January 2017 Running Challenge

1/1: 5 miles
1/2: 2.4 miles
1/3: Busy day
1/4: 4.5 miles (am), 4.5 miles (pm) + lifting
1/5: 6 miles
1/6: 4 miles + lifting
1/7: 4.2 miles trails
1/8: 10 miles +0.6 (Cocoa Classic 10 miler)
1/9: Sick day
1/10: Sick day
1/11: 4.5 miles
1/12: 6 miles
1/13: 5 miles + lifting
1/14: Lazy day
1/15: Lazy day
1/16: 4 miles + lifting
1/17: 8 miles
1/18: 4.5 miles + 4.5 miles
1/19: 2.6 miles + lifting + 6 miles
1/20: Rest day
1/21: Women's March / Lazy Day
1/22: 8 miles of trails
1/23: 6 miles
1/24: Impromptu rest day
1/25: 4.2 miles + 7.8 miles
1/26: 2 miles + 6 miles
1/27: 2 miles + lifting
1/28: 12 miles
1/29: 8.3 miles trails
1/30: 6 miles
1/31: 4 miles + 8 miles

Track Tuesday returns! Today's Hanson's workout was 8 x 800 on, 400 recovery, plus ~1 mile to warm up and ~1.5 miles to cool down. Goals for the 800m laps were 3:20-3:25, which I think I could have nailed in daylight but as the track got darker (no lights, just the lights from neighboring university buildings and a stadium) I got slower even though my effort felt steady -- and this is why I always try to do speedwork in the daylight. But I still had very respectable 800s: 3:17, 3:23, 3:26, 3:26, 3:29, 3:31, 3:35, 3:28. Legs were real tired the last 3 but I pulled out all the stops on the last one to bring it under 3.5 mins. And now I'm sleeping in tomorrow!




Winter/Spring 2017 Races:
1/8: NYCRUNS Cocoa Classic 10 mile 1:21:37 (10th AG)
2/18: Febapple Frozen 50 - 10 mile (trail)
3/12: E. Murray Todd HM
3/18: Looney Leprechaun 10k (trail)
3/26: Philly Love Run HM
4/30: New Jersey Marathon (or HM)
5/14: Delaware Marathon Running Festival HM
5/21 or 5/28: Cleveland or Vermont City Marathons (maybe)
7/1: Finger Lakes Fifties 50k (trail)

1/31 - 4.0
102.1 = Jan total Goal: 90
And that's a wrap! Great job everyone!

Stoshew71 wrote: »

OK! February Challenge is now posted.

http://community.myfitnesspal.com/en/discussion/10510164/february-2017-running-challenge/

Raspberries. I wasn't finished with January. February IS my mfp mrc runniversary.... I should probably. do. some. thing.

Not much to say about January except for a stellar first week and an extremely fun destination race in Key West. I'm wrapping up the month with 31 miles logged (of my 50 mile goal), plus 4 strength workouts, and looking forward to a better running month in February.

I'm still not recovered from the cold virus that's been bugging me for over a week, but feeling about 80% today. An easy run tomorrow will be a nice way to kick off a new month.

January Running Totals (miles)
1/1 – 10.39 warmup, 7.5 mile race, cool down
1/2 – 2.12 easy cross country
1/3 – 8.58 warmup, tempo intervals
1/4 – 5.01 easy
1/5 – 5.99 warmup, speed work, cool down
1/6 – rest day
1/7 – 16.59 warmup + Winter Warrior Half Marathon
1/8 – 7.62 easy on indoor track
1/9 – 6.51 easy
1/10 – 6.02 warmup + MP
1/11 – 6.20 mostly easy
1/12 – 9.01 warm up, speed work, cool down
1/13 – rest day
1/14 – 15.88 warm up, 5 mile race, post-race easy run
1/15 – 10.06 easy with hills
1/16 – 6.83 easy plus 4 strides
1/17 – 8.02 warm up, speed work, cool down
1/18 – 7.04 group run
1/19 – 7.67 warmup, speed work
1/20 – rest day
1/21 – 16.16 easy
1/22 – 7.63 one hour easy
1/23 – 6.50 easy
1/24 – 8.23 warm up, speed work, cool down
1/25 – impromptu rest day
1/26 – 5.17 easy (AM)
1/26 – 5.04 slow jog, time trial, easy run, slow jog (PM)
1/27 – rest day
1/28 – 13.23 paced run + race
1/29 – 14.07 easy with hills
1/30 – 6.69 easy plus 4 strides
1/31 – 7.79 warm up, speed work, cool down

January total to date – 230.05

Nominal Challenge Goal – 225 miles
Real Goals: Train toward Boston, working 3 Freezeroo races plus Winter Warrior Half into the training plan. Avoid injury.

Today's notes – The marathon training plan called for an aggressive workout at I pace, 1 x 800, 1 x 1000, 1-2 x 1200, 1 x 1000, 1 x 800, with same time recovery between intervals. I asked Coach how Bend should change that and he told me to do 3 x 1000 at T then 4 x 200 at goal race pace. I have no clue what my goal race pace for an 8K cross country event should be, so I targeted somewhere between T and I. Except by the time I was running the 1000's, I forgot the distance for the second set and ran 4 x 400 between T and I. Coach chuckled and said I was an overachiever.

