5 Weeks until Philly (Oct 20-26)

Planned miles: 42
Actual miles: 54
Planned long run: 18
Actual long run: 18
Accumulated pace for the week: 8:08

Links to key workouts: 8x Yasso 800s avg 3:02; 18 miles with 2x6 miles at marathon pace

Not bad views for an 18 mile run in the city of Boston.

 54 miles is (by 4 miles) the most I've ever run in a week before.

On a whim, I started Monday off with an easy 5.5mile lunch run along the Charles from work, and then ran the Milton 6mile loop in the evening when I got home, and then followed that up Tuesday with the Yasso 800s (fortunately I had company for that) that ended up totaling another 12 miles, and my week was off to a good start!

Wednesday I rested (I think I remember it POURING rain that day) and then Thursday I got out for an easy lunch run to PJP park, but an easy run Thur because I knew my long run would come on Friday.

Given that we would be out of town for the weekend at a wedding, I knew there was basically no way I could run my long run away from home, so I decided to take Friday afternoon off work to do my long run.  I used this workout from Competitor Magazine that I came across on Facebook a little while ago: a long run of 18 consisting of 2-3 miles of warmup, 6 miles at marathon pace, 10 min rest, 6 more miles at marathon pace, then 2 miles of cool-down.

Knowing the elevation profile of the Philly marathon, and that it is not terribly hilly, I decided to do the core 14 miles of the long run right in PJP park on a 1.3 mile loop of path along the water.  It has some very small elevation incline/decline, which is less than what I'll experience at Philly, but here are the advantages of doing  the long run this way: 1) water and fuel are right there when I need them.  2) no cars, no intersections, no stopping.  3) the feel of a track...just on a much larger scale with slightly more variation in the elevation.  4) there are a couple of bathrooms...just in case.  And I must say: it worked out really well to do my run there.

View coming back around the smaller section to my start/finish

I began the first 6 mile leg faster (at close to 7:15-7:20 min/mile) than what I hope to run the marathon in, which, to break 3:20, will be 7:37 min/mile pace.  That first 6 mile segment went fine and I still had fuel in the tank when I finished, but the second 6 mile leg was a challenge, even after the bathroom break and slow mile that I did in between.  I made a point to take in a big bottle of water, a half a bottle of gatorade, a bag of caffeinated Jelly Belly Sport Beans, and one 50mg Power Gel over the course of the workout, mostly prior to the second 6 mile leg, which was all much needed.  By the 4th and 5th mile of the second 6mile segment, I was struggling to stay below 7:40 pace, but I did rally on the 6th mile.

However, towards the end of the second leg, so miles 14-16 of the run) I was having trouble holding what even I would consider decent form...my cadence fell back towards 180 (I tend to run at 190 when I'm running marathon pace) and my stride started to get choppy, and I would catch myself running in awkward positions that I didn't seem able to do much about.  And, the run home was a cool down run, but over 9 min miles and certainly not a strong finish to the day.  BUT, the 12 miles at marathon pace, for the most part, went really well.

I was also able to experiment with footwear, using my pair of 1400v2 for a long run for the first time.  Over the last few months, I've come to really appreciate these shoes, and I tend to run fast and well in them, with only a few exceptions.  After getting used to the 1400v2, the 890v4s I wore post-Boston now feel heavy and sluggish to me.  I would like to wear these shoes at Philly, but I'm not sure if they'll support my weight over 26.2 miles.  Getting 18 down in them felt great, and I'll wear them on my 22+ long run this week as well.

Next week: hoping to stretch 48 planned miles to 60+, including at least one day of easy doubles, 9xYasso 800s, 5-4-3-2-1 Long run (22-23 miles) and possibly a late week tempo run.  Massages coming the first two weeks in November...can't wait for that!

Miles run in the past 12 months: 1,635
Miles run in 2014: 1,455
Philly plan through 12 weeks: 495 miles run vs planned 445.
Philly plan vs Boston plan through 12 weeks: 495 miles vs 446.

