jpn running - a training journal
Friday, May 15, 2015
Wednesday, May 13, 2015
getting caught up...and Eastern States 20 miler recap
It's race week, and I haven't updated this training log since I was at the halfway point of the cycle. Oops. It's worth mentioning off the bat that one of the reasons I haven't had time to put much effort into the log is simply that the training, and work, and family, have just all gone really well, and taken up a lot of my time over the last 2 months.
So, the plan here is to do a one big update of the last couple months, I'll try my best to remember to mention some of the highs and lows, and then later this week I would like to update again with my thoughts pre and post Sugarloaf.
8 weeks to go target range: 60-65 miles. ACTUAL: 66
7 weeks to go target range: 65-69 miles. ACTUAL: 68
6 weeks to go target range: 70-72 miles. ACTUAL: 75
5 weeks to go target range: 48-55 miles. ACTUAL: 45
4 weeks to go target range: 47-55 miles. ACTUAL: 58
3 weeks to go target range: 50-58 miles. ACTUAL: 62
2 weeks to go target range: 42-42 miles. ACTUAL: 48
Everything to plan! Weeks 8-7-6 to go was the big block of the workout, and it kicked off with my second B-race of the Sugarloaf Plan, the Eastern States 20-miler. ES20 is a flat, fast-ish course that most running were likely using as a marathon tune-up, and probably for Boston. For me, it was a chance to practice race day running, and to put in (hopefully) 20 miles at target marathon pace. I was coming off a rest week (of 50 miles) and I believe I received a massage either the week of or the week prior. The loose plan for the race was 5 miles at 7:15, 5 miles at 7:10, 5 miles at 7:05 and then try real hard to keep moving close to 7 min miles for miles 15-20. Things went mostly to plan through 15 miles, and while the last 5 weren't what I was hoping for, they weren't a disaster.
One of the goals for the race was to work on a fuel plan, and I took before and at ever 5 miles. The 7:10 split at mile 19 was thanks to a friendly competition I invented with myself. He had passed me when I was doing my 7:10, then I passed him back when I started doing 7:05s, and then he passed me back after mile 17, and at mile 19, just after seeing my family on the course in Hampton Beach, I decided to dig down a bit if I could to at least pass him before the finish, which I did. These are the silly games I play. The course was fairly sparse with runners, so I was working by myself most of the race, so having someone else to play catch-up to helped. Hopefully there will be a good amount of runners close to my pace at Sugarloaf.
The other goal was to try and finish the 20 miles at BQ pace, and at the finish to be able to say to myself "I could have done that for another 6 miles, no problem." That was definitely not how it finished for me though. While I did finish just at BQ pace (7:12 for my GPS distance) I'm afraid that if I had to run 6 more miles that day, they would have been in the 7:20-7:40 ballpark. But, with a good deal of training left to go, as well as a normal taper prior to Sugarloaf, I was still left hopeful that BQ was achievable based on the ES20 effort.
The next few weeks are sort of a blur. Most of the runs went well...certainly I did a better job with my tempo/intermediate length runs than I did with my long runs...I sort of suffered through some of the long runs, which included just one more 20+ miler at the end of my peak week, which was 75 miles! In a followup post, I'll include a chart with the data of the long runs, but I've done a decent job of summarizing how the long runs went in Strava, so I'll just need to reference that in the future if I'm curious.
The 75 mile peak week was a big deal to me, both mentally and physically. Boston's peak was 50 miles, Philly's peak was 64 miles, and my goal for Sugarloaf all along was to build the plan around a 75 mile peak week. The goal for a fall marathon would be an 80 mile peak week and next year's Boston, an 85-90 mile peak week. (I actually touched some of these future targets in this big block as I had to compress my longs to a Sunday followed by Saturday effort, giving me 88 miles in a 7 day stretch.) Of course by the end of the 75 miles, yes I was tired and worn out, but by that time of year, the weather had turned very nice for running, and my body seems to respond well to blocks of 3 buildup weeks followed by a rest week, and that was the case following this big block.
