Tuesday, March 23, 2010

Training so far...

Hi There,
 I guess it’s about time I updated this thing. Training has been going pretty well except for a couple of small hiccups here and there due to work and weather.

It shouldn’t really matter but in the last two weeks I’ve missed 2 easy days of training due to circumstances that I couldn’t/can’t control. The days that I actually got out running the training has been going well. I’ve been doing either 2 interval type workouts a week or one interval day and a race.

A couple of weeks ago I headed down to Cow town to run in the St. Patrick’s Day 10K. The weather wasn’t the greatest nor was it the worst that Alberta could’ve thrown at us at this time of year. I arrived early at the start of the race and ran a 5K loop to warm up, but then seemed to lose sometime after that as I had to rush to get ready for the race. I got into  a good position on the start line and tried to go with the leaders, but I guess my fitness isn’t what I thought it would be and I started to slow down just after the first hill. I went through the first mile in 5:27 (fast) but not as fast as I can run, slowing down throughout the race. As guys came by me I tried to use them to shelter from the wind, but I was slowing down the entire time. I managed to go through the first 5K in 17:34 which again is not bad but it’s not great. For the second 5K loop I tried to make sure no one passed me and that was about the only thing that worked. I ended up finishing in 36:08, which is not the worst time I’ve run for a 10K its closer to one of my best.

But it tells me I haven’t gotten the pacing down yet for 10K, with a split of 17:34 (first 5K) and 18:34 (second 5K) I went out too hard and then paid for that in the second half, I was probably paying for that in the first half, but it shoes in the second.

Last weekend I was invited to run in the second Aerobic Power 3K at the ButterDome, I wasn’t really expecting to run all that well as the day before I ran a 30K long run. I was thinking that I’d run as hard as I my legs would allow me too after the run. So on the morning of the race I ran 5K to warm up and then did some drills once inside the ‘Dome. The race went pretty well as I was pretty comfortable running around 38-39 second laps, I think myself and Marc Meunier went through first K in 3:16 – 3:17. The pacing was great, unfortunately for us Brian L was ahead, running closer to 3:10 per K. Not much we could do about that as we don’t have Brian’s speed right now. I kept the pace high and ran from the front for the entire race at some point I stopped hearing Marc’s breathing behind me and that kind’ve inspired me to run faster stopping the clock at approx 9:48.

This is a new PB for me, although it’s not uber fast in the overall scheme of things, it lets me know that the work I’ve done over the winter is working for me. This time last year I ran this race in 10:05 or 10:10 so it is a big improvement over a year.


One thing that I noticed after the race is I need to do more drills to improve my running. admittedly I almost cut out running in the Newton’s during the winter as I didn’t feel safe running outside in them in all of the snow and ice we had. I ran the 3K in a pair of Adidas Adizero RC’s that I’ve been using on the treadmill. Prior to the race from the mid foot back to the heel there was no wear or dirt on them, after the race there was. Even though these shoes weigh about 5oz’s I still managed to heel strike.




I can see other problems with my running form...arms maybe a little high, shoulders may not be relaxed and there is no lean in the upper body. Good things to keep are the ears appear to be over the shoulders and then in turn over the hips.



I’m watching the clock, trying to figure out our pace
Pictures are courtesy of Kevin Masters (Aerobic Power)

Tuesday, March 9, 2010

March Madness

March Madness doesn’t just refer to college Basketball, March Madness refers to the end of winter and the beginning of spring in some places the end of one tax year and the beginning of the next, if you’re a farmer it would refer to the new arrival of new lambs or calves. A lot of people go a little crazy in March , you see them out running in shorts and t-shirts when its only +5’C, out you may see them out on the track and their hammering out intervals quicker than they have done all winter. But by April they are back into their snug winter routine.

As an athlete I have found that March is a long transition month into racing, by that I mean April or even May is when the true racing season begins, in years past (almost a life time ago) the first race of the season was among the most important races of the year and for reasons that escape me now I don’t know why. Myself and my friends would get as fit as possible for that first race and more than likely it would be raining and we would end up having a pretty mediocre race. Now I try not to get carried away with the training in March but it happens to the best of us, it’s sometimes harder to hold back than to let yourself run with the energy that is bubbling up inside of you, the white stuff is starting to go away the days are getting longer and the air is getting warmer and you want to see what all of that training over the winter has done to your fitness levels. But as much as these are good reasons to start upping the training, by pushing too hard in March there is a good chance that by May you’ll be done either physically or mentally and won’t want to train once the really good weather gets here nor will you be thinking of the Fall races such as a marathon.

So try to hold back on increasing the intervals, if you’ve been doing 5 times whatever the distance don’t move to 6 times the interval just yet. If you’re running a race or 2, what result you get at this time of the year will almost be forgotten by the time October rolls around, so don’t get that upset if you don’t run according what you thought you would do. Use March as a stepping stone to bigger and better things later in the season.

Later...

Thursday, March 4, 2010

A quick howdy...

Hey there,
Just have time for a quick howdy y'all!! as of next Monday I have a plan and am sticking to it!!


I know it sounds scary, but until now my training has been a little unfocused, which is probably fine for the winter. But when you have a couple of races coming up its time to get focused. The goal races remain the same beginning with the St. Albert 10 miler and the Calgary Marathon. After that you knows a bit of a rest and then back at it for the Edmonton Marathon (provided the legs still want to run).


I'll post what the plan had and then post what was actually done.


Later