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Modesto Marathon ’16 training: the first bit

Modesto Marathon ’16 training: the first bit

Hello and happy new year, ya’ll. Hope yours was lovely. Christmas with the kiddos was a lot of fun, and shortly thereafter, we went to Playa del Carmen to meet up with family. It was a blast, and the baby did well on her first flight experience (though she wanted to party the entire 5.5 hour flight back home… oy).

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Going to Mexico = tiring
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Coming from Mexico = baby on a tray table!

With about 10 weeks to go until the Modesto Marathon, I thought I’d write out some quick ruminations on how the first “bit” of training has gone. Some background: I’m a Pfitzinger acolyte, and he divides his training into mesocycles. This time around, I’ve taken a hiatus from my beloved Pfitz and am instead using a custom plan developed by Jason Fitzgerald (of strengthrunning.com fame), customized for yours truly. I’m not writing an overview based so much on mesocycles as I am on a need to vom some thoughts out and think things through.

The big question mark – kinda huge, actually – is that Jason has based all of my pacing guidelines/targets on what I’ve done in the past (roughly, about the past 4 years, since I had A), so it is a bit of a gamble to know exactly how attainable the targets are since I’m coming into training freshly postpartum and off a year of not racing racing, let alone racing a marathon. You never know how things will fare until and unless you try, though, and marathon training is inherently an experiment of one, so I’m just taking things a day at a time and adjusting as necessary. It’s the best and only thing I can do – rolling with things – so you can bet your bottom dollar (who the hell says that?) that that’s my MO.

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I see such weird shit on my runs

The other thing that sometimes rattles me is that I’m working on targets that took me a good two+ years postpartum (after having A) to hit mere months since having Spike. That said, I keep reminding myself that how I am as a runner – my mileage volume, my strengths, my racing experience, whatever – is radically different now. In unscientific terms, I think I’m coming from a different running base, so naturally, my training these days will evolve differently than it did after my first pregnancy. Day at a time. Trust the process, trust the process…

Rather than rehash each week’s training (since I do it daily on Garmin, Strava, and DM), I’ll just highlight the key workouts – the speed stuff and the long runs – that I’ve posted so far. Jason’s program is 18 weeks, but it wasn’t until about 16 weeks in that I committed to Modesto. I usually train for marathons in 10-12 week segments, but hey– first marathon postpartum, I can use all the help I can get.

Weeks 16 & 15

speed: 8 mi with last 4 at steady state (7:10-25 target)

I ran this workout both times out of my home, running up to the base of the foothills, which naturally meant that on the return – when I’d begin my SS miles – I’d be on a ever-so-slight decline. Having not done any speedwork since TSFM ’14, I had no idea how this would go or even what these paces feel like in the first place. Week one’s attempt: 6:38, 6:49, 6:59, 6:56. I clock-watched because I have no feel for speed, and while it was pretty awesome to see some continuous sub-7s for the first time in a while, I internally scolded myself because the paces are prescribed as such for a reason. The next week’s attempt, run over the same route, was mildly more successful: 7:01, 7:04, 7:09, 7:00. Funny how much harder the second week’s attempt felt…

distance: 13 miles (fully conversational pace, 7:45-8:45)

Again, I stuck close to home for this LR and ran the rollers between home and the adjacent town, getting over 500′ of gain with an 8:18 average for 13.31. I understand that the Modesto course is very flat, but I enjoy running hills – remind me later I admitted this – and they kept the LR interesting. When I was supposed to run 13 the following weekend, I bailed. I fell back asleep after feeding the baby before I was about to leave (because let’s face it, squishy baby cuddles > running). My running window opportunity got smaller and smaller as the day wore on, and shitty weather (Bay Area style) sealed the deal. At least my big girl got to run in the Santa Dash (after the rain deluge, before the hail storm).

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Weeks 14 & 13

speed: 9 mi with miles 4-6 at tempo (6:55-7:05 target)

Speed stuff is typically the most challenging for me, in no small part because more often than not, I’m running this stuff by myself and/or in the early-ass hours of the morning. To better accommodate life and baby and my sanity, I do my speed stuff on Saturdays now and follow it with my LR on Sunday: not ideal but doable. Anyway – my first tempo in a year plus – a little intimidating. Best way to mitigate it? Get a buddy! Meredith, training for Boston, had a similar workout, so we ran a lot of this together on the GRT and in the rain. First week’s attempt: 6:34, 6:53, 7. Definitely still not easily finding the prescribed paces, and what an ugly-ass positive split in an attempt to find the right range.

