Monday, January 30, 2017

Week 04: January 23-29, 2017

Monday:
     AM: 5 x 20 push ups

Tuesday:
     AM: 5 x 5 pull ups.
     
Wednesday:
     AM: Pull up pyramid -1,2,3,4,5,4,3,2,1
     PM: 10.2 miles, 666', 7:32 pace. Easy Manchester roads and sidewalks.

Thursday:
     AM: 9.9 miles, 590', 7:33 pace. Early morning Candia roads.
     PM: 10.2 miles, 661', 6:54 pace. 2 x 3 miles at tempo effort.

Friday:
     AM: 5 x 20 push ups.
     PM: 9.8 miles, 649', 7:48 pace. Windy easy run on Manchester sidewalks. Definitely feeling yesterday's miles and workout - made a conscious effort to go slow.

Saturday: 11.9 miles, 699', 8:05 pace. Kept the pace and effort level reigned in.

Sunday: 

Warm up: 2.3 miles, 167', 9:05 pace.
Race: Boston Prep 16 miler, 915'. 6:19 pace.

This was my third time running this race, I've always used it as a fitness check for Hyannis Marathon about a month later. Given that I've only been training with anything approaching focus since January, I was expecting to run several minutes slower than when I was in good shape in 2014. I ended up doing far better at this race than I had any right to expect. Here's a quick comparison of my mile splits:

  Mile 2014 / 2017
  1. 6:29 / 6:29
  2. 6:14 / 6:14
  3. 6:00 / 5:46
  4. 6:09 / 6:09
  5. 6:47 / 6:38
  6. 6:05 / 5:57
  7. 6:08 / 6:05
  8. 6:05 / 6:09
  9. 6:12 / 6:14
  10. 6:45 / 6:39
  11. 6:58 / 6:39
  12. 6:58 / 6:51
  13. 6:18 / 6:13
  14. 6:14 / 6:18
  15. 6:05 / 6:16
  16. 6:04 / 6:01
Finish: 1:40:37 / 1:40:39
Pace:   6:18 / 6:18
Place:  5th / 11th

Some key take-aways:
  • This year's performance was nearly identical to the last time I ran BP16 in 2014. My mile splits are about as close as GPS can measure, especially considering one was done with a GPS watch and one was done with my iPhone on two different days. There's obviously some error in there since the totals don't add up. Conditions were more pleasant this year (35 degrees vs. 20 degrees) but I don't think it made any substantial difference time-wise.
  • This year I ran entirely by feel. I started the Strava app on my phone, then put it away in my back pocket and didn't look at it again until after I finished. In 2014 I had a watch feeding me splits for every mile.
  • My training is working and I should be solidly capable of a sub-3:00 marathon on Cape Cod next month. In 2014 I was probably physically capable of a 2:50 marathon but turned a 2:54 because I got greedy, overshot, and tried for 2:45.
  • The next few weeks will be contain some key workouts. I can run deep in the 6:00/mile pace, but I need to target my endurance at speed to close well from mile 16 onward.
  • I'm a little tempted to go for a PR, but it might be best to err on the conservative side and just try for an even, well-executed performance. My goal for Hyannis was to get into Boston and possibly go Sub-3, and I may benefit more by proving that I can hold back, sandbag a little, and not make every marathon I run turn into a gruesome shit show at the end.
  • The marathon is also a B-goal for the year. I don't want to burn myself out for the rest of the season, there are bigger fish to fry. Let's try not to lose sight of that.
Weekly Totals:
     70.5 miles, 4337', 8h 38m.

Wednesday, January 25, 2017

Week 03: January 16-22, 2017

Monday:
     AM: Pull-up pyramid- 1,2,3,4,5,6,5,4,3,2,1. Glad to get back into the upper-body stuff. A sore shoulder put a damper on things last week. Also did 7,000 meters in 30 minutes on the rowing machine.
     PM: 9.8 miles, 662', 7:24 pace. Listened to a new history podcast I found, The Fall of the Roman Empire, by Patrick Wyman. I was once a prospective history major in my freshman year at UNH but decided that kind of degree wasn't worth going into dept for. So now I'm a mechanical engineer and history is something of a hobby.

Tuesday: Zero. Ugly stomach bug, fever.

Wednesday: Zero. Still sick, flattered myself on the morning weigh-in, though.

Thursday: 
     AM: Pull-up pyramid- 1,2,3,4,5,6,5,4,3,2,1. My form starts to deteriorate halfway through this workout. Ideally, my chest bumps on the hang board each rep, like Bobby Maximus. Will need to do the whole thing with consistent quality before thinking about adding reps.
     PM: 8.8 miles, 556', 7:25 pace. Slushy Manchester sidewalks. I wanted to do a workout but thought it best to run easy on my first day back from an illness.

Friday:
     AM: 10 miles, 591', 7:39 pace. My first early morning run in a while.
     PM: 8.7 miles, 560', 6:37 pace. Started this one out intending to do 2 x 3 miles at tempo effort, but felt really tired within the first mile, maybe lingering effects of being sick earlier in the week and maybe also some fatigue from the morning run, without a lot to eat in between. In any case, I salvaged the workout by pulling back the pace a little bit, exchanging my planned cruise interval workout for more of a continuous tempo.

