Competitive Jerks Racing and Training - 2023 (Read 575 times)

https://www.kcra.com/article/cim-bus-shortage-delayed-start-medals-2023/46033172?fbclid=IwAR0uSib3sJH24W5PTZgQnxgoxc5pBzhzTyxOokrx-dkjoLiMe4U9dFHnu_g_aem_AQpAidndcqq8K5pqfYGNgjfyWnaIKn7FP0MDnqJpkD5AODnFj3ndmWsAGI_noholNy0

14-17 is just a long uphill grind. Nothing really hard, but when your hamstrings aren't there it sucks. It isn't rolling. It's about a 3% grade for 3 miles.

This isn't the CIM that's been mocked around here as being an easy course.  That sounds terrible

Jblack - welcome!  Good to see a new face on here.

Flavio - I've definitely had some ups and downs since being in really peak form in 2019-early 2020.  The downs have mostly been due to overtraining then getting sick.  But you've just gotta focus on being the best runner you can be in the here and now, and certainly over the past 6 months I've trained really consistently.  2023 will be close to an all-time mileage record for me, so hopefully that will pay off into next year.  I'm not running a really quick course until April so that will be a good test.  I have nothing to prove in terms of times so the big goal for me is putting in race performances I can be proud of (like last Sunday), and exploring new events (like the Xterra series last winter).

Cal you’ve run 10 now haven’t you? You qualify for their loyalty reward program or whatever they call it.  What is the discount they offer you? I am upset they did away with the 5/10/15/20/25 year goodies like coffee cups and travel blankets.

edit: people are really upset about the new price.   The re-run special of 2016 was nice.  Now with everything being more expensive due to Covid 19 and the war in Ukraine or Gaza or Tibet or wherever we need to have one to protest about it’s almost unappealing. The appeal of driving home is nice until I have to be out of my hotel an hour after I finish my race. I would much rather buy the $215 entry with an option to defer than $185. If I buy the $185 entry and sell it the next person is paying over $220 for a smaller marathon. Crazy since it isn’t one of those Major marathons…yet. Maybe UTMB will buy it so we can REALLY raise the prices.

Why's the price getting jacked up so much?

the government printed a metric fuck ton of money, handed it out to people, shut down businesses for approximately one year driving the cost of everything up 20% requiring businesses to pay their employees substantially more money to perform the same tasks so they’re able to continue operating at the adjusted cost of doing business thanks to the volume of currency in circulation all in an attempt to avoid stagflation.

Bidenomics

https://ktvo.com/news/nation-world/unspent-covid-19-money-leads-treasury-department-to-update-rule-relief-funds-coronavirus-pandemic-state-local-fiscal-finances-democrats-republicans-bidenomics-slush-fund-awards

MickJogger - Darkwave's rule is in still in full effect.
That said:
- although Sevilla has to be the flattest course in the world, it has been warm pretty much every year with highs of 18C by 11:30am.
Also they're sold out, it's waiting list only now.
I have not yet found another in the Feb + March period that is nearly guaranteed to have colder weather (max 14C by the end) and is super flat.
I'd also like to find one that has a half marathon or 10k on the same day, so that my wife can compete as well.

Mark - I agree running for position is much more fun than running for time. That's rarely an option for us mid packers unless it's a tiny race.
But I'm happy to see your running progress, and it's crazy to think your daughter is 6 already, it feels like yesterday when you announced her arrival.

me - So I dig into my training log to find out if my feeling was correct.

Look at this 10k in 40 minutes on October 18th:

https://www.strava.com/activities/10059694242

What about this over 11K in 45 minutes, on November 1st:

https://www.strava.com/activities/10140288291

Here's 4x4K@MP that was also comfortable on November 5th:

https://www.strava.com/activities/10163429345

Here's 4x 15'@4:00/km 6:34/mi on November 8th, also quite alright:

https://www.strava.com/activities/10181138545

Now see me having a similar heart rate running 15 seconds per K slower. I think this was when I took the biggest hit to my fitness, on November 19th:

https://www.strava.com/activities/10244445135

And just slightly better, but still bad, on November 26th.

https://www.strava.com/activities/10283817044

It's as if something happened during that big 76 mile week, like dunno, my body revolted and I lost 5-10% of fitness overnight.