The following week (the week of Christmas) I moved this workout to mid-week to accommodate life, and I surprised myself with an unofficial 5k PR mid-tempo. wut. I ran the WU miles around my hood, getting myself to a dirt track for the tempo portion (read: uninterrupted, vehicle-free running), and yet again, my internal pace gauge was non-existent: 6:22, 6:13, 6:17 (19:31 5k). This felt fantastic – very smooth and controlled – and even with me checking my watch every 400m and telling myself to reign it in, I still felt strong and, when I finished, like I could have kept going. This feeling! Gah, so good to get a glimpse of it again. Now I just need to do it in a race for it to be Athlinks official, ha. (I’ve never gone sub-20!).

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Nothing like running laps and laps in the dark, finishing with the sunrise, and realizing what’s just happened. Wednesday win before 7am: apparently beating a forever-old 5k PR (by a minute!) during a tempo run. 9.16 mi w 3 @ tempo, 7:22 avg, with a 19:31 5k – and I felt like I could keep going. (!!!!) To the doubt that often leaves me questioning everything: peace out. No time for you, homegirl. #runwolfpack #seenonmyrun #runSJ #teamrunthebay #runlocal #postpartumrunning #modestomarathon #strengthrunning

And then I came home, and the baby rolled over for the first time, and it was Christmas Eve, and it was basically the most awesome day ever.

distance: 15 miles (fully conversational, 7:45-8:45)

I ran the first 5 solo and then picked up Saurabh for the remaining 10, averaging 8:11 on the STACT/Baylands for 15.13. The run felt pretty challenging – I’ve gotta nail down my fueling stuff mid-run and actually remember to implement it – but we did it. I’m pretty sure at the end of this run I uttered something along the lines of I cannot fathom running a marathon right now. Healthy respect, if not fear, of the distance – welcome back!

When I ran the second iteration of this run, I did it the day after my unofficial 5k PR, on Christmas Eve morning, in what was probably the shittiest conditions that I’ve run in since living here. I ran this again over the rollers on a modified course between SJ and the adjacent town and got over 800′ vert at an 8:20 average for 15.57. I was so happy to be done with this run because my feet hurt; they had gotten wet early in the run, had wrinkled, and the friction between my wrinkles, my socks, and my shoes were making me ache like hell. +1 for mental toughness I guess.

Week 12

speed: 8 miles with 6×1′ @ 10k race pace , 2′ jog in between (6:45-50)

Skipped. We were in Mexico, and even though I brought all my running stuff and my pump and could have done it, I just didn’t. It would have been a huge inconvenience, and I wasn’t interested in playing Life Tetris on vacation in order to get a run in (and most likely on a treadmill, no less). In fact, I didn’t run at all on vacation. Ask me how guilty I felt about it.

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Distance: 15 miles with last 3 at marathon race pace (7:35)

Praise be to Allah for Meredith schlepping out to SJ early on Sunday mornings for our long runs. I hadn’t run in a week, she was coming off a tiring travel + rock-climbing schedule, so we were quite the pair on this. I didn’t read my schedule before beginning and just assumed that the MRP was a 7:30. Next time, I’ll remember to read. I needlessly worked my ass off for 7:26, 7:34, 7:22, which is funny considering how effortless my 5k time felt the week before. I chalked this up to a lot of stuff, mainly not running for 7 days, the preceding day’s Mexico-CA travel, the 4.5 hours of sleep I got and some expected welcome-back-from-Mexico gastrointestinal mid-run shit storms (you’re welcome). I’m not too worried, though it was a little discouraging to feel like my ass got handed to me in my first MP workout in over a year. Onward.

This is already ridiculously long for a high-level overview, so I’ll save the rest of my bantering for my next internal monologue … or my next post. While my confidence might be wavering a bit right now because I can’t fathom the distance again, I think I’m where I should be. I think. Trust the process… trust the process…

what I can tell you about 50k training so far

what I can tell you about 50k training so far

November, heyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy!!

