Rain, rain come and stay

If I could choose the weather for Saturday's race it would be just like today's: cold and dry. Unfortunately the extended forecast is indicating wet conditions for Saturday with rain storms likely. The good news is that the day's predicted low (usually the morning temperature) is below 50. So at least it should be cool.

People have told me that they hate running in the rain. I actually think it's fun (within limits) and preferable to oppressive heat and humidity. The last time I ran in rainy conditions I made the mistake of wearing a light waterproof jacket that did a good job of keeping the rain off me but also trapped heat and moisture which made me very uncomfortable. No matter what, I will not be wearing rain gear during Saturday's run.

This morning I concluded my training for the 5K with 21 minutes on the elliptical using moderate resistance. My intention was to keep a relatively fast pace without straining. While I did build up a sweat by the end, I considered today to be a light workout. My leg pain is still present but dissipating and I wanted to minimize impact but also work on flexibility.

I think I accomplished my mission and by taking a rest day tomorrow I should be set for Saturday's 8:00 AM start. So what if it rains that day? It may give me a competitive advantage against my hydrophobic rivals.

Turbulence about running shoes

I've been paying attention to running shoes lately because I know I need to replace my current pair. Despite my attempt to preserve my Nikes by substituting the insoles I've learned (thanks to some helpful advice via the Runner's World Loop) how to assess a shoe's true condition. I've moved past the denial stage and have gone back to my original insoles. Although the Turbulence 13's felt great with the replacement insoles (after I cut them to fit) the difference in heel height made me worry about the possible effect on my knees since I'm a mid/front foot striker. I'm hoping that I can get one more great run out of these shoes at Saturday's race.

With the original insoles intact I did what should be my last run before the 5K. I started at a moderate speed because I still have some upper leg tightness and wanted to warm up before stepping up my pace. I increased the treadmill speed every minute until I reached my target. Overall I covered 2 miles at 8:41, a pace I attained by running the last few minutes at about an 8:00/mile.

I've decided to go somewhat high end for my next pair of running shoes. Adventure Girl and others have advised me to look for shoes at running stores because those places carry better performing shoes than retailers like Foot Locker. My wife found some very good shoes at a Foot Locker as did I with my original Nike purchase. AG also told me that sometimes higher priced shoes cost more because of non-functional design elements. I don't care what my shoes look like but if I can get 5 seconds per mile faster on them I'm happy to pay.

This weeks's Sedentary Man

This week Sedentary Man writes about inefficiencies related to the way dogs drink water and the way humans hit golf balls. SM only has a solution for the latter. Read it here...

Not exactly heart insole

I was really hoping to publish today's post with the headline "Heart insole, I fell in love with you" after running with a replacement pair of insoles for my Nikes. I've been concerned that my shoes have accumulated too much mileage and that has contributed to the leg pain I've experienced over the last six weeks. The shoes still look pretty good so I don't know how to ascertain their true condition. Since the insoles, which take direct impact with every step, are easily replaced, I did just that.

The insoles I bought are Spenco Poli-Sorbs that retail for about $20. They come in size groupings so you can cut the extra material for a custom fit. I didn't do that and I suspect that's part of the reason I was disappointed.

Though I wear a 10 1/2 shoe and these insoles fit up to size 11's I was able to fit them into the shoes fine. The shape of the replacements are different than the originals but they're close. When I put them on they felt good, the extra padding at the heel was welcomed. There was slightly more material at the top but it didn't seem like it would get in the way when I ran.

I had a hard run covering 2 miles at about 8:52 per mile this morning. It was extremely hot and I suffered a bit until getting an energy boost at around 1.5 miles. The shoes felt okay as I ran but my upper leg pain was noticeable. Unlike when I ran with the other insoles, the pain persisted even after I'd warmed up. After I'd finished I noticed that the extra material had put enough pressure on the top of my foot to cause some slight abrasion and blistering. I can take care of that by trimming the insole but the real problem was that my leg hurt a lot after my run. I ended up wrapping a compression brace around my upper leg and that helped quell the soreness.

Now I'm wondering whether I'm better off cutting the insoles for a perfect fit and trying another run or just reverting back to the old insoles and hoping for the best. The race on Saturday is only 5K so it's not like I need to prepare for an arduous distance. The other choice is to run in my NB trail shoes. That's starting to sound like an interesting idea.

Running shoe anxiety

I have 5 days until my next race and I'm beginning to worry about my shoes. I mentioned yesterday that I've had some issues with my feet that seem to relate to my Nikes. This morning I switched to my New Balance trail shoes for the elliptical and they were much more comfortable. I really don't want to race with trail shoes on pavement but I also don't want to continue pushing my luck with the Turbulence 13's.

I have a busy schedule at work this week so it will not be that easy to get to a store at lunch to look at new running shoes. I want to avoid buying a pair in haste without considering other options just because of Saturday's race deadline. I have been reading reviews and talking to friends and I'm thinking this is the time to invest in a higher end pair. AG told me about a few stores in the city that have treadmills so staff can watch you as you run and help recommend the best shoe choices for your running style. If I'm looking to pay a lot for a pair of running shoes I don't want to buy the wrong thing and be disappointed.

