Breaking the Wall

Day of rest. Went to church.

A.M. 12 miles total. Most of it with the kids. Benjamin did 8, Jenny 4, Julia 3, Joseph 3.5, Jacob 2, William 1. Jenny and Julia did the mile time trial. Jenny was not having a good day again mentally. She started with a quarter in 89, which was great, then suddenly at around 550 mark decided she did not want to go further even though her 509.34 split was 1:56 - still on pace for the 6:20 target. I told her she had to try again. This time she made it to the quarter in 97 and just stopped. I told her she had to try one more time. She went through the quarter in 93, then did 97 (3:10 at 800) and just stopped. Benjamin was helping me - he learned what it was like to deal with this behavior as a pacer now - about 3 years ago he was the misbehaving pacee when he was trying to break the 6:00 mile.

Julia's time trial went much better. She opened with 95, then did 97. Plopped a little on the third lap (1:43), but then recovered and kicked in 97 finishing in 6:34.1 - a new PR by 13 seconds.  Now all of our children that are 7 and older have broken 6:40, and their average mile PR time is 6:08.

I did 1.5 tempo on hills near the house in 8:47.

A.M. Total of 13. Benjamin and I did a workout. We ran to Nunn's Park and did my favorite 3 mile tempo down the Provo Canyon. The target was 5:20 with the understanding that with 0.5 to go Benjamin had free reign and could go faster if he felt good to get his course PR of 15:54. My goal B was to survive up to that point, goal A was to partially survive his pattented long kick, and  goal A+ was to survive all of it. Unlike last time when we did it in the spring when I pulled Benjamin for about 1.8, this time I sat on him the entire time. We opened with 5:16 at a fairly even effort, but the first quarter was a bit slower (81) due to a rhyhm-breaking bump. The second mile had some pace variation. After seeing 5:16 Benjamin, I suppose wanting to be nice to his aging dad, eased off to 5:30 pace for 300 meters. His aging dad told him to pick it up. Then he picked it up to something like 5:10 before settling into 5:20 pace. The mile was 5:19. The next two quarters were 79 and 80, and then the grind began. He fed me a 75 quarter, but I managed to survive it. Not for long. With 300 to go he shifted gears and dropped me. His closing quarter was 73, I could only manage 78. So he ended up with 15:42, last mile in 5:07, I got 15:47, last mile in 5:12. For Benjamin this was a course PR, but I still have him by 27 seconds over lifetime. I did get my master's course PR though. 

Afterwards Benjamin went home and ended up with 10.6 miles for the day. I turned around, jogged 0.75 and ran a 2 mile "cool-down" tempo in 11:16 down the canyon. Ran another mile with William, Jenny, and Joseph when I got home.

Jenny did 4, Julia 3, Joseph 3, Jacob 2, William 1.

Over the last year somehow I managed to gain about 3-4 lb. I did not realize it for some time because my weight fluctuates a lot and I have a hard time telling if I just ate or drank too much, or if it is real weight. But a few weeks ago I realized it was just extra weight. Upping the mileage at 6:00 pace did not get rid of it. However, recuding the animal fats in the diet on top of the training made it go away, which resulted in a faster time today that in the previous weeks.

So one take from that is that with aging my ability to process animal fats has diminished. I can eat carbs to satiation, and it is all good - I use a lot of carbs. However, fats are a different story, particularly animal fats. They just go and sit there as dead weight for some time, and are very reluctant to burn.

Another take is that my spinal defect (spina bifida occulta) is perhaps extremely weight sensitive. That is perhaps the reason I was able to run 1000 in 3:03.8 at the age of 12.9 but the fastest I ever ran the distance is 2:49 achieved at the age of around 17.9 - 5 years later. I believe what happened was as I began to mature I started growing muscle, but that came at a  high cost - the spine could not properly support it. At 12 when I ran I felt like antelope. At 17 I felt like an elephant, and have felt like that ever since. This might have an implication for those with real spina bifida (manifesta as opposed to occulta), perhaps even a greater one - keeping the weight just a few pounds lower with the same muscle mass, or maybe even with lesser muscle mass as long as you stay away from the extremes, in some cases could make a difference between being able to walk and being bed-ridden.
 

