Tips for the New Year:
Megumi (and Kangway) recommend UA Cold Gear--warm and lightweight, kept my legs the optimal temperature, then at the end of the run, all of the nasty mud spatters crumbled cleanly off of the outside and hadn't soaked through the fabric. Nice!
Megumi does NOT recommend macaroni and cheese from the year 1998. However, if you DO happen to consume some by accident, you may still live to tell the tale. Apparently.
Sunday 12/30: 44:05, a shortened river path to avoid the roads without shoulders. Back up the big hill. Ah, finally the effects of last week have started to manifest... Shin splints on the left side only, due to running on banked road sides for the past week. People ruin their legs forever running marathons on banked roads. This is not good... Knees feeling pretty balky as well, heels sore. Gah, I guess when one thing goes, it all goes. Probably going to program in 2 rest days this week as a down week, and hopefully I won't be crippled again before I can get back to the trails.
On a brighter note, I mapped out the routes I've been running here, and the old cemetary loop is 4.8 and the river path loop is 5.2, so I've been going a fairly steady 8:45 pace all of last week, for just about 29 miles. Amazing, that's almost like a JV highschool training week... woo hoo! I guess I'm about halfway at this point between the starting point (3 miles per day at 10 min/mile pace) and the goal point (7 miles per day at 8 min/mile pace).
Monday 12/31: Off. Shins still feel inflamed, knees hurt... running on the east coast sucks. Probably going to take a few days off until I get back to Pasadena, so I can start the third microcycle in one piece. I guess it will just be a super super down week.
Tuesday 01/01: Resolutions. I will not shirk PT and core strengthening. I will not shirk PT and core strengthening. I will not shirk PT and core strengthening. I will not shirk PT and core strengthening. I will not shirk PT and core strengthening. I will not shirk PT and core strengthening. I will not shirk PT and core strengthening. I will not shirk PT and core strengthening. I will not shirk PT and core strengthening. I will not shirk PT and core strengthening.
Happy New Year everybody!!!!
Wednesday 01/02: Already starting to become mentally unstable after 3 days of not running. Argh... My feet have developed some strange aches, though the shins and knees feel better after a few days off. Meanwhile, snowflakes the size of quarters are falling relentlessly outside. Tried to take a picture but it didn't come out very well. On the plus side, scouted out the golf course... it looks like it could be a good non concrete running loop for when there's not 3 feet of snow everywhere. There's kind of an outer perimeter where one of the longer sides is a pretty decent incline, will check that out the next time I am here.
Thursday 01/03: 42:45, Monterrey to bridge loop. Normalcy returns, sort of. Flew back to L.A. today, happy to run on the trails again. Breathing felt a bit off, but that's pretty normal after a few days off. Wish it wasn't so cloudy and dreary... also that I wasn't as morbidly obese. I sat next to fat person on the plane today, and the row was DEFINITELY not big enough for the both of us :(. Discovered this break that my scale has somehow become incorrectly calibrated so that I'm actually 5 lb MORE than what it says! Horrors upon horrors, I guess that's what happens when you buy a scale for $10 at Target. This would also explain why I am having trouble fitting into my fat pants. Gah...
Friday 01/04: 42:36, Monterrey out and back to the second bridge, due to some annoying construction that was blocking up the other side. Feet feeling a lot better with the resumption of daily PT. Took it really nice and easy today, realized that I was running a lot faster than usual in Boston. For some reason it feels disproportionately harder (muscularly) to run on the trails than not. Felt kind of crappy this morning, but glad I forced myself to go run before it started to rain!
Saturday 01/05: 43:03, Monterrey to bridge loop in the aftermath of torrential downpour. Definitely an adventure negotiating all of the wash-out, mud pits and stranded boulders, but not really the type of adventure that I hope and wish for. The run had two redeeming qualities, however: I finally got to park in the 3rd parking spot, and it was also a completely pain free, easy breathing, fantastic feeling run.
First core strengthening in over a week at the gym with Peter. Was really painful. I guess the time off was bad. Tried some horrendous new hamstring/hip exercises. Hard. Good to get back into the habit of doing this though. Not a ton of training this week, but its a down week, so I guess its okay. I think the ill-effects of the 3 days off are pretty much gone now, and I'm solidly into the 40+ minute run range, so I'm feeling pretty good about the next microcycle.
Target training this week: 3 hours ... with only 4 days, what're you gonna do?
Actual training: 2:52:29
Sunday, December 30, 2007
Monday, December 24, 2007
Week of 12/23/2007 - 12/29/2007 (Pre-Base Week 7)
I arrived at the airport in Boston sweating through my 3 layers, because it was an unseasonably warm 40 degrees out. Fantastic, I say, until I push through the sliding doors and find a snow covered landscape... preserved faithfully by the not-sufficiently-above-freezing weather. ARGHHHHH... snow and ice on the ground, is by FAR worse than cold.
Running in Boston is... un-ideal. Its okay during the spring and the fall if you're able to take a lot of pavement miles, you can venture a lot of towns out into the hills and the nice little back country lanes... cuz everything's so small... but in the winter, its a nightmare. I don't even live near the trying-not-to-get-blown-into-the-river-by-gale-force-winds running path any more. Sidewalks are covered by a foot of crusted over snowdrift and probably a few weeks worth of preserved dog poo...
If you can get used to the vehicles whizzing around you, its maybe 50% tenable to run in the streets, but on larger streets, the cars splatter you with slush, or there's no room to avoid both the car AND the large puddle.... turning corners you have to take it really easy in case there's hidden ice. Its kind of an adventure, but more in the "I slightly fear for my life and can't ever get into a decent stride" sort of way, rather than the enjoyable sort of way. This is going to be... interesting.
Sunday 12/23: Off. Whole day shot due to being booted from my flight and not getting another one until 16 hours later. At least first class was enjoyable--mmmmmm ice cream sundae...
Monday 12/24: 42:00, First Boston run, to the old cemetary and back in a square. Same route as last time I was here, except with many, many detours to avoid traffic and weather phenomena. 45 and sunny is actually a lot more pleasant than 50 and dark, apparently. Was pleasant, except for the lack of ability to get any sort of rhythm at all bc of the constant zig zagging, back tracking, last minute swerving, almost getting hit by cars. Feet did not enjoy the pavement. I've also been slacking on PT and core strengthening, so maybe that has a little to do with it. Just so busy, so busy, so busy...
This week may end up being about damage control. Its hard to do all of the prep work away from home, the daily PT routine, the core strengthening, the gym is all far, far away. I'm also feeling less optimistic about the pavement running than before. Feet and also knees not liking this. Maybe will try for fewer longer runs to give the extra recovery time. Or, just take the down week now and build back up end of next week when I'm back in the land of trails and no snow.
Tuesday 12/25: 41:55, same loop as yesterday. Merry Christmas everyone!!! As a christmas present from the world to me, there were not many cars on the road today, and slightly less ice, making for a much more pleasant run. Knees and ankles also feeling better, managed to get in some PT and core strengthening as well. A nice day. Made a lot of food.
Wednesday 12/26: 45:13, did some adventuring to try to find my way back to the river path. Do not think I'll do that again. Between getting stopped for a really long time at a monsterously complex traffic intersection that only the east coast could have dreamed up, and realizing that the river path is mostly under 3 feet of snow, this was highly unpleasant. Got my first honk for being in the middle of a busy street--felt annoyed but then realized that that guy must have been from out of state, and/or the only sane one here, unaccustomed to the frequency of outrageous traffic phenomena. However, as "in a lane of traffic" is the only running space available here, I have no choice but to persist in consterning motorists with my presence....
A nice half mile hill on the way home, definitely not used to topographical features anymore... Wasn't as bas as I thought it would be. Wondered when I could add back the Bailey Canyon route again...
Thursday 12/27: 41:28, the cemetary loop again, in the cold and drizzle. Not a pleasant experience... outer layers soaked, could not see anything. Thankfully wasn't too too cold and not too many cars, could have been worse... but rain makes me grouchy. Felt a bit tired on the uphills due to yesterday's hill, but good on the flats. These runs are bad because I end up probably running faster and faster as I become more cold and uncomfortable and I don't even register it. Nothing alarming, but I'd prefer to keep a nice mellow intensity level for these first few weeks of getting used to the 40+ minute runs.
Friday 12/28: 41:00, same loop... not much room for creativity here. If I can find a relatively car and snow free route, its just not worth it to risk trying other streets. Realized that there's something about the cold and the cars that makes me subconsciously hurry. Each of these loops have gone faster than the previous one, but every day somehow during the run I've just rationalized away that well, I *think* my feet are moving about as fast as they were yesterday... I never thought the Arroyo was particularly exciting, but I think I'll appreciate traffic-less, snow-less, pavement-less running a lot more after this.
Saturday 12/29: 41:22, slightly more slowly this time. Yayyy! I have survived a week here, without an egregious drop in training time and so far, a lot of blisters but no stress fracture. I'll consider that a success. Pleasantly warm today, but did not have time to do the longer route, per being late for meeting my high school chemistry teacher for coffee. Everyone this break seems totally fascinated with the whole charter school thing. Interesting to hear how the systems are different in MA. Learned that I am inept at utilizing public transportation. I didn't think trying to use the pass card like a prox card was THAT illogical that the bus driver had to employ as much eye rolling as he did. *shrug*
Target training this week: 3:30 - 4:00
Actual training: 4:12:58
Running in Boston is... un-ideal. Its okay during the spring and the fall if you're able to take a lot of pavement miles, you can venture a lot of towns out into the hills and the nice little back country lanes... cuz everything's so small... but in the winter, its a nightmare. I don't even live near the trying-not-to-get-blown-into-the-river-by-gale-force-winds running path any more. Sidewalks are covered by a foot of crusted over snowdrift and probably a few weeks worth of preserved dog poo...
If you can get used to the vehicles whizzing around you, its maybe 50% tenable to run in the streets, but on larger streets, the cars splatter you with slush, or there's no room to avoid both the car AND the large puddle.... turning corners you have to take it really easy in case there's hidden ice. Its kind of an adventure, but more in the "I slightly fear for my life and can't ever get into a decent stride" sort of way, rather than the enjoyable sort of way. This is going to be... interesting.
Sunday 12/23: Off. Whole day shot due to being booted from my flight and not getting another one until 16 hours later. At least first class was enjoyable--mmmmmm ice cream sundae...
Monday 12/24: 42:00, First Boston run, to the old cemetary and back in a square. Same route as last time I was here, except with many, many detours to avoid traffic and weather phenomena. 45 and sunny is actually a lot more pleasant than 50 and dark, apparently. Was pleasant, except for the lack of ability to get any sort of rhythm at all bc of the constant zig zagging, back tracking, last minute swerving, almost getting hit by cars. Feet did not enjoy the pavement. I've also been slacking on PT and core strengthening, so maybe that has a little to do with it. Just so busy, so busy, so busy...
This week may end up being about damage control. Its hard to do all of the prep work away from home, the daily PT routine, the core strengthening, the gym is all far, far away. I'm also feeling less optimistic about the pavement running than before. Feet and also knees not liking this. Maybe will try for fewer longer runs to give the extra recovery time. Or, just take the down week now and build back up end of next week when I'm back in the land of trails and no snow.
Tuesday 12/25: 41:55, same loop as yesterday. Merry Christmas everyone!!! As a christmas present from the world to me, there were not many cars on the road today, and slightly less ice, making for a much more pleasant run. Knees and ankles also feeling better, managed to get in some PT and core strengthening as well. A nice day. Made a lot of food.
Wednesday 12/26: 45:13, did some adventuring to try to find my way back to the river path. Do not think I'll do that again. Between getting stopped for a really long time at a monsterously complex traffic intersection that only the east coast could have dreamed up, and realizing that the river path is mostly under 3 feet of snow, this was highly unpleasant. Got my first honk for being in the middle of a busy street--felt annoyed but then realized that that guy must have been from out of state, and/or the only sane one here, unaccustomed to the frequency of outrageous traffic phenomena. However, as "in a lane of traffic" is the only running space available here, I have no choice but to persist in consterning motorists with my presence....
A nice half mile hill on the way home, definitely not used to topographical features anymore... Wasn't as bas as I thought it would be. Wondered when I could add back the Bailey Canyon route again...
Thursday 12/27: 41:28, the cemetary loop again, in the cold and drizzle. Not a pleasant experience... outer layers soaked, could not see anything. Thankfully wasn't too too cold and not too many cars, could have been worse... but rain makes me grouchy. Felt a bit tired on the uphills due to yesterday's hill, but good on the flats. These runs are bad because I end up probably running faster and faster as I become more cold and uncomfortable and I don't even register it. Nothing alarming, but I'd prefer to keep a nice mellow intensity level for these first few weeks of getting used to the 40+ minute runs.
Friday 12/28: 41:00, same loop... not much room for creativity here. If I can find a relatively car and snow free route, its just not worth it to risk trying other streets. Realized that there's something about the cold and the cars that makes me subconsciously hurry. Each of these loops have gone faster than the previous one, but every day somehow during the run I've just rationalized away that well, I *think* my feet are moving about as fast as they were yesterday... I never thought the Arroyo was particularly exciting, but I think I'll appreciate traffic-less, snow-less, pavement-less running a lot more after this.
Saturday 12/29: 41:22, slightly more slowly this time. Yayyy! I have survived a week here, without an egregious drop in training time and so far, a lot of blisters but no stress fracture. I'll consider that a success. Pleasantly warm today, but did not have time to do the longer route, per being late for meeting my high school chemistry teacher for coffee. Everyone this break seems totally fascinated with the whole charter school thing. Interesting to hear how the systems are different in MA. Learned that I am inept at utilizing public transportation. I didn't think trying to use the pass card like a prox card was THAT illogical that the bus driver had to employ as much eye rolling as he did. *shrug*
Target training this week: 3:30 - 4:00
Actual training: 4:12:58
Sunday, December 16, 2007
Week of 12/16/2007 - 12/22/2007 (Pre-Base Week 6)
Death by cold.
Room mate has contracted the plague, which means that it could only be a matter of time... Have been afflicted by a headache-y malaise starting Saturday evening, so prognosis is not looking good. Really want to make it to the 4 training hours this week though, before the respiratory symptoms commence.
If by some miracle, I manage to escape the plague, it will be on to a cold of different nature, as the prodigal child returns home to the frigid artic wasteland that is the east coast in the wintertime. 2 pairs of base layer tights are being delivered to my home as we speak, but one knows all too well, that when it snows and sleets until you're drenched down to the very core, ain't nothing gonna keep you warm at that point...
Sunday 12/16: 43:52, leisurely 3 x Arroyo Tempo Loops (14:08, 14:11, 14:04) plus jog back to car. Felt dull and head-achey all day, but managed to drag myself out to the Arroyo before the daylight ran out. Run was surprisingly comfortable, took it real easy and felt better all around afterwards. Apparently 9:15 pace is here to stay, judging from the recent longer runs. I guess that's okay for now, 40 minutes doesn't seem so long now, and I think 8:45 is just around the corner. Core strengthening afterwards at the gym. These are getting easier too, felt under control today, major concern right now is some tweaks in the L ankle, likely resulting from the sprain last week. They were bothering me during the first loop today, but resolved themselves... really hoping that's on the mend.
Monday 12/17: 34:07, Monterrey to rock. A short run... going to have to modify this route again to make it 2-4 minutes longer. I think I'm okay to graduate the sub 35 minute runs at this point. Felt that faint soreness of the post-core strengthening day again, but it doens't affect my running that much anymore. Vague headache and not sleeping well continues... perhaps the two are at a causal effect to eachother, but not really sure how to exit the cycle.
Tuesday 12/18: Off. Rain... ugh. Was planning to run in the morning, but the rain started earlier than weather.com claimed it would. *shakes fist*. I really do not enjoy the rain. Plus, it kinda packs down all of the dirt in the Arroyo, basically taking away all of the feet-not-killing effect of soft surface training. Disgruntling...
Wednesday 12/19: 46:06, Huntington back via Virginia in the PM. I'm not really a patient person... sometimes its a wonder that I'm still enrolled in the Meinhold School of Running for Kids who need to Chill the hell out, with its promise of injury prevention and extolling the virtues of delayed gratification... *sigh* sometimes being slow just gets old! I was really hoping for some... non negligible improvement over last week, like there really is NO reason why it should take more than 45 minutes to complete this run... oh, the horror!
Thankfully it wasn't super cold this week, but it was unpleasantly damp, and that dampness seemed to turn into a positively suffocating steam when I went indoors for core strengthening. Felt discouraged and grouchy today. At least my feet felt mostly okay this time.
Thursday 12/20: 42:18, many, many laps around lane 6 on the track. Started to drizzle at the end... did not enjoy that. I guess the rain days are good consistent low HR training days though, bc I end up going to the track. Feet felt relatively okay for the second consecutive day of non trail running. I think 40 minutes is about manageable these days. Woo hoo! L ankle still a bit unsteady. That's really the worst injury concern right now, for better or for worse. I've got two training days left in Pasadena this year, and I've already picked out which two runs I want. Now the only thing left is... Weather, I command you to cooperate!
Friday 12/21: 42:29, Monterrey to bridge loop. GLAHGHAALHGHG... the curse of the parking spot continues! I am very particular about the necessity to park in the third spot from the end of Monterrey next to the little tree. For the most part, there aren't many takers for parking in this area, but every now and again, someone's wayward vehicle finds its way inauspiciously into MY parking space. At first it was merely the convenience of a standardized starting and ending point for every run, but over time I've come to believe that the third parking spot affords some magical protection from injury and consternation, ensuring a pleasant and productive training experience. Every time I do NOT park in this space, something disgruntling always occurs.
Today, a car was parked annoyingly in 3/4 of the third parking space, so I had to park 3/4 in the fourth parking space, and about 3/4 of the way through my run, I rolled my bad ankle again! GAH! It wasn't a bad sprain, but given the amount of damage already done to this ankle from the last sprain (also on a bad parking day) I can't express how consterning this turn of events is. I felt ironically as if today was the first day that the weird pains that percolated from the last sprain were starting to subside... calamity of the world!
Saturday 12/22: 41:44, one trail perimeter of Rose Bowl in the dark. Maybe not the best idea, given the nature of the terrain... had to go slow to pick through the semi-dark obstacles, almost turned my ankle numerous times, but I really wanted to do this one for the last Pasadena run of the year. Cold, cold, cold... but fun. Had to squeeze this in before going to the airport to go home to Boston. Little did I know the horrors that lay in wait...
