Sunday, January 25, 2009

Remembering the Past

*** warning: this post revels in 'glory days'***

We had dinner with a handful of running knobs on Sat night. Jeff Schiebler had a few people over at his place and cooked us dinner. It was funny as my old teammate and long time friend Dan Bertoia was also there. Jeff's running pedigree is without question, but guys like myself and Dan have known him since he was a high school schmuck and thus we still see him in that light. Whereas guys around his age and younger put him on the 'running pedestal' we tend to tell stories about how we got Jeff served his first beer and other memories when he was...'gulp'.... a young guy. He is now in his mid thirties and I forget how long ago it was when Dan, myself and Warren Barker roomed with Jeff when he was till in high school at a meet. It brings back some memories of a time when life seemed quite difficult, but in reality was pretty simple....

As far as this week and training I have taken the 'Harry Wilson' approach. Wilson was Steve Ovett's advisor/coach and I often refer to his training book as the gospel on how I also view what is important to running. he took an old school approach where you had good buildups and didn't really 'cycle; training, but the one thing I always took away (and use more as I've gotten older) is that from time to time you need a full training break in every sense of the word. This was one of those weeks where I took his belief and used up some rest time.

The good thing is that it really helped me to re-evaluate my training, how it's gone and what I've been doing versus what I have often done in the past. I have gotten somewhat caught up in group dynamics and forcing things at the expense of my own concept of 'what's worked for me'. It's funny how my first real injury and forced break made me forget some my own learned running lessons. In my attempt to add to the group dynamics of our emerging training group I got caught up in the 'hoopla' and realized I need to get back to my basics.

Friday, January 23, 2009

Wall????!!!!!

As I Type I can look at my last post as an omen, and not a good one. I knew I was taking my training to another level training wise, but I think I bit off way more than I could chew.

I took Monday off on purpose, and hit an nice 70min run. But I could tell during the run that taking monday off didn't have much of an impact. Ever since Monday i have been falling asleep early, but simply figured it was just catanps.

On Wednesday I absolutely hit a wall. I was supposed to do some longer reps, but I could tell on the warmup that this might be a tough one. Even it felt tough. I did an 800 then a 1200 and everything felt terrible. I dumped the workout and figured I might tempo the next day. I didn't full realize what I had done until I came home and fell asleep again. To top it off I came home on Thurs and fell asleep again. The worst part is that I am still exhausted when I wake up. Hopfeully it's just a bit of overtraining and I'll be fine by the end of the weekend. I am getting some bloodwork On Sat morning (so I can't make sat's tempo workout, which I'll do on my own, which isn't a bad thing).

I know over the last few months I haven't really been taking my Iron pills and with the pounding of the roads there may be some 'issues' Hopefully just over training, as I've had low Iron before and it can take quite a while to get back into the system. Either way a rest was obviously needed.

Monday, January 19, 2009

OH THE PAIN....

....aka as in ‘getting back in shape’. Another week down and a very different week from the previous ones. I think my legs hurt all week and it really showed on Saturday morning. I was able to get in some good training. I define good training as different things at different periods of time. Right now good training is simply getting in around 90-100 miles on my up weeks, and in that sense this was a good week of training.

If there’s one thing I have learned in general and about myself more specifically is to simply let the workouts come to you as opposed to forcing the issue. When I first committed to altering my training to a 5-10km runner I took the view that I would ‘throw my ego out the window’ and my butt clobbered in workouts. Rather than get overly concerned about keeping up to people in workouts, I simply kept up the training volume, paid the price in workouts and then one day things just began working. It was hard to take at first and with my lack of real injuries over the last few yrs I have never had to really buildup...til now....

