Early, early and early

12-13 October 2006

The last three days I’ve been out the door by 6:00 AM. As mentioned previously I’ve been on training all week and hence have had less time in the evenings to fit everything in. Wednesday we had a work dinner, last night I had a yoga class and today I wanted to catch another yoga class which was only offered first thing this morning before work.

Yesterdays run was scheduled for 75 minutes easy in zone 1. I did a loop through downtown which was nice as there was a lot more life in that part of town at that hour. I had one unforeseen incident. The Garmin stopped counting time when it lost the satellite signal. It only started losing the signal when I was downtown which means I didn’t notice that it wasn’t counting time until it was too late. I ended up with an extra 20 minutes to get home and that’s by taking the shortest possible route from downtown. All in all, not life threatening but it was annoying nonetheless.

Both Wednesday and Thursday I lost the satellite signal on my Garmin 305 before the sun came up. It makes me wonder if that’s not a coincidence. The atmospheric conditions just before dawn are slightly different than after the sun comes up. In general, the 305 has been better downtown than the 301. Wednesday, I wasn’t even near any buildings when I lost the signal. So what’s up eh. The satellite had me all over the place through downtown yesterday. I didn’t know that I could run through buildings.

Today I decided that since I had been up early the previous two mornings, I would go to an early morning yoga class. I still kept my regular Ashtanga class last night. This was the first time that I tried the early class. It’s a little heard to get going as I don’t have an opportunity to warm up prior to the class starting. I thought that maybe I’d have to do a few stretches at home next time before heading over. Fortunately its only 5 minutes walk from the house.

The other reason I want to try running early this week is that that will be only time that I can run next Tuesday – Thursday when I’m in Texas. Getting up at 5:20-5:30 made all the difference. My body needs time to wake up. I have to admit that I’m a bit tired today. It would probably take a week or two to get used to such an early schedule if I had to do that on a regular basis.

I’ve been trying to work out how much time I’ll lose in the first 30-45 minutes in NY for the marathon next month. I’ll be lined just ahead of the 4 hour group but there are a lot of people in that time range. My fitness level is a lot higher than a 4 hour marathon now hence my dilemma. I’m going to go check around the web over the weekend. Starting slow is not a bad thing hence it may work out well in the end anyways.

Where have you gone Mr. Satallite?

I ran this morning before work as we’ve got a work dinner tonight right after the course. Surprisingly I didn’t have too much trouble waking up this morning. It was early for sure, 5:20. I need a half an hour to wake up and eat before starting. That makes all the difference for me in the morning. Getting some carbs flowing through the system is key.

I was a bit tight for the first part of the run this morning. Fortunately I didn’t plan to start too fast. I was better as the run went on.

Today was the first time in a while that my GPS lost the satellites during the run. I lost about 2.5 km before it picked them up again. This morning was very overcast and raining and dark. This probably makes it more difficult for the Garmin watch to pick things up. The up side of this was that I was forced to set my pace by how I felt. I think I’m getting better at this.

It was dark for most of my run this morning. That was different but also meant fewer people on the canal this morning.

I can’t believe how hungry I was for most of the morning. I ended up having a baggle mid-morning to tie things over.

Overall I didn’t think I wasn’t as smooth this morning as I have been on other runs lately. Part of this, for sure, had to do with having to run in zone 3 for a good part of this run. My pace was good nonetheless hence I’m too worried.

Tomorrow is another easy run for 75 minutes. I’ll have to do that again in the morning before the class so that I can make it to yoga at 5:45.

Morning weight:- 206.0 lbs.

Late start but good workout tonight

I wasn’t able to get over to peak tonight until after 6 which is a bit late to start working out. All this week at work we’re in training. I was feeling tired before heading because of the course and I thought maybe this might not be a great workout tonight. Surprisingly I really had a good session. When you least expect it, you have a good night.

