Beginning my comeback

I have finally decided to resume my training in earnest. I want to run a 5K around the Thanksgiving holiday and have not run in the three weeks since my marathon, though I did play three flag football games. I used the Runner's World Smart Coach to sketch a training plan for me.


The plan today was to run four miles at slow 9:53 min/mi pace. I could not contain myself though and just ran finishing my neighborhood loop of 3.89 miles in 30:26, a 7:49 min/mi pace. I really don't like running on the roads at night because I don't have much shoulder to run on and am too tall to run for long stretches on the sidewalk because a branch will whack me in the face for sure. My wife bought me a reflective vest that should at least warn drivers that someone is on the road, but I think it may be too dangerous to keep this up and I must look for alternatives like running during the lunch hour at work. I don't plan on doing any more running on my treadmill than necessary.

Anyways, I plan on running at least a couple of 5Ks to prove to myself what kind of speed I have. I plan on getting my marathon time down to 3:30 next year and given my performances this year I have a lot of work to do. I'll be looking to run at least two marathons in 2010 and want to break 20 minutes in a 5K, 40 minutes in a 10K, and 1:40 in a half marathon. My current times are 46:21 in the 10K, 1:49:59 in the half-marathon, and 3:58:19 marathon. I have not raced a 5K in an organized race, but I have run 3.13 miles in 22:57 and 23:26 during training.

Overall the body feels good. My left knee felt a touch tight after the run and my lungs definitely felt the burn of the effort, but this went away shortly during and after the run.

The NYC Marathon this weekend was awesome. Congratulations to Meb and Tulu they really showed the class of great winners - supreme effort and respect for their sport and fellow competitors. Also inspirational is the book I am reading now The Perfect Mile the story of the three men who challenged themselves to break the four minute mile barrier in middle of the 20th century.

Happy running!

Planning the next training season

I have enjoyed my post-marathon rest, but am getting restless and need to put together the next training plan. I am targeting another marathon in mid-May 2010. I am going to try the Hal Higdon 30-week Novice Supreme training plan again. Now I have to schedule the following:

• 5-K race 6 weeks from now (December 6 - Columbia Metric Marathon and 5K)
• 8-K race 9 weeks from now (December 26)
  
• 10-K race 12 weeks from now (January 16)
• 15-K race 18 weeks from now (February 27)
• Half-Marathon 24 weeks from now (April 10)
• Marathon 30 weeks from now (May 22)

And, no, I am not worried about running in the wake of the recent marathon deaths.

Baltimore 2009 Race Report

Very satisfying race yesterday. I am proud of myself for improving on my previous time by more than five minutes and humbled again by miles 18 through 26. I ran a sub four hour marathon, which is always considered respectable, but I had some nervous moments trying to get there. I was coming down the home stretch during the time when the announce was goading those of us in the chute to watch the clock and get in under four hours. Cramps in my hamstrings taunted me just as I passed the mile 26 marker. It was as if my legs had listened to my Garmin watch alarm tell me that I had actually already finished the actual marathon distance (according to my watch we really had run 26.41 miles) I just made with a 3:58.19 chip time, but the clock time said 3:58:59 (chip time acknowledges the fact that it takes time for those of us who are elites must run a bit before crossing the starting line).

Baltimore yesterday was the tail of two races. I ran with the 3:40 pace group and kept up with them until mile 16. This caused me to beat my Baltimore Half Marathon time from last year (I ran 1:49:59 for the half marathon portion of this marathon - last year, I ran 1:51:57 and didn't have to run another 13.1 afterwords). I started struggling around Patterson Park and tried a couple of surges to keep up, but I lost them at E. Madison Street.

The trouble really began midway through mile 17 as I hit the downhill on N. Washington Street. My quadriceps seized up with cramps and I actually had to walk to get them back under control. I ambled along and held off the 3:50 pace group until for a long time even though I was losing over minute a mile from my goal pace. They caught me around Charles Village. I tried to run with them, but their pace dropped me like a Snoop song. It was then that I really started to fear for my goal to PR (break my personal record). I had gotten a diaphragm cramp (you know, a side stitch) from the bridge at Falls Expressway and held my guts in until Eutaw Street. Then the strangest cramp of all happened, I had simultaneous cramps in the muscles around my elbows. Finally, I found enough within to pick up the pace during the last mile stretch downtown to Camden Yards finishing with a 9:44 minute mile, which was my only single digit (minute hand) mile in the last eight.