Got in a good solid training week this week. So much so that my legs were actually feeling less than fresh. Did not do the requisite 3x per week core strengthening... nuts. This is a big increase from the previous week, given the trajectory of the past training cycle, so considering taking an early down week for the 3 week microcycle instead of the 4 week microcycle. We'll see how arctic wasteland goes.
Target training time: 4 hours 5 minutes
Actual training: 4:10:36
Room mate has contracted the plague, which means that it could only be a matter of time... Have been afflicted by a headache-y malaise starting Saturday evening, so prognosis is not looking good. Really want to make it to the 4 training hours this week though, before the respiratory symptoms commence.
If by some miracle, I manage to escape the plague, it will be on to a cold of different nature, as the prodigal child returns home to the frigid artic wasteland that is the east coast in the wintertime. 2 pairs of base layer tights are being delivered to my home as we speak, but one knows all too well, that when it snows and sleets until you're drenched down to the very core, ain't nothing gonna keep you warm at that point...
Sunday 12/16: 43:52, leisurely 3 x Arroyo Tempo Loops (14:08, 14:11, 14:04) plus jog back to car. Felt dull and head-achey all day, but managed to drag myself out to the Arroyo before the daylight ran out. Run was surprisingly comfortable, took it real easy and felt better all around afterwards. Apparently 9:15 pace is here to stay, judging from the recent longer runs. I guess that's okay for now, 40 minutes doesn't seem so long now, and I think 8:45 is just around the corner. Core strengthening afterwards at the gym. These are getting easier too, felt under control today, major concern right now is some tweaks in the L ankle, likely resulting from the sprain last week. They were bothering me during the first loop today, but resolved themselves... really hoping that's on the mend.
Monday 12/17: 34:07, Monterrey to rock. A short run... going to have to modify this route again to make it 2-4 minutes longer. I think I'm okay to graduate the sub 35 minute runs at this point. Felt that faint soreness of the post-core strengthening day again, but it doens't affect my running that much anymore. Vague headache and not sleeping well continues... perhaps the two are at a causal effect to eachother, but not really sure how to exit the cycle.
Tuesday 12/18: Off. Rain... ugh. Was planning to run in the morning, but the rain started earlier than weather.com claimed it would. *shakes fist*. I really do not enjoy the rain. Plus, it kinda packs down all of the dirt in the Arroyo, basically taking away all of the feet-not-killing effect of soft surface training. Disgruntling...
Wednesday 12/19: 46:06, Huntington back via Virginia in the PM. I'm not really a patient person... sometimes its a wonder that I'm still enrolled in the Meinhold School of Running for Kids who need to Chill the hell out, with its promise of injury prevention and extolling the virtues of delayed gratification... *sigh* sometimes being slow just gets old! I was really hoping for some... non negligible improvement over last week, like there really is NO reason why it should take more than 45 minutes to complete this run... oh, the horror!
Thankfully it wasn't super cold this week, but it was unpleasantly damp, and that dampness seemed to turn into a positively suffocating steam when I went indoors for core strengthening. Felt discouraged and grouchy today. At least my feet felt mostly okay this time.
Thursday 12/20: 42:18, many, many laps around lane 6 on the track. Started to drizzle at the end... did not enjoy that. I guess the rain days are good consistent low HR training days though, bc I end up going to the track. Feet felt relatively okay for the second consecutive day of non trail running. I think 40 minutes is about manageable these days. Woo hoo! L ankle still a bit unsteady. That's really the worst injury concern right now, for better or for worse. I've got two training days left in Pasadena this year, and I've already picked out which two runs I want. Now the only thing left is... Weather, I command you to cooperate!
Friday 12/21: 42:29, Monterrey to bridge loop. GLAHGHAALHGHG... the curse of the parking spot continues! I am very particular about the necessity to park in the third spot from the end of Monterrey next to the little tree. For the most part, there aren't many takers for parking in this area, but every now and again, someone's wayward vehicle finds its way inauspiciously into MY parking space. At first it was merely the convenience of a standardized starting and ending point for every run, but over time I've come to believe that the third parking spot affords some magical protection from injury and consternation, ensuring a pleasant and productive training experience. Every time I do NOT park in this space, something disgruntling always occurs.
Today, a car was parked annoyingly in 3/4 of the third parking space, so I had to park 3/4 in the fourth parking space, and about 3/4 of the way through my run, I rolled my bad ankle again! GAH! It wasn't a bad sprain, but given the amount of damage already done to this ankle from the last sprain (also on a bad parking day) I can't express how consterning this turn of events is. I felt ironically as if today was the first day that the weird pains that percolated from the last sprain were starting to subside... calamity of the world!
Saturday 12/22: 41:44, one trail perimeter of Rose Bowl in the dark. Maybe not the best idea, given the nature of the terrain... had to go slow to pick through the semi-dark obstacles, almost turned my ankle numerous times, but I really wanted to do this one for the last Pasadena run of the year. Cold, cold, cold... but fun. Had to squeeze this in before going to the airport to go home to Boston. Little did I know the horrors that lay in wait...
Got in a good solid training week this week. So much so that my legs were actually feeling less than fresh. Did not do the requisite 3x per week core strengthening... nuts. This is a big increase from the previous week, given the trajectory of the past training cycle, so considering taking an early down week for the 3 week microcycle instead of the 4 week microcycle. We'll see how arctic wasteland goes.
Target training time: 4 hours 5 minutes
Actual training: 4:10:36
Sunday, December 9, 2007
Week of 12/09/2007 - 12/15/2007 (Pre-Base Week 5)
"FAT" is just one S away from "FAST"
A series of unfortunate events have lead to some dietary changes lately, which has regrettably begun to tip the scales... I suppose with a diet consisting primarily of cashews, meat and stirfry, I shouldn't exactly be surprised, but good golly, I am officially fat.
Heading into my second pre-base microcycle, I'm actually feeling like the running portion is under control. Injury prevention remains top of the priority list, and I'd like to shed a few pounds to head off any risk factors as I approach the next increase in training minutes. Add 10 extra pounds to lug around for 10% more minutes... the impact starts to add up, when you're dealing with an already erratic and temperamental system.
Tune in this week to see if our roly-poly heroine will be able to curb the snacking and make it to 4 hours of training time!
Sunday 12/09: 43:32 Monterrey to second bridge loop. Felt some motivational issues while cramming cashews and pastries into my mouth at the kitchen counter. Did not feel as fresh and rested as I was supposed to after the additional day away from core strengthening. R hip a tiny bit inflamed but not at the usual spot. Felt uneasy about that, but a lot of stretching and it was fine during the run. This run always makes me happy bc it is kind of a real loop instead of an out and back. 40 minutes feels more like a real run, felt good all the way through. Core strengthening at the gym afterwards. Felt irritable due to large number of people and lack of exercise ball. Cookies in the late PM. Doing my part to deserve J.R.'s pet name, Fatty McFat Fat. Not starting the week off right on the weight loss front.
Monday 12/10: Off. Lately the off day is coinciding with non-core strengthening day, so I've been doing literally nothing. Today's strategy is to make the opening of the cashew bag really small, so I have to squeeze them out one at a time. Maybe that will slow the rate of consumption.
In other news, got some bloodwork back that included cardiovascular metrics... both hemoglobin and hematocrit a lot lower than a year ago, putting me on the lower end of the range for females... and presumably these are like normal, non athlete females... ugh, so depressing. Kind of a disgruntling, hating the world sort of day.
Tuesday 12/11: 34:45, Monterrey to rock. The Arroyo claims its first casualty of the season... the misfortunes continue for the embattled L foot. Just as soon as the bruise from the bottle accident has healed, I've managed to sprain it pretty badly on that first little downhill to get onto the path by Monterrey. Had to stop for a few minutes to shake it out, really painful... but I think the angle of torsion spared most of the key ligaments, so its really mostly a stabilizer on the outer part of the heel that took the brunt of it. Rest of run was a bit shaky but pain free as long as I made a very concerted effort to keep the foot strikes straight. ARGHHH....
Decided that it is just too exhausting to hate the world... so I'm going to try to have a better attitude. Make every obstacle into an opportunity: Maybe being allergic to 95% of the delicious free holiday chocolates and baked goods is an opportunity for me to lose weight, instead of a cruel and unusual deprivation of even the most simple pleasures of life. Maybe my abyssmal physical state is an opportunity to work on core strengthening and mechanics and things I would otherwise be too distracted to put effort into, instead of a reminder of being a disappointing failure and how I may never race again.
Wednesday 12/12: 33:35, California to RB. Had to park far away, grouchy. Ankle feeling steadier than expected. Felt good for a post-core strengthening day. Mostly a good run, but the breathing system was not in sync with the running system. Must have been a bad air quality (as defined by concentration of tree particles) day, per the mysterious tightness in my throat/upper chest area that occurs occasionally and unpredictably.
Thursday 12/13: 46:22, Huntington to Virginia in the PM. So cold I thought I was going to die! First "real" run in so much that its a route I used to do in the pre-crippled days. Other than the cold, it was nice to be out somewhere different, resisted the urge to do the full route up Oak Knoll, probably a very wise move. Felt really weird to run on so much pavement. Feet felt ... unenthused about the change. Kinda realized by the end that my body was a little freaked out by the change in terrain, grass, pavement, inclines, curbs, etc. which was a bit of a reality check in terms of how far I've got to go... but I think I'm going to keep trying a few more of these road runs, since pavement is all that is available when I go home for the holidays.
Had a good core strengthening session at the gym afterwards. Was really enthused about these for the first time ever, namely because after my run, I was ice cold from head to toe, and I knew that the core exercises would warm me right up. Feeling a bit worried about running in Boston. It's really tough with the low intensity training--you get up to cruising speed, and if you're still cold, then that's just too bad.
Friday 12/14: 34:42, Monterrey to rock in the twilight hours before Peter's company holiday party. Sub-optimal amount of sleep, but mostly a good run. Many dogs out. Really wishing I hadn't sprained that ankle earlier this week. There's kind of a persistent soreness in the L ankle area, probably connected to that incident. Mostly feels better after stretching the extensors.
Saturday 12/15: 40:33, One trail perimeter lap around the RB with Talia and the Brain in the AM. Really excited to have company, was fun. Good change of pace from the usual Arroyo jogs, met a nice man who knows Jesse Bloom. Yummy breakfast at Whole Foods afterwards. An unseasonably warm morning, very nice and sunny. Didn't quite make it to 4 hours of training time, but I still think this was a solid week.
Target Training time: 3 hours 50 minutes, gotta take it easy on the damn sprained ankle.
Actual training: 3:53:29
A series of unfortunate events have lead to some dietary changes lately, which has regrettably begun to tip the scales... I suppose with a diet consisting primarily of cashews, meat and stirfry, I shouldn't exactly be surprised, but good golly, I am officially fat.
Heading into my second pre-base microcycle, I'm actually feeling like the running portion is under control. Injury prevention remains top of the priority list, and I'd like to shed a few pounds to head off any risk factors as I approach the next increase in training minutes. Add 10 extra pounds to lug around for 10% more minutes... the impact starts to add up, when you're dealing with an already erratic and temperamental system.
Tune in this week to see if our roly-poly heroine will be able to curb the snacking and make it to 4 hours of training time!
Sunday 12/09: 43:32 Monterrey to second bridge loop. Felt some motivational issues while cramming cashews and pastries into my mouth at the kitchen counter. Did not feel as fresh and rested as I was supposed to after the additional day away from core strengthening. R hip a tiny bit inflamed but not at the usual spot. Felt uneasy about that, but a lot of stretching and it was fine during the run. This run always makes me happy bc it is kind of a real loop instead of an out and back. 40 minutes feels more like a real run, felt good all the way through. Core strengthening at the gym afterwards. Felt irritable due to large number of people and lack of exercise ball. Cookies in the late PM. Doing my part to deserve J.R.'s pet name, Fatty McFat Fat. Not starting the week off right on the weight loss front.
Monday 12/10: Off. Lately the off day is coinciding with non-core strengthening day, so I've been doing literally nothing. Today's strategy is to make the opening of the cashew bag really small, so I have to squeeze them out one at a time. Maybe that will slow the rate of consumption.
In other news, got some bloodwork back that included cardiovascular metrics... both hemoglobin and hematocrit a lot lower than a year ago, putting me on the lower end of the range for females... and presumably these are like normal, non athlete females... ugh, so depressing. Kind of a disgruntling, hating the world sort of day.
Tuesday 12/11: 34:45, Monterrey to rock. The Arroyo claims its first casualty of the season... the misfortunes continue for the embattled L foot. Just as soon as the bruise from the bottle accident has healed, I've managed to sprain it pretty badly on that first little downhill to get onto the path by Monterrey. Had to stop for a few minutes to shake it out, really painful... but I think the angle of torsion spared most of the key ligaments, so its really mostly a stabilizer on the outer part of the heel that took the brunt of it. Rest of run was a bit shaky but pain free as long as I made a very concerted effort to keep the foot strikes straight. ARGHHH....
Decided that it is just too exhausting to hate the world... so I'm going to try to have a better attitude. Make every obstacle into an opportunity: Maybe being allergic to 95% of the delicious free holiday chocolates and baked goods is an opportunity for me to lose weight, instead of a cruel and unusual deprivation of even the most simple pleasures of life. Maybe my abyssmal physical state is an opportunity to work on core strengthening and mechanics and things I would otherwise be too distracted to put effort into, instead of a reminder of being a disappointing failure and how I may never race again.
Wednesday 12/12: 33:35, California to RB. Had to park far away, grouchy. Ankle feeling steadier than expected. Felt good for a post-core strengthening day. Mostly a good run, but the breathing system was not in sync with the running system. Must have been a bad air quality (as defined by concentration of tree particles) day, per the mysterious tightness in my throat/upper chest area that occurs occasionally and unpredictably.
Thursday 12/13: 46:22, Huntington to Virginia in the PM. So cold I thought I was going to die! First "real" run in so much that its a route I used to do in the pre-crippled days. Other than the cold, it was nice to be out somewhere different, resisted the urge to do the full route up Oak Knoll, probably a very wise move. Felt really weird to run on so much pavement. Feet felt ... unenthused about the change. Kinda realized by the end that my body was a little freaked out by the change in terrain, grass, pavement, inclines, curbs, etc. which was a bit of a reality check in terms of how far I've got to go... but I think I'm going to keep trying a few more of these road runs, since pavement is all that is available when I go home for the holidays.
Had a good core strengthening session at the gym afterwards. Was really enthused about these for the first time ever, namely because after my run, I was ice cold from head to toe, and I knew that the core exercises would warm me right up. Feeling a bit worried about running in Boston. It's really tough with the low intensity training--you get up to cruising speed, and if you're still cold, then that's just too bad.
Friday 12/14: 34:42, Monterrey to rock in the twilight hours before Peter's company holiday party. Sub-optimal amount of sleep, but mostly a good run. Many dogs out. Really wishing I hadn't sprained that ankle earlier this week. There's kind of a persistent soreness in the L ankle area, probably connected to that incident. Mostly feels better after stretching the extensors.
Saturday 12/15: 40:33, One trail perimeter lap around the RB with Talia and the Brain in the AM. Really excited to have company, was fun. Good change of pace from the usual Arroyo jogs, met a nice man who knows Jesse Bloom. Yummy breakfast at Whole Foods afterwards. An unseasonably warm morning, very nice and sunny. Didn't quite make it to 4 hours of training time, but I still think this was a solid week.
Target Training time: 3 hours 50 minutes, gotta take it easy on the damn sprained ankle.
Actual training: 3:53:29
Sunday, December 2, 2007
Week of 12/02/2007 - 12/08/2007 (Pre-Base Week 4)
3 weeks down! Beginning to feel like its coming together a little bit. This week is supposed to be a down week, but I'm struggling to define what that means. When you run so little and so slowly, do you really NEED a significant down week? I'm feeling like my body can deal with the PT and the core strengthening a lot better now than when I started, which makes it feel like the load is less already.
On the other hand, there's been the unfortunate incident of the bottle falling squarely onto my bad toe. Its very disconcerting because there's a lot of bruised sore feeling in that area now, and I can't tell the pain from the blunt trauma apart from the pain from potentially having screwed up the original trouble spot again. So the current plan is, one "long run" and then a full week of the ~35 minute runs only, hopefully to let this heal and be in good shape to start the next training cycle.
Sunday 12/02: 44:59, Monterrey to second bridge loop. Nice and easy, felt like I've finally crossed over into a fitness level where I can run with a natural, smooth stride and still keep a low HR. vs. in last week's experiment, it felt like in order to keep the HR low, I had to change my stride to an uncomfortably glacial shuffle. Still really slow, but I realized on this run that I'm starting to feel a little bit of the joy of running again. It's gotten to the point where I don't have to concentrate so hard to keep my anti-foot hurting form, and running feels easy enough that my mind can wander into that transcendentally liberating brainspace where you can think about everything and nothing and for the time being you're outside of your life and all of its limitations.
Monday 12/03: Off. Diddly-squat.
Tuesday 12/04: 35:54, Monterrey to rock. Forgot to do PT yesterday, feet felt bad in the morning. Okay during the run though, boy is it nice to wear shoes that are not 3 years old. Starting to get this sore heel thing that often happens to me when my shoes start to accumulate miles... thought the whole trails only thing would extend the lifespan, but apparently not.
I think the meaning of this off week is that I'm logging some really truly low HR training, and I'm not going to stress about it being slow(er). I'm a bit worried about the toe/bottle situation and I'd really like all of the tweaks to be under control before I make an attempt on the elusive 4 training hours per week mark. Core strengthening in the PM.
Wednesday 12/05: 35:13, California to RB. Like 10 pounds of shit in a 5 pound bag. Some runs are just not enjoyable... Felt dehydrated in the morning, but was late, so didn't drink water. Uncomfortably sunny/warm, weird upper abdominal cramps made it hard to take deep breaths. Sharp pain in L ankle, but figured out halfway through what I was doing wrong that kept tweaking it... form gets sloppy when I feel crappy. A bad morning on many accounts... but fortunately the day did improve.
Thursday 12/06: 35:02, Monterrey to rock. A good run. Felt happy again, like a damn manic depressive. How well the run goes basically colors how I view my training future, my life, world politics, global warming... etc. Really need to get the emotions under control. A few little tweaks in the L ankle/achilles, a tiny bit concerned, but will just monitor for now. Core strengthening in the PM. Still more taxing than I would like, but it IS having a very pleasing effect on my progress towards the quest for the Butt Dimple!
