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Friday’s Run

After a rescheduled off-day on Thursday (Friday is my normal off-day) due to my day-trip to Ft. Lauderdale, Friday was a 6-miler at “easy” pace. I met Brian and Nathan at Bellevue United Methodist Church parking lot and we went down Sawyer Brown to Hwy 70, did two laps around the vacant Bellevue Center Mall, and then headed back up Sawyer Brown to close out the run. It was a pleasant run in cooler temps and a steady rain. I didn’t keep track of our splits, but overall it was a little faster than most of our recent “easy” paced runs.

Saturday’s Run

Yesterday was my first “tempo” run of the Hansons Advanced Plan. The objective was to complete 6-miles at goal marathon pace (7:26). Thankfully Brian joined me for this workout at the Edwin Warner Park picnic area, and we caught a great break in the weather. It was 55° with relatively mild humidity.

After a 2.75-mile warmup, with 3 stride outs, we ran all 6 “tempo” miles out-and-back on the Harpeth River Greenway without breaks. As has been the trend recently, my Garmin could not keep up so it was hard to tell if we were on pace or not. According to Brian’s watch, we averaged 7:30 pace for the 6 miles, and I actually felt really, really good. I was fairly nervous heading into this run, but my legs were relatively strong all the way through. Our pace was a few seconds slow, but considering this was the first “tempo” run, and I felt great, I’ll take it. With a 1.2-mile cool down, we got in just under 10 total miles for the day.

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Tuesday’s Run

Yesterday was a scheduled 8-miler at “easy” pace. I met Brian and Nathan at the Edwin Warner Nature Center for a run in the park and on the Harpeth River Greenway. My legs were very tired, but overall the run went ok. I do wish that I could push the pace a little faster, but at this point I’m happy simply be getting in all the scheduled miles. This is especially true considering the heavy humidity. Here’s a breakdown of our splits:

Today’s Run

Since I have a day-trip to Ft. Lauderdale tomorrow for a speaking engagement, I needed to move a few things on my schedule around this week. This meant that I got to do a solo track workout this morning at the Hading Academy track. Even though I despise doing track work by myself, this workout actually went really well.

I did the week 2 “speed” workout prescribed in the Hansons Advanced Training Plan. This was 8 x 600m with 400m recovery in-between each interval. This equates to 3-miles of intervals and 2-miles of recovery. Based on my goal marathon time of 3:15, the target splits for this workout are 2:26. While, this is the goal, the Hanson brothers really emphasize not exceeding your target pace, and even make their athletes do sets of push-ups for every second they exceed their goal.

I met Brian and Nathan this morning in the parking lot of the Bellevue United Methodist Church building for a 6-mile loop that incorporated the Harpeth River Greenway. We were met with temps in the mid 60s and a steady rain.

A run in the rain this morning was a welcome change from the soupy heat and humidity of the past two weeks. While it was obviously still humid, the rain was refreshing. My legs were very tired, but again they felt better than the same day last week, which is a positive. I can tell that my body is slowly adapting to the workload, but I still have a LONG way to go.

The last two days of my running were better than last week, but they were still tough with the soupy humidity!! My legs are feeling stronger, and the gears don’t seem to be grinding as much at the beginning of my runs.

On Saturday morning I met Brian in Percy Warner park for a hilly run through Percy and Edwin Warner. Even though both of us were wearing Garmins, for various reasons we lost track of how far we had gone so we just had to estimate when we reached the planned 6-miles. After getting back to the house I used mapmyrun.com and calculated our route to be 5.85-miles, which was a touch short. However, it was an enjoyable effort with Brian. My legs were very tired, but I thoroughly enjoyed the conversation during the run.

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I got in almost 33 years of practice doing “off-days” before I became a “runner” in 2007, so this “off-day” was a piece of cake.

Ooooo…I like cake! Especially with chocolate icing.

