High Speeds

So this is my first post in several years. Wanted a record of how I am training. Today did 2 down the canyon in 9:44 (71, 73, 74, 73, 76 (hill), 74, 73 and 70 at the end). Mile splits were 4:51 and 4:53. Better than I was expecting, and first time under 10:00 for two miles since before the mission. Gotta get back in shape!

First all-out race after the mission, so I wasn't sure how it would turn out. I ended up doing better than I thought. Historically, Murray Fun days has been a difficult race for me, and I never had cracked 16:30. This year was different. 

  I started out with Teren, but dropped back a little before mile 1. I missed my mile split, but was 5:35 at the turnaround which gives me a 5:13 or 5:12 first mile. I was afraid of crashing after falling back, but when I hit the downhill, I was feeling great. Was 10:22 at 2 miles, and catching up to second place, who had dropped back from Teren as well.

  Normally, at this point the heat gets to me and I writhe in pain to the finish, but today I was feeling good. One thing that may have made a difference was that I poured cold water and ice on myself right before the start. Perhaps it was a good night's sleep. Or possibly, being two years older compensated for the lack of training.

 In any case, I smelt blood, and went for it. I caught second place a little after two miles, on the little hill (of doom and sadness). Normally, this is where I get caught. But not today. The last mile was in 5:08 (long) and I ended up with 15:58.9. Under 16, and a huge personal course record.

  I'm grateful for how things turned out today, and wish all a happy Independance day (first one in the USA for 3 years!) 

The usual splits 9 + 3.

Splits again.

 Today we did version 1.0 of the Great Chase. The Great Chase is a two mile race among the siblings. The catch is that we have a staggered start. Me and my father used recent race performances and personal bests to determine how much of  a head start to give to each child. Steven had a 1:10 gap on William, William a 50 second gap on Joseph & Jacob, and I started 1:20 behind Joseph & Jacob. If everyone repeated their PR, we would all finish at the same time. So we didn't know who would win.

 I had 5:47 through the first mile (2:22 and 2:25). A little before 800 to go I caught William, who had crashed pretty badly. That third 800 was also 2:25. When I reached 800 to go I saw the rest of my siblings, and realized that they were within striking range. So I turned on the gas and pretty much stopped looking at my watch.

 I ended up with 2:17 for the last 800, 4:42 for the last mile, and 9:29 overall, a PR for me in two miles on this course. (and to my surprise I ended up beating all of my siblings in the Great Chase).

Did 8 miles down the canyon in 44:37. I intended to do a progressive workout. After four miles, I was out of breath, had a sideache, and had to slow down to 5:40 pace. Will need to do more longer workouts to overcome this issue before the Top of Utah half.

Today did an 8-mile tempo run down the canyon. The result was the best so far. Started out in 5:30, then did the next five miles in 26:10 (a 5:14 average). Finished off in 10:40 (5:17, 5:23) for a total time of 42:20. This is my best performance on this course this year.

Nine in the morning in 1:08:54, 4 in the evening with Jenny in 30:02.

  It happened! I went under 1:09! Also, by Ukranian standards I am now a КМС (Candidate Master of Sports) in the half marathon, which is a big deal. The standard was 1:08:30. The breakthrough seems to be a combination of getting 2 years older, and upping the daily mileage to 12.

  Like usual for this course, the first 4 miles were a little slow. My splits were (roughly) 5:15, 5:20, 5:15 and 5:10 to make 21:00 at four miles. Then I picked it up, and ran 5:01, 5:02 and 5:04 to reach 7 miles with 36:07. Teren was with me for the first 4, then fell back, but caught up to me around 7. Something about the transition from the canyon to flat made me develop a sideache. I was pretty worried about that, and said a prayer. It went away after a mile or so, and I was able to catch Teren around 9 miles. My split at 9 was something like 46:35, so 10:28 for those two miles (mile 8 was off).

 After catching Teren, I was still feeling good. I could see 5th place ahead of me. Money on the road. The next mile was in 5:11. making 52:46 for 10 miles. This was by far the strongest I have felt this far into a half marathon. I guess the evening runs have been making a big difference. Around 10.5 I caught 5th place, then set my sights on 4th.

  The hills in the Top of Utah Half are cruelly positioned - right at the end when it hurts the most. Yet I was able to do 5:23. 5:40 on the hills. Ben Van Beekum was a good sport and acutally helped to pull me when I caught up to him around mile 11 - thanks Ben! Then on the last 1.1 stretch, I did a little over 5:30, which ends up being 5:00 pace. Definitely a miracle for me at the end of a half!

   I'm very happy with this race, and am grateful there are so many good races in Utah and such strong competition. Definitely would not have run that time on my own! Most of all thanks to my Dad for his dilligent coaching and putting up with all of my whining about workouts and such.

This was perhaps the only half marathon I have raced where I didn't experience some sort of blowup in the last 3 to 6 miles. It was a new experience.

Today wasn't as glorious as last Saturday. To make a long story short. Hills & Fatigue. This week I didn't get in as much recovery as I needed to, and paid for it today. The first mile was 5:15, flat, but I was already not feeling it. Teren and Jason Lynch disappeared into the sunset while I slogged through the first three miles in 17:00 (yes, 5:40 and then 6:07). I was able to speed up on the downhill, but it was too little, too late. The saddest part was that my downhill miles (5:20, 5:14, 5:10) were slower than my average pace in the TOU half last week. Ouch!

