3.25.10

Took another rest day. Right when I was going to run a mere 2 miles it started raining and thundering. Supposed to rain on Sunday, but I'm still hoping for the best.

6.10.09

thunderstorms and lightning, stayed inside.

6.8.09

Was busy all day visiting and working, didn't get a run in.

6.5.09

Fully rested? I hope so.

6.3.09

Resting more

6.2.09

Rest

6.1.09

Taking a few days rest

5.27.09

So yeah this day was a big fat zero. Still not a total loss with a core workout. Good rest day after the tweet5k attempt. This will likely be a low week unless the storms move out.

5.20.09

No run today, just took a full day of rest, tomorrow an easy day, then a really light day Friday with some striders. Just the normal core work.

After Boston, Kara Goucher had planned to take time off. That mentality changed rather quickly when she finished within seconds of winning the marathon. She wanted a bit of redemption, or maybe just another crack at the marathon the next week at London. That may seem a little crazy, but not really due to the first three-fourths of the race being extremely slow. Thankfully she decided against it, heeding the advice from her coach Salazar. The marathon is an extremely grueling race, and London always being fast, would be difficult even if perfectly prepared and rested.

I wrote my own little opinion about it, basically stating that if I were in that position, family would have to wait until I got one more crack at the marathon. The fact is Kara was simply in excellent marathon shape, and I hated the idea of that level of fitness be reverted back to a sort of ground zero before taking another stab at a high finish. But alas, wise minds worked together and came up with the solution, the World Championships in August. That gives Kara another attempt at running her best marathon and enough time afterward to start a family before returning to training for the 2012 Olympics. I am glad she, her husband, and her coach made the decision. Assuming her training continues well, she will do amazing at World's. Paula Radcliffe will be there and what better marathon experience is there to gain from racing against the world record holder?

Goucher on World Championships in August

5.17.09

Nothing like a good old day off. Hams were STILL sore from this past week, didn't want to further the damage so I decided to wait until the afternoon and see how they felt. They actually felt better but by that time we had already made plans to go out with friends at 4:30. So I just figured it would be a good day to relax and not be a running robot.

Tomorrow I will do some kind of tempo work, nothing major I don't think. Possibly throw in some fast 200's or something just to keep the legs turning over. I'm not sure how much longer I am going to do speedwork. I'm actually wanting to lessen the speedwork slowly and sort of revert back to hill training, then back to base. Kind of like easing out of the speedwork instead of just completely stopping. Not sure how that will work, but it seems like a good enough plan.

5.9.09

Went to a wedding that was an hour away so that took quite a while just driving, didn't get home till late. Meh, thunderstorms in the a.m. and being busy the rest of the day. I guess we all have a few of them. Not worried, good rest day before a long run tomorrow and as of now weather looks to cooperate :)

5.1.09

Today was a rest day. Didn't really want it to be, but everytime it seemed like things were in the clear it rained. I looked at the forecast for the next ten days or so, there's thunderstorms nearly everyday. But it does look like the morning might be a little clear. At least it will be a little warmer in the sixties so I can run in the rain as long as it's not pouring, about noon there are supposed to be thunderstorms so I'll have to get out early to avoid that.

I was looking into crossfit and I'm still not sure what it's all about. There was a video on youtube that said something like "clear up all questions about crossfit" which I watched and still really have no clue what it's about, lol. I understand it's a fitness program, but I wasn't sure if there were specific methods/theories to use. I just starting looking into it so I'm sure I will find more information if I keep lookin'. Either way some of the exercises looked intense and I would like that not only for me, but for April as well. We went running later last night, jogged on/off for about 5 minutes at a time, then walked the rest of a loop around the neighborhood, took about 40 minutes but the point was we were out there. Hopefully we can keep it up, she is really wanting to be fit, I'm just not sure how committed she is yet.

4.22.09

These past few weeks have really been up and down for me. Sometimes I get my runs with good motivation and other times I just seem to wimp out. Today I was slacking.