In retrospect, I can say that I did well despite the physical ailments, I actually took time to take a potty break, and I held a low 8 minute mile pace for 17 miles. My average pace for 26.2 miles was 9:06 min/mi and I think that there is nothing to sneeze at there. I actually PR'ed in both my marathon and half marathon in the same race. I know that before my next marathon I must do a lot more endurance runs - going over 20 miles in more than a few long runs and I need to add hill work to develop strength as I found my legs not up to the hills like I thought they were.

Links:

• My official race results page
• My Garmin Connect (tm) page

Dedications:
First and foremost God, my wife, and family. Without them I would have nothing to be proud of and could not have done what I needed to do for this race. For the friends and family I lost recently, Granddad Wheeler, Grandma Stella, Ryan Trotman, Marcia Plater, and Ollie. For Gail who continues to recover from a stroke around Christmas. She's up and walking again being braver than I had to be to run the marathon. I ran for them, I thought of them as it got hard, they watched over me. For the friends who encouraged me and wished me well. I hope I did not annoy my Facebook network too badly with my constant training reports - it helped me.

I'll be doing this again soon. I will qualify for Boston.

It's time...

It's time to run my goal race of the year - the Under Armor Baltimore Marathon 2009! Since my last marathon i've run 75 times, covered 501.6 miles, one 20-mile run, and averaged 8:36 min/miles over all my runs. Unlike the training for the Frederick Marathon, I did no weight lifting and don't remember doing much core training. I ran during my vacation, on my 10th wedding anniversary, on my birthday, and during an overseas business trip. I believe my dedication is really strong. Now I've got to go out there and show some guts an run as strong as I can. My weak goal is 3:50 and my strong goal is 3:40. I do not want to speak of my secret goal.

This training has been fun and I think that I could have only improved it with more speed work and hill training. I'd like to run with a running group in the future - hopefully one with fast people who will get me motivated. I plan on keeping this running thing up for a while. So, stay tuned, I will write a detailed race report for those who'll be interested.

Reflecting on training thus far

I have just been skimming my marathon training logs and saw that amazingly I should hit 1000 miles this year right on my marathon this October 10th. I believe this Summer has been some of my best training yet in my short (1.25 years) running career. I am 2 weeks away from my second marathon ever. My goal is 3:50, but my "not-so-secret" hope is to run a 3:40.

So, the training plans I have utilized were Hal Higdon's Novice supreme and the Runner's World Smart Coach plans. I liked the RW plan because it got me used to planning the time to run frequent longish runs (mostly 7-8 miles) during the week. I believe that this will allow me to get used to higher mileage training programs as I try to improve. I haven't been doing so much speed work and I have a feeling that this must change to qualify me for Boston.

I have just gotten comfortable with running at a low 8-minute mile pace for 5-8 mile spans, but I have only run low 9-minute paces for my long runs. I feel like I did C-level work on my aerobic base building. I gave myself the C-grade because I felt very fatigued during my 20-mile run this past week, I only did one twenty miler, I quit during a 16 miler (finishing only 14 miles), and I did not train with proper fuel but for my last two long runs. I did C+ work for speed training. This grade because I actually did some speed work on the track, but I only did a 2 interval training runs and I did not enter any 5Ks or 10Ks. My strength hills and stamina work was a C. I did a few marathon pace and tempo runs, but I did not intentionally run any hills. However, my running locations tend to be very hilly on the geography side - the average elevation gain of all my outdoor runs this Summer is 1225 feet. On dedication and effort I definitely give myself an A-, because I didn't miss any workouts (though I am in danger, because I am going on an out of country business trip this Saturday and will not be able to run this Sunday) and I challenged myself to a psuedo 10K race where I clocked a time less than 45 seconds slower than my PB.

In all, I give myself a C+ training grade this season, which if scored on a curve with other rookie marathoners might eke out a B+ grade. I made it past my first marathon and trained for my second that makes me sure I am not a fly-by-night runner. I kept a fairly decent training log; annoying my Facebook friends with daily updates i'm afraid. I expect to PR in at least one race per year let's hope that I do not disappoint.

Happy running!

Thursday Tempo Run

8.0 miles - 1:05:48 - 8:13 min/mi average pace

Treadmill tempo run today. 1 mile warm up and cool down. 6 miles in 46:41 for an average pace of 7:46 min/mi. Good stuff, now for some football :)

Garmin Connect - Activity Details for Tuesday Easy Run

Garmin Connect - Activity Details for Tuesday Easy Run

8.01 miles - 1:03:31 - 7:55 min/mi

I didn't read my training plan today and ran 8 miles instead of 7. I also let my competitive juices get to me because I was running on a track instead the road and ran almost a minute and a half faster than my target pace. Since my tempo run on Thursday was 6 miles at a 7:57 min/mi I could swap this workout for that one.

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