Trail Runs are great!

I love trail running!  I don't do it enough but I love the twists and the turns, the ups and the downs.  It breaks up the monotony I sometimes feel running the same routes near my house.  Eugene has some great trails nearby.  One of my current favorites is the Ridgeline.  It's not crowded and it's close but you don't feel like you're in the city anymore.  I took a few pics when I was up there last week .  I wish I could carry a camera with me more often but I don't often have the pockets or want it bouncing around.  Any suggestions on small, lightweight cameras?















2/2:
5.84 mi, 9:44/mi
Yeah, this was on the Ridgeline.  There was quite a bit of up and down and my lungs felt tight until about halfway through.  I'm looking forward to improving the time on this out and back.

2/4:
5.95 mi, 7:54/mi
One of those days where I couldn't slow down.  Didn't need to run this fast but my brain and legs just kept turning over.

2/6:
5.93 mi, 7:51/mi
This is day one of the 12 week marathon training.  I've had some problems in my right foot indicating possible development plantar fasciitis, but not a ton of pain with it.  I think my Achilles is tight, along with the tendon along the bottom of the foot.  I'll be stretching it a lot more now and see if that helps.

2/8
10x400 repeats with 200m recovery.  1.5 mile warm up and 1 mile cool-down.  Will use the foam roller tonight as well. Average of 6:46/mi pace on the 400m repeats.

Embracing the struggle

I was at the Oregon Coast this weekend and needed to put in 11 miles one of the days.  Saturday was beautiful (Sunny, 60 degrees - NOT NORMAL) so of course I didn't run!  Instead, I ran Sunday when it was dumping rain, cold, and super windy.  Yes, I'm a moron.

My route ended up being really hilly and the flat parts were along the ocean where the wind was doing it's best to push me backwards.  Gotta love it!  But as I ran up and down hills, along gravel back roads where I thought I might get shot at by meth dealers, and tried to contort my body into the most aerodynamic position possible on the flats, I had this thought:

The most successful people in life are the ones who learn to run consistently, at a steady pace, up the hills, down the hills, against the wind and over the rough terrain.  There will be times when we just need to run hard!  But if you can run up that hill again and again, if you can embrace and welcome the struggle that life is, I think you will look back over your shoulder and realize "You know what, I did pretty good, considering everything." 

I want to be one of those people.  I don't want to wear myself out in the first 10 miles of the marathon and crash on the back end.  I want to be 65 and running marathons faster than I am today.  I want to be joyfully embracing life more in 20 years than today because I embraced the struggle honestly and was willing to pace myself.

I wanted to walk up some of those hills on Saturday but I didn't!  I only hope that I can do the same in life.


01/27:
5 mi, 7:48/mile

01/29
11 mi, 8:45/mile
Hilly, wet, cold and windy.  Body felt pretty great the whole time except a brief spot of nausea at around 5 miles at the top of a hill.  It passed quickly and never returned.  Legs were good.  Right foot was sore.

01/31
3 mi, 8:11/mile
This is an easy week before my 12 week plan officially begins on Sunday.  Letting the legs recover a bit and I need to sleep more!  Last week didn't encourage rest at all!

What do we miss?

On Saturday, I was out for a longer run on one of my usual routes.  I stretched the route out with a couple 1 mile loops at the end on one of my favorite trails.  As I came around the backside for the third time, I glanced to my left into the woods and was surprised to see a bright red sleeping bag on a bright blue tarp and there was definitely someone inside.  I already knew that some of the local homeless camped out in there periodically, but normally they're out of sight so they won't be harassed by stupid teenagers or the police.

What really shocked me was that I didn't see him/her until my third loop.  I like to think I'm a decent observer of the world - I tend to do more watching than talking.  I like to think that I have eyes to see the marginalized and oppressed people around me, regardless of how many times I've seen them before.  And sometimes I like to think that I actually care.

How had I missed this guy before?  It was morning so it was unlikely he had just shown up.  It made me wonder - what have I missed lately as I'm running through life?  Do I get so caught up in my agenda, in the path ahead of me, the place where I know I'm going, that I forget to look at the people around me and see them?  How many people have gone unnoticed in my life?  Ask any of my students and they will tell you (I hope!) that I believe one of the most important things we can do in life is love and serve the people around us.  A necessary part of that is seeing them first.  I don't want to run through life and miss the important parts.

1/22:
8.5 miles, 8:11/mi
Legs felt good and I probably should have done an extra mile or two but I had to get up to Seattle for a work conference.

1/25:
3.75 mi, 7:53/mi
Kind of a light week as I get ready to start the marathon training more intensively.  Didn't have the space to get a run in at the work retreat.  Legs felt heavy because I ate a lot of crap.  Hard not to do when the food is delicious and free.

1/26:
Played Ultimate Frisbee for a couple hours - more fun than running intervals on the track and a fair amount of sprinting involved.  Won't be able to do this much during the heavy training so wanted to take advantage of it now!

Hard days have different colors

There are some days when the weather hates you - the rain comes down sideways and slices into every nook and cranny, the wind is determined to stop your every step, and the clouds press in close and heavy, threatening never to let the sun shine again.  I love those days - it awakens something in me that confronts the wildness of nature and will not be beaten.  My legs move faster and my smile only grows larger.

Then there are days when your body hates you.  Not just your muscles, heavy and full of acid, slowly, slowly churning block after block under your lead feet, each step a decision.  Not just your lungs, seemingly half their normal size, refusing to breathe in sweet oxygen.  But something deep inside of you is tired and doesn't want to move.  Your brain fights your need to make the miles.  The tiredness of your soul that demands in a pathetic and yet powerful voice "Go home!  Cut the run short! WALK!"  These are not days of joyful running.  They are the days when you know it is becoming discipline.  Where you hold the one thread of memory that reminds you it's worth it.  And when you're done, when you haven't quit early, when you have refused to give into that voice, you know yourself a little better.  You know that you can go further.  You know there is more to you than you thought.  I don't want these days but I love them.  They teach me how to move through life.