Maybe something hit me, my immune system managed it relatively well that I didn't feel harsh symptoms (just sore throat and cough), but whatever it was it hit me enough to lose fitness.

Welcome jblackjr! Hope you stick around. I’d be glad to no longer be the newest member of this thread :-) I like Flavio’s idea of setting smaller in-between goals, but I can see right now you kind of just want to know where you’re at, and it could be faster than 29 min 5k!

Fishy, yeah, I can imagine after years of running successful marathons, you’ve got a good idea of what works for you and what doesn’t. Despite also having been running for a while, I can only state I thought one of those marathons were run well, and it wasn’t for time. I am slowly accumulating the strategies that I know work for me, and always grateful to learn new ones.

JMac, I am on the bandwagon of just going ahead and running on it and expecting improvements. I got PF at the beginning of 2019, got rehab and shockwave therapy, no improvement (really frustrating, as the shockwave treatment was out of pocket and 100 Euro a session), took a month off in Dec 2019, no improvement, took two months off with sock, taping, and rehab, no improvement—in fact, it almost felt worse after that longer break—, slowly built back up to running in April 2020 with rehab, sock, and taping, slow and steady improvement until I no longer needed to tape, and no longer needed the sock. That was maybe September 2020. Now I get a mini flare up here and there and wear the sock once in a while, but it’s gone for all intents and purposes. So yeah, definitely worth a try. Oh, and I forgot to say that I do get custom orthotics, and when I try to go off them, the PF comes back, so it does seem Im stuck with paying for those things for life.. But the good quality ones do last over 2500 miles. I hope you have a similar experience!

Flavio, it’s a real bummer to see your race result. But I’ve appreciated your attitude about it as shared in your report and after, and laying your training out like that makes it look a lot like overtraining. need2tri beat me to saying it, but it could be that you peaked too early. I did that 2019— workouts were going amazing until I did an incredible 10-mile tempo with little effort three weeks out, and after that running felt too hard. I’d chalked it up to the taper, but the runs themselves were not going well anymore… it wasn’t just the mental aspect around it. And the race itself was tough, without the needed strength to get through the marathon at my prescribed pace. It’s why I don’t do Hanson’s anymore, even though I like the plan, as such.

Also, “For the record, it could all also be performance-related anxiety. But I think that's a lower probability because:

a) I don't know of anxiety causing cold symptoms” —I thought the same, but I’ve been wondering a lot post-Philly if I did indeed freak myself out into illness without realizing just how anxious I was. One can’t forget the normal stress that comes with travel and work, either.

Thanks also for the reminder that even if I can’t make it to the gym, I can do something at home! I absolutely need to work that into my routine, too.

Stellar 5k, Steve! I wonder if the ability to be so aware of yourself and your emotions before the run played into being able to tap into top performance for the race. Sub 18 is absolutely not out of the question for you.

Mark, your race sounds exhilarating to run (if you’re fit enough for it) and watch. It’s great when you can run in a group and very awesome you could outkick that 20-year-old in a sprint finish. Also congrats to your daughter for her new PR!

Thanks for sharing your pace strategies, RP, Mark, and Cal! Always cool to see how folks prepare. And thanks for sharing the tracking, Steve, Mikkey, and JMac, I was able to check in and it was cool to see those splits.

Re race costs: Sure, inflation is part of it. But hello supply and demand? I still only paid $85 for Glass City and $95 for the Fort Lauderdale Marathon last year. But the Miami HALF Marathon cost me $185!! The race directors know they can charge more for these popular races, and so they do.

