day off for this recovery period. Wednesday I’m meeting my friend with the hip ailment. Maybe I can nag her some more about taking time off.

BLOGGER ETIQUETTE

Okay, here’s a blogger question for those that care to answer. What’s the best way to respond to comments left on your site? I see some people (like me) respond with another comment, some people go to the commenters blog and leave a comment there, others email responses. What is the proper etiquette?

I finally got off my ass this morning and “exercised.” I rode my bike 8 miles and wrote down where the half and/or miles occur. The ride was a good reminder of how poor my circulation is in my hands and feet. It was about 40 degrees out, but being on the bike made it feel colder.

I mentioned to my wife possibly running the Chicago Marathon next year and she was all for it. We’ll see.

The other day I wrote about my first training log, a spiral notebook. Last night I was going through my first “real” log book, “The Runner’s Handbook Traning Diary” by Bob Glover and Jack Sheperd. It was a great book. I wonder why they stopped publishing it.

The spine is all broken and it looks like there are a bunch of pages missing. The first entry is October 9th, 1982. That’s over 2 years since my last entry in my spiral notebook, so something has to be missing. Anyway, there’s still a lot of “good stuff” in this log book. I used to count my “week” as 7 days of running, not necessarily (or not likely) 7 days in a row. I’d only write down the days I ran. So while I may have been running 25-30 miles per week – it probably took me 15-20 days to get there.

At the time I lived in Northern Wisconsin and there weren’t a lot of road races around. We basically ran the same 6-8 races every summer. In 1983 there’s a stretch from July 15th to August 7th where I ran 8 times and 5 of them are races. A month later I was running my first cross country season. And you wonder why Lydiard says we race too often in the U.S.

This is getting kind of long so I’ll end with just one Daws quote today. “When you make up your training as you go, perhaps waiting to see how you feel before you train each day, it’s much like looking at individual pieces of a jigsaw puzzle and trying to imagine the picture.”

2005 AMSTERDAM MARATHON

I just got this article in an email from my college coach. He writes for Track & Field News and I thought I'd share it. Sorry if the paragraphs don't make sense as formatting may have gotten screwed up while copying and pasting.

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by Sean Hartnett

Haile Gebrsalassie is now a marathoner. Yes, the Ethiopian gold medal magnet faltered in the final 10K in his Amsterdam assault on Paul Tergat’s WR, but his brazen 62:03 opening half and his shear magical presence is sure to have a lasting impact on the 42K event.

World Records are often pursued in Chicago, London and Berlin, with a combination of fast courses, bold pacing, and deep competitive fields. Amsterdam was less complicated, it was just Haile and the clock.The record chase started well as Haile, a handful of pacers and Kenyan Daniel Yego simply cruised the opening half. They were not hammering, the pace was covered comfortably, even by Yengo who ran a 2:08:20 debut in Rome this spring.

“The pacing was perfect, for me it is not so fast.”Haile recalls. “The first part was a country run, very nice I could even smell the cows. But the second part when we got back to the city was difficult because the wind increased and was very complicated.”Yego held pace until just before 30K, then Haile pushed on alone, but his race began unraveling as he notes “there were problems with the wind, and after 35K, problems with my breathing system. I had very hard stitches in my chest, and the air couldn’t come in.”

Haile ran bigheartedly over the final kilometers to finish a disappointed 2:06:20, the year’s fastest time. “My expectation was to break the record. I felt like I ran 2:04 today,” Haile lamented, “but the wind stole two minutes from my time.”

Despite falling short of the record, Haile relishes his new career noting “the marathon is good for me,” - and clearly Haile is good for what has become the sports most promising and lucrative event.

Three years after his 2:06:35 third place finish in the London Marathon, Haile has found that marathon training suits his fragile legs and his growing family life well and is anxious to get on with his marathon career.“The training is not so hard on my body,” Haile offers. “I can train on the forest trails in the mountains, and I have never had to go to the track.”Gebrsallassie who just added a son Nathan to his family also notes, “I can also spend more time with my family, my business, and the charity concerns.”Haile has a great support crew with his long-time manager Jos Hermans and his assistant Michel Boeting, and coaching advisor Theo Joosten. Haile continues get advice from Ethiopian national coach Dr. Kostre but now works more independently noting “the Ethiopian system is changing because there are now so many athletes. “We no longer train at the national center, I have just have a small group that works with me.”

Like his long-time rival Tergat, Haile recognizes that there is a learning process in the marathon and he notes, “I think you can learn things from a mistake, and from experience. I have yet to be perfect in a marathon. I have to learn a lot.” Haile adds, “remember that when I was in London one of my big problems was with the drink, Yesterday it was perfect.

Richard Nerurkar accompanies me in training on a bike to provide fluids, so now we are already perfect on that issue, but there are one, two or three things that I am still thinking about.”

Yet, unlike Tergat, Haile has adopted Paula Radcliffe’s ballistic approach to the marathon and every race he runs may well be a WR attempt. “Sure, why not? Gebrselassie responds with a serious smile.“This is part of my plan, I am confident I can make the time, but I don’t know when.”

Despite being rebuffed in his record attempt, Haile admitted “after today I think that the marathon is the easiest one when I compare to 10,000. In the marathon you don’t need to sprint and run fast. You just have to keep up the pace and that is enough. You don’t need a lot of tactics you are just competing against time, looking at the clock.”

Haile adds “I am concentrating on the long runs, more time, staying longer. I think that the third or fourth marathon will be OK. This time I only focus on the time, but in the future I will handle the finish better.” Haile concludes “it didn’t work here in Amsterdam, but I think someday it will happen that I just do the time. We’ll see.”

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Thomas Sorensen recently met Geb too and he writes about it here.

I CAN FEEL IT

I’m getting there. I still don’t have the urge to run yet, but it is coming. I can feel it. Just walking around the office, my legs feel great. I haven’t done anything for 4 days now. I’ll probably get my mountain bike out over the next day or two, more for fun than anything else.

Again, I’ve been reviewing Ron Daws’s “Running Your Best” to help plan my training. Since I don’t have anything to say about my own training right now, I thought over the next few days I’d throw out a bunch of excerpts from this book. These could be copyright violations, but I’ll take my chances. These first few quotes are from the Introduction and Chapter 1 (Getting Serious).

“It is surprising how runners underestimate their capabilities. They look at current performance and fail to realize that their limits could be far beyond anything they’ve envisioned.”

“Success is not guaranteed by thrashing yourself harder than others in training. Undirected grueling workouts more often bring frustration than anything else. Successful conditioning means knowing precisely when to work hard, when to rest, and how to match various kinds of training to your specific needs.”

As David Moorcroft says, “There’s not a lot you can do about your natural ability, but there’s a hell of a lot you can do about the way you apply it. I’ve finally produced the performance level of which I was capable…so I can retire happy. For I’ve always thought that the most important thing is to fulfill your potential…”

Daws talking about his high school and college years; “Most aggravatingly, I would run reasonably at the beginning of the season and then my races would begin to disintegrate.”

“After college I decided to give it my all because there was nothing to learn from half a commitment. I wanted to see how far I could go given the talent I had. Otherwise, I would always know that whatever I did accomplish, I could have done better.”

“Making a commitment to run comes down to how badly you want to explore your limits. It means honestly confronting your excuses. It means making time to train.”

JOTTINGS

I’m in the process (although there’s really no “process” associated with it) of taking at least a week off from running. The hardest part about doing that is this is the nicest time of year for running. It’s been 45-50 in the morning and 60-65 in the evenings.

Yesterday I was going over my race results for the year. I punched all my times into this WAVA calculator. I used to think age-grading was silly, but now that I “qualify” (36 years and older) I think it’s interesting. If nothing else, it allows me to compare race X to race Y.

