A memorable May. Embracing the offseason!

After 25 continuous months of hard training where my body eventually started to tell me that it needed a serious break, I stopped most running after Boston (26.2 miles), and have been enjoying almost seven weeks of vacation (without counting the Grand Canyon 48 mile run which actually was a real vacation run!)

May 2010

• Total Miles 117  (240 in May 2009)
• Weekly breakdown: 33, 56, 0, 6, 8, 31
• Number of times run in May: 8
• Number of times I didn't run: 23
• Average Miles per run in May: 14.65
• Average miles per tun in 2010: 11.3

The Grand Canyon run was 40% of the month's total running.
The Grand Canyon + the run the prior weekend's (24miles to see how my legs felt) were 61% or the month's total.

Over the past 7 weeks, I've had almost no desire to run, but I must say that after 12.5 and 10.5 this weekend, and 15 this morning, the sleeping coals of the fire are showing they still have a little glow in them.  I'm thinking of blowing it up this weekend.  We'll have to wait and see.

Total miles for the year 2010 as of June 2: 845
Total miles for the year 2009 as of June 2: 1,142
Miles needed to catch up: 297 (need to find an extra month somewhere!)

January Numbers - Dork Style

January ended with 254 miles. Overall I give it a B-. It was a rough month that breaks down into thirds:

1. First 10 days were low in mileage as I tapered for Bandera. No need to revisit that day. 77 miles.
2. I then ran with either plantars, or a severe bruise in my left foot for 10 days. 58 miles.
3. The last 1/3 (eleven days) saw 128 miles, which means i ran more than half the month's miles in 1/3 of the month.

I've switched my training log from one online to a spreadsheet. I didn't like the lack of flexibility, and lack of ownership of the data from the online log. So now i can track any data I want, and also make any graphs I want. (I like pictures). I know this may look like overkill to some, but I like it, and it's all automated, so there's no heavy work to be done.

Here are some things I'm tracking...

Total Jan Miles: 254.6

Distance of Weekend Long runs:

13*, 36, 20, 25.7, 24.5

(* taper for Bandera)

Weekly miles:

27, 50.7, 36.5, 68, 72.5

It'll be interesting how to see how my daily breakdown changes as the year progresses. So far Monday has been my OFF day, due to a work meeting, but I really hate taking Monday off as I'd much prefer Fridays. We'll see if I can get myself to prep for my meeting on Sunday evenings or Friday late afternoons instead. I doubt it, because I have severe issues with doing work stuff on Sunday evenings, and Friday afternoons are well, Friday late afternoons.

I can also go nuts on graphs, which makes me happy. From left to right...

Total Miles per month, Total Miles per week, Weekend Long Runs:

Here's what I have so far for the year

Here's part of the log itself. It feeds graphs and other logs/tabs that autopopulate, and keep counts on the above etc.

I also track shoe miles:

Weekend Update

Saturday I ran the greenbelt with Karma around9am. Except for one turn to extend the run a little, I let him choose each and every trail we took. He's an expert in there, and knows where he's going almost all the time, so whatever direction he took on an intersection was the route we ran.

Once we got to the top of the end of Powerline, he veered towards the cars, while I told him to take Bologna loop back to extend the run a little more. He loved it, and kept up real well as I kept picking up the pace. Ran about 6 miles for a little over and hour total time, including his desire to go hang out down by the dam for 5 minutes or so. What a great run!

Sunday, Muz joined me for a loop out at Bastrop State Park. I love that park, but I really struggled through the run as my Cedar allergies were really kicking my butt and depleted all energy. Still a grea 8 mile run over there.

Ended up with 55 for the week, which felt much better than the 45 I ran the week before.

Only 5 days till the big race, of which I'll take Monday and Friday off, but run something on Tue, Wed, and Thursday. Not sure how much, but it looks like roads for tomorrow. Also have a pre-race massage on Tuesday and I'll have Lisa give me her opinion on an issue I've been having with my right knee.

Have a great week, and happy running!

2009 running - A good year. B+ grade

Not a bad year. My overall total mileage is down about 50 miles from last year(2984), and that was mainly due to taking June off. I had run myself to the ground over the prior 18 months, and just need to rest my body if I was going to train well for my Ultra races.

2009 had 4 major races. It was a year where I attempted to achieve a sun 3-hour marathon at Boston. A critical error in hydration foiled that plan, but still had a strong showing with a healthy 5 minute PR. 2009 also saw me enter the world of Ultra distance running and racing, and I’m happy with my performance, running 3 ultra distance races.

