running

PP5M Training: Week 5

Last week’s training was a bit messed up. Here’s the log:

Monday: Rest
Tuesday: Rest
Wednesday: 6.2 mi (trail)
Thursday: 5.5 mi (10×400 intervals)
Friday: 4.4 mi, road
Saturday: 1.6 mi trail + 3.5 road
Sunday: 1.6 mi trail + 7.9 road
Total: 30.7 mi

I started the week with 2 unscheduled rest days in a row. Not the best way to start a week, but necessary. Both Sunday night and Monday night I slept horribly (Sunday because I wasn’t feeling well, Monday I don’t know what the problem was), and I even went home from work early on Tuesday and took a 2 hour nap, which I never do. Generally when I nap I feel really sick and horrible, so I avoid them unless I just can’t function. I did yoga both days (after the nap on Tuesday, which helped me feel better) and I walked a couple of miles on Monday, so I wasn’t a complete deadbeat.

I don’t feel guilty about “unscheduled rest days,” to use the parlance of our time, because if they’re needed, they’re needed. Knowing when to give my body or my mind a break from running is important, and not listening to that impulse is going to be detrimental to my training. I just moved everything up by a day and skipped the rest day, and tried to make up the mileage. I made it to 30!

Wednesday I tried out my handheld on a trail run. Thursday I gave intervals another try and kind of sucked at them. I did that run on Park Point (a stupid idea, because while the flat surface was nice, dodging tourists who don’t look when they cross the street and who ride tandem bikes as if the whole street is theirs was unpleasant, and then I got bridged) and I think I’ll do that for the next set of intervals (fewer tourists). My splits were unknown, 10:50, 10:39, 10:49, unknown, 10:45, 10:46, 10:53, 10:34, 10:20. I forgot to hit the lap button for the two unknowns. While those are fairly consistent (with the last one an outlier), they are too fast. Either that or I’m going to slaughter my race on Friday.

Saturday and Sunday I did “doubles” as I did a short hike each day (a dry run and then the solstice hike) and a run. My long run on Sunday went ok. I brought along my handheld and started at 6 PM, trying to avoid the heat. Instead I got full-on sun in my face for a few miles and ended up salty as hell. I used my fantastic water bottle to douse my head and get the salt off my face. I felt really gross after the run, despite sipping water the whole way and despite feeling strong during the run. It was really stuffy in my house and was making me nauseated. I’m not sure if it was the heat, or if it was because I hadn’t eaten enough before my run. I think it was the latter, because after I laid down for a little while (in the grass outside, because I was feeling a little panicky) and ate a granola bar, I was fine and ate my dinner. I also didn’t show any other signs of dehydration or heat illness. Still, that handheld is coming with on all long runs or runs where I’m exposed to a lot of sun, just to be safe.

This coming week, I’m hoping to get back on the training schedule, with a few minor, but planned tweaks. With the race on Friday/Saturday (it starts at 11:59 PM on Friday) rather than Sunday as the schedule says (why do these stupid plans always have the races on Sundays? Saturday’s probably more common!), I’ll have Sunday as an open day and do a long run, and I probably will still only have one rest day (Thursday) even though the plan calls for two rest days in a row leading up to the race. It’s a 5K, I’ll survive on just one rest day.

Even though the training plan went pear-shaped for the week, I still got the important workouts in (long run and speedwork), got the mileage I wanted, and had some fun along the way. I’ll just be over here self-congratulating for this accomplishment.

From the Sidelines

I ended up spectating at Grandma’s Marathon today for about an hour. I left the house shortly after the end of the women’s race, got some coffee, drove around for awhile deciding where to park, then walked about a mile down Superior Street following the runners, ending up in front of Pizza Luce, which is somewhere between miles 24 and 25. I think I ended up there right around the time the 3:45 or so runners were heading through (just guessing), and I stayed until the 4:45 pace group had gone by (I saw the pacer, so no guesses there).