6 weeks until Philly

Planned miles: 33
Actual miles: 35
Planned long run: 15
Actual long run: 12
Accumulated pace for the week: 8:33

Links to key runs: Sunday's 2x2mile tempo rune

After averaging over 40 miles a week for the last month plus, this was a planned recovery week, with the goal of taking it a bit easy on the mileage and pace after the Npt Marathon.  The real goal is to make sure that, coming out of this week, I can increase my mileage to 40-50  miles a week (potentially 50-60 if I'm feeling great) and to run 2 long runs of 18 and 22 with long segments at marathon goal (7:30) pace.  Inside of my plan, I had no track work scheduled, but hopefully a late week tempo run followed by medium length long run of 15-16 miles.

In an effort to try and balance my social/family life with my running life, I tried to hit the 15 mile long run (at an easy 8:30-8:45 pace) Sat AM at 7am (to try and begin lining myself up for the philly 7am start time) and the goal was to do 9 miles through PJP along the water to UMass, and then to do the final 6 through some small hills in Milton.  On my return towards Lower Mills, I really wasn't feeling great at all, and a Power Gel w/ water didn't really help at all, so I decided to shorten the run up to 12 miles by running back and forth on the Neponset bike path/trail for a bit.  Needless to say, I was frustrated when I got home, but I was able to rationalize a few things...it had only been 6 days since Newport, and if I rested and came back for only 6 miles the following day I would hit my mileage goal for the week, with the hope that the abbreviated long run would help in the....well, in the long run.

The real kicker was that all last week, beginning with the Newport Marathon, the weather was PERFECT fall weather for running, but the entire time I was slogging through my runs, struggling to drop below 9 min miles at times.

That said, Saturday turned out to be a really nice day for family activities, filled with apply picking at Lookout Farm in Natick and then date night for the BC-Clemson game, and I'm glad for it since it was good to be up and moving around as much as possible.   Most importantly, I got plenty of good sleep both nights and Sunday AM I was feeling as fresh as I had felt all week.

I decided not to run in the AM to give the legs an extra few hours of relief, and by the early afternoon I had it in my head to try something faster, which for me is anything in the 7s at this point.  An FHR runner had mentioned recently that she runs a split tempo session fairly often, which I tried a few weeks ago by doing laps in PJP park.  I gave it a whirl Sunday afternoon with a 1+ warmup followed by 2x2mi tempo runs, with a 4 min jog in between.  When I ran this a few weeks ago, I was right around 7 min miles for the 4 mile laps of tempo, and this time out I was 6:50, 6:55, 6:47, 6:47...that's really good for me!  So, I came home and when M asked me how it went, I gave her a little waist-high fist-pump and told her it was a good run.  Bonus, the extra couple miles for this run brought me up over my goal for the week.

It was a hard week of running, but it ended well and I feel like I'm very much on track for my training.

Sorry, no race pics to liven up this week's entry.

The plan for the next three weeks is:
5 weeks to go: 42 miles with Yasso 8x800, 2x6mile long run totaling 18 miles, short tempo run. STRETCH GOAL: 50 miles
4 weeks to go: PEAK WEEK 48 miles with Yasso 9x800, 5-4-3-2-1 long run totaling 22 miles, short tempo run.  STRETCH GOAL: 55-60 miles
3 weeks to go: 40 miles with Yasso 10x800, 16 mile long run with final 6 at race pace 7:30, short tempo run. STRETCH GOAL: 45 miles

I'll also treat myself to two massages in this time frame.