So, most importantly, aside from being generally fatigued over this stretch, and always pressed for time, I made it through this stretch injury free, and no worse for the wear.
So, the plan here is to do a one big update of the last couple months, I'll try my best to remember to mention some of the highs and lows, and then later this week I would like to update again with my thoughts pre and post Sugarloaf.
8 weeks to go target range: 60-65 miles. ACTUAL: 66
7 weeks to go target range: 65-69 miles. ACTUAL: 68
6 weeks to go target range: 70-72 miles. ACTUAL: 75
5 weeks to go target range: 48-55 miles. ACTUAL: 45
4 weeks to go target range: 47-55 miles. ACTUAL: 58
3 weeks to go target range: 50-58 miles. ACTUAL: 62
2 weeks to go target range: 42-42 miles. ACTUAL: 48
Everything to plan! Weeks 8-7-6 to go was the big block of the workout, and it kicked off with my second B-race of the Sugarloaf Plan, the Eastern States 20-miler. ES20 is a flat, fast-ish course that most running were likely using as a marathon tune-up, and probably for Boston. For me, it was a chance to practice race day running, and to put in (hopefully) 20 miles at target marathon pace. I was coming off a rest week (of 50 miles) and I believe I received a massage either the week of or the week prior. The loose plan for the race was 5 miles at 7:15, 5 miles at 7:10, 5 miles at 7:05 and then try real hard to keep moving close to 7 min miles for miles 15-20. Things went mostly to plan through 15 miles, and while the last 5 weren't what I was hoping for, they weren't a disaster.
One of the goals for the race was to work on a fuel plan, and I took before and at ever 5 miles. The 7:10 split at mile 19 was thanks to a friendly competition I invented with myself. He had passed me when I was doing my 7:10, then I passed him back when I started doing 7:05s, and then he passed me back after mile 17, and at mile 19, just after seeing my family on the course in Hampton Beach, I decided to dig down a bit if I could to at least pass him before the finish, which I did. These are the silly games I play. The course was fairly sparse with runners, so I was working by myself most of the race, so having someone else to play catch-up to helped. Hopefully there will be a good amount of runners close to my pace at Sugarloaf.
 |
| I actually didn't feel that overdressed... |
The other goal was to try and finish the 20 miles at BQ pace, and at the finish to be able to say to myself "I could have done that for another 6 miles, no problem." That was definitely not how it finished for me though. While I did finish just at BQ pace (7:12 for my GPS distance) I'm afraid that if I had to run 6 more miles that day, they would have been in the 7:20-7:40 ballpark. But, with a good deal of training left to go, as well as a normal taper prior to Sugarloaf, I was still left hopeful that BQ was achievable based on the ES20 effort.
The next few weeks are sort of a blur. Most of the runs went well...certainly I did a better job with my tempo/intermediate length runs than I did with my long runs...I sort of suffered through some of the long runs, which included just one more 20+ miler at the end of my peak week, which was 75 miles! In a followup post, I'll include a chart with the data of the long runs, but I've done a decent job of summarizing how the long runs went in Strava, so I'll just need to reference that in the future if I'm curious.
The 75 mile peak week was a big deal to me, both mentally and physically. Boston's peak was 50 miles, Philly's peak was 64 miles, and my goal for Sugarloaf all along was to build the plan around a 75 mile peak week. The goal for a fall marathon would be an 80 mile peak week and next year's Boston, an 85-90 mile peak week. (I actually touched some of these future targets in this big block as I had to compress my longs to a Sunday followed by Saturday effort, giving me 88 miles in a 7 day stretch.) Of course by the end of the 75 miles, yes I was tired and worn out, but by that time of year, the weather had turned very nice for running, and my body seems to respond well to blocks of 3 buildup weeks followed by a rest week, and that was the case following this big block.
So, most importantly, aside from being generally fatigued over this stretch, and always pressed for time, I made it through this stretch injury free, and no worse for the wear.
