Training Log - Saturday, May 29, 2010

Today, I decided to go for a very easy run, trying not to worsen my lower ab problem. While it does not really keep me from running, it does present a severe discomfort throughout the day, when I stretch my abs. I took the opportunity that presented itself when I dropped of my son at his bass guitar lesson. His instructor lives near the Aldridge Creek Greenway, so I strapped on my shoes and when for a job during his lesson. I figured I can get 5 miles in without killing myself, and I did. I took it real easy, running 9:30 per mile pace. That doesn't mean it actually felt easy. The heat and humidity are just hammering me down right now. I am making a conscientious effort to hydrate throughout the day. Eventually, I figure I get enough fluids to stay and feel strong again during my runs. Right now, it's heavy legs on every run. On top of that, it feels like someone keeps choking the air out of me during my runs. It has to be the humidity. I am going to keep the foot off the gas until I get a handle on this. I have my biggest race ever in two weeks and do not want to risk not being in top condition to run it.

Training Log - Thursday, May 29, 2010

I decided to go for another 4.5 miler this afternoon. I have been keeping my mileage low in an effort to recover properly from Saturday's trail race. I have one word to describe today's run, "humid". I ran my usual UAH loop and once I got to the open area of the course, with no wind and just the sun beating down on me, the humidity really hit me. It felt like someone was continuously pressing down on my chest as I was trying to breathe. I tried to maintain a somewhat respectible 8:30 pace for a short training run and it felt like I was racing. I am struggling to adjust to the heat and humidity of summer. I need to adjust and increase my water intake throughout the day, not just before, during and after training runs. I am definitely taking tomorrow off in hopes that my little groin discomfort subsides enough to make for a comfortable run. I am afraid to rest too much with the ultra race in Germany coming up in two weeks. I know its good to taper, but this is more than just tapering.

Training Log - Wednesday, May 26, 2010

Since cross training was on the workout schedule for today and since I am still dealing with that blister and some lower abdomen issues, I figured I'd give the Vibram FiveFinger KSO's another shot. It had been a while since I tried them for the first and last time by running over 4 miles in them on the road, shredding my calf muscles in the process. So today I went about it in a much smarter way, which translates to me just running one mile on a dirt trail in them. Anyway, it all went well with no calf pain, yet. I followed it up with a few push-ups and crunches, realizing very quickly that I have been neglecting my upper body strength. Let's just say I felt like a wimp when I got done. As a result, I plan to do a set of push-ups and crunches once a day, every day with some yoga workouts thrown in for good measure. Of course, having never done yoga, this should make for yet another interesting experience.
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Training Log - Tuesday, May 25, 2010

I figured it was time to go for a recovery run after Saturday’s taxing trail marathon. The blister on my right foot, while bothering me a little bit, did not present any real problems during my short run. Hopefully, it will continue to heal quickly. Surprisingly, the heat did not affect me either. I took it easy and ran 4 ½ miles at a leisurely pace of 9 minutes per mile. I tried out a new pair of Motorola Bluetooth head phones. To my dismay, there were as terrible as the previous set I used. They kept cutting out every couple of seconds. While I can live with the slight discomfort of having some ear plugs pressing into my ear canal, I cannot accept a stuttering running podcast that literally cuts out half of the content due to interrupting the sound every two seconds. I guess I will have to revert back to my wired ear plugs. So much for the advance in technology. I tried both the Motorola MOTOROKR S9 Bluetooth headphones as well as the Motorola MOTOROKR S9-HD and, quite frankly, they are both useless. I used them with a BlackBerry Curve 8520 and it should have worked seamlessly. However, while the pairing was easy enough and the sound is actually perfect for my purposes, as soon as I started running or moving, the sound started to cut out literally every couple of seconds. That is just unacceptable. As you can tell, this training run was neither eventful and as a result of the shoddy headphones, it wasn’t relaxing either. Hopefully there is something else out there that will allow me to use wireless headphones with my BlackBerry while on the run. Wednesday night I have cross training (in other words, last soccer game of the season) on my workout schedule. I haven’t decided yet if I will go for a run before the game. I feel like a slacker right now, because I’ve only done 4.5 miles since Saturday’s disappointing trail marathon. I need to work on my heat management. A couple of notes on the Scenic City Trail Marathon I ran this past Saturday. Actually, I consider them “lessons learned”: First, don’t bother using any type of Garmin device to track your pace or progress as the location causes your Garmin to provide erroneous data to you. Second, use that issue as an excuse to actually enjoy this race and the wonderful views by running at your pace without worrying about what your watch tells you.