My schedule for the next few days will be a bit challenging. For tomorrow I need to get the run in before the course starts in the morning. This will make it pretty early as I need to run for about an hour and 40 minutes. This equates to a 10k plus warm-up and cool-down. 10K is supposed to be run in zone 3 which is 13.3.-13.7 or 4:31 – 4:23 /k. Tomorrow night we have a work dinner if I can stay awake that long. Might need an extra coffee or two. If I can work it out I’ll have a quick nap after work.

Thursday will also need to be run in the morning if I’m going to get to my yoga class in the afternoon. The Yoga starts at 5:45 which doesn’t leave much time to get there. There won’t be an opportunity to run during the day as we only get about 30 minutes max at time between sessions. At least after yoga I can crash. And Friday is my day off hence I’ll get to sleep in a bit.

I was feeling very strong on the treadmill tonight. My heart rate was relatively low but I still work up a good sweat. I worry that I use the arms a bit too much but they really do help me keep the pace. I find I’m much more consistent when I use my arms to keep a nice steady cadence.

Last night I was a bit too ambitious to think that I could get a yoga session after getting back from my travels. I was a bit too tired to give it a go. Tonight I ran through a number of yoga poses to help stretch things out. Felt much better because of it.

Better wrap this up and get some sleep.

Monday ==> easy day and travel day

09 October 2006

Today was a travel day and a recovery day. I took the train back from my mom’s place in Cobourg, ON. Very pleasant trip. I tried the wireless access on the train to see how well it works. It was a bit hit and miss. Posting my blog from the weekend proved difficult with the time delays their wireless access was experiencing. I didn’t get that fixed until after I got back. However, with a bit of patience things worked okay.

After the coffee I’m having now, I will get my 60-75 easy run in today. It’s really beautiful outside so this should be nice. Mondays are always a nice run.

If I have time later this evening I’ll do an hour of yoga with Rodney Yee. It’s a nice way to unwind in the evening for sure.

The more I reflect on yesterday’s run the more I think my main difficulty was not having enough to eat on Saturday night. This makes more sense to me. Being slightly fast isn’t usually enough to make the run more difficult. At least this weekend I’ll be at home and can guarantee some good carbs.

Sunday ==> Cobourg: Long Run

08 October 2006

I was in Cobourg at my mom’s for Thanks giving. I took the train down last night and will head back on Monday morning. Have to get my share of turkey in this weekend.

Today was another long run. The run included 110 minutes at the top of my zone 1 and 20 minutes at the bottom of zone 2. Total time was 2:11 today.

The top of zone 1 was slightly fast. I was aiming for 12.0 to 12.2. The result ended up being 12.4 km/h. The pace was pretty even today. I was also feeling that I was moving a bit faster than ideal today. At this pace, I found that I was burning more carbs even though I consumed all the fluids and carbs I had with me. I would have liked to have had more fluids and carbs. Not quite sure how I would have gotten more in as I was taken in stuff pretty steadily. Even though I was feeling it more today I was not totally wiped. I think sometimes it’s a fine edge to getting enough or too much. I was slightly on the wrong side but not by a lot I think.

I’m glad that I’ve been working on getting the right amount of fluids and carbs. This is not an exact science and I find it takes a lot of trial and error. This is one of those tasks that I’ll probably always be working on. For me I need to keep working on figuring out the optimal balance.

One last factor, I didn’t get a regular meal last night as I was travelling. This is important and probably would have helped today. Yesterday’s workouts were both really good and tough but getting a good recovery meal after didn’t happen. I ended up snacking or grazing for most of the evening. There probably wasn’t enough carbs in the mix.

Saturday -->Peak Day & Pilates for the first time

07 October 2006

This morning I was out to the Peak Centre. They were closing by noon hence I only had time to do the run portion of the workout. Today was also the first day with a new workout, “Low Power Specific Strength” (LPSS) training. You know something with a name that long is going to be tough.