If you’re not familiar with WAVA, it’s an age-grading system that allows you to punch in your age, sex, time and distance and it will give you such things as an age-graded result, which is your time if you were an Open runner and an age-performance percentage (the higher the better). It is this percentage that I used to analyze my races for the year;

2/5/05 70.55%
3/20/05 71.21%
4/30/05 71.55%
5/7/05 70.14%
6/18/05 66.99%
7/23/05 65.26%
8/7/05 68.35%
8/20/05 69.74%
9/3/05 71.87%
9/24/05 68.61%
10/15/05 69.43%

Other than my alumni meet in early September, my best races were in February through May. That’s probably not a bad thing, if you live in Arizona or Texas. When you live in Minnesota and are running your best races that early in the year, something is wrong. I gotta figure that out before next year.

I just found out the Big 10 cross country meet is at the U of M course on October 30th. That’s awesome. Go Bucky.

I also just read that Elizabeth Yetzer, the state’s best high school girl since Carrie Tollefson, (ever?) is planning on going to the U of M. Go Gophs.

So I was tagged the other day by DCG. Apparently, “tagging” is similar to a chain letter – at least that’s how I see it. But I’ll play along.

Again, my goal was to break 30 minutes, but I also had sub-6:00 pace (29:50) in the back of my head.

This was the 3/20/05 race from above. I ended up running 29:56.

I’ll tag Chelle, Yvonne, Mike, Andrew and Brent. Don’t feel bad if you “break the chain.” Nothing bad will happen to you – at least not that I know of.

Here are the rules;

1) Go into your archives.
2) Find your 23rd post.
3) Find the 5th sentence (or closest to it).
4) Post the text of your sentence in your blog along with these rules.
5) Tag five other people.

6.2 MILES VERSUS 10K

Did I actually break 39 minutes for 10K in Saturday’s race, even though I finished in 39:02? How’s that possible, you ask? Well as I was approaching the 5k mark, a light bulb went on. See, the 5k mark is in the exact same spot as the 10 mile mark of the half marathon. Sure a half marathon is 13.1 mile, but is the last 3.1 miles exactly the 3.1 miles associated with a 5k? If not, that means the last 6.2 miles of a marathon is not exactly 6.2 miles associated with a 10k.

I asked my friend Eric who certifies courses for extra cash. He said…

Marathon = 26.21876 miles (defined as exactly 42.195km) 10k = 6.2137119 miles. The difference between 10k and after 20 miles in the marathon is that the marathon is about 27 feet longer. Pretty close.

Sure, it’s “pretty close” but 27 feet is roughly 9 meters or the difference between a 1600 and a mile. Hmm, let’s do the math; 5280 feet per mile/27 feet = 195.6. I averaged 6:17 pace, which equals 377 seconds/195.6 = 1.9 seconds. Dang, still not sub-39.

WHISTLESTOP 10K RACE REPORT

Actually I should say “Cruisin’ the Corridor 10K Race Report” since that’s the real name of the race. However, it’s one of the events (marathon, half, 10k and 5k) during Whistlestop weekend, so more people associate it with that. One of my main reasons for doing this race is that it’s in my home town, so it gives me another reason to drive 4 hours and see my parents. Plus of all times to make this trip, mid-October is the best as the fall colors were spectacular.

On race morning I woke up to 47 degrees, sunny and a strong NW wind. Since all the events bus you out East of town, I thought everyone would have a nice crosswind and tailwind. If you’re not familiar with Whistlestop, nearly the entire distances for each race are run on an old limestone railroad bed – hence the name of the race. Anyway, the corridor is surrounded by trees on both sides, so you are really sheltered from the wind. With all the leaves, you can really hear the wind, but you don’t feel it as much as if out in the open.

Last year’s results had 2 guys around 32 minutes, while 3rd place was 40 minutes. So I thought this race would be interesting or boring. At the start, 2 guys take it out really hard. 2 more are a little quicker then me. I end up running with another guy and it looks like everyone is pairing up. Well that approached didn’t even last until the first mile as one of the guys just up ahead dropped back and I was in a group of 3.

One guy in his mid-30s looked the part. He was dressed in all black, had the Oakley shades on and his Nike Frees. I think he might have been a triathlete because it looked like his legs were shaved. The other guy was about 50 and overweight. I was kind of surprised he was hanging with us. The first mile felt controlled, but the 5:51 was quicker than I would have liked. However, in a race this small, I’d rather run 5:51 with a couple of guys than run 6:05 by myself.

It’s funny how our minds work. One second I’m wondering where I should make my move, the next I’m just hoping to hang on to 6th place. We go thru mile 2 in 6:11 and everyone seems controlled. We’re basically running 3 a breast with each of us alternating the “lead.” During the 3rd mile I tell myself to stay relaxed until the 4th mile and then I’d throw in a surge and see what happens. I figure I can’t wait till the last mile because I suck at sprinting. We reach the 3 mile marker (6:19) and both guys slow down. It was really weird. It’s like they said “Okay I’m halfway, I’m going to slow down.” Rather than slow down with them I picked up the pace – or at least the effort. I thought I picked up the pace, but my 6:30 4th mile says otherwise.

While it was nice to be ahead of those two guys, now I had to run the 2nd half of the race by myself and wonder where they were at. Just after the 5th mile (6:27) the course turns left onto pavement for the rest of the race. I used the turn as an opportunity to look behind me. I didn’t see anyone running close behind, however by this time I’m passing 5k walkers, so I can’t be positive that no one is close. I tell myself if someone is running with me at 5k and they drop off that quickly, they’re not going to be coming back on me 2 miles later.

As I approach the finish line I see the clock at 38:45 and I’m thinking I can get under 39. I pick it up a little and cross is 39:02. That means my 5k splits were (19:04/19:58). I was a little surprised to see that I put nearly a minute on the two guys I was running with; heavy guy 39:48, tri-guy 39:54.

First place was a 17 year old kid in 31:52. A little research shows he’s won the 10k the last 5 years. How’s this progression?

13 years old 38:04
14 years old 34:43
15 years old 33:13
16 years old 32:13
17 years old 31:52

He’s still in high school, so I’m not sure why he’s driving 5 hours to run a 10k three weeks before state. It looks like it was a big family affair though with 4 kids and 2 adults all taking part in one race or another.

Second place was 32:49 and third (and first in my age-group) was 36:08.

Other notes: I didn’t stick around to watch the half or full marathoners finish. First place in the half went to fellow Eau Claire alum, Scott Chapin, in 1:13:10. Not bad for a guy who “hates running” and would rather mountain bike and cross country ski. The first woman was former D3 all-American, Sarah Anderson in 1:23:52.

The marathon is usually won around 2:40-2:45. I believe the course record is around 2:37. That was re-written this year with a 2:31:43. The women’s winner ran 2:57:49. Third place overall went to former UW-Stevens Point uber-stud, Arnie Schraeder (who’s now 40) in 2:41:42. I first met Arnie the summer before my senior year of high school. He was a counselor at the UW-SP running camp. Back in those days the winner of the D2 and D3 cross country meets were allowed to compete in the D1 meet. I can’t remember his exact placing off the top of my head, but I want to say he was top-15. Heck, he’s probably the reason the stopped allowing D2 and D3 runners in the meet.

26 YEARS

I was planning on writing this post on October 3rd. I swear I have it written down somewhere that I started running on October 3rd, 1979. However, my first training log “describes” runs from October 13th, 1979 through August 27th, 1980. I put describes in quotes because only 3 things are listed; Date, How Far, and Time. That first entry looks like this:

Date – Oct. 13, 1979
How far – 4 mile race
Time – 34 min. 36 seconds.

This log book is actually a 3” x 5” spiral notebook with the words “Jogging Diary” scrawled across the cover – 3 different times (for emphasis, I guess). There’s even a stick figure of a guy running. Keep in mind that I was 10 years old at the time. If I had ever achieved running fame, this would probably be for sale on ebay. Actually, no it wouldn’t

Even after 26 years I still tend to learn things from each season. Here are a few of the things I learned (or re-learned) this year. Of course, most of these have already appeared on my blog at some point.

Periodization is important. I’m used to taking down time in the fall when the main racing season is over. I have to do a better job of taking more time off after the spring racing season, especially if I run a spring marathon.

After watching TCM this year I realized that “no one” runs well in the heat and humidity. I always thought it was just me.

