Forums >Racing>2024 Advanced Training and Racing Thread (still competitive jerks)
Dorothea
Thanks, Flavio. I guess that book first came out 2015, so my coaches' practices were not quite up to the newest sports medicine evidence. I'll try it, and see what happens. This whole conversation is making me realize that while I've always incorporated some kind of S & C into my routines, I can consider myself lucky to have been running (mostly) healthy for so long without a proper regimen.
A nice week from you going above the 100K mark again!
My week is pretty boring, since I came down with Covid on Wednesday (didn't find out 'till Friday, when I tested) and am taking three days off, including today. Did lots of walking as well. I've been feeling better since Friday, though, and I'm hopeful that I can start marathon training as planned tomorrow. I did also see the doctor this week and he showed me a nice X-ray of my knee where my knee is out of alignment with my other leg bones due to (shocker--not) muscle imbalance, which means a diagnosis of patellar maltracking. I get to do some PT, which involves S & C, so all in all a hopeful diagnosis as I got the okay to continue running. My calf/achilles have small amounts of tightness, but I figure that will slowly just get better and better at this point.
Weekly for period: From: 01/01/2024 To 01/07/2024
Date
Name
mi
km
Duration
Avg/mi
Avg/km
Elevation Gain
in ft
01/01
Afternoon Run
3.52
5.67
00:32:08
09:08
05:40
3
01/02
7.16
11.52
01:01:57
08:39
05:23
154
01/05
Morning Run
4.74
7.62
00:42:58
09:04
05:38
157
01/06
5.09
8.18
00:49:47
09:47
06:05
56
Totals: Time: 03:10:32 - 🦅Imperial: 20.9 mi - Metric: 33.68 km
Qualifications: I like to run. In Florida. In the summer. At noon.
Last race: April 28, Glass City Marathon, 3:29:53. Saw deer; cried; didn't melt in rain or heat.
Problem Child
Mmerkle do you have access to weights at home or would it be at a gym? All those sound like going to the gym and if I was young with no kids and living on my own id hit the gym after the run workout. If you have to drive from location to location it might not be as enticing but once you start it becomes routine. I’d also add in upper body. Back muscles will come into play for overall form and maybe running power swinging arms. Plus, I typically have bad back pains when hiking in ultras. Whatever was really sore during JFK could maybe benefit from strength training. I saw lots of benefits from doing sit ups and the Garmin ab core 10 minute workout recently. Full 1 minute plank on my T ReXing was a nice pat on the back after asking who will carry the boats and the logs. Shaded, not dark, places are sometimes not as scary as the light makes them out to be.
Many of us aren't sure what the hell point you are trying to make and no matter how we guess, it always seems to be something else. Which usually means a person is doing it on purpose.
VDOT 53.37
5k18:xx | Marathon 2:55:22
Flavio- Nice week!
DKT- Keep working through those injuries.
My week:
5K 18:36 (2023), 10K 39:40 (2022), 1/2 1:24:37 (2023), full 2:58:36 (2015)
Flavio Thanks for the input, I figured you'd appreciate the discussion.
RP I have kettlebells at home. The rest I do at the gym. After JFK my hip flexors, especially the left, were messed up for a while and I developed patellar tendonitis in both knees, so I think my quads and hip flexors need strengthening.
Mark Nice volume, sick LR.
My Week
Counting this as week 1 of my training cycle for the Salisbury marathon. That speed session sucked. I was so winded after the 400s (although I caught my breath pretty quickly after stopping) and the splits were sub par. Trying to keep my cool, but I'm a bit frustrated.
Mother of Cats
18 miles running and 5 hours of pool-runningM: 3 miles very easy (9:52), 1 hour pool-running, and upper body weights/core.T: 5.5 miles, including some gentle fartleking. Followed with leg strengthwork. Sports massage in evening.W: Streaming yoga, 4 miles very easy (9:50), and 30 minutes pool-runningTh: 6 miles, including a 3323m tempo (8 laps in lane 3) in 15:28 (7:30 pace). Streaming pilates in evening.F: 1 hour pool-running and upper body weights/core.Sa: 70 minutes pool-running and streaming pilates.Su: 80 minutes pool-running and weights.
I decided to DNS Houston and take my running break this weekend - I'm sad, but it's the right decision.
Essentially, I've been dealing with some sciatica that is the result of an inflamed muscle in my butt (quadratus femoris/obturator externus) pressing on my sciatic nerve. Why is that muscle inflamed? Because it's really weak, and so I've been doing PT to strengthen it, and I think the strengthening plus running plus frigid weather was just a bit too much for it.
Everything's calmed down now and nothing's seriously damaged, but I'm still not quite 100%. I don't see myself running the time I wanted to run at Houston, and running Houston would almost certainly force me to take a few weeks off afterwards to heal up and rehab.
Since I've got a lot I'd like to accomplish this spring, I decided this week that the smarter choice was to take my break now (hence the switch to pool-running) and use what would have been taper/recovery time to really prioritize the rehab and the strengthening so I can run well this spring.
CK - I should still be good for a run this week, as I'm going to start running again on Tuesday.
Everyone's gotta running blog; I'm the only one with a POOL-RUNNING blog.