No excuse for this missed day of opportunity. It was nice outside today, but I was really tired from last night. Although I love April for buying me a starbucks, since I had it later on when I got back from my run it ended up keeping me awake well into the morning hours. Not her fault, I should have tried to go to sleep but I chose to watch all the DVR'd tv I missed while I was running instead. So that wore me out and I got a late start in the morning, spent the day working on my painting which is so close to being done I can taste it. Then of course we ate dinner and I just couldn't get myself in the mood to run on a full stomach again. So anyway there's the justification, legs feel good and fresh today though :)

So what to talk about that is still motivating. Oh yeah - the rumor that Kara Goucher would run London (which is this weekend) right after her great performance on Monday. Well that seems a little silly to me when I saw the rumor floating around twitterland leading to article that said she was "petitioning" her coach to let her run. Well I'm not the biggest guy on taking 1 rest day for each mile raced, but still this is a little too close for comfort. I'm sure she isn't worried about the negative publicity she would receive (for the very reason I just stated, recovery period) but she should be worried about how it would look if for some reason she had a bad race. All the media would be on her and it would bring a lot of negativity to her as well as our sport. Not a risk worth taking in my honest opinion, although I admit she is in such great shape that I wouldn't put a great performance past her.

I've ran beside a guy who Won a marathon Saturday, then the following day came down here to Knoxville and placed 3rd. So I'm not surprised when I see Kara wanting to get back out there. She is elite and I believe elite bodies are so well trained to run, that recovery time is exponentially less than typical runners, they are simply adapted to running hard.

Now also consider she wants to take time off right now. I understand she's getting "older" and wants to start a family, but if it were me I would choose to run at least few more races. I mean she's SO close to winning a major marathon, just seconds away. Why not train for another marathon and see if she can take it while she is in excellent shape? The whole theory of "why wait?" really seems appropriate. But I suppose the same goes for the whole family making goal as well. Let's face it, being pregnant isn't exactly the ideal training conditions, at least not near the third trimester. I'm not saying definitely she should wait. I mean Paula Radcliffe won New York months after having a baby and that's amazing, but Paula had won marathons before that and had already established herself as a world record breaking marathoner. She also suffered an stress fracture due to the pregnancy most likely the result of depleted calcium. I'm not saying it's a terrible thing, but just knowing how close she came, I think Kara should give it at least one more shot.

Image by Mark Shearman

Turning things to my side I've been thinking about my own goals and wondering what will be next for me. I was considering some ultra's as I think I could do really well in one, but that sort of goes against my whole focus on speed and requires a ton of mileage, so I pretty much threw that idea on the backburner real quick. Right now my goals are more abstract, get faster, more flexible, and improve at shorter distances. Those aren't very objective goals, but they are measurable so I think it's a good thing. Longer term I'm thinking half-marathon in the fall. I need a race to look forward to, races motivate me. Although the half would be my goal race, I would use 3 or 4 5ks as time trials and indicators of fitness leading up to it.

Even longer term I'll probably follow that race with the Knoxville Marathon again in the spring with a 10miler or 10k inbetween. It's a good race to train for because I know the course personally now, I know the people, the training schedule through a tough winter, and I learned a lot from just trying to race that distance. So coming back next year at the very least I'll know what's coming and definitely be able to focus my training better, i.e. hills like everyday and more runs at/below marathon pace. That's really as far as I want to think ahead. It's good to have goals, but you also have to be flexible as things change, so for now that's the plan.