If I want to race well (relatively speaking) in the heat I need to incorporate Ron Daws’ theory of training in the heat first. That means wearing extra clothes during practice. Daws liked to show up at hot races and see his competitors sporting a nice tan. Then he knew he had an advantage.

I need to do a better job of explaining what plan I’m following, where I’m at in the plan, what I hope to accomplish, what was actually accomplished, etc. Just recording each run in a log book is not enough. I need an easier way to go back and see what worked and what didn’t.

I’m not 16 or 26 any more. If I cut my mileage, I must cut my calorie in-take too. If I start sharpening for upcoming races and gain 5-10 lbs, no amount of speed work is going to make up for the added weight.

I’m sure there are more lessons than that, but that’s a good start.

CLARIFICATION

I managed to sneak out at lunch for a nice, average 5 mile run which took 39:20 - roughly 7:50 pace. Now that I’ve decided to take a break after Saturday, I feel like a weight has been lifted from my shoulders. There’s nothing to worry about, no paces or miles to hit. I just ran. I’m thinking if I take tomorrow off and go easy on Friday that maybe another week will be enough time off. However, I’m not going to set a date, I’m going to play it by ear and lace them up again when I feel ready.

After reading dgc’s comment yesterday, I realized I didn’t make it clear that I already have Neil Young’s new album and I didn’t mention that I love it. Will is the writer, so I thought his “Holy Christ, is it good.” pretty much summed it up. If you go to the "new album" link above and click on the song titles, you can hear them for yourself.

About the only time I listen to my CDs is at work. Somewhere along the line I got in the habit of playing my new CDs over and over and over while I work. As soon as it ends, I hit “play” again. I figure it’s more of a background noise than actually listening to the CD.

DON’T QUIT YOUR DAY JOB

I finally got my pictures back from the Guidant 10k and the Twin Cities 10 miler and marathon. They’re all shit. They’re either fuzzy or the runners are too far away. So, Alison, who takes photos for the New York Road Runners and such sites as fast-women and men’s racing has nothing to worry about.

We have a fairly nice camera, a Cannon Rebel. I think part of the problem (other than having no training what-so-ever) is that I tried to be a fan and take pictures at the same time. I think I half-assed both endeavors. Plus, I only had 200 speed film in the camera. That can’t be good for action photos, right?

Nothing exciting going on with my running today. I limited myself to two days off in a row and managed 6 miles this morning.

I don’t talk much about non-running stuff here, but Neil Young has a new album out. I’m a huge Neil Young fan, so it didn’t take much to convince me to buy it, although Will’s short, but sweet review didn’t hurt.

THAT FELT GOOD

I slept in this morning thinking I’d run on the treadmill during Monday Night Football. A “funny” thing happened when I got home. I had no desire to run, so I didn’t. And it felt good. I just sat on the couch and flipped back and forth between baseball and football.

Just so it wasn’t a total waste, I read Daws’ chapter on Peaking (now that I don’t really need it for this year). Again, he mentions something that I’ve been thinking lately. He quotes Marty Liquori, “My recommendation is that you pick one big race to be the ultimate test for the season.” I take “season” to mean spring and fall, not just once a year.

The reason I’ve been thinking about this is that the 5k and 10k races I have/had planned just aren’t “doing it” for me. There’s no build up or excitement surrounding them like there is a marathon or a conference, state or national meet. It’s really got me thinking that I need to have some big event each spring and fall to really gear my season towards. It doesn’t necessarily have to be a marathon, but I think it has to be an event that has some hype or at least some meaning to me, like my alumni meet, a large 10k or some type of series of races that I’m entered in. I haven’t worked out the details yet, just thinking “out loud.”

CHICAGO

Well, the way “everyone” PR’d at Chicago has me considering running it next year. There are quite a few bloggers who raced and I won't link to all their report. However, two bloggers performances that stand out to me are Yvonne’s 8 minute PR and The Thinking Runner’s sub-3. The top performance I came across actually goes to a non-blogger, Jen. 4 weeks ago Jen finished her first Ironman in a very respectable 12:37. Sunday she ran a 3:11 to PR by 6 minutes. That’s absolutely mind-boggling to me. Maybe I’d better start doing triathlons again if they'll help my running that much.

I didn’t mention this yesterday, but my left knee was bothering me a little during my track workout. Last night it was still bothering me as I walked around the house. Just to be safe, I took today off.

IS THAT YOUR FINAL ANSWER?

I’ve been finding it hard to do speed workouts during the week days lately. Maybe it’s because my training group isn’t getting together any more, maybe it’s due to the cool mornings or the sun setting earlier. Whatever the reason, I decided to do a track workout today. I figure with sunny skies, a light to moderate breeze and temps in the mid-50s, I wouldn’t have any excuses.

My last track workout was 11 days ago and I managed 6 x 800, averaging 2:48. Today I thought it’d be better to sacrifice a little speed in order to increase the quantity. I thought 8 reps would be good, maybe 10 if I felt great. Looking back that was very optimistic. After 3 reps I thought if I made it to 6 I’d be happy. During the 4th rep all my thoughts were negative. Finally after my 5th rep I came to my senses. Why be miserable if I don’t have to? I realized that I have no desire to do any 5k races this fall and I stepped off the track.

I’m more excited about what lies ahead for next year than I am about how I’d do in a 5k this year. So I’ll run a 10k this weekend, mainly because it's a small race in my hometown. After that, I'll call it a season and take 1 week off for sure, maybe 2.

Yes, that’s my final answer.

HALF-JOKING

Yesterday I was half-joking when I said “tomorrow I’ll be bitching because it’s too cold.” Well this morning it was 39 degrees with a 20 mph wind. When I heard the wind, I didn’t bitch about it; I just rolled over and went back to bed.

While I didn’t run in the morning, it doesn’t mean I took the day off. Tonight I managed 58 minutes on the treadmill with 25 minutes at a tempo pace. I’ve given up on trusting the mileage my treadmill reports. I know it’s not calibrated correctly, so I just base things on effort. I called this an 8 mile run.

In today’s mail I got a letter from Bolder Options – the group that organized the 10K race I ran on 9/24. I won a $10 gift card to REI for winning my age-group. Cool. That beats a trophy. The letter also reminded me to look online for photos. Here’s one of me and Jim. I promise I figure out how to fit these into the body of my post – someday.

SPOOKY RUN

Yesterday I mentioned it rained. I meant it RAINED!!! There were reports of up to 8” of rain in some parts of the Cities. After the rain passed through, the temperatures rose. By 6 AM it was 65 degrees and the dew point wasn’t much lower. When the temp and dew point are so close, it usually means fog and this morning was no different. So this morning’s run was pitch black, foggy, and damp with lightning in the distance and for about 10 minutes straight, police car and fire truck sirens. It was a little spooky.

I find that my attitude towards running ebbs and flows with the weather lately. It’s October 5th and I’m running at 6 AM in a tank top and I come back sopping wet. WTF? I managed 8 miles in 65 minutes, but the whole time I just wanted to turn around and call it a day. In fact I wanted to call it a season. Pull the plug. Take two weeks off before ramping back up. But I reminded myself; “This is Minnesota, tomorrow I’ll be bitching because it’s too cold.” Besides, I looked at a calendar for next year and did a little planning. Even if I race through October this year and then take 2 weeks off, that’ll still give 17 weeks of conditioning. Lydiard recommends at least 12 weeks, so I think I’ll be fine.

Speaking of Lydiard’s training plan, if you haven’t come across Mike’s Running with Lydiard blog, check it out. I like it because Mike’s fast, 30-something, with kids, training for a winter marathon (P.F. Chang’s in Phoenix) and, most importantly, he’s following Lydiard for the first time. He’s just finishing up his conditioning phase. Follow along and watch Lydiard training in action.

RANT, RANT, RANT

I’m beginning to wonder if this is the first year that my coach has added runners to his triathlete group. I’m getting the sense that he’s not sure what to do with us, especially those that aren’t running fall marathons. After deciding not to do a fall marathon I sent him an email with a list of 5k-10k races that goes through October 29th. I guess I assumed he’d write workouts for me with the idea of peaking for that last race.