Newport Marathon Week (Oct 6 through Oct 12)

50 miles (XT adjusted) vs 46 planned miles.
Links to Key Runs: Yasso (7x800) avg 3:04  and Newport Marathon 3:41


Goals for Newport:

1. Run negative mile splits for as much of the race as possible, beginning with a VERY conservative opening 5-6 miles 9:30 down to 8:30 min/miles.  Increase the pace over the next 10 miles to a comfortable pace between 7:45 and 8:15.  Finish with a strong final 10 miles, dropping down under 7:30 min/miles, if the legs feel up to it.  Mentally, a strong finish feels important to me 6 weeks out from Philly.
2. Don't do anything that might injure yourself.
3. Take the opportunity to work on race day hydration and nutrition.  This includes pre and post race.
4. Enjoy this one!  No pressure to race fast.  Enjoy the views.  Stop and say hi to the kids.  It's awesome that Cait is running the half in the same race I'm running the full...how cool is that for the kids to see?!
5. In my training log, I entered in target 1/2 splits of 1:55 for the front and 1:45 for the back, and the night before the race I told Caitlin my goal was to break 3:40.

Everything went according to plan the week of the race.  I was recovered enough by Wednesday to do my Yassos at the Harvard Track, and at a fairly strong pace.  I skipped the week's tempo session (as planned) but focused on stretches spent Thur-Sat tapering and carb-loading.  After reading about Steve Way's process of Carb depletion prior to carb loading, that was somewhat in my mind early in the week, but considering it wasn't a true taper, I wasn't sure how that would affect it, so I didn't really shy away from carbs early in the week.

Friday I got a great night of sleep, and then nana picked the kids up Saturday afternoon to take them to the cape. Saturday was a cold-ish rainy day, so I spend most of the day watching the Kona Ironman.  My interests where to see how FHR leader Owen would fair as well as NB athlete Sebastian Kienle, and they both had an awesome day, with Kienle winning.  Went out for an Italian mean early Saturday evening (before 5pm, without kids!) and then watched a movie (Wolf of Wall Street) Sat evening.  I'm not sure why, but I missed an opportunity to stretch for most of the movie because I just sat on the couch.  Also, I'm not sure I drank enough water the day before the race, and was generally not as disciplined with water, food, rest, stretching as I would have liked to have been the day before the race.

With the race starting at 7:30, and being an hour and a half away, I was up at 4:45 to walk H before having breakfast (coffee, water, smoothie, banana, oatmeal w/ brown sugar), and hitting the (night) road with Caitlin.  While it was a great day for running (clear day without much wind and race time temps around 50 degrees) it was pretty chilly in the AM before the race started, with temps in the low to mid 40's.  Here was the view as we pulled into the beach parking lot where we would catch a shuttle to the race.

Sunrise in Newport

Everything went according to schedule, which was huge because I really didn't want to be running around in a panic prior to the race.  The race actually started 15 minutes late, which resulted in a lot of grumpy and cold runners.  The first few miles, I stuck to my plan of running well above 9 minute miles, but in mile three I stopped (and waited 20 seconds for a free one) to use a porta-potty, and then when I resumed running, I felt comfortable running mid 8's and stuck to that for most of the first half of the marathon.

Through 6 miles, I was averaging 8:59 minute miles. 

My official half marathon time was 1:56, but my watch tracked me as having 2 minutes of non-running time that I will deem "avoidable." I'll also say that the landscape of the initial half marathon is stunning...mansions and beautiful sea views nearly the entire 13 miles.  As a half marathon, I really really enjoyed the course, and would love to go back and run the 1/2 again in the future.
 

 Miles 7 through 13, I averaged 8:24 minute miles, 

bringing my average down to 8:41

The other minute was a stop just before the 1/2 marathon pt to say Hi to C and R (who was playing on the beach and didn't even want to come over right away to give me a high five!)  At the Boston marathon in April, I ran by the family so fast that C wasn't able to pick me out of the crowd, and it was actually pretty upsetting for him.  Every time I ran a race after that he would get upset and say "you're not even going to stop to say hi!"  So, when I pulled over a few hundred yards before the 1/2 marathon finish line to say hi, I was a little surprised that he wasn't actually all that excited to see me...at the time he was per-occupied with getting the beach sand off his feet.   So, after a (literal) minute there, including a photo taken with the kids and Nana on a very un-digital camera, I resumed the run to try and drop the pace a bit.