Speaking of, yep, Glass City is the marathon I signed up for. I’ll figure out logistics later, but it will involve flying to Detroit and renting a car for Toledo. I went through all the options— thanks so much for the help Dave, wcrunner, darkwave, Half Crazy, Longboat,— but I realized I’d want another medium sized race and one with a good reputation for weather and flatness. Other than a fluke in 2022 (which obviously can repeat itself), it’s cool weather; there’s, like, 300ft of elevation; the organization sounds good; and I may have a friend who is going to run it with me, so we can share costs and the experience. It’s the same day as the Eugene Marathon (which is definitely on my list of longterm race goals, Dave!), and it means I have 4 months of solid training even after taking most of December easy. I’m signed up for the Miami Half, but I only did that to be part of something I’m no longer really part of, so I’m thinking of switching to the full and deferring to next year. I’ll be back in Berlin for the summer, darkwave, which is why I can’t do Grandma’s…but that sounds like a pretty cool race, too. And so yeah, I can’t be in Europe until the summer, Flavio. 

Darkwave, it’s disappointing to read about the negative medicine effects. I imagine you’ve already looked into how long it usually takes for the side effects to abate. Hopefully your doctor(s) can recommend something else to try fairly soon.

Merkle, hope your hip flexor and IT band feel back to normal, soon. Re: avoiding slipping… I learned that part of hilly ultra running is learning to deal with falling. I think krash may have one or two things to say about that. As for banking time… I think it’s part of racing strategy for sure, and there will be also times in the race where you’re naturally going to get a runner’s high and feel really amazing for a few miles. However, you do need to be able to find the sweet spot between faster and too fast… and I think that’s just trial and error. 8-8:15 may absolutely be a fair speed, but it may be a matter of how long and how early in the race. I think the more experienced ultra runners should chime in on that, though. I’ve only done three, no more than 40 miles!

SomethingClever, it’s great to read you’re back above the 10-mile mark since injury! That’s always a great threshold to cross when getting back.

CKeen, sorry read about new goals for the fall 2024, but who knows what that’s good for. Better to get your illness out of the way and slowly build back up. I’m not sure if you ever told us of your final plans for the spring.

RP, sorry to see your girl didn’t meet her goal, but it seems like she became a mentally stronger runner at CIM, which is always a win. And at least you got to run the race with her, so that’s better than completely solo, which I’ve done and is not terrible, but it’s always nicer to have friends/family around.

Also, I used manual lap for the first time during Philly—something I’d talked with Fishy and Darkwave with before the race, and I think Fishy is right when he said there’s something reassuring about seeing the mile automatically pop up. It may not be totally accurate, but it’s a useful metric if that’s what you train with. I think I’m going back to it, too, as I was annoyed having to hunt down mile markers with my eyes and hitting the watch.

And also also, CIM sounds like a terrible course for non-hill friendly folks, and I’m glad I didn’t run it!

Re faster runners: The infrastructure around racing has increased ten-fold in the past 20 years. You’ve got different sports companies putting on these huge events for kids across the country, and the programs have definitely learned from more years of learning and adapting. It makes sense. That being said, just come to Florida if you want to feel fast again. It only takes about 3 weeks to acclimate to the heat and humidity ;-)

Wcrunner, ugh, annoying about catching Covid! Hope you continue to have a smooth recovery with no lasting effects. And hope the return to running continues smoothly as well.

I’m running a mile race for the first time since high school today. I have no expectations except I don’t want to injure my knee. And I’m running a half on Sunday after switching my deferred marathon from last year to the 13.1. I have no expectations except to enjoy some time with club mates and maybe surprise myself. If not, that’s okay. I also would like to keep my knee niggles at bay, there.

Dorothea - Glass City is a good pick! I’ve heard good things, not sure why I didn’t think of that. I planned to run that one back when I lived in Detroit, but got injured, then moved away.