Cross-training, and not . . .

The transition to triathlon a few years ago taught me some great things about cross-training.  It allows us to increase training volume with less risk of injury.  It fights off boredom.  It exercises different muscle groups.  It also allows us to shift events when injured. All of these things are good.  One thing is bad.  There is a big difference between running 5-6 times a week and running 3-4 times a week.  The same thing goes for swimming.  I notice less of a difference with cycling, but FWIW, I'm more of a natural cyclist than the other two.  When I increase my focus on running, my running form improves.  Right now, I'm not running, so I've been swimming a lot more.  My swimming is improving.  I wonder if we shouldn't work more periods of training that focus on improving just one of the events, while deemphasizing the others.  Is it possible to improve, and then maintain the gain, or is it better just to keep rotating.  I suspect that there's not one right answer to this question.

Comrades

Speaking of Comrades, I have generally had very little interest in "ultras."  Max's feats amaze me, but I know how I feel after a marathon, thank you very much, and 100 or so miles on a bike is plenty.  But I do feel an odd attraction to the Comrades Marathon.  Its history, the idea behind it . . . There's more to it than just the miles.  Maybe someday.  Max, is it uphill or downhill this year?

Welcome Back Max

Welcome back Max.  It's good to hear that you are back to enjoying running. I would actually like to hear more about the logic of your hiatus.  The psychology of "on" and "off" is currently very interesting to me, as right now, I'm struggling a bit with motivation, and I'm not sure why.  Okay, I'm not entirely mystified.  At the moment I'm wrestling with the aforementioned hamstring pull that is proving to be more stubborn than I had hoped.  Every marathon has its "lurker," and this has turned out to be a good one. I went straight from a really fun 10x400 with lots of optimism about the future to old mr. gimpy again.  I've managed to hold it together with spinning an swimming, but each time I try to run again, the microtear, sciatica, or whatever it is reasserts itself.  This week, even the motivation to improve my swimming, which had been keeping me going, has fallen off.  I have truly fallen into a winter slough of despond.  I find it mystifying that the same brain that finds joy in running long miles to train for a marathon or a tri can fall into a pattern where even swimming for 40 minutes seems like a chore . . .  Oh well, it's January.  Max, talk me out of this . . .

Ted's Right

Ted's been carrying this blog for the past several months.  Regrets from this end.  My excuse is that my running for the 12 months from November 2014 through November 2015 was almost certainly in the double digits of miles.  Next to none until November, when it picked up a tad. 

So, congrats to the co-bloggers for last fall's good half-marathon (Spencer) and good marathon (Ted), and I'm sure I'm missing something because I've been out of it.  Regrets at missing out on some good group runs that I know took place.

Glad to report that I finally started getting busy in December.  I did some great running in Miami while attending a seminar; got in some miles in Austin over the holiday; and had two cool runs in NYC while attending AALS.  One, along the Hudson, south from 34th to Wall Street and back. 

A little cooler than this last weekend.

And two, along the Highline from 34th to the southern end and back.  I've been running with long-time training partner J__ on weekends on the Glen Echo trail, with a couple of long runs in the 15-16 mile range.

The Highline.  The plants weren't quite so green last weekend.

Too early to predict that I'm back in the saddle.  I am on a ratcheting the mileage upward plan, with a long week of about 40 miles recently and still feeling great.  And I do have a goal, with a bib reserved for Comrades (South Africa) in May -- and the need to get a marathon in before then for a qualifying time.

I'm in.

And I hope to catch one or more co-bloggers for a run in there somewhere.

New Year -- Hello Out There

Okay, so we've all fallen silent since late October.  It's a new year, though, and time to recommit to the blog.  I have been quiet because I've been in post-marathon tailspin.  I don't know what's up with the rest of you, but I'm curious about our various aches, pains and small triumphs.

I felt great after the Marathon in mid-October, but have fallen victim to a series of pulls and cramps since then.  First my knee got twingy.  Then at Thanksgiving, as that got better, my hamstring seized up.  That has taken a while to resolve, so it has been a frustrating late Fall.  Right now, it seems to be okay for about 2 miles. Then it gets iffy after that, and debilitating somewhere between miles 4 and 6.  It's better if I keep it slow, but as soon as I go above a 9:30 pace complaints start.  Yeesh.  So, I've rededicated to swimming for the moment, and am hoping to start the crawl back in the next few weeks. I don't have any major races scheduled, so will concentrate on returning to form.  How about the rest of you??

