Progress this week

I've had a bit of a roller coaster in the past week, but things are starting to look up.

I was getting some nasty dehydration issues a week ago that I was never able to overcome.

It seems like Tuesday tipped it off. Whatever I ate for lunch was causing me some cramping and dehydrated me before the track workout. I don't think I ever fully recovered from that. After that, Bastille Day 5K was a flop. Then Friday night's 10 miler was supposed to be an "easy" run with Jason, but it was far from easy. The humidity hurt. Could've been worse though, I guess I could've been hurled over on the side of the path sticking my finger down my throat...?

Saturday's 18 was the low point... I didn't get a lot of sleep Friday night, and I swear everything I drank to rehydrated myself went in one end and right out the other end.
I was supposed to do a long workout with Mike and Jason, but pulled the plug before we even kicked it off. It was a good thing too. I would've died. I instead hung back and still had a death march in the last few miles. That was my ugliest and most difficult long run in a month.

A couple good nights of sleep, and swamping my system w/ fluids put me back on the map though...


Monday night's tempo was great. Whatever recovery I did since Saturday worked wonders. It was the first time in a while that I actually felt fast + strong. Splits were 5:49, 5:40, 5:47, 5:44, 5:30, 5:34... (those are Chicago miles, so #'s 2 and 5 are short by probably 6 to 8 seconds).... but the important point is, I did the same exact workout a couple weeks earlier in some nasty heat and pulled a positive 30 split. This week, the weather was slightly better and I was now a negative 28 split... and had gas in the tank. That was a big and much needed confidence booster after some of the recent garbage runs.


Wednesday night we did a time trial at the track for Claudia. Goal was 3200 w/ laps 1-5 @ 82, #6 @ 81, #7 @ 80, #8 sub 80.

We loosened up with 4x 200 @ 36+37's w/ 200 outs. Then a 5 minute recovery.

3200 went 79.6, 82.5, 82.7, 83, 83.5, 80.9, 82.4, 75.9 = 10:50.7 First 200 was a little fast, and a couple of the laps with some strong head winds in the final 100, but otherwise it was about as perfect as we could've run it.

Topped it off with 4 nice 400's @ 73.4, 72.2, 71.4, 70.4 w/ 60 rest. I think I was actually more happy with the 400's than the 3200 - each was 1 second faster than the prior.

That was a very cool workout! I'm going to try it at least 1 more time before October.


Saturday will be my first long run w/ hills. Going out to Waterfall Glenn. We're going to run two laps of the Xtreme 10's route.

They can't all be winners

I've had a couple solid weeks of training... I'm back towards 60 miles/week, with some quality work. I’ve had a couple decent tempo and track workouts, albeit slower than I'd like. Some very good 15/16 mile runs, which included progressing the pace towards some sort of "marathon goal pace" for at least a few miles near the end of those runs.

I am still feeling some tightness in my hip, but it seems to be manageable. I haven't had a massage in about 3 weeks and am probably due for one, and I'm still getting acupuncture once every other week. My sleeping patterns are horrible right now… I’m barely getting 7 hours.

That said, I've had a reintroduction into racing as I've participated in 3 events in the last 2 weeks. All three have been very humbling experiences. In spite of some ultra conservative goals, they all fell short of my expectations - and I have lame excuses as to why they weren't good races.


6/27 - Old Man Mile @ 5:04
Goal was to go sub-5. I don't care what happened earlier in the day... 4:59 was still a conservative goal. Instead, a very poor showing for my 1-mile debut. 5:04 was slower than my fastest mile, which was about 5 flat in a track workout... and far from what I'm capable of, which should easily be sub 4:50.
It was a fun experience, considering I've never raced anything that short before. It was over so quickly though! I mean only 5 minutes. I’m used to dragging it out over hours. I felt like there wasn't even a chance to get into a rhythm. More like "just run a fast 800, then hang on to as much discomfort as you can for the next 800, and try not to die." Unfortunately, I was a great big giant pussy about it... I was trailing a small pack, and then I mentally caved. After 800, it was either hang or be done and run comfortably... I chose the latter. The excuse was, I ran 16 miles at a solid pace in the morning, then spent the day at the beach, and even had a few beers. It was a long day, and I was tired... so I told myself after 800 that I didn't care. But of course after the fact, I did care! 2 weeks later, and I’m still pissed about it. 19 miles total that day, and I was still a pussy.

7/4 - 4 on the 4th @ 22:40
Here's a great idea... let's go run 16 miles hard the day before a race (slowest mile was 6:50, average was sub 6:30)... then hit the beach, get all dehydrated, watch a bunch of fireworks down at Grant Park, eat very little, drink no water, drink a ton of alkihol, get drunk, then go to bed after midnight... then get up at 5:45 am to run a 4 mile race.... Serious, I was still drunk when I woke up, and I felt like a crumpled up $1 bill at the starting line. A couple mile warm up shook some of it out of me, but it didn't stop me from having a terrible race. It was a miracle I didn’t puke! 5:30's for the first couple miles, then 5:50's for the second couple.... hence 22:40 when I should've easily gone sub 22. I really had no goal at the starting line, other than get back to bed ASAP. This was pathetic.

7/9 - Bastille Day 5K @ 17:01
I should've PR'd this race. My 5K PR was (and still is) 16:55 from Oakpark in April 2008. Last year I ran 16:57 at Bastille Day. I'm long over due to reset the 5K bar.
Admittedly, this race is usually a heater, and avoiding a fade in the conditions is almost impossible. I thought to myself that this year might be different though... it was only like 75 degrees (better than 85!). Yeah, think again.
I'm really not sure why, but throughout the day I had some stomach/digestion issues going on. I’ve actually felt it all week long. I had a big salad for lunch and in hind sight, this probably killed me. After lunch, I wasn't able to hold anything in my system. I became very dehydrated well before the race. Even on a warm day, this would’ve been a mix for disaster. And of course, going into the race I thought about this all too much. More than likely, I probably convinced myself that this was going to be my excuse and it was OK to bonk.
I hung with Chris and Michael through the first mile... we rolled 5:19. Jason and a couple others were slightly ahead of us. Sub 16 guys had their own pack up front. 5:19 was slightly faster than I wanted, but I didn't feel too horrible. Thinking I had some time in the bank, I decided to relax and back off slightly. I let Chris and Mike go... Second mile was 5:27. Maybe I pulled back too much? But I was still doing fine. Just holding that pace would’ve given me a sub 16:50. Mile 3 was a bomb though. My gut was wrenching and only gas pedal I had was the kind that desperately required a pit stop... and I was badly in need of it. My body was done. Towel was thrown in. Mile 3 was a 5:40, and there was no kick. 17:01. I don't care how out of shape I was a month or two ago... and I don't care how many track workouts I haven't had... I should've been able to walk this thing backwards faster!
(A shout out to Mike and Chris – Huge PR’s! Nice job guys!! I wish I could’ve been there with you.)

SO, ripe with excuses... 3 disappointing race. The good news is that I'm starting to feel good about running fast again. Bad news is that I still have a lot of work to get back to where I was pre-Boston.

I need to start acting like a competitive runner again. I need to kick the excessive toxins out of my system, eat better, and definitely get more sleep. If I'm going to train hard and run races, I can't give myself any chances for excuses to enter my head.

Talk is cheap. Time to get to work.

My next race is in 2 weeks: Waterfall Glen Xtreme 10 Miler. It's a tough and hilly course, and generally very hot. Unfortunately, I haven't had any hills since April... and that heat will be a bitch... so, I'll probably be happy with anything under an hour. If I can pull my shit together though and everything clicks, I should be able to go sub 58.