Training Log - Thursday, September

I was able to meet up with the Need For Speed group this evening for planned 400m repeats. However, the Grissom High School track was occupied by it's marching band, so Shannon chose to run Fartleks on the neighboring roads across the street from the school. The layout of the neighborhood lent itself to this type of training. The grid of streets allowed us to run at near maximum pace for .3 miles down one street before turning on the next street for a 70% recovery jog. Once we reached the end of the next street, we would pick up our pace again for another .3 miles. We kept "zigzagging" down the neighborhood and back until we had about 5 or 6 pickups in the books. It was quite a challenge to stick with Shannon's pace during this workout as Jason can attest to as well, but we managed to stay with him for the most part.

When I got home, I finally had a chance to look at our pickup pace for the 5 or 6 repeats. We managed to keep a sub 5:30 min per mile pace for all of the fast legs, not too bad at all. I do not plan an major workouts for the next 8 days in order to give my body time to recharge for the Georgia Jewel.

Training Log - Thursday, August 16, 2012

Instead of meeting the "Need For Speed" group for a Fartlek workout, I had to make up a solo workout instead, following Shannon's instructions. I ended up doing the workout on my trusty ol' UAH loop and while I struggled to get up to speed on the first 2 min interval, I managed to hit my goal pace on each following pick up. Then again, it was a fartlek workout and exact goal or target pace or length of intervals is not important at all. You gotta love a workout that doesn't allow you to fail because there is no such things as not hitting the goals of a fartlek workout...well, short of not running any pickup pace that is. Hopefully, I can arrange to meet up the Need For Speed folks again in the near future. It's much more fun to get beaten down together than alone.

Training Log - Thursday, August 2, 2012

Part1: Not knowing whether I would be able to do the track workout with the "Need For Speed" group in the evening due to other family activities, I decided to get a quick 8 miler done in the morning. I opted for 2 figure 8 loops around the UAH campus. I kept my pace just above 8 minutes per mile as I needed to leave some in the reserve just in case I did do a speed workout in the evening. Before I knew it, the workout was over and I was drenched in sweat as usual these days in the hot and humid south.

Part 2: I ended up finding time to squeeze in a speed workout after all, but I ended up having to do it on my own rather than with the group at the Grissom High School track. Instead, I loaded the workout of the day into my Garmin Forerunner and took off from my house headed to UAH. I knew I'd get a nice 1 mile warm up and cool down to and from my house and I'd get just enough mileage around the UAH campus to get the 12x 400m float intervals done. I had to run 1 mile warm up followed by 12x 400m at 5k +15 seconds pace, where I had to run the first 300m hard followed by 100m easy. There would be no breaks until the 1 mile cool down. I was glad to get it done, just in time to pick up my son from his soccer practice:-)

Training Log - Thursday, July 19, 2012

"Need For Speed" Thursday. Timo decided to join the speed workout group today and although it was a tough one, i think the group might have a new member. Shannon scheduled mile repeats of a special variety. Five 1 mile repeats progressively getting faster with a one mile warm up and cool down. After the cool down, I realized it was way too hot for a really aggressive pace, so I decided to run my first mile at 7:15 minute per mile pace followed by each mile to be 15 seconds faster than the previous one. Recovery jogs in between the repeats were 1 minute. I really struggled on my final mile repeat and Shannon was kind enough to drag my butt along the final mile only slightly slower than goal pace to complete the workout as scheduled. Thanks, buddy! And the 100 mile training continues...

Training Log - Thursday, July 12, 2012 (Part 2)

Second workout of the day was definitely a fun one. Jason graced us with his presence as well;-) The "Need For Speed" group met at the Grissom High School Track at 6PM tonight as every Thursday night. Shannon had come up with another great speed workout. 12x 400m intervals with 1 minute recoveries preceded and followed by a 1 mile warm up and cool down, respectively.

While 5K pace was the target, I planned to drop the pace to below 6 minute per mile. I had hoped to keep sub 6 min pace with the goal to drop the pace closer to 5:30-5:45 min pace for the last couple of repeats. I finished the final lap in 5:13 minute per mile pace, not too shabby. Jason was kind enough to run with me, making the recovery jogs much more entertaining than usual. Of course, chatting the entire minute of recovery also made it feel a lot shorter. Great peeps, great workout, thanks everyone and especially Shannon for continuing to keep it challenging.

Training Log - Thursday, July 5, 2012

Thunderstorms, lightning, rain, hail, 85 degrees...perfect conditions for a track workout. Unfortunately, I was running late so I had to do most of my laps on my own. However, if I really needed proof that it was a great idea to join the "Need For Speed" group under Shannon's guidance, I got it last night. Every lap I ran, I received encouragement by the group and I mean on every lap. It was great. Thanks again to everyone for being such supportive fellow runners. It's not always to get dressed to get your run in, but this group of peeps surely made it a pleasure. And their motivation worked. When I got home and uploaded my Garmin data, I noticed that I ran negative splits for every repeats we ran. Shannon had created the following workout: 1 mile warm up, 1x 1200m at 5K pace followed by 2 minute recovery jog, 2x 800m at 5K pace followed by 1 minute recovery jogs, 6x 400m at 5K pace followed by 1 minute recovery jogs, 1 mile cool down. I started the first 1200 meters at 5K PR pace of 6:15 min per mile, followed by 6:13 and 6:08 for the two 800m repeats, followed by 5:51, 5:48, 5:48, 5:40, 5:42 and 5:32 respectively for the six 400m repeats. I even managed to keep with the tradition of running your last lap of a track workout as the fastest lap, too. Great day all around.