Monday, March 23, 2015
9 weeks to go (halfway to Sugarloaf)
9 weeks to go (Down week)
Go-in target range: 40-45 miles
Coach Alan's plan: 45, w/ one off-day
Workouts:
Pace for the week: 7:30
The one (physical) bothering me the most: I would say my right glute/upper hamstring, which feels tight when I'm not running. Close second would be the outside of my left knee, that started feeling weak towards the end of the long run this week.
Weather sort of cooperated this week...well, not really. Early in the week we had decent weather, and I had a nice Monday recovery hill run up to BC from work. Tuesday, the wind came, and was a factor most of the rest of the week. Maartje was recovering from her race early in the week and was on Yasso duty, so Alan came out to NB to run the Tuesday session with me along the Charles. Wind was racing, 15-20 mph with gusts that definitely seemed stronger than that. That helped us most of the way out through our warmup and the first few miles of the 4 mile tempo, but after 3 miles it was time to reverse and face the music. The last mile was a lot of effort to barely move at times, but thanks to the downwind sections, we hit 6:35 for this segment (vs target of 6:50.) The 2 miles then came all into the wind, and we pushed hard to hit 6:40 pace (vs target of 6:30.) As Alan put it midway through the run, given the conditions we were running into, this was about effort more than just pace. By the end of that 2 mile section, Alan was basically asking me if I was OK because I was struggling to keep up with him and the 6:40 pace. For the final fast mile, we did a bridge to bridge loop that had us half with wind, half against it. The bridge in the middle was a pace hindrance though...a touch of elevation and people to dodge. We hit 6:15 for that mile though, which I was happy with. Alan smartly had us moving close to 6 min pace for the whole downwind section to start it out, and the return trip was like running into a wall. For the entire 11.7 miles we managed 7:10 pace-happy with that effort!
The wind kept right on blowing the rest of the week, followed by a few inches of snow on Saturday! I didn't do anything hard in this portion of the week, but I did finish every run with a set of strides, and my paces were fine. Saturday in the snow, I hoped to find PJP runable, but it really wasn't at all in the far west section (I think it has been drifting up there all winter) and I bailed hard coming down a decline when I couldn't see what was beneath the new snow (it was solid ice.) I don't know when I'm going to be able to run hard and fast in PJP again, but my guess is not for at least a couple of more weeks. Disappointing, as that is a comfortable spot for me to run in after kid bedtime on weekday nights and I'm expecting a need to be out there doing work as I enter into the next buildup phase prior to our Europe trip.
Maartje and I were able to connect for the long run this week, thankfully. Esteban joined us also, so I was fortunate to have strong company. In an effort to get in some downhill work as practice for the significant downhill I'll be working through at Sugarloaf, we drove one car out to Ashland to run 16 miles back in to BC on the course. We had a really nice tailwind the whole way, and we were clipping off low 7:20 miles for the majority of our run, at an effort level that felt (to me) more like mid 7:30s, but I do believe I was working harder than I realized, since midway through the 6 2 minute pickups, my legs crumbled on me. Strong pace for the run (and the week) but not pumped about my finish to the long run. At 16 miles, I was still about a mile away from the car and I decided to split the runs and treat the surplus mile as cool-down. I took my sweet time climbing heartbreak (and descending as well.) Here's the link to the longrun.
The conclusion of that week brings me to halfway through the 16 week training program, and I'm happy to say that so far, I feel as though things are on track towards a BQ. My workouts have gone almost entirely to plan, and both my overall training pace (7:39 average) and long run pace (7:27 average) are in good shape. I've put in 411 miles, which is over 30% more than the 314 I had run for Philly. Here are two of my favorite graphs capturing the progress, miles per week and pace per week from the three training period of the last year.
And here's another good one!
Good trends on those graphs, hoping they continue on moving in the right directions.