Friday 12/07: 33:39, California to RB, a.k.a. the how far will you go to avoid that mud puddle?adventure. My answer: As far as necessary (without breaking stride). Wet shoes are among the top 5 catastrophes that typically happen on a run, so I make absolute sure to avoid this as much as possible. Felt really good and steady, despite it being a post-core strengthening day. Ran in the afternoon to avoid the rain, then holiday party with Peter at Dodger Stadium. Got screwed over for the batting cage, but ate some delicious mini red velvet cakes... yum!
Saturday 12/08: 34:46, Monterrey to rock. Still a lot of puddles, argh... but pleasant and sunny to round out a mostly positive down week. Felt a bit queasy from donuts and cashews eaten for breakfast... but a solid run anyways. Most of the aches and pains have resolved themselves, but the bad toe feels sore in a new way, which is a little bit consterning... will have to monitor that heading into next week. Felt like this week's training load was not taxing, which is encouraging because it was more minutes than I had expected.
Target Training: TBD - supposed to be a down week. Not sure how to define that.
Actual Training: 3:39:33
On the other hand, there's been the unfortunate incident of the bottle falling squarely onto my bad toe. Its very disconcerting because there's a lot of bruised sore feeling in that area now, and I can't tell the pain from the blunt trauma apart from the pain from potentially having screwed up the original trouble spot again. So the current plan is, one "long run" and then a full week of the ~35 minute runs only, hopefully to let this heal and be in good shape to start the next training cycle.
Sunday 12/02: 44:59, Monterrey to second bridge loop. Nice and easy, felt like I've finally crossed over into a fitness level where I can run with a natural, smooth stride and still keep a low HR. vs. in last week's experiment, it felt like in order to keep the HR low, I had to change my stride to an uncomfortably glacial shuffle. Still really slow, but I realized on this run that I'm starting to feel a little bit of the joy of running again. It's gotten to the point where I don't have to concentrate so hard to keep my anti-foot hurting form, and running feels easy enough that my mind can wander into that transcendentally liberating brainspace where you can think about everything and nothing and for the time being you're outside of your life and all of its limitations.
Monday 12/03: Off. Diddly-squat.
Tuesday 12/04: 35:54, Monterrey to rock. Forgot to do PT yesterday, feet felt bad in the morning. Okay during the run though, boy is it nice to wear shoes that are not 3 years old. Starting to get this sore heel thing that often happens to me when my shoes start to accumulate miles... thought the whole trails only thing would extend the lifespan, but apparently not.
I think the meaning of this off week is that I'm logging some really truly low HR training, and I'm not going to stress about it being slow(er). I'm a bit worried about the toe/bottle situation and I'd really like all of the tweaks to be under control before I make an attempt on the elusive 4 training hours per week mark. Core strengthening in the PM.
Wednesday 12/05: 35:13, California to RB. Like 10 pounds of shit in a 5 pound bag. Some runs are just not enjoyable... Felt dehydrated in the morning, but was late, so didn't drink water. Uncomfortably sunny/warm, weird upper abdominal cramps made it hard to take deep breaths. Sharp pain in L ankle, but figured out halfway through what I was doing wrong that kept tweaking it... form gets sloppy when I feel crappy. A bad morning on many accounts... but fortunately the day did improve.
Thursday 12/06: 35:02, Monterrey to rock. A good run. Felt happy again, like a damn manic depressive. How well the run goes basically colors how I view my training future, my life, world politics, global warming... etc. Really need to get the emotions under control. A few little tweaks in the L ankle/achilles, a tiny bit concerned, but will just monitor for now. Core strengthening in the PM. Still more taxing than I would like, but it IS having a very pleasing effect on my progress towards the quest for the Butt Dimple!
Friday 12/07: 33:39, California to RB, a.k.a. the how far will you go to avoid that mud puddle?adventure. My answer: As far as necessary (without breaking stride). Wet shoes are among the top 5 catastrophes that typically happen on a run, so I make absolute sure to avoid this as much as possible. Felt really good and steady, despite it being a post-core strengthening day. Ran in the afternoon to avoid the rain, then holiday party with Peter at Dodger Stadium. Got screwed over for the batting cage, but ate some delicious mini red velvet cakes... yum!
Saturday 12/08: 34:46, Monterrey to rock. Still a lot of puddles, argh... but pleasant and sunny to round out a mostly positive down week. Felt a bit queasy from donuts and cashews eaten for breakfast... but a solid run anyways. Most of the aches and pains have resolved themselves, but the bad toe feels sore in a new way, which is a little bit consterning... will have to monitor that heading into next week. Felt like this week's training load was not taxing, which is encouraging because it was more minutes than I had expected.
Target Training: TBD - supposed to be a down week. Not sure how to define that.
Actual Training: 3:39:33
Sunday, November 25, 2007
Week of 11/25/2007 - 12/01/2007 (Pre-Base Week 3)
The second week always sucks, from what I remember. You're not as rested as the first week you start, but you're just as weak and out of shape. Thankfully, the second week has been survived, as have a few runs approaching 40 minutes.
Now, this is where it gets interesting. This third week will tell, whether there's a few MORE weeks of grueling slow progress to go, or if my body has managed to shift into the next gear and I can continue making the trek towards real training. I'd like to think it will be the latter. I feel like I put in a good 3 or 4 weeks of painful, slow slogging before the Europe vacation, and the layoff after that was only about 2 weeks, so perhaps some of that progress will have been retained.
I'm not aiming to make a huge increase in total minutes this week, but I'd like to see how the foot with the orthotic handles some "longer" runs. We've been okay with runs in the 35 minute range now, up from 30 minutes a month or so ago, but I'd just feel a ton better if we could make it consistently to 40 minutes. 40 minutes is almost a real run. Almost.
Sunday 11/25: 34:55 Monterrey to rock. All things considered, not a bad start to the week. First halfway-decent run on a day after core strengthening. Feet did not hurt, stride felt good towards the end, did not feel tired. Feeling cautiously optimistic about this week. A little worried about the transition back to morning running, means < 24 hours of rest for the toes in addition to just not enjoying the morning cold, groggy and tired.
Went rollerblading with Peter at the RB. Was fun, but kind of harrowing. Discovered that I am not very competent at this activity, as per having a poor sense of balance and lack of gross or fine motor skills. Did not fall on face though, and a good time was had :).
Monday 11/26: 42:07 Monterrey to the second bridge, loop by the casting pond and back on the other side of the Arroyo. Hard to get up in the AM, but bright and sunny, felt like a good day to try a longer run. Actually it was kind of not an optimal day to try a longer run. This is the 7th running day in a row without a rest day, plus <24 hours since the last run... both conditions that my feet have yet to deal with. The run itself was actually pretty good, felt a bit groggy and stilted in the beginning, but it all settled down nicely into a smooth stride and comfortable breathing pretty quickly.
Unfortunately, after PT and shower and a few hours, the bad toe is feeling less than delighted. A lot more soreness than usual, not horrible but a little bit concerning. Probably wise to cash in the off day tomorrow, even if it feels alright in the morning. Lets see if I'm disciplined enough to stick to that.
Tuesday 11/27: off. Feet felt fine in the morning, but didn't get finished with core strengthening and errands until late yesterday, so decided it would be a good day to catch up on some morning sleep. Probably really should stick to taking an off day once every week or so anyways, so I guess this is okay. Nothing today other than PT... and getting fat.
Wednesday 11/28: 46:20, 3 x Arroyo Tempo Loops plus a little extra. An experiment, some learnings, and the conclusion that sometimes, ignorance is bliss...
Woke up feeling crappier than I expected. Both hamstrings felt tight and sore, presumably the second day after effect from some new exercises added to the core strengthening program. Still not adjusting to the going to bed early, waking up early thing, so felt tired and bad in the morning despite having gone to bed early... because ofcourse, I couldn't fall asleep for a few hours. Argh. Nevertheless, I figured, I wasn't going to feel any BETTER tomorrow after core strengthening again today, so might as well keep on going with the plan.
Broke out the old HR monitor to test the theory that various people have put forth, that injuries feel better after a very, very low intensity day. Since all of my days are low intensity, this means slowing to glacial speeds, and I figured the only way to do that without going nuts is to set the HR monitor to 150. I thought I was enough weeks in that I shouldn't see any exorbitantly high numbers... but boy, was I wrong. I decided in the interests of finishing this run... today... to reset the expectations to a HR of 160.
The conclusions of today's experiment is as follows:
1. I am still horribly out of shape if a HR of 160 corresponds to about 9:30 min/mile pace.
2. My new hypothesis is that how happy my L foot feels is a function of total # of footstrikes... and not of intensity or distance, or even duration. Its sort of like a starting pitcher, you can only throw X number of pitches before the form breaks down and quality declines. On average, my feet are good until 35-37 minutes. Running faster, my feet feel good for 40 - 42 minutes, on today's ultra slow run, my feet felt crappy after about 32-33 minutes. The slower you run, the smaller your stride, the more footstrikes are expended per minute.
This kind of derails the idea of decreasing intensity in hopes of increasing overall training time/distance... the variable that is less well defined is minimum recovery time before next run can safely be attempted. That does, preliminarily seem to scale with intensity and not duration.
Conclusions: I think, there's just no getting around it. I have to stick to a majority of ~35 minute runs and gradually work my way up at a rate that my foot allows. I'm also leaning towards accepting the Kangway HR calculation methodology: % difference between max and min... vs. straight up % of max HR. By that calculation, 160 HR is about 65% effort, which is about what today felt like. It actually felt like my stride was really stilted, bc its hard to find any rhythm at all if you're constantly making an effort to slow yourself down. Meh...
Thursday 11/29: 34:08, California to RB. Shaking off the bad day and getting back out there. Did an extra set on the bad leg of hamstring/hip strengthening yesterday, so didn't feel all that fresh this morning. Took it real easy, but was happy with the effort level, and stride felt more natural, feet didn't hurt. Put in the squishy orthotic again, its been working pretty well to take a few days off of the podiatrist orthotics every once in a while when the first and third toes start to feel sore from the extra redistributed pressure.
Friday 11/30: 37:12, many, many laps around the soggy track in the PM. Tried hard to deal with the wet grass for the benefit of my feet, but it was just too squishy and suction-y. Interfered with a nice stride. Felt excessively cantankerous about the rain, but it turns out the run was very relaxing and of optimal temperature. Very easy per having eaten some food before heading out.
Felt conflicted about being at the track for the first time in many, many months... it was kind of bittersweet and painfully nostalgic, like seeing someone who had broken your heart many years ago. Ran opposite direction in the outermost lane, which is about as impersonal as you can get with a track, almost perfectly 2:35 per lap. Very strange to run on an even surface. Feet felt sore on and off due to unfamiliar impact. Not delighted about this turn of events, hopefully there won't be any fall out tomorrow.
Stayed for some core strengthening at the gym, mostly went well, except for the hip/hamstring exercises. Then went home, had stomach ache, and dropped a bottle directly onto my bad toe just past the joint... felt VERY disgruntled.
Saturday 12/1: 33:45, California to RB. Butt felt unpleasantly sore after yesterday's hip exercises... also, felt irate about the fact that the rain has packed down all of the dirt in the Arroyo into a jarring, hard surface, and the bad toe felt sore where the bottle fell yesterday. In addition, developed a stomach ache halfway through due to 1,000 calories worth of cashews consumed earlier in the day. Ran what felt like very, very, slowly, but was encouraged to find that it wasn't much different from any other day's run. Really annoyed about the whole bottle thing, but I guess there's not much to be done at this point. The bruise isn't so bad, but it feels like the whole toe became kind of inflamed after the incident.
In other news, KB won the Tiger Run, keeping the title in the Caltech family. Pie 'n Burger (aka, a lot of cashews) afterwards. Fun discussion about many odd and possibly inappropriate topics. Felt inspired to keep on chugging along, so that someday I too may race again...
Target training: 3 hours 45 minutes
Actual Week's Training: 3:48:27
Now, this is where it gets interesting. This third week will tell, whether there's a few MORE weeks of grueling slow progress to go, or if my body has managed to shift into the next gear and I can continue making the trek towards real training. I'd like to think it will be the latter. I feel like I put in a good 3 or 4 weeks of painful, slow slogging before the Europe vacation, and the layoff after that was only about 2 weeks, so perhaps some of that progress will have been retained.
I'm not aiming to make a huge increase in total minutes this week, but I'd like to see how the foot with the orthotic handles some "longer" runs. We've been okay with runs in the 35 minute range now, up from 30 minutes a month or so ago, but I'd just feel a ton better if we could make it consistently to 40 minutes. 40 minutes is almost a real run. Almost.
Sunday 11/25: 34:55 Monterrey to rock. All things considered, not a bad start to the week. First halfway-decent run on a day after core strengthening. Feet did not hurt, stride felt good towards the end, did not feel tired. Feeling cautiously optimistic about this week. A little worried about the transition back to morning running, means < 24 hours of rest for the toes in addition to just not enjoying the morning cold, groggy and tired.
Went rollerblading with Peter at the RB. Was fun, but kind of harrowing. Discovered that I am not very competent at this activity, as per having a poor sense of balance and lack of gross or fine motor skills. Did not fall on face though, and a good time was had :).
Monday 11/26: 42:07 Monterrey to the second bridge, loop by the casting pond and back on the other side of the Arroyo. Hard to get up in the AM, but bright and sunny, felt like a good day to try a longer run. Actually it was kind of not an optimal day to try a longer run. This is the 7th running day in a row without a rest day, plus <24 hours since the last run... both conditions that my feet have yet to deal with. The run itself was actually pretty good, felt a bit groggy and stilted in the beginning, but it all settled down nicely into a smooth stride and comfortable breathing pretty quickly.
Unfortunately, after PT and shower and a few hours, the bad toe is feeling less than delighted. A lot more soreness than usual, not horrible but a little bit concerning. Probably wise to cash in the off day tomorrow, even if it feels alright in the morning. Lets see if I'm disciplined enough to stick to that.
Tuesday 11/27: off. Feet felt fine in the morning, but didn't get finished with core strengthening and errands until late yesterday, so decided it would be a good day to catch up on some morning sleep. Probably really should stick to taking an off day once every week or so anyways, so I guess this is okay. Nothing today other than PT... and getting fat.
Wednesday 11/28: 46:20, 3 x Arroyo Tempo Loops plus a little extra. An experiment, some learnings, and the conclusion that sometimes, ignorance is bliss...
Woke up feeling crappier than I expected. Both hamstrings felt tight and sore, presumably the second day after effect from some new exercises added to the core strengthening program. Still not adjusting to the going to bed early, waking up early thing, so felt tired and bad in the morning despite having gone to bed early... because ofcourse, I couldn't fall asleep for a few hours. Argh. Nevertheless, I figured, I wasn't going to feel any BETTER tomorrow after core strengthening again today, so might as well keep on going with the plan.
Broke out the old HR monitor to test the theory that various people have put forth, that injuries feel better after a very, very low intensity day. Since all of my days are low intensity, this means slowing to glacial speeds, and I figured the only way to do that without going nuts is to set the HR monitor to 150. I thought I was enough weeks in that I shouldn't see any exorbitantly high numbers... but boy, was I wrong. I decided in the interests of finishing this run... today... to reset the expectations to a HR of 160.
The conclusions of today's experiment is as follows:
1. I am still horribly out of shape if a HR of 160 corresponds to about 9:30 min/mile pace.
2. My new hypothesis is that how happy my L foot feels is a function of total # of footstrikes... and not of intensity or distance, or even duration. Its sort of like a starting pitcher, you can only throw X number of pitches before the form breaks down and quality declines. On average, my feet are good until 35-37 minutes. Running faster, my feet feel good for 40 - 42 minutes, on today's ultra slow run, my feet felt crappy after about 32-33 minutes. The slower you run, the smaller your stride, the more footstrikes are expended per minute.
This kind of derails the idea of decreasing intensity in hopes of increasing overall training time/distance... the variable that is less well defined is minimum recovery time before next run can safely be attempted. That does, preliminarily seem to scale with intensity and not duration.
Conclusions: I think, there's just no getting around it. I have to stick to a majority of ~35 minute runs and gradually work my way up at a rate that my foot allows. I'm also leaning towards accepting the Kangway HR calculation methodology: % difference between max and min... vs. straight up % of max HR. By that calculation, 160 HR is about 65% effort, which is about what today felt like. It actually felt like my stride was really stilted, bc its hard to find any rhythm at all if you're constantly making an effort to slow yourself down. Meh...
Thursday 11/29: 34:08, California to RB. Shaking off the bad day and getting back out there. Did an extra set on the bad leg of hamstring/hip strengthening yesterday, so didn't feel all that fresh this morning. Took it real easy, but was happy with the effort level, and stride felt more natural, feet didn't hurt. Put in the squishy orthotic again, its been working pretty well to take a few days off of the podiatrist orthotics every once in a while when the first and third toes start to feel sore from the extra redistributed pressure.
Friday 11/30: 37:12, many, many laps around the soggy track in the PM. Tried hard to deal with the wet grass for the benefit of my feet, but it was just too squishy and suction-y. Interfered with a nice stride. Felt excessively cantankerous about the rain, but it turns out the run was very relaxing and of optimal temperature. Very easy per having eaten some food before heading out.
Felt conflicted about being at the track for the first time in many, many months... it was kind of bittersweet and painfully nostalgic, like seeing someone who had broken your heart many years ago. Ran opposite direction in the outermost lane, which is about as impersonal as you can get with a track, almost perfectly 2:35 per lap. Very strange to run on an even surface. Feet felt sore on and off due to unfamiliar impact. Not delighted about this turn of events, hopefully there won't be any fall out tomorrow.
Stayed for some core strengthening at the gym, mostly went well, except for the hip/hamstring exercises. Then went home, had stomach ache, and dropped a bottle directly onto my bad toe just past the joint... felt VERY disgruntled.
Saturday 12/1: 33:45, California to RB. Butt felt unpleasantly sore after yesterday's hip exercises... also, felt irate about the fact that the rain has packed down all of the dirt in the Arroyo into a jarring, hard surface, and the bad toe felt sore where the bottle fell yesterday. In addition, developed a stomach ache halfway through due to 1,000 calories worth of cashews consumed earlier in the day. Ran what felt like very, very, slowly, but was encouraged to find that it wasn't much different from any other day's run. Really annoyed about the whole bottle thing, but I guess there's not much to be done at this point. The bruise isn't so bad, but it feels like the whole toe became kind of inflamed after the incident.
In other news, KB won the Tiger Run, keeping the title in the Caltech family. Pie 'n Burger (aka, a lot of cashews) afterwards. Fun discussion about many odd and possibly inappropriate topics. Felt inspired to keep on chugging along, so that someday I too may race again...
