Good morning, Spring is in the air here in NYC. Or maybe it was the taxi fumes.... actually it was nice this morning.

A good 10 miler along the Hudson River this morning. Went from my mid-town hotel down to the WTC (where I used to work) and back. Lots of runners out early today.

qotd: pass.

Went for a 5 mile walk with DW last night, so I'm calling yesterday a double.  SRD today.

Queen and Couch - hope you are feeling better.

Warden - congrat's on the 4 miles, glad you are running again.

Sandy - I always have to avoid competing with other runners when I'm in a bust city.  As in, "I think I can catch that guy".

LB2 - "Easy Tempo" sounds good.

QOTD:  We tell that to my XC runners all the time.  Our home course has some big hills and we've timed them on the ups and downs and found this to be mildly accurate.

My slowest marathon was Pike Peak, and that's 1/2 up 1/2 down.  Now maybe my time was slow because they turned to O2 off for anyone coming from PA.

Going to the Broad Street Expo today to pick up my bib, and running a few miles after work.

QOTD: I haven't really heard that phrase. Though I'm a much stronger downhiller than uphiller...

Marley and I enjoyed a nice 5 mile trail run this beautiful sunny morning.

QOTD: As a cyclist I know that if the uphills are tough enough it becomes completely impossible to make up the lost time.  For example if you were to slow to half pace on the uphill it becomes mathematically impossible to make it up regardless of the pace on the down hill.

Despite running the same distance up and down hill you are spending more time running uphill.  Running half as fast up the hill can't be made up for by running twice as fast down the other side.  That makes it really hard or in most cases impossible to make up what you lost.  The more the pace drops on the uphill the more that becomes true. Say you are running 10 minute miles on the flat and drop to 20 minute miles on the climb.  You would lose 10 minutes on a 1 mile climb.  To make that up on a mile descent you have to do a zero minute mile, clearly an impossibility.

Morning, folks.

I had a great 6 mile run this morning, a little drizzly but also the first day in a short sleeve shirt

in months-nice!

MT-nice miles yesterday, good to hear the heel is heeling.

QOTD: I've never heard that, but makes sense to me. My relationship to hills has completely changed

over the past few years; I've gone from avoiding them to embracing them. When time is a factor, like

a race, I go by effort on the uphills. When I'm training I tend to run the hills just to get that sweet training

effect.

The question of the day stems from some conversations I have had with experienced mountain runners over the years. To the folks I have talked to and/or run with, the general consensus is to run or walk those uphills within your capabilities so that you minimize the time lost by running the downhills or flats. Of course, over the course of a long race, the downhills take a real toll on your quads. So, it isn't like down hills are necessarily easier, but they should be quicker. But I often hear people imply that they can make up all that time, or most of that time, lost on the uphill when they hit the downhill. I have totally screwed this up at least once in a race where I was totally shot before I even got halfway to the finish line by overestimating my uphill capabilities.

A particularly sadistic friend I have in Utah (not Lace, although he is quite sadistic), put this to the test with me one day when I was up there. We left out of Millwood Canyon in Logan, UT and started running up the side of the mountain to where it intersects with the trail going down to Leatham Hollow. After a half mile of running, we started hiking up the mountain, and he started explaining to me that if we tried to run the pace we started 5 miles up that road we would be reduced to a walk well before we reached the top and would have nothing left to run the beautiful downhill into Leatham Hollow. So, we hiked up the majority of the mountain, running the short benches that flattened out along the way. Those small 50 to 100 yard stretches of running help, especially in longer races. I think every step you are able to run that is efficient is beneficial, even if it is only 50 to 100 yards stretches in some areas. So with the hike and short running stretches, we made the 5ish mile journey in about 1:15. The next 5 mile section was done in about 45 minutes, with a short section of walking across an old rock slide. Of course, the better you are at uphill, the less time you lose, but I don't think you will make it all up on the down, especially when you get deep into a long run. Forgive my rambling...

Those averages are interesting, AT, they almost exactly even themselves out. It would be interesting to

do the same test with the additional factors experienced deep into a long race.

At work for a 24 hour shift.  Maybe a run tomorrow.

QOTD: I wasn't going to bother posting but the question intrigued me enough to put in my 2 cents.  I've heard it. Not sure if I agree or not. On most of the longer races that I've done I actually could push on the uphills later in the race while the downhills just killed my legs. Taking it easy on the uphill did not let me go faster downhill. Taking it easier on the up hills does, however, allow me to run better on the flats or rolling hills, so I will hold back on the uphill so I can run as soon as I get to the flatter sections.