Training Blog July 24 to 30, 2017 Getting Stronger...

Monday noon road 10 miles 1:08:34, tired, spent most of the day catching up on yard work and errands...

Tuesday AM 5.3 miles with Melissa and Uta, 39:25
PM at rail trail 3 mile warm up, drills and strides, 4x2 miles with 2mins of drills recovery, 10:22, 10:27, 10:15, 10:09.  Actually started to feel good by the last one which was nice.  Getting a bit of endurance back.  2.2 mile cool down

Wednesday AM 7.1 miles in 54:24, pacing Melissa through her 2x2 mile, in 12:40 and 1xhalf mile in 2:55 workout.  We also did some drills and strides during this.
PM 8.1 miles on roads solo, 55:27

Thursday AM at Phillips Academy, 3 warm up, drills, strides, 10x300m with 300m jog, ie full recovery and then some.  This is muscular work so the first one basically felt the same as the last one except I had bit of fatigue in the quads and calves, no acid burn etc...  Averaged 46.9 with fastest at 46.5 and slowest at 47.3, jogs were very slow, mostly over 2mins.  3 mile cool down

Full disclosure I went fishing instead of doing a second run, pretty lazy choice but it was a really nice afternoon and I'm trying not to go too crazy with the mileage...

Friday AM road 10 mile solo, 1:05:37
PM 5.1 miles around Phillips fields with Melissa and Uta, 42:11

Saturday PM 3 warm up, drills and strides, 5x mile on rail trail, 5:21, 5:08, 4:59, 4:52, 4:50.  Goal was to be in the 5:20's then 10's then 0's then 50's then 40's.  Given my current 5k fitness, ~15:00 that was a fairly big ask and by being on the low end of the first 4 reps I pretty much screwed myself.   The first 3 actually felt pretty good I was even having delusions of grandeur that I would bust out a 6th rep in the 4:30's but by the half mile in the 4th rep the reality that running much under 5min pace is pretty hard for me right now settled in.  Rests were 2mins with drills. Actually the rests were exactly 1:59 for every one which I find a little funny, I'm not usually that consistent. 3 mile cool down.

Sunday AM with Melissa on rail trail.  This was here long run/workout.  So we ran 11.6 miles with no stopping 3 miles easy as warm up, then 5 miles of 3/4 in the 4:30's, 6:0's pace, with 1/4 slow jog recovery then 3.6 miles easy at the end, 1:30:16 for the whole thing.
PM road 8.2 solo, 55:19, saw a deer very close up, about 15 feet.  Finished off a good week for wildlife.

Summary 102 miles for the week, three nice workouts.  I'm starting to get to a point where I can see my body wanting to get back to 'normal' paces and abilities.  I'm not there yet but hopefully over the next few weeks it will happen.
  The weather this week was crazy nice, probably the nicest whole week I have ever trained through in a Massachusetts summer.  Generally we have very high humidity and very high dew points so that even 80 degrees tends to feel like a death march.  This week not only was the temp in the high seventies and low 80's but it felt cool.  It really was a nice break.  It looks like the humidity is going to be back this week so we'll see how I handle it.  Generally it doesn't bother me too much for a single session but it grinds me down and I have to start putting in more rest days.  We are however coming into August and often the mornings and evenings are cooler in August giving a chance to work around the heat more effectively.
  This week I'm going to do a couple of workouts and a 5k race.  I'm planning on trying to start racing into shape over the course of this month.  Just hopping into some local races and running hard.  I'm ready for that.  I still don't know for sure what I'll be focused on for the fall, that is going to depend on how the next 6 to 8 weeks go but it is time to start trying to hurt a little for real.
  This weekends race will be the John Leclerc Memorial Wind Turbine 5k in my hometown of Templeton, MA.  It raises money for cross country program which was a power house for many years but fell on hard times right after I graduated with the addition of a lot of other sports, Narragansett is a tiny school.  From the programs inception in 1963 through to 1998 they never had a losing season and won state titles in 1966, 1979, 1983, 1995, 1996.  The titles in '79 and '83 were when Massachusetts didn't have divisions so that was beating schools that were 10 to 20 times larger. Since then they have struggled.
   My expectations are pretty low.  I'm going to aim for 15:00 but I'm not feeling confident that I'll be able to run that.