As I was walking, I passed a lot of fans and sort of observed. Some people were yelling generic things, some people were clapping, others were calling out specific things (“Go braids! C’mon yellow shirt!” or other distinguishing characteristics), and some were silent and taking it all in. I passed a woman holding a small megaphone, who turned to the other people she was with. “Why don’t one of you say something?” she asked, holding out the megaphone. The others demurred, and she said “They’re never going to see you again, and it might make their day!” (Or something. I just remember the “They’re never going to see you again” part.) I took that to heart, and when I got to the spot where I stopped to watch, I made sure to cheer loudly, even though I was by myself.

I wasn’t sure what to say, so I just “Woowoo-ed!” a lot and clapped, and said platitudes like “Looking strong!” and “You got this!” I yelled “GO NAVY” to a guy with a Navy t-shirt on, which he liked. I found it interesting that every once in awhile, my voice really penetrated into someone’s running fog, and I got a smile, or a nod, or at the very least eye contact. I gave a lot of thumbs up, too. I tried really hard to think about what would annoy me if I was running. I figured I’d be annoyed if I needed to stop to walk, and someone yelled at me to keep going or something, so I just sort of clapped and made noise as those folks went by. I also didn’t lie, so I was only yelling “Looking strong” at people who looked strong. And I didn’t yell anything stupid, or try to make jokes, and I didn’t yell “You’re almost there!” because I am sure to people who were struggling it still felt like forever. That’s a lot of thought to put into cheering, I know, but I like to overthink things, it’s the hallmark of an engineer.

Watching a race is fascinating. Watching the different running gaits and postures of runners as they went by was interesting. Here are all these people going the same speed, and they are accomplishing it in wildly different ways. Wearing a wide variety of outfits. Most people wear standard running gear, a few wear costumes (I saw these guys!), some wear as little as possible, a few had no shoes on (one was CARRYING his shoes), and some even appear to be in street clothes. One guy was wearing a button-down short-sleeve plaid shirt. Another woman looked like she was out hiking and stumbled into the marathon, in what looked like camping shorts and a t-shirt. All that matters is it’s comfortable. And doesn’t make one’s nipples bleed, which several more traditional running shirts seemed to do to some poor men. This is preventable! Don’t let it happen to you! Towards zero bloody nipples!

My friend (whose daughters weren’t with her, they were at the Mile 15 aid station probably charming every runner they saw) met up with me a little after the 4:00 pacer passed me. She told me her husband was running with the 4:30 pace group, so we had plenty of time to cheer together before he came, and to chat. As she started to recognize some of the runners she’d seen along the course while she’d been waiting to meet up with him at other checkpoints, she started to get nervous, and we were on the lookout. We spotted SEVERAL decoys, including white people, women, and old men, all who were revealed as not him once they neared (apparently a blue shirt and black shorts is a VERY popular running kit). This made us laugh and kept her from worrying too much as the 4:30 pacer came and went and her husband still didn’t show up. We crossed the street since she said he was running on the other side of the pack. I HATE crossing in front of racers. I think it’s incredibly disrespectful, especially of someone who has run 24.5 miles already. I hated it in my high school sports days (along with varsity skiers skiing the nordic skiing racecourse backwards after they were done with their fast races and had nothing better to do while us peon JV losers plodded through our races), but sometimes a street must be crossed. We were very careful not to cut anyone off.

When we finally saw her husband, we started screaming and cheering for him so he could see us a block away. Her concern was for nothing, because even though he’d lost his pace group, he looked strong and happy and gave us a big smile and two thumbs up. He thanked me as he passed, which I thought was kind. He ended up finishing in 4:38, which I believe he was happy with. I am really glad I was able to cheer him on at the end. My friend actually had tickets to the bleachers at the finish line, but we weren’t sure we could make it there in time, so at least we were able to give him a final boost of energy as he finished.

