Since soon after running in the 5th Avenue Mile four and a half weeks ago I've been seeing my chiropractor twice a week. I had been having discomfort in my very lower right back for some time and it seemed to have gotten worse. Turned out I had a very stressed out iliolumbar ligament due to a leftward tilt to my spine and a downward tilt on the right side of my pelvis. At this point it's about 95% corrected.
At my last visit he did something different: he adjusted my feet. I've always had tight ankles and I regularly do the stretch where you sit back on your ankles and press the soles of your feet to the ground to stretch your foot and ankle. I can only do this with shoes on though as the shoes provide a barrier and you have to press pretty hard to get some stretching. If I try it barefooted it's too much of a stretch and too painful right off the bat. The foot adjustment involved him digging his thumbs into various parts of my ankle and foot and then banging/slapping the foot on a padded board contraption thingy. My feet and ankles felt remarkably better immediately after. But still have a ways to go.
Also over the weeks since the 5th Avenue Mile I have moved through my new training paces starting at the tops of the ranges and progressing down to the bottoms of the ranges while maintaining a consistent HR profile. I've been doing a long run and two days of hill drills and the rest recovery pace or easy pace at most. I've done high knee repeats up the hill and hill bounding. It took until about the third session to get the bounding right. The first session I was striding too far up the hill rather then pushing off correctly. The second session I cut down the striding but didn't have the push off quite right. About the middle of the third session it seemed to suddenly all come together and I got the knack of it -- I think. I haven't tried hill springing yet. I'm a little leery of that one due to bunions of my big toes. Over flexing them can be quite painful. I will at least try a gentle version but these may just not be for me.
Based on recent progress I should just about be able to cover 2 miles in a 12-minute Cooper Test. Haven't tried to do that since college when we had to cover at least that during the first week of soccer practice each year. Back then I could cover very close to 2.25 miles in 12 minutes. Just getting to 2 would be great right now though. Perhaps I'll attempt a time trial in the next week or so... maybe on Monday... which is my 49th.
Wednesday, October 28, 2009
Friday, October 16, 2009
First 30-mile week... Ever
Sunday 5.0 Fartlek
Monday 6.5 Long and hilly
Tuesday 4.5 Recovery in 40 minutes on TM, HR @ 135
Wednesday 4.5 High knees uphill x 5 plus WU & CD
Thursday 5.0 Easy in 41:50 on TM, HR @ 145
Friday 4.5 Hill bounding x 4 + Wu & CD
Week 30.0
Monday 6.5 Long and hilly
Tuesday 4.5 Recovery in 40 minutes on TM, HR @ 135
Wednesday 4.5 High knees uphill x 5 plus WU & CD
Thursday 5.0 Easy in 41:50 on TM, HR @ 145
Friday 4.5 Hill bounding x 4 + Wu & CD
Week 30.0
Wednesday, October 7, 2009
First Hill Workout Week and Rest of Year Plan
Started the week with 90 minutes of soccer. I'm just about to the point where I can run as much as needed for the whole 90 and still be able to function. Just about. But not quite. Last 10 minutes or so included a lot of tired passes to no one in particular. Afterward felt pretty good though. Tired, but not exhausted. I count these games as 5 miles of fartlek, but it sure seems like more.
Monday morning I did what has become my standard long run for the last month: 2 miles mostly somewhat down then a bit somewhat up, 0.65 mile hill with one down section and one flat section but mostly steeply up, 0.6 mile gradually down, 0.65 down, 0.6 flat back to start of hill, then the initial 2 miles back. That's 6.5 total. I can cut the hill loop down a bit and fashion this into 7 or 7.5, etc. Eventually doing 2 complete hill loops for 9 total.
Tuesday I did a 40-minute recovery run on the treadmill. 1% elevation. Started at 5.0 mph and increased 0.1 mph every minute until my HR was at 135. That took 20 minutes so I was then at 7.0. Held that for 5 minutes. At that point HR was up to 139 so went down to 6.9. Held that for the remaining 15 minutes. HR went back to 135 for most but up to 137 for the final few minutes.
Covered 4.25 miles in the 40 minutes. Interestingly that's a 9:24.7 average pace. Based on my recent 1-mile race result and using the McMillan calculator the high (slow) end of my recovery run pace should be 9:25. Nice. A month and a half ago or so I did this same run and ended up around 6.0 mph for a 135 HR. Good progress then.