I learned a ton from each of those as the year went along, and am very happy with my results. It's strange to look back at all this as a summary and think that it's just my first year running ultra distance races. It feels like I’ve been running trail ultras for much longer, but that’s probably because those 3 races too over 20 hours to complete! Ha ha ha

Here’s a breakdown of my 2009 running year:

Total: 2,925 miles - 248 runs for 433hrs at 8:40/m pace - average run 1hr44mins

1,869 on Roads (64%)- 164 runs for 238hrs at 7:40/m pace - average run 1hr27mins

1,056 on Trail (36%)- 84 runs for 194hrs at 10:36/m pace - average run 2hr19mins

Average Monthly miles - 243

• Hi Month - 332 miles in January (3 months over 300 – Jan,Oct,Dec)
• Lo Month - 96.45 miles in June (2 months under 200 – Apr, Jun)

Average Week - 56.25 (terrible! but due to taking many recovery weeks after my races and June as a rest month. Removing those, the average is closer to 65)

• Hi Week - 100 miles (8 weeks over 80 miles)
• Lo Week - 17 miles (5 weeks under 25 miles)

Long run Breakdown:

There a saying that goes “The bigger the base, the better the race” and it is 100% accurate.

In 2009, I ran 54 runs 15 miles or longer...

• 38 of those were 18 miles or longer
• 35 of those were 20 miles or longer
• 18 of those were 25 miles or longer
• 10 of those were 26.2 miles or longer
• 7 of those were 30 miles or more
• 2 of those were over 35 miles
• 1 of those was 50 miles (technically 51+ miles, because I ran off course!)

RACES:

3 Marathons (1 “A” race):

• Austin 3:10:xx training run
• Boston 3:03:06 "A" race - 6:59/mile pace – Personal Best
• Stockholm 3:39:xx Fun with Dehydration & Diarrhea!

3 Ultra-distance Trail races - (The first 3 of my running career)

• Bandera 50km (31 miles) - 4:59:42 (7th Overall - 1st place Age Group)
• Inks Lake 60km(37.3miles) - 6:20:21 (2nd Overall)
• Cactus Rose 50mile (80km) - 9:01:xx (3rd Overall)

Other random races:

• Austin Capitol 10km
• The Maze Trail race 10km
• The Bluffs trail race 30km (18.5 miles)

What's in store for 2010?

• Bandera 100km(62miles) in January
• Boston Marathon in April (attempt #2 to get under 3 hours)

...and then I honestly have not made up my mind. Some ideas are swirling in my head, but I will not make up my mind until after I run the Grand Canyon Rim2Rim2Rim in May for fun.

Only a B+, because I missed my sub 3 in Boston. No gifts, no excuses.

Dissecting the year.

I could spend hours looking at statistics. Not standard deviations and useless statistics stuff you learn in college, but sports stats, etc.

One of my favorites, is grabbing my running log and dissecting it to see what's going on.

I love looking at graphs, because they tell you a whole lot.

For instance, here's my weekly mileage for each week of 2009, along with the races I've run. (Austin wasn't really a race, but it was a hard effort run)

**The weeks preceding Bandera from 2008 were 27, 35, and 25 as I was simply resting up after my big marathon in early December. I finished 7th in Bandera with a couple short runs during the week and a 15-20 miler on the weekends on the trails.

**Austin had no rest leading up to it, and I still did well on my workout, then didn't even take a down week, as I still posted almost 60 miles.

**Boston was an "a" race that had a nice taper. It was also on a Monday, so that's why the total for that race week is 30. I think i ran about 4 miles that Thursday or Friday to test the legs.

**Stockholm was a crap-chute-training to try and do well(sub 3), and thinking back this should have just been a leisure marathon.

**June was a much needed rest month after 8 marathons+ in 9 months, followed by the official start of endurance buildup for the Bandera 100km in July.

**Got 2nd place in the Inks Lake 60km (37 miles) which at that point was the farthest I'd ever run. There was no rest before it, jsut a run through race to get mileage. Took a week recovery, then training to load up to 80km (50miles) started in earnest for September and October.

**I took a week to rest after Cactus Rose, which again was not a race, so no rest leading up to it, and now it's the stretch run to Bandera. 4 more weeks of hard work before 2 real taper weeks like I did for Boston.

This morning was chilly 37F, and I ran 10 miles at an easy pace in shorts, long sleeve, gloves and beanie. Tomorrow I have 15 on the road on a day that's supposed to include some light snow flakes. We shall see if I get that lucky! Saturday's another 20 miles on the roads, then Sunday calls for a recovery trail run for an hour or so, followed by an hour of hill work, putting me at about 75 miles for the week.