The idea behind this LPSS workout is to run for specific periods of time with the grade on the treadmill set really high while running at the top of my zone 1. The first set was done at 6% grade and 11.8 km/h for 5 minutes. The second set was done 6.5% grade and 12.0 km/h and finally the third was done at 7% and 12 km/h. Between each set I ran 5 minutes at or just below the bottom of my zone 1 speed for recovery.

I found that the 6% grade although tough was not quite hard enough. Apparently you should not feel that you can go much further at the end of each set. The third set was a lot tougher @ 7%. I still got through the third set hence I’ll probably start there or 7.5% for the next LPPS workout. Eventually I’m supposed to get to 8% grade.

Kristen was good enough to keep things open for me to complete my cool-down run before leaving. That made things a lot easier as I didn’t need to run again after getting home.
Since I didn’t get my ST&C workout in today I decided it was a good day to try a Pilates class for the first time. I had been told that it’s really good for the core muscles. The folks at Santosha yoga had also suggested that it would be a good compliment to my Ashtanga class. All-in-all, it was really nice. There were only a couple of moves that we’re awkward mostly because the muscles aren’t developed to hold those positions gracefully. Graceful I was not but I felt I got good value for getting a core workout and some further stretching.

Morning weight was up quite a bit after the massive artery clogging steak I had last night at some friends place. I haven’t had that much meat in ages. Dessert was the icing on the cake so to speak. It always takes me an extra day to fully process something like a steak. The weight should be back to normal after the weekend assuming I don’t each too much turkey tomorrow.
I talked briefly to Kristen today about going for a sub 40 minute 10k next summer. That would be sweet. This gives me something to focus on and plan towards. In my mind I think it’s doable. I guess that’s the important part in that you need to be able to believe you can attain a goal.

My run tomorrow will be around Cobourg as I’m on my way to my mom’s as I write this tonight. Cobourg is small enough that I’ll pretty much run a full circle around the town. As long as I avoid any dogs I should be okay.

I'm back

10 days without blogging. A life time can pass in 10 days. Part of it was unavoidable, part of just didn’t happen even though I thought about it a lot. Amazing how you miss the writing aspect once you start doing this for a while. One of the great joys of doing this blog is getting to write about something that isn’t work related and won’t be reviewed by committee.

Last Wednesday night or Thursday morning a truck knocked the telephone wire off the pole to our house. We didn’t even notice it missing until we discovered the phone wasn’t working and hence the internet as well (DSL). We got the wire replace Saturday and we were back in business. We also had my mother and my in-laws here over the weekend as well. Hence things were quite hectic for a few days.

How has my running been since I last posted? Overall I’d have to say really great. I seem to be in really good place right now with my running. I hope I can hang onto this until the marathon next month in NY.

On Sunday I ran for 2 hrs 18 minutes and got a solid 27 k @ 5:05 pace. This was another of my multi-zone runs but the key point for me is that I felt really good throughout the run. Correction, the run part was really good. A few dog owners, on the other hand, really pushed my buttons while I was doing the run. The run was a lot of work still but I was able to get into the target paces really well on this run. All in all this kind of run is a really good confidence builder.

Wednesday’s run was also a really good with the “Boyz” (funny how that term has stuck with me). Luc and Jason were really pushing the pace after the first few k. I was able to stay with them for the whole 10k which is something I wouldn’t have been able to do last spring. Progress.

I’m also trying out another log/tracking package to store my run stats. I still use and will continue to use the software provided with my Garmin. However, Brian Green pointed me at another tool called SportTracks. Really interesting tool. I’ll comment more on that in subsequent posts.

My weight has been solidly between 185 and 187 all week. This exceeds my original goal of 190 very nicely. Interestingly enough I always get my most weight loss following my slowest run of the week which is usually on Monday’s. I’m burning more fat from what I can see at those speeds. I’m grappling with trying to figure how much weight I can loose. This probably tells me that I need to go see Beth Mansfield again. In the last few weeks before the marathon, I don’t want to be losing more weight. (30 days to go.) This morning I’m at 185.0.