Running Notes by HJL

I’ve been fairly casual this time around, compared with previous marathon training cycles. This will be my 4th outing at Big Sur, and I’m basically just planning to enjoy the run, probably something around 4:30 or even 5:00ish, depending on the weather and how interested I get in taking photos. I took a lot of notes and did a lot of planning the first couple of times on the course, but this time I’m relying more on past experience and being able to look back at previous runs there.

Looks like I’ve averaged something like 35-40 miles per week since the start of 2007 on this training cycle. The graph is slightly misleading as I’ve also been coaching my daughter’s soccer team for the past few months, and other activities which I don’t try to log, but in general I’m running at slower paces than a couple of years ago which tends to hold down the weekly mileage. This training cycle has been pretty similar to last year’s.

I still haven’t gotten any constructive resolution of my “mysterious breathing problem“, other than it’s not life-threatening, and my lung function is still testing in a “healthy normal” range. I find it psychologically challenging, though, in that I always feel like I’m working harder than the pace I’m actually running, i.e. it “feels” like I’m running 30-45 seconds/mile faster, based on my level of effort and heart rate from a couple of years ago.

This year I actually did log a single 20 mile run (versus last year’s zero 20+ runs) although I don’t feel that it’s making me any more prepared at this point. I generally try to stay at 3 hours or less for training runs, and I simply don’t go as far in a given block of time on my current (slower) paces. While we were on vacation in Maui a couple of weeks ago, I had the luxury of extra time and nice scenery, so I got in 10-12 miles along the ocean, several days in a row, and in relatively higher temperatures than I expect to see on Sunday.

The current forecast for Carmel this Sunday says 64 hi /51 low, partly cloudy, 10% chance of rain. A few degrees cooler, and that’s nearly ideal weather for the marathon.

Views like these are basically why I run at Big Sur:

There’s a huge storm on the East Coast this weekend with flood warnings from New York to Maine. I just looked to see what the word is on tomorrow’s Boston Marathon.

From the Boston Athletic Association:

FORECAST:
The most up-to-date weather forecast calls for a predicted Spring storm on Monday, including heavy rains (potentially 3 to 5 inches), with the start temperatures in the mid to upper 30’s. Wind will likely be East (in the face of the participants for most of the race) in the 20 to 25 mile per hour range, with gusts to as much as 50 miles per hour. This will produce a wind chill index of 25 to 30-degrees Fahrenheit.

Ugh.

Update 04-19-2007 17:35 PDT - Robert Cheruiyot won for the second year in a row, in 2:14:13. At the other end of the field, Jacob Seilheimer finished (unofficially) last, in roughly 9:40. I’m impressed that he actually finished, he apparently started training in January, mostly on a stationary cycle, and weighs around 350 pounds.

I logged 20 miles on the treadmill at the gym yesterday, which will be my last long run before Big Sur at the end of the month. I did the whole run at 9:00 pace, with a water/bathroom/gel break at each hour. I think I’m going to plan for a little slower than that on the course, though. I did 16+ at 9:30-10:00 pace a couple of weeks ago during vacation in Maui where it was scenic, but around 80 degrees by the time I finished. Wasn’t planning on putting in 20 miles yesterday, but it was raining a little which got me to run in the gym instead of outside, then I figured I’d just run for 3 hours instead of 2+. I also started on the treadmill at about the same time as Waterworld started playing. It’s a relatively long movie which I’ve seen in bits and pieces, never had sufficient interest to rent it but interested enough to keep it tuned in instead of my usual treadmill fare of SpongeBob on the video screen while I listen to my own music on headphones.

I didn’t prep as thoroughly for yesterday’s run as I might have otherwise, as I didn’t originally plan to go that far. I discovered a few sunburned spots that got chafed at 3 hours that have been ok at 2 hours running time. I also didn’t trim back my toenails beforehand, so I have some blistering around one of them, which may end up falling off. No carb loading, so I ended up a little tired and hungry all day yesterday and today. On the plus side, no cramping, no joint or muscle problems, no blistering except around the slightly long toenail. The Hurricane 9’s have been OK during the long runs on this training cycle, although I would like just a little more forefoot cushioning / support. I guess I still like the Hurricane 5’s better, if only they still made them.

I’m still having problems getting my the Timex HRM strap working lately. It doesn’t give sane readings on the new Bodylink watch I got to replace the old one, and I get bogus data in the data recorder as well. So no nice charts and graphs. I may try doing one more round of changing all the batteries before I completely give up on it. It hasn’t really been useful since I ran Big Sur last year, I didn’t even bother bringing it on vacation to Hawaii. Using the old fashioned method of counting heartbeats, I ended the 3 hour run at about HR 164.