Things have been movin’ around here, though my relative dearth of posting might indicate otherwise. By now, we’re just about five weeks out from the Woodside Ramble 50k on 12/14, my target race for the autumn (winter? It’s in December…), and while I haven’t nearly talked as much about my training for this race as I have for any of the previous marathons this year (Oakland, Newport, SF, Santa Rosa 3:35 pacing), things still have been full-throttle in these parts.

When I began training this cycle–one in which I can’t really pinpoint a beginning… after the Santa Rosa Marathon pacing gig? after San Francisco in late July? something around those parts–things were a little screwy. I knew that there were generic 50k plans out there because I had read and researched tons of them, but I didn’t find one that I was super keen on; though I haven’t yet done a 50k, for some reason, I was convinced that every sample plan I had come upon was grossly inadequate or wrong. For my first few weeks, I made all of my runs time-based: 50 minutes here, 120 minutes there, 100 minutes here, whatever. I quickly discovered that I really didn’t like training in this way, probably just because the mileage became too unpredictable, and the unpredictability threw off my long-term, week after week, month after month training schedule that I was patching together. To be sure, I can cover significantly more mileage in 120 minutes on roads than I can on trails, so I quickly scraped those plans, read Relentless Forward Progress, and based the remainder of my training on that book’s generic 50k plan.

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Now, as we’re just a few weeks away from beginning to taper down for the 50k in Woodside, I thought delineating how this training (so far) has mirrored or differed from marathon training could make for an interesting discussion. Of course, your mileage may vary–quite literally–depending on how you train for marathons or 50ks, so don’t take my words as gospel. Besides, unlike many other runner bloggers on the interwebz, I won’t feign expertise. 🙂  Seriously, do what’s right for you, and tell me all about it because I’m really intrigued.

Similarities

1. Mileage is my BFF…still. Ever since my Eugene ’13 training, when I began following a Pfitzinger 55/12 plan (and later bumped that to 70/12 for Chicago, NYC, and all of my subsequent 2014 marathons), I have very strongly believed in the benefits of fairly high mileage for me. Prior to 2013 (and really, prior to having my daughter in 2011), most of my long runs would top out at 20 (and I’d only post 1, maybe 2 20s per cycle) and my weekly volume wouldn’t go beyond 50.  Really, since early 2013, it has become standard fare for me to go longer (farther) more often and to somewhat habitually average at least 50/55 mpw and peak around 70-75. Going into 50k training, then, it’s really been much the same in terms of volume; the biggest difference has been back-to-back long runs (like doing 22 on Saturday and 12 on Sunday, 24-12, 18-10, 20-13, whatever, ensuring that one is on roads and the other, trails). RFP maintains that you can run a 50k on <55 mpw, and I’m sure some people do, but for me, I honestly think I run better when my volume is higher. Naturally, this depends on you as a runner, your history, your injury propensity, and all those extremely important variables–in other words, if you haven’t been running, please don’t go drop a 75 mile week and a substantial weekend double–but this seems to jibe with me. For 50k training, higher mileage coincides with acclimating your body to run  through fatigue (which is also a cornerstone of Pfitzinger’s philosophies with his training), so fortunately, my body already knows what this type of fatigue-based running feels like and how to navigate it appropriately.

2. Figuring out how to eat on the run is critical. Another lesson from marathoning that has had transferable effects. In marathons, I basically rely on AccelGels for my on-course nutrition, and whatever real food that I can grab (bananas, oranges, any real food that’s vegetarian) and fluids simply supplement the calories my body can quickly derive from the gels. Literally everything I’ve read regarding ultra training, and every bit of advice I’ve gleaned from experienced ultra runners, all point to the necessity of figuring out how to fuel on your runs (and thus, in your ultra) so you don’t completely crash and burn. A key difference in ultras, of course, is the slower paced running compared to road marathons, so it’s not uncommon for ultra races’ aid stations to be stocked, Old Country Buffet-style, with tons and tons of real food offerings. Can you fathom how your stomach would feel if you ran 31+ miles on nothing but gels, electrolyte-rich sugary beverages, and water? vom.  During this training, I have stuffed a ton of food (super salty pretzels, pepitas, pb bagels, and more) into my UD vest so I can experiment with eating on the run (literally) and figure out what my body can quickly digest and absorb and what it, uh, quickly drops…