A.M. 12 miles total. Did 1.5 of tempo pickups. Joseph wanted to do a time trial, so Benjamin and I paced him in the mile at Orem High. His first lap was 91, followed by 94, and another 94. Then he kicked in 92 finishing in 6:14.0 - a new PR by two seconds. This was a real mile - 1609.34 meters, so we have a left-over of 3 seconds relative to the some of the rounded splits. His Crocs are now pretty old, he had stretched out the strap, so they do not stay on very well. About half way through he lost both of them and finished wearing just socks. He probably lost 2 seconds on that. I ordered him a new pair of Crocs.

Jenny did 4, Julia 3, Joseph 3, Jacob 2, William 1, Benjamin 8.

A.M. 12 miles total for me. Benjamin did an 800 time trial. A year ago I could pace him in that. Now even if I was in my best ever 800 shape the only way I could participate over the entire distance would have been by drafting, and my 800 speed is not quite what it used to be. So we decided he would run the first 300 by himself, then I would pull him for 200 and then step aside so he can pass over the next 100, then I would provide a competitive challenge from behind over the last 200. The plan was to open in 64 and see what happens. We did the time trial at Orem High track.

It pretty much went as planned, except I was not too competitive in the last 200. He got to 300 in a high 48, I pulled him through 400 in a high 64, then 1:21 at 500, then I stepped aside and he passed me with 1:38 split at 600, then I hung on for dear life for the next 100 with 1:55 split at 700. Then Benjamin finished in 2:12.3 and I finished 1.4 behind. Benjamin got a 4 second PR and was only 0.3 off my best time ever. 

So here is the plan for Benjamin's OTQ 2016: 800 - 2:00, 1500 - 4:00, 5000 - 14:30, 10000 - 29:45, and that should hopefuly be enough for a little under 1:05:00 half on an eligible course. In all honesty, my main concern is the 800 meters. That is where we have relatively little control. The longer distances will come with training if the speed is there - his endurace has developed quite well off just 50 miles a week already, so I am quite confident that once the mileage goes into the 80-100 range there will be no problems with the endurance.

Jenny did 4, Julia 3, Jacob 2, Joseph 3, William 1. William ran 0.5 in 4:04, a new record for him. I did 1.5 of tempo running.

A.M. Total of 12. Did 1.5 of tempo pickups. Benjamin did 8, Jenny 4, Julia 3, Joseph 3, Jacob 2, William 1.

P.M. Helped Benjamin with his Eagle Scout project. He marked 4 miles of the Murdock Canal Trail with the Provo River Trail style triangles - cycles of 1,2,3,4 with each mark separated by 330 feet (1/16th of a mile) and each cycle making up a quarter mile.

A.M. 20 miles total. Benjamin was retaking the ACT in the hopes of hitting something higher than 33 which he got a month ago on his first try. I ran the first 8.5 miles with Chad. We did a 2 mile tempo down the canyon. In spite of having raced a marathon only a week earlier Chad was feisty and made me run the first 0.5 in 2:39. Then he started fading but I did not mind since I did not really want to run 5:20 pace anyway. We finished it in 10:58. This tempo provided some more evidence for my theory that a damaged muscle fiber when repaired regains power before it regains endurance. We jogged about 0.75 and ran another tempo mile in 5:47 on a rolling section. Then I ran with the kids - Jenny did 4, Julia 3, Joseph 3, Jacob 2, William 1. I did a tempo pickup for 0.75, and then a 2 mile tempo up the canyon in 12:15 (6:11,6:04) - headwind was bad in the first mile, but calmed down in the second, then jogged a little and ran the same stretch on the way back in 11:10 (5:33,5:37), and then jogged some and did one more mile uphill back to the house in 5:57.

P.M. Benjamin did 8 including 7 on the Murdock Canal Trail to check if the marks were good. I rode the bike alongside.