Wait….where was I….Oh yeah, today was an “off-day” from running, and it was good to get a break after 6-straight-days of scheduled runs, and a tough workout last night. My legs actually feel really good today. I remember last Friday that I was extremely sore after a hard track workout the night before. Today I’ve got a little soreness in my right hip-flexors, but otherwise am feeling better than I expected. Hope this holds true on my scheduled 6-miler tomorrow.

Today marked my 6th consecutive day to get in a training run, and I can’t remember the last time that has happened. I’m guessing it has been well over a year, if not much longer. Many of these runs have been fairly crummy (Sat, Sun, & Mon specifically), but tonight’s “speed” workout was BY FAR the best I’ve felt during those 6-days.

I met my normal track group tonight at Vanderbilt, but instead of joining their workout I did the week 1 “speed” workout prescribed in the Hansons Advanced Training Plan. This was 12 x 400m with 400m recovery in-between each interval. This equates to 3-miles of intervals and 3-miles of recovery. Based on my goal marathon time of 3:15, the target splits for this workout are 1:38. While, this is the goal, the Hanson brothers really emphasize not exceeding your target pace, and even make their athletes do sets of push-ups for every second they exceed their goal.

After a miserable run on Monday, yesterday’s run was significantly better. I’ve come to grips with the fact that I simply cannot hit the target paces from then Hansons plan when the humidity is at 95%. It’s funny that in the weeks leading up to the start of my scheduled training, when I was practicing the different pace ranges, that I was having trouble with being too fast! Of course, many of those mornings were in 50s or 60s with 60% humidity. It makes a BIG difference.

Anyway, I met Nathan and Brian at 5:00am on the Harpeth River Greenway for an easy-paced 8-miler. My legs felt better than Monday, and overall the run was much better too. We kept the pace very chill for the first 5-miles before picking it up a-bit for the last 3 (probably ran a bit too hard for the final 400m on the last one):

One of the core principles of the Hansons Marathon Training Plan is “Cumulative Fatigue,” which essentially means that you are always running on tired legs until the week of your race. Well, it has only taken 6 runs for “Cumulative Fatigue” to take over! Today I had NOTHING!

This morning I met Nathan and Brian at 5:30am for a jaunt on our old “Nature Center Loop” starting in Edwin Warner Park. I knew right away that my legs were dead, and they just seemed to get worse the longer we went.

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The last two days of my running week were tough!! My legs felt dead and sore, and I just didn’t have it. Add to this that the humidity was at 90% with temps in the 70s for both Saturday and Sunday’s run.

On Saturday morning I met my running group in Belle Meade, but my friend John and I ended up breaking off and doing our own thing. We did a 7-mile loop that consisted of the Richland Creek Greenway and various streets near the Sylvan Park community in West Nashville.

I knew from the start that the run would be a struggle, and I’m grateful to John for pulling me through when I was struggling. The route had quite a bit of elevation gain, especially in the first 4-miles, but I still hit my goal “easy” pace with an 8:57 average per mile.

Today was a scheduled off-day from running and, as usual for my off-days, I ROCKED IT!

Just Kidding

It was nice to have the day to recover from the hard track workout last night. My legs are fairly sore, and it will be interesting to see how they feel on my run tomorrow

Tonight was my first track workout in over a month, and it was good to be back running with the Jim Spivey Running Club (JSRC). I intentionally shifted the Hansons Advanced Marathon training plan a bit so that the “speed” workouts would fall on Thursday instead of Tuesday. This way I can continue to run with the JSRC during the “speed” phase of the plan.

Thick humidity has descended on Middle Tennessee with a vengeance this week, and tonight was tough with temps around 85º. I know it is only going to get worse, but my body struggling to get acclimated right now.

It’s been quite a while since I’ve logged 20-miles after the first three days of a running week, and my legs are REALLY feeling it! This is especially true considering that today’s 6.4-miler had almost 1,000′ of elevation gain in the first 3.2 miles. I met Dawn, Mary, Marc, and Nathan at the main gates of Percy Warner Park at 5:15am, and then ran an out-and-back to the top of “3-mile-hill.” I did this same run last week in order to get in some practice with uphill and downhill running, which will clearly be needed in St. George

While climbing “3-mile-hill” (see peak below), my legs were SCREAMING, and had Nathan not been right beside me, I very likely would have stopped and walked.

