So here I sit, 41 days from the marathon. Anyone who looks at my training log either thinks I'm forgetfull and no longer am logging miles or that something is wrong. Unfortunatly it is the latter. Moving back to last weekend, I had to make an emergency trip back home to the valley to see my family. I left on Saturday after work, but before I left, I went for a quick 5 miles that didn't go very well. I could really feel my left groin bothering me. When I tried to go out on Sunday and get my Q1 in, I could barely run. I wound up taking Sunday and Monday off and then coming back with 10 miles Tuesday. On Wednesday, I went out for 5 at lunch, and the plan was to get another 5 after a meeting a work. Well at the meeting, I was informed that everybody was taking a 10% pay cut, so me and one of the guys went to have a couple beers insetead. On Thursday I went out and ran 4 X 12 minutes @ T pace, with 2 minute rests. Including the 2 mile warm up and cool down, it was 10 miles total. It was also probably the best marathon specific workout that I have ever had, with the possible exception of a 20 miler I did before my first marathon, before I knew what LSD was. Friday morning I got up, felt a little sore in my legs, went down to Runners Roost, ponied up the 95 bucks for the marathon, and was planning a 13.1 mile run that day. No go. I tried to run Saturday at lunch, same result. My thigh on my left leg feels torn up inside. Rewind to Thursday afternoon. My left foot was bothering me some that day, but having missed some runs, I wanted to try and get out and get my workout in, especially having missed my previous Q workout. I tested it, and it felt ok to run the 10 miles on. Looks like it changed my gait though, bothering my thigh, my knee, and my groin all at once. So bottom line is this. Last week I ran 20 miles, I haven't made a Sunday long run in 2 weeks, and although I'm on the mend, I probably will have almost taken 6 days off by the time I resume.
I went to watch the Colorado Mammoth play indoor lacrosse last night, (it was entertaining, but I still prefer hockey) and as I watched the game I was thinking alot about training, marathoning, and such. For both of my first two marathons, I trained for 13 weeks. 11 hard than a 2 week taper. When I tried to prepare for Chicago last year, it was right around the 12 week mark that I broke down. Looking at the calendar, this is right about in that same time frame. The difference right now is that, when I was training for Chicago, as the days and workouts came and went, I really felt like I was never getting anywhere. Looking back, I still think I could have saved the Chicago Marathon this year, I just didn't have it in me to continue on in the training when I knew it wasn't working for me. I could have worked throught the IT issue and still run it. I just don't think I had the fire in my belly to go out in front of all these people I knew, and not be able to perform to the standard I had set for myself. Not one anyone else has set for me. I don't feel that way right now. I have made tremendous gains in my training this time, with Thursday night's run really showing me how far I have come, in really what has been a short time. I was running less than 35 mpw when I first started this program, and although I only hit 70 one out of the three times I was supposed to, and even with this time off, this marathon is not only doable, but I can still get in around the time I want to I believe.
I will hopefully return to running tomorrow, for 5 miles or so. Then run the rest of the week, leading up to Sunday. The Daniels' program Q1 workouts are now out the window. My next 4 sunday workouts will go as follows (hopefully) 19 this Sunday, 20 the following, 21 the weekend after, then the Horsetooth Half Marathon, then my 2 week taper. The 2 marathons that I have made the starting line to, that's how I did my 20's. The Q2s will still be run each week, but the long stuff will change.
No worries people.
Monday, March 23, 2009
Wednesday, March 11, 2009
The Big Toe
So last week after my Q2 workout, I came down with a sprain in my big toe on my right foot. When I went out and did my 19 mile run on Sunday, about 14 miles in, it really started bothering me to the point that I really was worried about it. I had to pick up the pace at that point and go back to 7 minute miles, and for a couple minutes I really thought I was in a bad way. I had been reading about Turf Toe, and how it can put people out of action for almost a month. Upon further review though, the pain was on the top of my foot, and resonating it's way down to the toe. A little ice and some Advil, and after yesterday's 13.1, I am unconcerned about it. I think it was just a ding from all the miles I have been running.
