Signed up for a 5k

I just signed up for the Achilles St-Patick Day 5 km Run on March 16th in downtown Toronto. I didn't feel like waiting till March 30th to race again. Call me impatient. It's a nice flat course in the business core. Even if I try hard, it shouldn't have an impact on my 10k race two week later. I'm going to try to go under 22 minutes for that 5k, which is a 4:24/km pace. That should be quite the challenge.

Hardest one yet

Why are some workouts harder than others? Quality workouts are supposed to be hard, but some are harder than others. Is it the stress, the time of day, what you ate last night? All of the above, maybe?

I just finished a workout that I've done on Wednesdays for the last 3 weeks. I've never had to dig so deep to finish it. But, I'm not sure I've felt this good after, either. Maybe it's the pint of Stella that I felt I deserved.

What's going on in that body of ours? Why am I chasing that pipe dream, that PR that I will then try to surpass again? This only can last so long. If you ask me right now, I believe that I feel the need to commit to something with my whole being. Because running is so basic, that both my body and my mind can embrace the pain that comes with some of the training and most of the racing.

While I was nursing my beer at the club, I pulled my Garmin and looked at my last race, an 8 km race. I looked at each lap. I remembered clearly how I felt, how the first two km just flew by, with a barely noticeable uphill, then a very light downhill all the way to the lake to about 5.5 km. I passed the 5k marker faster than my previous 5k PR. Km 7 was hard, and the first half of km 8 was even harder. And I had a friggin' stich to the right side. Never happened to me before. Then I could almost see the end but not quite because it was just around a corner, to the left. Maybe 100 m from the corner. I picked up the pace a bit, although I didn't think I could. The last 100m was just a sprint that used energy I pulled out of thin air. I recorded my race for my podcast and on the audio recording, you can hear the pain at the finish. Best race yet.

I can't even imagine running faster than that. But I know I will. Because I now know a truth about myself: I'm a wuss. I trained when I was in my twenties and I always pulled back when I felt any kind of strain. I never actually committed to my running. I was a slow runner, that's how I was born and that's how it was going to be. My 10k PR is 49:59, which I ran when I was 25. I now run faster than that on training runs. I now know for a fact that I was a better runner than I thought.

But all this doesn't really matter. It's the past. I had a blast anyway. Today though, I'm committed. I realize I'm not a gifted runner. But, I intend to realize as much of my potential as possible within my life's constraints. I cannot abandon my job and my family to dedicate myself to running. I can still do a lot though.

White Hell!

Is the snow EVER going to stop? It's horrible. I moved to Toronto, from Quebec City, to escape the white stuff! It tracked me down and now it's making me pay. This is the view from my home office, how depressing is that?

Not only is there a lot of snow but it's also horribly cold. I managed to run outside yesterday at a snail pace to keep from slipping on the pervasive ice. Other than that it's been treadmill-orama. Quality runs simply cannot be done outside at this point. Unacceptable.

When, when, when can I start running outside again?

British Running

I've been pretty good over here in Britain. I got at the hotel at 7:30 am on Sunday and THANK GOD they gave me a room immediately. I slept a couple of hours and then walked around the city, looking for my running trail, that I had previously located on mapmyrun.com.

I left the hotel around 3pm for my run and proceeded on the path I thought was the right one. The trail ended after 500 meters, so I turned around and ran around for a while. It had to be close! Finally, after 20-25 minutes, I found it. It was a pretty nice trail by a little brook. I managed to run for about 70 minutes minus 4-5 minutes standing around looking at my map.

This morning, Monday, I got up at 6 am and went for an easy run. I stuck to the street since it was pitch dark. After a while, there was no more street lights and it was a bit dark. There was a bit more light on the way back.

At the conference, I met a guy I used to work with who said he started running a few weeks ago. Since the morning's sessions are about a topic that I don't really care about, we're going for a 9 am run together and we'll split a taxi to the conference before lunch. I'll stop by his hotel, run 5 km with him and then do a few km on the way back. Sounds like fun!

Travels and tribulations

Spent most of the week in Houston for work. Came back on Thursday night, shoveled all day yesterday. Today I'm packing because I'm leaving for the UK this afternoon.


I still managed to get some running done. In Houston I found a route on Mapmyrun.com pretty close to my hotel, so I was a ble to run a quality run on Wednesday morning. I got home at 6 on thursday and went to the gym for a quick treadmill session and yesterday, between shoveling sessions and work, I was back on the treadmill for my second quality workout. No way you can do any kind of speed in this snow.

I might go out for some "junk" miles in the snow. It's nice today, but the roads and sidewalks are a mess. Still, this would almost qualify as low impact. Maybe.

