Fall is here

There are 7 days until my next attempt to qualify for Boston.

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It's been a good, consistent week of running. After my long run on Tuesday (last post), I did 2 easy miles on the track on Wednesday, 5.4 miles through town on Thursday, 4 miles on the track on Friday, and 3.5 miles around the loch yesterday.

Today is my local 10K.

After feeling ok on my long run, my confidence for the marathon has been much restored. Also, my training is essentially done - I'll just be doing easy runs this next week - so there's nothing more I can do at this point.

The lesson I've learned in preparing for this marathon is that running consistently seems to help a lot. I feel stronger on my Sunday long runs if I've run the 5 previous days, even if some of these runs aren't particularly long. Perhaps my body just gets used to the fact that it has to run nearly every day, and adjusts. This agrees with something I'd heard of Bill Rodgers' training - he didn't run excessively hard, but did run consistently.

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The weather has turned much cooler here at night. This morning it was 32 degrees (0 c), and there was frost on our deck table and chairs. It might be difficult to see it in the picture, but it's there. Summer is over.

Hopefully, the weather will be similarly clear and cool next weekend.

A better long run

11 days until my next attempt to qualify for Boston.

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Yesterday I went for my last long run before the marathon.

I treated the first 5.4 loop through town as a warm-up. I took it nice and slow. I wanted to fool my body into thinking that it really wasn't running yet.

The second lap was good. I had a niggle in my upper legs, but overall I felt good, and my pace was faster.

My third loop, up to 16.2 miles, was encouragingly. Instead of feeling gutted at the end of it, I felt like I still had energy reservers. There was some tiredness, but I was still running. Now it was dark, so I ran with my flashlight. I had a sports drink and brownie hidden in a tree at the start of each lap, and I sampled both at the end of each lap. It was a mild evening, and I ran in shorts and a synthetic t-shirt. I sweated.

On the final lap, I felt o.k. I was able to hold my pace for the most part, though I slowed on the climbs.

Near the end of the run, I stopped because a man had apparently collapsed on the pavement (sidewalk). He was older, overweight, and semi-conscious. A passer-by phoned for an ambulance.

So, my final long run of this training session was encouraging. I'd run 21.6 miles in 3:02.

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Earlier in the day, before my wife returned, I took my children to a local castle. The children had been there before, and enjoyed showing me where the dungeon was, and how the bathrooms were just holes leading to the sea next to the castle walls. In the former dining hall, there was a nice picture of what a medieval meal may have looked like.

I'm not ready for the marathon

16 days until my next attempt to qualify for Boston.

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I know I'm not ready. I did a long run this past weekend and suffered. Even with a run:walk strategy, 8 mins run: 1 min walk, I was reduced to shuffling at the end of my 21-miler.

That's the endurance I possess right now.

My only hope, delusional as it is, was that this was just a bad run. I was jet-lagged. I definitely had a cold. I'd not run the week before.

I've tried to get in a reasonable week of running this week, but my wife is out of town for for days this weekend, so I'll be taking care of the children. Perhaps I can run around the playground while they are there or something, but I won't be getting in any serious distance.

My plan is to do one last long run on the day she returns. Hopefully it will go a little better. After that I'll do some maintenance runs, and then my local 10K the weekend before the marathon. After this, I'll do some easy runs (5 miles or less) in the week before the race.

Perhaps this is a little light in terms of tapering, but I've found that I seem to recover from runs quickly. Also, a lesson I've learned in training for this marathon is that I tend to feel strongest on my weekend long runs when they've been preceeded by a consistent week's running.

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Fall is in the air here. It was 44 degrees this morning (about 8 degrees celcius), and the house was a bit chilly. The trees in our garden (backyard) are starting to colour a bit and shed their leaves.

A training interuption

23 day until my next attempt to qualify for Boston.

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I was away for the last 10 days, ran only 2 of those, and feel well behind with my marathon preparation.