I've looked at the removable soles in my Nikes and, while they look okay, I have no idea how much cushioning and flexibility they've lost in the eight months that I've had them. I'm thinking about trying a pair of cushioned replacement soles to get me through the race on Saturday. If they do the job, great. If not I'll be paying a visit to a running store on Sunday.

Not so Long Slow Distance

I must have slept through spring because summer is here on Long Island. Actually the temperatures are very summer-like but happily the air is still spring dry. I'm a cold weather person and a morning runner but yesterday was busy and I wasn't able to get out until 5:00 PM when the thermometer read 84 degrees. I ran late afternoon on Friday so this was similar in terms of timing. However, our Central Park run was much cooler.

I made the mistake of not properly wrapping my small toes prior to the Friday run. This is a technique I started over a decade ago when I lived in the city. Those days it wouldn't be unusual for us to walk from Battery Park to the Upper West Side, across town and then home to Murray Hill, all in one day. I used to get tremendous blisters from this and discovered that wrapping a small piece of plastic wrap around my first and second toe would ward off most of the damage. I'm beginning to suffer from this problem with my Nike Turbulence 13's and it's making me think that they're due for replacement after over 400 miles of excellent service. By yesterday morning my feet were hurting pretty good and although I wrapped them for Saturday's and today's runs they are a little raw. Tomorrow I'm planning to elliptical which has far less impact on my feet and I'm hoping they bounce back quickly.

My running over the past three days has been a mixed bag. I thought Friday was a very good run although the numbers don't reflect that. Yesterday's afternoon run was about the same distance (3.2 miles) with a pace just under 9 minutes. This morning, with only 15 hours separating me from yesterday's workout, I took the LSD approach (you can argue whether 3 miles should be considered "long") and my pace reflected it, closer to 9:20. But let me tell you it was hot and, in terms of conditioning, a real workout.

Overall, I covered close to 10 miles between 5:00 PM Friday and 9:00 AM Sunday. The weather reports are encouraging, predicting closer to 60's than 80's for next weekend. I'm pleased that I was able to manage some taxing runs late in the day with some heat and I'm happy that I'm only covering 5K and not 4 miles at Saturday's race. I'm excited about this race because I know more about what to expect. After all, you only experience your second race once!

Product review - MixMyGranola

After putting it to the test, the Emerging Runner Advisory Board has reviewed MixMyGranola, a website that allows customers to custom blend their granola mixes. MixMyGranola can be described as Web 2.0 for food. Consumer generated content on the web that you can eat. Interesting yes, but is it a good experience? I took it to the Emerging Running Advisory Board to see what they thought about this product. The raters were me, Sedentary Man and Adventure Girl and our rating criteria were based on quality, taste, freshness and value. You can read the full review here on the Emerging Runner Laboratories product review page.

I'm looking to do a couple of training runs this weekend. Last night AG and I had a great run in Central Park after work covering about 3.25 miles. The weather was perfect and there were a lot of people in the park. We hit traffic at spots, between the pedicabs and roving bands of clueless walkers who obstructed the running paths, we had to slow down and even stop for a second at a few points in our run. But we kept a good overall pace and we both felt it it was a great workout. I'm a week away from my next race so I hope to make some progress on speed today and tomorrow.

Hot weather, cool advice

This weekend is supposed to be very warm and temperatures are expected to reach the 80's. I'm hoping that nature will come to its senses for the following weekend so I won't need to deal with those conditions for my race. Of course, with an 8:00 AM start, there's a chance it will still be comfortable for running.

One of my friends, CK, is an accomplished runner who has given me great advice and encouragement since I started running again last September. After I'd debriefed him on my 4 mile race he gave me the following advice for training for the 5K:

1. Stay on the road as much as possible (if not all the time) when training for this next race.


2. Start your runs faster than normal, but slow down after two or three minutes to a comfortable pace.


3. Push hard the last ½ mile (or 4.5 minutes) during training to acclimate yourself to race conditions.


4. Consciously push/kick off hard during the last part of the run (last minute or so).


5. Try to incorporate some hills.


6. Stretch before and after (especially if you are doing hills).

Some of this differs from other guidance I've received. For example, in item #2, he advocates a fast start leading to a comfortable pace. I've usually assumed the opposite; start slow and build speed as you go. A couple of months ago I started a run at a much faster than normal pace. After about a quarter of a mile I felt spent and feared that I would not be able to make my planned distance. I did recover and it turned out to be one of the longest runs I've done to date. I'll try that technique this weekend and see how I do.

Also related to training, my dad sent me a link to an interesting article that ran in the NY Times this week about using a trainer as a way to improve speed. The article states that "..training, if done right, is the ultimate performance enhancer..."

This afternoon I'm participating in an end of the work week run in Central Park. It will be warm by then so I'm hoping for the best.

State of my weight

I weighed in today for the first time in weeks. I'd assumed I stabilized but the scale showed I've lost almost three pounds since last month. I've been disappointed with a number of technologies that I've used for quantifying status and/or performance (inaccurate HRMs, failed displays, etc.) and I've discovered that my digital scale falls into that category. I've learned not to trust the first result but instead step off it and allow the scale to reset before stepping on again. Most of the time the first result will under count and I sometimes repeat my weighing 4 or 5 times before I'm confident that it's returning a consistent number.