I don't rant much in my blogs, mostly because I figure "what does anyone care what I think?", but I've never made any secret of the fact that I love Colorado, and Ft. Collins in particular. But here lately, as I get out and about on these longer runs, I am tending to notice some things, and they are some things that bother me about my little community. At the corner of Mulberry and Lemay, right out in front of the Home Depot/Wal Mart complex the past week or so, there has been a guy with a sign asking for money. Don't get me wrong, I am not here to say "I hate the homeless.", or anything like that. It's just that we never have had much of that around here. Ft. Collins actually has a decent sized homeless population, and about 3/4 mile away from where I work, there is a park where they are allowed to habitat, sleep, and such. The police allow them to stay there and don't bother them, and in agreement, they do not populate the neighboring parks and areas. And literally, there is pretty much never any trouble that comes from them, but seeing this really reminds me of areas in Denver that I have been to, and it makes me feel like my little town isn't quite so little anymore. I hope that makes sense...
6 days ago, I was on a 19 mile run, and as I came down to the last 4 miles or so, I was on Drake heading west. With the exception of College Ave, Mullberry, Drake, Prospect, Horsetooth, and Harmony roads ( the main roads here in Ft. Collins) almost every road in this town has a bike lane on it. I spend a lot of time running in bike lanes, mostly because it's asphalt instead of concrete, and because the sidewalks are either full of people walking, or, people on bikes????even though they have a bike lane. So as I headed west, there were 3 guys walking west and the sidewalk was only wide enough for 2, so one of them was pretty much walking in the street. A car honked at the guy to get out of the road, and had to go into the other lane to get around him. As the car drove to the next light, one of the guys picked up a rock and started running to try and get within throwing distance. I'm watching this happen, thinking to myself that if this guy hits that cars window with a rock and breaks it, I'm going to have to step in. I'm 15 miles into a run, there are 3 of them, but I can't just let it slide. So the light turns green and the Pontiac speeds away, unharmed. The guy goes to his knees, hacking because he ran about 300 feet and as I pass him, he looks sideways at me, and I utter "dumbass" as I go by. He heard me, but said nothing in return. Kids in general are idiots these days. When I was young, even up till I was just getting into high school, if I acted up, my dad whipped my ass. And good. Fear of an ass kicking didn't keep me from drinking, or smoking, or things like that, but stupid shit, like that kid, you didn't do because you knew there were consiquences for your actions. It doesn't seem to be that way anymore.
End rant.
Lower miles than I wanted this week, I did the 13.1 over the hills of Horsetooth on Tuesday, after doing the 19.1 on Sunday. I was about 5 minutes quicker over the HTH course than I was about 10 days prior, which was good, and I figured I would head out for a 10 mile run on Wednesday after work...well I got 3 miles and that was it. My thighs were pretty trashed from the hills. I took Thursday off and did my Q2 last night, totaling about 8.2 miles of interval work. At the beginning of this training cycle, I was running a lot of doubles, just getting miles. Now that we are within two months of the marathon, that will change for me. Praise Jesus for daylight savings. Most of my runs from now till the end of the cycle will be of double digit miles or more, with the possible exception of the occasional recovery run, or if my Q2 calls for less than 10. This gets my body ready for longer runs, plus it will probably give me an extra day off during the week, as I start doing some 22's and really get to the hard part of this training plan.
That said, maybe 5 or 6 after work to finish the week, then into my pickup and to the other side of the state. My sister is in failing health right now, at age 33 and I need to go visit, before I don't get the chance to again...
I don't rant much in my blogs, mostly because I figure "what does anyone care what I think?", but I've never made any secret of the fact that I love Colorado, and Ft. Collins in particular. But here lately, as I get out and about on these longer runs, I am tending to notice some things, and they are some things that bother me about my little community. At the corner of Mulberry and Lemay, right out in front of the Home Depot/Wal Mart complex the past week or so, there has been a guy with a sign asking for money. Don't get me wrong, I am not here to say "I hate the homeless.", or anything like that. It's just that we never have had much of that around here. Ft. Collins actually has a decent sized homeless population, and about 3/4 mile away from where I work, there is a park where they are allowed to habitat, sleep, and such. The police allow them to stay there and don't bother them, and in agreement, they do not populate the neighboring parks and areas. And literally, there is pretty much never any trouble that comes from them, but seeing this really reminds me of areas in Denver that I have been to, and it makes me feel like my little town isn't quite so little anymore. I hope that makes sense...
