Training update, Perspective, and Races Approaching

As a refresher, all of my training for this season is focused on running well at Grandma’s half marathon in June. At this point, I’m solely trying to build base, strength, and get down to a better running weight. The diet has been a little more relaxed lately, but I’ve been pretty good about staying away from “less healthy” food (aside from occasionally enjoying a couple beers). For once, my training has been consistent and I’m beginning to see some benefits. I’ve really tried to avoid “fitness gauging” workouts and quite honestly have not run too many workouts. Over the last couple weeks I’ve run the Franklin Bridge hill workout. Each repeat is ~0.4 miles and I’ve run workouts with 7 and 8 repeats which were plenty to stimulate a breakdown in my muscle fibers and induce a need for recovery runs. I actually ran this workout in consecutive weeks and each repeat was ~4-5 seconds faster the second go around. I’m sure a lot of this had to do with confidence, but I am feeling stronger on my runs, and it’s always nice to see the times heading in the right direction.

            In the after life of club nationals, I really have deemphasized my long run efforts. This was actually really difficult for me to do. Quite honestly, hard long runs are a stimulus that I’m addicted to. I can’t explain why, but I just enjoy lack of consciousness that comes over the last 5 miles of a hard long run. However, over the last couple months, I simply took the hard long runs out of my training regime because I was feeling injured after every single effort. Instead, 14-16 mile easy efforts were becoming a Sunday ritual. Two weeks ago I decided that my training had reached a reasonable level of consistency and that I was ready to move the long run up to 18 miles. Early into the run, I decided that I was only up for an easy effort. I honestly don’t recall what I averaged (maybe 6:15-6:40ish???), but I bonked hard over the last 4 miles. The only explanation was that I hadn’t been running long and my recent streak of consistent training has left me a bit fatigued and depleted. Going into this past Sunday’s run, I wanted to put forth an honest, fast pace and struggle to make it through 20 miles. The route I chose put the wind at my back for the first mile with a net downhill. I didn’t look at my watch at all….it clicked, I looked down, and it read 5:30. I was pretty sure that my watch wasn’t working, but the second mile turned me into the wind, and I ran a 5:28. At this point in the run, I was clearly running an effort that I wasn’t going to quite be able to hold for 20 miles, but I wasn’t worried about running an even paced run. Instead, I was trying to make my body respond to distress in the second half of the run. In the 8^th mile of the run, I ran around Lake Calhoun into a fairly stiff wind and overexerted myself to run a 5:35. This put my 8 mile split at 43:57 (5:30 pace), and it put my body in a position where I needed to back down. I backed the pace off and averaged somewhere in the mid to upper 5:40’s for the next 8-9 miles and really struggled to get home the last 3. I think my last 3 miles were 6:05, 5:45, 6:08. It ended up being a 20 mile run in 1:53:55. Going into the run, I was expecting to maybe run in the 1:59’s to achieve what I wanted for the day so I was pleasantly surprised to run 5-6 minutes faster than expected to achieve what I wanted for the day. It definitely gives me confidence moving forward and leaves me a little more optimistic that I’ll be in half marathon PR shape by the time mid June comes along.

            In the short-term, my first spring race is shaping up to be the Human Race 8k in about 3 weeks which will be followed by the Shamrock Shuffle 8k in 4 weeks. I’m not sure how sharp I will be, but I’m definitely NOT running the races as workouts. In my build-up, I’ve decided to have 8-9 consecutive “up weeks” with running fewer than normal workouts which has left me with tired legs, but I’m going to run a mini taper that focuses on freshening up for the Shamrock Shuffle. While I don’t guarantee that I’ll be running fast or impressing anyone, I’m definitely planning on finding out what kind of shape I’m in at the moment. While I’m not in the best shape of my life, my 8k PR isn’t my best PR and I’m hoping to take a shot at it. However, most importantly, I’m just excited to get back out and race.

            As talk of racing comes up, the topics of workouts and training plans are common themes. In the workouts that I have run, I’ve dialed back the duration and intensity some. Every runner’s mentality is very different, but my biggest weakness as a runner is to run too hard too often. When I’m on a training schedule, easy fartlecks quickly turn into efforts that are harder than my track workouts with planned rest. Unfortunately, rest and recovery is the most overlooked component to a training segment. While I don’t consciously do this, I can not put together a workout schedule because at some point, I always try to beat the schedule. I suspect that a lot of runners have this problem, but I am always trying to do more than I thought would be possible. I’m pretty sure that I do it for the runner’s high afterwards, but the moral of the story is I can’t train to a schedule. I need to know what I’m building towards, bur I honestly think I need to plan my workouts week by week, and adjust them depending upon how my body responds. This probably gives the impression that I’m unfocused or maybe I’m not doing everything I could be to get better, but the reality of the situation is I’m probably a “little” too obsessive compulsive about training details. I’m sure those who know me strongly disagree with that statement, but yes, I might over analyze training a little bit at times. While planning weeks or months of training is definitely is an effective method for some, it’s definitely not for me. To summarize how planned training goes for me, I am always running a little faster early on, but I’m always barely holding on, missing workouts, or not hitting my times by the end. It’s quite easy to spiral into a negative mentality without even knowing it. Without the structure a flawless training schedule, I’m finding that letdowns on bad workouts has lessened while great workouts still yield the same runner’s high. For the time being, I’m just enjoying running healthy and really looking forward to the up and coming racing season. While I’m aware of the details that are required to run well, I’ve made a conscious effort to not be aware of them, but not obsess over them.