Given that my previous schedule only went through yesterday and that Tuesdays are typically speed workouts, I emailed him this morning to see if we were meeting tonight. Usually we meet at the Macaleter track at 6:30. I figure if I didn’t hear from him, I’d just go to the track and hope someone was there, if not, I’d workout on the track by myself. At 4:20 I got a group email saying “No practice until Saturday. Enjoy some downtime after TCM weekend. This is the time of year to back-off on running…blah, blah, blah.”

Hmm, so I guess I’m on my own for the next month. Not that I can’t come up with some workouts for the next 4 weeks, but part of the idea behind hiring a coach was trying to gain some ideas regarding tapering and peaking. Plus the suddenness of it really bites. I mean I like to kind of know what’s on tap for my hard workouts so I can mentally prepare for them.

Tonight I was like “now what?” You know how they say you should know what you’re trying to achieve with every workout? Well tonight I felt like I had no clue. Obviously, there was no need to drive 20 minutes to the track. Should I do a track workout near my house? What kind of workout; 800s, cruise intervals, tempo run, etc.? I decided to just run to the track and see what happened.

By this time, the weather wasn’t helping my mood either; 60 degrees for both the temperature and the dew point, plus rain. Thoughts of getting in a hard workout were vanishing rapidly. They disappeared completely when I got to the track and there was a football game going on in the middle of it. Screw it, it’s supposed to be cooler in two days. I’ll run hard then. Instead I managed 5 miles at a brisk (probably sub-7:30) pace.

Okay, rants over (for now).

LAKEFRONT UPDATE

Well, the good news is that the Twin Cities Marathon wasn’t today. It was 10 degrees warmer this morning and the dew point reached the high sixties later in the day. A marathon today would have been even uglier than yesterday.

I wanted to mention how Double and Peter (who post comments here frequently) did at Lakefront yesterday, but my entry ended up way too long. Anyway, Double won his age group with a 2:53:18, while Peter turned in one of the top performances of the weekend with his first sub-3, 2:59:13. Way to go guys! Complete results for these marathons can be found here. Also there are some photos from Twin Cities up here.

I ended up not running yesterday. I figured biking 22 miles was enough. Besides, yesterday we spent the afternoon at an apple orchard. It was a lot of fun but I could wait to put the girls to bed so I could finally sit down.

Tonight I jumped on the treadmill for an easy 5 miles while watching the Packers get beat (again). I wore my Nike Frees for the first 3 miles. That’s the longest I’ve worn them for so far. Usually I just wear them when I walk/jog with the dog.

MARATHON WEEKEND

Last night it felt like I was running the marathon. I got 4 good hours of sleep and then tossed and turned for 4 hours. On my way to watch the race a bank clock said 61 degrees at 6:50. It was sticky and breezy too. About the only thing going for the runners were the overcast skies.

I met Mary, Matt and Tony just before mile 3 of the 10 mile race. I was able to cheer and get a picture of Debbie (1:02:41), Eric (1:06:03) and Jim (1:06:48). We hung around and just watched thousands of runners stream passed. Next stop: the Metrodome to watch the start of the marathon. I mainly wanted to see the start in order to start my watch, so I’d know the “official” time.

After hanging out a couple of minutes we had to zip ahead to about mile 2.25. We literally got there 10 seconds before Jenna. A minute or two later Aaron came by. I should mention that Jenna was shooting for a Trials Qualifier while Aaron was looking for his first sub-3 (having run 3:02-3:05 about 8 times). Next stop: mile 7.

We didn’t beat the men’s leaders to mile 7, but probably those running 2:25 pace. Nicole Aish already had at least two minutes on second place (Dana Coons). A minute later a huge pack of women went through. Shortly after Jenna came by looking smooth. Then Aaron came by and he seemed to be doing okay – running with his training partner, John. Next stop: mile 11.

A funny thing happened on the way to mile 11. The road we were on came out right at the 10 mile marker. Again, Jenna got there 10 seconds after us. Instead of hanging out there we went ahead to mile 11. This is when the ugliness of the day began to rear its head. Jenna came by and kind of threw her hands in the air. She was running 6:l0 pace but apparently having problems with her breathing. John put a couple of seconds on Aaron, who was shaking his head. Next stop: 13.1.

I like watching at halfway because, obviously, you can see what people go through the half in. Joan Benoit-Samuelson came through in 1:21:11, Jenna was 17 seconds back. It seemed like a lot of women were going for the Trials Qualifier. Erin who’s run 2:53 her last two marathons went through in 1:23:46. Aaron was already beginning to struggle, crossing halfway in 1:29:45. Next stop: 17.5.

Getting to the next stop before Jenna was hard. It’s a “good thing” she was slowing. Again, we managed to arrive about 10 seconds before her. This time the runners were going under a bridge. We were on the bridge so it was hard to get a read on how she was doing. Rather than wait for Aaron, we crossed the bridge and were at mile 21 in time to watch the 2:30 runners go by. Nicole Aish was still in the lead. She increased her 4 minute lead at half to 5 minutes by mile 20. Zika Palmer looked good and was closing quickly. Nicole would eventually hold on to win by 45 seconds in 2:40:21.

About a 100 meters before Jenna reached us, she stopped to stretch. Matt ran down to meet her and they had a “long” discussion. Thoughts of dropping out were running amok. Matt convinced her to keep going. Watching the race, Jenna really wasn’t running that poorly. I’m not sure if she knew how fast she was running. She told Matt that she didn’t want to finish over 3 hours, however she was still on 2:50 pace (a year ago that was her PR). Next stop: I’m not sure.

I wasn’t sure where to go next. Matt said he was going to follow Jenna down Summit Avenue. If you’re not familiar with the course, Summit is a wide Boulevard. The runners run down one side, so it’s fairly easy for someone on a bike to cheer, zip ahead and cheer some more, etc. Just before mile 23 we saw some teammates watching the race. Mary and I decided to hang out there and watch the race. We saw Jenna go by one more time.

I hung out near mile 23 for about 90 minutes. This was the first time I really got to “relax” and just observe all the runners going by. Ugly is really about the only way I can describe it. Evan said if you ran a positive split by 7 minutes, you were doing well.

Let see if I can list the results of everyone that I mentioned in this entry. 48-year old Joan Benoit-Samuelson ran a tough 2:46:27, Dana Coons’ first marathon resulted in a 2:46:54, Jenna ran a very respectable 2:51:23, Erin, believe it or not, ran her third 2:53(:36) in a row. Aaron’s friend John ran 3:00:46, while Aaron crossed the line in 3:24:25.

Congrats to all who finished, including another first time marathoner who’s blog I came across recently, Brent.

HEAT WAVE

This morning Evan and I met at the Minnesota Wildlife Refuge for a run along the Minnesota River. We got the worst part (a mile stretch along Interstate 494) out of the way first and then hit the trails. Our loop took just under 70 minutes and we called it 9 miles.

Evan is training for the Philly marathon and he’s got me considering running it next year. One of the things I like about it is it’s still 7 weeks away. That means I’d be able to lay low in the summer and get in some quality training during my favorite time of year, fall. I’m not a huge fan of traveling to a marathon, especially when Grandma’s and Twin Cities are in my back yard. I’ll have to mention it to Amy and see what she thinks.

I was so happy that we ran in the morning. Man, did it get hot (for October 1st) this afternoon. It must have reached the low-80s and it was sunny and windy. Wasn’t it just 40 degrees 3 days ago? I spent the afternoon swimming with my family at a local YMCA. My mother-in-law gave us 10 passes that have to be used by the end of the year. We thought they’d take a pass for each adult, but they only took one for the entire family, so we still have 9 passes left.

SEPTEMBER RECAP

Well, our cold-snap has come and gone. It lasted one day. Not that today is hot, but after 40 degrees yesterday morning, it was 52 this morning. Temps for Sunday’s marathon keep creeping up too, plus it’s been windy lately. Again, I’m glad I’m not racing.

Call me crazy but I outlined a schedule of where I can watch Jenna and Aaron from based on ease of travel, travel time between locations (based on biking 12-15 mph) and their paces. I plan on being at the start and then seeing them at 2, 7, 11, 13.1, 17.5, 21, then probably the finish.

