Week 18 Summary: 20 mile peak o' training

Mileage

Scheduled: 39 miles
Ran: 41

Cross training

Push-ups: 190
Crunches: 480

Week notes

Once again I did not go rock climbing since Matt has been flying out of town quite a bit recently and his limited schedule hasn't matched up with mine. Once again I was able to make myself stick with the 6/7 days of push-ups and crunches routine. In fact, a few of those days I did 35 push-ups instead of 30. I've heard that it's good to give your muscles a day to recover after working out. I'm wondering if I should take another day or two off. I think I'd rather stick with the habit that I've fallen into; I usually do the exercises just before I jump in the shower. And if I'm not feeling particularly up to it at that time, I tell myself that at the very least I should do 10 push-ups. That's usually enough to overcome the resistance of getting started and I complete the rest of the reps in no time.

The weather conditions were miserable Thursday morning (torrential rain, wind, cold temps) so I ran inside on the treadmill. I had 6 miles scheduled, so I planned to break it into 2 miles at a 10 min/mile pace, 2 miles @ 9 min/mile, 2 miles @ 8 min/mile. After the 9 minute miles (and 36 minutes of running plus 3 during warm-up) I decided to see how long I could maintain a 7:30 min/mile. It didn't last long. I was able to stick with it for about 5 minutes before I really started to struggle. At this point the heart rate monitor showed 97% of my max heart rate. Not good. I stopped for 2 minutes to let my body recover, then ran a little over a mile at a 9 min/mile pace to complete the 6 miles. It was an interesting experiment, though I think I'll avoid running that fast until after the marathon.

Team in Training group notes

About 60 minutes before the run:
Ate 2 eggs and 1.5 slices of wheat toast. Drank 1/2 cup water.

Weather: Cool. ~42-47 F. Overcast/misty/sprinkles/rain.

Attire: Yellow & white Supernova Classics, short synth running socks, cotton boxer briefs, black Nike synth shorts, white synth t-shirt, green GoLite synth wind shirt, blue bandana.

Jennifer informed me that my sunglasses were in the Subaru glove compartment, but she took that car out of town so I ran without them.

I was running late and in a hustle to get out the door. I planned on it taking 1 hour to get to the park, but it only took 45 minutes including a detour due to the Telegraph/I-696 ramp being closed. Arrived with some time to spare. Put my running shoes on and contact lenses in while sitting in the car. I had brought various pieces of clothing with me so I could play it by ear but settled on the shorts, TNT synth shirt and wind shirt.

Stretched during group announcments. Only Bayshore participants were there at that time.

Kensington's loop is approximately 8 miles long. The coaches recommended going 2 miles out then back to get 4 miles complete, then doing two 8-mile laps.

Mile 0: Started and ran the whole distance with Sue and Kim. Also warmed up for the first half mile with Dave, the lawyer whom I met during an earlier training run. His knee was bothering him (enough to cause a noticable limp) but apparently it's fairly common when he's starting out and wasn't enough to keep him from finishing before us.

Mile 2: Took a brief break to let Kim use the bathrooms. Also turned back around to complete the first 4 miles.

Mile 4: Stopped for water and ate 1/3 of an Organic Food Bar. As I mentioned in my last group training run, I've decided I want to avoid the highly processed "energy" products that contain maltodextrin, soy proteins, etc. I came across these at last week's trip to Whole Foods. I actually know exactly what all of the ingredients are, and they're organic and cold processed (proteins aren't damaged). Additionally, it's pretty high in calories and at least 30% of them are from fat (wish it was more but it would probably affect shelf life). At 300 calories, it's about 3 times the amout as the PowerBar PowerGel that I had previously used (110 calories), so I figured 1/3 of the bar at a time would be appropriate. I decided to forego the chocolate covered espresso beans this time. I'm reading a book on running called "Lore of Running". It mentions that while caffeine does help endurance, there's a chemical in coffee that negates the effect!

Additionally, Julie joined us and ran the rest of the distance with us.

Mile 8: Coach Ken distributed water which we drank on the run.

Mile 12: Stopped again for water and another 1/3 of the Organic Food Bar. Took off my wind shirt for the last 8 miles.

Mile 14: Air started to become misty with sprinkles.

Mile 16: Stopped for a quick water break at the water drop. Finished the last 1/3 of the Organic Food Bar.

Mile 17: Started to feel a little slugish but able to keep the pace. Sue has decided she can't keep it so she tells us to go on ahead. We all started to listen to our mp3 players around here.

Mile 18: The sprinkles developed into full on rain shower. Kim had a song on her mp3 player called "Black Betty" that she want us to listen to since she found it a great motivational song to run to, so Julie, Kim and I took turns listening to the song while Kim held the mp3 player. A guy passed us on a bike saying we were maintaining a 9 minute mile. Not bad for mile 18.

Mile 18.5: With the rain coming down in buckets and we're pressing on, I feel like I'm in a Nike or Adidas commercial.

Mile 19.75: I'm tired but want to finish strong so I pick up the pace for the last half mile. Kim and Julie picked up the pace, too, and we finished together at the tent.

Mile 20: Approximate time to complete was 3:20 (10:00 min/mile), or approximately 3:10 (9:30 min/mile) not including the pit stops.

Cooled down by walking in the parking lot and stretching by the picnic table. Drank a lot of water. Ate quite a few orange slices, a banana and a rice crispy-type homemade bar. The rain cleared up shortly after we finished. I changed into dry clothes relatively quickly as I started to get cold.

People met:
Julie - Approximately 35. Has 5 kids, lives around Rochester (not sure where exactly). I remember seeing her at the info meeting back in January but we never ran together in any previous group training. She had been running with two other people but they dropped out for various health reasons. She had been running slower when running with them, but I remember seeing her pass us running solo last week or the week before. It was fairly evident that she could keep up with us when she joined us at mile 4, though she was feeling a bit out of it having gone to the Kid Rock concert last night.

Post run:
I was a little sore after the run and iced my knees when I got home. My left shoulder was not as sore during or after the run as last time. Overall I feel better than last week. I also feel like my appetite and overall energy levels recovered better this time around. I think the Organic Food Bar worked pretty well, and the orange slices were a nice addition to the post-run offerings.

Additionally, I've decided that I need to wear the bandages over my nipples for the long distance runs when it's as cold as it was today. I've not needed them in the past when wearing the TNT synthetic t-shirt for the long distances. I had attributed this to how smooth the material is. But the cold weather caused a bit of "pointiness" which resulted with raw nipples once again. Ahh... it's the little things in life...