Race Report - 2010 Scenic City Trail Marathon

While looking for a training run to prepare for my upcoming 108k ultra race in Germany, I came across this race listed on the G.U.T.S. online race calendar. Honestly, I first tried to register for the Twisted Ankle Trail Marathon, but it had filled up already. But can you blame me? What thrill seeking trail runner wouldn't want to register for a race with the phrase "twisted ankle" in it? Anyway, that's when I decided to register for another race fairly close to home. The Scenic City Trail Marathon is actually going to be the first marathon or ultra race I am traveling overnight for. This should be great training for my ultra in Germany.

The Scenic City Trail Marathon takes place at the Racoon Mountain Reservoir in Chattanooga, TN, which was build on top of Racoon Mountain ten minutes from downtown Chattanooga. This reservoir drops water down 990 feet to create electricity with turbines inside the mountain. After the water has been used to create electricity, it is discharged into the lower reservoir. The penstock or pipe that carries the water to the turbines below is large enough for a full-size bus to drive through. Built in the 70s, the upper dam is 230 feet high and 8500 feet long and the power capacity consists of 4 units supplying 1532 megawatts. The upper reservoir is 1.2 miles in length and the trails circumventing this reservoir will be the site for this marathon and a half marathon taking place at the same time.
I drove to Chattanooga the night before the race for the race packet pick-up and to take my better half out for a nice dinner. We had decided tostay in town through Sunday to enjoy a weekend away from home. I immediately located the Rock/Creek store in downtown Chattanooga, where I picked up my race bib and swag (a nice Patagonia short sleeve tech shirt). Afterwards, we drove about 5 minutes to our hotel to check in and to meet my running buddy Richard and his girlfriend. Richard was kind enough to run with me in my preparation for the ultra next month in Germany.
Richard and I went to the race location on top of Raccoon Mountain at 6:30 AM so he could register on site. We arrived there with the early crowd, able to enjoy some organic coffee and muffins (courtesy of Greenlife) that were absolutely fantastic. We put on our bibs, got our calves marked with the black letter "M" to identify us as marathon race runners to other runners. This was done to allow racers to recognize and differentiate the marathon from the half marathon runners during the race. Aparently, the race had doubled in size from the previous year. Since I had done some research online reading other race reports from last year, I knew that the course was 90% single track trail and that runners would get "stuck" behind each other on large stretches of the race. There was an opportunity to minimize that problem by going out hard on the first quarter mile on the road immediately after the start of the race. Now, all I had to do was convince Richard that is was a good idea to start out fast prior to reaching the single track trail...and I did.
We came out fast and settled in what I figured must have been at the front of the mid pack of runners. The field consisted of what must have been over 450 runners in the marathon and half marathon combined. I was settling into a comfortable pace, but Richard felt he was going out too hard too early. He sent me on my way arounf 5 miles into the race. Even though this was a training run, I wanted to try to push for a sub 4 hour finish. The course had been advertised as a fast trail course and I confirmed this tag line with other runners before the race, so I figured that I should give it a shot. I figured it must be rather flat since it was considered a fast course by many. However, there were two problems with my plan. First, the course wasn't flat or fast my any means of my imagination. Second and more importantly, there was a serious discrepancy between the actual distances covered during the race and the distances recorded by my Garmin 310XT (many other runners reported the same problem after the race). As a result, my Gramin kept showing me a pace significantly slower than my actual pace since it used false distance information. I, not aware of this error, continued to try to push harder to maintain a 9 minute pace not realizing that I was already going faster than that. The result of this error cost me dearly. Add the humidity and fairly high temperatures of the day and you get the inevitable crash and burn I experienced even before I reached mile 20. I was actually on track to finish in under 4 hours about 2 hours into the race. Unfortunately, my demise was becoming more and more evident as my balance and ability to lift my feet increasingly declined. I stopped counting my tripsand near face plants after ten. That coupled with my erroneous decision to wear two pairs of socks to prevent blisters and for added padding caused some foot problems late in the race. First, I stubbed my toes too many times to count. In addition, the high humidity caused "swamp" feet early in the race and the extra pair of socks did not seem to prevent blisters as I now have one pretty good one on the outside of my right foot. Next time, I will add hyrdopel to the mix (cover myfeet in it) and see if that helps.
Looking at the splits, I lost a significant amount of time towards the last third of the race. My Garmin recorded almost 4 miles less than the actual race distance. However, this need to stop running the hills late in the race to try to recover and lower my heart rate really allowed me to take in the beauty of this course. There were many places along the course where runners had magnificent views of the surrounding mountains and valleys. I just wished I had brought a camera to capture these images. Instead, I will have to leave you with an image of the price I paid to run this great event (see below).