Today’s plan was for 8-miles at “easy” pace, and I was joined by my friend Brian on the Harpeth River Greenway at 5:30am. The humidity was again pretty dense (there was even a low-lying fog), and temps were slightly higher than yesterday.

We started off by the driving range on Old Harding, and ran 3.25-miles out and back on the greenway. Our pace was very chill, but I still nailed the high-end of my “easy” range on every split but the first one. It is already obvious to me than many of the goal pace ranges in the Hansons Plan will have to be modified as the heat and humidity continue to rise in Middle Tennessee.

While this is technically the first week of my training plan for the St. George Marathon, the first scheduled run doesn’t happen until Saturday. However, I’m hoping to get in some good mileage leading up to the weekend.

Last Week:

After getting off to a good start last Tuesday & Wednesday, I turned into a lazy bum the remainder of the week. The only real positive is that I got in 4 solid days of cross training activities, including 2 upper body workouts, 2 leg workouts, and 2 abdominal workouts.

I also mapped out my weekly cross training schedule for St George training…

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My goal is to get in 15 to 20 minutes of cross training each day until race week. Now that training has officially begun, there can be no more lazy days off from running or cross training!!

This looks daunting when written down, but below is my tentative training plan (click to enlarge) for the 2014 St.George Marathon. It is based on the Hansons Advanced Marathon Training Plan:

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It’s gonna take a LOT of discipline the make it through this schedule, especially considering I’m having a hard time finding running partners these days. The total weekly mileage peaks in the mid-60s, but the longest single run is only 16-miles (that’s right….NO 20-milers).

I shifted the Hansons plan a bit so I could end up with my Speed / Strength workout on Thursday and my tempo runs on Saturday. My plan right now is to do the speed workouts at the Vanderbilt track with the JSRC track group. I won’t be able to do the same workouts as everyone else, but at least it will give me access to a track. When it comes to the strength workouts I plan to do these on local greenways.

By far my two biggest concerns are consistently doing 6-days of running each week AND the tempo runs at goal marathon pace. Those are gonna hurt!

Beast Mode…ON!

Just found out about an hour ago that I was selected in the lottery for the 2014 St George Marathon! So excited to be participating in this race. Definitely one of my bucket-list marathons and a chance for redemption after dealing with multiple injuries over the past 18+ months. It is also the perfect race to celebrate my 40th Birthday! Can’t wait!!!

Now, I’ve got to work-out travel arrangement and my training plan. On training, my goal is simple….3 hours 15 minutes. I’ve broken it once before, but this time it will be for a BQ. Everything I do in training will be aimed squarely at this target. I also know that to get there I have to avoid injury, which has been a problem for the last year and a half.

I mentioned in my post yesterday that I hoped to get back on the road today after taking last week off. I got in a solid 6.25-mile easy run on the Harpeth River Greenway. It was pretty warm and humid, but overall my legs felt fantastic. If I decide to go with the Hansons Marathon Training Plan, my easy-run target pace will be between 8:26 and 9:26 per mile. Today I averaged 8:40 pace, which is right in-line.

Beast Mode….ON!!!!

Well…tomorrow is the day I find out whether or not I made it into the 2014 St George Marathon. Feeling a little nervous, because I REALLY want to do this race to celebrate my 40th birthday and return to marathoning. If I don’t get in, then I hope to quickly select an alternate race. Either way I plan on mapping out my training plan ASAP, and am strongly considering doing the Hanson’s Advanced Plan. More on that later if I choose to go this direction, still in the middle of reading the Hansons Marathon Method book.

After the 500 Festival Mini Marathon last Saturday, I took an unplanned week off from running this week. Just felt tired and decided to take a week to recover. My plan is to get back on the road tomorrow. I did a new core workout yesterday morning, and my obliques are more sore today than I ever remember before. This is definitely a problem area for me, so hoping this new routine will help out there.

Beast Mode….ON!