Running: May 16-22

[limewave]

I'm taking the initiative this week . . .

5 very early miles for me yesterday morning. I'm still feeling sluggish from the 25k last week, but not feeling pain anymore.

No races for me on the horizon. My goal for the summer is to keep my long runs between 6-9 miles and I want to work on my 10k pace. I would LOVE LOVE LOVE to run an 8:30 min/mile 10k.

I see speed work and hill repeats in my near future.

[Grog]

I've been quiet the last couple of weeks, lots of work and lots of time spent playing outside or reading books instead of being online. Felt good, actually!

Yesterday was my first marathon, the Capital City Marathon in Olympia, WA. I wrote this in an email to a friend this morning and I thought it was a good race report overall, so for all of those who wonder how my race went, here it is:

The Capital City Marathon is - it has to be said - a *fantastic* event. I'd call it a boutique marathon. Less than 400 runners (on the full marathon), a beautiful rural course, well-staffed water stations every other mile, a de-luxe pasta dinner sponsored and hosted by some local Italian restaurant for $12 (!!), great soft-shell like jackets instead of one-more-tshirt, and beautiful weather on top of it, a little sunny a little cloudy not too warm. No medal but a "finisher's tile" (nice to use as a coaster) instead. What else can you ask for? It's also a really shallow field as there are few really fast times being posted and fewer really slow times, they don't allow walkers in the marathon. Really, if you're ever going to do a marathon in your life, you have to go and do that one. (Hopefully they find a new race director - theirs, a volunteer, is retiring this year after many years of service. Anyone interested?)

The only thing that's not included is a flat course. I don't know who said it's supposed to be a relatively flat course but it's really rolling hills, and the elevation graph does not do justice to it. Maybe 4 miles of flat total, other than that pretty significant rolling hills the whole time. It just gets steeper in the second half. I was aiming for 4:30 but my first half was fairly rapid, I was on pace for 4:15, but I slowed down a bit on uphills and a lot on downhills, which kill my feet and hips. The last three miles did me in, as can be seen here:
http://slowgeek.com/ru/Grogotte/1750601626?unit=km

My wonderful husband Chris followed me along with a rental bicycle (thanks to the Olympia Outfitters store) almost the whole way. The roads were really really quiet and he was able to ride on the other side without interfering with the race (or traffic - what traffic??). Chris went for a couple of miles at a time and then waited for me - why always at the top of the hill? - to take pictures or cheer. It was great.

I very much enjoyed the experience overall, including the training, but if I was to do it again I would train for about 6 months, with a significant amount of speedwork, to take it under 4 hours. It would be some work but within the realm of possibility. But I'm not sure I'll have enough time to train for this again before I retire (or get a maid, a driver, and a personal assistant). For now, I'm going to get a new bike. I also want to increase my foot strength by progressively introducing so-called barefoot running (i.e. Nike Free or Vibram 5-fingers).

We went down to Olympia from Vancouver on the Amtrak Cascades train. The train! It's wonderful. And there is a lot of road work on the I-5 around Tacoma this year so after all it probably would have been longer to drive according to locals. This being said, it's not fast, about 2/3 of the speed compared to driving. The worst bit is Vancouver BC to Everett, after that it speeds up. It took us even longer coming back last night because there was an incident on the track - we didn't hit anyone but the conductor had to do an emergency stop because of someone looking unstable walking by the track, and then we had to wait for the sheriff to pick him up. There is a beautiful view of the water to be had about 85% of the time, and it's a lot more comfortable than the bus. The food is good (relative to train food in general) and not that expensive, they even serve micro-brews (so I could get a Deschutes Black Butte to celebrate), and the rolling personnel is hilarious (as my experience has been on North American trains in general). I just wish I had more time on the Coast to justify the length of the train trip, but on the other hand I don't think driving would have been a good alternative.

Thanks everyone for the cheers and tips when I was in training!