Part of me felt more compelled to run this marathon, but part of me was a little weirded out. It’s just so many people. It did solidify my resolve to never run the half marathon of this course. If I had run the half (and not gotten swept from the course), I’d have been finishing long after people had lost interest in the race and were looking ahead to the leaders of the marathon. Plus, it starts way way way too early.

Maybe I could run the Grandma’s Double instead? Ha!

Hand Held Test Drive

I fulfilled one of the items on my summer gear wish list by purchasing a couple of hand-held water bottles.

I bought two UltrAspire hand-held water bottles from the Trail and Ultra Running store at a nice discount. They are having a blowout sale (I think they are shutting down the store and focusing more on content, but I’m not sure) so I bought two of these 20 oz hand-held water bottles for $7.00 apiece + shipping. I did absolutely zero research. They’re sold out now, probably thanks to their regram of my pic. I’m an influencer!

I took one of the bottles out for a test drive yesterday evening. I was running 6 trail miles, which I have done without a water bottle plenty of times, but I wanted to see how I liked it before hauling it along on some grueling 20 miler. (I don’t have any grueling 20 milers on my training calendar at the moment, but they’ll come.) I also was feeling pretty low on energy as my allergies have been bothering me, and I was so tired on Tuesday that I went home and took a nap after work.

I took a full water bottle (which had been sitting full in the fridge since Sunday, since I thought I’d be running Monday… nope… Tuesday… nope) and decided I wouldn’t drink anything til I was three miles in, just so I wouldn’t get sloshy. I didn’t really feel the extra weight, or at least I don’t think I did. I was running incredibly slowly and not even sweating much or feeling out of breath; I couldn’t find a higher mental gear. After the third mile, I took a couple sips of water and it perked me right up again and I was able to start really running and finish strong, sipping every mile or so.

Next time, I won’t run with a full water bottle if I’m going on a medium-length run. I’m not looking at using it for full-on hydration, just to keep my mouth from getting dry. While it wasn’t super heavy, there’s no reason to carry 20 oz of water when I’m going to drink less than 10 during the run itself. On a hotter day I would of course carry more, so I could use it to keep cool.

So hey, after one use, I’m a believer. I could stuff my car keys in the little front pocket (they are on a carabiner so I clipped that to a little loop on the pocket for extra security), and I could easily stuff a snack in there too. I noticed a few drips leaking during the run, so I tightened the lid again and I think that fixed it. I hope. It wasn’t a bad leak, but I don’t want a leak at all.

On a long run or during a trail race, I could bring both and even fill one with some kind of fancy expensive sports drink and one with water, and maybe I could leave the hydration pack at home. I will have to try a two-fisted run one of these days, just to see what it feels like. Maybe on a hot day when I could try out the water/sports drink combo and hopefully not look too dorky carrying two hand held water bottles.

I wouldn’t bring it on a 5K or a race where I really needed to run fast. I think it would be more of an annoyance there. I might bring it to my 5 mile race, I might not. I think it’ll depend on how hot it is and how confident I am that I can run hard for 5 miles without dying. Right now I’m not sure.

PP5M Training: Week 4

I need to add another item to my summer gear wish list: insect repellent. Heat + humidity + sweat + trails = bites. I was making myself dizzy whipping my head around every time I even thought I was being bit by a mosquito. I don’t want to cover myself in the hard-core, eye-searing insect repellents that I use when I’m camping or at a bonfire or something. Those repellents have their place, and I’m certainly not crunchy enough to forgo them entirely, but I don’t want them on my arms/neck/face when I’m running, since I’m always wiping my sweat off my face with my arms and hands.

Here’s this week’s training update. I skipped a week in the Higdon program, as it called for a 5K. I will do that week as Week 6, when my next 5K is scheduled.