On Wed I did a decent session with Steve and Ryan. I was hurting from Sunday’s race and my 85 min run on Monday, so my first goal (as it always is right now) was to simply finish the prescribed 10 x 1km off 1min. I ended up running most of the workout on my own after about 30 secs (I started taking a slight head start on the last 5 so it wasn’t as bad). Even on Sat I knew I was in big trouble before I began. I ended up running around 24 kms on Thurs and never really recovered from the Wed/Thurs combo. I knew this was probably going to happen, but once again I stay by the plan. The original workout as a near 12km tempo run at Stanley park, but I was messed early on so broke up the workout into 20mins-60 sec off-10min-6 min tempo. Although I’ll bet I was going pretty damn slow by the end.

In the old days my ego would've gotten the better of me and I would have rested up for these sessions. At certain times of the year i do this, but right now it's simply about getting out there and building up the base

The roads have really taken their toll on me as I’ve been running more and running on some trails on Sunday seemed to really help as my legs felt good today. I hope the snow disappears even more to the point where I can get in some good trail runs and stop the round and round of Riverview.

Mon: 85 mins (quick run, but legs hurting from Sunday’s race)
Tues: afternoon 55mins PM 32 mins
Wed: 10 x 1km off 60 sec (we were slightly short of 1km by a handful of metres)
Thurs: 1 hr 38 mins
Fri: legs really hurt but did 48 easy in the afternoon and Bikram Yoga at night (for the first time in months and I hurt like hell....especially the next day)
Sat: AM tempo run 20min-60 sec off-10min-60 sec off and 6 mins PM: 45 mins but felt much better
Sunday: relaxed, yet also difficult 2 hr run (maybe a min or so more) as ran relaxed form wise, but legs still in rough shape

Sunday, January 11, 2009

SCALPS.....

Dickie took down a big one today in Jon Brown. There aren’t many 4th place oly runners in this world and to take one down irrelevant of distance and conditions is huge for Dickie. I hope it becomes a springboard for future successes. No runner will admit it but when they take down a really big named scalp it creates a sense of both confidence and uneasiness. It's kinda like you won the lottery, but what are u going to do with all the money.

I hate running races when I am not in really good shape. It’s one of those things over the years I have seldom done and that is run a race when I am not really ready. Some guys have the ability to simply go out and roll. I often wish I was one of those people, but I am not. It’s always taken me a while to really get going and then when I do things really ‘click’. Today wasn't one of those days.

I can’t say I was disappointed with my time today, as I had no real expectations except to run a ‘masters race’....in other words I had no real goal of being competitive in the open race, and it showed in every sense of the word. I knew I wasn’t physically ready to have a good one, but I also knew my lack of racing focus and having really not hurt in practice was more of an issue. I simply ran with little focus except to get out there and see what happened.

I sometimes wonder if I need more of these types of races to just get ou there and get motivated, but I also know that I don’t like to race at a higher level unless I am in somewhat decent shape.

I also ran as it was my club that was putting on the event and it is heavily influenced by Bob Reid. If there is anyone who is owed to in this sport it is Bob and since this was my first official masters race I figured why not open it up with a race that he helps to organize.

Race review: simple...... to simply finish in one piece. In the end I ended up pulling former training mate Sean Chester around the course and then letting him go. I have no idea if I could’ve even outkicked Sean, but in the end it didn’t matter. I had done what I had set out to do around 25 mins earlier and that was simply beat every other ‘old guy’. It may be the only time all year I think like that this year, so why not get it out of the way early.

Training week: I accidently fell asleep on tues and didn’t run so that meant i really trained thru this moreso than planned...oh well right now it;s all training...

Monday: 66mins...nice and cruisy
Tues: sleep...
Wed: a really nice run....82 mins
Thurs: I ran over to Riverview but there was black ice and I was went down on my warm up so i changed things to hills I did a sort of monfartlek on hills so 3 x 90sec, 4 x 60 sec, 4 x 30 sec and 4 x 15 sec hills off jog back down. I ended up taking 28mins to do this when if i did a traditional monfartlek I would have done just under 26mins
Fri: afternoon 70mins
Evening 35mins
Sat: AM 45 mins nice run
PM 28mins
Sunday: AM race 8km 25: 42
PM 30min run

Monday, January 5, 2009

Oh Yeah....

check out Canadian Running (http://www.runningmagazine.ca/and my impending entrance into the masters competition) as I officially turned 40 on Friday....but that's another completely other story

Sunday, January 4, 2009

Despite the snow...

