October (2016) Running Challenge

Still in rest mode as my quad pain is slowly subsiding but my calves are aching hard today. Given the aches, pains, and hobbling I was doing around Chicago yesterday (vs. fellow competitors in the airport, museum, finish line, etc..), I think I may hold off on doing full marathons in racing flats as the lightness is nice, but the recovery seems slower.

May try a pull buoy aided (no legs) swim today so I don't fall too far behind on swimming training, and maybe a bike tomorrow, but no recovery running planned until at least Friday. Got in 12,000 steps (navigating the city/museums/old office/airport), which probably didn't help much as well.

Oddly enough, got on the scale this morning, and noticed I was about 10lb heavier than a week ago (before starting my carbo-load), but suspect the few flights, carbo load, swelling in my legs from the recovery, and retained water are probably keeping me out of equilibrium for a few days. From a calorie net standpoint, I'm guessing I'll come out of this up about 3lb, but I'll check again in a few days. Still, if I ended up running the race 8lb heaver than my target weight and 2lb heavier than Pittsburgh it gives me a bit more hope on my next one if I can (sustainably) get down to a better racing weight.

10/1 - 5 miles (w. 5x800s @ 6:00 pace)
10/2 - 8 miles (finished at MP)
10/3 - 4 miles
10/4 - 4 miles
10/7 - 3 miles
10/8 - 26.2 miles (3:04:57 - Chicago marathon)

Total: 50 miles
Goal: 140 miles
Remaining: 90 miles

2016 Race Schedule:
Disney Marathon - Jan 6 - 3:29:09
Gasparilla 15K - Feb 20 - 1:01:59
Ironman 70.3 Florida - Apr 10 - 5:07:51
Pittsburgh Marathon - May 1 - 3:08:25
Ironman 70.3 Augusta - Sep 25 - 4:43:56
Chicago Marathon - Oct 9 - 3:04:57
Ironman Florida - Nov 5
Rock 'n Roll Las Vegas 10K - Nov 13

Now that I'm back to my PC, and have caught up on a few hundred posts:

@kristinegift - Congrads on the alum win for the college 5K and more importantly your even pacing!

@ddmom0811 - It'll be another day or two before I hit up the bike, but hope the debris isn't too bad here across the state. Beach is covered with seaweed and has eroded a bit, but otherwise neighborhood is mostly unscathed now that I'm back.

@mnlittlefinn - Thanks for the support and continued well wishes! Having friends, recognizable landmarks, and a familiar route all helps with a full marathon, and I'm glad I did one in my hometown as my first. 15 weeks is a perfect gap between a HM and your first full, as most training plans have you complete a HM as part of the M cycle (albeit closer to 8-10 weeks apart). No strong opinions on separate plans vs. consolidated plan.

@mobycarp - Ended up tracking my few Kona teammates online and I think each of them except one looked at the race as more of a victory lap as 3/4 had qualified recently (Boulder & Vineman) and were about 1-2 hours slower than their qualifying races. Still, they all seemed to love it, and our tri-team captain who qualified a year back at Florida had a great race as he was much better rested. I hope your recovery continues and your body progresses so you can get back to running and enjoying it. If a BQ-10 isn't good enough for Boston next year, I'm giving up.

@ereck44 - Congrads on your PR. After racing 2+ hours, I'm shocked I can get up after sitting down, but at least can enjoy catching other finishers. Late in races, I'll usually just go by my heart rate to gauge effort, and it seems that every time a body part twinges, I get paranoid it'll shut down and leave me hobbling to the finish.

@orphia - Glad you enjoyed trail running. I do lots of well marked paths, but whenever I try less well marked paths, or do some hashing, I keep on having too many close calls to falls to want to make it a regular thing. Still, if you can find some well maintained trails, it'll definitely reduce the pounding your legs experience.

@respectthekitty - Thanks for the pre-race well wishes. Weather was absolutely incredible for the race and my lungs didn't burn either as it was just warm enough. Didn't even need to start dunking water until late in the race as the wind helped, as did the drier air.

@katharmonic - Congrads on your HM, especially squeaking under your goal time! Always great when you have enough in the tank to kick hard at the end. My quads are still hurting, but it usually takes about 3-4 days for soreness to subside after marathons.

@adrianchr29 - Huge congrads on your HM. Loved reading the race report, and your pacing (and consistency) was amazing. Funny reading about the concerned grandmother! Glad you had a friend to push you regardless of the 7 seconds. It has been awesome reading about your improvements here over the past few months and I think you definitely have the ability to tackle something bigger in the spring if you can manage the winter training.

@cljoe7- I should have DVRed the broadcast! Didn't realize it was televised.

And a big thanks for the kudos - @_nikkiwolf_ @louubelle16 @skippygirlsmom @lporter229 @stoshew71 @jodilynnsanders5104 @untermrad @elise4270 (you'll get back soon) @honunui

No problems waking up for my run this morning. The going was a bit slow, though. My legs were still a bit tight as I walked 4 miles and climbed the stairs at work twice (18 floors) yesterday (hell of a rest day!). Today I did my 5.3 mile loop, taking care to avoid the wooded area of the Prairie Path as it was still dark when I left at 6:30 am.

This was my first run with my new pepper spray that arrived yesterday. It's got a Velcro strap so you can hold it in your hand while you run. It was fine, I didn't have any issues with something attached to my hand. It made me feel a wee bit safer.

Hey
10/01 6.5 miles
10/07 3.1 miles
10/10 13.1 miles Half marathon PB!!

