Tag: ClubSLR

Spartans, Swiss Days & New Goals

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So, its been awhile. Life has a way of getting extremely busy especially during the summers. And add to that I wasn’t able to run the majority of June and I haven’t felt like writing much.

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I was able to do the Spartan Stadion Race. While I wasn’t able to do it as quickly as I would have liked I had a blast doing it. That was mostly do to having someone from to run it with. Dr. Ryan, my chiropractor, did the race with me and was a lot of fun to run with. I probably would have slacked off it I hadn’t been trying to keep up with him. Managed to cut 10 minutes off my time from last year and reinforced that I still don’t know how to climb a rope. One day I will conquer my nemesis the rope!

After the Spartan I started running a the 2 min on/off cycle and only for around 2 miles. Until the end of June when one of the guys, John, goaded me into running with him. We maintained an ok pace, around 10 minute miles but we ran for all 4 miles. Came to find out that he had already done several miles before the group got there and continued for a couple more after. But, it was what I needed.

John also encouraged me to come out to the bike rides as a way to build fitness. So, I thought lets give it another try. Attempt #3 went a lot better. I took the old Schwinn and met up with the group. and it didn’t go too bad. Although, the guys did tell me that I was fighting the weight of the all steel bike and that a newer little bike would be amazing things to both my comfort level and ability to keep up.

The weekend while at a used sports equipment shop I found an aluminum Cannondale from the 90’s. On the first test ride with no adjustments I knew that they guys where right. The Cannondale was so much easier to ride than my Schwinn. So we got it. John had a set of clip-less pedals that he wasn’t using and told me I could have them. I just needed to get cleats and shoes.

Being attached to your pedals is kinda interesting. I feel like it didn’t take as much effort to get the same power per stroke the trade off being when you stop you have to remember to un-clip. If you don’t you slowly fall over. I’m happy to report that I remembered to un-clip before I stopped every time. However, three quarters of the way through the ride after having stopped I forgot to push off and get moving before clipping my right foot back in and slowly fell over on my left. I’m told this is a right of passage that everyone goes through. I was just bruised and had a couple of scraps so I was able to continue. And I dare say that I actually had fun.

I have now purchased a bike jersey and shorts to go along with my shoes. And since the group usually rides on Wednesday’s the jersey is hot pink and the shorts match. Why? Because on Wednesday’s we wear pink!

At the end of July I ran in the Swiss Days 5K with several of my cousins and brother. I knew that there was no way i could stay with my speedster cousins having only been back to running for 3 weeks but I still wanted to put up a decent time. My family did very well. I got 18th in my age group with a time of 28:46. Given that I’m still rebuilding from the injuries to my foot and calf I’m pretty happy.

received_2082643498696906On the way home from the great Indiana road trip we stopped for the night in Albuquerque, NM and I found a great little 5K to run.  The Rudi Cancer 5K.  This is an annual run to benefit cancer research in honor of Kevin Rudi.  Compared to a lot of the runs I do this was very small.  About 60 people, mostly family and friends of the Rudi family.  His mom came and introduced herself to us and was extremely friendly.  Even though most of the field already knew each other they were all very welcoming.  It was one of the most challenging 5k courses I’ve encountered.  The entire first mile was uphill, the second was downhill and then back up for the third.  It was brutal, but a lot of fun.

It has got me re-evaluating my goals for the year. Between injuries, newborn, work, and we are trying to sell our house and find a new one, I’m not sure that my goal of sub-18 5K is reasonable.  I just don’t have the time to train without sacrificing time with my growing family.  So, this year my revised goal is to get my 5K under 24 minutes.  But, don’t think that I’ve given up on my quest for a sub 18, its just going to move to 2020. All the rest of the goals will then push back 1 year.  So it will look like this:

received_476802426218927-12019 5K under 24 minutes
2020 5K under 18 minutes
2021 10K under 40 minutes
2023 13.1 miles under 90 minutes
2025 26.2 miles Under 180 minutes

Due to the longer distances involved I’m going to give myself 2 years for both the half and full marathons.

There is SO MUCH more that has happened since the last post but that will have to wait for another time.

