TRAINING LOG:(Part 2 of the “start in the present and write into the past” thread)
2011-MAY-12I read an article on the benefits of a “standing desk” and decided to give it a whirl. I’ve had issues for ever with tight hamstrings and poor flexibility and I know my desk-bound slouch isn’t a good thing. I also did my first run in my new Asics Gel Kayano 17s. I’m working on breaking them in advance of the marathon since I’m still not sure if I’m going to race in those or my ultralight Saucony Fastwitch 4s.
The run-du-jour was a 5 mile run at short-tempo pace. It was a nice, sunny(ish) day and in the mid 60s. I set out on my 5 mile loop and felt pretty decent for the first mile or so (other than the usual, “OMG this sucks!” you get with the first mile of a run until things warm/loosen up). One of the things I struggle with when I get new sneakers is the break-in period. I’ve talked about it before and it manifests itself differently depending on the shoe manufacturer & model, but in the case of the Asics, it felt like there were hot coals where the insole should have been under the ball of my right foot.
The idea behind a tempo run is that you do a fairly intense, sustained workout for a moderate distance to put your body under stress and strong-arm it into accepting the fact that this is something you expect it do and it damn well better adapt! The problem with this workout became trying to balance the need/desire to complete a solid tempo run (which I could have done, but with extreme discomfort) with the knowledge that the unpleasantness I felt every time my right foot hit the pavement would very soon result in my stride changing to compensate.
That’s a bad thing. Once you’ve settled into your running stride/groove/form/whatever-you-want-to-call-it, your body begins the process of adapting to that specific movement and stresses it places on bones, muscles, joints, ligaments, tendons, etc. This commonly causes varying body parts to hurt to varying degrees for varying amounts of time until some sort of equilibrium is reached. When you change that stride, you start that process all over again.
So my options were a) suck it up & keep running the Tempo Run, knowing that something new would hurt which would likely cause something else to hurt and & so on & so on for days or weeks or b) call off the tempo run and find a suitable pace to get back to the gym. I ended up doing a little of both, running for a while longer to see if the burning would go away (it didn’t) and spent the last 2 miles of the run at more of a jog, alternating between walking intervals as needed. The result was that I missed the goal of the tempo run distance, but still managed to get in a decent run.
2011-MAY-11
Kettlebell class, nothing remarkable in terms of strength. We did some extended circuits and kept everything light (16kg). I’m definitely looking forward to getting back to STRENGTH training.
2011-MAY-10
Today’s run was supposed to be a 8x800. That just didn’t happen! I went in with the best intentions and I’m pretty sure I could have powered through the workout, but after the first one or two, my hamstring was still feeling VERY twingy. Being this close to the race, I’m increasingly cognizant of “pushing the evelope” at the expense of breaking the contents.
So I called off the interval workout and did some runs at marathon pace to try to improve the calibration of my HRM’s pedometer (it currently says my “race pace” is 10.1 MPH or just under 6:00 per mile) and did an extended post race stretch & cool-down.
2011-MAY-10 Nike+ Treadmill Workout
2011-MAY-09
Happy Birthday to me! I turn 0x25 today. Workout today was focused on higher reps and lighter weights and the goal seemed to be complete upper body punishment. In that regard, class was a success! Birthday means wine and tonight I celebrated with a bottle Wellington Noir de Noirs and a perfectly grilled medium rare steak and fillet of cod with a stupidly large serving of cake and a reasonable pour of Knob Creek bourbon for dessert. Happy Birthday to me indeed!
ohh....there is it
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