Mile 14-20, I averaged 8:12 minute miles, 

bringing the total average down to 8:31.

The strategy of starting off very slow and then accelerating through the rest of the race lead to the natural result of passing people...a LOT of people.  When the results were posted, I looked at my standing after the 6 mile time check, the 1/2 marathon time check, and at the finish.  I passed 80 people between mile 6 and 13.1, and then another 210 people in the second half.  The runner with the second most passes over that stretch had 200.  There are some obvious positives to passing that many people, but the downside is not having runners moving with you at your desired pace.  I realized that benefit of that at Nahant.  (My hope is to run Philly in fairly even splits, hopefully at around 1:40 for each, and I hope I can fall in with other runners who are moving at the same pace.)

Aside from the first and last mile of the half marathon, I would definitely qualify the first half of the marathon as "rolling hills," but the back half of the marathon was challenging.  The out-and-back nature was mentally challenging...just running up hills that I knew I would have to ascend again from the other direction (2-5 miles later, of course) made it hard to really power up the hills, and the entire run carried roughly the same elevation gain as the punishing Nahant 30k, and substantially more than the Boston Marathon.  Considering the elevation, and that I was running a training run, I'm very happy with the way I finished out the race.

Miles 21-26 I averaged 7:43 minute miles, 

bringing the total for the marathon down to 8:26.

I was lucky to have one young guy pass me coming down the hill at mile 23 or so got my competitive juices going.  I stuck with him along the beach and then coming back up the last steep incline (approaching mile 25) I passed him back and then kept him behind me through the finish, and I moved pretty fast through the final mile of the race, which I'm pleased with.  As for fuel, I held on to a pack of Jelly Belly sport beans (50 mg of caffeine in the bag) and chewed a couple with each water stop through about mile 15.  I took down a 50mg caf power gel at mile 7, a 25 mg caf power gel at mile 14, and 50 mg caf power gel at mile 19...all with water.  I tried to mix in gatorade as well as water at as many of the stops as I could, and also scored the top half of a banana at around mile 12.

Cait took 10 minutes off her 1/2 marathon PR and I didn't end up in the ER this time!!

Post race, I was a little out of it for a maybe an hour or two...I was actually struggling to stand during the above photo.  Getting a ton of liquids into my body (water, gatorade, coco water AND chocolate milk) made a huge difference, and when we stopped for lunch an hour after the race's finish, I stayed away from any fried or greasy food and stuck with a club sandwich (wrap) and rice.  The rice hit the spot.  The final stop on the way home was at CVS to get three bags of ice for an ice bath, which was misery! But, I followed that up with a hot bath (which I read later is not recommended for 48 hours after a marathon, but that was the same article that suggested waiting 26 days until your next hard workout....) and then an afternoon in compression calf sleeves and a ton of water, and by that night I was actually moving around really well!

So, all in all, a totally successful marathon training run!  I am a little daunted by the fact that my goal for Philly is to run 20 minutes (a HUGE drop) faster than Newport, but I still have 3 huge weeks of training/long runs left to go, and I'll have the benefit of a taper before Philly.  I like my bridge marathon approach, and I was able to check Rhode Island off my list of states!  Wins for the Neal-Murphy family all around!

Miles run in the past 12 months: 1,554
Miles run in 2014: 1,371
Philly plan through 10 weeks: 406 miles run vs planned 370.
Philly plan vs Boston plan through 10 weeks: 406 miles vs 378.

That concludes the "Race" portion of my training schedule, which included 6 races in the last 5 weeks: 22 miles at the RTB relay; 5k; 30k; 5k; Mile; Marathon.  Next week is a bit of a recovery week at 33 miles, with no speed work planned.  I do hope to get in a late week tempo run as well as a 15 mile long run next weekend.  This recovery week leads into 3 monster weeks averaging 44 miles a week, with Yasso 8-10x800s, longer tempo runs, and long runs of 16-22 miles with significant portions at marathon pace.  Should be fun!

