Competitive Jerks Racing and Training - 2023 (Read 574 times)

Merry Christmas an happy Holiday!!

Baring a last minute (and hopefully bloodless) coup it looks like I'll be l starting the 2024 thread. In the meantime I thought I'd throw out a couple of items for discussion/consideration.

1. I really like the idea of DMing the goal races.  I'm sure I'd miss some if there not all in one place!  You can beging sending them at any time.  I've only got one that's set in stone for me so far.

2. Keep the same name or go with something new heading into 2024.  My first thought is "The Kinder and Gentler Competitive Jerks Racing and Training 2024" 

Anyhow....Week 17 to Boston is in the books.  Had an unscheduled rest day due to work that set me back a bit on the mileage goal.  I had to use some mental discipline to NOT try to make up the miles somewhere to meet my mental number at the risk of overdoing it so early in the cycle.

Weekly for period: From: 12/18/2023 To 12/24/2023

Totals: Time: 09:12:48 - 🦅Imperial: 67.63 mi - Metric: 108.81 km

As Thread Dictator you’re allowed to name it however you wish, and require DM for goal races could work. I know it was a little tricky the year I tried to run this place.  It might have been 2020, and the power of kicking people out when they raced anything shorter than 26 miles was denied.

Hi all! Taking a little bit of non-family time to check in and wish everyone who celebrates it a merry Christmas (sorry for the NZ folks, where it's already the 3rd 4th day—in Germany, we get two days, so I that’s why you’re still getting it from me now).

 I'm happy to see Fishy step up to be thread leader. If I'm still around and consistently posting a year from now, I volunteer for 2025—I promise I’m more level-headed and more laissez-faire than I am in my posts (I wouldn't keep my job if I wasn’t). I would probably call people out if I think they’re posting something egregious to online forum etiquette—my bar for poor taste is probably lower than most—but I don’t need to be forum dictator for that. I wouldn’t have done that at the beginning of the year, but I feel more comfortable to do that now. 

I agree with Andy about the race list. I do use it to double-check and make sure I can keep up with forum participants. Dave’s suggestion to announce known races at the start and then DM throughout the year makes sense to me. 

Re race predictions: They’re like horoscopes. Take what you need to from them, but don’t take them seriously. I trust Garmin’s least of all. According to my app, I was peaking a few days ago, because it figured my effort-to-pace-ratio was of that level. Peaking for what? I don’t know. 

Some nice weeklies from Steve and Marky. It’s like it’s summer where y’all are running. Steve, “Saturday was 98% humidity, but only 20C - the workout went great but I can't remember ever being so drenched.” — try this morning in South Florida. Except here's it's 5 degrees Celsius warmer. Not that it’s a competition, but I still think your summer is better than our winter.

My only real excuse is that I’m still injured--the calf less so than the knee, which I weirdly tweaked trying to get back to running and it's been back to bothering me ever since. I did manage 8 miles today (I had to back-track once during my Strava art today), but there’s a 5K race at the end of the week I was eyeing that I rationally know is a stupid thing to sign up for, even if “all my friends are running it and I really want to run with my friends,” but “if your friends jumped off the edge of a cliff would you do it?” The hardest part of being an adult is being my own voice of reason.

Also a nice weekly from wcrunner. I want to get to where you are by the end of this week, and I’m coming back from a lot less! Hope the Covid effects are not sticking around much longer. 

Mt, hope the continued recovery goes smoothly. I kind of learned from you to avoid reaggravating the calf, so I seem to be a bit better off. I honestly find it easier to lose weight while staying active, so it’s great that you’re walking. I found heating and then massaging the calf/Achilles to be really helpful. 

jblack, I often like to run without my watch on times/paces… just the map or clock time, and it helps to tune into one’s rhythm and often feels like less effort. darkwave races excessively like that, and a lot of forum participants either agree or joined the dark side. 

Great week heading back into Boston training, Fishy! My race is 2 weeks after yours, so I’llll probably be starting to share weeklies in 2 weeks as well, and you’re inspiring me :-). I can recommend Desiree Linden’s Choosing to Run, which I just finished reading. It’s basically a race recap of her winning Boston in 2018. 

RP, you say things have gone downhill, but I, for one, am really happy to see you’ve taken steps to change a career out of something you seemed absolutely miserable in. So if anything, that was your Fall 2024 Boston PR surprise. Hope those processes continue well for you. The TRX sounds pretty cool, too. I did those in my gym back in 2018/2019, and those exercises help a lot in strength but also injury prevention. 

 

wcrunner - Interesting that you're finding recovery harder.  Is that a sudden thing?

 

Yes, that's something that developed over the last few months.  Some of it I can attribute to deconditioning, some to Covid, and possibly some to the ablation which I've been told can take 3 months to fully heal.  After I retired in 2017 and had more flexibility, I shifted to a 10 day rather than 7 day cycle to add the additional recovery days.  As I've gotten older, recovery seems to take longer, but what I'm going through now is, I hope, an anomaly.  I'm also placing more emphasis on being sure I'm well rested for my long runs and quality workouts even if that means taking a full rest day rather than a recovery jog. It probably means I'm running a few less miles, but I'm getting better runs when I run long or hard.

 

I think you mean "exclusively" but "excessively" is also accurate

 

 

Tuesday was a frigid morning (over freezing, but dark, damp, and very windy).  I just couldn't get warmed up and it felt like I would strain something if I forced a workout, so I just jogged easy and rerouted to the treadmill the next morning.

 

Saturday's long run wasn't great either.  I had intended to run the last 8 miles at marathon effort, but my legs just didn't want to move.  I suspect it was because I did too much on Thursday after Wednesday's treadmill workout.  So I've pulled back a bit the past few days (Sunday through today) to make sure I'm back on the right side of the stress/recovery line.

OOPs. you're right, darkwave. So weird I didn't catch that in rereading.

And I remember dark, damp, and windy runs in Berlin and Hamburg. Even if the ground is still kind of stable, there are just some weather conditions that make one so miserable, it's really just stupid to force oneself through them. Interesting to see your reflection on your Saturday run. It looked good on paper, but I guess your perceived effort tells the whole story. Hope a few days rest/easier is all you need. This is close to/actually peak week, right?

Also Steve, I realized I did make it sound like I was saying, "you think you've got it bad?" I honestly just still have to wrap my head around the fact that the whole season is like this for you now. But you're right (and I think Fishy noted this too), training through the hot summer will make you a stronger runner in the fall. And we also have a wetter and colder winter than usual... it could be the El Niño effects?

Didn't realize you've been to FL before! Where?

Anyone see the jackets for Boston 2024? They’re very fishy looking and remind me of Alaska King Salmon.

darkwave - Really nice week.  I know things don't shut down as much over this period since it's not summer in the US, but does it feel weird coming up to peaking while most people are in relaxation mode?

Dorothea - In 2019 I did a trip down south - I'd previously done a road trip around New England and New York, Cal etc so even though I loved those places I decided to go somewhere new.  The closest I'd been before was 2013 with a road trip from New York to DC, Kentucky, Tennessee, Texas and Louisiana.  This time (2019) we flew into Houston and drove with some stops to New Orleans then flew to Orlando.  In Florida we went down the east coast to Vero Beach, then to South Beach in Miami (quite an experience), then over to Naples on the West Coast and up to Little Harbor, across the bay from Tampa.  I ran almost every day on the whole trip, always easy pace which got slower as the heat fatigue built up.  It was in May, not even the peak of summer.  Workouts would be so hard, although I should factor in that I was in travel mode and not living the healthiest...