I'll add my race report to the many others floating around that I haven't had chance to read, kudos to all of you.
After not having a great build up after twisting my knee a few weeks before the race, and a friend I was running with not managing to to get much training in with a bad cold we weren't aiming to beat the previous time of 2:59:05 for our half we were aiming just to finish.

I've got to say Oxford have managed to put on an amazing half marathon, great atmosphere around the course, thought it was really well set up. We were setting out to run 5k then walk 0.5k just to keep injuries at bay but we were feeling good and took our first walking break at 7k going faster than planned but feeling good, our next walking break was at 14.5k for just over the half kilometre this time but still in fairly good shape compared to Edinburgh last year, at this point we knew we'd definitely come in at below our previous half even run walking the rest. Had a little walk just before we got into where the main crowds were for the last mile and just kept the legs ticking over crossing the line together in 2:53:49 taking over 5 minutes off our previous time. Very pretty and flat course I'd definitely recommend to anyone in the UK (or abroad if they fancy the travel). I'm just glad I didn't get overtaken by the minion although I did get beaten by the Honey monster.

The best thing is the knee is no worse than it was before the race so just going to take the rest seriously this week with gentle walks, stretching and maybe a swim to keep me ticking over and get my knee back to 100% before I start doing anything too stressful on it.

200+ posts to catch up on..YIKES!

I had three runs over the weekend, all pain free!

10/07 - 4.6 miles with Kody
10/08 - 5.3 miles with Kody, on the trails
10/09 - 5.0 miles with Kody
10/10 - 3.0 mile walk with Kody
Total for October - 14.9 Miles

I'm thrilled to be running pain free. I've decided I'm going keep the runs in the 5+ range until mid November and then start ramping up from there towards my ultra. I have two hunting trips and a trip to see my daughter between now and then so I won't be getting full mileage anyway. I just want to make sure my calf is good before the ramp up to 50K.

Some pix from my trail run Saturday. Kody had a great time!








@MobyCarp sorry to see your continued problems getting your run back, but it does sound like you're making some progress. I returned a pair of my ASICS Gel Nimbus on a warranty claim, even told ASICS that they had 250 miles on them, and they still replaced them.

10/1 - 2.08 Easy
10/4 - 4.0 Easy Track AM
10/4 - 2.04 XC Indian Run PM
10/5 - 7.18 Easy W/ 2 @ MP
10/6 - 5.13 Easy
10/7 - 5.25 Easy
10/9 - 26.53 Prairie Fire Marathon
10/10 - 1.12 Super Easy
10/11 - 3.31 Recovery

Total 56.64 of 140 Miles

Today I was a little more sore than yesterday, but still feeling really good considering. I got up a bit early and did some stretching and light core work at home before taking all the kids to school. I headed out for a easy recovery run before going in to work. Legs felt good and there was really no pain anywhere, a little tightness in the the hamstrings but nothing that had me concerned. Probably do another couple days of easy recovery paced runs until the legs feel completely back to normal before doing anything longer than 3-4 miles. Hopefully by this weekend I can do a 8-10 mile long run

I had some time last night to review all my data from the marathon, and look at the results that were posted. Although I wasn't able to run the sub 4 hr goal pace due to some hip issues I was able to get fairly close without over doing it and re-aggravating things. I ran my slowest marathon half way split at 2:02:50 and was in 233rd place over 495 overall, previous marathon were faster with worse overall finishes. Our race has a dual start half and full that splits about 6 miles in so it was fairly crowded at the start with over 2k people. I had several people that I chatted with during that part of the course to pass the time so the miles seemed to fly by. At the split it got a bit lonely out there. I could only see about 4-5 people in front of me, and it took a bit of time to finally catch one of them. Once I finally got up to her about 10 miles in she was beginning to fad a bit and said she was going to slow down some, which sucked because i really want to run with someone through about mile 14 when the half and the full came back together and I had to start dodging walkers. I really couldn't tell how many other marathon runners I was passing during miles 14 - 18 because you had to concentrate on weaving through the walkers. At Mile 20 my time was 3:08:xx, for some reason my time didn't register at the mat but that is roughly what I remember. I was is about 213th so i had passed 20 runners, with only 1 runner at about mile 15 passing me, who ended up running a 7 minute negative split. I still never had found anyone who was running at or near my pace to run any length with. I guess running all my long runs this summer solo payed off. I began to pass more and more people who were starting to hit that wall at about 21-22 miles and my pace was off just slightly but i was still running fairly comfortable. I ended up 184th overall and 26/51 in age group. It was nice to finally have a good marathon experience without having any issues with cramping or wanting to shoot myself to end the pain. Every run i've looked at on Strava or Garmin Connect had the distance at 26.5-26.6. I know i tried to run as straight as possible but was consistent in losing .03-.05 every mile, which added up to an additional 3 minutes on my overall time.

If anyone is really wanting a good training plan I'd highly recommend Pete Pfitzinger Advanced Marathoning. I did the 18/70 plan which was probably a bit of a stretch on total mileage I was comfortable with. For a mid pack runner it was probably overkill, but I did have the best finish i could have asked for and feel like i was very prepared for the distance. During the guts of the plan I was running 10-12 hours a week. You'd need a base of 55 miles a week to start which is what some beginner and intermediate plans peak at. There is also a 18/55 plan that would have probably done the same thing with a few less hours a week of running which I might do over the winter when time is more of a premium for me.