Go-in target range: 40-45 miles
Coach Alan's plan: 45, w/ one off-day
Workouts:
- Tuesday: 4 mile tempo at 6:50 pace, 4 mins recovery jog, 2 mile at 6:30 (threshold) pace, 3 mins recovery, 1 mile at 6:15 pace w/ warmup & cooldown
- Sunday: long run of 16 miles at 7:30 pace w 6x2 min pickups to finish.
Pace for the week: 7:30
The one (physical) bothering me the most: I would say my right glute/upper hamstring, which feels tight when I'm not running. Close second would be the outside of my left knee, that started feeling weak towards the end of the long run this week.
Weather sort of cooperated this week...well, not really. Early in the week we had decent weather, and I had a nice Monday recovery hill run up to BC from work. Tuesday, the wind came, and was a factor most of the rest of the week. Maartje was recovering from her race early in the week and was on Yasso duty, so Alan came out to NB to run the Tuesday session with me along the Charles. Wind was racing, 15-20 mph with gusts that definitely seemed stronger than that. That helped us most of the way out through our warmup and the first few miles of the 4 mile tempo, but after 3 miles it was time to reverse and face the music. The last mile was a lot of effort to barely move at times, but thanks to the downwind sections, we hit 6:35 for this segment (vs target of 6:50.) The 2 miles then came all into the wind, and we pushed hard to hit 6:40 pace (vs target of 6:30.) As Alan put it midway through the run, given the conditions we were running into, this was about effort more than just pace. By the end of that 2 mile section, Alan was basically asking me if I was OK because I was struggling to keep up with him and the 6:40 pace. For the final fast mile, we did a bridge to bridge loop that had us half with wind, half against it. The bridge in the middle was a pace hindrance though...a touch of elevation and people to dodge. We hit 6:15 for that mile though, which I was happy with. Alan smartly had us moving close to 6 min pace for the whole downwind section to start it out, and the return trip was like running into a wall. For the entire 11.7 miles we managed 7:10 pace-happy with that effort!
The wind kept right on blowing the rest of the week, followed by a few inches of snow on Saturday! I didn't do anything hard in this portion of the week, but I did finish every run with a set of strides, and my paces were fine. Saturday in the snow, I hoped to find PJP runable, but it really wasn't at all in the far west section (I think it has been drifting up there all winter) and I bailed hard coming down a decline when I couldn't see what was beneath the new snow (it was solid ice.) I don't know when I'm going to be able to run hard and fast in PJP again, but my guess is not for at least a couple of more weeks. Disappointing, as that is a comfortable spot for me to run in after kid bedtime on weekday nights and I'm expecting a need to be out there doing work as I enter into the next buildup phase prior to our Europe trip.
Maartje and I were able to connect for the long run this week, thankfully. Esteban joined us also, so I was fortunate to have strong company. In an effort to get in some downhill work as practice for the significant downhill I'll be working through at Sugarloaf, we drove one car out to Ashland to run 16 miles back in to BC on the course. We had a really nice tailwind the whole way, and we were clipping off low 7:20 miles for the majority of our run, at an effort level that felt (to me) more like mid 7:30s, but I do believe I was working harder than I realized, since midway through the 6 2 minute pickups, my legs crumbled on me. Strong pace for the run (and the week) but not pumped about my finish to the long run. At 16 miles, I was still about a mile away from the car and I decided to split the runs and treat the surplus mile as cool-down. I took my sweet time climbing heartbreak (and descending as well.) Here's the link to the longrun.
The conclusion of that week brings me to halfway through the 16 week training program, and I'm happy to say that so far, I feel as though things are on track towards a BQ. My workouts have gone almost entirely to plan, and both my overall training pace (7:39 average) and long run pace (7:27 average) are in good shape. I've put in 411 miles, which is over 30% more than the 314 I had run for Philly. Here are two of my favorite graphs capturing the progress, miles per week and pace per week from the three training period of the last year.
And here's another good one!
Good trends on those graphs, hoping they continue on moving in the right directions.
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