Category Archives: My Running

Marathon Training: Week 10

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This was a pretty good week of training overall.  The weather finally cooperated for the most part with only a few humid days and many excellent nights.  My in-laws came in Monday night and left on Saturday night so we had plenty of touristy things to do around town.  We had a great hill workout on Tuesday followed by a PR in the 15K on Sunday!

Monday: Easy 4 miles. Four nice easy recovery miles on a cool but humid morning. It was 70 degrees again with like 90% humidity. I ran down Park Ave towards downtown and came home on the LRT Trail my Downtown-Park 4 Mile loop.  Its a good loop mixing in some scenery with the Metrodome and just being downtown! I ran it in 31:11.  I failed on the first attempt at Day 1 of Week 5 of push-ups.  So back to Week 4 for me!

Tuesday: 8-10 miles with hills. I finally started bike commuting again this week so that has been fun! With the marathon training class actually meeting in south Minneapolis I was even able to ride to class which felt great! We met at Lake Nokomis and then ran to the Ford Dam on the Mississippi River for a hill repeat workout.  It was in the low 80’s without a lot of humidity so a pretty good day for a tough workout. From our starting point to the bottom of the hill it was just under 2 miles. We then proceeded to run up a 1/4 mile hill 10 times! My Garmin says it was like a 10% grade without 70 ft of elevation gain (Does that sound right?), but the Garmin’s elevation profiles are notoriously off. I do know that we ran up the hill 10 times and here are my splits: 1:37, 1:32, 1:30, 1:27, 1:23, 1:36, 1:34, 1:31, 1:34, and 1:15.  This was a fun workout not only having the guys I normally run with but also having the entire training class running up and down the hill passing each other all the time – it was a good “team building” workout.  We took our time jogging back to complete the 8.25 mile workout in 1:05:21.  Afterwards it was a quick swim in the lake before heading home on the bike for 23.5 miles of biking.  I was worn out, but luckily the National Night Out block party was still going on!

Wednesday: 5 easy miles. I thought I would be completly exhausted and worn out after so much excercie yesterday, but I didn’t feel too bad. In some ways I think biking like that helps clean out some of the toxins from my legs.  I did my push-ups before heading out and did 77 back on Week 4 Day 2. Yesterday evening I left the car at a tire shop to get a screw pulled out of the tire and fixed so I planned my run to end at the tire shop. It was a beautiful morning in the upper 60’s and it felt really nice despite the humidity.  I ran along the Greenway and ended the route perfectly at the shop for 5 miles in 40:45.

Thursday: Rest Day! This was a day of rest from running, but we spent a lot of time walking around.  My in-laws are visiting so we did some touristy things like visiting the Walker Art Center, wandering around St Paul, and much more.

Friday: 9 miles at race pace. I was still a little undecided about racing on Sunday or not but thought I should keep my options open and not run at race pace. I can always make it up later! I ended up running 9.5 miles with a starting temp of 61 and some nice breezes.  It was humid but the low temp kept most of it away! I ran the route that takes me downtown and makes a square around the river.  I added a little bit of distance by cross the Stone Arch Bridge twice and running along the East side of the river towards the Univ of MN before cutting back across on 10th Ave Bridge. The bridge seemed to take forever but it gave me plenty of time to look at the new 35W Bridge that is rapidly nearing completion. I took it nice and easy and could feel a little bit of the Tuesday workout. My overall run time was 1:17:45.  I did my push-ups before leaving again and managed to get 85 done for Week 4 Day 3.

Saturday: 10-12 miles. I took today off since I knew we’d be doing more walking and touristy stuff today and I’m planning to race on Sunday.

Sunday: Cross Training. 15K Race today in 1:03:22 unofficially.  It was the MDRA 15K which was a 3 lap course with some hills on a beautiful morning temps stayed around 60 the entire race.  Check back tomorrow for more details!

Weekly Totals:

Running – 36.1 miles

Biking – 24.5 miles

Hal’s Tip of the Week: Practice makes perfect. Practice not only running, but everything else related to race day. That includes equipment. Do you know what shoes you’ll wear on race day? Buy a new pair now! How about shorts and singlet? Test your clothing in training to make sure nothing chafes or causes a blister. Do you expect hot or cold weather race day? Weather can be unpredictable. Will you be prepared if the temperature suddenly drops (or rises) 30 degrees on race day? Consider every scenario you might encounter.

Week 10

[tags] Marathon Training, Hal Higdon [/tags]

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Race Review: Hennepin Lakes Classic 10K

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This is the pack at the end of the first lap. Our faces are a little grainy but you can see the lake and skyline which makes it cool!