And...if you want a running Instagram where all the pictures are of cats, I've got you covered.
DKTrotter - oof on the Covid, but I'm glad you're kicking it quickly.
re: weight training after workouts - I usually do it in a gym, as I include barbell squats, and I don't have a power cage at home. It depends on other variables, but I will sometimes even jog to the gym as part of my post-track cooldown, as the gym is a bit less than a mile away.
Fishy- ahh...I see you got the snow that we missed. Just cold rain here.
MMerkle - I'm actually entered in Salisbury, as that was my spring marathon until the Boston opportunity popped up. I'm sorry we won't get a chance to meet there.
Marky-Mark - I would include the Parkruns and call it your biggest week. Just in case you need an enabler.
Flavio- you could call it marathon-ish pace....
Flavio, Merkle, Fishy - nice weeks
Mark - absolutely count the parkruns, miles are miles! (Unless they’re kilometers.) It’s not like you’re walking around the mall.
DK - ugh, sorry about the COVID, hope you get past it quickly.
DW - sorry about Houston, but absolutely sounds like the right call. Let discretion be the better part of valor, keep your powder dry, etc., etc.
Me: I haven’t been posting my weeks for a while, since I’ve been lazy plus it hasn’t been too exciting. But with the new year, might as well get back to it. Even though still not too exciting. It’s my biggest week in a while, but not intentionally, it just happened. No workouts, in consideration of my 5k last weekend, plus I just wasn’t feeling it. I’ve been annoyed that my easy pace has been super slow the last few months, by >30 sec/mile, and not sure why. I’m not too worried since I’ve set 5k & 10k PRs during that time. But it just means I have to allow more time for my runs in the morning. I could run by time rather than distance, but no. Marathon training officially starts in 4 weeks.
Dave
First week of 2024... these are all treadmill miles, and no laughing at my low mileage
I will be building back slowly...
1/1 - 7
1/2 - 3
1/3 - 3
1/4 - 0
1/5 - 0
1/6 - 8
1/7 - 4 (am) - 3 (pm)
wtd - 28
ytd - 28
be curious; not judgmental
Part of TLC
Aaah, lots of people in their fifties this year, nice. But boys and girls, does this thread move fast again this year. This might become a problem for me with time constraints and limited language skills. I also post at the Walton's place and participate in the running game. Some of you do one or the other or both, too. I'll cross post my weeks, but I'll probably react to your posts only once.
Michael - I'll call you Michael. Merkle sounds like Merkel and I don't (want to) see you as an ex-chancellor of Germany .
Doro (if that's okay)- I hope PT solves your problems soon.
Mark - That's a lot of gain in a LR. And since what goes up must come down - how are your quads?
Don't hurry - next AG will start 2026
Monday 2:05 easy to moderate
Wednesday 0:47 easy
Thursday 0:42 incl. 2x2000 est. LT, 800 easy
Saturday 2:05 easy to moderate
After the first long run I felt good enough to run again on Wednesday. On Thursday I had an uneventful cardiac stress test which I celebrated by meeting our T&F-team for the first time since my covid infection last February. Then I really celebrated by running a kind of tempo workout (2x2000 estimated LT with 800 easy in the middle) for the first time in ages. It felt sooo good. Until it didn't. The last 600 were kind of difficult so I guess true LT is a little bit slower than I thought. Great to be on the track again, though. A second LR in a week will remain an exception. Forecast says it's gonna be cold and windy for the next few days, conditions I don't like to run long in. This time I had less problems in the shoulder/neck area and succeeded better in trying to keep my HR below 140.
LR was followed by track meet of DS1 in the afternoon, today was race day for the rest of the family, me being the driver (and race walking pacer for DS3). DS1 rebounded from a disappointing 800m yesterday by winning the 4K outright.
Are we there, yet?
MrMatt - I definitely won't be laughing at your miles unless I'm willing to laugh at mine as well.
darkwave - DNS makes sense; your reasoning is similar to why I haven't committed to any races before summer
Dorothea - are you taking any Covid medication? My doctor prescribed an anti-viral which was supposed to reduce the severity of the symptoms. Since I had symptoms for only 3 days after starting to take them, it seemed to work. Though probably too late if you haven't started by now.
First week of the year wasn't too bad, in fact somewhat encouraging.
M: 3 miles easy run-walkT: 3 miles easy run-walkW: 6.1 miles run-walk, a little too fast in the middle, so struggled a bitT: 2 miles brisk walk, that's about all I could muster F: 3.2 miles easy run-walkS: Rest, some snow and freezing rain made surface treacherous; also wanted to be well rested for intervalsS: 6.1 miles, 30 minute warm up run-walk, 10 x (200m, 250m jog-walk recovery), 18 minute run-walk cool down
Weekly total: 23.4 miles / 37.7 km
2024 Races:
03/09 - Livingston Oval Ultra 6-Hour, 22.88 miles
05/11 - D3 50K, 9:11:09 05/25 - What the Duck 12-Hour
06/17 - 6 Days in the Dome 12-Hour.
Hot Weather Complainer
wcrunner - Nice way to kick off 2024, hope it turns into a good year.
