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20072008
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Location:

Alexandria,VA,USA

Member Since:

Jun 03, 2007

Gender:

Male

Goal Type:

Local Elite

Running Accomplishments:

4:34 mile, DC RR Mile, 2007

15:39 5k, Occidental College, 2007

25:52 8k, Rockville Twilighter, 2007

32:54 10k, Shelter Island (tough course!), 2004

49:30 15k, Tulsa Run, 2001

52:21 10 mile, Broad Street Run, Philly (fast course!), 2007

1:08:49 half marathon, Hobble Creek (downhill), 2001

2:28:55 marathon, St. George (downhill), 2006

2:33:04 marathon, Chicago, 2001

Short-Term Running Goals:

15:20 5k

4:25 mile

2:26:00 marathon

Long-Term Running Goals:

sub 15:00 5k

sub 2:22:00 marathon

Personal:

I live in Alexandria, VA, but still consider myself affiliated with Wasatch Athletics in Salt Lake City, UT, and High Noon A.C. in Ithaca, NY. My coach is Demetrio Cabanillas.

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Miles:This week: 0.00 Month: 0.00 Year: 0.00
Easy MilesMarathon Pace MilesThreshold MilesVO2 Max MilesTotal Distance
13.000.000.000.0013.00

AM: Met Kyle Smith and Erik Olson at Roosevelt for a warm up.  Kyle leaves for Princeton tomorrow.  Bummer to loose a good training partner to a good education...  Made my way over to the canal.  Warm up ended up being about 40 min.  Did 4 striders and started a 4 mile tempo between miles 2-6 on the canal.  It was pretty brutal.  Definitely paying for being over zealous on my "easy" runs and in the weight room this week.  The splits were:

5:33, 5:32, 5:39 (ouch!), and 5:51 (what the?).

I certainly hope that last mile was long.  I didn't feel like I fell off pace that much, but I must confess I was not pushing it, and was not feeling particularly good, so I guess it is possible.  Still, I've never run this section for time before and there are a couple of little jogs in the path that I could imagine would test a surveyor's credentials.

Well, it is a bit of a new leaf for me to be looking on the sunny side of all my failures, but this workout points to a couple of positives: First, it is confirmation that my AT is not what it was earlier in the summer when I was averaging 5:25 for this workout on 100 mile weeks.  Second, I think falling off pace was mainly a result of still being sore from the weight training from Thursday, which points to the fact that I really do need to strengthen these muscle groups.  However, probably best to move weights to Monday, as they seem not to affect intervals as much as threshold runs.

 

Comments
From Sasha Pachev on Mon, Sep 10, 2007 at 14:17:39

Randy - this type of falling off pace in tempos had been a very common experience for me. I have not had it since isolating and addressing the causes - lack of sleep, and lack of fuel. My theory on that that this is a neurological shutdown. The brain can be fatigued in two ways - if you do not let it sleep, or if the blood sugar stays consistently low. Once it hits you, mentally the effort feels the same, but your breathing becomes a lot more relaxed, and your HR actually drops. But you absolutely cannot go any faster, not even for 100 meters. I think this can also happen if you experience prolonged emotional stress, or if your life gets too hectic.

From Randy on Mon, Sep 10, 2007 at 14:36:01

Sasha, Interesting theory. I think being sore from the weights is a more direct cause, but -- as you can see from my today's (9-9-07) entry -- the other factors you mentioned were probably present as well. My main problem right now seems to be sleep, I think because of the heat. I can't sleep when it is hot, and my a.c. is too loud. So I cool my room off before going to bed, turn the a.c. off, and when it gets hot again I wake up at 3am and can't sleep anymore.

Anyway, good luck at TOU! I'll never forget 2003 when I thought I'd rabbit you through the half, and you ended up dropping me at mile 10. I'm sure you're even stronger this year.

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