I make my own training schedule, so that sounds good enough to me (for a rest week).

Thanks for reading, and happy running

Week runnning review

Only got 4 days of running in, but still got to 57 miles.
I'm happy but not happy at the same time.
Will get many more in this week!

I saw a racoon this morning, and so did Karma. This led to him cleaning out my ear drums with his high pitched whining to get out of the car and chase that fatso down! I'm sad to report that I kept him on a leash, so there won't be any Coon Stew at the casa this week.

February Recap

A little late, but who cares, and No graphs for Feb, just don't have the interest in creating one.  Sorry.

Feb Weekly totals: 73, 61.5, 58.5, 65.5

Total miles run in Feb: 255

Total miles run in Jan: 332

The combination of not enough days in February AND a few work related incidents making me miss 10-14 mile runs 3 times AND a forced recovery week, AND a mini taper leading in to the Austin Marathon, made February a very low month.

However,  that should change pretty quickly as I'm already at 55 miles for the month of March and it's only March 6.  Add to that tomorrow's 23 miler, and Sunday's 8-10, and we're sitting at mucho miles, very early on into March.

Regardless how little I try, this week will end up well over 75, and probably very close to 80.   Not bad, not bad.  Especially, since Tue and Thursday were TOUGH days.

Forrest Gump liked to run

 I sit at 435 miles with two more weeks to go in February.  Seeing that I'll easily get in 70 miles by end of the month, I'm currently on pace to run way over 3,000 miles for the year. 

Seeing that I felt like I ran really far last year, and ran 2,893 miles, I'm not sure if I should be scared of excited. 

3000 miles divided by 350 miles per pair of shoes = 8 pairs which = a need for 1 more pair as i have 7 left which = "anyone have $100 to spare?"

January 2009 Summary

It was a good January running wise: 

• 3rd Highest Monthly output ever with 332miles.  (382 and 380)
  
• My 1st 50km trail race! (and I surprised myself with how "simpler" it was as I really thought it would require a much higher energy output.)
  
• A smart ramp in weekly mileage, Saturday Long runs and speed.
• I'm feeling physically healthy (not counting the usual aches and pains that are expected)
  
• I'm running faster on the roads for my easy long runs without effort.
  
• With the help of my coach, I now have new long term goals, and my entire running(race) plan mapped out for the next 15 months.
  

I ramped up nicely in January and finished this last week with 88 miles. 2 miles short of 90, but I preferred to cut my trail run short today as it wasn't the flattest and I had tired legs from yesterday's output. I'll cut back down to 80 for this week.

A quarter

I just noticed that i'm at 299.76* miles for this month.
I may just have to get out there and run a 1/4 mile this afternoon.

I'm sure the pupper would like a little sprint to shake the legs!


* I usually don't count 0.06, but a 50km is 31.06 miles, so I felt compelled to put in the correct mileage for that race. ha!

11.6 miles of Foggle / Frizzle / Drog

I ran a Karma loop with the fur face before meeting up with Bruce and surprise guest Jason L for 10 miles.
Today was a great day to be out there running. It was 52 degrees and Drizzly-Fog.
The weather people said drizzle, but it wasn't drizzle. It really looked more like fog, but it was wetter than fog, but drier than drizzle. Not sure what it's called, hence three made up words up there.


My legs really could use a massage and i could feel it for the first few miles, but once we were running up Red River my mood switched from, "just get through this run" to "I could run forever!". The weather was absolutely perfect for a short sleeve, and gloves (i'm a sucker for warm hands). The air was just crisp enough to keep you cool, without a noticeable wind.

I ended up a little shy of my goal of 12 miles, but hopefully the routes Rogue makes up for us tomorrow, Thursday and Saturday will be a tad long to make up for it.
Goal for week 7 looks as follows:
Mon - 11.6
Tue - 14
Wed - 10
Thu - 12
Fri - 10
Sat - 24
Sun - 8
Total 90 (adding 0.4 somewhere)


Pretty nice ramp... looks like a hiccup there in the midle, but that planned due to the 50KM I ran in week 4.

Total miles run in 2008 turn man into Forrest Gump

I ran my last run of the year this morning, and I'm glad it was on the greebelt!
It was a great morning to run out there.

I end the year with 2,893 Miles!
That's 4,655 Kilometers

How far is 2,893 miles?
It is 93 miles FARTHER than running diagonally across the country from Vancouver, Canada to the bottom tip of Key West, Florida.