4.19.09

Would have liked to run today, but there was lightning and what not. Wasn't feeling the treadmill either, so no excuses really, just a bit of laziness on another gloomy day. Hmm me lazy? Yeah it happens to everyone from time to time :)

On the good note BOSTON is tomorrow. I will be watching on universal sports. I wish it were on tv. Why don't they broadcast big races on the standard channels??? I mean wouldn't it draw more people to the sport? I guess it's being aired locally, but I mean come on, it's Boston. So that is kind of disappointing, but at least it's being aired online too. Hopefully they have their stuff together as last time I watched a marathon we were stuck with a single angle, no commentary, and very little if any actual racing. So if all goes well I'll be able to actually see this one :)

4.15.09

Kind of sore from the workout yesterday, but a comfortable soreness. Still working on painting so took another day off of running. Should help with recovery and I may be able to do another less intense workout tomorrow because of it, so it's a good thing. That's really all there is to report for now, more tomorrow.

4.13.09

Not sure why I lost motivation today, but it usually tends to coincide with doing artwork. So the trend continues. I have to work on that. Just doing core work and stretching tonight. It was cloudy all day, but never rained, tomorrow I don't think I'll be as lucky. Only about a week and a half left until the one mile race, so I'll try to get in at least 3 speed workouts between now and then.

4.7.09

Wasn't feeling right today. Not really sure why because I had plenty of sleep last night. I was just sort of tired and sluggish most of the day, even after doing some sittups and things like that. We did run out of gatorade the other day, maybe I'm having withdrawal as it's practically all i drink. I dunno still didn't feel good most of the day, should have just went ahead and tried to run anyway probably. Good to have a day off of running though, I still got my core work in so that is good too. Sorry this was kind of boring, but it's pretty much how I feel so I guess I captured the day... Tomorrow will be better.

4.3.09

Spent the day on artwork, didn't find time to run during the day. Then I found out we were going out to dinner, so I didn't have enough time to get it in. Oh well - it'll be good to get some extra rest. Legs feel great though, next week I should be back on my normal schedule.

3.31.09

Thanks to all the fellow runners and friends who have congratulated me on my race. I really appreciate all the kind words from everyone! I took the day off today as my legs are still really sore. Quads are completely sore, all four parts and hams are too. Only my right calf was sore, so I think maybe one of my legs is longer than the other, or my stride needs a little perfecting because the soreness is definitely more geared toward that side.

I didn't walk or anything today as I was busy working on my website. I have it completely designed as I finally worked out some of the problems I was having with flash and the new Actionscript. So now all that is left is to check all the links. I also went downtown to pick up my award for the race and meet up with Regina who leads our marriage group study on Sunday's before church. She has been wanting me to do some murals and I had a book to return to her. Since our church is right by the Runner's Market, it was two birds with one stone.

I posted pics of the worn tread of my shoes on twitter today.http://tinyurl.com/dgucpu http://tinyurl.com/cj5hkl The saucony's are literally falling apart. I mean that is normal for a shoe, but the way these are headed it seems a little too far along for what few miles are on them. Entire chunks of rubber are fraying and falling off, and I'm starting to think maybe my shoes were in a bad batch? If this is normal for a racer, then I don't think I'll be buying anymore. So if anyone out there knows if this normal, please drop a comment because I don't want to be criticizing for no good reason! edit: I actually researched a little and found at least two other reviews which said tread wear is quick on this model.

My legs feel a lot less sore today than yesterday, and tomorrow I'll be able to run a little. Not sure how far, but a slow hour sounds really sweet. Going to try to take it easier on my rest days. I always intend on it, but running fast feels so gooood :)

3.30.09

So I didn't quite get my goal of top 10, but 1st place in my age group isn't anything to slouch about! What a race. It was definitely hard and without a doubt a tough day, but the training paid off. Maybe it's a little too early to start assessing things, but now that I have some data to work with I don't think it's a problem.