This is the pack at the end of the first lap. Our faces are a little grainy but you can see the lake and skyline which makes it cool!

It has been awhile since I raced so I was glad to get out there and do it again.  The 31st Annual Hennepin Lakes Classic 10K, 5K, Doubleheader had a decent day for racing.  It was about 72 at the start with humidity about the same, with a slight breeze.  To top it off it was overcast… until the start! Located at beautiful Lake Calhoun on Minneapolis’ west side this could have been a good race.

If you read my weekly training update you pretty much know how I felt going into the race, but I woke up feeling pretty good and thought it’d be a good day for racing.  After warming up and hitting the porta-potty it was time to line and get this thing started.

I wanted to take it out slow and build the pace throughout the race.  I discovered that MDRA Teammate Colin had the same plan in mind for about the same finish time so I stayed back with him at the start.  It is frustrating because we definitely weren’t that far back from the front – maybe 6-10ft or so and we got boxed in pretty much from the buzzer.  We settled into what felt like a good pace and dodged people for awhile coming through the first mile in 6:33. Maybe a touch faster than we expected but a good start.  A quick little hill with about 50ft elevation gain at about 1.25 wasn’t too bad.  It was really enough to make you push up it. They had water available at the 1.5 mark which was good.  Up until this point the race had been along East Calhoun Parkway, now we headed out onto Lake Street for the last half of the second mile.  We came through the 2 mile in 6:45. I really need to figure out how to setup the Garmin so it gives me the mile time and overall (anyone know how to do that?) so I don’t have to do math in my head while running! Finishing up on Lake St we turned onto West Calhoun Parkway where we were quickly hit hard with a headwind. By now the race had pretty much strung out and there were just little clumps of runners and a lot of individual runners.  Colin and I were still together and looking at the picutres my wife took, there was actually 6 of us in the picture for maybe a pack of 4 or 5 ( I think we were passing some of them). Up to this point all the miles had been marked perfectly, Mile 3 was setup pretty early. But actually it was the 3 mile mark for the 5K race later – but it was blown around by the wind and a “helpful” spectator put it back up (but the wrong way)! The 3 mile mark was in the right spot and we ran it in 6:51. There was a waterstop setup as we passed the finish chute – I drank a little and tossed the rest on my head. We hit the first 5K in 20:55.

At this point I knew we were off pace and that’d I’d have to run a 20:30 to PR and 19:05 to hit my goal of breaking 40.  The headwind took a lot out of us.  As we rounded a curve female teammate Carly made herself known as she pulled up beside me.  So here we were 3 teammates running 3 abreast down the street, if only for a few strides. The 4th mile was pretty unremarkable as we all struggled along,except that there was a headwind here too. I think the larger pack at the start mitigated much of the wind’s force but now in smaller groups we could feel it. We came through 4 in 6:47. I’m not sure when Colin dropped back but Carly was right with me until we hit the hill.  Part of me wanted to beat her and part of me wanted to help her.  I decided that I needed to focus on my race and try and encourage her as much as I could.  So as we went up the hill at about 4.5 and I started to pull away I yelled some encouragement to her as I passed some other runners.  Grabbed some water at about 4.75 and came through the 5 mile in 6:48. As I approached the mile mark I knew that I needed to be around 32 minutes to hit my goal time so I was a little discouraged to see my Garmin click over to 34 minutes.  But I still put in a quick surge and tried to pick-up the pace (although my effort felt a lot harder than my times showed) and actually examining the 1/4 mile segment my pace slowed by a few seconds.  Nevertheless I did pull away from the small group I was in and continued passing people for the whole race.  Turning back onto West Calhoun I again got hit with the strong headwinds. I kept pushing myself knowing that the only way I could PR was going to be pushing the last mile HARD.  I came through mile 6 in 6:52. Still struggling to run as hard as possible I finished the last 0.2 miles in 1:19 (which is 5:45 pace).  Final 5K time 20:58 pretty much an even split race.  Overall time was 41:59.

Post race they had lots of water, some healthy fruit bar, fruit strips, and Naked Juice. They were also giving away Clif Bars.  Nothing too fancy but still a pretty nice setup.  This is my second event hosted by The Sporting Life (TSL) Events (the other was Human Race 8K).  They put on a good race.

5K Start

5K Start

I recovered a little bit and cooled down with some of the guys who were warming up for the 5K.  I was very glad not to be doing the double header! We stuck around for the start of the 5K and then took a quick dip in Lake Calhoun before heading home!

