Midway into week 16 of my Boston training

Hello,

I hope everyone had a nice holiday? My holiday was nice, I was a good boy last year so Santa was nice to me. I got some running gear, some clothes etc and the little man (Alex, who is now 6) had a great holiday. Santa brought the family a Wii so that has been a lot of fun. Well a lot has happened in the past couple of weeks. Here is the update:

• I was using the Furhman FIRST Marathon training plan but I was having a hard time getting the cross training sessions in and thus the 3 runs per week were not going to cut it. So I did some sole searching and talked a lot with friends and did a lot of searching on the web and I have decided to go with a plan that works for me. I am able to run 60 minutes per day during the work week at any one time and I need to rest atleast once over the weekend to handle the needs of every day life so I am going to run Tue, Wed, Thur, Fri and Sunday with Sunday as my LTR, Friday as a tempo run and Wed as Speed and Hills and the other days for easy runs. This will bring me to 35-50 per week which is more realistic.
• The health of my calves and left foot have been great and I have not had any pain since getting the orthotics

Overall, training is now going well and I am enjoying getting the miles in even if it means running on New Years Day when it is 7 BELOW ZERO....

Tim

Building base miles pain free....

Ok, knock on wood I have been running for about 2 weeks after being cleared by my podiatrist from stress fracture without any discomfort. The first couple of runs without the orthotics produced some pain but now that I have the orthotics in all is well.

Now the plan is to build the base miles and prepare for week one of training which begin 12/17/2008.

Tim

Stress....

So, it has been 15 days since my first half marathon and I am now in an "injured timeout" phase. When I got home from the half, my left foot hurt really bad and I couldn't stand to walk on it. It took 2 days before I could walk on it so I went to my PCP for some x-rays and they showed nothing so I was told to "rest". Well I did that and felt fine that weekend so I tried to run 2-3 miles at a gentile pace while running along side my son as he rode his bike. That was all it took for me to figure out that my foot was still not right. So I made an appointment to see a Podiatrist and met with him this past Friday. Within 30 seconds of looking at my x-rays and then another set to be positive I was diagnosed as having a stress fracture in my left foot. No running or impact training for the next 3-4 weeks but I am not really upset because if it had been a soft tissue or tendon problem it could have dragged on for 8-12 weeks.

So, no running for me until November and I will be spending some time in pool. The good news is I will be well rested for the start of my Marathon training on December 15th....

Tim

Peak Performance Maine Half Marathon

On a beautiful fall Sunday morning in October I lined up with 1611 other runners to run the Peak Performance Maine Half Marathon along with about 900 runners for the full marathon. This was my first half marathon and training was a little scattered. I didn’t follow the training plan I original chose because of the calf injury but I was able to get my long runs in and I felt comfortable that I could finish the run but I wasn’t positive I could get the sub-two hour time I was looking for.

I was able to meet a guy named Doug McCrae online via the Extra Mile Podcast and we had similar goals so we hooked up and ran the race together. It works out that it was good that Doug was planning on running with me because when he had car issues I was able to drive him to the race. So after picking up Doug and his friend John (he was running the full marathon) we headed off to the gym at the University near the start line to hang out in a warm room. My only complaint for the pre-race was the limited number of restrooms but other then that everything was fine.

The weather was great, it was about 45 degrees so I started with shorts and a long sleeve shirt over my race short with the plans of tossing that later on. The race started on time at 7:45 and the 2500 plus runners made their way down Baxter Boulevard and overall the crowd moved well considering there was no corrals for the runners. Doug and I made our way and easily settled into a 9:15 pace, in we were to get under 2 hours we knew we needed to average under 9:09. The race went well and the course was pretty flat through the first 5 miles then there was so rolling hills. We stayed at about a 9’15 pace so we were on target.

At mile 9 I started to loose steam and get a side cramp. I am not sure if it was because I didn’t fuel up correctly the night before (loaded pizza) or a lack of electrolytes but regardless I started to fade. So I let Doug go ahead and I struggled through the last few miles. I finished in 2:04:18 and I gave it all I had, Doug finished in 1:58:20 (he followed my strategy and he had the fuel to pull it off). It wasn’t a bad race, I had fun I just learned a lot:

1.) I need to focus more on running my long runs at race pace, how can you maintain a pace that you are not use to running.
2.) I need to stick to a training plan and log the miles and maintain quality runs.
3.) I need to loose more weight, running Boston with 25 pounds less on me is a big benefits.

Cheers,

Tim

Milestones and enter the taper phase…

Well on Sunday, the 21st of September, my 17th wedding anniversary and 1 day after my one year anniversary being diagnosed with Type 2 Diabetes, I awoke at 4:45 AM, laced up the sneakers and headed out for my last long run before the Portland Maine Peak Performance Half Marathon.

My goal was to do 13.1 with 2 miles at a slow pace then pick up to my predicted marathon pace for 9 miles and then end with 2 miles at the slow pace. The run was great, and I was able to maintain a solid pace in the middle miles and finished the run in 2 hours and 6 minutes. This was a great way to end my training. I was able to get the 13.1 miles and the psychological fear of “can I run that distance” off the table and most importantly get the confidence that I can move from the slow “injured” pace back into the fast pace that I wanted prior to the injury.

So now I am done with my training for the half and I will use the next two weeks to do cross training and yoga to maintain my conditioning and show up in Portland on the 5th with a well rested calf.

Update on training…..

With less then 4 weeks to go until my first Half Marathon the training is going very well. I visited my kid sister in Kennebunk, Maine and ran 10 miles on Sunday morning on some of the flattest roads I have ever run. It was a nice run, beautiful farm lands, cool fall weather and clear skies. I am going to get three small runs in during this week and then do 12-13 miles on Sunday and then I think I am going to stop running for the two weeks.

I don’t want to risk injury so the thought is to rest the impact of the roads and swap the 3-5 mile runs out with 30-50 minutes of rowing or cross training and then work on yoga and stretching until the final week. I will replace the last two long slow runs with 1-2 hour sessions on the ARC Trainer to get the conditioning without the pounding of the road. Then the week of the race do two short 3-5 miles runs and rest the Friday and Saturday before the race. This should keep me rested and ready to run strong in Portland.

Cheers,
Tim

Run for 2 hours, who would thought it was possible

In my training for the Portland Maine Half Marathon it was critical that I get 2 hours of running in to get myself use to it. This was a big milestone for me and I am really glad to have this under my belt.

I woke up at 4:30 AM on Sunday the 31st with the plan of hitting the road for 6:00 AM. The weather was perfect and I headed out to meet with Sherry and Dimitra for part of the run. We did the Mendon Road to Quaker to School then 122 to Church Street route. This is normally an 8 mile run and I added 3 miles to it by going down my road.

Well with this run and no injury to my calf from this an even better run. I feel very comfortable at this point that I can complete the half marathon, now I just need to stay healthy.

Tim