3rd Straight Day of Running and...

I felt great up until 15min into my fartlek. I think I went out too fast, and did not give my shins adequate time to warm up. So the second half of my run was quite a bit slower as I mixed walking with slow jogging to try and prevent any more injury. But before I had to shut it down, I was feeling fast and I was feeling good. So on the bright side only 3 weeks into my training program and I am feeling a lot lot faster. Right now a 7:30 min mile seems like a nice slow relaxing pace. 3 weeks ago that was me pushing. Extrapolating this success for 30 weeks, which I know is impossible, has me going to bed at night fantasising about winning my marathon!

Well its off to a wedding for me today, tomorrow is scheduled for an 8 mile run. Hopefully I will be able to complete it.

Short but good

Today I ran a quick 'recovery' run. I had about a 40min window between a particle physics exam and dance rehersal. The rest of the day I spent driving to Milwaukee for a cousin's wedding. But my run, wow it was fast. I did not feel like I was pushing it, but I crused. My frist mile was fast enough, at 7:30, but then I ran my next and final mile in 6:03! I don't know if was training paying off or some wind I did not sence going out, but wow I flew.

Weather wise it was a bit drizzley, so perhaps that helped keep me cool, but wow.

Tommorow is a 30min fartlek, which by Hal's definition is this:

Fartlek was developed in Sweden; the word means "speedplay." Fartlek is similar to tempo training in that it features a continuous run that starts and ends slow with fast running in the middle. The difference is that fartlek includes multiple changes of pace over varied (mostly short) distances. Run as you feel. Be creative. Pick out a tree and run hard to it. Ease back into a jog until rested, then pick out another landmark for your next sprint. Hard, easy, hard, easy. You define the tempo by how you feel. It's an enjoyable form of training that can either be your toughest or easiest workout of the week.

See you tommorow!

Oh Yea!

I went on a tempo run today. I started off very slow, running 12min miles. This was to hopefully warmup my shin muscle things. I was even running on peoples lawns next to the road to soften the blow. I ran through a park, and along side a cemetary to find the grass. I think this helped, along with the gradual pickup of speed. I just had to watch out for fallen tree brances that I could not see because it was dark. Those bastards can sneek up on you in a hurry.

Also, since I am a physics major, and we love making graphs, I will treat you to one of my run today. The blue line is speed, and the red one is my avg heart rate over each mile. I think that is pretty close to textbook on how to do a tempo run.


As y0ou can see I increased my speed slowly, then kept up a good pace for a while, then droped off to cool down. Its always a good feeling to know you went out and rocked a run.

And on an injury update, I have my shin wrapped in ice as I type this, but it did not hurt at all during the run. Since Tuesday's run irritated it on Wednesday, we'll see how it is tommorow. But again things are looking up.

On the bike again :(

I was not able to go running today, but I did get out on my bike. I spent about 25 min going up a huge hill against a very very strong wind. When I turned around, I got to the bottom in about 4 min! that was one big hill. Needless to say I think I got my cardio work in with that one.

I also did some real good stretching today at dance. (Yes I dance, but that does not necessarily make me gay). I have noticed that when I do the laying on the ground hamstring stretch, I am now able to get my leg well past vertical, and if I wanted to I could kiss my knee. Its always nice to see progress with something, be it running or flexibility.

As far as shin splint care goes, I am keeping up with my regimen or ice, icyhot, compression, rest, elevation, and ibuprofen. I have a 45 min tempo run scheduled for tommorow. And just so people know what I mean by that, here is the official Hal Higdon definition of a tempo run.

A tempo run is a continuous run with a buildup in the middle to near race pace. (Notice I said "near" race pace. You don't want to go faster than your 5-K or 10-K race pace.) In this program, tempo runs are scheduled for Wednesdays or Saturdays, alternating with fartlek runs. A tempo run of 30 to 40 minutes would begin with 10-15 minutes easy running, next accelerate during the 10-20-minute middle, then decelerate gradually and finish with 5-10 minutes easy running. Important: The pace buildup should be gradual, not sudden, with peak speed coming about two-thirds into the workout and only for a few minutes. You can do tempo runs almost anywhere: on the road, on trails or even on a track. In this program, tempo runs alternate with fartlek on Saturdays.
I hope I get to do that tommorow. For now I am out.