Oktoberfest 5k and Franklin Park Mile Race recap (Sept 29 through Oct 5)

This week's plan: 35 miles
This week's actual: 42 miles

Key runs: Yasso 6x800 @  3:14; Oktoberfest 5k 20:34; Franklin Park Mile 5:49

Going into the philly marathon schedule, I had it in my head to run the Newport Marathon as a long training run.  With the Nahant 30k just two weeks prior to that, I was originally planning on doing a bit of a mini-taper this in-between week to recover a bit.  I was planning on maintaining the Yasso 800 mid-week track workout.  I finally clued into the fact that there is a really nice track just about 1.25 miles away from my work, so as long as I'm able to take a long lunch, I can run there to do my 800s.  Of course, for this session it was cold, windy and raining, but no matter!

After clearing that off my to-do list mid-week, I was content to skip the tempo run and for my long run on Saturday, I did 6 miles along the water in PJP and then 6 miles through Milton hills, but at a modest pace, which left me energy for Sunday's races.

A month or two ago, a good friend from work suggested that for her birthday, we should all do an Oktoberfest 5k (complete with post-run beer garden and pretzels!) but the conflict was that that was the same day as Forrest Hill Runners own Franklin Park Mile, so...short races, but a busy day on tired legs.

Everything went fine in the AM, I didn't run nearly as well as I had a few weeks earlier in Framingham, and finished about a minute off that PR.  I can't say I really held back much, I opened up at 6:20 for the first mile, but after that, I just didn't really have 5th gear available to me and hit 6:30 for my middle split before dropping back down to 6:20,  Realistically, my goal for this race was to break 20 minutes, which I came up a bit short of.  BUT, it was a good race, and it was a chance to break out my 2014 Germany jersey.

Approaching the finish line.  I beat this guy to the line.

Following a quick cool-down....beer time!

Not pictured: my beer, behind the birthday girl.

So.....after that, I headed home to rest for a bit before running over to Franklin Park to meet up with Forrest Hill people.  I could barely get going under 9 minute miles on the run over to FP though, so I didn't have high hopes for the Mile race. I ran the course once...slowly, before the women's heat started off the day.  My goal for this race, based on how my legs were feeling coming off Nahant, was to just break 6 minutes.  Please keep in mind, I've owned a Garmin watch since April 2013, and the fastest I've ever traveled any mile has been 6:01, which was the first mile of the Framingham 5k, so to break 6 minutes would be a nice accomplishment for me.

The race was actually loaded with sub 5 minute guys, so at the start I was a little overwhelmed and didn't fly off the starting line, but after 800m, we hit a small hill that I had an easier time with than 2 or 3 of the guys around me, so over the remaining 800, which is over varying terrain, I was able to pick up the pace and close ground on a guy that was 20-30m in front of me while we both finished strong.

After all that, it ended up being a busy, and faster week, than I was planning on having...especially the weekend before running a marathon.

Halfway to Philly

8 Weeks to Philly!!  < and the blog is back on track! :) >

Thought I would take this opportunity, as I'm resting prior to running not one, but TWO races tomorrow, to update the blog on the performance vs the plan.

Through 8 weeks of training for the 2014 Boston marathon, I had run 288 miles.
Through 8 weeks of the PLAN for the 2014 Philly marathon, I planned to run 290 miles.
Through 8 weeks of actual miles for the 2014 Philly marathon, I have run 314 miles.

So far this year, I have run 1,277 miles.

Here's what life looks like since getting my Garmin.  4 month Marathon prep months are color-coded.

(click to enlarge)

Here are some graphs tracking my progress towards the Philly marathon.









 A note about weight...at the start of 2013, before I started running again, I weighed 218 lbs.  At the start of 2014 I weighted 188.  As the above chart shows, I have plateaued recently at 178, but my hope is to run the Philly marathon as close to 170 as I can get.  Realistically, knowing how I lose weight, I will probably be close to 175 for Philly.  Of note, I was slightly over 180 at the running of the 2014 Boston marathon.