I closed the books on September with a 5 mile run at lunch. I’d call it a moderate run (38:30), not hard and not easy. That gave me 186 miles for the month. Since mileage is secondary this time of year, I’m not too concerned about it being so low. At least I’m a lot more consistent than I was in August, 4 days off vs. 9 days off.

I was never really able to figure out why I couldn’t post a picture of the trophy I won from last Friday’s 2 mile Wellness Race. I'll try again and see what happens.

BASELINE

I guess I’m so into the habit of taking Wednesday’s off lately, that I took yesterday off without even thinking about it. I brought my cloths with me and thought I’d make it out over lunch. The next thing I know I’m eating my lunch and the thought of going for a run never crossed my mind.

It is September 29th, so I shouldn’t be too surprised by this morning’s 40 degree temperature. Someone at work said it was 18 in northern Minnesota. Now I like cold weather as much as the next Minnesotan, but that’s too cold, too early. For me, 40-45 would be perfect for a marathon. However, it doesn’t look like the cooler temps will hang around for this weekend’s Twin Cities Marathon. Right now they’re predicting lows of 60, which means it’ll probably be around 65 at the start. Highs are supposed to reach 77. At least it sounds like it’ll be overcast. I told a friend that I’ve raced in crappy conditions too many times to worry about what other people will be experiencing.

This morning I ran 7 miles with 4 miles at an “up-tempo” pace. Actually, I was planning on a tempo run (using the definition of 10k pace + 15 seconds). Using my less than stellar 6:22 pace from Saturday, that’d mean I should run around 6:35-6:40 pace. After warming up for 2 miles I managed splits of 7:18, 7:00, 6:50 and 6:50. Again, I didn’t look at my splits until afterwards, so the “disappointment” didn’t sink in until I finished.

Okay, disappointed is too strong a word. But man I was working to hard “just” to be running 6:50 pace. I thought I was “flying” during my last 2 miles. Maybe I can blame being tired from Tuesday’s workout (although I felt okay), not being warmed up properly (this is most likely the case), or my mile markers not being accurate. Anyway, instead of getting down on myself I told myself that I now have a baseline for this type of workout. Besides, you can’t be disappointed when you have nothing to compare the workout too.

THAT’S MORE LIKE IT

I decided to head to the Macalester track again tonight and join my teammates for a track workout. Not surprisingly the numbers were down. There were probably only 5-6 of us there. With Jenna running the marathon and Jim running the 10 miler on Sunday, they were just doing a pace run. Two others were doing 400s. That left me all alone to do my 6 x 800 workout. Although I ran them by myself, it was nice to have other people on the track too.

After running 30:02 (6:01 pace) 3 weeks ago then 39:30 (6:22 pace) last weekend, I wasn’t really sure what to expect tonight. During that 3 week stretch I’ve really only done 3 VO2max-boosting workouts. Last year I did a lot of 800 meter workouts and I finally started getting under 2:50 towards the end of the year. So I was really happy with tonight’s times; 2:47, 2:46, 2:48, 2:48, 2:49, 2:52. On the first 4 I was going through 400 meters in 82, then fading. On the last 2, Matt suggested going out slower, then bringing it home quicker. I got the first part right with an 84 and 85, but never really brought it home. In between the reps I took a “400” meter jog. Actually it was longer since I ran in lane 3. Time-wise, my rests were 2:35, 2:43 (water), 2:52, 3:09 (water, brief pacing chat with coach), 2:49. Last year I think my rests were all 800 meters or close to 4:30. If so, that means tonight’s workout is one of my best in awhile.

So what does it all mean? Right now I’m planning on running 3 more races this year; a 10K on 10/15 and 5Ks on 10/23 and 10/29. The 10K is flat, but it lacks competition, so it might be a solo effort. The 5Ks are supposed to be flat and fast and I’d like to get under 18 minutes.

WELLNESS WEEK RECAP

After running relatively hard on Thursday, Friday and Saturday, I decided to keep things really easy Sunday and today. I managed 5 miles each day at a pace slower than 8:30 pace. That should allow me to bounce back and be ready for a hard workout tomorrow night.

Wellness Week wrapped up on Friday, but since we could still count our minutes for Friday, final results weren’t sent out till today. We had a great team with each member “working out” (remember walking, stretching, lifting, attending seminars, etc. all counted) over 2 hours every day (we had a total of 2,085 minutes). Believe it or not, that was only good enough for 2nd place. Another team, which consisted of dock workers, was given credit for 3,420 minutes. Apparently they were allowed to count the number of minutes they loaded/unloaded trucks during the day. I’m not upset that we lost, but I am upset because that doesn’t really seem fair. Whether or not it’ll keep me from participating on a team next year, I don’t know yet. I mean, I don’t need the motivation to work out. So what’s the point? I suppose I’ve set the precedent of being on a team and now they’ll expect me to be back next year.

Oh, I biked the run course over lunch and it was very close to 2 miles. There are a lot of tangents on the course, so I’m calling it accurate, but not certified.

BOLDER DASH 10K REPORT

I’m still not sure what to think of this race. Overall, I ran a smart race and was in control the whole time, but in the end, the time was slow (39:30). This race is in downtown Minneapolis, right along the Mississippi River and is a double out-and-back course. I thought I wouldn’t like that layout, but I actually did. It was a little hillier than I had imagined, being along the river.

After last evening’s hard 2 mile effort I wasn’t really sure how my legs would respond, so when Jim asked me what I was going out in, I said 6:15-6:20. True to my word I passed the mile in 6:15 with Heather, the lead woman. We were about 3 seconds behind Jim. Since Heather and Jim are usually good for around 39-minutes, I felt comfortable with my positioning. A half mile later I made the first turn-around in 7th place. First and second were out of sight, but 3rd-6th were just in front of me. Over the next quarter of the race, I continued to run a comfortable, even pace, going through miles 2 and 3 in 6:21 and 6:20 and reaching 5k in 19:38. During this stretch I also moved into 3rd place with Jim close behind in 4th. For some reason, Heather dropped off the pace.

At the halfway point I’d guess the leader was around 17:30, while second was around 19-flat. I was still feeling really controlled and thought negative splits would be likely. I even had illusion (delusions) of catching the guy in 2nd. I continued running even-paced miles; 4 in 6:19 and 5 in 6:20 before “tailing off” to 6:23 for the last mile. 1:32 (which seems inaccurate by a good 10 seconds) for the last two-tenths brought me home in 39:30 – 19:52 for the second half. Jim rolled in 20 seconds later. Heather faded to 41:26. Around 4.5 miles, I saw her neck and neck with another gal. She ended up finished 51 seconds behind her. Ouch.

Like I said, I don’t know what to think. I felt relaxed and controlled, but that should be expected when I’m running 20 seconds/mile slower than what I ran in April. Maybe if this had been a big race with more people to run with, I could have pushed more. If I plan on running 2-3 more 5k this year, I definitely have to get my head around pushing the pain threshold more.

SO THAT’S WHAT IT FEELS LIKE

My company wrapped up Wellness week with a 2 mile “race” this afternoon. Last year’s winner, Tom, was looking to defend his title. I thought I’d research my competition, so I searched his name on a website that keeps track of most of the local races. I only got one hit, a 35-minute 5 mile race in June. I figured I could run 6:30 pace and still win. Since I’m doing a 10k tomorrow, I was a little torn; should I go “all out” or should I run just fast enough to win. I chose a combination.

I ran “easy” for the first 4-5 minutes with Tom and another guy right behind me. Then the course takes a hard right and there’s a gradual downhill. As soon as I turned the corner I picked things up and started running hard. I hate to say it, but I turned around a few times to make sure I was clear. I crossed the line in 12:09. Tom was probably another 30 seconds back, with 3rd place 30 seconds behind him. I’m not sure how accurate the course is. My guess is that it’s a little short. If I have some time next week, I may clock it on my bike.