Split times from milliseconds - I like this site, but very hard to interpret data. The Knoxville Track Club has a much cleaner streamlined way of showing the race data (but no splits).

checkpoints
1- 41:07.966
2- +45:00.002
3- +47:55.058
4- +45.24.004

06.2M - 41:07.966
13.1M - 1:26:07.968
20.0M - 2:14:03.026
26.2M - 2:59:27.3

average pace @
10k | half | 20Miles | 26.2
6:37 | 6:34 | 6:42 | 6:50.671

So firstly we can see that at 10k I was well within my goal pace which if I were to hold, would put me at a 2:54 finish time or so. So that was good pacing for the first few miles, especially with all the halfers running much faster. Even with big old Noelton hill, I gained time through the half, 3 seconds a mile (about 40 seconds). That was the flattest part of the course, so I'm sure it helped a little with the pacing, but I was still very much on track for 2:55 or so. I felt really good at this point, and it leads me to believe that a 1:23-1:24? wouldn't have been out of the question had I chosen to just do the half. Compared to last year I still gained 4 and a half minutes of time (even with pacing for a marathon) so that is a pretty good gauge of improvement. Mcmillan calculates the effort as equivalent to an 18:24 5k, 38:13 10k, and 1:25 half, but considering I ran 18:35 back in November and the fact that I usually beat Mcmillan at it's own game, 1:24 would definitely be possible.

At 20 miles I had slowed another 8 seconds a mile and lost about 2 minutes overall time from original pace. By the end of the race I lost another 8 seconds a mile, so I was really slowing down hard there. That was the part of the course with the roughest wind so that compounded matters. Also my legs really started feeling the burn even before 20, so slowing down was imminent. Judging from how sore they are today, I regret not doing like a million more hills over that last few months to prepare. From here on there was really nothing left to do. Factoring in all the issues I think it was a great time. I'm kind of glad I didn't hit a better time goal actually because that leaves a lot of room for improvement next time, lol.

As for training I did have about two weeks off with the tibia and that didn't help my fitness a bit, I was running 5:22 mile repeats, and after back down to 5:34 range. Also I was supposed to be -Building- on the speedwork, but mostly I ended up just maintaining. I did the best with what I had though. I have some really good ideas for training the next two months, and really want to get into some races rather quickly. There is a one mile race at the end of April, and I'm pretty much set on running that thing no matter what. I've really been wanting to break 5 minutes, and that is the perfect opportunity to do it officially. So I can't wait to get back into training. I recover pretty well, so hopefully I can get in some quality workouts over the next few weeks. I really want to work on speed the rest of this year. I've been so worried about mileage that I think I sacrificed a lot of coordination/speed drills which gave me great endurance, but not a lot of turnover.

There is also the issue of pacing itself. The Nike+ system is great, but unfortunately is off by a fraction for me - if you notice yesterday's total mileage of 28.12 (93% accurate) then you know that it's not as accurate as a gps. It is a footpod, so it's never going to be as accurate as gps, but it wasn't nearly as far off as I had believed. Just two miles, that's less than a mile for every 13 which ain't really that bad. I knew it was off as I said, and is the reason I run for time, and not for miles. As much as I'd like to have a garmin, it's really not in my budget right now, and as long as the nike system is working 30$/year is just fine by me. In fact I recently had a sensor battery die, but since April never uses hers I had an extra one so no problem at all. I got almost 3,000 miles out of the last one, so that ain't bad either. But pacing is still an issue. I never really know how fast I'm going so it does become somewhat of a guessing game. So if I want accurate pacing I have two choices between visiting the track, or hoping I get a garmin as a birthday gift or something.

So things are looking good, one mile race April 24th, and then the 10k Expo at the end of May. Not sure beyond that point. I almost did the Rutledge Marathon last year, and unless some other race looks really good, I might plan on running that - it's in October I believe and this will the be the second year of the race. Goals at this point are less about time and more about training. Speed drills, striders, and once a week speed workouts with a long run every other weekend are the basic plan. Mostly I just want to build from this marathon, it is by no means an ending point, but a springboard into further training. Actually I just looked at the calendar, and Carl from Oak Ridge has a June Madness series that looks interesting, with another 1 mile race June 6th, woot. I'll definitely try that mile race, and hopefully can get some more info about the series once I get a chance to check out the Roadkill Club's site.

Okay that's about it for today, wow I didn't think there would be that much to talk about, but I guess I was wrong. Hasta mañana.