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Posts Tagged Marathon Monday

9 Weeks Till … ???

Mar 15

Posted by Shari B. in Marathon Training | 15 Comments

Hi FitFeat friends!

I hope that you all had a wonderful weekend.  I don’t think I’ve gone three days in a row without a blog post since I first started FitFeat last year, missed you all!  It was a C-R-A-Z-Y busy weekend!

It started Friday night a group of girls getting together to celebrate Beth’s birthday with some All-You-Can-Eat sushi.  It was a lovely time.  The miso soup was CHOCK full of mushrooms (bonus!), and I also had two slices of Sweet Potato Tempura, a salad, and a few rolls from the shared plate (like the avocado roll and the cucumber roll).

When 9:00 PM started closing in, I had to be a party pooper and excuse myself, or I knew I’d be tired for the Saturday morning run.

I got to bed a hair before 10 then got up at 5:30 and had my pre-run meal.  This time I had one slice of Ezekial toast with almond butter and a sliced banana, drizzled with a bit of raw honey.

I packed up a Coconut Cream Pie Larabar in my little backpack along with my hydration pack, and a coconut water.

MSP and I drove over to a local trailhead where I knew they had restrooms, because I knew I was going to need it after two cups of coffee and some water that morning!  We arrived at the trailhead where a sign that said “Restrooms closed for the season” was posted.  WHAT??? Who does that? Is the park closed?  Noooo.  Not cool to close the bathrooms, Parks & Rec peeps!

MSP generously decided he’d run (rather than skate) the early miles of the outing with me so that I could be on a dirt path at first, then we’d plan to swing back by the car where he could switch to rollerblades and we’d head onto the bike path.  We each put on our VFFs and took off.  About 2 miles in, I knew I was going to have to detour to SOMEPLACE where I could use a restroom.  If it wasn’t such a busy trail, I’d have run off into the bushes.  :) We hit up a city street and ran to a nearby gas station to borrow their facilities, then ran back to the trail.

After 4.65 miles in our FiveFinger shoes, our calves were telling us we’d done enough ‘barefooting’ so it was time to make the switch to my trail runners, and MSP to his rollerblades.

At 5.69 miles I drank my coconut water and had a few bites of my Larabar.

At 9.81 miles, I took a look at the time and knew that I was running late.  I had to be at Keri’s YOGA grand opening at 1:00, still had to run back to the car, try to get in a post-workout drink & meal, shower and get ready, and drive 40 minutes to her studio.  And the route back was primarily uphill.  So we turned around and when we got back to the car, my total mileage ended up being 14 rather than the planned 16.

With all the ups and downs of the hills, my Garmin told me that I had a total ascent of 2,161′ and a total descent of 2,138′.  (Good Lord it’s hilly here!) My average heart rate this time was 147 bpm, which is good since I was aiming for 143.  This required a s-l-o-w pace, but I’d promised myself I wasn’t going to worry about that.

To save time, we hit up Jamba Juice on the way home since I knew I wouldn’t have time for a homemade green smoothie at the house.  I picked one with mango, orange juice, pineapple juice and 8g of protein powder, plus a double shot of wheat grass on the side.  Not ideal in my book, but this would have to do the trick.

The downside to this run is that my knees were REALLY bothering me again.  They felt GREAT while I was running in my barefoot shoes.  But shortly after  I switched to my regular shoes, they started to ache (especially the left).  There is no rhyme or reason to what part of my knee hurts in order to troubleshoot and tweak future runs.  Sometimes it’s the inner left knee, sometimes the outer left knee, sometimes just an overall burning.

While it is disheartening to say this ‘out loud’, I’m going to need to adjust my training goal for the sake of saving my knees.  I don’t mind muscular soreness (actually I oddly enjoy muscular soreness) but joint pain is not something I’m willing to mess around with.  Every run 10 miles or more on this journey has caused some pretty nasty knee pain, so I need to figure out what is at the root and fix it before I add any more distance.

It occurred to me during this weekend’s run that there is a reason someone dreamed up the idea of the HALF-MARATHON:  because 26.2 is too LONG!  :D

I don’t think a marathon is out of the question, and maybe even yet this year.  But I can say with a fair amount of certainty that it won’t happen on May 16.   The smart thing to do is focus on building up my PAIN-FREE mileage in the VFFs since I don’t experience any knee issues when running in them.  I’m currently near the 5-mile mark in them and aiming to progress at about 10% increases per week, maybe a bit more.