MrMatt - No-one putting in the work will be laughed at for it.
Dave - With a week like that before you even start marathon training is very encouraging.
Fishy - You're going to get a non-human reputation like Cal if you keep churning out weeks like that,
Dorothea - Bummer about the cold but that's very helpful info on the muscle imbalance that hopefully you can start working on.
Flavio - Really solid week. The illness robbed you of your rightful fitness in Valencia.
Mark - Monster week. Those Park Runs count, 100%. How did you do multiple Park Runs? I thought they all started at the same time.
me - A well timed down week after a big month to finish 2023 - actually turned out to be my biggest month of the year with more than double the climbing of the next highest - not surprising given the hill focus of this base phase.
I had another hill run this week and with fresher legs, cooler temperatures and light winds it was very comfortable even on the bigger climbs.
<caption>Weekly Grid</caption>
5km: 18:34 11/23 │ 10km: 39:10 8/23 │ HM: 1:26:48 9/23 │ M: 3:34:49 6/23
Motorway Half Marathon February 25, 2024 1:29:55
Christchurch Half-Marathon April 21, 2024 1:27:34
Selwyn Marathon June 2, 2024
Dunedin Half Marathon September 15, 2024
DW - I'm sorry that you are battling health issues. Boston is an exciting silver lining.
DK - Take it easy and feel better! Last Summer/Fall (15-18 months ago) was supposed to be my running comeback, but covid->wretched lingering bronchial stuff->pneumonia set me back another year. It seems like respiratory stuff is here to stay for awhile.
AndyTN - I ran a jingle bell 2 miler with my 8 year old, first time he has ever gone for a run. It was a blast. I underestimated the little guy, started us behind a lot of walkers and joggers and we ran like 10:15/9:15 splits. One race sponsor is a local chain of bars/restaurants, they were serving beer, so I had a pre-race and post-race beer. It was a very merry evening for a lot of runners . Now we are signed up for a 5k in a couple weeks.
Mark - Grats on an all time high week! I think my running game team is competing with yours this week, whatever that means. So for now, you are a sand bagging sob. But still, great week!
Flavio/Fishy/Dave/wcrunner2 - Solid start to the year!
MrMattM - Good starting week! I started back last Sept after years of inactivity, it's a process.
RP/Merkle - One nice thing about plyo and single leg lifting, you can do it with almost 0 equipment.
I finally ran again this week. I did more miles than I wanted to since I'm in that running game. My calf is feeling Ok, not good or bad. My right hip, which is my problem spot historically, is starting to complain. It might be a quick transition to the injured reserve status haha. I stopped my run today only to notice that I was like 0.04 miles short of my running game goal, so back out for another .05....embarrassing
Reading Jmac, DW, wcrunner health updates, I'm determined to appreciate the positives. Even if I get hurt, I see two trends. My weight is going down and sticking on lower plateaus, and my fitness is going up and sticking on higher plateaus. Even if I have to take off 2-3 weeks every 10 weeks, I will plow ahead and make it work. My first goal was a sub 22 5k by the end of the month, but I think I'm going to shift that to sub 21:44. I noticed on a website that 21:44 is the first sub 7 min/mile pace. I'm still kind of slow and overweight, so it should be interesting.
Intl. correspondent
Dorothea - I believe there are many examples of people who never get injured and never do strength training.I reckon it's probably a combination of excellent genetics + moderation when it comes to training load.Pelé, the best footballer ever and the athlete of the century (RIP), has recognised that a great part of his success was that he was very rarely injured, allowing him to always remain in top shape.It sounds like you're already on the other side of the respiratory infection, so hopefully you can resume running pretty soon.
MMerkle - I echo RP in that back muscles are very important for running (pretty much anything that helps stabilise the core more).I feel direct correlation between pull ups and better running form for instance. I have a bit of kyphosis and the pull ups sort of help pull the shoulders back into place.
DW - It sucks that your plans for Houston got derailed but smart of you prioritise the long term plans.
Dave - If I were to post only the exciting weeklies here I guess I'd never post LOL.Anyway, whatever you're doing you're doing it very well, so keep doing it!
Josh - Woah, speedy kiddo!
PRs: 1500 4:54.1 2019 - 5K 17:53 2023 - 10K 37:55 2023 - HM 1:21:59 2021
Up next: some 800m race (or time trials) / Also place in the top 20% in a trail race
Tool to generate Strava weekly
So a while back an eye doctor told me I must wear glasses whenever I'm outside my home (I think it's the high photophobia + cornea abrasion).
So I've been wearing the Rudy Project cutline sunglasses during my runs.
They work perfectly for that.
That said, they've got photochromic/transitions lenses.
For some reason I always thought those lenses turned from clear to black due to exposure to light.
But it's actually exposure to UV rays.
So the lenses sort of stay rather clear if there are clouds, if I'm in a vehicle, etc.
So I'm now in the market trying to figure out if I can find running sunglasses that are still photochromic but are much darker by default.
I've read about the Transitions Xtractive, but have not yet found running sunglasses with that.
I might need to buy separate sunglasses (maybe cat3 or cat4) for when I'm just walking around under the sun.