Were you there? What did you think of the event?  Several of my teammates doubled!

[tags] Hennepin Lakes Classic, 10K, Lake Calhoun, Race Review [/tags]

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Marathon Training: Week 9

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This has been a pretty weird/rough week.  I think there are 3.5 reason why this might be the case.

0.5 –  Camping and being gone all weekend didn’t setup the week very well.
1 – Staying up an extra hour pretty much every night this week working on my list of tasks, including wading through 435 pictures from the camping adventure.
2 – Not recovering from running in 91 degrees on Tuesday.
3 – Changing the schedule around to coordinate with the race on Sunday and wanting to perform well!

Monday: 4 easy miles. 4 miles on the downtown loop from home. I did it in 31:55 in the 69 and humid weather.  This is a fairly easy loop with a lot of stop and go, due to traffic. I was a little stiff and sore from the activities from the weekend.  I think specifically walking down the river on the rocks caused a variety of stabilizing muscles to be sore!  I finished with a total of 73 push ups in Week 4 of the Hundred push-up challenge.

Tuesday: 9 miles with hills. This was a scorcher of a run at the Hyland Hills with the Marathon Class. It was 91 degrees with a slight breeze.  It actually wasn’t too bad when we were in the shaded areas, but much of Hyland is prairie so there was plenty of sun! I had spent the last several hours walking around the Minnesota Zoo with some of the kids I work with – so I was a little tired! I tried to stay hydrated before the run and felt really good until we decided to run up the ski-lift hill. According to Garmin this is over 100ft elevation gain in about a quarter mile for about a 25% grade = brutal on the quads! I made it to the top without stopping and then barely hung on for the next 2 miles. it was overall a rolling trail with pretty much a hill of some degree in each mile.  We ran about 9.5 miles in 1:15:51 so not too bad. Afterwards we all went to Majors for a Dinner Fun Night which was a good time to meet others from the class not in my training group.  I had a burger and fries, while Mark across from me ate a Colossal Burger all 2lbs of it!

Wednesday: Four easy miles. I think it was expected to wake up a little tired from yesterday’s run, but I definintely had no motivation and a somewhat early meeting made me opt out of the morning run. I really did plan on running in the evening, but it never happened.  I did bike for 6.5 miles – that counts for something right?

Thursday: Rest Day! Well since I took yesterday off from running I decided I didn’t really deserve a rest day. So I went for an easy run along the Powderhorn loop.  I still felt pretty tired and wiped out so the 3.26 miles in 27:21. It was 71 and pretty humid.  I did manage to bang out a total of 76 push-ups for Week 4 Day 2 of the hundred push-up challenge.

Friday: 9 miles at marathon pace. No excuses for not running again. I woke up lacking motivation and pretty tired still.  I biked 10 miles including 5 after the Twin game on a beautiful evening out.  It would have been a good time for a night run!

Saturday:18 miles. Wanting to race well on Sunday I decided to skip the long run today.  I think it will be ok! I might need to look at the schedule closer and not miss many more long runs though.  I would have preferred to take a day off before the race, but having already taken 2 off this week I thought I couldn’t afford it.  So I went out for an easy 3 miles on the Little Earth Loop.  It was 62 which was great but the humidty did catch-up by the end.  I ran it in 24:12.  I didn’t think I’d be able to finish Week 4 Day 3 of the push-ups but I did manage to struggle through 85 total push-ups!

Sunday: Cross-Training. 10K race – 2 laps around Lake Calhoun on a decent day for racing. It was in the lower 70’s with about that much humidity.  It tried to rain a few times but never quite did and the clouds broke right about starting time.  I finished in 41:59.  My 5K splits were pretty much even 20:55 and 20:58.  Check back later for all the fun details!

Weekly Mileage:

Running – 26 miles

Biking – 37 miles

Hal’s Running Tips: Stretching is important for marathoners, who risk losing flexibility because of their high-mileage training. Include some stretching in your daily running routine. The best time to stretch is not before you run. Pre-workout muscles may be tight; the risk of injury is increased. Instead, stretch during–or after–your run, when muscles are warmest. If you own a hot tub, do some stretching while you’re soaking.

Week 9

[tags] Marathon Training, Hal Higdon, Running [/tags]

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Marathon Training: Week 8

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This was a pretty good step back week.  For the most part the temperatures were great although the humidity tried to ruin that whenever it could. A good week was topped off by a good weekend of camping and hiking around to celebrate my 27th birthday!!