3. It’s always funner with another. Absolutely. If I’m running 24 and a friend is running 16, I can guarantee you that I’ll figure out a way to work the logistics so I spend as little time running by myself as possible on those long runs. On average, 5 of my 6 weekly runs are sola, so I treasure the company when I can get it. It’s the same as marathon training (or probably with any type of running)–it’s more fun with a friend.

in Alum Rock during a weekend double
in Alum Rock during a weekend double

Differences

1. Difference type of event = different type of speed. It all depends on whom or what you read, but some folks maintain that still doing straight-up formal speed stuff for ultra training, the same type of stuff that you’d do for marathons (tempos, threshold, intervals, repeats, and such) is necessary. Others say the opposite. For me, for my first 50k, I’ve not done a lick of formal marathon workout-based speedwork but instead, throw in stuff like hill repeats or hill sprints on trail runs, pick-ups/strides on GA runs, or GMP miles whenever I want to run in a different gear. My thinking is that if I choose to do another 50k in the future, perhaps I’ll incorporate a more formal speedwork regiment, but for this first iteration, I’m more concerned about time on my feet, which brings me to…

wheeze wheeze hill sprints wheeze wheeze make you a stronger runner, right? wheeze wheeze
wheeze wheeze hill sprints wheeze wheeze make you a stronger runner, right? wheeze wheeze

2. Time on my feet reigns supreme. The most significant area where this differs from my way of training for marathons is in my long runs. During marathon training, it’s normal for me to make most of my LRs into progressions, with mileage sometimes changing from recovery-GA-GMP or down from recovery-GA-GMP-HMP-10kRP or some other variation. With this 50k training, though it has been challenging to specifically **not** make my LRs into big cut-down runs, I’ve deliberately chosen to make nearly all of them as comfortable (think: recovery or GA-paced) as possible to maximize the amount of time I am spending on my feet (again… fatigue-based training). I read somewhere that for ultra training, pretty much all of your runs should be at a very conversational, low heart-rate pace, so that’s what I go for. If I can run 20 miles in 8:50s or in 8:00s, for 50k training, I’m going for the 8:50s, but for marathon training, I’d surely be after the 8:00s. Of course, this all depends on the terrain of where I’m running (because believe me, a ‘recovery’ pace on roads can feel like all-out sprinting on some of these trails here!), so again…. your mileage may vary.  This is just how I’ve been doing things.

3. Trails, climbs, views, and learning how to walk. Kinda weird to say that I’ve needed to learn how to walk because, well, I’m in my third decade of life, but with ultras, pretty much all but the pros walk at least some during the race. Just like road races though, trails/ultras still have time standards, so learning how to walk efficiently (read: with a purpose) is critical. If a climb warrants a walk, I’ve had to learn how to hike the thing instead of just meandering, as I’m probably more wont to do (hey look! a pretty flower! wow, look at that view! and oh, what’s this?! oh nature, you’re so lovely, swooooooon…). And, naturally, since this 50k I’m doing is on trails, I’ve made it a point to make nearly a third of my weekly volume be trail-based each week… specificity FTW, my friends.  Running trails has its benefits though, and while the work might be significantly more than on roads, even with the slower paces, fuckin’ A if the views don’t compensate for the air-sucking ascents and the seemingly out-of-control descents.

wheeeeeeeeeeee
wheeeeeeeeeeee

 

follow the pretty lines
follow the pretty lines
en route to Monument Peak in SJ, CA (11/14)
en route to Monument Peak in SJ, CA (11/14)
not a bad place to be before 8am on a Sunday (cred: @8hasin)
not a bad place to be before 8am on a Sunday (cred: @8hasin)

I’m sure there are other things that I’m forgetting in this quick and dirty list, but as an exclusive road racer (and marathoner) before this training cycle, let me assure you–if you’re thinking about going for your first trail race, or training for your first 50k, you absolutely, totally should. It might be premature for me to say that, seeing as how I’ve actually not done my event, but details… And! If you live in a place that makes it nearly impossible to run trails in the winter, you have a friend in the fine state of California, where there is no shortage of trails and races available year-round. 🙂

What differences have you noticed in your training for roads versus trails-based races? Which is your preference?