Tomorrow I'll get in a few easy miles between packing and last day preparations before flying out on Thursday. I don't know what running opportunities I will have on Thursday and Friday. Saturday I'll find out what it's like to run 2K loops on a golf course that has been cleared of snow by manual volunteer labor. It will be an experience.

2017 races:
January 1, 2017 Freezeroo #2 (Resolution Run 7.5 mile) (Mendon, NY) Finished in 50:45
January 7, 2017 Winter Warrior Half Marathon (Gates, NY) Finished in 1:32:40
January 14, 2017 Freezeroo #3 (Pineway Ponds Park 5 mile) (Spencerport, NY) Finished in 33:42
January 28, 2017 Freezeroo #4 (Hearnish 5 mile) (Victor, NY) short course, finished 4.88 miles in 32:50
February 4, 2017 USATF Cross Country National Championship 8K (Bend, OR)
February 11, 2017 Freezeroo #5 (Valentines Run "In Memory of Tom Brannon" 8 Mile) (Greece, NY)
February 25, 2017 Freezeroo #6 (White House Challenge 4.4 mile) (Webster, NY)
March 11, 2017 Johnny's Runnin' of the Green 5 mile (Rochester, NY)
April 17, 2017 Boston Marathon (Hopkinton, MA)

BeeerRunner wrote: »

Elise4270 wrote: »

Stoshew71 wrote: »

OK! February Challenge is now posted.

http://community.myfitnesspal.com/en/discussion/10510164/february-2017-running-challenge/

Raspberries. I wasn't finished with January. February IS my mfp mrc runniversary.... I should probably. do. some. thing.

@Elise4270 Happy runniversary! You should enjoy a box of chocolates!!

I was thinking about running. I know it sounds crazy.... But hear me out.... Haha! My scale says "let 'er rip" pants that is.... Yoga pants. Black gold, Texas tea.... Huh? Haha! You silly hillbilly.

I had 3.5 brownies. It's the sugar talkin'.

ETAsk, wait. Is that a Forrest Gump reference? Box o Chocolates, running, me gimpy? Or am I bein' newrdy?

MobyCarp wrote: »

@OSUbuckeye906 - As I read this, I have to ask what the definition of "running alone" is. I run a lot of long runs in a pace group which is definitely not alone. Most of my speed work is done with the club, where I have a coach and teammates present; but different people have different workouts, and my paces are not the same as anyone else's, so mostly I'm running the speed workout by myself, but on the same track with other people running the same or different workouts at their proper paces. Is that running alone?

From my introverted perspective, this is close enough to group activity to give me a motivational nudge, i.e. I will actually *do* the speed work. I joined the club originally because I noticed I wasn't getting the speed work done on my own, and I hoped the group would provide enough peer pressure to get me to do it. It worked.

I do see clumps of club runners doing workouts together. I know they can't all have the same precise paces, so some of them must be running a bit too fast or a bit too slow for where their paces should be. I have occasionally been joined in my intervals by another guy whose proper paces should be a bit slower than mine; but he's usually willing to work his *kitten* off running faster than the workout calls for.

I was defining "running alone" as not running in a group/club setting but, as you indicated, "running alone" can mean different things depending on the situation. I guess I was thinking about the simple definition of the term since I've never run in a group setting before. Under this same notion, I guess "running together" can mean different things as well. I have a lot of family members that are runners and we will frequently run races together - except for the fact that we are mostly all different paces and don't actually run together.

The part that is bold above is precisely one of the reasons I prefer to run/train alone. I'm a pretty competitive person by nature and I don't want to put myself in a situation where I'm trying to run at a pace that I shouldn't be. I think I've matured enough as a runner where I probably wouldn't do this on a long run, but I could see myself running a bit too fast during speed work if I had company. We'll see how things go when I finally get the nerve to join a group for a run (I'm a pretty introverted person too). Actually, I'm ready to try one out now...just need to get back to running first.

It was a beautiful night for my final run of the month. 8.3 miles with about 3 miles of that going up and down a hill 6 times.

Month total: 152.9 miles
Month trail total: 21 miles

I made my overall goal, but was well short of my trail mile goal.





@OSUbuckeye906 I mostly run alone. I love being by myself and into my own thoughts as I run, just as I love taking long drives alone, hiking alone, or sitting in a deer stand all day long alone. That's not to say I'm anti-social. In certain settings I really enjoy group runs. In particular, weekend long runs on the trail. There's an vibrant trail running community here and which often organizes weekend long runs and I'll hit those when I can, and when it suits my schedule. One problem I have though is they like to start really early in the morning most times and I have a tough time with that. When it works out, though, I have a really good time running with them and need to make more of an effort to make it. For weeknight runs it doesn't make sense to put an hour of time getting to and coming from a group run just for an hour of running. Too much to do at home.

Last winter I did join a local store's "Winter Warrior" group runs every Tuesday night. The problem I had with that is that there were two routes...3.5 miles or 7 miles. I wanted to run the 7 mile route but everyone else who ran the longer route was faster than me, so I ended up running alone anyway. By the time I got back to the store, the good beer was gone and the socializing was winding down. I didn't join that group this winter.