Training Log - Thursday, June 28, 2012

108 degrees Fahrenheit, that´s what the thermometer in my car´s computer was displaying when I got in to drive to tonight´s track workout at Grissom High School. When I arrived, there were already 10 or so runners warming up. Wow, I didn't expect a lot of folks to brave the heat tonight. Shannon had come up with the following workout: 4x mile repeats at sub half marathon pace with 2 minute recovery jogs or walks and a 1 mile warm up and 1 mile cool down. Both Shannon Jacobs and Eric Charette were kind  enough to slow down to my fast pace for a couple of laps to pull me along. I ended up running 6:40 minute per mile pace average for all 4 repeats. Not bad for a sweltering speed workout on a completely exposed track.

Training Log - Thursday, June 21, 2012

My third track workout in this training cycle...well, ever, really. Only 5 or 6 runners showed up at the Grissom High School track tonight to enjoy* (*Shannon speak for "suffer") a good speed workout. Shannon Jacobs prepped a workout of a 1 mile warm up followed by 3x 800m repeats at 5K pace with 1 minute recoveries followed by one 1200m repeat at 5K pace before a 1 mile cool down. This was actually shorter than the original workout he had planned for us, but all of us appreciated the adjustment  since it was extremely hot and humid. I did truly enjoy the workout and I am looking forward to next week's session. Hopefully, the addition of track workouts will not only help me with my 100 mile training, but also help me permanently move under the 20 minute mark for the 5K distance.

Training Log - Thursday, June 14, 2012 (Part 2)

The weekly track workout was on the schedule today and I officially met Shannon Jacobs, the guy that's kind enough to organize and run these track workouts week in week out. There were about 15 people attending the session today, including my co-worker friend David Scarlett and his daughter. Hopefully they can make it out a few times this summer. We met at 6PM at the Grissom High School track. This was only my second track workout...ever. Shannon had come up with a great Fartlek (Swedish word for "speed play") workout. We would warm up for 1 mile or 4 laps, followed by 3 minutes at just under 5K pace with 1 minute recovery jogs until we completed about 12 laps or 3 miles, followed by a 1 mile cool-down. I was shooting for a 6:30 minute per mile pace and was able to stay under or just around that pace for the most part. It was a great workout and a nice way to get in my first two-a-day of this training cycle.

Training Log - Thursday, June 7, 2012

My first track workout in years. I had decided to add something new to my current training program to help me get faster over every distance and to change up my new (old) training routine. I showed up at the Grissom High School track to work out with the local ¨Need for Speed¨ training group not knowing what to expect, but thankfully, there were a few familiar faces. Not having done a formal track workout ever before (I´m an old dog trying to learn a new trick;-), I didn´t know what would be expected of me, but when I learned that I wasn´t the only one fairly new to this, I was slightly more relaxed.

The speed workout lead this week was Lynn and she had something for us called the speed ladder workout, I think. We would start at 10K pace and get progressively faster. We started with a 1 mile warm-up followed by 1600m at 10K pace with a 400m recovery jog, followed by 1200m at 5K pace with a 400m recovery jog, followed by 800m at 5K pace with 400m recovery jog, followed by 400m at 1 mile pace with 1 mile cool-down. I made sure I went progressively faster, starting the first mile after the warm-up a little slower than I thought. I made up for it by going faster than originally planned on the remaining ladder workouts. It felt pretty good to do some speed work with purpose. I´m sure my hill repeats help my speed, but there is nothing that replaces a good old fashioned track workout, or so I´m told by folks with much more running experience than myself.

Thanks again to Lynn for organizing and running this week´s workout and thanks to all the other folks participating for making this not only a purposeful but fun workout.

Training Log - Monday, October 17, 2011

With 8 weeks to go until the Rocket City Marathon in Huntsville, Alabama, I decided to give it another go at a marathon PR. Initially, I had planned to try to qualify for Boston, but since I did not stick to the actual 16 week marathon training program, instead opting for an ultra per month with lots of tapering and recovery periods in between, I am going to shoot for "just" a PR, instead. The goal is a time of 3 hours 29 minutes and 59 seconds. Anything faster than that is just icing on the cake.

Training Log - Monday, August 1, 2011 (Part 2)

Wow, after completing the workout scheduled for yesterday this morning instead, I decided not to wait until tonight to do today's speed workout, but to squeeze it in during my lunch break. I know that's not qise, but I actually did ok, at least I managed to keep the target pace during each leg of my intervall workout.