Cut it short, very short

Coming off of yeserdays great run, I thought that I would be golden for this morning. Think again. About .1 miles into my run my shins started to hurt bad. This was even with my compression bandage on it. So not wanting to injure myself further I walked back home. I iced my shins, stretched, and put on some icyhot.

I think I will try to go out and run a little bit later, and if that fails I will again go biking. But I really want to run. I don't like my bike.

while I was icing my shins, I put my mad paint sills to use, and edited a photo from me at my last marathon, to reflect my goal this year. Wow, I did get high up there though :P

I'm feeling much better now

Today I went running again. I was scheduled to run 7x hill repeats, and I was quite nervous about doing so. I did not know how my shins would feel, and to be honest, last week the 6x repeats had me nearly collapsed after the sixth one. But I FELT AWESOME! I had no pain in my shins during the run. I ran fast up the hill despite a very strong headwind. I even ran an extra half-mile just because I felt good. I can actually feel myself getting faster, and I'm only into my 3rd week!

I did make sure I stretched my calf in many different positions before I started up the hill for the first time, and then once more after 4. I also did some major stretching once I got home, and resumed my icyhot and ace bandage compression. I feel good today, but I don't' want these to come back in a week.

Tomorrow is a recovery day, and I should be running 5 miles. Hopefully I can do that too. I think that two back to back days of running will tell the story. Wish me luck!

Went Biking Today

Today was officially the first time I went biking in place of a run. I found that in order to even start breathing moderately I have to stand up on the bike and pedal pretty hard. Overall though it was a pretty enjoyable process. I even got to experience some wicked speed as I got up to 30mph on a downhill according to my Garmin 301. I did not know my cheep $40 bike could go that fast without falling apart!

Once I got back I did my strength exercises, focusing mainly on my upper body. Most runners neglect this, and later in races, their arms dangle on their sides, reducing their running economy. I am going to make sure this does not happen to me. So I did 2 sets of 20 bicept curls with 15lb weights, 2 sets of 20 "bench presses" with my 15lb dumbells, 2 sets of 12 behind the head tricept things with one dumbell, and 2 sets of 12 lunges with my dumbells. I also did 2 sets of 30 slow slow slow situps. I think that the slow situps are much more effective than the crunches, although much tougher, since it takes a lot of strength to controll yourself as you go up and down.

As usuall I will be taking care of my shins same as the last couple days, and hopefully I get get back into running tommorow! (BTW not a single twinge of pain whatsoever in my shins today!)

Getting it back

Today I was scheduled to run 7mi at a moderate to slow pace, which for me is about 8:00 to 8:30 min/mile. I again spent the morning making sure that my calf was wrapped in an ace bandage and constantly had icyhot or regular ice on it.

For today's run I kept the bandage on my calf to see how that would work, and it worked awesome. I also decided to run on highways with a nice level gravel shoulder to reduce impact, but I was able to go about 3.5 miles before I started to feel any pain. I then walked for .25 miles, and then ran some more. Then at 5.5 miles I had some more pain, and walked home after each test run had me feeling pain again. My workout was cut short from 7 miles to 6, but I am not too distressed by this since recovering from my injury is a higher priority then getting my miles in. Once I got back home I massaged my leg with an ice cube (yet another trick I found on the web to cure shin splints), then proceed with RICE.

I think that tomorrow I will be taking my bike out for about 30min, even though I know I could run the 3 mile recovery run I am supposed to do, because Tuesday has me set for 7x Hill repeats, and I want to make sure that I am physically able to do that.

Overall I am excided about my seemingly quick recovery rate!

Ouch

I am officially going through injury now. I decided to do my 30min tempo run today, but to make sure I do not hurt myself, I ran almost entirely on grass. I was able to run for about 20 min with minimal pain. Then I decided to stop and walk back home. There I applied RICE to my shin. Right now I have my leg compressed with an ace bandage and icyhot on it. I will go to bed like this and see how I feel in the morning.