Saturday:
     AM: 17 miles, 1003', 7:59 pace. Candia roads, pre-dawn.
     PM: Pull-up pyramid- 1,2,3,4,5,6,5,4,3,2,1

Sunday: 12 miles, 702', 7:28 pace. Candia roads, pre-dawn.

Total: 66.4 miles, 4062', 8h 18m.

I did a decent job of salvaging the week, with two off days, totals were very similar to last week in mileage, elevation gained, and time spent running. I haven't done any mountain or trail running in months and I don't really have any on the radar until spring. A lot of this is stemming from the enormity of my family room remodeling project which, due to scope-creep and a severe underestimation of the timeline, has hogged all my weekends. If I want to run, it has to be in the early morning or on my lunch break. A possible side affect is that I may be a bit better prepared for my marathon in Hyannis, since my training is more specific to road running. Running mountains may make you strong, but I don't think it makes you fast.

Monday, January 16, 2017

Week 02: January 9-15, 2017

Monday 1/9: 8.7 miles, 545', 7:34 pace. Snowy Manchester sidewalks.

Tuesday
:
     AM: 10, 7, 3 wide grip pull ups (failed at 2x10 attempt).  I've found some some recent success with pull ups after improving my technique to recruit back muscles more. With 5x5 being fairly easy, I decided to give sets of 10x a shot. No dice. Rowing machine; 7051 meters, 30 minutes. Since I have a rowing erg available, I figured I'd make use of it for come cross training. I have the vague notion that the motion is similar to steep hiking, so maybe it'll improve my climbing strength.
     PM: 8.7 miles, 554', 6:47 pace. 2 x 3 miles at tempo effort - hard to gauge actual pace since I'm using my phone for GPS tracking instead of a watch and I don't look at the screen until I'm finished. Right now I'm just looking to ease into some casual workouts for the marathon and there's no pint in being uptight about accurate pacing when I'm running a hilly route on sidewalks that are 50% snow and ice.

Wednesday:
     AM: 100 push ups in sets of 20-5. I was hoping to do 20 x 5, but that's a little too ambitious for now.
     PM: 13.3 miles, 623', 7:33 pace. Old Manchester Half Marathon course in reverse. Temps got up into the 50s, so I was happy to wear shorts and a t-shirt for the first time in months. I happened to pick my Hardrock 2012 shirt, forgetting that it seems to be bad luck for road running. Took a digger and scraped up my palms on the Hanover street sidewalks.
   
Thursday: 13.2 miles, 679', 7:39 pace. Manchester roads and sidewalks. 55 degrees out again.

Friday: 9.7 miles, 659', 6:51 pace. 2 x 3 miles at tempo effort. Basically the same workout as Tuesday bit with an extra mile of easy running in between tempo sessions so the overall pace is slower even though I ran a bit faster for the 6 miles harder running because the sidewalks were snow free.
   
Saturday: Zero day. Did an open practice day at Team O'Neil Rally School in Dalton. Had a blast sliding my Forester around cones in a controlled environment.

Dude rippin' it up in a supercharged Tacoma.


Sunday: 13.4 miles, 863', 7:33 pace. Ran home from kids' YMCA class. Hung more drywall in the evening.

Boss man.

Total: 67.2 miles, 3921', 8h 15m

A decent week with two good workouts. I'm optimistic about the marathon.

Monday, January 9, 2017

Week 01: January 1-8, 2017

I neglected to write up a lot of 2016's notable happenings and as a result, I've already lost some of the details that I wanted to remember. So I'm going to give weekly blog entries a try; for tracking running, accountability, and some general self expression. Let's see if I can make a habit out of this.

Sunday 1/1: 12.2 miles, 722', 7:47 pace, Candia roads.

Monday: 10.2 miles, 600', 7:21 pace, Candia roads

Tuesday: 0 miles. Raining, went to lunch with co-workers instead of running.

Wednesday: 13.4 miles, 738', 7:11 pace. Manchester roads.

Thursday: 9.8 miles, 653', 7:29 pace. Macnhester roads.

Friday: 9.9 miles, 620', 7:48 pace. Manchester roads.

Saturday: 14.9 miles, 902', 8:10 pace. Candia roads.

Sunday: Zero miles. Snowy roads convinced me to skip the morning time slot and I spent my day hanging drywall. My treadmill is located in the renovation-zone right now, but I should be able to find a temporary arrangement for it so I can get miles in without worrying about getting hit by a snow plow in the dark.

My supervisor

Total: 58.3 miles, 3510', 7:24.

As for future running plans, I have no A goals until the spring time. In the interim, I'd like build some good base fitness after a low-mileage end to 2016, and to help with that I signed up for the Hyannis Marathon on late February as a shorter-term motivator. While I don't enough time to realistically train for a personal best, 3:07 or better seems achievable. This would give me the option of running Boston in 2018 and I just turned 35, so my required time just went up by five minutes to 3:10, but I'll need go a bit faster than that to get an entry slot.