Target training: 3 hours 45 minutes
Actual Week's Training: 3:48:27
Sunday, November 18, 2007
Week of 11/18/2007 - 11/24/2007 (Pre-Base Week 2)
Tired.
The first week has safely been complete and I find myself mostly well. My toe is doing well, the feet and ankles have had their aches and pains but nothing major or chronic, so all things considered, good. What I hadn't really expected though, was to be so exhausted. It's not so much the running itself, which is, minimal... but there's physical therapy every day for my bad feet, then there's the grueling hour of core strengthening every other day for my bad hips...
When all is said and done, my body is getting used to a drastic increase in exercise, which sometimes makes it feel like progress is very, very slow. It's sort of like, before, through brute force I was getting relatively efficiently to some sort of training local maximum, but this point would forever be limited by injuries and misfortunes. I like to think that now I'm on a new path, that by being patient and creative, I am traversing the topographical map of my running ability, towards a point that will eventually be higher, even if the starting point is somewhat farther away.
Sunday 11/18: 33:57, California to RB. Feeling the effects of exhaustion, both from lack of sleep and dehydration, and also from yesterday's core strengthening. Vague headache throughout the day, hopefully from tired and dehydrated, and NOT from the beginnings of coming down with the plague... but otherwise, the run felt fine--it was just slow. Felt good about the fact that locking into the right stride and effort level is coming easier now. The only evidence of tiredness is the headache and the slow overall run time.
Monday 11/19: Off. Woke up in the morning and the low level headache is persisting. Stomach also feels barfy. Argh. Going to cash in the off day and still keeping those fingers crossed for NOT plague. I think I'll feel well enough for core strengthening in the PM.
Tuesday 11/20: 35:24, Monterrey to rock. Several consecutive nights of not getting a good night of sleep is getting to me. Almost tripped and fell on my face not once, but twice... argh. Kinda felt sloppy today, and after the run, my left foot felt funny. Definitely one of those runs that is closer to the type that is just slogged through, rather than enjoyed. On the plus side, I don't think I'm coming down with the plague... headache is gone, thankfully. I think I blame the chicken wings at IH on Saturday... stomach has been feeling vaguely barfy since then. Much better than yesterday though. Met a funny old retired man whose morning pastime is to collect errant golf balls from the Arroyo golf course and place them on car windshields to freak out the golfers who come chasing after them.
Wednesday 11/21: 39:30, 3 x Arroyo Tempo Loops plus jog back up the switchbacks to car. As of this morning, felt tired and still waffling about whether I should increase the training minutes at all this week... but by the time I left work early, full of free turkey and holiday cheer, it seemed a waste to piddle away my day-where-I-am-NOT-exhausted-from-core-strengthening on a shorter run.
Goal was to run a steady medium-easy pace for ~40 minutes to test if the feet would tolerate some longer runs. Loops ended up being in 38:04 (12:53, 12:28, 12:43) for just above 8:15 min/mile pace, which is just about base pace if I were in shape... which means I probably put too much effort into them. I always feel kind of iffy about base runs where the pacing is erratic like that, it usually means some funky psychological phenomena is at play, compromising ideal training effort level. I think a little bit of frustration definitely went into this run--I've been feeling crappy about the past few days, cranky about feeling physically unwell, and exasperated at how little my body seems to be able to handle.
I knew that I was expending more effort than the usual pleasantly plugging along state, and I tried to tone down the last lap, but it was honestly hard to curb the aggression. I did manage to stick to the breathing out of my nose only rule, and I didn't feel tired at the end going up the little hill to my car, and I felt like I kept good form and relaxed shoulders throughout, so it wasn't as if it was an egregious effort... but I think what troubles me is the lack of ability to control my emotions. It's this sort of impatience and frustration that left unchecked, will eventually cause me to do something stupid and end up back on the injury heap--and for ONCE in my life I want to avoid that mistake and complete a season of *something*.
Thursday 11/22: 34:15, California to RB. Happy Thanksgiving everyone!!! :) Extremely, extremely slow run. Everything feels a bit worse for the wear after core strengthening and the longer faster run yesterday. L foot felt funny throughout as well, making for a kind of consterning experience all around... but felt much better after a large helping of turkey and stuffing and gravy with Peter. Wonderful day except for the run...
Friday 11/23: 36:06, Monterrey to rock. Put in the squishy pair of orthotics again. Had a suspicion that the new orthotics that unloaded pressure off of the second toe was starting to put undue pressure on the third toe, so wanted to give that little guy a break. Considering alternating days to see if that helps, but did notice that the old pair of orthotics does a worse job of keeping my ankles aligned. Almost took a nasty spill on the way back, rolled out the L ankle, but no popping sound and minimal pain so just ran through without breaking stride. Still kind of consterned though, a bit of soreness during PT afterwards. Argh.
Toes felt better after today. Stride felt smoother, just took it really easy and felt like the system was recovering. Maybe its a good thing the gym is closed, so core strengthening will get pushed back to tomorrow. A bit more food in the stomach than I'd like though... there is just so much food around these days. Must try to mitigate the weight gain though, as that will certainly not help out my feet.
Saturday 11/24: 38:53, Parked a few blocks up on California, ran to RB. Some football game going on at the RB, traffic backed up and streets blocked off where I would normally park. Felt particularly cantankerous today about these annoyances... Had to run some extra pavement (eee...) minutes to get to car, which made the run longer than intended. Also had a meal uncomfortably close to running time, so felt kind of blimp-like and breathing constricted. Otherwise, a nice, chill run. Feet felt mostly okay, nothing felt sore or tired, hi-fived a drunk guy on his way back to his car.
Core strengthening at the gym with Peter, had to squeeze the mandatory 3rd session in this week on the last day. Felt a renewed sense of consternation about how weak my core is... but have to plugging away at this. Can actually feel some new abs growing under the layer of turkey-induced blubber.
Target Training: 3 hours 30 minutes
Actual Training: 3:38:05
The first week has safely been complete and I find myself mostly well. My toe is doing well, the feet and ankles have had their aches and pains but nothing major or chronic, so all things considered, good. What I hadn't really expected though, was to be so exhausted. It's not so much the running itself, which is, minimal... but there's physical therapy every day for my bad feet, then there's the grueling hour of core strengthening every other day for my bad hips...
When all is said and done, my body is getting used to a drastic increase in exercise, which sometimes makes it feel like progress is very, very slow. It's sort of like, before, through brute force I was getting relatively efficiently to some sort of training local maximum, but this point would forever be limited by injuries and misfortunes. I like to think that now I'm on a new path, that by being patient and creative, I am traversing the topographical map of my running ability, towards a point that will eventually be higher, even if the starting point is somewhat farther away.
Sunday 11/18: 33:57, California to RB. Feeling the effects of exhaustion, both from lack of sleep and dehydration, and also from yesterday's core strengthening. Vague headache throughout the day, hopefully from tired and dehydrated, and NOT from the beginnings of coming down with the plague... but otherwise, the run felt fine--it was just slow. Felt good about the fact that locking into the right stride and effort level is coming easier now. The only evidence of tiredness is the headache and the slow overall run time.
Monday 11/19: Off. Woke up in the morning and the low level headache is persisting. Stomach also feels barfy. Argh. Going to cash in the off day and still keeping those fingers crossed for NOT plague. I think I'll feel well enough for core strengthening in the PM.
Tuesday 11/20: 35:24, Monterrey to rock. Several consecutive nights of not getting a good night of sleep is getting to me. Almost tripped and fell on my face not once, but twice... argh. Kinda felt sloppy today, and after the run, my left foot felt funny. Definitely one of those runs that is closer to the type that is just slogged through, rather than enjoyed. On the plus side, I don't think I'm coming down with the plague... headache is gone, thankfully. I think I blame the chicken wings at IH on Saturday... stomach has been feeling vaguely barfy since then. Much better than yesterday though. Met a funny old retired man whose morning pastime is to collect errant golf balls from the Arroyo golf course and place them on car windshields to freak out the golfers who come chasing after them.
Wednesday 11/21: 39:30, 3 x Arroyo Tempo Loops plus jog back up the switchbacks to car. As of this morning, felt tired and still waffling about whether I should increase the training minutes at all this week... but by the time I left work early, full of free turkey and holiday cheer, it seemed a waste to piddle away my day-where-I-am-NOT-exhausted-from-core-strengthening on a shorter run.
Goal was to run a steady medium-easy pace for ~40 minutes to test if the feet would tolerate some longer runs. Loops ended up being in 38:04 (12:53, 12:28, 12:43) for just above 8:15 min/mile pace, which is just about base pace if I were in shape... which means I probably put too much effort into them. I always feel kind of iffy about base runs where the pacing is erratic like that, it usually means some funky psychological phenomena is at play, compromising ideal training effort level. I think a little bit of frustration definitely went into this run--I've been feeling crappy about the past few days, cranky about feeling physically unwell, and exasperated at how little my body seems to be able to handle.
I knew that I was expending more effort than the usual pleasantly plugging along state, and I tried to tone down the last lap, but it was honestly hard to curb the aggression. I did manage to stick to the breathing out of my nose only rule, and I didn't feel tired at the end going up the little hill to my car, and I felt like I kept good form and relaxed shoulders throughout, so it wasn't as if it was an egregious effort... but I think what troubles me is the lack of ability to control my emotions. It's this sort of impatience and frustration that left unchecked, will eventually cause me to do something stupid and end up back on the injury heap--and for ONCE in my life I want to avoid that mistake and complete a season of *something*.
Thursday 11/22: 34:15, California to RB. Happy Thanksgiving everyone!!! :) Extremely, extremely slow run. Everything feels a bit worse for the wear after core strengthening and the longer faster run yesterday. L foot felt funny throughout as well, making for a kind of consterning experience all around... but felt much better after a large helping of turkey and stuffing and gravy with Peter. Wonderful day except for the run...
Friday 11/23: 36:06, Monterrey to rock. Put in the squishy pair of orthotics again. Had a suspicion that the new orthotics that unloaded pressure off of the second toe was starting to put undue pressure on the third toe, so wanted to give that little guy a break. Considering alternating days to see if that helps, but did notice that the old pair of orthotics does a worse job of keeping my ankles aligned. Almost took a nasty spill on the way back, rolled out the L ankle, but no popping sound and minimal pain so just ran through without breaking stride. Still kind of consterned though, a bit of soreness during PT afterwards. Argh.
Toes felt better after today. Stride felt smoother, just took it really easy and felt like the system was recovering. Maybe its a good thing the gym is closed, so core strengthening will get pushed back to tomorrow. A bit more food in the stomach than I'd like though... there is just so much food around these days. Must try to mitigate the weight gain though, as that will certainly not help out my feet.
Saturday 11/24: 38:53, Parked a few blocks up on California, ran to RB. Some football game going on at the RB, traffic backed up and streets blocked off where I would normally park. Felt particularly cantankerous today about these annoyances... Had to run some extra pavement (eee...) minutes to get to car, which made the run longer than intended. Also had a meal uncomfortably close to running time, so felt kind of blimp-like and breathing constricted. Otherwise, a nice, chill run. Feet felt mostly okay, nothing felt sore or tired, hi-fived a drunk guy on his way back to his car.
Core strengthening at the gym with Peter, had to squeeze the mandatory 3rd session in this week on the last day. Felt a renewed sense of consternation about how weak my core is... but have to plugging away at this. Can actually feel some new abs growing under the layer of turkey-induced blubber.
Target Training: 3 hours 30 minutes
Actual Training: 3:38:05
Monday, November 12, 2007
Week of 11/11/2007 - 11/17/2007 (Pre-Base Week 1)
And... it starts again.
Post vacation, I think I logged one solid week of training, through the nasty ash-filled southern california air... before succumbing to a variety of medical troubles, respiratory and otherwise. 2 weeks and one podiatrist appointment later, it starts again. The Season-that-will-either-be-known-as-Track-2008-or-XC-2008 begins now!
While yet another doctor has been mostly flummoxed by my medical mystery foot... I've gotten another pair of orthotics and the go-ahead to try running for 1 month to see if correcting some mechanics will reduce the pressure point on that toe. Apparently the bone structures looks normal, so scar cartilage or something from the ankle breakings and toe smashings is suspected. Lets hope it doesn't come to surgery to scrape it away...
Sunday 11/11: 32:57, California to the RB and back. So far as being restricted to the same 5 miles of Arroyo every day goes, this is one of my favorite routes, given the variety in scenery. Went real easy, felt good. Tried to think about correcting the mechanics in my right (uninjured) footstrike (per the video analysis at the foot doctor's) on the thought that maybe an imbalance here is somehow creating the pressure point on the opposite foot. Since no one seems to know, my theory is as good as anyone else's. Orthotics not as crappy as I thought they would be. No pain.
Monday 11/12: 35:52, Monterrey to the rock and back. Very sunny, felt uncomfortably warm, ergo sluggish, but not terrible. Not that I was in any sort of shape before, but a couple weeks off certainly sets a person back, no matter where they are. Just aiming for some good easy 30-35 minute runs all this week to get back into it. Definitely do not feel as crappy as the first time coming back though. Starting to feel the first ill-effects of orthotics, in the form of a nice expansive blister on the R arch... argh!
Tuesday 11/13: Off. You hope for good starts to new things, but it doesn't always happen so. R hip became inflamed during the night and couldn't sleep. Iced, stretched and took 1 Aleve and 5 enzyme tablets early in the AM. This is a familiar exhaustion injury, its just really demoralizing when a sum total of 1 hour of running makes your body so tired it breaks. Suspect that this has to do with trying to correct the footstrike on the R side. Something that keeps the leg aligned properly is NOT used to working hard.
Core strengthening with Peter in the PM. Ran into Feldman at the gym. Maybe he'll do the Tiger Run in my place this year... haha. Realized that I severely lack core strength, especially post-fasting. Felt totally exhausted afterwards... Also saw Natalie Muren at the gym, she's one of those people who reminds me that I am weak, fat, slow, and pathetic. She is also one of those people who remind me how much I do NOT want to be those things, and how I've got to be strong and keep fighting through this.
Wednesday 11/14: 33:43, California to RB. Back in the metaphorical saddle again. The good: both feet held up well, no pain, felt like the running system is taking well to the mechanical adjustment to my R side, felt smoother and more natural. Hip felt a little sore, but not painful. The bad: core strengthening makes me really more exhausted than running. I woke up and my whole body felt like lead. Had to run realllly slowly, and with this feeling that my legs were shoving a dead weight forwards. I really wish I could just abandon core strengthening, but as they always say, the people who find X most painful are the ones who need it the most. I'm hoping that some day, this will all be worth it when my hips can keep my legs straight and my feet healthy and my shoulders don't cramp on long runs.
Thursday 11/15: 35:24, Monterrey to rock. Finally getting the hang of this morning thing. It makes it a lot easier because its been pretty warm out :). Felt groggy and was slow in the beginning, until something clicked with my stride and I was suddenly running much smoother and faster and with less effort. There's just so much to think with every step I take, and I'm still at the point where it feels like an effort to coordinate everything, and that it doesn't always quite come together... but when it does, its kind of nice to see that I am rewarded for my efforts.
Feet are feeling better this week than ever before in the past 7 months. I've been doing physical therapy every day--I've noticed that it seems to help a lot more to do the exercises immediately after running and stretching, than to leave it until the end of the day or whenever I have more time. This necessitates waking up a little bit earlier, but seems to be well worth the pain. More core strengthening in the PM... I hope that at some point my body gets used to this, and it will cease to be quite so painful to hold my torso upright during the run on the day after. I suppose we will see tomorrow if there is any improvement...
Friday 11/16: 32:34, California to RB. Not feeling particularly creative this week... the 30-40 minute time limit sort of limits the destinations that are available too. All things considered, a good effort--felt exhausted from yesterday's core strengthening again, but this time, somehow managed to keep the shoulders relaxed and retain some quality. Felt better at the end than the beginning again, but the switchover point from groggy to smooth happened closer to 1/4 of the way in rather than 1/2, so that's encouraging.
Saturday 11/17: 34:31, Monterrey to rock. An unexpected good run! Just felt like the running system was operating harmoniously, finally. By far the lowest effort and fastest pace of the week. Felt very relaxed, almost forgot to turn around and go home. These are the runs that make the crappy days worth it. A little soreness on the bottom of my L foot makes me a tad suspicious about the sustainability of the new orthotics, but I'll just keep an eye on it. Maybe I can wear them every other day, if this persists.
Target Training: 3 hours and 15 minutes
Actual Training this week: 3:25:01
Post vacation, I think I logged one solid week of training, through the nasty ash-filled southern california air... before succumbing to a variety of medical troubles, respiratory and otherwise. 2 weeks and one podiatrist appointment later, it starts again. The Season-that-will-either-be-known-as-Track-2008-or-XC-2008 begins now!
While yet another doctor has been mostly flummoxed by my medical mystery foot... I've gotten another pair of orthotics and the go-ahead to try running for 1 month to see if correcting some mechanics will reduce the pressure point on that toe. Apparently the bone structures looks normal, so scar cartilage or something from the ankle breakings and toe smashings is suspected. Lets hope it doesn't come to surgery to scrape it away...
Sunday 11/11: 32:57, California to the RB and back. So far as being restricted to the same 5 miles of Arroyo every day goes, this is one of my favorite routes, given the variety in scenery. Went real easy, felt good. Tried to think about correcting the mechanics in my right (uninjured) footstrike (per the video analysis at the foot doctor's) on the thought that maybe an imbalance here is somehow creating the pressure point on the opposite foot. Since no one seems to know, my theory is as good as anyone else's. Orthotics not as crappy as I thought they would be. No pain.
Monday 11/12: 35:52, Monterrey to the rock and back. Very sunny, felt uncomfortably warm, ergo sluggish, but not terrible. Not that I was in any sort of shape before, but a couple weeks off certainly sets a person back, no matter where they are. Just aiming for some good easy 30-35 minute runs all this week to get back into it. Definitely do not feel as crappy as the first time coming back though. Starting to feel the first ill-effects of orthotics, in the form of a nice expansive blister on the R arch... argh!
Tuesday 11/13: Off. You hope for good starts to new things, but it doesn't always happen so. R hip became inflamed during the night and couldn't sleep. Iced, stretched and took 1 Aleve and 5 enzyme tablets early in the AM. This is a familiar exhaustion injury, its just really demoralizing when a sum total of 1 hour of running makes your body so tired it breaks. Suspect that this has to do with trying to correct the footstrike on the R side. Something that keeps the leg aligned properly is NOT used to working hard.