My interuption was a long-planned backpacking trip to one of the most spectacular backpacking areas in the world. I went with some family and friends, and because of an injury to one of our party, our 5-day backpacking trip was curtailed. In the end we did 2 days of backpacking, 1 day of hanging around our camp and swimming in a crystal clear river, and 2 days of day-hiking.

I'm counting some of this as cross training. We were at elevation for much of the trip, and on some of the hikes we climbed a good ways.

But all of this isn't running.

So, now I have four weeks left before the marathon. All I can do is get in four good weeks of training. Of course, I want to taper in the week before the race, so I really have three weeks of training left.

My plan is to get a good week in currently, and go for a 20-miler this weekend.

Next weekend will be disrupted as my wife is out of town, and I'm on child-care duty. Should I get a baby-sitter so I can go for my long run? Maybe take the plunge on a treadmill? At the moment, I'm just planning on postponing my long run until the Tuesday that she returns.

The weekend after this I have my local 10K. It's also the weekend before the race, so I can't really squeeze in another 20-miler. Then some easy runs. Then the race.

So, that's where I am. I'll do two more 20-milers, maybe, and try to run consistently - that is, every day - for the next 3.5 weeks. I'm hoping that at the end of this time I'll be feeling confident.

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But I am haunted by the woods. As I take the busy train to work, or drive on the rainy highway, I keep going back to wilderness through which we backpacked. I want to go back - to spend more nights in my tent, and more days on the trail. We just scratched the surface of what was there. I look at my map of the area and devise alternative routes, temporarily suppressing the knowledge that I won't be back for a while.

Runing the good race

There are 45 days until my next attempt to qualify for Boston.

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This past Sunday I ran the Sheriffmuir Challenge Road Race. It starts from at isolated pub in the hills, climbs for 1\2 mile, and then descends for the next 5 miles. The route is on an isolated road, with great views of the surrounding mountains. Along the route there are isolated farms, fields of sheep, grasslands, and the occasional patch of woods. Runners turn around at the end of this road and run back to the pub. This is largely uphill, and give a total distance of 11 miles.

I was tired at the start. I'd done my scheduled 20-miler the day before, using, for the first time, walk breaks. I started with a 4 minute run: 35 second walk ratio, but after my first 5.4 mile loop through town, I switched to an 8 min run: 1 min walk ratio.

I tried the run-walk-run approach for a few reasons. First, I'd suffered on my past 16-mile runs in this training period, but with the marathon quickly approaching, I needed to increase my endurance by running farther. Second, I wanted to run the Sheriffmuir race the next day, so I didn't want to be utterly exhausted from my 20-miler. Third, I've been listening to a podcast entitled The Extra Mile Experiment, where the podcaster is following the Galloway run-walk-run strategy in preparation for his fall marathon.

The run-walk went well. I was tired after the 20 miles, but not shattered. Although I thought the walk breaks would be disruptive, in fact they passed quite quickly. It seemed like I'd just take a handful of steps, and then it would be time to run again.

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My first mile was 7:15. I could see C., a woman I'd met at previous races who runs about the same speed as me, about a 1/4 mile ahead. I wanted to try and catch up to her, but she was going out fast. I didn't know how my legs were going to hold out after the previous day's long run, so I held back.

Mile 2 was largely downhill, and I ran it in 6:52. It was a warm, sunny day, and I gratefully took water at the first water table near mile 3.

Mile 3 was flatter, and came in at 7:20. 4 had a lot of descent, and came in at 6:36. I commented to a guy I'd drawn even with that we were doing a good pace. He agreed, but said we'd pay for it on the way back.

By mile 5 I hadn't made much progress catching C. At the turn around point, at 5.5 miles, I again took water. I drank a few mouthfulls, and then poured some down my back to keep cool.

Mile 6 had a sustained climb, and I ran it in 8:15. The sun was hot now, and the occasional short stretches of road in the shade of trees were welcome.

Slowly, I closed the distance to C. My soreness was gone, and I felt strong. I ran a sub-8 minute pace for the next few miles, fixating on the runner ahead of me, catching them, and then moving on to the next runner.