I could talk about my pros and cons, and all the thoughts that went through my head while coming to this conclusion, and how hard it was for me to make this decision (then share it publicly).  It’s been an internal dialog now for about 3 weeks.  But the long and the short of it is I talk a lot about listening to our bodies and I’m listening to mine at the moment.  I’m bummed, but I need to do this in a way that doesn’t cause damage or injury.

On a positive note, the yoga open house was fantastic and VERY helpful after the long run.  The Kripalu style of yoga that Keri teaches is different and fun. With moves like “Windshield Wiper” legs, how can you NOT have a good time?  I think going forward whenever time allows, I will try to schedule enough time for some yoga on long run days because it really seemed to speed up the muscular recovery.

What was your fun fitness over the weekend? Our city had the annual Running of the Green 7k race that a few people I know ran, and a client of mine in WA state ran her first 5K in a St. Patty’s Day race.

Have a MARVELOUS Monday blog buds!

– Shari B. =)

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10 Weeks Till 26.2

Mar 8

Posted by Shari B. in Marathon Training | 12 Comments

Hi friends!  It’s Marathon Monday again already!  The weeks are flying by!

So as you may recall my 14 mile run didn’t go too well.  I was awake a lot the night after that run because of my knees aching and I had a lot of time to think.  I really went back and forth a lot about whether I wanted to continue this journey.  By the time Sunday evening rolled around, while I was pre-writing the next day’s Marathon Monday post, I knew that I would press on for the time being but that I would definitely have to make some adjustments.

Prior to this experience, when I would run what I consider “comfortable” distances (in the vicinity of 3 to 5 miles) I enjoy running a 10:00 minute mile average pace.  It’s a pace at which I can carry on a conversation with running buddies yet still feel that I’m getting in a good workout.  I can run faster at those distances if I really want to challenge myself, but usually not much faster than an 8:45 or 9:00 minute pace.  The best half-marathon I completed was a time of 1:59 which is a few seconds over 9′s for the whole distance.  I was ecstatic when I crossed that finish line.

But that was 2006.

It occurred to me when I signed on for this ‘challenge’ that I’d be upping my distances in a BIG hurry and was concerned that I’d be forcing the distance progression too quickly.

Mainly because leading up to the start of our training 7 weeks ago, the farthest I’d run in the months recent to that time was 4.25 miles. It’d also been 3 years since my last half-marathon.

And during those shorter runs, I’d run at a pace that had my heart rate pretty high (mid to high 170s), without concern because I wasn’t aiming to improve my body’s aerobic capacity, increase my oxygen consumption or improve my lactate threshold.  I was just running for fun.

Now let’s talk a little about heart rate.  There are a number of methods one can use to determine their estimated maximum heart rate and the levels of training intensities as a percentage of that estimated max.  Short of doing a field test, the simplest method (but considered less accurate than other methods) is to subtract your age from 220.  For me, at 37 years old, that places my max at 183 beats per minute (bpm).  You can also use the newer equation of 205 – (.5 * age).  That one puts me at about 186 bpm.

So using the 186 bpm as the starting point, here’s what my heart rate looks like at various intensity levels:

Intensity BPM
100% 186
95% 177
90% 167
85% 158
80% 149
75% 140
70% 130
65% 121

Over the course of our recent runs, my heart rate has looked like this:

Mileage Avg HR Max HR
5.5 run 164 192
7.6 run 175 186
9.1 run 173 186
10.1 run 170 188
12.0 run 166 181
14.0 run 166 181

This means that I am generally working at intensity levels of 90-95% of my MHR.  For well over two hours!

Wanna know where I should be for long runs while training for a marathon?  65% to 75%  (121 to 140 bpm)

Now, I’ve known that I’ve been running at a rate that is too high.  If I had a client tell me that this is what they’d been doing, I’d be sitting them down for a serious chat.

I have been letting pride and ego get in the way of proper endurance training.  (Here’s what goes on in my head:  I don’t WANT to run slower than I already am because I already FEEL slow.  I really like having people to run with and if I go even slower I’ll lose my running buddies.  I ran a half-marathon at a 9 min mile at 155 bpm, I just need to suck it up and push through.)