26 years of racing and I can’t remember ever winning a race. While I was in the service, I used to “win” the 1.5 mile Physical Fitness runs. This felt a lot like that. Maybe winning a “real” race would feel the same, I don’t know. Also, in my 26 years of racing, I’ve never won a bigger trophy.

Hmm, for some reason the photo of the trophy is not uploading. I'll take a look when I have more time.

WHAT HAPPENED?

What happened to all the “free-time” I used to have at work? Man, I’ve been so busy, I’ve barely had time to surf running site, read blogs and update my own blog. Normally I like to keep entries separated by date, but if I do that for the last 3 days, they’d probably be 3 short, boring entries. Instead I’ll post 1 medium, boring entry.

“Double” was in town again this week and we were able to get together Tuesday evening for a run. To help with logistics and saving time, he just met me at my house. We ran along some of the bike paths in the next suburb over, near my old house. Part of the course has some miles marked. We both felt flat, but I was still surprised to see that we were barely under 8:00-pace. It sure felt harder. After 7 miles into our 9 mile run we finally started to feel better and pick up the pace. Or did we pick up the pace and then start to feel better? Either way it was a nice run.

Wednesday I decided not to run. Instead I joined some co-workers for a 50 minute bike ride over our lunch hour. We had great weather, 70 degrees and sunny. Afterwards, the company gave us box lunches and we had a little picnic.

This morning I decided to do a progression run. I probably “need” an anaerobic workout more than a progression run. However, with tomorrow’s 2 mile “race” and Saturday’s 10k, I didn’t want to push things too much. So I thought I’d try out my newly marked miles and see what happens. Since it was dark, I took all my splits but didn’t look at them till I was finished. I ended up running 8:33, 8:04, 7:27, 7:13, 6:55, 6:54, 8:30.

WELLNESS WEEK

This week is Wellness Week at my company. They have various events set up throughout the week, such as Pilates, Yoga, Biking, Health Fair, etc. Things wrap up Friday afternoon with a 2 mile “race”. Actually it’s a 2 mile run, I added the word “race”. Another activity consists of teams of 3 tracking their minutes of “wellness” throughout the week. The two women on my team are very solid. They are 2 of the few people that use the workout facilities on a regular basis.

I like the idea of tracking minutes, but I’m a little torn. This should be the part of my season where I’m scaling back my exercise time and focusing on rest and intensity. Luckily we can count such things as going for a walk, stretching, attending Wellness seminars, etc. I figure I could do a little biking too, which wouldn’t wear me out too much. This morning I biked for 45 minutes along the trails I normally run. That gave me a chance to figure out where some of my mile markers are located. I figure if I try to push the pace a little more this upcoming base-building session, it’d be nice to have an idea of my pacing.

Wellness week kicked off with a motivational speech by Tony Schiller who, at 47, is one of the top masters triathletes in the U.S. I found an interesting video clip of one of his speeches at this site.

Later this evening I ran an easy 5 miles on the treadmill while watching Monday Night Football, then I stretched, lifted and did some ab work. All totaled (biking, running, walking the dog, attending the speaker, etc), I had 165 minutes of “wellness”.

FORT SNELLING 5 X 5K RELAY

A couple of weeks ago Dale (a guy who works for my former employer) asked if I'd like to join a team for a relay race in town. I didn't have any other racing planned so I said sure. Dale, who's just coming back from a stress fracture assured me that it'd be "just for fun." Not that that would make any difference.

Most of the 23 teams that competed in this 5 person relay were made up of "hard core" runners that represented the top teams in the area. Each member ran 1 lap on the dirt/gravel trail around Pike Island, which is part of historic Fort Snelling. Our team of 3 men and 2 women was one of two teams in the co-ed division, which guaranteed us a trophy.

Robert lead off with a 20:31, Dale followed with a 20:52, Robert's wife Ellen went third in 24:53, Sandy was next in 24:41 and I ran 19:52 (6:20, 6:26, 6:32, :34) as the anchor. Times are basically meaningless unless they're used to compare to other runners. When I do that I see that I'm basically where I "should be" compared to a few people I raced earlier this summer. We ended up placing 18th overall and 2nd in the co-ed division.

I should mention that this was a solo time trial for me. The only runners I saw on the course where the ones that were cooling down. There weren't any other teams with +/- 3 minutes of us. Still it was a unique, fun event - something different than just racing on the roads all the time.

PACING

Usually I have a very good sense of my pace. However, lately I’ve felt fairly clueless as to my pacing during some runs. So today I decided to go to the track and just run steady at various efforts and see how that corresponded with various paces. Since I’m racing tomorrow, I didn’t want to go too hard, capping my speed at marathon pace. I ran 10 minutes to the track and then every 800 meters I picked up the pace, dropping from 8:05 to 7:45 to 7:15, then I ran a mile in 6:50 before running home another 10 minutes. All told I ran 5 miles in 38:30.

I think this run helped with my pacing. The 8:05 pace seemed in-line with my easy pace of 8:15ish. 7:45 seemed moderate while 7:15 felt quick, but doable. 6:50 required some concentration and I doubt I could maintain that for 26.2 miles at this point.

This evening Jim had me, Eric, Debbie and her husband over for a dinner party. It was a beautiful night and a terrific setting. We ate in Jim’s screened-in out-building that reminds me of a ski chalet. It’s got a dinner table that sits 6-8 people and a fireplace with another 4 chairs in front of it. Very nice. Debbie and her husband are probably still there, but Eric and I left at 10 PM.

TIME TO GET SERIOUS

Today’s weather was awesome; 65 degrees, sunny, dew point of 50 and a slight breeze. It would have been a little warm for a marathon, but it was perfect for an easy 5 miles (42 minutes) over lunch. Perfect for golf too, which is where “all” my co-workers are today.

Last night I had to pick my parents up at the airport. Last weekend they few to Washington state to visit with a couple they met at the Boston Marathon in 1985. They’ve exchanged Christmas cards over the years, but that’s been the extent of their contact. I guess retirement allows you to travel more often. Just think if they had blogs 20 years ago.

I’ve mentioned that I’ve been thinking about next season quite a bit lately. One of the things I need to do a better job of is tracking my program. I’m not talking about just logging what I do each day. I’m talking more about having some big picture overview that’s easy to view and know where I’m at (or want to be). Something that says November through February are base-building months, March is hills, April is anaerobic – but with more details.

Sure I’ve followed Daniels and Pfitz programs in the past, but even then I’ve never made any notes like “Starting Daniels Marathon Plan B” or “Using Pfitz’s 18-week, 70 mpw plan.” Sure I could pain-stakingly go through my log book and figure things out, but there’s got to be a quicker, easier way to get the gist of the entire program, how it went and what my thoughts were along the way, without having to page through my log book week-by-week.

My coach has a decent spreadsheet that outlined my 18 weeks before Grandma’s. It listed each week, races planned, the phase (base, strength and pace), mpw, long run, weekend mileage and training focus. I think I’d like to have a space for comments and key reminders (like “think about adding more up-tempo runs” or “make smooth transitions between phases”) as well as thoughts regarding how things are going.

It’s been nearly 26 years, I figure it’s time to “get serious” and try to make heads or tails of my training rather than just “aimlessly” running and logging my mileage.

KONA-BOUND

Yesterday I decided to extend my streak off taking Wednesdays off to 3 weeks in a row. This morning I decided to do a workout similar to last Friday’s 1:30 on/:45 off workout. The “on” portion is at 10k pace. Last week I shut things down after 9 reps. Daws recommends this workout with 20 reps. I figured that’d be too large of a jump in one week and I decided to do 2 sets of 8 reps with a 5 minute jog between the sets.

The first set was difficult logistically, not physically. That’s because it was pitch-black and I couldn’t see my watch. I had to keep using the light on my watch in order to know when to start and stop each rep. Also, since this workout is on the bike path, rather than the track, it’s a little difficult to know what 10k pace is. I figure if I go “too fast” then 45 seconds isn’t enough recovery and I need to slow down a little.

Doing speed workouts in the dark is new to me this year, so I’ll have to get used to them if I plan on racing through October. It was a year ago that I started my current job. However, I was done racing for the year, so I never had to do hard workout in the dark.

