I paid a visit to my LRSover the weekend. I had been unable to run recently because of an amazing amount of pain in my foot. Ever since my RnR Philly Race I have not been able to get much mileage in. This weekend I decided to start from scratch and get fitted for running shoes…
While I usually wear Stability Shoes, I decided to head in and see what the wonderful people at Pacers could do for me. Well, I hopped on the Dread Mill and ran at a 9:00 pace. Pacers uses a video camera to watch you run and then goes over the video with each person. What we discovered was that I am actually a Neutral Runner with a very slight moderate pronation. He recommended the Nike LunarEclipse and when I put them on (I tried a pair of NB and Asics as well) it felt like I was cheating. These shoes are very comfortable and I am able to run pain-free for the first time since my return from Altitude Training.
Because of my recent break from running, I’ve decided to run no more than 5 miles this week.
Well this year has started off very slowly, but now I need to get my butt in gear. My first race this year is the Love The Run You're With 5k on Valentine’s Day weekend. My goal going into this race is to shake off the cobwebs and get a general idea of my fitness. Another new thing about this year (other than starting to race so soon) is that I am a part of a racing team. My LRS has graciously added me to their list of 2011 Pacers Ambassadors. This is very exciting to me because I get to support a store that I truly believe in and I get to meet to some great new people as part of the process.
I will be focusing on the Chicago Marathon again this year. I also hope to drop many of my current PR’s substantially in the months and weeks to come. One thing that stayed the same is my continued work with the amazing, and amazingly patient, talented and flexible, Coach Nicole and Speed Endurance Coaching. I look forward to some of the challenging workouts that she always puts together for me.
I haven’t written on this in a while and this will be a short post. Since the last post, I’ve returned to the States and raced in my first HM. This half was meant as a workout in preparation for my Marathon in Baltimore (Baltimore has been pushed, but more on that in a different post).
My coach’s direction for Philly was…
Sunday, Sept 19-run this workout inside the HM race
Please avoid running faster-this race is too close to your marathon to race it
20-22 mile total moderate run including 12 miles of alternating mile paces below:
1 mile 10-12 sec’s faster than GMP then 1 mile 45 sec’s slower than GMP. Repeat 5 more times without rest between pace changes. Run the last mile as hard as you prefer
So my thought was easy. Run 8:20/9:20. Simple right? Uh-huh! Rather than explain it, here is the chart of my Garmin times (note: I didn’t worry about tangents and used the miles listed on the course for lap pace).
So that was not exactly what my coach prescribed, but I’ll take it. My goal was to run under 2 hours (but really under 1:55) and hit that goal with a Chip Time of 1:54:54.
The course was pretty nice. I really wish I had driven the entire course before the race. I assumed that it would all be in the city and that was about half wrong. All-in-all, a good day and a good race. One of the weekends major disappointments was the Hotel. I stayed in the Hilton Garden Inn and they were horrible for race details and help. The people at the desk didn’t even know where the start was, really!
The race felt pretty good all of the way through until about 10 miles. I actually had to stop during my slower miles to adjust my shoe. First, I adjusted it looser. Then tighter, then way way looser (more loose?). I think I was/am in the beginning states of Plantar Fasciitis. Which leads me to my new training tool (read: toy).
Today I brought a new training tool. It is a 2010 Trek 6000 Mountain Bike. I will use it as a commuter/Cross-Training bike. I really enjoy it so far and think that I will get a lot of use out of it.
Well that is all for now. I will be updating this blog more often…promise!
Upcoming Workouts:
Thursday, Sept 23-move to Friday if tired or run easy both days
8-9 mile easy run including 10-15 x 30 sec’s @ 5k effort w/1 min jog rests
Friday, Sept 24
XT 30-45 min easy
Saturday, Sept 25
4 -5mile easy run
Sunday, Sept 26
15-16 mile total moderate run including Yasso 800’s. Run 10 x 800m ~ 4 min w/2-3 min recoveries. Finish w/ 3 x 100m @ mile effort
As I sit here three days after my recent 5k PR I am pretty happy. My happiness isn’t because of the PR or the race even; it’s about the prospect for future performances. It was nice running 23:30; but it would have been nicer to run 23 flat or 22:30. I’m still a fairly new competitive runner so my potential is untapped and it is kind of a hindrance. I know I’m capable of much more, hell I’ve run faster training runs then I did in this race.
After my 5k (24:15) earlier this year; my coach mentioned that I could probably run a full minute faster soon. Four months later, I did that and I still had more left in the tank. At first look at the splits, it makes the race seem pretty disjointed. I took some time to look at the actual splits broken down in Half Mile and Quarter Mile increments. I was surprised at how even each individual mile was run.
This break down shows me that my race was not fluid and while I can be happy with the breakdown I need to work more on running a continuous, even race. I believe I could have saved some time by just running more evenly throughout the race. I expect the first and last mile to be different as I account for dodging people in the front and ‘kicking’ at the end. This may not affect me to bad now with these shorter races but come Marathon morning I believe that this is the type of the thing that will cause a really bad race and probably an even worse experience all around.
Upcoming workouts:
Friday, Aug 6
5 mile easy run w/4 strides
Saturday, Aug 7
4 mile easy run
Sunday, Aug 8
18 mile with 6 x 5 min hills @ marathon effort. Then 5 strides.
"The essential thing in life is not so much conquering as fighting well"