Monday:Four comfortable miles. It was a little hard to run comfortably with 80% humidity but I managed to run 4 easy miles in the 70 degree temps. I tried out a new loop downtown running to Nicollet and making a square through the middle of downtown.  I probably won’t do it again because I had to stop at a lot of intersections which really broke up the run (good and bad!) I did the 4 miles in 30:49 threw in a couple of accelerations and completed Week 3 Day 1 of the hundred push-up challenge (completing a total of 64 push-ups), and other core work.

Tuesday:7-9 miles. Met the training class at the Edina Community Center again (for the last time) for a 9 mile run.  We had a good run and I felt pretty good throughout. It was to be a conversational run and we had discussions during the early parts as to what a conversation actually meant! We did 3 loops around Bredesen Park; 2 on the inside and one on the paved outer loop.  Our leader got us a little lost on the first loop! Our overall run was 9.75 miles in  1:12:17 which is 7:24 pace.  Our fastest mile was a 7:08 and our slowest was a 7:54 (1st mile).  Overall it felt like a very solid run with a lot of pace variation throughout.

Wednesday:Four comfortable miles. I ran in the evening again and didn’t really like it! It was 83 without any real humidity so it should have been fine, but I felt tired and sluggish.  I was a little impressed to see that I ran 29:07 for 3.75 miles which is around 7:40 pace.  Most definitely a little tired! A total of 72 painful pushups for Week 3 Day 2.  I didn’t think I was going to be able to make it through.

Thursday:Rest Day! It was a nice day of rest!

Friday:8 mile run. This was a very wet run so I was quite glad when it started raining.  It was about 70 degrees at the start but 98% humidity – so it could have rained pretty much at any point.  I ran toward downtown – across the Stone Arch Bridge – around Hennepin and Boon Islands across the Plymouth Bridge and back home for a nice 8.75 mile run! I did this easy run in 1:12:57. It spit a few rain drops while on Boon Island but didn’t start raining until I was on the West River Parkway heading home!  This is a very scenic run. 82 pushups on Day 3 of Week 3!

Saturday: 10-12 miles. After the run Friday morning we packed the car and headed to the Minnesota North Shore and went camping at the Finland State Forest Campground. I almost didn’t run but decided I really couldn’t miss the opportunity to run on some very scenic trails.  I decided to run on the Superior Hiking Trail, north from Lake County Rd 1. I had to power walk within the first mile as I hit some steep inclines! The trail was quite rugged, as to be expected, with a lot of rocks and tree roots, so even the downhills where quite hard and dangerous. It was worth every second of the 1:20:25 run and every inch 1,500 elevation gain over 4 major “summits”. Talk about some amazing vistas!  They made it worth the effort for the ~7 mile run. It was cool up there as well – not sure an actual temp, but I started in long sleeves and got cold even while sweating.  The air off Lake Superior has a nice cold tinge to it.  After the run I waded into the Baptism River at Lake Superior for a nice ice bath!

Sunday:Cross training. Lots of hiking and exploring waterfalls for my birthday!!

Weekly Mileage:

Running –  33.3 miles

Hiking -15 miles

Hal’s Tip of the Week: To improve your ability to concentrate, visualize your race during workouts, particularly during marathon pace runs. “Put yourself into an emotional marathon mode,” says Bob Williams, a coach from Portland. Oregon. “Picture different parts of the course.” One workout, practice cruising miles 8-12; the next, rehearse miles 12-14. If you’re running a hometown marathon, run specific portions of the course during practice for familiarization. If it’s an out-of-town course, and you’ve run it before, replay the memory. Running Boston: Is there a hill similar to Heartbreak Hill near where you live? “Training on terrain similar to that on which you plan to race is essential,” emphasizes Williams.

Week 8

[tags] Marathon Training, Hal Higdon [/tags]

Marathon Training: Week 7

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Week 7 is over.  It was a tough week as mileage continues to increase.  Both of my easy days saw miles increase as well as the mid-week long run.  But training is also almost half over! It was a busy week personally and I’m feeling a little tired (the 16 miler didn’t help:)  Next week is a step back week and hopefully things will settle down a little bit.

Monday: Four comfortable miles. I had to come up with some new courses now that the distance changed so I tacked on some additional roads to my downtown loop and still have pretty much the same loop – going past the Metrodome and skirting the edge of downtown. I ran the 4 miles in 31:39 and felt tired and tight from all the traveling. It was in the low 60’s but very humid for early in the morning. In the hundred push-up challenge I had to start over on Week 2 because I didn’t do the third day’s workout.  So back to Week 2 Day 1.

