I run therefore, I am!

I've noticed the same thing about pace in AM vs. PM. I think waking up during the day helps...

Yes Adam, I felt like i was working harder this morning and my average pace was alot slower. Maybe thats why I ran faster in del sol? They need to start these races at night! let us wake up!

An old coach of mine said V02 max peaks in the afternoon and is lowest in the wee hours of the morning, which is why morning runs are slower if you don't warm up.

Walter, I did feel like I was flying that first night leg in Del Sol...

Jon, I mentioned this on my blog a bit ago but often even running at a faster pace in the evening my heart rate is slower. Going off of the % max mentality that would fit with your coaches thoughts...

Back when I wore a HR monitor, my HR was much higher in the evening than in the morning. Mornings always seem sluggish, and I usually need a longer warmup when I do hard workouts in the morning, vs. the afternoon. A little "workaround" I've developed is to jog a mile or so when I get up, then stop back at the house, eat a little bit, stretch out, and then do my "real" run. The little mini-run serves to wake myself up and get the blood moving.

Paul, When you wore you monitor all the time did you have days when the first mile or two were very high and then leveled off to normal. I've seen that a couple times lately during my AM runs. On a side note I did a little homework and came accross the following on diurnal changes in HR and VO2. In one study (J. Sports Sci. 2002) 9 athletes ran at 6am, noon, or 6pm at moderate or high intensity there was "The results of this study indicate that the amplitudes of the VO2 kinetic responses to moderate- and high-intensity treadmill exercise are similar within and across test days."

Oops! I was still editing that...

The second study I came across (Chronobiol Int. 2006) is in cyclists looking at 6am vs. 6pm exercise at high and low intensity. Here they concluded the following. "The mean time to exhaustion recorded at 18:00 h (270.6+/-104.8 sec) was greater than at 06:00 h (233.9+/-84.9 sec)." and "The blood lactate concentration and absolute core temperature at the point of exhaustion were significantly higher during tests done at 18:00 h. There was no diurnal variation in core temperature increase, .VO2, and RMS slope. The time-of-day effect for every variable did not depend on pedal rate. Diurnal variations in maximal aerobic endurance cannot be explained by a change in aerobic metabolism or in muscular fatigue. The origin of the diurnal variation in the time to exhaustion is likely to lie in greater participation in anaerobic metabolism." There is a ton more but not being an exercise physiologist most of it is out of my field of expertise. Hope this helps. Walter sorry for hijacking your blog...

My same coach would have us run 1 mile (very slow) right when we woke up the day of the race, even if the race was 5 hours later. Seemed to help, kind of like Paul's mini-run.

Walter -

They just released the Boston bib numbers and I think that you got just about the coolest number possible.

No surprise that the cyclists could push themselves harder in the evening. Regarding morning HR being high, I think when you first get out, there is not enough moisture between your body and the strap, so your HRM is reading bogus data, and it happens to be on the high end. This used to happen to me all the time back in the days when my HRM actually worked. What is funny is that something like this happened during my VO2 Max test as well in 2004.

To Andy- Oh my gosh that is sooo funny that my number is 1234 it sounds so smooth! I hope my race is as smooth as my number! Are you running it this year?

To Jon that is good advise Paul mentioned that he wakes up runs a mile and then comes back and eats a little, stretches and then does a run. Im going to experiment with that and tell you how it goes. Some runners that did a 5k at the capitol got together at 6 am and ran 8 miles and then did the 5k at 8 am and everyone of them pr'd! I always feel like doo doo at the start of marathons and then my body wakes up and then its too late. jk. no but theres alot of good advice here.

To Sasha- yes Im sure that our monitors are not exactly dead on right. but I wasnt trying to push myself this morning until I looked down at my average pace and saw it was at 7.15/mile. Maybe thats also why we did a better run in del sol not having the ability to gauge yourself off of other runners so we depended on our watches and they could be a bit slow. Ill try looking at my watch more on my runs.

My heart rate is usually lower first thing in the morning. I often run better in the mornings as well.

How are you feeling James? Well enough to do a long run on saturday?

That depends on how long you are talking about?

16-18. Cody mentioned he was coming down here to slc and I thought I get you to join in.

I'll have to see how I feel, but I don't think I could go that far yet. I'll let you know and thanks for the invite.

Thanks for the welcoming! Yes, I do know the Carter's. I went to high school with Ryan but he is a bit older than me. But we do have kids the same age that play sports together.

Hey, 1234! Great job last night at Hill Kills (I think I'm just gonna copy and paste your hill kill description on my blog).

See you Monday at the Oval or if your Saturday morning plans don't pan out, feel free to join us in Bountiful. Coach Bill will give us a good workout (~15 miles but feels like so much more).

Ok Andrea madame! I will let you know. You are such an inspirational person! Almost obsessive huh? Im actually giving up my Hawaii trip with my wife to run the WBR relay this year. Now that is plain obsurd! Have a good one and hopefully the sun will dry up this crap we woke up too! C ya!

To Sunny, It is a small world after all! Walt Disney was dead on with that ride, even though I sing the song for days after riding the ride! Janell is a stud! We always stay with them when we do the st. george thing. I know janells folks really well, they live up in smithfield. So get your miles up and we can count on you and mik'l to rip up some half and full marathons!