  Mercy smiled upon me, and I still took third. Still in the money. This course is slow, but I cracked 33:30 as a 17-year old. So something else was afoot. I guess не все коту маслиница (literally, 'Not everything is cream to the cat"). Meow. A Russian proverb that says you don't always get what you want.

  Cooled down by running the 5K course with Teren, my Dad, Matt, and some others. An age-graded scoring mechanism was proposed for the curcuit next year. Not sure how I feel about that, given certain old guys can beat me without any help from age grading :-).

Did 6x1000 down the canyon into a headwind. Was not able to hit the target of 3:00, but was pretty close (around 3:02 or 3:03). Very exhausting workout.

Today I was faced with an interesting situation. My Dad set up a 5K in Liberty Park at 6:30PM. I found out about this after having scheduled a date for 7 PM that night. Fortunately I was able to move the date an hour back to 8 PM. I thought that I'd have enough time. However, the 5K started almost a half hour late. This provided me a very strong impetus to complete the distance as quickly as possible. The workouts I'd been doing (6x1000) seemed to pay off. I was able to set a post-mission PR: 15:34. Before the mission, I ran 15:28 in San Francisco, but I'm pretty sure after altitude conversion this time is better.  So the moral of the story is to schedule a date right after every race :-). 

Ran the Haunted Half Marathon as a training run. I got 1:12 with change. As soon as the half marathon was over, I quickly got in my car and drove over to campus to participate in the regional ICPC programming competition. Back-to-back! 

Did 3 easy in the morning. Then in the afternoon was planning on doing 3x2 at 5:00 pace. The first interval was in 10:11. Then I realized that if I did the whole workout, I would end up with 15 miles for the day. So I did one more interval, but made it a half mile longer. My total time was 12:40-ish. After the first mile a little sub-5, all I could do was 5:20 pace.

easy

Last hard workout before the Monumental Marathon. Did 3x2 mles down the canyon with one mile recovery. Ran in the afternoon, so there was headwind. The first was in 5:01, 5:04, the second 4:55, 5:03, and the third 4:58, 4:48. In the first two intervals I started out faster, and then slowed down. My Dad encouraged me to do the reverse in the third interval, and it paid off. Thanks Dad!

Easy

Easy

Easy

Easy pace.

In Indianapolis, tapering for the race tomorrow.

  First marathon since returning from the Ukraine in May, second lifetime marathon. My first half was 1:14:45, then I gradually faded and ran a 1:17:08. Definitely not a reflection of my half speed (1:08:21) but still a good PR (previous best was 2:35:45). The limiting factor was impact tolerance. My lower back and legs got pounded pretty hard. I could feel this from the start and so didn't pace it as aggresively (the plan was to go out at 1:12-1:13). I think this spared me a major blow-up and possibly a DNF.

  With the exception of the last six miles, I always had someone to run with, a really nice thing about this big of marathon. There was a bathroom stop during mile 11, which probably took 25 seconds, and a stop in mile 22 to take off my pants (I had shorts on underneath). It was very cold at the start, so I needed the pants. They were pretty tight-fitting, a purchase from Walmart the day before the race. I had forgotten my sweatpants at home. I think if I'd been wearing those, I wouldn't have needed to take them off.

  In any case, I'm grateful for the PR and the experience. Was definitely a lot less miserable than my first marathon. Need to figure out what to do about impact tolerance. 

  The next marathon will probably be Grandma's, but we'll see. For now, I need to recover.

That's right. One mile. It was all I could do before my marathon-pounded legs gave out. I ended up having to walk home. Despite not being as miserable, I think this marathon took more out of me than Top of Utah did when I was 17.

Better than yesterday, but still pretty painful to run. Ran on grass.

Recovering.

Recovering from the marathon.

Easy

Tried to do a 3 mile tempo, but could only eke out a 15:45. The marathon won't let me get away that quickly :-).

Easy pace.

Easy pace.

Easy

Did 12 easy. Was able to do a two-mile tempo a little under 10:00 (9:51 or so). Think I'm mostly over the marathon.

Today 6 easy.

My current direction now is to work on top speed. In line with that, did 8x400 with full recovery. Was able to average about 63 seconds per interval, but I was fading hard in the last 200 (32 or slower).

Easy pace. Because of class, did 8 in the morning and 4 in the afternoon.

Easy pace. Did 9 in the morning and three at night like usual.

Ran 8 easy. Tapering for the race tomorrow.

Still feeling the Monumental Marathon. Started out around 5:00 pace, but faded hard. Wasn't too tired at the end, but did not have another gear. Still, got the turkey :-). 

Today 8 miles easy. Lots of snow.

Did 14 miles today at an easy pace. The trail was plowed, so the run was not too bad.

Easy.

Wasn't feeling 100% so cut the morning run to 8 and the evening to 2.

Easy pace.

Today ran three miles fast in 14:51. The goal was to run the first 2.75 at 5:00 pace. and then hit the last quarter as fast as I could. Went 4:58. 4:59, 3:45 and 69 for the last quarter.

Ran 5 easy.

Total of 5 miles fast. Did three starting at 5:20 pace, then all-out in the last quarter (67). Then did two miles fast, the first uphill in 5:42, the second starting at 5:20 pace with the last quarter in 61. The purpose of this workout was to work on speed, and to see how much faster I could hit the last quarter if I slowed down the first three miles.