Until then…C-ya!

 

Injuries and Cautiousness

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Being injured sucks.

Now, I’m sure that seems like an obvious statement but there it is. I’ve been down for almost 3 weeks now with plantar fascitis.

Arrowhead LoopIt happened on an unscheduled Monday morning run around the Arrowhead Loop with Jon and Courtney. Sunday Courtney posted on the FB group that they were in town and asked if anyone wanted to join them for a run Monday at 5:30 am. I jumped at the chance to run with them because I hadn’t seen them in awhile.

I was the only person, other than Jon and Courtney, to show up. We started out fairly slow about a 10:30 pace the second mile sped up a little to around a 10 minute pace. At that point Courtney told Jon and I to take off and not worry about staying with her. So, Jon and I took off and went down to a 9:20 pace.

It was in this third mile and chatting with Jon that this run had a shot at negative splits. I’ve never done negative splits on any run of any distance. I was pretty excited by the prospect. So, as we crossed the 3 mile point Jon kicked it up a notch and I went with him.

Jon does a fantastic job of pushing without getting annoying about it. We were cruising along just a little under 9 minute mile pace and I started feeling a twinge in my foot just in front of the heel. Normally I would have stopped and walked a little to feel out what was going on but the prospect of being so close to negative splits for a 4 mile run I pushed on. With about a quarter mile left it was starting to hurt and I changed my gait a little to try to relieve the pain without slowing down. By the time I finished I could barely walk. BUT we got the negative splits finishing the last mile in 9 minutes!

I haven’t been able to run for about a month. I could barely walk the first week and decided that I should get some help with this. Not so much to get through the acute phase but to figure out why it’s happening and prevent the next time.

Cadence-PT-and-PERF-BlueLetters1500x500So, I decided to set an appointment with Charlie Boeyink at Cadence Physical Therapy. Charlie is a runner and often comes on runs with the EYPAZ group and Tortoise and Hare Running store. I decided that this would be a good idea since he is a runner, so he has a better understanding of the stresses of running and the mechanics involved. Not to mention the mentality of an endurance runner. Namely that we are nuts and go insane when we can’t run.

Charlie has a little different approach to PT than a lot of the other physical therapists that I’ve been to. He doesn’t like the model of seeing the therapist for just a couple of minutes and then getting handed off to a technician who, for the most part, watches you do exercises that you do at home. He is very hands on and looks at more than just the injury to what may have contributed to the injury happening in the first place.

He has also introduced me to a new technique. It involves dry needling and, just to up the game a little, he hooked a TENS unit to two of the needles and started running electricity through it.  Dry needling is odd enough on its own and I’ve had that done before, but adding electricity to it is, um….interesting. And I liked it! I liked it a lot actually.

It also seems to have gotten good results. After 3 weeks, I’ve been able to get back to running. Albeit I’m taking it slow and easing back into it, but last Thursday I ran about 2 miles. At Charlie’s advice I ran 2 minutes then walked a minute with very minimal pain. Actually I wouldn’t call it pain as much as mild discomfort, closer to fatigue than pain.

ICR-2019-EB-BannerSaturday morning I ran in the Tortoise and Hare Sports 4 mile Ice Cream Run. For this run I did a 2 minute on and 2 minute recovery cycle. This worked very well. Although my pacing on the run portions is all over the place. the first two cycles were 7:52 and 7:47 respectively. Then a couple of 8:30ish, a 8:09, a 9:45 and the last one was 6:04. I have got to find some consistency. Of course this is a similar problem to what I’ve always had. I have no concept of pacing. That is something to work on as I re-train from this injury.

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The next real race that I’m signed up for is the Swiss Days race at the end of July back in Indiana. I’m hoping that I can be recovered from this injury and able to average 7 minute miles for that race. It would be a return to my high school times in a race that I ran several times when I was in high school. I also will be running with my cousins, as it’s our annual Steiner Gathering.

Berne-Swiss-DaysThis means that my extremely fast cousin Brad will be there. He mentioned recently coming out of retirement from competitive racing to do one more 5K at speed. He is a sub 18 running and may be even faster than that. My goal is going to be to hang on to him for as long as I can and see if he can pull me into a sub 20.