Training Log - Wednesday, May 19, 2010

With yesterday being a rest day, I opted for a short monring and short afternoon run to get some miles without killing myself. I am a little concerned with my abdomen issues and I want to make sure to give myself some recovery time before this Saturday's race, the Scenic City Trail Marathon. I selected that race as a long training run in preparation for the 108K ultra in Germany. Anyway, Richard stopped by my house at 5AM this morning. For some reason, he did not check his text messages while heading to my house. Otherwise, he would have read the slew of chain messages I sent him, trying to weasel out of this monring's run. I just didn't sleep well at all and wanted to try to catch another couple of hours of sleep. Since he did not respond to my messages, I assumed he was already on his way, and, not wanting to dissapoint him or have him pull up to a completely dark house, I ended up getting ready. By the time he got to my door, I had already finished my first cup of coffee. We decided to go for a short and easy, real easy, 4 1/2 miles around the UAH campus, my old stomping ground, and returned right around 6AM, in thime for the loca news and some breakfast without having to rush to the office.
Later that day, I chose to add another 6 miles by running the Indian Creek Greenway out & back. It was perfect running weather, a slight overcast with little humidity and temeratures appearing to be in the low 60s. Anyway, that added up to a nice 10 miles for the day. I think I'm gonna rest again tomorrow to help my abdomen and groin recover . I'm still not a hundred percent sure where and how I hurt myself.

Training Log - Monday, May 17, 2010

I was pretty achy this morning, especially the groin and lower abdomen area. Must have been from the long run on Saturday and playing a 90 minute soccer game yesterday. Anyway, we all met up at the hiker's parking lot at Monte Sano State Park for an easy run on the trails. We opted for the South Plateau Loop-Family Bike Trail-Bucca Family Trail-South Plateau Loop option, which added up to a little over 5 miles. It sure felt like a lot more to me. My hear rate never went above 140, but my lower abdomen was just hurting a little too much. After all of that rain over the last couple of days, we really expected very muddy trails. I took this opportunity to try out my new pair of Inov-8 Roclite 312 GTX trail running shoes, hoping I would get to run through some serious mud and water. However, it wasn't to be. The trails were barely wet. But the shoes felt great. I hope to have a shoe review on a couple of shoes I recently purchased once I have been able to thoroughly put them through the paces, i.e. get some serious miles on them. I will also be reviewing my new road running shoes (Brooks Defyance 2) shortly. They withstood their first real road test (Strolling Jim 40 Mile Run) with flying colors and so did the Injinji socks. I haven't decided yet, if I will rest tomorrow. I might go for a run during lunch to do some heat/humidity training for my 108k race in Germany next month.