After all that weighing I determined that I've actually lost about a pound since the last time I measured. I'm really fine with that although I don't want to go much lower since I've already been through a round of suit tailoring and clothes buying. I've reduced my weight significantly since September (when I took up running again) and I can roughly correlate my weight reduction to pace time improvements. I'm not interested in losing any more weight simply to improve my speed so the next wave of performance will have to come from strength and speed training.

This morning I did a 20 minute workout on the elliptical using one of the built-in training programs that simulates big hills. It was tough at times but, unlike running uphill, I was able to use the arms of the machine to help my progress. I mapped the upcoming 5K on MapMyRun and it doesn't seem to have elevations like my last race. All the same I figure that hill work can be helpful for endurance and leg strength.

Training as the clock runs down

It's less than 10 days to my next race so I'm pushing as much as I can to prepare. I had a shorter window to run this morning so I tried to make the best of it. I've declared a goal of running my upcoming 5K under 26 minutes and since I don't have very long to prepare for that I'm focusing every workout on a specific aspect of the race.

Today I focused on speed - not tempo level speeds - but I tried to maintain a faster pace than I normally achieve during my weekday workouts. I only had 18 minutes to run this morning and I needed to build in a few minutes for cool down so I ended up running 15:22 for 1.79 miles for an overall pace of 8:35. It wasn't as hard to do this as I thought it might be. My first 5 minutes were actually a little slow, closer to a 9 minute pace, but I ran the last mile around 7.4 MPH. I'll admit that running fast for less than two miles on a flat surface is not the same as running a 5K under road conditions, but I think I can build on that.

Tomorrow I plan to follow the hill climb program on my elliptical. I don't know how the grades will be on the 5K course but I don't want to find myself struggling on hills like I did last Sunday. This weekend I'm thinking about a long street run on Saturday, perhaps expanding to neighborhood #3 for the first time and attacking those hills. On Sunday I'd like to go to Stillwell Woods and run the trails to take advantage the softer, more challenging surface.

AG said that Lululemon is sponsoring another group run in Central Park on Tuesday so that may be a good opportunity for a post-weekend long run before May 2nd.

Goals for my 5K

Today was Day 1 for training for my 5K run on May 2nd. The 2nd is a Saturday and the start time is 8:00 AM so I only have one more weekend to focus on long runs. I haven't seen an elevation map of the race course so I don't know what I'm up against in terms of hills. I'm glad for the early race start because I suspect it will be warm. From what I see on the website map it will be mostly open roads with little shade.

My pace goal for the race is 8:39 per mile. It is definitely a stretch for me as I rarely beat 8:45, even on shorter runs. The reason I picked this target relates to one of my 2009 running goals: to maintain that pace for at least 3 miles. If I get a good start and the course is fairly flat I do think I have a chance at a sub 8:40 time. Like I said, 8:39 is a stretch. My other goal is completely ego driven: to pass more runners than I get passed. I'll start the count after a couple of minutes to let the 5, 6 and 7 minute speedsters get by. In truth, I mostly care about those who pass me near the end, a mile or less before the finish.

I ran a couple of miles at 8:48 this morning. It was a relatively hard run considering I'd taken Monday as a rest day. The warm weather is already noticeable and I remained concerned about running in real heat this summer. Later this week I plan to do some speed drills on the treadmill and do some high resistance workouts on the elliptical for hill training.

I also realized I have no races scheduled after the 5K. I need to do something about that!

Lessons from my first race

I indulged myself this morning by skipping exercise. It's not that racing 4 miles yesterday really required me to rest today. I considered going on the elliptical but then I decided to create separation between my first race and my second: the LI Marathon 5K on May 2nd.

Tomorrow I will start my training for that event and while the distance is shorter I am not assuming the race will be easier. Despite reading articles, posts and comments online and hearing first hand from friends who race, I didn't fully understand the experience until it happened. Here's what I learned:

#

1. There's a lot of positive energy on race day. Everyone is competing but mostly with themselves.

2. You need to ask a lot of questions: "How do you attach your bib number?" "Where are the bathrooms?" "Where do we line up for the start?"

3. No matter how cold it is at the start, it's worth dressing lightly because you're going to get very hot very quickly.

4. It's really hard to drink water from a paper cup while running. It's also hard to grab a paper cup from a table while running.

5. Hill training is not an optional technique if you plan to compete.

6. Familiarity with the course is more helpful than just knowing distance in terms of gaging progress.

7. It's amazing to see people who you'd never guess could even run around the block pass you, quickly.

8. The toughest 100 feet are those leading to the finish line.

9. The cheering, fatigue, heat and crowd at the end is very disorienting. I forgot to stop my Garmin so it continued to record long after I had finished the race.

10. You may get very hot during the race but you'll cool off fast. Put on more layers as soon as possible.

Those are the things that I remember the most. I'm sure, after my next race, that I'll have a few more to list.