Core strengthening with Peter in the PM. Ran into Feldman at the gym. Maybe he'll do the Tiger Run in my place this year... haha. Realized that I severely lack core strength, especially post-fasting. Felt totally exhausted afterwards... Also saw Natalie Muren at the gym, she's one of those people who reminds me that I am weak, fat, slow, and pathetic. She is also one of those people who remind me how much I do NOT want to be those things, and how I've got to be strong and keep fighting through this.
Wednesday 11/14: 33:43, California to RB. Back in the metaphorical saddle again. The good: both feet held up well, no pain, felt like the running system is taking well to the mechanical adjustment to my R side, felt smoother and more natural. Hip felt a little sore, but not painful. The bad: core strengthening makes me really more exhausted than running. I woke up and my whole body felt like lead. Had to run realllly slowly, and with this feeling that my legs were shoving a dead weight forwards. I really wish I could just abandon core strengthening, but as they always say, the people who find X most painful are the ones who need it the most. I'm hoping that some day, this will all be worth it when my hips can keep my legs straight and my feet healthy and my shoulders don't cramp on long runs.
Thursday 11/15: 35:24, Monterrey to rock. Finally getting the hang of this morning thing. It makes it a lot easier because its been pretty warm out :). Felt groggy and was slow in the beginning, until something clicked with my stride and I was suddenly running much smoother and faster and with less effort. There's just so much to think with every step I take, and I'm still at the point where it feels like an effort to coordinate everything, and that it doesn't always quite come together... but when it does, its kind of nice to see that I am rewarded for my efforts.
Feet are feeling better this week than ever before in the past 7 months
Friday 11/16: 32:34, California to RB. Not feeling particularly creative this week... the 30-40 minute time limit sort of limits the destinations that are available too. All things considered, a good effort--felt exhausted from yesterday's core strengthening again, but this time, somehow managed to keep the shoulders relaxed and retain some quality. Felt better at the end than the beginning again, but the switchover point from groggy to smooth happened closer to 1/4 of the way in rather than 1/2, so that's encouraging.
Saturday 11/17: 34:31, Monterrey to rock. An unexpected good run! Just felt like the running system was operating harmoniously, finally. By far the lowest effort and fastest pace of the week. Felt very relaxed, almost forgot to turn around and go home. These are the runs that make the crappy days worth it. A little soreness on the bottom of my L foot makes me a tad suspicious about the sustainability of the new orthotics, but I'll just keep an eye on it. Maybe I can wear them every other day, if this persists.
Target Training: 3 hours and 15 minutes
Actual Training this week: 3:25:01
Week of 10/14/2007 - 10/20/2007 (Traveling Week 2)
A Fat American in Europe – Part the Second
Like many unfortunate runners, I suffer from a phenomenon called a very weak stomach. Eat the wrong thing before a run? Drink too much water? Stars aligned incorrectly? and WHAM! a run starts more closely resembling a mad treasure hunt from public restroom to public restroom than ... well, training.
In the U.S. I consider myself an expert at ferretting out peeing spots. I've got every park and public restroom in and around my runs mapped out, I know every store where there isn't *technically* a public restroom but the employees don't care, and in times of dire straits, I can invent a tear jerking tale of epic woe to convince a random establishment along the way to conveniently convert itself into an emergency pit stop for me.
This doesn't really fly in Europe, apparently. They are much more protective of their restrooms. A lot of them require payment to even enter, and the ones belonging to restaurants and other workplaces are kept under a watchful eye of some old lady who can and will turn into a wailing banshee if a random person from off the street dare trundle inconspicuously in to use the facilities... Thankfully, though for the most part there is also an abundance of relatively quiet forest trails in which, if heaven forbid one would need to pee, the nearest tree is 2 feet away.
Sunday 10/14: off. Weather forces us to descend from the mountains :(. Wanted to run in the trails again, but felt that a day off was advisable, so drove back to the flatlands of Peschiera. Plan was to bike a little bit with Peter but this turned out rather poorly. Suffice it to say that it lasted only about an hour, and included 2 flat tires, 1 Power Bar from the year 1991 and some unfortunate medical problems.
In the evening drove to beautiful Verona to see the quirky Italian ex-triathlete and his non English speaking Cuban wife. Walked around the old city, ate pizza and embarked on the ultimate quest for an authentic Cannoli. Luckily for me, Marco was extremely knowledgeable about that subject area. Felt afraid for my life/the integrity of the paint job on our poor little rental vehicle in the narrow 0.5 lane cobble stone roads, but everything was worth it for the Cannoli.
Monday 10/15: 31:57 in the AM. Extremely grouchy due to morning and cold… Tried to find some trails to run on but was mostly unsuccessful. Ended up running up and down a short segment along the river bank feeling irritated. Unfortunately this morning excursion was necessary in order to catch the train to Venice!
Probably the most striking city we saw, for obvious reasons. Really liked all of the little canals and bridges and old buildings. Bought gifts, ate dinner by the water, and some delicious mystery pastries for dessert. Lots of walking, feet were not delighted by the end. Really liked the city except for the discovery of a rare species of Restaurant Nazi—the kind that don’t let you use the bathroom, and scream like a banshee if you try to sit down with your cup of coffee. Apparently sitting down makes your meal twice as expensive, leading to the curious phenomenon of neat little rows of empty tables and throngs of customers milling around the counters stuffing their edibles down in the upright position. Got back pretty late, then drove up to Salo on the west side of the Lake.
Tuesday 10/16: Hiking! Felt close to death in the morning after the coldest night of my life. Apparently heating is a luxury of expensive hotels here… what’s most outrageous is that there IS a heating unit IN the room… it just doesn’t WORK. Did not get any sleep at all due to it being cold.
Day turned out much better though, we departed the town of freezing cold, went to a neat Italian supermarket. Bought some delicious cheese, cookies and probably bought more fruit than we needed due to the novelty of the “print it yourself” weight and price sticker machine. Took the food with us on a hike in the Alps above Tremosine. Followed a mountain bike path for a bit, then veered off onto a smaller trail, which turned out to be a fantastic choice. Walked along a narrow 0.5 person wide trail carved into the side of the mountain, including rock face. I would have rejected the path as incredibly dangerous and impassable, but it didn’t seem to faze Peter. Was exhilarating in that “HOLY CRAP I’M GOING TO DIE” way sort of like a roller coaster. The best part was finding someone’s adorable little mountain hut at the top. Had a picnic lunch nearby and headed back down a safer larger trail. Really fun. Feet were not happy by the end though. Drove straight to Milan from trailhead, ate at a funny little restaurant called GROG.
Wednesday 10/17: Central heating at last! Really enjoyed a full night of sleep and the towel heater and mini fridge. Peter went to meet the professor at the university in the morning, then we went to explore the city in the afternoon. Emerged from the train station into the mother of all shopping districts. There were Prada stores and Gucci stores on every corner like Starbucks! Trying to imagine the amount of money that must change hands here every day to keep all of these shops in business was just mindbending. We found suits for 2000 Euros or like $3,000 and shoes for 950 Euros. Peter was instructed to buy business attire here, but somehow that didn’t end up happening… We did find some culinary treasures, such as the best Gelato I’ve ever had, and this funny little shop that sold inexpensive fried/baked calzone-like edibles.
Thursday 10/18: Left Milan in the morning in search of some more hiking prior to dinner with Peter’s professional triathlete friends. Wasn’t quite as successful finding good trails today, not to mention the intermittent drizzle… Aborted a few extremely steep rocky paths, then found a quaint little route that we didn’t have enough time to explore. Feet not feeling great.
Drove back up to the North side of the Lake to complete our circuit of the circumference, and had dinner with two professional triathletes who were married to each other. They were surprisingly down to earth and non-scary, but I was very thankful nonetheless that the topic of my athletic incompetence did not come up in conversation.
Friday 10/19: Drove back to Germany. Failed in the quest to find another SMA brand supermarket where I had hoped to buy a lifetime supply of pastry cookies, pasta, cheese and mini croissants… was very sad about that, but we managed to find a different supermarket the size of a shopping mall on our way back that had a large variety of pecorino cheeses, which I was persuaded to view as acceptable compensation for the lack of pastry cookies and mini-croissants that I had wanted. Had coffee and a fantastic apple strudel with another of Peter’s friends, then drove (through the snow!) to the Olympic stadium in Munich. Was sad that the track was closed, but we got to see the inside of the swimming complex.
Saturday 10/20: The last day :(. Bought last minute gifts, saw some more people, packed. Went to an authentic Bavarian restaurant to eat potato dumplings and cabbage for lunch. Peter does not understand my extreme fondness of sweet red cabbage, but I ordered a second helping anyways. We also had Meinhold Family Dinner with all of the brothers and sisters and their significant others, was impressed with delicious home made Indian food. Was exhausted afterwards, happy to let Peter hit the bars with the boys while I had a nice hot bath and read in bed.
I guess this doesn’t really qualify as a training week. I’m just hoping that all of the walking and hiking has at least kept me from becoming morbidly obese and out of shape. And that it hasn’t destroyed my feet… but we’ll see.
Like many unfortunate runners, I suffer from a phenomenon called a very weak stomach. Eat the wrong thing before a run? Drink too much water? Stars aligned incorrectly? and WHAM! a run starts more closely resembling a mad treasure hunt from public restroom to public restroom than ... well, training.
In the U.S. I consider myself an expert at ferretting out peeing spots. I've got every park and public restroom in and around my runs mapped out, I know every store where there isn't *technically* a public restroom but the employees don't care, and in times of dire straits, I can invent a tear jerking tale of epic woe to convince a random establishment along the way to conveniently convert itself into an emergency pit stop for me.
This doesn't really fly in Europe, apparently. They are much more protective of their restrooms. A lot of them require payment to even enter, and the ones belonging to restaurants and other workplaces are kept under a watchful eye of some old lady who can and will turn into a wailing banshee if a random person from off the street dare trundle inconspicuously in to use the facilities... Thankfully, though for the most part there is also an abundance of relatively quiet forest trails in which, if heaven forbid one would need to pee, the nearest tree is 2 feet away.
Sunday 10/14: off. Weather forces us to descend from the mountains :(. Wanted to run in the trails again, but felt that a day off was advisable, so drove back to the flatlands of Peschiera. Plan was to bike a little bit with Peter but this turned out rather poorly. Suffice it to say that it lasted only about an hour, and included 2 flat tires, 1 Power Bar from the year 1991 and some unfortunate medical problems.
In the evening drove to beautiful Verona to see the quirky Italian ex-triathlete and his non English speaking Cuban wife. Walked around the old city, ate pizza and embarked on the ultimate quest for an authentic Cannoli. Luckily for me, Marco was extremely knowledgeable about that subject area. Felt afraid for my life/the integrity of the paint job on our poor little rental vehicle in the narrow 0.5 lane cobble stone roads, but everything was worth it for the Cannoli.
Monday 10/15: 31:57 in the AM. Extremely grouchy due to morning and cold… Tried to find some trails to run on but was mostly unsuccessful. Ended up running up and down a short segment along the river bank feeling irritated. Unfortunately this morning excursion was necessary in order to catch the train to Venice!
Probably the most striking city we saw, for obvious reasons. Really liked all of the little canals and bridges and old buildings. Bought gifts, ate dinner by the water, and some delicious mystery pastries for dessert. Lots of walking, feet were not delighted by the end. Really liked the city except for the discovery of a rare species of Restaurant Nazi—the kind that don’t let you use the bathroom, and scream like a banshee if you try to sit down with your cup of coffee. Apparently sitting down makes your meal twice as expensive, leading to the curious phenomenon of neat little rows of empty tables and throngs of customers milling around the counters stuffing their edibles down in the upright position. Got back pretty late, then drove up to Salo on the west side of the Lake.
Tuesday 10/16: Hiking! Felt close to death in the morning after the coldest night of my life. Apparently heating is a luxury of expensive hotels here… what’s most outrageous is that there IS a heating unit IN the room… it just doesn’t WORK. Did not get any sleep at all due to it being cold.
Day turned out much better though, we departed the town of freezing cold, went to a neat Italian supermarket. Bought some delicious cheese, cookies and probably bought more fruit than we needed due to the novelty of the “print it yourself” weight and price sticker machine. Took the food with us on a hike in the Alps above Tremosine. Followed a mountain bike path for a bit, then veered off onto a smaller trail, which turned out to be a fantastic choice. Walked along a narrow 0.5 person wide trail carved into the side of the mountain, including rock face. I would have rejected the path as incredibly dangerous and impassable, but it didn’t seem to faze Peter. Was exhilarating in that “HOLY CRAP I’M GOING TO DIE” way sort of like a roller coaster. The best part was finding someone’s adorable little mountain hut at the top. Had a picnic lunch nearby and headed back down a safer larger trail. Really fun. Feet were not happy by the end though. Drove straight to Milan from trailhead, ate at a funny little restaurant called GROG.
Wednesday 10/17: Central heating at last! Really enjoyed a full night of sleep and the towel heater and mini fridge. Peter went to meet the professor at the university in the morning, then we went to explore the city in the afternoon. Emerged from the train station into the mother of all shopping districts. There were Prada stores and Gucci stores on every corner like Starbucks! Trying to imagine the amount of money that must change hands here every day to keep all of these shops in business was just mindbending. We found suits for 2000 Euros or like $3,000 and shoes for 950 Euros. Peter was instructed to buy business attire here, but somehow that didn’t end up happening… We did find some culinary treasures, such as the best Gelato I’ve ever had, and this funny little shop that sold inexpensive fried/baked calzone-like edibles.
Thursday 10/18: Left Milan in the morning in search of some more hiking prior to dinner with Peter’s professional triathlete friends. Wasn’t quite as successful finding good trails today, not to mention the intermittent drizzle… Aborted a few extremely steep rocky paths, then found a quaint little route that we didn’t have enough time to explore. Feet not feeling great.
Drove back up to the North side of the Lake to complete our circuit of the circumference, and had dinner with two professional triathletes who were married to each other. They were surprisingly down to earth and non-scary, but I was very thankful nonetheless that the topic of my athletic incompetence did not come up in conversation.
Friday 10/19: Drove back to Germany. Failed in the quest to find another SMA brand supermarket where I had hoped to buy a lifetime supply of pastry cookies, pasta, cheese and mini croissants… was very sad about that, but we managed to find a different supermarket the size of a shopping mall on our way back that had a large variety of pecorino cheeses, which I was persuaded to view as acceptable compensation for the lack of pastry cookies and mini-croissants that I had wanted. Had coffee and a fantastic apple strudel with another of Peter’s friends, then drove (through the snow!) to the Olympic stadium in Munich. Was sad that the track was closed, but we got to see the inside of the swimming complex.
Saturday 10/20: The last day :(. Bought last minute gifts, saw some more people, packed. Went to an authentic Bavarian restaurant to eat potato dumplings and cabbage for lunch. Peter does not understand my extreme fondness of sweet red cabbage, but I ordered a second helping anyways. We also had Meinhold Family Dinner with all of the brothers and sisters and their significant others, was impressed with delicious home made Indian food. Was exhausted afterwards, happy to let Peter hit the bars with the boys while I had a nice hot bath and read in bed.
I guess this doesn’t really qualify as a training week. I’m just hoping that all of the walking and hiking has at least kept me from becoming morbidly obese and out of shape. And that it hasn’t destroyed my feet… but we’ll see.
Wednesday, October 17, 2007
Week of 10/07//2007 - 10/13/2007 (Traveling Week 1)
A Fat American in Europe – Part the First
Training heads to the other side of the pond. Peter and I hit the road again with Boston, Ingolstadt, Germany and Lake Garda, Italy this week. Tons of traveling, but somehow I was so stressed about mashing in running time where-ever it would fit that I ended up doing my second highest weekly training minutes total thus far. Some off way to spend an off week… its shaping up that next week will end up being really sparse though, which may end up okay with starting a new cycle fresh when we land back in LA.
Lots of interesting new running locations, but much more good food and many more interesting cultural learnings. Beverages are un-refrigerated, hotel rates are per person, the left lane is not for driving, groceries aren’t bagged and bags are not free, and baked bread is purchased daily. At 5 euros per hour, internet time is limited though, so for now I will leave you with the following cultural mystery:
For several days I had been confounded by the creeping suspicion that something was a little bit off about the toilet paper here, until I finally discovered the source of the strangeness. In Europe, the standard aspect ratio of one square of toilet paper is different than in the states. While one sheet of US toilet paper approximately resembles a square, one sheet of European toilet paper approximately resembles a rectangle—like an 8 x 11 sheet of white paper. Why?????
Sunday 10/07: Off. Drive down from Maine to parental unit’s new condo. Feeling crappy and allergic and still jet lagged. Decided to let the body and the legs rest from yesterday. Instead, took a turn around the new neighborhood with Dad. Nice to see the fall colors.
Monday 10/08: 42:12 around the ‘hood. Tried to make it to the old cemetery with the soft grass, but turned back without making the whole circuit because run was already getting too long and the L foot was starting to feel funny. Was fairly relaxing to run in the overcast, cold weather, though a bit consterned about the possibility of rain. Also, woke up with sore throat and tons of snot. Unclear whether this is related to illness, allergy to the family cat, or traveling stresses.
Tuesday 10/09: 28:12 arrived at Peter’s parents house in Germany after staying up doing math puzzles in the airplane all night. Rabbits and grapes and cheese bread, oh my! Tired and cold, but was really excited about the best bread ever. Saw garden, compost pile, rabbit pens, home grown grapes and pears and real live English Granny. Really quaint and nice, but another cat—argh! Still not feeling great, but went for an exploratory fun in the fields/woods behind the house with Peter on bike. Many trails and sights to see, but foot started hurting about 16 minutes in so came back a bit early. Thinking this is related to lack of doing physical therapy (idiotically forgot to pack the stretchy-band on Friday….) so borrowed a theraband to work on the toe in the evening.
Wednesday 10/10: 30:58 slow jogging with Peter. Felt substantially crappier than yesterday. Tired and groggy and even more jet lagged, still with an excess of mucous. Went slow and felt peeved, but toe held up for about 22 minutes this time, so felt good about the improvement—like last time, the physical therapy helps a lot. Saw the town center today, also very quaint and cute, with old buildings, fantastic little bake/bread-eries and cobble stone streets.