1/20:
6 mi, 8:17/mi
Along Fairmount to the river, back along Villard to Fairmount and home.  Hard, afternoon run. Woke up at 5am for appointment and late night before.  Rest is important in the training!

Kale & Chocolate milk? Never again

Just a short note - don't make smoothies out of kale and chocolate milk.  They are great things on their own, but throw them in a blender with a banana, some flax seeds and chia seeds and BLEH!  No good!  I drank it because I couldn't stand to waste it (and my wife would have never let me live it down - as she puts it "No offense Joel, but I think your smoothies are gross").  I like spinach with chocolate milk and blueberries but never again kale.

Nothing good about this.

Pick'em up, Put'em down!

I mentioned last post how my cadence is low compared to what most coaches would encourage so I thought I would try to push it up around 90rpm (180 steps/minute) to see what it feels like.  The last time I trained, I averaged 76-78 rpm but I wasn't in barefoot shoes, and with barefoot shoes, I've been around 80-83 rpm. 

All I have to say is 90 rpm means moving your feet fast!  Whoa, I kept looking at my watch and for a while I couldn't get above 87rpm.  I was on a night run and was glad nobody could see me because I felt ridiculous.  At 90 rpm, it was kind of like sprinting in place, with just a slight forward motion.  So for two miles I ran at 90 rpm and I noticed something - the natural motion required to move my feet that fast forced me to start picking up my feet before they hit the ground, leading to a lighter step and almost a cycling motion.  My pace didn't really change and it wasn't exhausting to move my feet that fast.  The hardest piece was the mechanics - I had to constantly think about moving my feet faster than I was used to moving them. 

My goal is not to always run at 90 rpm.  But I think 86+ rpm will improve my form, be less damaging to my feet, and easier on my calves over the long miles.  Now I've got to train my body to do it!

1/16, 4.5 mi, 8:21/mile
After eating my weight in Chinese dumplings, I went for this night run.  I don't often run at night so I was pleasantly surprised with how my body responded.  I wasn't too sore after the long run on Saturday and the legs loosened up after the first couple miles.  This was where I experimented with cadence for the middle two miles.

1/18, 5.5 mi, 8:15/mi
Hill run into Hendricks park and down the backside.  Coming back along Fairmount adds a little uphill for the last mile or so as well.  Shoes were wet and slippery on the inside - side effect of barefoot shoes w/o socks.  Splashed through some extra puddles to try and clean them out a little bit. 

Stupid NBC, and some running

Okay, I'll get caught up on the runs in a minute.  First a little rant.  This morning were the Olympic Marathon Trials in Houston.  NBC had exclusive broadcast rights and didn't have a live feed!  Are you kidding me?!  USATF didn't work that into the contract?  Instead they did a rebroadcast at noon that is two hours long.  I've been watching and I'll at least say they're showing more running than I thought they would - I though it would be filled with a lot of human interest stories and not a whole lot of running.  But seriously, no live feed?  Thousands of us were on flotrack.com reading the live updates and twitter feeds. 

Okay that's enough of that.  Hopefully they got enough frustrated emails to change that in the future (I sent two)!  Haven't updated in a couple days but I've done three runs, capping with a 9 mile run this morning.  Looking forward to a rest day tomorrow:

01/12:
6 miles, No time
This was the same run as 01/08, just a shorter route back.  It felt much better!  It was a beautiful sunny day and I was able to just relax and enjoy the run. I had considered shortening it to 5 miles but I"m glad I did the 6.

01/13:
I finally got some new batteries for my Garmin watch and foot pod (Forerunner 50 - I'll probably write a later post on this later).  Today's run was a short 3+ miles to calibrate it.  I went down to the Adidas trail to calibrate it on the 1000 meter loop.  I ran two loops and it came in pretty close.  It was nice to have an easy day.  After two cups of coffee in the morning and a lot of meetings, it felt good to get a little running in.  Calves and shins felt tight in the evening.  Took the rolling pin to them and they loosened up.  I should probably ice them but I'm out of peas!

01/14
9 mi., 1:16, 8:23/mi
Whew!  9 miles this morning with Christy and Megan.  Megan talked the whole way, which I love!  It keeps me distracted and it's fun.  It was a cold morning.  Running with other people pushes my competitive edge so I refuse to slow down.  We were running around 8:15-8:30 which was faster than we should have been running for a long run, especially me since I'm just trying to increase mileage before my 12 week plan starts.  But I felt good most of the way.  I stopped to stretch my calves at the halfway point and the last couple miles, my hamstrings and quads were tired.  I'm glad we ran on concrete the whole way since that's what the marathon will be.  It was a good excuse to have steak for lunch!

With batteries in my Garmin, I was able to record not just pace, distance and time, but also my cadence.  Everybody is talking about cadence today, maybe too much.  I think there is something to be said just for finding what is comfortable for you within a healthy range.  I'm training in Merrell's Trail Gloves, which is a minimalist shoe.  It's been great as it forces me to run lighter on my feet which has been really good for my knees and my IT bands (struggled with ITBS in past training).  I've been trying to increase my cadence but it's helpful to be able to easily measure it (I don't want to run with a metronome or music).  I'm coming in around right around 80 rpm (160 steps/minute).  They say ideal is 90 so I'll try increasing it this week on some runs and see how it feels.