While I was Away

Haven't posted much because until recently haven't run much.  Having more or less successfully completed 9 months of exercise physiology and major changes to my gait and stride I can now run pain free.  The weird thing is that I can't both maintain correct posture, gait and stride and my breathing all at the same time.  So its kind of a best 3 out of 4 at any one time.

I'm at the very end of the walk run rehab portion of my recovery where I tend to walk a bit every 12-15 minutes which isn't a lot different before I saw the doc in early 2015 after lumbering through a painful and not that fun New Orleans half-marathon with Matt Sag.

Three nice things to report running wise.  About a month ago, I finished the Chicago half in just under my lousy New Orleans but pain free, running better, and enjoying it more.

Second, I took advantage of a heavy domestic travel schedule and I ran in Little Rock, Providence, New Orleans, and Chicago all in a 12 day period! My main take away from this is that Little Rock has its River Run half right and man is Providence hilly.  Also fun to rerun the last half of the New Orleans actually enjoying it compared to January.

Finally, best wishes to Matt Sag who is running NYC this weekend for his third marathon in the past 7 weeks.  Truly inspired and crazy even by the standards of this esteemed blog.

Race Report -- Hudson Mohawk Marathon

Sunday, October 11, I ran my last marathon of my early 50s -- the Hudson Mohawk Marathon, from Schenectady to Albany along the Mohawk and Hudson Rivers.  I picked it for one set of reasons, and enjoyed it for an entirely different set.  The original concept was that a whole bunch of us from the South Brooklyn Running Club would go and use the race to try to qualify for Boston.  The race is small.  The course is pretty flat and net downhill.  What's not to like.  As we got closer to race date, however, the phalanx dwindled due to injuries and other health concerns.  By the time the race rolled around, it was just me and F.   Oh well, the few, the proud.

As I have detailed earlier, I'd been wrestling with various goals -- BQ, PR, 4 hours. . .  Quite frankly any of those would count as a success, but the question was which one to aim for.  Boston qualifying was the original idea.  In 2012 I ran 3:42 -- a freakish outlier and PR.  The qualifying standard for me for 2017 is 3:40.  That seemed vaguely within reach.  That is, until the qualifying standard for 2016 was announced to be 2:30 under the stated standard.  There's a big difference between a two minute PR and a 5 minute PR.  That knocked the wind out of my sails, along with the fact that I simply did not feel quite as fit as I was in 2012.

That said, I made a plan (in conjunction with my guru M).  Go out at a stead 8:20 pace (3:40), and if there's gas at 20, light the afterburners -- Hah!!  There were two flaws in this plan, and I knew them. It assumed: (1) that 8:20 was a conservative, rather than aggressive pace; and (2) that I have ever, ever, ever, in my life, run negative splits in a Marathon.  Oh well, go big or go home, right??

So that's what I did.  After a cold wait for the start, I lined up with the 3:40 pace group, and headed out.   While at the time, I thought (due to Garmin peculiarities) that we had gone out a bit fast, careful review of the data showed stead 8:15-8:20 miles from the start.  I felt good, comfortable, the weather was cooperating.  The course was spectacular -- first country roads, then the shores of the Mohawk River on a perfect fall day.  I hit the half marathon right on schedule -- 1:49.30 and held pace, mostly (okay, assuming 8 minute miles for the last 10K), through 20 (2:49.40) miles. Without going into the details, though, I slowed a little bit at 18-19, over a tough part of the course, gunned it to get back on pace at 20, and then blew up big.

It wasn't an injury blow up. I just ran out of gas.  My legs just wouldn't go anymore.  My heart rate dropped, and I lost my mojo.  I was okay doing the survival shuffle, but not much more.  I stopped to pee, I chatted with the other broken souls, and gutted it out.  End result, 3:55 and a bit.  Gotta say, that surprised me.  Out of defeat, a pretty nice victory.  Sub-4 hours, 9 minutes faster than last year, and in what I usually think of as my happy zone.  The vast majority of my marathons have been in the zone of 3:50-3:55, with the plurality in the vicinity of 3:54-3:55.  I am so _not_ complaining with that result.

Another one for the books!