Thursday 10/11: 32:23, finally a good run! Trails with Peter on the bike again. Felt quick and relaxed. Toe was okay for almost the whole time. Felt just the tiniest bit tender in the last 2-3 minutes, but discovered that strangely it takes pressure completely off of the pain point if I open up my stride and run faster. Felt good to go at a solid steady pace, but the cardiovascular effort felt too high to maintain for an extended amount of time at this point.
Friday 10/12: 32:37 early morning on the trails again with Peter. Cold, sleep deprived and grouchy. Felt bad, tired, nose was running continuously, and toe started to hurt pretty early on. Not in the habit of running in the morning and did not like it. Feet did not enjoy the < 24 hours of recovery time either. Felt irritated about screwing up all of the rehab effects of the past few days, and also about being up and about in the cold, and about the fact that unfortunately Peter runs with me on the days where I feel slow and groggy (which appears to be every other day recently, and since he jogs with me every other day the cycle never ends). Today we drive to Lake Garda in Italy though, so the morning run and all of its woes were regretfully necessary.
Saturday 10/13: 35:32 random adventuring up in the mountains of San Zeno di Montages near Lake Garda. Found these fantastic soft woodsy trails that were unfortunately a bit too short, but there were some segments of extended climbing that were a lot of fun. Really liked the soft dirt paths and rolling terrain. Toe hurt on and off, but the trails were so fun I just ignored it. Strangely feet felt much better after the run.
Target training total: ~ 2.5 - 3 hours
Actual to date: 3:21:54 hours. Ooops. So much for an off week.
Sunday, September 30, 2007
Week of 09/30/2007 - 10/06/2007 (Transition Week 7)
Obviously the story of the week is Geb, the amazing perfect human being. I was really, really not expecting this turn of events, but at the same time, when I saw it, I wasn't really all that surprised. No one had really even gotten close to Tergat's time in so long, I had started to wonder if it would take the next generation to break it, but then again, Haile has been churning out WR's recently and it was sort of like, well ofcourse, Geb can do anything. duh. The man is fast, and also a fierce competitor, and also a classy, cheery, likeable sort of guy. He's also interesting in that he's adapted with age, always being the best at what he does--instead of having one event and eventually declining and retiring. For me, I guess the fact that people who are 34 years old and still setting world records exist makes the loss of one competitive year of my 20's slightly less devastating.
From the old to the new, someone who's been getting slightly less attention at least for the time being replaces Shalane Flanagan as my new girl hero:
http://www.iaaf.org/WRU07/news/Kind=2/newsId=41916.html
10K girls can do anything. Imagine setting an AR in your debut half marathon. Per a recent Caltech blog thread, she is rapidly becoming the more impressive Goucher.
Sunday 09/30: 42:11 with KB to the RB and back. First "long" run, by which I mean accompanying the lovely Ms. Breeden on a recovery jog :). Felt pretty good though, didn't feel like the extra 10 minutes was taxing, thus leading me to the conclusion that currently the limiting factor is not cardiovascular fitness but the structural integrity of my feet. Time passed quickly, good to talk and chill out.
Ate a lot of bread, then resurrected physical therapy. Lots of icing and stretching. Various aches and pains are coming and going and its hard to tell exactly what's happening. Both ankles now seem to have stabilized, but now the arches feel tight and sore, plus the funny tendons that run above the metatarsals are sometimes achy. I thought for a while that my toe was collapsing again, but upon closer inspection, I can grab the toe itself and jerk it around and joint isn't painful at all... its just that where tendon attaches to the toe knuckle is bizarrely inflamed. Not sure what causes this or how to fix it, so for now, just icing a lot and attempting to stretch the top of my feet (which is an awkward and mostly ineffective endeavor).
Monday 10/01: 30:23, goodbye pile 'o wood chips, hello La Loma bridge! I've finally decided to extend the formerly 30 minute run out a few hundred meters to become the newly 30 minute run. Happy to put the Nike Frees back on my feet. I can't explain why, but my feet just feel better in them. Did some more PT, tried to massage out those weird little tendons on the top of my feet. L Arch still a bit tight and sore, gotta keep an eye on that.
As I was heading back past the park on the Arroyo, my usually calm, pleasant jogging was interrupted by the growing awareness of heavy breathing behind me. Momentarily distressed, I quickly got out of the way to let he/she/it pass on by... and was suddenly confronted by a vision of a former self: a short, dorky looking asian girl came barreling through on my left side, arms flailing wildly in bad form, huffing and puffing, she turned and scrambled on up the trail up to the streets above and disappeared as quickly as she had appeared.
She looked as I imagine I must have looked several years ago as a fledgling runner, with a chip on my shoulder and something to prove, pounding out the miles as fast as I could, running as if the demons were right behind me... Its not that I've quelled those demons, per se. They are still alive and kicking, perched firmly on my shoulder, they've never left my side--whispering sweet nothings in my ear about wasted potential, I've missed my chance, I'll never be unbroken again and gosh, how much of a disappointment I've turned out to be... but what I've learned in the past few months is that what you have to do is grit your teeth and tell them to shut the hell up and be patient. Because shit happens, LIFE happens... and great runners are forged over years, not weeks and months. So you just have to suck it up and do whatever you have to do, every day to train, or be able to train. Its not always pretty, but, I guess that's just too bad.
Tuesday 10/02: 33:04, to the RB and back. Inaugural run in my new old ebay Nike Free's, freshly delivered from Canada! The Nike Free 5.0 v2 is the best shoe ever made. Unfortunately they are REALLY hard to find even on ebay, and my first pair are getting very, very worn. Also some debacles at work, didn't get home until sunset, so did a slightly sketchy Arroyo run in the semi-dark. Hard to see footing, so a bit scary, but otherwise, it was actually really nice. Good temperature, felt relaxed and form felt good, breathing easy, legs fresh.
Wednesday 10/03: 35:39, tried to find the "20 minute rock" and was disgruntled to realize it had either been removed or rolled to the other side. You take half a year off and everything's all different.... sheesh. This used to be the standard 20 minute mark on an easy run starting from my house--thought it would be a good 16-17 minute turnaround for my current Arroyo route, but it ended up taking 18 minutes. Felt crappy today. Stomach felt heavy, had a mild side stitch, breathing felt shallow, legs felt uncoordinated and eyes hurt a lot today from allergy or infection. Went slow(er than usual) and felt irritated. I guess I'm almost 3 whole weeks in at this point, so maybe statistically there's got to be a crummy day in there at some point.
Also noted, per Mark's observation about physical therapy exercises, I feel like mine are both helping and hurting this week. Feeling some good progress in the stability of the toe in question, but at the same time, I feel like those funny little muscles in my shins are sore now, and where they feed into my ankles feels weaker... I think the answer here is to keep at the exercises, and maybe plan in a "down" week next week. I'm on track to be increasing 30 min/week, but when one's weekly total is like 2-3 hours, that's 15-20% increase per week. Maybe that's a lot for just starting out. I guess that's alright since next week will probably end up being light anyways due to travel.
Thursday 10/04: Off. Trying to get stuff done for the trip. Managed to squeeze in some physical therapy, the more PT I do the better my toe feels but the worse my weird little ankle tendons feel. Hope that goes away soon.
Friday 10/05: 43:24 to the RB, a little ways around the trails on the side and then back. Felt... eh. Wasn't going that slow, but kinda choppy, not as relaxed as usual. Just felt like I was getting through the allotted time, which is sad because I usually really enjoy my runs lately. On second thought a lot of this may be explained by the fact that I had to run in the morning, which I've sorely gotten out of the habit of, and we all know I am NOT a morning person, at least not in my natural state. Felt really tired, hard to get out of bed, and just not excited about anything except crawling back into bed.
Mostly all of my other runs have been at dusk, after I've been awake and fed for a while and generally itching to stop doing work stuff and get out there to do some running stuff. This morning I felt inadequately rested, stressed out and crunched for time, which made going out there feel like a chore rather than something to look forward to... I think I'm fixating on this because I really want to avoid that state where running becomes a severe emotional stress, and right now there's no reason why it should have to be that way.
Saturday 10/06: 42:22, debacles in far away lands! Around confusing little Maine country roads, got lost, somehow my "easy" day got turned into a "long" day and running harder than normal too to try to get back to the hotel in time to get ready for Stu's wedding. Nice weekend getaway on the New England coast with Peter though :). Unfortunately not a good running location, all of the things that looked like trails were some rich person's driveway--so ended up running on the pavement for the first time in months in my Nike Frees--not sure I'd recommend this. Argh, my heels hurt... Its so much easier to run on pavement though, other than the impact factor. There were also a lot of these tiny little hills, which made me realize that I am in VERY appallingly poor climbing shape--harder than I would have liked. All in all, the 40 minutes didn't seem too long, and the slightly faster than jogging pace didn't feel too bad, so mostly a good run. Took an Aleve upon returning to help with the anticipated heel pain tomorrow.
Target training: 3 hours and 30 minutes
Traing to date: 3:45:03 hours
As much as I dislike off days, the 1 day off a week system will have to be the steady-state for a while. I find that my feet require that rest day, and while they are still tentative, probably best not to push it. For this week I'd like to phase in a few 35-40 minute type runs provided that my feet are holding steady.
From the old to the new, someone who's been getting slightly less attention at least for the time being replaces Shalane Flanagan as my new girl hero:
http://www.iaaf.org/WRU07/news/Kind=2/newsId=41916.html
10K girls can do anything. Imagine setting an AR in your debut half marathon. Per a recent Caltech blog thread, she is rapidly becoming the more impressive Goucher.
Sunday 09/30: 42:11 with KB to the RB and back. First "long" run, by which I mean accompanying the lovely Ms. Breeden on a recovery jog :). Felt pretty good though, didn't feel like the extra 10 minutes was taxing, thus leading me to the conclusion that currently the limiting factor is not cardiovascular fitness but the structural integrity of my feet. Time passed quickly, good to talk and chill out.
Ate a lot of bread, then resurrected physical therapy. Lots of icing and stretching. Various aches and pains are coming and going and its hard to tell exactly what's happening. Both ankles now seem to have stabilized, but now the arches feel tight and sore, plus the funny tendons that run above the metatarsals are sometimes achy. I thought for a while that my toe was collapsing again, but upon closer inspection, I can grab the toe itself and jerk it around and joint isn't painful at all... its just that where tendon attaches to the toe knuckle is bizarrely inflamed. Not sure what causes this or how to fix it, so for now, just icing a lot and attempting to stretch the top of my feet (which is an awkward and mostly ineffective endeavor).
Monday 10/01: 30:23, goodbye pile 'o wood chips, hello La Loma bridge! I've finally decided to extend the formerly 30 minute run out a few hundred meters to become the newly 30 minute run. Happy to put the Nike Frees back on my feet. I can't explain why, but my feet just feel better in them. Did some more PT, tried to massage out those weird little tendons on the top of my feet. L Arch still a bit tight and sore, gotta keep an eye on that.
As I was heading back past the park on the Arroyo, my usually calm, pleasant jogging was interrupted by the growing awareness of heavy breathing behind me. Momentarily distressed, I quickly got out of the way to let he/she/it pass on by... and was suddenly confronted by a vision of a former self: a short, dorky looking asian girl came barreling through on my left side, arms flailing wildly in bad form, huffing and puffing, she turned and scrambled on up the trail up to the streets above and disappeared as quickly as she had appeared.
She looked as I imagine I must have looked several years ago as a fledgling runner, with a chip on my shoulder and something to prove, pounding out the miles as fast as I could, running as if the demons were right behind me... Its not that I've quelled those demons, per se. They are still alive and kicking, perched firmly on my shoulder, they've never left my side--whispering sweet nothings in my ear about wasted potential, I've missed my chance, I'll never be unbroken again and gosh, how much of a disappointment I've turned out to be... but what I've learned in the past few months is that what you have to do is grit your teeth and tell them to shut the hell up and be patient. Because shit happens, LIFE happens... and great runners are forged over years, not weeks and months. So you just have to suck it up and do whatever you have to do, every day to train, or be able to train. Its not always pretty, but, I guess that's just too bad.
Tuesday 10/02: 33:04, to the RB and back. Inaugural run in my new old ebay Nike Free's, freshly delivered from Canada! The Nike Free 5.0 v2 is the best shoe ever made. Unfortunately they are REALLY hard to find even on ebay, and my first pair are getting very, very worn. Also some debacles at work, didn't get home until sunset, so did a slightly sketchy Arroyo run in the semi-dark. Hard to see footing, so a bit scary, but otherwise, it was actually really nice. Good temperature, felt relaxed and form felt good, breathing easy, legs fresh.
Wednesday 10/03: 35:39, tried to find the "20 minute rock" and was disgruntled to realize it had either been removed or rolled to the other side. You take half a year off and everything's all different.... sheesh. This used to be the standard 20 minute mark on an easy run starting from my house--thought it would be a good 16-17 minute turnaround for my current Arroyo route, but it ended up taking 18 minutes. Felt crappy today. Stomach felt heavy, had a mild side stitch, breathing felt shallow, legs felt uncoordinated and eyes hurt a lot today from allergy or infection. Went slow(er than usual) and felt irritated. I guess I'm almost 3 whole weeks in at this point, so maybe statistically there's got to be a crummy day in there at some point.
Also noted, per Mark's observation about physical therapy exercises, I feel like mine are both helping and hurting this week. Feeling some good progress in the stability of the toe in question, but at the same time, I feel like those funny little muscles in my shins are sore now, and where they feed into my ankles feels weaker... I think the answer here is to keep at the exercises, and maybe plan in a "down" week next week. I'm on track to be increasing 30 min/week, but when one's weekly total is like 2-3 hours, that's 15-20% increase per week. Maybe that's a lot for just starting out. I guess that's alright since next week will probably end up being light anyways due to travel.
Thursday 10/04: Off. Trying to get stuff done for the trip. Managed to squeeze in some physical therapy, the more PT I do the better my toe feels but the worse my weird little ankle tendons feel. Hope that goes away soon.
Friday 10/05: 43:24 to the RB, a little ways around the trails on the side and then back. Felt... eh. Wasn't going that slow, but kinda choppy, not as relaxed as usual. Just felt like I was getting through the allotted time, which is sad because I usually really enjoy my runs lately. On second thought a lot of this may be explained by the fact that I had to run in the morning, which I've sorely gotten out of the habit of, and we all know I am NOT a morning person, at least not in my natural state. Felt really tired, hard to get out of bed, and just not excited about anything except crawling back into bed.
Mostly all of my other runs have been at dusk, after I've been awake and fed for a while and generally itching to stop doing work stuff and get out there to do some running stuff. This morning I felt inadequately rested, stressed out and crunched for time, which made going out there feel like a chore rather than something to look forward to... I think I'm fixating on this because I really want to avoid that state where running becomes a severe emotional stress, and right now there's no reason why it should have to be that way.
Saturday 10/06: 42:22, debacles in far away lands! Around confusing little Maine country roads, got lost, somehow my "easy" day got turned into a "long" day and running harder than normal too to try to get back to the hotel in time to get ready for Stu's wedding. Nice weekend getaway on the New England coast with Peter though :). Unfortunately not a good running location, all of the things that looked like trails were some rich person's driveway--so ended up running on the pavement for the first time in months in my Nike Frees--not sure I'd recommend this. Argh, my heels hurt... Its so much easier to run on pavement though, other than the impact factor. There were also a lot of these tiny little hills, which made me realize that I am in VERY appallingly poor climbing shape--harder than I would have liked. All in all, the 40 minutes didn't seem too long, and the slightly faster than jogging pace didn't feel too bad, so mostly a good run. Took an Aleve upon returning to help with the anticipated heel pain tomorrow.
Target training: 3 hours and 30 minutes
Traing to date: 3:45:03 hours
As much as I dislike off days, the 1 day off a week system will have to be the steady-state for a while. I find that my feet require that rest day, and while they are still tentative, probably best not to push it. For this week I'd like to phase in a few 35-40 minute type runs provided that my feet are holding steady.
Sunday, September 23, 2007
Week of 09/23/2007 - 09/29/2007 (Transition Week 6)
Pleasant Arroyo Jogs Continue (hopefully)
Last week was say 2.5 hours on 5 runs, which I'm feeling pretty good about given that 3 hours was a relatively arbitrary goal for a first week. I'd like to get to 3 hours on 6 runs this week, keeping the ~30 minutes per day rule. For some reason I've decided that I value the consistency in training right now over increasing time/miles per day. Its sort of like, I would rather condition my body to accept running on a daily basis even if it has to be in small doses, than to be able to run say 5-6 miles in one go ASAP.
For some reason I'm thinking right now that this approach is less taxing on one's body than last summer's strategy of running 5 miles 3 times a week for my first week back (discounting the debacle where I ran an "easy 8.5" on my first attempt and couldn't walk for the next 3 days due to soreness...).
Sunday 09/23: 33:32 from California entrance to the Arroyo to the Rose Bowl and back. I've noticed a tendency to feel choppy and tight the day after an off day, which plagued the first 5-10 minutes of this run, but settled in nicely after that. Went back to the Free 5.0's, for some reason I've been feeling lately that a person's foot naturally lands in such a way to reduce impact and injury and the more "stabilizing" a shoe is, the more weird pressure points accumulate.
Ground a bit mushy from yesterday's rain but overall, pleasant conditions. Lots of folks out, mostly dog walkers and strollers, but there was some odd race thing going on near the RB. There were even some folks who were running slower than me... now THAT hasn't happened in a long time :).
Monday 09/24: 29:59 Improvement! First time to the woodchips in under 15 minutes, consequently, the route was a bit short, time-wise, but supposing its okay since yesterday's was a bit long. Felt pretty good, wanted to go longer, but trying to keep in mind that the feet are disproportionately stressed by the 30 minutes than any other body part.
Tuesday 09/25: 30:04 same as yesterday, didn't have time for anything fancy. Had to squeeze in a run during the daylight hours to prevent tripping and falling in the Arroyo. Felt like I was going slower, but somehow managed to end up at about the same pace as yesterday. Feeling stressed and irritable about work today, but felt much better after running.
Wednesday 09/26: 29:15, the weekly check-in. 2 x Arroyo Tempo loops 27:43 in 13:54, 13:49. Just squeaked under the 9 min/mile mark at 8:56 pace. Pleased with progress, but considering scrapping this run for the next few weeks. I really don't like knowing how long something is right now, I noticed that I just felt stressed on this run--not physically, but emotionally. I knew I would be sad if it were slower than last week's, but at the same time I was worrying about running too hard because I was thinking about time and improvement.