Monday: 4.9 mi, road
Tuesday: 6.1 mi, trails (Hartley)
Wednesday: 4.7 mi, road, tempo
Thursday: rest
Friday: 4.7 mi, trails (Bagley)
Saturday: 5 mi, trails (SHT)
Sunday: 7.5 mi, road
Total: 32.8 mi

I changed the planned rest day from Friday to Thursday. It makes more sense. It also ensures that I am not doing my long run right after a rest day, as it sometimes works out better to do my long run on Saturday rather than Sunday, and I always want to make sure it’s done on “tired” legs.

Overall it was a fairly decent week for training, and I finally got above 30 miles, so that was good. I felt kind of sick on Friday night, but I was fine and it didn’t affect Saturday’s workout. Just as I was planning on heading out on Sunday, I got a charlie horse in my calf simply from trying to stand up. So, that set me back a few hours. It ended up being a blessing in disguise as it was still fairly warm when I headed out just before 4, and it was sunny most of the way. I would have liked to have a couple shorter runs in warmer temps to acclimate a little better, but that’s the way it goes. Since my goal race is going to be in warmer temps, I’m going to have to trudge along until I get used to it.

Unhappy Trails

Yesterday, for my cross-training workout for the week, I did a trail hike/run. The Higdon Intermediate 10K Plan calls for a 60 minute cross-training workout every Saturday, but I’ve been making that a trail day and trying to choose more technical trails so that it doesn’t end up being a real run.

I picked a new trail this week, a section of the Superior Hiking Trail starting at the Martin Rd parking lot and heading out north along the North Shore State Trail, which is mainly a snowmobiling trail. (I would never run it in winter for fear of getting plowed over.) This isn’t a trail review per se, since I didn’t stop/turn around at a traditional spot along the trail. I think I turned around at Prindle Rd.

This portion of the trail was not fun. It was grassy, but not tamped down at all, so at times I was crashing through a barely-forged trail with grass up past my knees on the sides. I sorely wished I’d worn long pants. I also need to invest in some kind of bug repellent post-haste.

I suffered through most of this run, not because it was hard, but because I couldn’t stand the feeling of grass brushing against my legs. I know that’s silly, grass isn’t poisonous, but it made me itch and I kept thinking ticks were going to jump all over me. It was a bit wet and muddy in some spots, though not terribly so, and there were piles of horse crap along the way to dodge.

If the grass was tamped down enough to forge a nice trail, the run would have been pleasant. It was very run-able once I got past my annoyance with the grass. I passed UMD’s new wind turbine and Sustainable Agriculture Project Farm. After I got past the farm, the more open area turned into deciduous forest, with private lands on either side of the trail and many houses visible through the trees.

Despite a few cars in the Martin Rd. parking lot, I didn’t see anyone on the trail, and I suppose I am not surprised. In the opposite direction, the trail is a lot more traversable and more scenic. However, the Martin Rd. lot is the first spot where thru-hikers can jump on the trail and find campsites (though I’m not sure how one would need a campsite just a few miles in), so I would have expected to find evidence of someone else on the trail. (Someone not equine, I mean. I found plenty of evidence of those folks.) The trail would be a heck of a lot better if more people braved the grass and made more of a true path. Right now it’s not even single-track, more like one-third-of-a-track wide through most of the grass.

Maybe I’ll try it again in a month or so and see if it’s improved a bit, when I’m in need of a long run and can travel the whole distance and back or something.

Mangled Up In Tangled Up Knots

In an effort to improve my flexibility and to add some additional strength training, I am trying to do yoga.

I am really not good at it. My friend, who is a yoga teacher, said “No one is bad at yoga,” when I told her that. I disagree, I think that’s something they teach you at yoga teacher school to make clumsy stiffs keep coming back to classes.

I am bad at yoga partially because I have a bad attitude about it. I am not into the more spiritual aspects of it, and I find some of the terminology a little too new-agey for my taste. I do find the relaxation portions at the end very beneficial, but I don’t know about “lifting the heart” and “shining.” I am not still not sure what the yogi meant there.

I am also bad at yoga because my flexibility is probably the worst it has ever been. So, a good reason to do it, and I do feel slightly better even after only a few sessions.