The other day I mentioned the brutal Ironman Wisconsin results for some of my teammates. Today I’d like to congratulate a gal I trained with in 2003, Julie Hull. Julie was 2nd in her age group and qualified for the 2006 World Championship race at Kona, Hawaii. Now I don’t feel so bad about getting biked into the ground by Julie.

I SHOULD WRITE A BOOK

I swear this is exactly what I’ve been thinking about doing for next year…

If racing were simple a year’s work would involve something like a big build-up during the winter, sharpening and racing until summer, backing off during the summer to recharge the mental and physical batteries, briefly rebuilding and racing again through late summer and fall, resting, and then starting the whole process over. The advantages are 1) the main mileage training is done in the winter when you aren’t (or shouldn’t be) racing, 2) you are in peak condition in the spring and fall when the weather is right for fast times, and 3) you get to back off during the summer heat.

Daws goes on to talk about big exceptions, like having your key race in the middle of summer. Luckily I don’t have to worry about that as there really aren’t any races that I “have” to do from mid-June to mid-August.

Tonight I met my teammates at the Macalester track. As I suspected, there weren’t many people there – only about 7-8 of us. Most of the triathletes are done with their season, plus a lot of people had long (half ironman, ironman, 10 miles, 25k) races last weekend. Jenna, Roger and I formed a small group and basically performed a progression run – gradually picking up the pace throughout.

We ran down Summit Avenue to the Cathedral and back to the River Road before returning to Macalester. On the way back our coach pulled alongside us on his bike and started talking. Jenna used that opportunity to pick up the pace and pull away from us. Roger and I continued on, finishing with 76 minutes which was at least 10 miles, maybe 10.5. Since I hate those halves in my log book, I’ll leave it at 10.

ACCURATE OR MISLEADING?

I was thinking about the statement I made the other day and its accuracy.

Hmm, so all this time of slogging through 85 mpw should have been 70 mpw at a faster pace? I’m definitely going to keep this in mind as I plan my next season.

While it’s “accurate” it can also be misleading. Sure I ran some 85 mile weeks last winter, but am I really an 85 mpw runner? Looking back at my log, I only ran over 80 mpw 6 times during my base-building. Hell, if you think about it, 70 mpw is basically 300 miles per month. In my entire 25 years of running I’ve been over that mark 3 times.

So what does that mean for my next base-building session if I want to run 30-40% of my mileage near my marathon pace? Obviously, I’ll have to play it by ear. I’m curious to see what 70 mpw with that kind of pace work feels like. But I’m getting ahead of myself, as there are still races to run this year.

Today I just ran an easy 5 miles before work. My legs felt terrible. Hopefully it’s just due to the heat and humidity and hopefully this is the last wave of that weather.

WEEKEND RECAP

Not much to report from the weekend, running-wise. After two harder workouts on Thursday and Friday, Saturday was an easy 5 mile run. That gave me 46 miles for the week. Obviously, that’s not huge mileage, but it’s my 3rd week in a row over 45, so I’ve been consistent.

Somewhere along the line the weather turned hot, humid and windy. Thoughts of doing a 5k on Sunday were diminishing quickly. They completely evaporated when some friends invited us to go swimming and grill out. It wasn’t a late night, but by the time we got the girls to bed it was 9 PM. I set my clothes out, but didn’t set my alarm. I figured if I was up and ready to go by 6:30, I’d race. I wasn’t, so I didn’t.

Instead of racing, I hopped on the treadmill for a 10 mile progression run while watching the dreadful Minnesota Vikings.

The weather didn’t keep my friends from racing over the weekend. Debbie and Jim ran a 10 mile race. Debbie was 1st woman and 4th overall in 1:02:42, Jim was 6th overall in 1:06:14. Jenna (1:36:21, 1st woman), Evan (1:42:57), Aaron (1:45:28) and Eric (1:46:36, first race since May) all ran a 25k.

Today was also fourth time Ironman Wisconsin was held in Madison. The first year the weather was cool. Since then, it’s been brutal. When I did it in 2002 it was 85+ degrees and sunny. I think that was mild compared to today’s weather, which was much windier. Results show that nearly 20% of the field dropped out. Of my 4 teammates that competed, 2 DNF’d and 2 had times way over their goals. But no matter their time, they’re still an Ironman. No one can take that away from them.

AEROBICS AND ANAEROBICS

Last night I only read one chapter from Daws’ Running Your Best, titled Aerobics and Anaerobics. It basically told me everything I’ve been doing during my base phase has been wrong. I’ve mentioned a few times that I need more up-tempo/progression runs in my training. Apparently I need A LOT more.

"During your buildup…it’s difficult to log much more than 30 to 40 percent of your mileage near your fastest aerobic pace."

“Fastest aerobic pace” meaning your marathon pace or a little slower. 30 to 40 percent? Man, I’m probably closer to 10 percent. I’ve been doing one such workout per week when it seems I need 3 or 4. But how do I get there when I’m running “high” mileage? Glad you asked. Read on.

“As you become fitter and have reached a high but endurable weekly mileage, you should not try to run more miles, but more at or near the fastest pace you can without becoming anaerobic.”

Hmm, so all this time of slogging through 85 mpw should have been 70 mpw at a faster pace? I’m definitely going to keep this in mind as I plan my next season.

In addition to the above quotes, I came across a VO2Max building workout that I thought would fit in nicely to my training; 10 x 90 seconds at 10k pace with a jog lasting only 1/3 to 1/2 the duration of the rep. I ended up doing 9 x 90 seconds with 45 second jog. The 9th one seem harder than the others and it didn’t seem like I was recovering as quickly, so I pulled the plug rather than force one more.

INDECISION

If you read my blog regularly you’re probably going to be overwhelmed with Daws and Lydiard references for awhile. I’ve been reading Daws’ Running Your Best: The Committed Runner’s Guide to Training and Racing. I’m a big highlighter guy. I like to read with a highlighter to mark the key things on each page so I can go back and easily find the key points. The problem with doing that with this book is that half of the book ends up highlighted. Seriously, this book is 20 years old, but it’s one of the best, if not THE best I’ve read on training. It’s not super scientific like Daniels’ Running Formula, but Daws writes in such a way that everything seems very logical. He’s got me excited to start training for next season, even though I’m still in the middle of this season.

One of the things Daws keeps mentioning is making smooth transitions from one phase of training to the next. When I looked at my log book last night, I noticed I did this with my anaerobic workouts last year. I was doing 80-100 meter strides through out the year. Then a few weeks before I was going to be doing harder 400s and 800s, I started doing 200 meter pickups for a week or two, then 300 meter pickups for a week or two. The idea being that I didn’t go from 0 to 800s in one workout.

Even though I’ve done one 800 workout and numerous mile repeats, I thought it’d be a good idea to do some 200-300 meter pickups today. Again these would help prepare me for future 400s and 800s. In addition, they’d be “easy” enough to not wipe me out for a 5k this Sunday.

Well right at the last second (just as I was finishing my warm-up) I had a moment of indecision and decided just to do an up-tempo run. My reasoning was that I could get in an up-tempo run and a shorter speed workout on consecutive days, rest on Saturday and race on Sunday. I figured the up-tempo run would require more time to recover, so I did that first. I ended up warming up 20 minutes, running up-tempo (marathon pace or faster) for 30 minutes and cooling down for 10 minutes.

SWAMPED

I’ve finally learned not to set my alarm for 5 AM after a Tuesday night workout because I just turn it off and reset it for 6 AM anyway. Now I just set it for 6 and if for some reason I’m awake before that, I have my running clothes ready to go. Today was not one of those days. I didn’t even want to get up at 6, but I did. I brought my running clothes to work in hopes of getting out for a run at lunch. Usually I can’t use this excuse, but I was so swamped, I never made it out.

This evening I sat down with my log book from last year to help determine what I want to do for a workout tomorrow morning. I noticed that I only ran 6 days a week during last year’s racing season. That seemed to work well, so I decided to take today off too, since it’s been a week since my last day off.