All in all, maybe the effort was a little bit higher than last week's, but I did maintain my default anti-pushing the pace rule of "if its uncomfortable to breathe through your nose, slow down". This is this weird thing that Andrea Vasconcellos ingrained in me during my first year of running--that one should do one's easy runs breathing solely through your nose, apparently this helped her make sure she actually ran easy on easy days. Everyone else has subsequently has told me that this is weird and artificial and that most people manage to keep a relaxed pace while breathing through their mouth, etc. etc. but for some reason I just can't break the habit at this point.
There were also a lot of folks out, and on the last stretch back to the start, there was a little group of 3 runners, 2 guys and 1 girl, and it really irritated me that I wasn't catching up to them.
Thursday 09/27: 34:22 same run as sunday to the RB and back, but had to park a bit farther away this time. Ran at a relaxed zoned out pace and felt slow, but good. Also, tried running in trainers today. Picked a pair with a pretty flexible sole so as to be closer to the Frees. Bleh, I'm caught between the dilemma of competing potential injuries... the trainers really made my heel feel better... but now my R ankle is a bit sore. For some reason the Frees help with my L toe and R ankle, but the trainers help with my R heel and my L ankle. Goodness only knows WHY... but that's the way it is. Or maybe the aches and pains come and go since I haven't run in so long, and I'm just assigning causation where there isn't any.
Anyways, I need to learn to be able to wear trainers anyways, cuz there's nothing but pavement available in Boston where I'll be next weekend, and also, I'd like to race again some day, and I'll need to be able to wear something other than Frees for that.
Friday 09/28: Off day, whoopie-doo. Ironically, my feet were feeling fantastic all day. Kinda wanted to go out and run, but didn't have a ton of time, and I knew that I needed to take a day off pretty soon. So, stuck to original plan.
Saturday 09/29: 28:44 to woodchips with Peter (in his VERY first pair of Nike Free's :-D). A bit short, but I've managed to safely reach my goal training time of 3 hours! Feel self conscious to run with company... definitely not presentable yet. I do feel encouraged by the progress though, I know I shouldn't think about distance and speed, but I've shaved 3 minutes off of this woodchip pile route, or say ~10%. Which means that potentially I'm running closer to 9 minute miles at this point. Never thought I'd see a day when that was a cause for celebration, but that day is today.
Weekly Goal: 3 hours
Training to date: 3:05:56 hours
Last week was say 2.5 hours on 5 runs, which I'm feeling pretty good about given that 3 hours was a relatively arbitrary goal for a first week. I'd like to get to 3 hours on 6 runs this week, keeping the ~30 minutes per day rule. For some reason I've decided that I value the consistency in training right now over increasing time/miles per day. Its sort of like, I would rather condition my body to accept running on a daily basis even if it has to be in small doses, than to be able to run say 5-6 miles in one go ASAP.
For some reason I'm thinking right now that this approach is less taxing on one's body than last summer's strategy of running 5 miles 3 times a week for my first week back (discounting the debacle where I ran an "easy 8.5" on my first attempt and couldn't walk for the next 3 days due to soreness...).
Sunday 09/23: 33:32 from California entrance to the Arroyo to the Rose Bowl and back. I've noticed a tendency to feel choppy and tight the day after an off day, which plagued the first 5-10 minutes of this run, but settled in nicely after that. Went back to the Free 5.0's, for some reason I've been feeling lately that a person's foot naturally lands in such a way to reduce impact and injury and the more "stabilizing" a shoe is, the more weird pressure points accumulate.
Ground a bit mushy from yesterday's rain but overall, pleasant conditions. Lots of folks out, mostly dog walkers and strollers, but there was some odd race thing going on near the RB. There were even some folks who were running slower than me... now THAT hasn't happened in a long time :).
Monday 09/24: 29:59 Improvement! First time to the woodchips in under 15 minutes, consequently, the route was a bit short, time-wise, but supposing its okay since yesterday's was a bit long. Felt pretty good, wanted to go longer, but trying to keep in mind that the feet are disproportionately stressed by the 30 minutes than any other body part.
Tuesday 09/25: 30:04 same as yesterday, didn't have time for anything fancy. Had to squeeze in a run during the daylight hours to prevent tripping and falling in the Arroyo. Felt like I was going slower, but somehow managed to end up at about the same pace as yesterday. Feeling stressed and irritable about work today, but felt much better after running.
Wednesday 09/26: 29:15, the weekly check-in. 2 x Arroyo Tempo loops 27:43 in 13:54, 13:49. Just squeaked under the 9 min/mile mark at 8:56 pace. Pleased with progress, but considering scrapping this run for the next few weeks. I really don't like knowing how long something is right now, I noticed that I just felt stressed on this run--not physically, but emotionally. I knew I would be sad if it were slower than last week's, but at the same time I was worrying about running too hard because I was thinking about time and improvement.
All in all, maybe the effort was a little bit higher than last week's, but I did maintain my default anti-pushing the pace rule of "if its uncomfortable to breathe through your nose, slow down". This is this weird thing that Andrea Vasconcellos ingrained in me during my first year of running--that one should do one's easy runs breathing solely through your nose, apparently this helped her make sure she actually ran easy on easy days. Everyone else has subsequently has told me that this is weird and artificial and that most people manage to keep a relaxed pace while breathing through their mouth, etc. etc. but for some reason I just can't break the habit at this point.
There were also a lot of folks out, and on the last stretch back to the start, there was a little group of 3 runners, 2 guys and 1 girl, and it really irritated me that I wasn't catching up to them.
Thursday 09/27: 34:22 same run as sunday to the RB and back, but had to park a bit farther away this time. Ran at a relaxed zoned out pace and felt slow, but good. Also, tried running in trainers today. Picked a pair with a pretty flexible sole so as to be closer to the Frees. Bleh, I'm caught between the dilemma of competing potential injuries... the trainers really made my heel feel better... but now my R ankle is a bit sore. For some reason the Frees help with my L toe and R ankle, but the trainers help with my R heel and my L ankle. Goodness only knows WHY... but that's the way it is. Or maybe the aches and pains come and go since I haven't run in so long, and I'm just assigning causation where there isn't any.
Anyways, I need to learn to be able to wear trainers anyways, cuz there's nothing but pavement available in Boston where I'll be next weekend, and also, I'd like to race again some day, and I'll need to be able to wear something other than Frees for that.
Friday 09/28: Off day, whoopie-doo. Ironically, my feet were feeling fantastic all day. Kinda wanted to go out and run, but didn't have a ton of time, and I knew that I needed to take a day off pretty soon. So, stuck to original plan.
Saturday 09/29: 28:44 to woodchips with Peter (in his VERY first pair of Nike Free's :-D). A bit short, but I've managed to safely reach my goal training time of 3 hours! Feel self conscious to run with company... definitely not presentable yet. I do feel encouraged by the progress though, I know I shouldn't think about distance and speed, but I've shaved 3 minutes off of this woodchip pile route, or say ~10%. Which means that potentially I'm running closer to 9 minute miles at this point. Never thought I'd see a day when that was a cause for celebration, but that day is today.
Weekly Goal: 3 hours
Training to date: 3:05:56 hours
Monday, September 17, 2007
Week of 09/16/2007 - 09/22/2007 (Transition Week 5)
RUNNING AGAIN! This time for reals (fingers crossed).
A new beginning, hopefully. Unfortunately I am definitely not even ready for base miles. For the next few weeks, with a little help from the powers that be, I will be doing my pre-base miles, which I've decided will be measures in minutes and not miles to discourage the grousing about slow paces and embarassment. I may even forgo the HR monitor for the first few weeks lest I should be so discouraged that I give up on this again.
The goal of the pre-base miles is just to get my body used to running again, to make sure all of my broken parts are holding up, and just to get to a point where running a solid 30-40 base mile training week can be managed without undue stress to the system. However long it takes to get to that point, so be it. I think this will be fastest safest way to training again.
Sunday 09/16: Off, traveling back from Colorado. Flight delayed, pretty miserable. Got to bed around 2 or 3 am. Working from home this week, thank goodness.
Monday 09/17: 31:22 pleasant jog in the Arroyo. Drove to the entry point to be really really cautious, jogged out 15 minutes, back the same way then a little extra up the little hill back to car. Whether it was from descending from altitude, or just because I wasn't stressing out about pace--it actually didn't feel at all like drowning. Felt cool and pleasant the whole way, feet even felt pretty good in the Nike Frees on the trails.
Stretched and iced after getting back, really hoping I can just manage 30 minutes a day for the rest of the week without it breaking my feet again. Really felt like I could have happily done more today, but need to be really really careful with the feet. At this point in the game, its less about gaining fitness and more about gaining back the ability to train at all. The fitness will come, just so long as the feet don't break--so that's got to be the first priority.
Tuesday 09/18: 31:33 same route as yesterday, just a smidge slower. Felt good, no drowning, but did notice a bit of soreness in the hamstrings today throughout. Nothing major but eeesh, it is not good if 30 minutes of jogging makes one sore! Lots of precautionary stretching and icing. Its not much, but being able to run even a little bit really slowly is like a little piece of heaven.
Wednesday 09/19: 30:53 out to the random pile 'o woodchips again. Slightly faster today, so considered going 30 seconds farther out, but decided to restrain myself. Maybe later on I'll try driving to the California entrance to the arroyo and run 15 minutes out just to mix things up a little bit, but I'm really going to try to enforce the 30 minutes only rule this week.
Tried out a brand new pair of Nike Frees 7.0's felt good, just a tiny bit more steady on my feet but really felt mostly the same as the 5.0's. Liked the wide toe box for my big duck feet, and narrow heel. By comparison the 5.0 v.3's that I tried on really sucked... it felt like the sizes ran small, AND they were narrow and uncomfortable and something about the heel just didn't fit right. Argh. Had to find some v.2's on eBay--didn't find as many as I hoped, but DID learn interesting enough that the pair I currently own is like some rare collector's item... hahahaha.
Otherwise, stretched and iced exhaustively as a precautionary measure. Just the fact that I've actually run 3 consecutive days and am still standing is a miracle in and of itself.
Thursday 09/20: 31:36 drove to California and Arroyo for 2 x Arroyo tempo loops, easy, then a little extra up the switchback back to car. Cheated a little on the whole minutes only don't measure distance thing, since 2 Arroyo tempo loops approximately = 5K according to Ian. Was slightly too sunny at 2 pm, but felt pretty good. 15:09/15:06 for 30:15, or 9:45 pace... was pleased with sub-10 minute miles--this warrants a felicitous upgrade of my training state from "glorified walking" to "warm up jogging"!
Friday 09/21: 31:16 back to the old route. Almost sprained ankle, ergo slightly less placid than the other days. Also, rain clouds looming. I am just such a pansy about the rain... Don't get me wrong-rain, shine or snow, I WILL go out there and run, but I just really dislike it when I have to run on a rainy day. Felt a twinge in the mystery ankle tendon making a sharp right turn, which was consterning. On second thought, I'm thinking maybe 5 days of running may be sufficient for this first week, and I should take tomorrow off to hope that the tendon doesn't twinge again.
Saturday 09/22: Off. Probably a good call--raining all day, and L ankle felt kinda tweaked out all day. Did a lot of cleaning, hauling crap around though, which hopefully counted for some exercise. Iced for a long time, ankle felt better after that.
Weekly goal: 3 hours
Week Actual: 2:36:40 hours
A new beginning, hopefully. Unfortunately I am definitely not even ready for base miles. For the next few weeks, with a little help from the powers that be, I will be doing my pre-base miles, which I've decided will be measures in minutes and not miles to discourage the grousing about slow paces and embarassment. I may even forgo the HR monitor for the first few weeks lest I should be so discouraged that I give up on this again.
The goal of the pre-base miles is just to get my body used to running again, to make sure all of my broken parts are holding up, and just to get to a point where running a solid 30-40 base mile training week can be managed without undue stress to the system. However long it takes to get to that point, so be it. I think this will be fastest safest way to training again.
Sunday 09/16: Off, traveling back from Colorado. Flight delayed, pretty miserable. Got to bed around 2 or 3 am. Working from home this week, thank goodness.
Monday 09/17: 31:22 pleasant jog in the Arroyo. Drove to the entry point to be really really cautious, jogged out 15 minutes, back the same way then a little extra up the little hill back to car. Whether it was from descending from altitude, or just because I wasn't stressing out about pace--it actually didn't feel at all like drowning. Felt cool and pleasant the whole way, feet even felt pretty good in the Nike Frees on the trails.
Stretched and iced after getting back, really hoping I can just manage 30 minutes a day for the rest of the week without it breaking my feet again. Really felt like I could have happily done more today, but need to be really really careful with the feet. At this point in the game, its less about gaining fitness and more about gaining back the ability to train at all. The fitness will come, just so long as the feet don't break--so that's got to be the first priority.
Tuesday 09/18: 31:33 same route as yesterday, just a smidge slower. Felt good, no drowning, but did notice a bit of soreness in the hamstrings today throughout. Nothing major but eeesh, it is not good if 30 minutes of jogging makes one sore! Lots of precautionary stretching and icing. Its not much, but being able to run even a little bit really slowly is like a little piece of heaven.
Wednesday 09/19: 30:53 out to the random pile 'o woodchips again. Slightly faster today, so considered going 30 seconds farther out, but decided to restrain myself. Maybe later on I'll try driving to the California entrance to the arroyo and run 15 minutes out just to mix things up a little bit, but I'm really going to try to enforce the 30 minutes only rule this week.
Tried out a brand new pair of Nike Frees 7.0's felt good, just a tiny bit more steady on my feet but really felt mostly the same as the 5.0's. Liked the wide toe box for my big duck feet, and narrow heel. By comparison the 5.0 v.3's that I tried on really sucked... it felt like the sizes ran small, AND they were narrow and uncomfortable and something about the heel just didn't fit right. Argh. Had to find some v.2's on eBay--didn't find as many as I hoped, but DID learn interesting enough that the pair I currently own is like some rare collector's item... hahahaha.Otherwise, stretched and iced exhaustively as a precautionary measure. Just the fact that I've actually run 3 consecutive days and am still standing is a miracle in and of itself.
Thursday 09/20: 31:36 drove to California and Arroyo for 2 x Arroyo tempo loops, easy, then a little extra up the switchback back to car. Cheated a little on the whole minutes only don't measure distance thing, since 2 Arroyo tempo loops approximately = 5K according to Ian. Was slightly too sunny at 2 pm, but felt pretty good. 15:09/15:06 for 30:15, or 9:45 pace... was pleased with sub-10 minute miles--this warrants a felicitous upgrade of my training state from "glorified walking" to "warm up jogging"!
Friday 09/21: 31:16 back to the old route. Almost sprained ankle, ergo slightly less placid than the other days. Also, rain clouds looming. I am just such a pansy about the rain... Don't get me wrong-rain, shine or snow, I WILL go out there and run, but I just really dislike it when I have to run on a rainy day. Felt a twinge in the mystery ankle tendon making a sharp right turn, which was consterning. On second thought, I'm thinking maybe 5 days of running may be sufficient for this first week, and I should take tomorrow off to hope that the tendon doesn't twinge again.
Saturday 09/22: Off. Probably a good call--raining all day, and L ankle felt kinda tweaked out all day. Did a lot of cleaning, hauling crap around though, which hopefully counted for some exercise. Iced for a long time, ankle felt better after that.
Weekly goal: 3 hours
Week Actual: 2:36:40 hours
Week of 09/09/2007 - 09/15/2007 (Transition Week 4)
Finally! Food returns. This week has been devoted to eating and travel. I perhaps naively thought that I would resume running immediately upon conclusion of fasting--but as it turns out, I'm a great deal weaker than I thought I would be, so the timetable has been shifted so that this week will allow me to ease back into quasi-normal existence again.
Final results: I weighted in 10 days ago at 111 pounds, after not really exercising at all for a while, with both my feet and my allergies getting alarmingly worse. At the conclusion, I weighed a shocking 98 pounds but remarkably, during this time, my feet healed extremely quickly and my upper respiratory allergies cleared very quickly in addition to the food ones (for obvious reasons). Another strange effect was that after day 1, I really ceased to be hungry in a physical sense at all, though I did find myself thinking longingly about food a lot. It made me realize though how much food is a psychological phenomenon for me... I missed food the same way I miss running, or my family or something that's heavily an emotional thing--rather than how you miss water if you're thirsty or oxygen if you're racing...
At any rate, 10 days and 13 pounds later, when I finally did start eating--oh, food is so, so good. Its still a bit of a mixed bag how much this helped me, but in general I feel like it was a good rest for my body, and that all of the allergic reactions are like, less severe and towards the end of the week I felt up for running again.
Friday 09/14 - Saturday 09/15: Colorado
Preliminary investigations of the greater Denver basin with Peter. 2 days and 400 miles of driving later, there seem to be more questions than answers. Loved Boulder, it was like a neat little Pasadena meets Boston, all the good parts only... everywhere else, a bit sketchy. Downtown was moderately acceptable, but then there were just expanses of scary mass produced suburbia and small hick towns that reminded me uncomfortably of the deep south. Still taking in all of this information, unclear for now what the future holds.
Drove up THE real Flagstaff mountain--very impressed. Steep, scary switchbacks even by car. Amazing views, trails everywhere. Plus the whole altitude thing... really wished I could have had a go at the route described in RwtB but not enough time or fitness (obviously) at the current time.
Also drove past the entrance to the Mt. Evans hill climb, also from RwtB, very cool. Totally psyched to see all of the famous sites--I'll be back some day to actually explore. Wished dearly for ability to run again.
Final results: I weighted in 10 days ago at 111 pounds, after not really exercising at all for a while, with both my feet and my allergies getting alarmingly worse. At the conclusion, I weighed a shocking 98 pounds but remarkably, during this time, my feet healed extremely quickly and my upper respiratory allergies cleared very quickly in addition to the food ones (for obvious reasons). Another strange effect was that after day 1, I really ceased to be hungry in a physical sense at all, though I did find myself thinking longingly about food a lot. It made me realize though how much food is a psychological phenomenon for me... I missed food the same way I miss running, or my family or something that's heavily an emotional thing--rather than how you miss water if you're thirsty or oxygen if you're racing...
At any rate, 10 days and 13 pounds later, when I finally did start eating--oh, food is so, so good. Its still a bit of a mixed bag how much this helped me, but in general I feel like it was a good rest for my body, and that all of the allergic reactions are like, less severe and towards the end of the week I felt up for running again.
Friday 09/14 - Saturday 09/15: Colorado
Preliminary investigations of the greater Denver basin with Peter. 2 days and 400 miles of driving later, there seem to be more questions than answers. Loved Boulder, it was like a neat little Pasadena meets Boston, all the good parts only... everywhere else, a bit sketchy. Downtown was moderately acceptable, but then there were just expanses of scary mass produced suburbia and small hick towns that reminded me uncomfortably of the deep south. Still taking in all of this information, unclear for now what the future holds.