Tuesday: 7-9 miles. Due to a scheduling conflict I wasn’t able to make it to the training class so I missed out on running with the group and the discussion about stretching afterward. However, I was quite happy to miss out on the 90+ temps that they had to run through.  Although it was still 84 and humid when I ran at 7am. I ran around Lake of the Isles and for an 8 mile run – I just didn’t feel like tacking on anything else to the extra mile in. I still made it under 8 minute miles with a time of 1:03:16 so that’s not too bad.

Wednesday: Four easy miles. I thought I would try adding some mileage onto the Powderhorn loop that I run around Powderhorn park but I guess I miss judged it and only ran 3.5 miles in 29:34.  A lot slower than expected but that always seems to happen here.  It was in the mid-70’s and humid (again!) and I felt very tired and sluggish.  Week 2 Day 2 of the push-up challenge went pretty smoothly.

Thursday: Day of Rest! I totally enjoyed the rest day!

Friday: 8 miles at marathon race pace (7:15). I had setup my Garmin so that it would beep at me if I varied out of the pace range, I thought.  But I had loaded the wrong workout onto it, so I stopped and quickly setup a “quick workout” which I thought would include a virtual partner to “race” against. Not really sure what happened because my training partner never showed up – typical – and my watch screen was showing some weird sections I hadn’t seen before.  Oh well… Not sure what was happening but a ton of cop cars were swarming the area speeding around almost skidding around corners – something big.  I ran from home and did the loop around Boom and Hennepin Islands making a couple of water and a bathroom stop. It was 70 degrees out with 76% humidity at the start.  I did the 8 miles in 59:48 which is a 7:28 mile.  Hal Higdon says that you shouldn’t worry about your runs unless they are more than 15 seconds per mile off in either direction.  So I guess this is a good run. If nothing else it is always fun to run along the river and downtown. Week 2 Day 3 of the push-up challenge was a little tougher than usual since I was tired from the run but I was able to complete the workout.  I acutally forgot to do the rest of my core workouts, oops!

Saturday:14-16 miles. 66 at the start with humidity probably didn’t really warm up much over 70. I biked the 4.5 miles there and arrived with plenty of time to relax and let my legs recover before the run (the ride was at an easy pace).  We started with an out and back along Minnehaha Parkway before running around Lake Calhoun and Lake of the Isles tacking on a little at the end to reach 15.77 miles.  The TC Marathon was hosting an aid station that we hit 2x’s that included the same type of Powerade and Gu that they will have available on race day – so that was really nice.  They had Clif Shot Gu in two flavors Chocolate andDouble Espresso; the Chocolate was quite delicious. I felt pretty good for the most part – our pace yo-yo-ed throughout the run with an average of 7:54. No mile was over 8:25 and none under 7:37 so this was a nice LSD run for a change – although our actual pace varied greatly – actually hitting 7:00 a few times (the chart shows some 10 minute paces but those are probably at stop signs.  I was glad for it to be over that is for sure! This is my longest run ever so that feels good too.  Afterwards a couple brave souls and I took a dip in Lake Harriet to cool off and relax.  At times it was quite cool out there when the sun was behind a cloud and the wind was blowing.  15.77 miles in 2:04:30.

Sunday: Cross Training. This is probably the most sore I’ve been yet after a run.  Saturday night we walked around a little bit at the Rose Garden and Harriet Band Shell so that helped clean some of the junk out of my legs, but I still felt it.  I couldn’t decide between biking and swimming so I opted for the lower impact activity! It felt good to be in the water even though I struggled a little bit. I wanted to get to 400yds but decided to be done at 300 before getting too fatigued. I needed to do an exhaustion test for the hundred push-up challenge.  My results are a disappointing 16 but I had already swam, which wears out the arms, and I still had several more left in my arms.  Huh? Remember I’m using a core strength ball for my push-ups.  My feet rest on the ball which wiggles back and forth while I do the push-up.  Basically the ball rolled out from underneath me – meaning my core wasn’t able to handle the strain.

Weekly Mileage Totals:

Running – 39.3 miles

Biking – 30.3 miles

Swimming – 300 yds.

Hal’s Running Tips: Marathoners need to learn the value of strength. If you plan to win the marathon, running is not enough. Most top runners head to the gym two or three times a week to pump iron. That’s good advice for anybody. Machines and barbells work for the elite, but you can stay in shape with push-ups and sit-ups in your own front room. Then you can flex your muscles while crossing the finish line on marathon day.

Week 7

[tags] Marathon Training, Hal Higdon, Training [/tags]