6 days ago, I was on a 19 mile run, and as I came down to the last 4 miles or so, I was on Drake heading west. With the exception of College Ave, Mullberry, Drake, Prospect, Horsetooth, and Harmony roads ( the main roads here in Ft. Collins) almost every road in this town has a bike lane on it. I spend a lot of time running in bike lanes, mostly because it's asphalt instead of concrete, and because the sidewalks are either full of people walking, or, people on bikes????even though they have a bike lane. So as I headed west, there were 3 guys walking west and the sidewalk was only wide enough for 2, so one of them was pretty much walking in the street. A car honked at the guy to get out of the road, and had to go into the other lane to get around him. As the car drove to the next light, one of the guys picked up a rock and started running to try and get within throwing distance. I'm watching this happen, thinking to myself that if this guy hits that cars window with a rock and breaks it, I'm going to have to step in. I'm 15 miles into a run, there are 3 of them, but I can't just let it slide. So the light turns green and the Pontiac speeds away, unharmed. The guy goes to his knees, hacking because he ran about 300 feet and as I pass him, he looks sideways at me, and I utter "dumbass" as I go by. He heard me, but said nothing in return. Kids in general are idiots these days. When I was young, even up till I was just getting into high school, if I acted up, my dad whipped my ass. And good. Fear of an ass kicking didn't keep me from drinking, or smoking, or things like that, but stupid shit, like that kid, you didn't do because you knew there were consiquences for your actions. It doesn't seem to be that way anymore.
End rant.
Lower miles than I wanted this week, I did the 13.1 over the hills of Horsetooth on Tuesday, after doing the 19.1 on Sunday. I was about 5 minutes quicker over the HTH course than I was about 10 days prior, which was good, and I figured I would head out for a 10 mile run on Wednesday after work...well I got 3 miles and that was it. My thighs were pretty trashed from the hills. I took Thursday off and did my Q2 last night, totaling about 8.2 miles of interval work. At the beginning of this training cycle, I was running a lot of doubles, just getting miles. Now that we are within two months of the marathon, that will change for me. Praise Jesus for daylight savings. Most of my runs from now till the end of the cycle will be of double digit miles or more, with the possible exception of the occasional recovery run, or if my Q2 calls for less than 10. This gets my body ready for longer runs, plus it will probably give me an extra day off during the week, as I start doing some 22's and really get to the hard part of this training plan.
That said, maybe 5 or 6 after work to finish the week, then into my pickup and to the other side of the state. My sister is in failing health right now, at age 33 and I need to go visit, before I don't get the chance to again...
Thursday, March 5, 2009
Q2
This is the first time so far this training session that I have written about a specific workout that I have done. My running log is available for everyone to see on RWOL.
http://traininglog.runnersworld.com/profiles/e1195ed2a8194cf6bbd220a914b648c6
It doesn't tell the whole story on certain runs though. On a workout like yesterdays, my average pace was very good, but it was an interval workout, so 40 of the 50 minutes were spend at what would be a higher intensity.
I left work at 5pm, still daylight, and still shorts weather here in Fort Collins. I knew that barring a setback, that I would finish right after sunset. I mapped the run earlier in the day, and thought I had put together a nice 11 and some odd mile route that would be perfect for the run. I took off up Mountain Ave to the west. The wind was blowing out of the west pretty good, so the 2 easy miles at the beginning were a little harder intensity than I had hoped for. I started the 20 minutes at Threshold Pace still heading west. At 2 minutes, I got caught by a traffic light, just for a second, but stopped my Garmin. About 2 minutes later into the run, I looked down to find that I had never restarted it.
I'll give a little backround into my Threshold runs here lately. Last weeks Q2 was 2 easy, followed by 2 x 15 minutes @ T pace with 3 minute rests. I was staring at the Garmin at about 10 minutes into the first one, counting the seconds till the rest period. The week before was 4 x 1 mile @ T pace, with 1 minute rests, followed by 5 easy minutes, then another 3x 1 mile @ T pace. Needless to say that I didn't even do the last 3 repeats of that workout. 2 weekends ago, I ran a 5k on the Colorado State campus with the intention of running it at T pace, (which is about 30 seconds slower than I have run some 5k's in my life). Near the end I was gasping, but the biggest reason I did it was to work on my breathing. I read a lot about it in the Daniels' book, but seem to be stuggling with it. It's something that I needed to get figured out.