You can call me Forrest Gump.

Week's Mileage - 75.4 miles

End the week with 75.4 miles on 6 days of running, inlcuding only 3 miles on Monday.
probably the toughext 75 mile week i've ever assembled with 40 hard miles Tue-Wed-Thu and then 33 on Sat Sun.

By the skin of my chinny chin chin!

I just realized during our run today, that today is the 1st of September which means I had to go check out my August stats.

I managed to eeeeeek out a new Monthly mileage record (382.40 miles / 615 kms) by a mere 2.2 miles! 18 minutes of running! YAHOOOO!!!!



And...

At the end of last week I told you I'd make sure I won the title of "Mediocrity" during this recovery week! Well here it is... 43.7 miles last week. Less than 6 hours! HAH HAH Who can beat a 56% drop!?!

The End is just the Beginning

Thus ended the Lydiard Base Building Phase. I ran a few weeks longer than most as I started 6 or 7 weeks earlier. The first 4 weeks were really to get going again, as I was sidelined by a bad IT Band issue, and had also taken quite the vacation from running from December till March. (I did run AT&T, and other fun trail runs, but nothing was time based. Simply fun running)

Starting this program off, I really had no idea how I was going to get the mileage I decided to get. Coach Sisson presented us with options of 50, 60, 70, 80 and 90 miles per week in his Lydiard Base Building Macro, and I immediately decided I'd go for the highest mileage, and the decrease it, if I felt it was too much. I also felt that if I was going to go for 90, I might as well go for 100, as that's what was initially presented to me verbally.

(Right Click & Open in new window to see them larger)

TOTAL MILEAGE DETAILS:
Here's what my 20 weeks ended up looking like.
Weeks 1 to 5 were really weeks to get back into running, and the last 14-15 were the actual high mileage weeks.
The grey cells are the days I took off.
As you can see, when you don't involve any track work, speed work, hard hills repeats etc, you can pretty much run "forever".

WEEKLY MILEAGE TOTALS:

Here's a chart showing my weekly mileage increases, culminating with 3 consecutive 100 mile weeks. I ran a hundred miler in early July. That was a rough 100 miler as I finished it with an 18.6 mile trail race on the "Toughest 10-K course". Talk about a painful finish. I continued to build from there, and things got much easier once my running friends were up to the mileage I was at. The key was to have people to run with and really vary the running routes. We invented came up with some new fun routes, and also invented Free Running around town, which is really only possible if someone has a GPS (Garmin Pace Slave) on.




I'm not really too amazed by the mileage I poured on, because it really came pretty easily. Provided you're willing to sacrifice other things in life for a few months, and you have a job that is flexible in your arrival time in the morning, the weekly mileage load is something anybody* can do. *The most important thing being that you stay with the plan, and don't cause injuries by running too hard when you're not supposed to, and really listening to your body. Barton Springs' cold water, and regular leg massages were also key.


SATURDAY LONG RUNS
Here's my favorite graph. This one shows the distances for the last 16 weeks of my base building phase.

In past marathon training programs I've done, I think the high mileage Saturdays have totalled something like two 18 milers, two 20-22 milers and one 24 miler. That's 5 weeks over 18 miles.

Take a look at the graph. So far, I've already run:
18 miles - 2 times
20 miles - 5 times
22 miles - 5 times
24 miles - 4 times
(all these were run at easy long run pace, meaning 7:45 - 8:15 min pace.)

I think we'll continue these 20+ mile Saturdays. However, they'll undoubtedly get tougher and tougher, as we'll start adding speed, and Marathon Goal Paces to these runs.

WHAT'S NEXT?
One week of recovery - this week
Continued mileage, but probably in the 70-80 Mile per week range, I think. (We'll see)
A phase of Hills Hills Hills!
A phase of Track Track Track and Speed Speed Speed
And phase of mixing it all together to ready
Then we can just hope the planets align for the big day on December 7!

C I .V !!!

That's right! C I . V! (101.5!)
I did it. Second time this summer to get over the century mark!

I met Jo Dee, and Ken for a little (easy recovery) run around town. I needed 9.5 to get to 100. Jo Dee needed 9 to get to her all time high of 60! Ken needed 8 to get to 100.
I mapped out a little run around town, some streets we hardley ever run, like Trinity, 6th street, 22nd, San Jacinto etc.

I ran 1.2 miles with Karma beforehand, then we went and ran 9.5. I then went and ran another 0.3 around barton springs so Ken and I wouldn't run each other to the ground by running a little bit further than the other. We called it a truce at 101.5.