I’ve been putting it off, but it’s the end of January and tomorrow the registration fee for this year’s Big Sur Marathon goes up by $10.

I’m a bit ambivalent about it, mostly because I still haven’t found a solution to my ongoing mysterious breathing problems, and I’m not too excited about the resulting slow paces.

On the positive side, I logged a 10 mile run this weekend at 9:00 pace without any problems. I remembered to find the Vanilla Gu from the pile of last year’s training stuff in the drawer. Popped one at about 60 minutes. Wasn’t quite as sleepy afterwards as the week before without it, although my conditioning is probably improving slightly from week to week.

As I’ve written earlier, this year I wrote off my initial time goals due to training issues, so I decided to just enjoy the run and take some photos along the way.

I’ve posted these and a few more photos from the 2006 Big Sur Marathon in my Flickr account.

Non-runners sometimes ask, “How long is a marathon?”. The answer is that in modern times, they’re all 26.2 miles. This happens to coincide with the mileage posted on this highway sign, which apparently helped trigger the organization of the Big Sur Marathon something like 20 years ago. (Someone usually tacks on the “.2″ when the marathon is being held, which you can see if you click through on the photo.)

The weather is nearly ideal — overcast, cool, and misty, not too much wind.

Well, this year’s marathon training cycle for Big Sur has gone fairly miserably. Regardless, I look forward to running this Sunday. Big Sur is a hilly, but scenic course. Part of the reason I like it is because it’s simply a nice place to run, and the road along the ocean shore is closed only once a year to hold the marathon.

Since training hasn’t really gone as I’d planned, it’s time to assess where we are and come up with a plan to match.

Some shortcomings:
- Breathing and HR are still behaving strangely. The symptoms haven’t gotten worse, but haven’t gone away either.
- Weekly mileage maxed out in the low 40’s instead of low 70’s. Average in the high 20s to mid 30s, vs mid 40s to mid 50s. This is partly due to running slower paces, but I’ve also logged fewer hours on this training cycle.
- Longest runs in the low teens, no 20+ mile runs. Normally I would like to have logged 3 or more.
- Relatively little LT pace training compared to previous training cycles. This is partly related to the mysterious breathing problem, since I limited LT and anerobic training for a while, in the interest of being cautious while seeing how my body is behaving.
- Difficulty getting my mental game together this time around for training at what feel like really slow paces.

Some assets:
- This will be my 3rd time on the Big Sur course, so I have pretty detailed knowledge of the various hills that don’t show on the elevation profile.
- No major joint or muscle problems, partly because I haven’t trained that hard.
- No observed problems breathing while inactive, or at easy aerobic paces. Performance has been pretty consistent with running at altitude, or reduced O2 intake.
- I have no particular time goal, and am willing to DNF if something blows up.
- I have good data from two previous runs at Big Sur, along with training logs from this time around, which give me some confidence in how my body will perform.
- Had some good 10+ mile runs while on vacation in Hawaii. It’s much easier to focus on running without other things going on in the day.

Recent paces:
Aerobic: Most of my easy mileage has been at 10:00 pace, versus previous cycles at 9:00 or even 8:30 pace.
LT: I’m able to hold 8:00 for over an hour, versus something inside 7:30 or perhaps 7:15 at this time last year.
Anaerobic: Not useful for marathons, but I tried cranking up the treadmill and I can still turn over at 5:30 pace, just not for more than a minute or so. This is consistent with my theory that my performance is mostly O2-uptake limited right now.
VDOT: Being able to hold 8:00 pace for an hour+ (i.e. at or below LT) puts me at around VDOT 40, but I am also undertrained at longer distances. VDOT 34 corresponds to a MP of 10:00, which matches my comfortable training pace, so that gives me a range to think about.

Plan:
Run at 10:00 or whatever pace feels very easy. Don’t expect any problems in the first half, through Hurricane Point and Bixby Bridge. I usually find the hills around mile 19-22 mentally challenging, but at this point I know where and when to expect them. Will keep an eye on the HRM and see if anything strange is going on, in particular if I’m at an unexpectedly high HR. During training I have found it pretty easy to accidentally end up at a higher HR than I want, presumably because of the reduced O2 intake, and corresponding reduced outgoing CO2 rates. It’s also likely that I’m going to have a more difficult time after 3 hours / 18 miles or so, due to being underconditioned for longer runs, but it probably helps that I’ve maintained a base of 25-30 miles weekly for the past few years now.

Goals:
Primary goal: finish comfortably in around 4:30 (avg pace 10:18).
Fallback: finish under 5:00. (Course closes after 6 hours. Used to be 5:30, but they apparently extended it this year.)
In general, just enjoy the run and see how things turn out. I may stop and take pictures this year, since I have absolutely no intention of beating last year’s time (3:50).

