Wrapping up 2008

Well 2008 has come to an end, but my 2009 goal has not changed.  I just printed up a 12 week training schedule for half marathons.  I used the one from RunnersWorld.com

 which I know is kinda generic, but it's good enough for me.  

I got a Garmin Forerunner for Christmas, which is good and bad.  It's good, because it's a little more accurate than Nike+, and bad because now I know how slow I really am.  Actually, I'm only a little slower than Nike+ was telling me, which is good because I thought there would have been a larger difference.  My average pace is now around a 9 minute mile as opposed to 11 min/mile back in May.

Monday Jan 5th officially starts my training routine.  In the mean time, I've run 5K every day for the past 5 days.  In addition (though I'm a little embarrassed) I started using the Wii Fit for Yoga.  My hope is that it will help me with my running form and "running tall".

Happy New Year!

Two 5K's later

So apparently, it's been a while since I've posted anything.  Since my last post, I have run the Bergenfield 5K back in November and the AMBS 5K Reindeer Run yesterday on Dec 6th.  After a poor showing in November, I decided I needed to start training a little more seriously.  Unfortunately, I'm not a big fan of the cold weather, but so far I've still motivated myself to get out on a fairly regular basis.  I just started buying cold weather gear, and asked for more for Christmas.  The good news is that I've been out on long runs every Sunday (except today) and have been finished 6-7 miles without a problem.  I think I'm going to try 8 this weekend and 10 the following.  

So the end result was a better time than I posted in November, and I was able attack the hills better than ever before.  But, I didn't beat my "goal" time by a minute or so.  I think I need to do more speed work and keep increasing my long runs.  

My next 5K will be January 1st in FairLawn, so we'll see how that goes.

After the Wyckoff 5K

Last Saturday (Oct 18) I ran the Wyckoff 5K, which doubled the number of 5K races I ran (ever).  It was pretty cold that morning and I had to go by myself, because the kids had Saturday workshop and Ciaran had dance after that.  My reach goal was to finish in under 28 minutes.  I did a great job of pacing myself in the beginning, but I never really picked up the pace until the last 200M.  I ended up sprinting that last stretch, which means I had way too much in my tank.  I think I will make a note to pick up the pace at the half way mark, when I run the Bergenfield 5K in two weeks.

With the cold weather, it really hard to motivate and get outside to run.  I've been going to the gym, but the treadmill doesn't work well with Chi Running and me.  I either end up running too fast or too slow.  Oh well, good thing I'm not starting to seriously train until January.

Chi Running (after the honeymoon)

As I said in my last post, reading the Chi Running book was truly inspirational on that first run.  

So after almost two weeks or so of Chi running I've had mixed results, which is to be expected.  I went out and bought the book and have been reading it on and off since.  At first I had posted some really good times for me.  Then I think I got caught up in the whole speed thing and my form fell apart, which in turn made me slower.  After going back to the book and doing some serious reading, I realize that I need to slow down and focus on my form.  I was hoping to find a seminar locally, but being so late in the season, it doesn't look likely.  So it looks like it's just me and the book.

I've run 6 out of the past 9 days and spent the last 4 focusing exclusively on form.  This week is supposed to be a light week before the 5K on Saturday.  Form will be my primary focus for the two runs before the race, which should translate into speed.  Hopefully I will finish sub 28 minutes, but I'll still be happy with anything in 28 minute range.

Chi Running

On Thursday I discovered Chi Running!  One of my co-workers was telling me what she knew about and it sounded great.  On September 16th I posted a entry about how I discovered that shorter faster strides was the way to go.  Since making that discovery I've been consistently faster, but I never felt as good as I did that first night.  Until...

After getting home from working on Thursday, we did the usual dinner, bath, bed routine for the kids, but we got them in bed 30 minutes earlier.  I ran out to library as soon as they were in bed, came home and read the first three chapters (which is all background info) and skimmed through the beginning of chapter 4.  By this point I realized that Chi Running was very similar to what I had done on September 16th.  This book described in detail the mechanics and the state of mind I had on that run.  Even though I only skimmed chapter 4 (which covers the mechanics), I was able piece enough of it together to give it shot that night.  So without a lot of effort I was able to knock out 5K in 28:17 which is a personal best for me, then on Saturday morning I got down to 28:07.  I am confident that I will post a sub 28 minute time my next time out.

Tonight I plan on finishing a few more chapters, and reviewing chapter 4 again.  The possibilities are really exciting!  Just think, I didn't even get to the meat of the book and it helped me this much.  I can't even imagine how great this will be once I finish the book and really study it.  I'm even considering taking Tai Chi now!  Talk about drinking the Kool-aid!

Some short trips along the way

It's been a little while since my last entry.  And while I'm still averaging a little over 12 miles a week, it has been noticeably more difficult to keep myself motivated.  I used to run so I could post my times on Nike+ and Runnerplus and comment on runs posted by my friends.  I guess the novelty has started to wear off.

So... in an effort to keep myself driven, I've decided to do a 5K each month.  10Ks would have been better, but the way schedule worked out, these 5Ks will have to do.  My first one is on October 18th and my goal is to finish under 28 minutes or close to it.  I also have ones scheduled for November 9th and January 1st.

I was talking to one of my coworkers about doing the NYC half marathon in July and she said that she was doing the NJ half in May.  We agreed that we'll both run it next year.  I started recruiting other runners at work and I'm up to 5.  Being realistic about the holidays, I've decided that I won't start training for that until January.  Hopefully this won't hinder me too much.

Ahh-Haa!

So the past weeks I've been "Playing around" with my stride. For some reason I thought if I took longer strides, I would go faster. I had mixed results and my legs were a little sorer than normal, but I attributted that to just being old. Then Sunday, I ran my heart out, based on the way I felt afterwards, it should have been my best 5K time yet. However, I ended up being slower than normal and infinitely more tired and worn out. Now I was really confused, so when I posted my run on runnerplus.com, I mentioned my change in stride. One of my friends posted an article about stride and cadence. Basically, everything I was trying to do by lengthing my stride was not only inefficient, but somewhat hazardous. It ended up giving me shin splints and made both of my knees sore.

So long story, slightly shorter...
I needed to go back to shorter faster strides. Tonight I went out and ran 5K to put this theory to the test. I knocked 2 minutes off my last 5K time and I feel a bajillion times better afterwards.

Just in case anybody is interested I'll post the link. It really is quite informative.
http://www.runrichmond.com/id23.html