In the UK, I should be able to run a few times. I found a route on Mapmyrun.com that I might try. The weather forecasts is improving slowly over there. I'll let you know.

My iPod is chock-full of back episodes of my favorite podcasts. I should be able to catch up on the plane.

Robbie Burns 8k Race

Last night I had a hard time going to bed. I tried to rent an On-Demand movie but they didn't have "Chariots of Fire". Luckily, "Armageddon" was playing on a commercial-free station and I only saw it 20 times, so I watched it again! My new favorite line in the movie: "HE'S GOT SPACE DEMENTIA!!!". Just great entertainement.

For those who haven't read my previous posts (which is everyone), my target time for this run was 38:40, which is a pace of 4:50/km, or 7:30/mile. This is the fastest pace I've run in a race, a 5k on December 30th. And I had run hard. I figured that if I can sustain it for 8k, I could live with that result.

This morning, I got up at 6 am to drive to Burlington, Ontario, which is about a 50 minutes drive from my house in Toronto. My bag was packed and my running clothes were downstairs so I wouldn't wake up my wife and kids. I had an envelope of instant oatmeal and a black coffee for breakfast, got dressed, jumped in the car, hooked up my iPod (containing 2 episodes each of Planet3rry and 'Dump Runners Club').

We had some light snow last night but the roads were clear, as was the course. I got there pretty early and drove the course to scope out the hills. It was pretty darn flat. I picked up my kit at 7:45 and got dressed.

I met Marty, from 42at42.blogspot.com. We had exchanged messages on buckeyeoutdoors and decided to meet. Everting is weird. Everting (to evert), a term I picked up in a William Gibson novel, happens when cyberspace projects in real life. Marty and I chit-chated a while and then he went on to meet a friend of his.

The weather was just about perfect, 0C and no wind. I decided to only wear 3 shirts without the outside shell. Looks cooler! I had my recorder, which I turned on for my French podcast (lelievreetlatortue.blogspot.com).

The race started and what more can I say? I gave it everything I had. I went a bit faster than the pace I had picked, but just by a bit, and I felt like I could handle it. My splits for the first 3k were about 4:45 and then we started going slightly down hill and the remaining splits are between 4:33 and 4:40. I was just friggin' flying! On my way, I blew my 5k PR out of the water by 25 seconds with a 23:30. I got a side stitch in the last 500m but I still managed to summon some kind of a kick at the end and pass a few people suffering worse than me.

Final time: 37:46, a full 14 seconds better than my ultimate best case scenario. What a race.

I was 191th out of 608 finishers. I was 154th male out of 333. And I was 30th out of 48 in my age group (40-44). That's a harsh age group. I think I'm going to have to win by longevity.

Now this new time means that my VDOT is up two notches, from 40 to 42. My quality workouts will go from painful to excrutiating. For example my Threshold pace will go from 5:06 to 4:56/km.

Brain Training

Bought that book that RunnerMatt (Dump Runners Club) recommended: Brain Training for Runners. The foreword was from Tim Noakes (Lore of Running) so I just couldn't resist.

I'm not quite done yet. Basically, this is about training within the context of the Central Governor Model instead of the more common Cadiovascular/Anaerobic Model. I first heard about the Central Governor Model in Tim Noakes book and my understanding is that basically it postulates that fatigue is a feeling induced by the brain to prevent organ damage or failure as opposed to a lack of fuel.

The book is interesting. The training program is based on Jack Daniels' training program, which I'm currently following. The VDOT table is basically the same but the various paces have been modified a bit to fit the "Director" model. Although the programs are similar, there are differences that, as a novice runner, I'm not comfortable with.

The first difference is that the Threshold pace running is pretty much replaced with Race pace running. I'm a bit uncomfortable because Daniels is so specific about not running at race pace during training. If it was benificial, you'd think he would have noticed.

The second difference is that the VDOT adjustments (called "TPL" in Brain Training") are kind of done by feel. Again, that's something Daniels is against. VDOTs should be upped as the result of a race time or after 6 weeks of structured training.

One of the reason I picked Daniels' program was the self-limiting aspect of it. There's a "sling-shot" effect where training improves race time, which improves the VDOT, which increases training, which improves race time, ...
The logic of this system appeals to the computer geek in me. It also prevents me from increasing training too fast or too slow.

The Brain Training program, on the other hand, leaves more freedom to the runner, which might be all good, but in my case I don't think I have the experience to use it. In a couple of years, I think I will find the program much more attractive.

This won't prevent me from using some of the techniques in the book. I believe he make a good point about improving one's stride technique and I will definitely do that, as well as some of the other exercises and use proprioceptive cues (don't ask, just buy the book).

Definitely worth the price. The section on Flow (aka "the Zone") alone makes it worth it.

My two cents.