Rhett

AWESOME training run with hills and SO VERY SPEEDY! So happy you're all recovered and into training mode! You'll rock UVM!

You are so cool. Seriously, I wish I could call a 7:41 the hard end of easy.

Glad you are back into happy training mode. I am starting to feel a funk come on, but if it would stop snowing here so I could get outside I think that would help! I will laugh if it snows for the UVM!!!!!

Have a good week! Crossing my fingers for you and your wife (I do not know how to spell her name I just realized) to get into St George this year, I think she would love the course! And it would be great to see you guys again.

Sounds like a good hill to train on. Nice job!!!

You know that if Pron8r were on this blog he would say something like "wow you are sure going through a lot of ups and downs with your training."

you've got the training dialed in for UVM...keep up the great work.

Welcome back to the flow.

Do you have a goal for UVM yet? BQ for corral #1? What would that take? Maybe 5 minutes off your Boston time?

Fly, yes I want to get to corral #1. Unfortunately that just means the top 1000 fastes entries, so I could be any time. At Boston I finished 1057, so if you subtract the ellite men and women I finished in the top 1000. I'm guessing 2:52 will get me in.

At UVM I think I'm going to try and run a 6:30 pace which would get me a 2:50 if I can hang on. I think there is a high probability of crashing hard before the finish line, but I hope to learn from the experience and take another shot at 2:50 at SGM if I get drawn.

Any idea how much faster the UVM coarse is vs. Boston (weather and you being equal)? I assume it is faster due to the net downhill even though it is higher.

No idea, but it's got to be 3 to 5 minutes faster with all the downhill and lack of uphill. My only big challage will be altitude since I train at sea level and won't be able to get up there until Thursday night before the race.

Reading blog comments it seems many runners don't think elevation makes a difference. I do not agree. It may not make a difference if you are running easy, but if you are red lining it I think you will be a bit slower. So, you should be sleeping in a hypobaric chamber. Unfortunately hypobaric chambers are expensive. Perhaps you could make your own? Using duct tape, empty soda bottles, and bailing wire to create a device that lowers ambient air pressure may be difficult. Perhaps as a poor man's alternative to lowering ambient air pressure, you could just lower the amount of oxygen entering your lungs while you get your beauty rest. This could easily be achieved by sleeping with your mouth shut and a finger up one nostril.

On a serious note, here is the article about altitude vs. elevation loss.

http://runningtimes.com/Article.aspx?ArticleID=10507&PageNum=1

St. George is used as an example and their conclusion is that St. George is slower than a flat sea-level course.

"the gravity boost is almost precisely 4 minutes for 5-minute milers, 6 minutes for 7:30 milers...." BUT

"...its average elevation is about 4,500 feet — enough to convert a 3:00 marathon into a 3:08"

On the other hand, Sasha's predictor suggests: St. G 3:00 = 3:03 flat sea level.

The Running Times' times are theoretical/estimated based on numbers from published studies. I believe Sasha's calculator is based on "intuition" gained from real-world observations of runners who train and live along the Wasatch Front (~4,500').

Laughing hard Fly. Thanks for the info. I think I'll try duct taping my mouth shut while I sleep and stuff cotton balls up my noses. LOL