Currently, I don’t know when my next run is going to be. I’m under orders to report back how the 4 mile run went and wait for instructions. In the mean time I’m going to install a hitch on my car and try to find a used bike carrier.

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Until next time…C-YA!

Timing and New Arrivals

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4267_1554572271183They say that half of everything is timing. They also say that hindsight is 20/20. With that in mind looking back at the first part of the year this wasn’t a good time to start an aggressive training program for a couple of reasons.

I mentioned in an earlier post that I did a lot of soccer reffing at the beginning of the year. and it extended longer into the year than expected. I tried to start 5K speed training at the same time. I know know that this was less than ideal. I had to skip a lot of training runs to work soccer games and they aren’t quite as equivalent as I hoped. That was mistake #1. I think it actually lead to more mental aspect of running fast than fitness problems.

Once the seemingly never ending soccer season finally ended I was able to get down to the business of training and following the plan that Coach Corrie had laid out for me. It went very well for about a month. I was fairly certain that I was going to die during a few of the sprint workouts. Had what was probably the worst asthma attacks I’ve suffered in the past decade.red-card

The workout was repeat 400s and I only had to do 5. I was actually really excited for this workout even though my search for a track to do it on had failed. 400 was MY race in high school. I know how to run a quarter mile, or so I thought. I found a quarter mile loop in my neighborhood. Laced up the flats and set out on a short warm up to the loop. Coach V even came with to help time them. Temp was good but windy, I mean seriously windy. But I ran track in all kinds of weather. As my middle school coach, Coach Smith, would say, “We are an ALL weather track team.” besides when you are running a loop you have the wind at your back the same amount as its in your face.

We had previously worked out that i would need to run just under 1:30 400s to equal my goal race pace. and my thought was “no problem” I used to be able to go sub 50 seconds. Turns out that was 20+ years ago and a few things have changed. Namely about 70 pounds.

Lap 1:

The first one wasn’t bad came through at 1:23. The main concern I had is that it took all I had to pull that off. I was only suppose to rest for a minute before round 2. I stalled and waited 2 before I felt like my heart wasn’t going to explode.

Lap 2:

This one was somewhat predictably slower. 1:48 I was finishing into a headwind and it was taking a toll. Again waited 2 minutes and went again

Lap 3:

About half way though I was struggling mentally to keep going and walked a couple of steps before turning back into that merciless headwind. The I waited 3 minutes and noticed that coach V was concerned. It had taken me 2:30 to make that lap. And I was apparently starting to look pretty rough. I was losing control of my breathing. Which isn’t good for anyone but is of particular concern for an asthmatic. But did I stop. No, I’m just not built that way.

Lap 4:

I was completely mentally out of this workout at this point. I was beating myself up for taking so long on lap 3. I lost complete control of my breathing and then turned into the wind. A headwind feels like its sucking the air out of your lungs and doesn’t let you replace it faster enough. This greatly amplified the sever asthma attack that was continuing to get worse with each step. 1:52 Ok that was faster but I knew that I was paying for it. I waited about 5 minutes for try to regain my composure and not throw up as soon as I took another step. Coach V suggested calling it a day and reluctantly I agreed. I knew that once I stopped the asthma attack would get worse but I had to get out of this wind if there was hope of controling it.

So we walked home. She tried reassuring me that I did a great job on a very difficult workout made more difficult by the conditions. But frankly, I was pissed off at myself. For being so slow, for walking in a 400 m run, for letting Coach V and coach corrie down. And for letting an asthma attack get so out of control before I started taking it seriously. It took almost 3 hours of constant use of my rescue inhaler and meditation, I may talk about that in a subsequent post, to get to get a handle on it. In hindsight I should have gone to a hospital for it. It took another 3 days before I felt like I was breathing normally again

While I’m still not happy about that day but I know that one bad session does not have to invalidate a program or progress. I was still improving and more importantly having fun.

I felt like I was getting faster, too. During the group runs I was hanging with some of the faster packs, and occasionally leading.