Soon there were only two runners between me and C. Then one. Then, with just under 3 miles to go, I drew even.

We chatted for a bit, and then she pulled ahead briefly. On a steeper section, she slowed and I eased past.

As I neared the top of the last hill I picked up the pace slightly. There was an older guy ahead of me, and as soon as we started the descent to the pub, his pace accelerated dramatically. However, I stayed behind him, and then picked up my pace once again and passed.

I was now striding out, but worried that I'd begun my kick too early. I kept going, and as the finish line neared I put in a final sprint.

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I didn't win, of course, nor will I ever do so. I'd finished 23rd out of 91 runners. However, I'd had that rare experience of performing to my absolute capacity, and feeling strong while doing so.

I'd run a good race.

Trying to fit it all in...

53 days until my next attempt to qualify for Boston.

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After a good week of training while on vacation, I had an o.k. week of training last week. After a mid-week, 10-mile hilly run, my calf was a bit sore. Two days later, after some mile intervals on the track, it was even worse. I read a bit about calf strains on the internet, and was alarmed that they might require several weeks of non-running for recovery.

However, I tried a 16.2 mile long-run (4 times around my town 5.4 mile town loop), and was o.k., calf-wise. I was tired at the end of the last loop, but perhaps not quite as exhausted as I'd been when I last tried this loop. Earlier in the week I thought I might go for a 20-miler for this long run, but with the sore calf I thought I'd just see what I could do. On the day, I only had the energy and endurance to do 16 miles.

My schedule calls for a 20-miler this weekend, but there's also an 11-mile road race that I'm planning to do. I might try the 20-miler next week.

This isn't optimal. One problem with this is that I don't have a lot of open weekends after this for more 20-milers. I really want to get comfortable at this distance, as I think my lack of distance work really hurt me in the Edinburgh marathon.

For now I'm going to focus on getting in a good week's training. I didn't run on Monday after my 16-miler the day before. Yesterday I played full-court basketball for nearly 2 hours, and I count this as cross-training. Today I did my town loop in the morning. If I can run each day for the next three days, and run a good race on Sunday, it should be a reasonable week.

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During the past week I finished re-reading Haruki Marakami's What I talk about when I talk about running. Marakmi is a novelist, but the book is an account of his running career and his preparations for the New York Marathon. I really enjoyed his calm style of writing, his awareness of aging, and his descriptions of running by the Charles river in Boston.

Running in the morning

Yikes! Only 60 days remain before my next attempt to qualify for the Boston Marathon.

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For the past week and a half I've been with my family on a beach holiday. In Scotland, in the summer, it's often cool, overcast, and rainy, so the prospect of some time in the sun was appealing for our family vacation.

I quickly discovered, however, that running in the Sunny Hot Country was a challenge during the day. There's a reason everything shuts down after lunch for a siesta - it's too hot to do anything.

After a few runs in which I drained my water bottle, I shifted to running in the mornings. The advantages of this were two-fold. First, I could run before the sun was really up. Second, I could get my run with little impact on my family's activities for the day. Indeed, on one day, I finished my run before anyone was awake.

I'd wake at 6, make a cup of instant coffee (black), and eat a small bowl of corn flakes without milk. Then I'd hit the bathroom, dress in shorts and a synthetic t-shirt, and head out the door.

Running in the morning was a revelation. It was cool and comfortable out. Once my legs warmed up, I felt fine. There wasn't much, if any, car traffic on the roads. Occasionally I'd pass resort workers on their way in to the resort where our rented apartment was located. Off of the resort, the road wound through a sandy pine forest. Occassionally, there was the fresh scent of eucalyptus trees (I think).

I had a good week of running, perhaps my best so far. I took Monday off (after a 13-miler the day before in the heat), and then ran for 6 consecutive days (6 or so miles most days, with one 8.5 mile run), culminating in an 18.5 long run on Sunday.

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Now, back in Scotland, I want to get in good weeks of training. I'm away for a week at the end of the month, so I have three full weeks to train before then, and three after. Then there's one week for tapering.