'back in the day' front page of the local paper from the first state champion team I was on at Narragansett

Training Log June 26 to July 3, 2017

Me in my rabbit kit on the carriage roads in Bar Harbor.

Monday PM road 8.1 solo 51:24

Tuesday AM 3.8 warm up to the track, drills, strides, 8x400m with slow 200 jogs (avg. 65 seconds) averaged 68.4 for the 400's with a few 69's and a 65.9 for the last one. I did a 200 jog at the finish just so I could cover the 3 miles for comparison as I move to Aussie Quarters in the coming weeks, 17:54, ie not fast.  Felt pretty smooth and though it was a shock to the system I felt strong in spite of some real deal humidity. 3.8 cool down. 

Most everyday I since school ended I have been walking a few miles with Uta to keep her exercise up, she doesn't run as much when it is hot, and to get some more volume on my legs.  This week we had my father in laws dog to join us for a few of those walks.

Wednesday Noon 8.2 miles around Eagle lake area in Bar Harbor with Melissa and Uta.  Melissa was doing a workout and I was pacing.  Very nice little run despite the fact that we literally just hopped out of the car after a 4.5 hour drive and did this before going to the hotel.  I was mostly impressed with Melissa being able to do a great workout like that but I was also happy my back seemed un-bothered which isn't always the case after a long car ride.

Thursday AM 10.2 miles around carriage roads, first 3 miles easy with Melissa and Uta, then would do 20 second sprints, jog back to join them and do another 2 mins later when they finished their run I did 20 second sprints and then just jogged back to where I had started and repeated this until I had done 30 sprints.   I did a mile cool down.

a bit later in the AM  we had some car issues and this lead to a lot of walking and I got board with it so I ran about 2k on the roads.

Friday PM road and trail 10, 1:10:46,  felt pretty darn flat.

Saturday AM  on chelmsford rail trail, 1.8 warm up with Melissa and Anna, did some drills and strides and a 30 second effort, then 3 miles in 15:52, drills, .2 miles before realizing I had stopped the watch, so I took 45 seconds did another drill, then did 2 miles in 10:23, drills, and 1 mile in 4:58, drills, then met back up with Melissa and Anna for a cool down of 1.8 miles. After the run we went to the gym where I mostly did some easy mobility stuff but Anna and Melissa suckered me into a circuit which has left me with some sore shoulders.

Uta did not want to get out of bed this morning.  Neither did I.

Sunday AM road 10.5 in 1:11:36, first 3.3 with Uta, but it was too hot for her to do much so I dropped her off and finished solo.  

Summary about 70 miles for the week, very happy with all three workouts.  Resting HR is coming back down to normal which is a good sign for a slow return of aerobic fitness. All in all another step in the right direction.  

  For all of you who ordered the rabbit gear with the link, which I'll provide again below, thanks!  I hope you like it.  If you want to tell me about your experience with it I'd be really interested and you can email me directly, nateruns at hotmail , or leave a comment. I may do a blog on it later or send some feedback to the company or just use it to help me chose what stuff to get myself!  

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Training Blog June 19 to 25, 2017 Sorta Training

Me finishing at last weekends USATF-NE 5 mile Championship

After the race last weekend, which was pretty humid, my legs were just junk for a few days.  I wan't sore and I felt find walking around but when I would run my legs felt crushed and I felt very heavy and with no power.  I was also feeling really dehydrated overall.  I had my last two days of school on Monday and Tuesday and then my summer vacation started.  I didn't get hired for summer school so I'll at least be getting some quality recovery in.

Monday PM road 6 in 42:55

Tuesday PM road 8, 56:44, surprised to still feel this flat.

Wednesday Noon road and trail 10, pretty hot and humid, 1:09:06.  Felt pretty shitty but a shade better then the last two days so I decided on an easy day for tomorrow and to try 100's on Friday.