So as I got around 7 minutes into the first 20 minutes, I was coming up over a pretty good hill where I needed to take a right and continue up another. I shut down for about 30 seconds at that point and started to walk, sucking wind. I restarted and as the road flattened out and I seemed to be doing just fine. I finished the 20 minutes and went into a 10 minutes E after that. As I was coming to the end of that interval, I hung the corner onto the bike path that is the home stretch of both the Horestooth Half and the Colorado Marathon. The last 6 miles or so are raced on this stretch. I started the 2nd interval and after about 3 minutes, BINGO. My breathing was there. I nailed the last 17 minutes and probably could have easily carried it another 20 minutes or so. I got to the end, ran the 2 easy miles for a cooldown, and called it a night. I've had my 2 best Q workouts this week. It's quite exciting, don't you think?
I closed the night at Coopersmiths, enjoying the $18.68 dinner deal with a friend of mine. Nachos, a large pepperoni and sausage pizza, and a pitcher of Poudre Pale Ale. It's part of the Great Plates deal here in town.
http://downtownfortcollins.com/pdf-gateway.php/documents/GP_09_insert_final
I should go out for dinner again tonight.
http://traininglog.runnersworld.com/profiles/e1195ed2a8194cf6bbd220a914b648c6
It doesn't tell the whole story on certain runs though. On a workout like yesterdays, my average pace was very good, but it was an interval workout, so 40 of the 50 minutes were spend at what would be a higher intensity.
I left work at 5pm, still daylight, and still shorts weather here in Fort Collins. I knew that barring a setback, that I would finish right after sunset. I mapped the run earlier in the day, and thought I had put together a nice 11 and some odd mile route that would be perfect for the run. I took off up Mountain Ave to the west. The wind was blowing out of the west pretty good, so the 2 easy miles at the beginning were a little harder intensity than I had hoped for. I started the 20 minutes at Threshold Pace still heading west. At 2 minutes, I got caught by a traffic light, just for a second, but stopped my Garmin. About 2 minutes later into the run, I looked down to find that I had never restarted it.
I'll give a little backround into my Threshold runs here lately. Last weeks Q2 was 2 easy, followed by 2 x 15 minutes @ T pace with 3 minute rests. I was staring at the Garmin at about 10 minutes into the first one, counting the seconds till the rest period. The week before was 4 x 1 mile @ T pace, with 1 minute rests, followed by 5 easy minutes, then another 3x 1 mile @ T pace. Needless to say that I didn't even do the last 3 repeats of that workout. 2 weekends ago, I ran a 5k on the Colorado State campus with the intention of running it at T pace, (which is about 30 seconds slower than I have run some 5k's in my life). Near the end I was gasping, but the biggest reason I did it was to work on my breathing. I read a lot about it in the Daniels' book, but seem to be stuggling with it. It's something that I needed to get figured out.
So as I got around 7 minutes into the first 20 minutes, I was coming up over a pretty good hill where I needed to take a right and continue up another. I shut down for about 30 seconds at that point and started to walk, sucking wind. I restarted and as the road flattened out and I seemed to be doing just fine. I finished the 20 minutes and went into a 10 minutes E after that. As I was coming to the end of that interval, I hung the corner onto the bike path that is the home stretch of both the Horestooth Half and the Colorado Marathon. The last 6 miles or so are raced on this stretch. I started the 2nd interval and after about 3 minutes, BINGO. My breathing was there. I nailed the last 17 minutes and probably could have easily carried it another 20 minutes or so. I got to the end, ran the 2 easy miles for a cooldown, and called it a night. I've had my 2 best Q workouts this week. It's quite exciting, don't you think?
I closed the night at Coopersmiths, enjoying the $18.68 dinner deal with a friend of mine. Nachos, a large pepperoni and sausage pizza, and a pitcher of Poudre Pale Ale. It's part of the Great Plates deal here in town.
http://downtownfortcollins.com/pdf-gateway.php/documents/GP_09_insert_final
I should go out for dinner again tonight.
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