This is where you might expect me to say something along the lines of , “And then disaster struck”. And as cool as that would be to say, it wouldn’t be true. Other parts of my life simply started to take over.

I believe I’ve mentioned before that coach V and I where expecting our 4th addition to the family. This coincided with the last month of the training. The last month of the pregnancy was exhausting for me, so I can’t imagine what is was like for coach V who stayed at her day job up until the day before baby Molly’s arrival. She wasn’t sleeping well do to being so uncomfortable, which meant I wasn’t sleeping well since i’m a pretty light sleeper. I also tried to pick up as many of the household tasks as I could to take some burden off her. So running just moved down the priority list.

The latest addition to the running support crew arrived on April 2 at 8:24 am. 6lbs 8 oz and 19 inches long, easily the biggest coach V has had to date. Coach V made the whole thing look easy. Completely natural birth, no complications at all and we where out of the hospital the next morning in time to get lunch.20190402_100852

Molly is now nearly a month old and we are still trying to re-establish routines and find the new norm for the house. The biggest challenge is Molly wants to eat constantly. I mean this kid is definitely mine she has my ability to eat anytime regardless of how long its been since she last ate. This isn’t the first go around with a baby for me or coach V and this impressive.

So, I think its safe to say that I’ve been a little distracted recently.

There is still time this year to work on my sub 18 5k goal and I haven’t lost hope. I have speed in this body somewhere. I just need to find it again.

I am struggling with staying focused during races. I’ve been running 5ks like I used to run the 400m dash. Go out fast and try to hang on. Its how I ran in high school cross country too. The issue seems to be that after about the 1.5 mile mark my brain starts screaming at me to stop and walk a couple of steps. The main problem is that once you stop and start to walk, even if its just a little bit, its hard to start back up. It also starts a cycle of wanting to stop more frequently. I know this is all part of the mental game and that my body can easily handle running 3 miles, but I don’t know how to get past this mental hurdle.

I recently ran in the Scottsdale Run the Runway. Coach V and Molly came to support me 4 days after she was born.

Talk about a flat course. Basically you start in the middle of the airport on a taxiway. Run to the end turn left to get on the runway. Go the length of the runway. Turn left back to the Taxiway and run back to where you started.

4275_1554572287538Before the race I bumped into one of the guys from the Embrace your Pace Group and decided to try to stay with him. I did alright for the first half. it was a rolling start so there was alot of dodging slower runners and strollers at the beginning. Aaron is a big believer in negative splits, which is kinda the opposite approach I’ve always used. However, with someone there who I know that I can stay with during the group runs I thought I would give it a try.

I made 2 errors.

Error number 1, we had just had a kid 4 days ago. I was exhausted. Turns out that birth is taxing even for the dad, although I’m sure its to a lesser degree than the mom.

Error number 2

This is kind of 2 errors in one. I had only been on 1 run in the previous 2 weeks. and that lead to the second part of the error. I kinda have 2 modes, going hard and seriously laid back. I have no concept of internal pacing. During the group runs I push myself to stay with people. Aaron has more pace disciple than I do and uses the group runs as “easy” run. So, my pushing after a month of intense training can stay with Aaron’s easy to moderate run. His race pace is..um..faster. Had I stayed with the training through to the race I may have had a shot of staying with him. After 2 weeks of nearly nothing I feel lucky to have stayed with him as long as I did.

It was really cool to see him at the end of the race cheering me to the finish. He did mention that the strength of my finishing kick was an inspiring thing to watch. Admittedly I can drop the hammer down when I need to, just not for very long.

But my kick is part of what frustrates me so much. I can get down under 5:30 pace during the kick to the finish. So to me that says that I’ve got the foot turnover and power to go fast. I’m just not sure if I don’t have the endurance or my brain doesn’t think I have the endurance to go that fast for 3 miles.

My high school coach always thought that I was subconsciously holding on to too much reserve. I think it it has more to do with going too fast at the start, and slowing down to a recharge pace in the middle. So, next race I’m going to try for a negative split. Its time to stop thinking like a sprinter and think like an endurance runner.

Until next time…C-YA!