I am practicing this yoga in the privacy of my own home, using Chromecast to show free YouTube yoga videos on my television. There are several downsides to this. First of all, there’s no one to correct my form, so I’m just doing everything wrong. There’s also no one to notice if I am taking a longer time to get into poses, so I get behind. I actually turned off the first video I tried yesterday because it was too fast to follow. I don’t have a yoga mat either, so I use a towel, which is not ideal. I don’t get any traction, and it doesn’t provide much padding. It’s just slightly better than lying on a wood floor. I feel like a yoga mat is like a gateway drug into retreats and public Ommming and inner peace, but I might have to get one anyway if I keep this up.

To choose which regimens to follow, I used the scientific practice of Googling “Yoga for Runners.” Once I have found a few I am certain I like, I’ll post some links, but I am still testing out some channels. I may try some non-running related ones that focus on the body overall, not just the legs, and maybe a few that are a little longer (the ones I have tried are around 20 minutes and some of that is jabbering at the beginning and end.)

I haven’t replaced my super-fancy strength workout of push-ups and sit-ups, I am still doing that irregularly, but it’s too basic, and doesn’t address my flexibility issues. I am not sure if yoga will actually make me a better runner, but it will help me recover better, I hope.

PP5M Training: Week 3

Apparently last week was so boring I didn’t want to write about it.

Breakdown:
Monday: 4 mi (road)
Tuesday: 4.9 mi (trail)
Wednesday: 3.5 mi (road, tempo)
Thursday: OFF
Friday: 4.2 mi (road)
Saturday: 7.1 mi (trail)
Sunday: 3.4 mi (trail)
Total: 27.1 mi

I wanted to get up to 30 miles last week, but I didn’t, thanks to Wednesday and Sunday. Wednesday was really misty so I had to cobble together a safer route, as I already discussed.

Both Saturday and Sunday were terrible. Saturday I drove out to Jay Cooke State Park to check out that section of the Superior Hiking Trail. I got a year’s state park pass for $25, which is a bargain! I am sure I’ll get my money’s worth this year. It’s good until July 1st of next year.

People were swarming the swinging bridge, but I was heading out the opposite way, ready for some nice technical trail action. It turned out to be paved the entire 3.5 miles I ran out. It turned back into trail just as I was turning around, which was annoying, but there was no point in going any further. I wasn’t dressed for running (I had shorts on, which are fine for intermittent running, but kept bunching and riding up when I was running, and I hadn’t put on anything to prevent chafing, so I had to run kind of bow-legged at times while trying to adjust them.) and I was wearing my hydration pack (bladder empty, but a full sports drink tucked in). I also just didn’t feel like running. I could not get my feet and legs moving for the first three miles or so. I ended up with a respectable 16:49 average time, I guess… but considering I was running on paved, mostly flat terrain, I should have been about a minute faster. I can probably attribute some of that to the shorts. The pack didn’t bother me much.

Since Saturday was supposed to be my “cross-training” day and ended up being my long run day, I set off on Sunday in search of some real hiking action. My plan was to park at the SHT lot near Ely’s Peak and head south. I drove all the way there and the lot was closed and the temporary lot was overflowing with cars. My car really sucks and isn’t exactly secure, so I didn’t feel comfortable leaving it on the road. I ended up driving back to the Magney-Snively parking lot near Spirit Mountain and decided to try out the Spirit Mountain section of the trail.

It started off nicely.

Then I came across a trail detour. It turned out to be straight uphill, followed by a mile along the road to the Spirit Mountain Chalet. I made it about half a mile up the road, in the direct sun, with the pavement radiating heat, looking like a bedraggled hitchhiker, before I decided to forget about trying to hit any specific mileage goal, turned around, and hoofed it back down the road to the cover of the spur trail.

It was kind of a disappointing week of training. I felt ok, but my motivation was lacking for some reason. I’m chalking it up to a bad week and putting it behind me.