Thursday 5PM 8 miles in 52:53, I didn't feel good but I didn't feel like complete crap so a good step in the right direction

Friday Noon stupid humid.  I had been out in the AM and it was humid but didn't feel too bad.  As I was getting ready to run I checked the temp and it was like 82 or so and I thought nice it hasn't really warmed up this will be great.  I knew I was wrong the moment I opened the door.  It was intense.  4 mile warm up to the track in 29:13 then drills, 20x100m at an average of 16.0 with very slow 100 jog recoveries, covered 4k, then 4 mile cool down in 27:38.  It was so hot that I actually drank out of a discarded water bottle at the track because I wasn't sure I would make it the 4 miles back to the house without some water. 

Saturday AM 8 miles around Phillips fields and track mostly with Melissa.  I did her warm up, jogged around while she did drills and strides, then paced her 4 mile tempo run in 26:00 then jogged during her 4 minute recovery and paced her on a 2:49 800 going 93/76.  Then an easy cool down with her. It rained pretty hard at times but the cooler water felt very nice.

Sunday AM humidity had blown out and ran pretty early on the very shaded Chelmsford rail trail. 3 mile warm up with Melissa and Uta, 23:10, drills and strides, 2x2 miles with 3mins of drills for the recovery and a few drills right after.  10:26 (5:20/5:06), 10:26 (5:18/5:08).  Felt pretty good but my legs were suprisingly heavy on the second rep.  I have the engine but the body is very unfit. 3 mile cool down with Melissa, Uta and we quickly picked up Kara Haas, in 23:40

Summary 61 miles and a couple of light workouts a nice step in the right direction.   

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Why do Short Hills

Why do I do short hill repeats if I'm training for a marathon and not a mile?
I do short hill repeats for 2 reasons the first goal, and most obvious, is to gain physical strength. Since strength is in our sport is often interchangeable with speed I see why it seems strange for a marathoner to be doing this type of a workout especially with such frequency. I mean why try to get a faster top end speed when even to run a world record I only need to run 4:45 or 4:46 a mile. The first reason is that every race is a race of speed, meaning that no matter how long the race is the fastest person over the distance wins. But that alone doesn't justify hill repeats one to three times a week. The real reason is strength and speed over the short distance equal efficiency. By doing these hills and getting stronger and faster in the maxim. I teach my body to consume less glycogen, and less oxygen when moving at sub maximal speeds. The less of these "fuels" the body consumes at a given pace the longer I can hold that pace.
the 2nd reason I do short hills is that they drive my heart rate way up in an extremely short period of time, to within 10 beats of max or higher in 10 seconds or less and then because my heart rate hasn't been up that long and no acid needs to be flushed out of my system (it takes 15 seconds of an exercise to begin to produce any lactic acid) my heart rate basically plummets back down to a relatively rested level, 120 to 130 beats per minute, in a short time 20seconds to a minute. This exercise on the heart teaches the heart efficiency as well meaning it takes less energy to pump more blood.
Now if I was training for the mile I would still do short hill repeats for the same reasons I have listed above but I would probably try to go a little longer (say 13 to 15 seconds rather then my usual 8 to 12) and I would try to do it on a slightly less steep hill and with better footing. Why? Because a miler would want to improve there efficiency, muscular as well as heart but he/she would also want to work more specifically on there top end speed and running uphill but with your form closer to that which you use to run over flat ground is a spectacular way of doing that.

Finally the greatest advantage of short hills is that you can reap huge long term benefits without having to sacrifice much of anything. They are very easy on the body and mind. Sure you run all out but only for a few seconds so they really are not hard and because little or no acid is accumulated in the system they take little recovery at all. This is why if I had one thing I would recommend to all runners to add to there program right now short hills would be it. They improve your basic speed, improve your efficiency and strengthen your heart and if you do them once or twice a week your body won't be any more tired or worse for the wear. It’s a win win situation. I am convinced that these, progression runs and the use of circuit training are the biggest reasons the Kenyans are so far beyond us here in the US. That said I believe we are starting to look to their training and we are closing the gap rapidly. So add progression runs and short hills to your routine and join the charge for world class running in the US, or at least a new pr.