In the Hong Kong Standard:

Heavy air pollution and a record number of participants were blamed for 22 runners being taken to hospital - two in critical condition - during the Standard Chartered Hong Kong Marathon.
…
The Environmental Protection Department said the roadside air pollution index was “very high,” ranging from 124 to 149.

The air is probably better if you get away from the major cities, but in Hong Kong, Beijing, and Shanghai, the air is pretty bad a lot of the time, not what you’d want for a long run. I usually stick to the hotel treadmill while travelling in a lot of Asian cities because of the smog.

Went to MetroSports today for their 1-day, 20% off sale to pick up replacements for my current shoes. The place was packed — apparently runners aren’t as focused on the Super Bowl and related festivities as much as some. I ended up with a pair of Saucony Hurricane 7’s and ASICS GT-2110’s.

I’ve been running in Hurricane 5’s and GT-2100s for a while. The Hurricane 5’s have worked well for me and I didn’t like the feel of the Hurricane 6 (too narrow or something) when I tried them on a couple of years ago, so I didn’t go with the update back then. Fortunately, the older shoes are still available on the internet (Road Runner Sports, etc), even though they’re sort of discontinued.

The Hurricane 7 has been out for a while and is about to be replaced with the Hurricane 8, so the 7’s are already being discounted. I’m not too concerned with getting the latest and greatest version of the shoe, but I’m not sure how long the 5’s will continue to be available. The 7’s seem to fit better than the 6’s, so I’m giving them a try. I’d like to find a current production version that works for me.

The GT-2110 is nearly indistinguishable from the GT-2100. Trying it on at the store, I can’t really tell the difference, so it appears to be essentially the same shoe.

The Hurricane 5’s were the shoes I selected when I first started running a few years ago. I wanted something with adequate support and cushioning to help avoid injury as I increased mileage. At the time I was 30+ pounds heavier and had much worse running mechanics, so I wanted fairly robust shoes. As my running has improved, I’ve gotten lighter and my mechanics have become more efficient and I don’t land as hard, so the shoes have lasted longer.

I started running in the GT-2100’s about a year ago, to see if a slightly lighter shoe would work for my improved running form. I like them, but have found that I start getting achy joints if I run exclusively with them after more than a couple hundred miles of wear.

Since starting running, I now own the most shoes I have ever had in my entire life. I typically get something like 300-500 miles out of each pair, after which they’re only used cautiously for shorter runs or retired for use for daily walking around. I ran one pair of Hurricane 5’s up to around 700 miles, but I think that precipitated a minor injury so I didn’t try it again. Shoes are cheap compared with medical treatment.

I find it a little strange to have so many pairs of running shoes which appear to be in good shape but which are too worn out for me to run in safely. I’ve been experimenting with aftermarket insoles such as SofSole and SuperFeet, but they’re a little heavy. They do seem to extend the useful life of the shoes once the midsoles are starting to wear out, though.

At the moment I’m still evaluating how things are going, but assuming things stay on track for Big Sur, I’d probably like to run in shoes with more than 100 and less than 200 miles on them. Last year I ran in the GT-2100’s, the year before in the Hurricane 5’s. Lighter is better, except I may end up going a lot slower this year if I can’t breathe very well, in which case having more support under my feet for the longer duration would be a good thing.

Continuing to cautiously ramp up mileage and longer runs. The heart rate monitor is returning better data now, after a new battery. Yesterday I logged 9.5 miles on the treadmill, at 9:00 pace. Taking out the warmup and cooldown, the HR data for the middle 80 minutes looks substantially better than a similar run a few weeks ago. I’m still starting out 10 points higher than my 2005 baseline, but I’m not getting the steeply increasing heart rate anymore, and it seems to be tracking about 10 points higher than the baseline all the way out now.

Some of the improvement is just adaptation to having resumed longer runs, but I’m starting to get some improvement in my breathing. It still doesn’t feel great, but it’s definitely not as bad as last month, and I’ve also stopped having random episodes of feeling out of breath while sitting at the computer.

It’s hard to gauge my current conditioning right now, but having the flatter, if elevated HR curves, is encouraging. I may try resuming a little bit of hill and T pace training if things stay like this, working from whatever VDOT seems to fit. The fallback plan will be to just continue on base building.

My goals for Big Sur emphasize having an enjoyable run, as opposed to going as fast as possible, although I’m still holding out hope for improvement over last year’s time (3:50:34). Last year I got beat by a 70-year-old (who turned out to be George Hirsch, founding publisher of Runners World).