But I also know that I’ve been running at an anaerobic level which isn’t going to do much to improve my AEROBIC level if I don’t start training at it. (Aerobic basically means “with oxygen” and anaerobic means “without oxygen” – there’s a little more to it than that, but that’s a whole other discussion and this is already a lengthy post.)

The point here?  I have to slow down to get faster.

Seems weird huh?  Here’s why:

Once I take the time to start running in my aerobic zone I will train my body’s energy system to start burning fat as fuel (rather than carbohydrates [glycogen]).   As that happens my pace will increase, but at the lower heart rate level. So I’ll slowly be getting faster, but without having to work at 95% intensity.

So this past weekend, while my running buddies were out of town, I decided to do a 10 mile training run where I focused all of my attention on my heart rate and none of my attention on pace.

My goal was to keep my heart rate under 143.  During the first 5 miles that wasn’t too hard to accomplish because I was running downstream.  Coming back from the turnaround point it did creep up a little as I had a gradual incline (if 1,150’ of ascent is considered ‘gradual’).  Truly there is no place flat to run when you live near the foothills of the Rocky Mountains. :) Even when it LOOKS and FEELS  flat I get home and plug in my Garmin to find out it’s not even close to flat.

I finished the run with an average heart rate at 150 bpm, so I was around 81% intensity.  I need to drop that down a bit further on the next one (16 miles) and really focus on staying at LEAST under 143.  As much as I hate to see the snail’s pace I was running at this week get even SLOWER, I know it is what must be done.

The outcome:

  • The run itself was VERY enjoyable.  MSP was kind enough to rollerblade alongside me while I ran and it was so nice, pointing out scenery and having a few hours of quality time together. (Thank you MSP – I know it took a lot of time out of your day!)
  • My knees still hurt this time (concrete bike paths be damned!!) but they recovered pretty well by the next morning.  So well that we were able to take the dogs out Sunday morning for a hilly 5 miles, so that’s a great sign. And I didn’t even ice them Saturday (or take a torturous ice bath.)
  • No issues sleeping the night before or the night after the run.
  • No physical (or mental) fatigue afterward.

The trick will be finding out whether I have enough time to build up my speed within the aerobic zone before the marathon date of May 16.  (Or maybe pick one in May that’s at sea level rather than a mile high – that would definitely improve the heart rate!) ;)

Today’s discussion question:  do you monitor your heart rate when you exercise?  Or do you follow the RPE method?  (Rate of Perceived Exertion) I have used a heart rate monitor for cardio since I became a personal trainer in 2001 and I have to admit, I love it. It helps me keep an eye on when things aren’t working as well.

Speaking of running, I want to give a big shout out to Beth who ran another half-marathon this past weekend at DisneyWorld. Nice job Beth!!  If you are interested in helping Beth raise money on behalf of the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society, please click on the Team In Training banner in the right side-bar to donate.  She’ll be running her first marathon in June in support of this great cause.

Make it a GREAT week everyone!

– Shari B. =)  (aka The Tortoise!)

***

For further reading on the topic of heart rate training and aerobic endurance:

http://www.duathlon.com/articles/1460

http://www.runnersworld.com/article/0,7120,s6-238-267–1039-1-2X5-2,00.html

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11 Weeks Till 26.2

Mar 1

Posted by Shari B. in Marathon Training | 20 Comments

Happy Monday friends!  (Is it really here already?)

Which means another installment of MARATHON MONDAY!

When I was growing up, a phrase my mom often used was, “If you can’t say anything nice, don’t say anything at all.”  Try as I might, I seem to break this rule more often than not.  I’ll definitely be breaking it today as I recap my 14 miler from this weekend.

To sum up this run in one word:  DISCOURAGING.

To start with, I had a pretty rough night of sleep leading into which doesn’t make for an energetic start to a long run right off the bat.

Since our meet up time was planned for 7:45 this week, I ate my pre-run meal at 6:00 am.  Two slices of Ezekial cinnamon raisin toast with almond butter on one and coconut butter on the other.

I made my date snack to take along during the run, this time using coconut butter in the pit ‘void’ rather than coconut oil.  I also crumbled half of a Coconut Cream Pie Larabar into a baggie to bring in my Camelbak.