So you’re probably thinking “why does he have to determine his own workouts if he has a coach?” Good question. First, my last schedule went through August 28th and I haven’t seen a one since. Last Tuesday I got an email saying I’d have my new schedule on Wednesday. Thursday at 6 PM, I finally got an email (rather than the normal excel file) with workouts through Monday. Second, I’m not sure if my coach received my last email regarding not doing a fall marathon and focusing on shorter races instead. Granted, his college cross country teams are back in town, but he had time to send me a bill yesterday. I’ve talked to other teams members and they’re in the same situation. It’s frustrating.

Next season I think I’m going to see if I can cut a deal with my coach and use him more as a consultant. After reading all these Daws and Lydiard books lately, I’d like to write my own schedules and have him review them. Plus, I’d still like to train with the group a couple of times a week.

Speaking of Lydiard, I’ve also been trying to work through this thread on letsrun.com. I waited till it was 15 pages before I started reading it and now I’m trying to play catch-up a little at a time.

CHICKEN AND THE EGG

I had a nice group workout tonight. The size of the group was pretty decent, however most people either raced yesterday, are racing this weekend, or their season is over. I ended up running with Roger, who’s training for a fall marathon in California. We met at Macalester College and started out by running down Summit Avenue towards downtown St. Paul before heading back to the Macalester track. After a 2 mile warm-up we did 3 x 5:00 with 2:30 jog in between. The pace during these pickups was a little faster than a tempo pace. We weren’t going all-out. Once back on the track, we did 3 x 1600 in (5:55, 5:59 and 5:55) with 2:30 jog after the first and 3:20 rest after the second.

Overall I felt really good. I’m trying to build on the confidence and mental energy that finally seems to be coming around. During the 1600 repeats I really focused on staying relaxed and positive. Coach even mentioned how good my form looked. That was cool. I’m also trying to do more of the “little things” like stretching, lifting, core strengthening, relaxation exercises and watching what I eat.

That brings me to the whole “chicken and the egg” issue. Am I running better because I’m doing all these things or am I doing all these things because I’m running better? Has my confidence increased because I’m racing faster or am I racing faster because my confidence has increased? Usually I’d say I do all the little things and my racing improves, however, this year I think it’s the opposite. My last race was a huge improvement and I began to think about salvaging this season. As a result, I started to pay attention to the “little things.”

LOSING ITS APPEAL

The thought of racing a 10k two days after Buckshot was already losing its appeal DURING Buckshot. Honestly, I didn’t think I could turn around in 48 hours and “go to the well” again. In addition, the great weather we had on Saturday had turned into 70 and muggy by this morning. Finally, I’m just starting to gain some momentum and I’d hate to take a step backwards with what had all the makings of a poor outing. So it’s no surprise that I decided not to run the Victory 10k today. Instead, I went to watch, run the course and cheer on teammates Jenna, Aaron and Jim.

This is an out and back course, so I stood near the 2 and 4 mile marks. Jenna had an awesome race getting the victory in 35:09, which is just a few ticks off her PR. She put 41 seconds on the 2nd place gal over the final 2.2 miles. Somehow I managed to miss Aaron on the course. He finished in 38:22 after going through the mile in 5:45. Jim kicked ass too, running 38:50 to win his age group by 54 seconds. Roughly 50 minutes after finishing, he doubled back with a 19:52 5k.

As for my running, I did an easy 4.5 miles yesterday because I was still thinking about racing today. Today I managed to get in nearly 10 miles while watching the race. My calves were a little stiff, but overall I didn’t feel too bad. Last week I ended up with 47 miles.

Warning: marketing pitch ahead. At the race today I ran into a college alumni who’s selling a new line of high performance apparel called Zensah. It’s seamless, moisture wicking material out of Italy that doesn’t hold odors like some high-tech materials. It sounds like they’re just getting into the U.S.

BUCKSHOT 5 MILE RACE REPORT

“Pleasantly surprised” would basically sum up the results from this race. After running 6:03 pace for a flat, fast 5k two weeks ago, I though 30:30 would be an aggressive enough goal. Mainly I wanted to place in the top-3 of my age-group. That was even one of the goals I wrote down when I first contacted Matt to coach me at the beginning of the year.

As mentioned yesterday, the weather was awesome. It was probably 65 degrees. The only thing I had wrong was the overcast skies. It was actually very sunny, but with the low humidity it was very pleasant.

Splits for this race really can tell a really goofy story if you don’t know the course. At least half of the first mile is downhill. It’s one of those perfect down hills too. It’s more than gradual, so you actually feel it, but it’s less than steep, so you’re not putting on the brakes the whole time. Since the course starts and ends in the same spot, you have to make up for the downhill somewhere. That occurs right after the 4 mile mark with a steep hill that takes about 75 seconds to get up before leveling out to a gradual hill for another 45 seconds. With that said, I ran 5:33, 6:03, 6:08, 5:56, 6:22 for a 30:02. Good enough for 40th overall and 3rd in my age-group. Results can be found on Badgerland Striders.

Last year I ran 29:42, but I was right at the peak of my season, having already raced 11 times in the previous 3 months. Since Grandma’s marathon, I’ve raced 3 times this year. While I’m happy with the time and age-group place, I still have some work to do. I was just hanging on the last 1.5 miles and I didn’t really respond when people passed me. I think that’ll come around with more speed work and more racing.

455 MILES

I currently use this online running log. It’s nice because you can set up a team and see how others are training. I’m on two teams; a group from the hillrunner forum and alumni from my college. One guy from the latter group is running Twin Cities Marathon. He just finished a 455-mile month. That’s “only” 103 miles per week, but it looks like a hell of a lot more when you see each day broken out. I was more impressed with his comments. Nearly every comment spoke of something hurting. I guess that’s a given when you’re running that much. Maybe that’s the difference between “average” and “above average”. The average runner takes the day off; the above average runner pushes through and gets his mileage in.

After reading Self-Made Olympian, I decided to get Daws’ other book, Running Your Best. Last night I read the first couple of chapters. He mentions Ron Hills’ streak of running 20 years in a row without missing a day. Now I hear about “days run in a row” streaks all the time. What makes Hills’ streak even more impressive is that it includes running TWICE a day everyday (except Sunday) for 20 years. I’m sure he wasn’t pain-free for each of those 7,300 runs!

Speaking of books, I’m trying to add to my collection of out-of-print running books. I also bought Clean Pair of Heels and Kiwi’s Can Fly through adebooks. I also picked up Steve Scott the Miler, 26 Miles to Boston, and On the Run From Dogs and People from Half Priced Books. I mainly bought those last 3 because I had a gift certificate from my birthday.

With a race tomorrow, there’s nothing exciting to mention regarding today’s run; 5 easy miles with 3 strides thrown in at the end. I could mention that the weather was stunning, 65-70 and sunny with a dew point less than 45. Alumni weekend is notoriously hot and humid. So it figures that after a summer of bitching about the weather, tomorrow looks like it will be awesome; probably 60-65, overcast and low humidity. I think I can break 31, but would guess that sub-30 is out of the question. Goals: 30:30 and top-3 in my age group.

CHANGES IN PERSPECTIVE

As I mentioned yesterday, I have 2 races this weekend. I wanted to get in some faster work today, yet not leave me tired for the weekend. The solution? The fartlek workout I did last Sunday. This time I did it during the course of an 8 mile run. Two days after my Sunday fartlek, my legs felt good for the 800s, so hopefully they’ll feel good for Saturday’s race.

It’s funny how our perspective changes over time. Yesterday I mentioned my “whopping” 181 miles in August. Last night I was looking through my old logs from college. My best season of cross country came after running 184, 186 and 185 miles in June, July and August. Remember, that’s the key base-building stretch for college runners. Man, that’s only 42 mpw. Not that sub-17 and sub-35 are fast time (by college standards), but how the hell did I ever run that fast on 6 miles a day?

Doesn’t it seem reasonably to think if I double my base mileage, I should be able to run faster – even if it’s 10 years later? I suppose "all else" would have to remain constant for that to really be the case. I have about 25 seconds per mile to drop from my best performances last year. That’s not going to happen this year. Maybe next? I suppose that’s what keeps me going.