Congrats to us!
Ken hits a new 1-week distance PR by 1.5 miles!
Jo Dee hits a new 1-week distance PR!
I hit a new 1-week distance PR by 0.4!

This week's century, was considerably easier than the 100 i ran last time when i decided to run the 3 loops of the "Toughest 10K in Texas" course to get to 100. I won't do that again.

(I'll pop back down to my normal 87<-->93 this coming week with a day off either on Friday(work travel) or next Sunday.

Week recap:

Mon 14.70 Miles 02:02:00 8:17/M
Tue 10.00 Miles 01:22:00 8:12/M (warmup/cooldown)
Tue 4.00 Miles 00:26:27 6:36/M (progressive)
Wed 10.40 Miles 01:27:00 8:21/M
Thu 17.20 Miles 02:20:00 8:08/M
Fri 10.20 Miles 01:23:00 8:08/M
Sat 24.00 Miles 03:20:00 8:20/M
Sun 11.00 Miles 01:36:00 8:43/M

July Totals - 380 Miles!

I've got my running in for the day and have completed my July running. I have shattered my previous month total record(320), but didn't really plan for it either. I just went about my training.

It's a huge jump going from 320 miles to 380 miles in 1 month; but, not to sound cocky, I'm kinda sad I couldn't go 14 on Tuesday, and instead only went 1, cutting the mileage down from a potential 393 miles!
Oh well, there's always August!

Perspective : A straight line from Austin to Oklahoma city of 362 miles.

(and yes, Brownie, I know I shoulda put in 100miles in one day. Give me a few years to get a nice foundation, unlike your 10+ years of running, and I'll join you for one of those adventures!)

Happy Running everyone.

FIVE 22 TEN 20 THIRTEEN 18.

Ken Doll, Geezman, Bruiser Bruce and I were talking the other day about our Saturday runs, and how it's become routine to run 20+ milers. Ken asked me how many 22's I'd done. Below is my long run count for the prior 15 weeks. It looks like I've done fewer than i thought, which is kid of a disappointment.

W1- 4/12 - 6
W2- 4/19 - 15.5
W3- 4/26 - 14.5
W4- 5/4 - 18.6 (Trail race)
W5- 5/10 - 18.5
W6- 5/17 - 20.1
W7- 5/24 - 20.5
W8- 5/31 - 16.5 / 13 (Adventure race Saturday, Trail race Sunday)
W9- 6/7 - 20
W10- 6/14 - 20
W11- 6/21 - 21
W12- 6/28 - 22 (Saturday 22 miler, followed by 18.6 mile Sunday trail race)
W13- 7/5 - 22
W14- 7/12 - 22
W15- 7/19 2 22

So AFTER this Saturday's 22, in 16 weeks of Lydiard training:
FIVE runs at 22
TEN runs over 20
THIRTEEN runs over 18

After this Saturday, I'm going to bump the Saturday shizzies up to 24 miles, pending coach's approval.


UPDATE *** After digesting and re-reviewing these numbers a few times, I'm not disappointed at all. Those are some good stats ***

Week 15 - 91.5 miles

Ran a fun 7 mile trail run this morning with Meredith, followed by a leg soak, and a yummy breakfast. Thanks, Mer!, a great way to start a Sunday.

I must admit that my legs are pretty much pooped from the week.
Mon- 10.2
Tue- Speed 14.3
Wed- 10
Thu- Hills 16
Fri- 12
Sat- Hills 22
Sun- Hilly trail 7

Quite a difference from past weeks of flat easy running with a hilly trail run sprinkled in. I still finished the week with a strong 91.5 mile output, and I'm acutually prouder of this one, than my 100 miler.

Next week, I think I'll end up in the 80's, as I'll take Friday off.

Stupid me forgot to record this morning's TdF, so I have to stay away from sports channels and wait till 7pm to watch the replay. :( Bt that's OK, I've got get some work done this afternoon.

I'm on pace for a 380 mile month, but I seriously doubt that will happen as the second half of July will get real busy in my other life, but that's a good thing!

June 2008 & 2008 YTD - Totals

I did pretty good in June. I'm not feeling any different than in May.
For a while I didn't even think I'd break 300 miles for the month, as I traveled for work, and had a couple of less-than-anticipated-mileage weeks.
However, I finish the month with three new records:
- 46 hours of running (43)
- 320 miles run for the month. (previously 306)
- 101 miles run in one week. (previously 81) [I'll write up a different post with my thoughts on this one]