Drove up THE real Flagstaff mountain--very impressed. Steep, scary switchbacks even by car. Amazing views, trails everywhere. Plus the whole altitude thing... really wished I could have had a go at the route described in RwtB but not enough time or fitness (obviously) at the current time.
Also drove past the entrance to the Mt. Evans hill climb, also from RwtB, very cool. Totally psyched to see all of the famous sites--I'll be back some day to actually explore. Wished dearly for ability to run again.
Tuesday, September 4, 2007
Week of 09/02/2007 - 09/08/2007 (Transition Week 3)
Healing.
This week will be taken off from exercise so that I can heal, in various respects. I have decided that its just not a great idea to start the running again on feet that are still so questionable. I want to get through at least a week without pain before I start to jog (slowly and painfully) again.
Other factors exacerbating my return are the increasingly severe allergies (both external and food related) including a new violent reaction to prolonged contact with sweat. Life has just become one big miserable inflammation. I feel like I'm always uncomfortable, and just taking stabs in the dark as to what I ate, stepped on, walked through today to cause the problem. To solve this... I will be fasting, sleeping and watching DVDs in my room this week. After this period of rebooting, I will introduce foods and activities one at a time so that I can more accurately ascertain what causes allergic reactions so that they can be more effectively avoided.
Well, off I go now--wish me luck. Expect the next update next week. Happy running to the rest of you!
This week will be taken off from exercise so that I can heal, in various respects. I have decided that its just not a great idea to start the running again on feet that are still so questionable. I want to get through at least a week without pain before I start to jog (slowly and painfully) again.
Other factors exacerbating my return are the increasingly severe allergies (both external and food related) including a new violent reaction to prolonged contact with sweat. Life has just become one big miserable inflammation. I feel like I'm always uncomfortable, and just taking stabs in the dark as to what I ate, stepped on, walked through today to cause the problem. To solve this... I will be fasting, sleeping and watching DVDs in my room this week. After this period of rebooting, I will introduce foods and activities one at a time so that I can more accurately ascertain what causes allergic reactions so that they can be more effectively avoided.
Well, off I go now--wish me luck. Expect the next update next week. Happy running to the rest of you!
Thursday, August 30, 2007
Week of 08/26/2007 - 09/01/2007 (Transition Week 2)
Like 10 pounds of shit in a 5 pound bag...
Steve Slattery is so funny. Granted he had being suddenly transplanted to altitude as an excuse for feeling that way... whereas, I on the other hand am just fat, and woefully, woefully, out of shape.
I'm running and updating again, but as the former is going so poorly, I'm feeling more than a bit cantankerous. If by some unlucky chance, you do happen to see me running, and I sincerely hope that you don't... kindly avert your eyes and refrain from asking how it went. Just pretend that you asked me how my run was, and know that my answer would have been: "Like 10 pounds of shit in a 5 pound bag."
Sunday 08/26: 3.5 miles, 34 minutes. Rule #1: Never, EVER eat a large roast beef and cheese bread sandwich 1 hour before a taxing run. Unfortunately for me, running right now only comes in one variety--taxing. The sandwich, ofcourse, was delicious, but the run, was probably one of the worst I've ever had. Jogged painfully from Peter's to the North Fields, struggled mightily through 10 laps, then jogged back to Peter's. Am still amazed that I did not keel over or barf up my sandwich.
Saw Kiesz, then Markimarkonnen... *big sigh*... wanted to run away, but knew that I wouldn't make it to the next closest source of grass, so had to suck it up and be observed in this compromised state. The painful cramping/distended stomach feeling really complimented the usual drowning/suffocating feeling to create a thoroughly delightful running experience. Was glad to survive this one and never make this mistake again.
Monday 08/27 - Tuesday 08/28: Off. Woke up on Monday morning and nearly fell back over due to a sharp and unexpected pain in R arch. Gathering my wits a bit, I determined very quickly that this must be plantar fasciitis pain. Judging from the location and the unforgiving nature of it, it just couldn't be anything else. Remembered groggily that I had neglected to stretch or ice after Sunday's debacle due to the preoccupation with the sandwich induced discomfort. Thoroughly regretted the decision and the consequences... but some too late but copious icing and stretching on Monday brought the condition mostly under control. Took Tuesday off too to be safe, still nursing a slight twinge in the R arch. Was definitely a scare, but recovered about as well as I could have hoped.
Wednesday 08/29: 3.1 miles, 29:39 for 10 laps around the North Fields. REALLY CRAPPY YET AGAIN. Also, lightly rolled R ankle, had to stop to shake it out. Felt really irritated. Feet and legs are feeling pretty good, but the hot, suffocating sensation is unrelenting from the stomach up. Still can't manage anything faster than about 3 minutes per lap. I don't even recognize what I've become. Its as if I'd never run a day in my life before this.
Thursday 08/30: Unplanned off day due to pain at the ankle where the rolling took place yesterday. Feeling grouchy. This whole returning to running thing hasn't exactly been terribly successful from any standpoint so far.
Friday 08/31 - Saturday 09/01: Feeling some aches and pains in the L arch. This isn't the heel pain or the plantar fasciitis type pain... its just the same old thing that precipitated my training decline all last year. I actually remember the first day I felt it, it was while turning right onto Fremont from my house, and it was like this sudden, unforeseen sharp stanbing pain right at the base of my ankle where the highest point of the arch is. It freaked me out, but for some reason it resolved itself without further problems that time... this was like sometime in summer of 2005. Since then its just gotten worse and worse, in so much that the frequency of occurence has drastically increased and so too the recovery time between flare ups. Its hard to tell what exactly is wrong too, because there isn't really a tendon associated with the precise spot... its just this mystery shooting pain. Kind of cramps the comeback though. Argh.
Steve Slattery is so funny. Granted he had being suddenly transplanted to altitude as an excuse for feeling that way... whereas, I on the other hand am just fat, and woefully, woefully, out of shape.
I'm running and updating again, but as the former is going so poorly, I'm feeling more than a bit cantankerous. If by some unlucky chance, you do happen to see me running, and I sincerely hope that you don't... kindly avert your eyes and refrain from asking how it went. Just pretend that you asked me how my run was, and know that my answer would have been: "Like 10 pounds of shit in a 5 pound bag."
Sunday 08/26: 3.5 miles, 34 minutes. Rule #1: Never, EVER eat a large roast beef and cheese bread sandwich 1 hour before a taxing run. Unfortunately for me, running right now only comes in one variety--taxing. The sandwich, ofcourse, was delicious, but the run, was probably one of the worst I've ever had. Jogged painfully from Peter's to the North Fields, struggled mightily through 10 laps, then jogged back to Peter's. Am still amazed that I did not keel over or barf up my sandwich.
Saw Kiesz, then Markimarkonnen... *big sigh*... wanted to run away, but knew that I wouldn't make it to the next closest source of grass, so had to suck it up and be observed in this compromised state. The painful cramping/distended stomach feeling really complimented the usual drowning/suffocating feeling to create a thoroughly delightful running experience. Was glad to survive this one and never make this mistake again.
Monday 08/27 - Tuesday 08/28: Off. Woke up on Monday morning and nearly fell back over due to a sharp and unexpected pain in R arch. Gathering my wits a bit, I determined very quickly that this must be plantar fasciitis pain. Judging from the location and the unforgiving nature of it, it just couldn't be anything else. Remembered groggily that I had neglected to stretch or ice after Sunday's debacle due to the preoccupation with the sandwich induced discomfort. Thoroughly regretted the decision and the consequences... but some too late but copious icing and stretching on Monday brought the condition mostly under control. Took Tuesday off too to be safe, still nursing a slight twinge in the R arch. Was definitely a scare, but recovered about as well as I could have hoped.
Wednesday 08/29: 3.1 miles, 29:39 for 10 laps around the North Fields. REALLY CRAPPY YET AGAIN. Also, lightly rolled R ankle, had to stop to shake it out. Felt really irritated. Feet and legs are feeling pretty good, but the hot, suffocating sensation is unrelenting from the stomach up. Still can't manage anything faster than about 3 minutes per lap. I don't even recognize what I've become. Its as if I'd never run a day in my life before this.
Thursday 08/30: Unplanned off day due to pain at the ankle where the rolling took place yesterday. Feeling grouchy. This whole returning to running thing hasn't exactly been terribly successful from any standpoint so far.
Friday 08/31 - Saturday 09/01: Feeling some aches and pains in the L arch. This isn't the heel pain or the plantar fasciitis type pain... its just the same old thing that precipitated my training decline all last year. I actually remember the first day I felt it, it was while turning right onto Fremont from my house, and it was like this sudden, unforeseen sharp stanbing pain right at the base of my ankle where the highest point of the arch is. It freaked me out, but for some reason it resolved itself without further problems that time... this was like sometime in summer of 2005. Since then its just gotten worse and worse, in so much that the frequency of occurence has drastically increased and so too the recovery time between flare ups. Its hard to tell what exactly is wrong too, because there isn't really a tendon associated with the precise spot... its just this mystery shooting pain. Kind of cramps the comeback though. Argh.
Wednesday, August 29, 2007
Week of 08/19/2007 - 08/25/2007 (Transition Week 1)
To where I am transitioning is not clear. But what *IS* clear at the moment is that I'm done recovering. What's even less clear is whether that's really a good thing. I feel mostly okay these days, but the weird aches and pains don't really clear up. Its always something slightly different, but I never feel... totally good. Its just like this plateau of no man's land. The funny thing is, the less I exercise, the worse my feet feel.
I honestly feel totally overwhelmed with work and athletically and physically directionless, but for lack of desire to stay where I am, I'm moving on. To something. Let's hope its to running again.
Sunday 08/19: 11.5 miles, hiking. Mt. Baldy adventuring with Peter. After my proposed route was vetoed, we parked halfway up to the ski lifts, then took the south side "Ski Hut" trail up to the summit, then came back an easier, longer way along the ski lifts on a fire road back to the car. The way up was *brutal*... that or I am miserably out of shape. Likely a combination of both. Had a fantastic roast beef sandwich and a nap at the top at 10,000 feet. Windy and beautiful. Really enjoyed the wind and the clear air and the coolness. Way back was more boring, but getting tired so glad for the less challenging terrain.
Feet held up pretty well to this excursion, mildly rolled an ankle at one point, but thankfully the hiking boots avoided the other Mt. Baldy-esque disaster. Some aches and pains later on that day, but miraculously pain free the next morning!
Monday 08/20 - Tuesday 08/21: Really, Really, sore... ughhhh. This was NOT a welcome development. The bipedal motion muscles must really be shot. The second day, the rolled ankle felt sharply painful to the touch. Iced a lot, but the feet are still okay. Had promised myself that if the feet held up to the hike, I would go ahead and try 20 minutes of jogging. Feeling really antsy to get the show started.
Wednesday 08/22: 2 miles, 21 minutes with Peter. Oh, the rude awakening that is el first "run" back... all of these months of darkness I imagined what running would be like, to glide effortlessly over hill and dale, perhaps a bit more slowly than usual, but nevertheless... all crisp cool air and quickly bounding legs. Little did I know... within 50 ft, Peter was already sprinting on ahead, and when I finally caught up, panting for an easier pace... I was met with pure incredulity: "WHAT?! but we're almost *walking* as it is!"
The reason for his complaint was discovered some 4-5 minutes later when we arrived at the track, and I realized that we were going like 9 minute miles... and it already felt like drowning. The thing is, I was prepared for bad... I was even prepared for... really bad... but this was... off the charts bad! This is going to take like, a good 3-6 months to repair.
Thursday 08/23: 3.1 miles, 31 minutes. Pre-race from the gym at night. Hoping to meet no one I knew... was successful at least this time. Sans el boy unit, I was able to go at a pace that didn't require huffing and puffing. Sadly for me, this was just about 10 minute miles. The running system feels really, really bad. HR pushing 170, sweating like a pig, but at the very least, my feet were okay.
Friday 08/24: Off. L achilles really painful. Decided to institute the 2 days on, 1 day off plan until the aches and pains stabilized out a little bit. Iced a lot, and it all cleared on up. Feet holding up better than I expected, but nonetheless resolved to run on grass for the next few.
Saturday 08/25: 2.5 miles, 24 minutes, 8 laps around the North Fields at dusk. Apparently 10 minute miles on pavement is NOT the same as 10 minute miles on grass... Felt pretty drowning, HR really really high. Really discouraging run--looking back before I started this last 4 month stretch of being injured... the whole 3 min/lap speed was my rest day routine of 10 laps at 135 bpm. This was less a "run" and more just a pleasant jog, just to get the blood circulating on non training days. Right now, said pleasant jog requires a heart rate of 175 bpm, and an unpleasant drowning sensation. I realized after 8 laps that I was really relieved to be done. Legs felt heavy, heart was pounding uncomfortably, everything just felt bad, bad, bad.
Weekly Totals: 7.6 miles. With some help from the Medical Gods... I could even reach double digits next week!
I honestly feel totally overwhelmed with work and athletically and physically directionless, but for lack of desire to stay where I am, I'm moving on. To something. Let's hope its to running again.
Sunday 08/19: 11.5 miles, hiking. Mt. Baldy adventuring with Peter. After my proposed route was vetoed, we parked halfway up to the ski lifts, then took the south side "Ski Hut" trail up to the summit, then came back an easier, longer way along the ski lifts on a fire road back to the car. The way up was *brutal*... that or I am miserably out of shape. Likely a combination of both. Had a fantastic roast beef sandwich and a nap at the top at 10,000 feet. Windy and beautiful. Really enjoyed the wind and the clear air and the coolness. Way back was more boring, but getting tired so glad for the less challenging terrain.
Feet held up pretty well to this excursion, mildly rolled an ankle at one point, but thankfully the hiking boots avoided the other Mt. Baldy-esque disaster. Some aches and pains later on that day, but miraculously pain free the next morning!
Monday 08/20 - Tuesday 08/21: Really, Really, sore... ughhhh. This was NOT a welcome development. The bipedal motion muscles must really be shot. The second day, the rolled ankle felt sharply painful to the touch. Iced a lot, but the feet are still okay. Had promised myself that if the feet held up to the hike, I would go ahead and try 20 minutes of jogging. Feeling really antsy to get the show started.
Wednesday 08/22: 2 miles, 21 minutes with Peter. Oh, the rude awakening that is el first "run" back... all of these months of darkness I imagined what running would be like, to glide effortlessly over hill and dale, perhaps a bit more slowly than usual, but nevertheless... all crisp cool air and quickly bounding legs. Little did I know... within 50 ft, Peter was already sprinting on ahead, and when I finally caught up, panting for an easier pace... I was met with pure incredulity: "WHAT?! but we're almost *walking* as it is!"
The reason for his complaint was discovered some 4-5 minutes later when we arrived at the track, and I realized that we were going like 9 minute miles... and it already felt like drowning. The thing is, I was prepared for bad... I was even prepared for... really bad... but this was... off the charts bad! This is going to take like, a good 3-6 months to repair.
Thursday 08/23: 3.1 miles, 31 minutes. Pre-race from the gym at night. Hoping to meet no one I knew... was successful at least this time. Sans el boy unit, I was able to go at a pace that didn't require huffing and puffing. Sadly for me, this was just about 10 minute miles. The running system feels really, really bad. HR pushing 170, sweating like a pig, but at the very least, my feet were okay.
Friday 08/24: Off. L achilles really painful. Decided to institute the 2 days on, 1 day off plan until the aches and pains stabilized out a little bit. Iced a lot, and it all cleared on up. Feet holding up better than I expected, but nonetheless resolved to run on grass for the next few.
Saturday 08/25: 2.5 miles, 24 minutes, 8 laps around the North Fields at dusk. Apparently 10 minute miles on pavement is NOT the same as 10 minute miles on grass... Felt pretty drowning, HR really really high. Really discouraging run--looking back before I started this last 4 month stretch of being injured... the whole 3 min/lap speed was my rest day routine of 10 laps at 135 bpm. This was less a "run" and more just a pleasant jog, just to get the blood circulating on non training days. Right now, said pleasant jog requires a heart rate of 175 bpm, and an unpleasant drowning sensation. I realized after 8 laps that I was really relieved to be done. Legs felt heavy, heart was pounding uncomfortably, everything just felt bad, bad, bad.
Weekly Totals: 7.6 miles. With some help from the Medical Gods... I could even reach double digits next week!
Sunday, August 26, 2007
Week of 08/12/2007 - 08/18/2007 (Recovery Week 8)
Its bad when you can't even remember what you did for training. This, in the current case is a combination of the fact that this week was a long time ago, and the fact that I have, in fact done miserably little training between then and now.
The short story is that I'm losing the battle with work... rides have kind of dwindled from 5 a week... to 3... to 2... to none?
The only rides I know for sure happened on this week were:
Birthday ride up Wilson to Clear Creek with Kev, and 8 or 9 laps around the RB in the AM on Friday also with Kev. Probably about 30-35 miles a piece. Fun, but generally felt weak and tired. Feeling physically pretty lousy lately. Not a whole lot of sleep, eating crappy, really stressed. Also, out of Zyrtec, and no time to track down a new prescription. My state has been steadily worsening since this happened. My nose won't stop running, and my eyes are back to not being able to tolerate contacts again...
There may have been one other short ride in there somewhere, but not exactly sure. Working on trying to contain the workload situation. Hope for improvement in the coming weeks, but not very likely. Posts are/have been/may still be sporadic. Apologies for the technical difficulties. Please tune in a little bit later.
The short story is that I'm losing the battle with work... rides have kind of dwindled from 5 a week... to 3... to 2... to none?
The only rides I know for sure happened on this week were:
Birthday ride up Wilson to Clear Creek with Kev, and 8 or 9 laps around the RB in the AM on Friday also with Kev. Probably about 30-35 miles a piece. Fun, but generally felt weak and tired. Feeling physically pretty lousy lately. Not a whole lot of sleep, eating crappy, really stressed. Also, out of Zyrtec, and no time to track down a new prescription. My state has been steadily worsening since this happened. My nose won't stop running, and my eyes are back to not being able to tolerate contacts again...
There may have been one other short ride in there somewhere, but not exactly sure. Working on trying to contain the workload situation. Hope for improvement in the coming weeks, but not very likely. Posts are/have been/may still be sporadic. Apologies for the technical difficulties. Please tune in a little bit later.
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