Today I did my first hill workout. I used a 150 meter hill that is 80 meters up, 40 meters flat, and 30 meters up. The up parts are pretty steep. To get back to the bottom it's about 0.3 mile that goes flat for something less then 0.1 mile, down for something less then 0.1 mile, and gradually down for the rest. So the whole loop is about 0.4 mile. I did 4 loops of flat-footed high-knees on the steep sections of the hill with recovery jogging on the loop. Along with warm up and cool down recovery pace jogging. By the top of each of the 80-meter initial sections the knees weren't so high. Same with the top of the 30-meter section after a brief respite on the 40-meter flat. So it seemed about right for the first time out.
The plan for the next few weeks is to do 2 hill sessions a week like this...
High knees both days
High knees one day / Hill bounding one day
Hill bounding both days
Hill bonding one day / Hill springing one day
Hill springing both days
Then a recovery week leading into a hilly 5k.
After that it's 8 weeks or so an anaerobic period. For the first 4 weeks I'll do a progression run and a tempo run, for the second 4 weeks I'll do a long interval workout every 6th day. This will lead into a 5k on January 1st and the an indoor mile or 1500m on January 7th and then end with a 10-mile trail "race" on January 9th.
And then 2 weeks off.
At least that's the plan.
Monday morning I did what has become my standard long run for the last month: 2 miles mostly somewhat down then a bit somewhat up, 0.65 mile hill with one down section and one flat section but mostly steeply up, 0.6 mile gradually down, 0.65 down, 0.6 flat back to start of hill, then the initial 2 miles back. That's 6.5 total. I can cut the hill loop down a bit and fashion this into 7 or 7.5, etc. Eventually doing 2 complete hill loops for 9 total.
Tuesday I did a 40-minute recovery run on the treadmill. 1% elevation. Started at 5.0 mph and increased 0.1 mph every minute until my HR was at 135. That took 20 minutes so I was then at 7.0. Held that for 5 minutes. At that point HR was up to 139 so went down to 6.9. Held that for the remaining 15 minutes. HR went back to 135 for most but up to 137 for the final few minutes.
Covered 4.25 miles in the 40 minutes. Interestingly that's a 9:24.7 average pace. Based on my recent 1-mile race result and using the McMillan calculator the high (slow) end of my recovery run pace should be 9:25. Nice. A month and a half ago or so I did this same run and ended up around 6.0 mph for a 135 HR. Good progress then.
Today I did my first hill workout. I used a 150 meter hill that is 80 meters up, 40 meters flat, and 30 meters up. The up parts are pretty steep. To get back to the bottom it's about 0.3 mile that goes flat for something less then 0.1 mile, down for something less then 0.1 mile, and gradually down for the rest. So the whole loop is about 0.4 mile. I did 4 loops of flat-footed high-knees on the steep sections of the hill with recovery jogging on the loop. Along with warm up and cool down recovery pace jogging. By the top of each of the 80-meter initial sections the knees weren't so high. Same with the top of the 30-meter section after a brief respite on the 40-meter flat. So it seemed about right for the first time out.
The plan for the next few weeks is to do 2 hill sessions a week like this...
High knees both days
High knees one day / Hill bounding one day
Hill bounding both days
Hill bonding one day / Hill springing one day
Hill springing both days
Then a recovery week leading into a hilly 5k.
After that it's 8 weeks or so an anaerobic period. For the first 4 weeks I'll do a progression run and a tempo run, for the second 4 weeks I'll do a long interval workout every 6th day. This will lead into a 5k on January 1st and the an indoor mile or 1500m on January 7th and then end with a 10-mile trail "race" on January 9th.
And then 2 weeks off.
At least that's the plan.
September Re-Cap
Finished up my aerobic base period in September with weeks of
28.5
25.75
29
22.75
The 1st week started with a Labor Day 5k and the 3rd week ended with the 5th Avenue Mile. Yes, you shouldn't be racing during aerobic base building but it was fun.
That's also more than 100 for 4-weeks which is a first.
Next up: hill work. We'll see how that goes.
28.5
25.75
29
22.75
The 1st week started with a Labor Day 5k and the 3rd week ended with the 5th Avenue Mile. Yes, you shouldn't be racing during aerobic base building but it was fun.
That's also more than 100 for 4-weeks which is a first.
Next up: hill work. We'll see how that goes.
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