Imminent Catastrophe
OK folks I'm working on it. It's kind of long, because it was a long race and a lot of stuff happened.
I did my longest run since RDL yesterday, my right achilles tendon is still iffy, it has a bump and has been a bit sore. 8 miles with 4 of that at "tempo" pace. The good news is that my achilles feels fine today. The bad news is that my "tempo" pace is about 30-45 seconds slower than a month ago due to the taper and recovery. So I'm out of the Ridge to Bridge Marathon this weekend, I need to be ready for JFK50 in 4 weeks. That's too bad because Ridge to Bridge was going to be a Boston Qualifier, but I'm registered for Tucson in December which is also a fast course. And my family is there.
"Able to function despite imminent catastrophe"
"To obtain the air that angels breathe you must come to Tahoe"--Mark Twain
"The most common question from potential entrants is 'I do not know if I can do this' to which I usually answer, 'that's the whole point'.--Paul Charteris, Tarawera Ultramarathon RD.
√ Javelina Jundred Jalloween 2015
Cruel Jewel 50 mile May 2016
Western States 100 June 2016
Another 13 miler Happy. Sounds like that is getting a bit easy for you.
Well, yes and no. The extra mile for each was unplanned and in fact was easy at the time. But I found that even though I took the next day off from running, the next run was pretty awful and my body felt a bit beat up, especially in the mornings. For this week, although Tuesday was miserable, last night was great. So as usual it takes me 3 days to recover from any extra effort. I think it's a combination of things, but still I really intend to run long on alternating weekends because I think that will be easier on me. But my plan is to do a slow build and see where it takes me.
Don't make excuses for why you can't get it done.
Focus on all the reasons why you must make it happen.
PerfesserR, I think it sounds like your recovery from RDL is coming along extremely well. The race was barely two weeks ago. I imagine your pace might be slower for the next two months at least! Why not give those tendons and everything else a chance to mend before putting in any hard effort? You ran 100 miles!
.........so my objective for the weekend was achieved, even if I didn't want to. :-)
That's called team work, right? How long will your longest run be before the Nov. 3 ultra?
OK, here it is. Like I said, it's long, because a lot of stuff happened.
Also, it's my first time using Blogger so it's not pretty, and the course map slows it down a bit. Anyway, enjoy.
Thanks for the report, Russ, and for answering every one of my questions in it. It just sounds really hard. Not that I didn't think it would be. Relieved to read it got better towards the end. Also it sounds like a lot of effort was made by the organizers in terms of marking and remarking the course. So did you purposely abstain from caffeine so it would hit you harder when you used it in the ultra?
MTA: A phenomenal effort - you are amazing - really toughed it out in the hard parts and kept going - 100 miles!!!
As our younger friends say: Awesomeness.
Perfesser - I'll have more time to comment on that thorough race report this weekend.
To the office, A
Recalculating...
Tomorrow I run the annual Spooky 12K trail race for my second time. The chance of rain is dwindling, although it will still be cool; just under 50F. I'm not going to try and plan any specific pacing since there's no mile markers to go by and my Garmin isn't accurate in the forest. If the course is the same as last year, it gives me some information to plan a bit of strategy. So I want to get through the first 3 miles where the steepest grade is in a comfortable effort and then go as quick as I can the rest of the way. Since instituting weekly tempos into my running over the last year, I hope to see an improvement over last years time. Trail conditions will be a big factor though; so mainly it will be a fun, challenging, playful experience. Nothing makes me feel more like a kid than chasing other people through the forest
Have fun Happy. Are you wearing a costume>
Nope - no costume - per the "nothing new on race day" rule. I'll need to focus, while trying to relax at the same time. I just talked to the race director and he said it's the same course, but the reverse direction. So essentially - it will be all new! even more fun! That said, it means FIVE miles uphill from the start instead of TWO - yikes!
Soooo. I'm baaack with mixed reviews of my 12K trail race.
First the Bad: I was hit with a Major Sideache in the last 3 miles to where I could hardly breathe and sometimes had to walk. I should have expected it because ..well, long story, won't go into now; but I didn't think of it because I only slept about 3 hours last night. Dang! Wide awake at 2 am. Crazy since I wasn't nervous about the race or anything. So I started the race feeling tired and that didn't really go away. I ran as fast as I could whilst trying to keep my breathing under control. (That seems to be my biggest problem in a trail race.)
Now the Good: I bettered my time from last year by FOUR minutes! It was a harder course due to more uphill; so I feel it shows my tempos and trail running that I started last Spring are paying off.
I must admit that about 2 miles from the end, I thought "This is the longest race ever! I don't know how people run marathons."
MTA: I was 3/3 AG and 71/200 OA
My time was 1:11:40 - so 9:37 avg pace, although the first mile was about 13 minutes because it was a single file walk. My avg pace last year was 10:10, so you get why I say the tempos and trail practice have paid off.
Nice run Happy! Pretty good pace for a trail race!
To answer your previous question, yes, I gave up caffeine for a couple of weeks so it would work better during the race and it sucked! But it really worked, just a little cup of Coke really revived me and later on the Doubleshots really got me going, even after 87 miles!
How's your Achilles doing, PerfesserR? Is the swelling/bump going down at all?
Good job, Happy! The work does pay off.
Thanks for writing up the report Russ. Really enjoyed it.
New Orleans Marathon - 2/24/2013 4:16:32
Kentucky Derby Festival Marathon - 4/27/2013 4:09:56 PR!
Honolulu Marathon - 12/8/2013
Best of luck tomorrow Puke! Hope you feel great and the weather cooperates.
I'll be going out for 12-mile trail run with my friend and her dog tomorrow morning. Yay for that since for some reason I just wasn't looking forward to a solitary paved route run.
What's everyone else up to this weekend?