It was 26 degrees at the start of the run and a little breezy so I took a fleece and a light windbreaker plus a scarf with mittens since we’d be running directly into the wind during the first half.  My calves were still sore from the Thursday run in my VFFs and for some reason my low back was stiff, so I arrived about 15 minutes early to get in a good warm-up and do some stretching before we took off.

At about the 5 mile mark, I was really feeling blah.  Just wasn’t feeling the run this time.  The spotty night of sleep wasn’t helping the situation.  My heart rate was running high, staying between 175 and 180 bpm so I kept trying to run a bit slower to bring it down.  I really prefer to keep it under 170 on the flats.  I had my fuel at this point because I was hoping for a little energy boost.

Finally we reached the 7 mile mark and turnaround point. As soon as we headed back the other direction, it became very clear that we’d been running a pretty good incline during that first half.  I knew we were running “upstream” along the creek, but didn’t realize how “UP” it was.  This is the elevation graph from my Garmin:

From there until mile 9,  I felt so much better.  My HR was back down to 164.  My knees weren’t screaming as badly.

We used the ‘walk one minute at every mile’ strategy again this time, which my heart rate was thankful for:

But unfortunately it didn’t seem to offer the same relief to my knees.

The run just seemed to drag on forever.  I felt cranky the last few miles and spent a lot of time ‘in my head’, questioning my desire to run a marathon.

I already knew I was going to be miserable the rest of that day.  Bags of frozen edamame weren’t going to cut it this week.

Gonna have to bring out the big guns:

I picked up 20 lbs of ice on the way home and built a torture chamber ran an ice bath in the spare bathroom.

I did two rounds of immersion of my knees and lower legs in the ice bath.  I had a hot bath (with Epsom salt) waiting in the other tub as soon as I got out of this one.  I’m not kidding you, my lips were BLUE!

Throughout the rest of the day I iced my knees three more times with bagged ice.

From a “FUEL” standpoint, since I was in such a hurry to get home and finish stretching, I scrapped the planned banana and glutamine drink.  While buying ice at the gas station, I got a GREEN MACHINE  by Naked Juice to chug in the car.  This juice is so high in sugar that I would rarely choose to drink this any other time – but is why it was perfect for replenishment directly following a workout where I’d burned 1,237 calories.

I drank the whole bottle.  66 grams of carbs (56 of which are sugars) and 800 mg of potassium.  After I was home for a while I had a hard-boiled egg for a shot of protein and two Umeboshi plums for a sodium boost.  I also took ginger root capsules AND bromelain for inflammation.

Then to top the day off, while I was in the car driving back from the run, I got a weird tickle in my right nostril like I inhaled something funny.  And I had one of those sneezing fits where I thought I was going to run my car off the road!  It was about 10 huge sneezes in a row and then my right eye got really squinty and watery.  It was BIZARRE to say the least.  I don’t know WHAT it was, but I felt like I had a cold the rest of the day:  I sounded congested and my nose ran nonstop.

I’m thinking I’m developing an allergy to distance running.  ;)

The best part of the whole run?  The SUN was shining and it was 50 degrees by the time we’d finished.  (I have to find a silver lining somewhere, right?  :) )

I didn’t have a stellar day and I had a lot of “pros and cons” running through my head the rest of the weekend (cons are currently winning) and questioning whether the knee pain is worth it.  The thought of having to add 12 more miles onto the distance I just completed almost brings tears to my eyes.   We’ve adjusted our training schedule to accommodate some out of town trips for each of us in the upcoming weeks, so from here on out we’ve planned the long runs for every other weekend.  So I’m hoping that putting some distance (no pun intended!) between this long run and the next will give me some time to regenerate some excitement. I know not all runs are great runs.  I certainly don’t expect that.  I’m okay with having runs where I’m just not ‘feeling the groove’.   It seems that every other run so far has been one without pain (meaning one is good, one is bad, next is good, etc.), so maybe when it’s time for the 16 miler, that will be the day my knees decide to be happy.  Time will tell!

Did I mention the sun was shining that day?  ;)   Ha ha!

Have a marvelous Monday blog buds!

– Shari B. =)

PS:  If you didn’t get a chance to see it, you have to check out yesterday’s Sunday Comedy post.  It’s short and it will bring a smile to your morning!

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