[colby]

I did about 18 miles yesterday, it was rough. I had a rough weekend all around. The weather was hard on me (too warm, too dry, too soon) and I just felt "off". I walked more than I have in a really long time and stopped often where I could to cool off with river water on my head/face (I was dreaming of those soaked sponges they give you at Ironman run aid stations). I ran out of water at about mile 13-14, which was 3 miles shorter than last week's run when I didn't run out of water at all. This will probably be my longest long run before Ironman and I have to let it not get me down.

[Crankin]

I ran 5k yesterday to test out my Zoot compression tights after the run (see the apparel thread).
It was a bit painful, but I brought no electronics, since i seem to do better without focusing on that right now. I know I am far below the 9:45 pace I had last summer. Last June I bought new shoes; my bunion was killing me in my shoes. The new ones are great for that, but not enough support for my shins and other places that have hurt in my last few runs. I had no trouble before. When I get back from my cycling trip, new shoes are first on the agenda, because I signed up for a 5k on June 5th! I am sure I will be DFL, but I didn't want to do the walk. It's for the cancer wing of the local hospital; my good friend is a development officer for the hospital (i.e. she's in charge of the event).
What have I done? I am not competitive at all. And the course ends on a hill...

[OakLeaf]

Way to go Grog!!

Yesterday was my first too, we took the long way home today and did a little sightseeing so I'll put together a full report later - but the weather was perfect, I had fun and beat my time goal by 8-1/2 minutes (4:21).

I feel better today than I have any right to, I think - like, better than I've felt the day after a lot of my longer training runs at a much slower pace. Makes me wonder if I just didn't work hard enough yesterday. I guess that's what I get for having a hypothetical Magic 8-Ball as my coach.

[colby]

Way to go, Grog! Just under 4:30. Sounds like a beautiful course, too.

And, another WTG to OakLeaf - beating your goal by over 8 minutes is awesome. Not being sore is even more awesome. It doesn't mean you didn't work hard enough, it means you worked within appropriate limits and your magic 8-ball training plan worked well. (Or that your delayed onset soreness hasn't started yet) Maybe you could have gone harder, but it's hard to find that balance - I'd rather go easier, reach my goal confidently, and not feel dead the next day than cut 5 minutes off my time and not be able to walk.

[Bike Chick]

Way to go all of you! Quite impressive.

[Grog]

Great work Oakleaf, congrats!

I feel the same as Colby: I think I could have gone harder at times, but I know I would have had a sh**ty week, and I need all of my senses and my whole brain at work. I didn't want to feel tired and spent for more than a day. I'm a little sore, going down stairs is not very pleasant, but absolutely tolerable, especially once I get going.

[limewave]

Yay Grog and Oakleaf!!! What an accomplishment!

[zoom-zoom]

Wow, awesome results, marathon ladies! Enjoy your reverse taper recovery time.

[skhill]

Way to go, Grog and Oakleaf!!

I don't know what happened, but somehow I did my 6 miles at an 8:54 pace this morning. It felt comfortably fast (which is maybe 9:10 or so for me) not fast fast (sub 9:00 for that distance); could my new-found enthusiasm for speedwork be paying off already? I was thinking of aiming for sub 55 min in my next 10k, but maybe I can aim even lower (it's not until July 4)....

[limewave]

I've switched modes and am doing a 10k training program that focuses on speed work/intervals. . . . Even though I have no 10k plans in the near future

2 mi WU 10 min pace
4 x 400's @ 1:50 ea
1 min recover b/w
2 mi CD 10 min pace

Phew!

Anybody hear from Urlea lately?

[rocknrollgirl]

I checked her blog, she has been having some injuries, but she did her 50k this weekend and kicked it!

[Susan Otcenas]

Congrats to all the marathoners! You are all so inspiring.

I did 10.3 miles this morning. I didn't get enough sleep last night (like 5 toss-n-turn hours) so I wasn't expecting much, but my pace turned out better than expected. Around 10:22 per mile.

Jeff had whole wheat applesauce pancakes waiting for me when I got home.

[kacie tri-ing]

8 with some speedwork. I felt better than expected considering I did my first olympic this weekend.

Awesome work ladies!!! Keep it up!