..it was a decent week, but of course that may be because I wasn't back home til Wed.....hmmmmm......

Had planned on going to Stanley park on sat morning for my first group session, but the snow was a coming and I had a physio appt at 11:30. Even before I knew it would be a tight schedule, but with the snow I knew it was impossible.

I will say this the snow hasn't yet gotten to me, but it certainly is trying my patience. Mostly the lack of dug out sidewalks which makes getting to Riverview a bit more difficult and somewhat dangerous. Oh well it could be worse.

Mon: AM 35 min pool run. After my 2+ hr run on Sun this was fantastic. My legs were dea before, but the lack of pounding and movement made them feel great
PM We switched from our suburban hotel to one one the beaches of SD (near seaworld). I ended up running for a really nice 70mins on the compact parts of the beach and then did some drills
Tues: We got tickets to the Holiday Bowl between Oregon vs Oklahoma St.(a great experience for many reasons, but mostly the intensity of the fans...gosh they love their football). We were lucky and got great tickets at a great price. As a result there was no time for doubles and I ended up doing a 'classic' Kenyan fartlek of 20 x 60 sec hard-med. By the end the sun had me and I was feeling trashed, but in a good way. It was a very controlled session for this time of the yr and was true blue fartlek (read the med parts were of good quality and the hard stuff wasn't insane)
Wed: were heading back to Van so i knew a dbl was out of the question and planned my training as a result with a 94 min nice run around the beaches/parks. I felt really relaxed
Thurs: AM 65 min run that was very smooth and quick despite the previous 2 days..heck previous 5 as i hit some super quick splits despite the road conditions. I hope a good sign
PM: 35 min run with drills in the middle
Fri: decided that the previous week and a half needed a real recovery day, so I did a very easy 55mins and nothing else.
Sat: AM looked outside...saw snow and well went out for y short dbl run of 35 mins
PM: THE SNOW WON'T STOP!!!!!!. I ran over to Riverview and even it was not that good. I found one of their long hills and simply went up and down for 30mins ( a 2+min hill with a 30 sec flatter section on the way down that i went hard), plus 6mins of a 30 sec hill and 4 mins of a 15 sec hill.
Sunday: decided to sleep in and do an afternoon run, but once again the snow wouldn't stop and i ended up doing an evening run around Riverview for 93 mins. but at a good clip.

In the end this was my highest mileage since I began running again. Over the last few weeks things have progressed nicely (SD helped) and i ended at 75, 80 miles (with one full day off) and mid 90's this week.

Thursday, January 1, 2009

2 feet of snow......15+ degrees and sun...hmmmmm....

....I don't know what's better the sun of San Diego or the snow of Vancouver......yeah right. Tough choice.

We just got back last night to 0 and snow. Considering it was around 20 degrees when we left SD it was quite the change. But alas at least I got in some decent training in nice conditions. Things didn't go perfect (the day after we got there I took the day off as I think I slept through the day, as there were delays everyhwere and we were simply lucky to get out of the airport). But once I got into the training routine things went well. Last week I ended up at around 80 miles but that was with a day off so really not that bad.

I was somewhat fortunate that where we stayed the first week was a 20 min run to some great dirt and hilly trails (the ones I like best) so I even had the ability to get in a nice fartlek and my first 2+ hr run in about 4mths.

Over the last few days we stayed at this very nice resort style hotel on the beach (near seaworld) and I was able to get in some nice runs on the pathways that went around the beaches. Considering I started all my runs in a t shirt and often ended up taking if off part way through the run you could say I liked the weather. The funny part was all the locals with long sleeve shirts, long tights and even gloves on as I whizzed around in a pair of shorts.

I am supposed to race in a week, but have no idea on my fitness. I know I can get in some longer runs, but have no idea on whether I am capable of running quickly.....I guess we'll see....