If I do not feel better, I think I will take out my cheep beat up mountain bike for a ride to try and simulate the cardio work I would be doing for my 7mi run that is scheduled for tomorrow.

Intro - 12 days in

A brief bio of me first. I am a senior physics student at the University of Wisconsin River Falls. I will be graduating in May, and am training to run my third marathon on October 7th. I have yet to decide which marathon to run, as the Twin Cities Marathon in Minneapolis/St. Paul and the Milwaukee Lakefront marathon are on the same days. I am from Milwaukee, but my school is located just 20 min from the twin cities. But registration is not for a month or so, so I have time to decide.

My first marathon I ran in 4:15 which was well beyond my expectations since I did almost no training. I ran a half marathon about 3 months before the marathon, and jogged sporadically for the summer, and did absolutely no running the month leading up to the marathon (and no this was not an attempt at a super taper, just laziness)

For my second marathon I decided about 15 weeks before the marathon to start training regularly and with a program. I found a good one at halhigdon.com and since I am a young cocky male, I decided to follow his Advanced II program. This involved lots of speed work, and a gradual buildup to 6 weeks that involved 20 mile runs. I was able to follow this program very well, despite being hit with shin splints in the middle, which sidelined me for about 2 weeks. This time the month leading up to the marathon I did some running, but I choose to do other things once school started, and running got put on the back burner. My goal was 3:15 and I was confident I could do it.

During the marathon I was feeling great at my pace, I was even slightly ahead of where I should have been at about 7 miles. Then I started to notice a slight pain in my knee. This grew and grew until at 10 miles I was off my pace, and other parts of my legs were in pain from compensating. I struggled on, and ran into my family at 15 miles, who conveniently had some Aspirin on them. That helped a little, but what made my day great was the knee brace the found at a local Walgreens, and gave to me at 20 miles. With the drugs and brace I felt much better, but still sore from all the compensation. I finally finished at 4:11, disappointed but pleased that I was able to finish.

This year I have the same goal, but I am going to double the time I will allot to training, and I will make sure I correct my running form and strengthen vital parts of my body to reduce the risk of injury.

This winter I kept up my running, and participated in the American Birkiebeiner cross country ski marathon. This year it was shortened due to a lack of snow, but it kept me in shape all the way up to the end of February. So going into March I had been training, doing some hill sprints, long runs, and fartleks. Some weeks my weekly mileage got up to 5o miles. I then slowed down at the start of March to prepare myself for my marathon training.

I will be training for 30 months leading up to the marathon. The first 12 weeks will be a speed training program once again from Mr. Hal Higdon. It is called his "Spring Training: Advanced" program. It incorporates hill training, fartlek, tempo, interval, "sorta-long" runs, recovery runs, and races. Then afterwards I will use his 18 month marathon training program Advanced II version which incorporates a lot of the same as the speed training, but with more of a focus on building mileage and working on marathon pace. Also, no racing :(

The spring training program is here: http://www.halhigdon.com/spring/Springadvance.htm
and the marathon program is here: http://www.halhigdon.com/marathon/advancedint.htm

The 30 week mark from the marathon was March 11th, But since the program starts on a Monday I started on the 12th.

The first week went well. I got all my workouts in and felt very good.

The second week was/is a bit tougher. I felt awesome on my 6x hill runs, but the next day during a 4mi recovery run, I started to notice a slight twinge in my shins. My though was "oh no not again" so I immediately started a program of ice, elevation, stretching, and some slight strength training exercises. The next day was a 40 min fartlek, and my shin splints started to come back again, so I took a couple walking breaks to try and prevent any more of an injury. I was able to run most of it, and again felt great. Today I had a 3mi recovery run that I spent only about 1mi running. I figured that its recovery for a reason, and took no chances today.

Tomorrow is supposed to be a 30min Tempo run, and I will see how I feel going into it. Hopefully I caught this before it became a major problem. (I tried to run through the pain early on last summer and it bit me back hard).

The next couple posts should not be as long since I am done giving the basic back story :) Thanks!