Better, Faster, Stronger

There's a great article in June 2011's issue of Runner's World that begs the question: does form really matter?  You can find it in it's entirety here.

 Here are the biomechanics of elite runner Ryan Hall's run.  Can you say the same about yours?

"In slow motion he almost appears to bound.  He keeps his upper body still, leaning slightly forward, with his back straight, his arms half dropped, and his palms open.  He lands on his midfoot, not his heel.  Even at 300 frames per second it is hard to tell exactly when he touches down - it is a gradual, fluid motion.  At the same time, his opposite leg extends backward, drifting along behind his body until he pulls it forward and back into service."

The Ironman Is NOT a Cult?

Ironman St. George AKA Highway To Hell

Iron Ryan headed up to St. George last weekend to see if he could top his previous attempt at the challenging course of Southern Utah, trying to best his previous time of 13:50. 


On Saturday, Ryan exited the swim with an impressive 59:12, comparing the open water thrashing to "running the bulls in Spain, but in the water". He then rocked the bike portion of the race, shaving 40 minutes off his previous time, for a 6:30 bike split.  


I'll pick up his story at the beginning of 26.2...

Run:

I started the run with a good pace.  I felt pretty good for the first mile.  The two guys I was running with both said, “wow only 25 more to go” as we reached mile one.  The aid stations had cold water, ice cold sponges, misters, and some even had garden hoses spraying you off as you ran by.  

As the run began, you could start to feel the heat pounding down on your body.  At mile 3 you reach to the top of the mountain and are surrounded by red rocks and black asphalt with added temperature nearing 100, this was not your ideal running conditions.  My feet felt like they were melting.  As the run went on, the pain factor in the body went up.  My feet began to ache from the heat pounding on them.  I felt like someone was chasing me with a blow torch.  As I reached mile 4, I passed Mike as he was heading back down the hill.  I yelled at him and he yelled back.  It was nice to see him out on the course.  

As the day went on, the heat increased and my run slowed to a jog and then a shuffle and eventually a fast walk up some of the steepest parts of the run.  I did not feel bad about my speed walk because people walking were actually going as fast as those who were shuffling up the steep hills.  After one loop (13 miles) I knew the second loop was going to suck even more than the first.  I had never been at a point during a race where the heat sucked so much out me that even walking became difficult.  

I then thought: should I just stop now and save myself from the unknown that might occur during the second loop of the run.  I was spent.  I knew it and my body knew it even more.  Did I go too hard on the bike?  Am I drinking enough? Food?  All these thoughts kept entering my mind.  How was I ever going to make it 13 more miles?  

I looked at my watch and saw that it was around 5:30 PM.  I had been going for ten and a half hours.  I knew I could make the midnight cut off time even if I walked 2 miles an hour.  I was determined to finish at all costs.  I started my job up the road and at mile two I saw my wife, two kids and my mother-in-law.  They were cheering loudly and telling me I could do it.  I am glad they were on the opposite side of the course, because if they were any closer, I would have emotionally lost it.  I held back a few tears, gave them a fist pump in the air and told them to wait for me at the finish line..

After seeing my family, I entered the most difficult part of the run course.  It is about one mile long and is very steep.  I somehow made my way to the top and to the aid station.  I drank as much as I could, ate a few oranges and then began my shuffle down the fiery path.  The aid station I had just left was playing music and they had the song on “highway to hell”.  I thought that song was very fitting for the current situation that I found myself in.  I was now focusing on one foot in front of the other.  About a quarter mile past this aid station, I saw Mike again heading down the road.  I thought to myself, “if he feels anything like I do, then we should just go lie down and die together..” (I can put a little bit of blame on him for getting me into the mess I was in on top of the hill).  

As we got closer to each other I began to tear up and get emotional.  I could see the pain he was feeling by the look on his face.  It was kind of a relief to see his pain because I was feeling pain also.  At the top of the run loop, in the hot sun, I gave Mike a huge hug.  We were both crying as we stopped to embrace each other.  He told me “this is the hardest thing I have ever done and we are going to finish.”  With tears streaming down our faces, I somehow got the words out for him to just wait for me at the finish even if it was midnight, I would not give up.  He gave me a few encouraging words and we parted our ways.. He was down to his final 3-4 miles and I still had 10 more to go. 

That moment out there on the run course was a defining moment for me.  It made me really dig down deep, deeper than I had ever been before.  Thanks Mike, I needed that.  I continued on my journey, one mile after the next with people cheering us on at every aid station, telling us to keep going and not give up, knowing what we were suffering out there in the heat.  I made it to the turn around and knew I only had 6.5 miles to go.  The next three were up hill and every step tested my will power.  I made it to the top and started to see the light at the end.  One step at a time is what I kept telling myself.  I did not put myself through weeks and weeks or training to give up now. No way.  I was in it for the long haul.  

I made it to the final aid station and I stopped to get a drink.  I jokingly asked the girl who gave me the cup of water how I looked because I wanted to look good for the finish.  She laughed and gave me a sponge to wipe the salt away from my lips, eyes and ears.  One mile to go. I looked at my watched and saw that it was at 13:33… My time last year was 13:52.. I thought to myself that I just might get a PR after all the misery I felt out on the course. 

I then took off, nothing was going to stop me now. I ran the last mile at about a 9 min pace. I ran down the shoot and heard the famous words I had been dreaming about all day…”Ryan Stokes, a police officer from Mesa Arizona… YOU ARE AN IRONMAN!”  I had made it… 13:42,. A PR by ten minutes.  

After crossing the finish line, puking water all over some nice volunteer's feet, getting my medal and picture, I finally met up with Mike and my family. What a day, what a day. All I can say is that when someone turns the furnace on, it literally sucks every bit of juice out of me. It was the most difficult event I have ever done in my life, but I am glad I did it.

Can't wait to get back in the pool...

Ryan 

A Shot In The Arm

Sometimes it take a little somethin' somethin' to get me motivated to get out there and train.  I'm counting down to Ironman France and those long bikes are like bad dreams lurking in my future!  In my MIND I want to be pro runner Kara Goucher, who ran religiously up until the day she delivered her baby, then ran a marathon a few months later.

In MY REALITY, it takes a little retail therapy to get me up and at 'em in the AM.

So lucky me, wandering past the Garmin booth at the Boston Expo last week, I heard that all-to-familiar whisper from a tricky salesman,"For you, special price!" Answer me this: what girl can walk away from that?  *BTW they can spot me a mile away in Mexico.

I've owned my fair share of HR monitors.  I've used a Polar, then switched to the Garmin 305 and 405, and I find them invaluable for training.  I've had my eye on the 310XT for years now, but didn't want to fork over the cash since I had a perfectly usable 305 charging on my bathroom counter.

But, those discounted prices got my palms all sweaty and the debit card just sort of slipped out of my hands and fell right into the credit card machine.  And now the 310XT is mine!

Let me just tell you how cool this thing is:

1.  After you've set up the device, the minute you walk in from a workout and walk by your computer, the 310XT buzzes and starts downloading your new workout information directly to your computer.  No wires, it's like magic.

2.  You get all kinds of really useful information in the form of graphs, maps, mile splits.  It's so detailed and easy to read, like this:

And, you can upload all this information to Training Peaks.  Bonus.

3.  It's waterproof, which means you can swim with it and get accurate distance measurements for open water swims.  Sweet!

4.  If you have different bikes, you can set up each one under a different name, so you look back on your records and know which bike you were using on a particular day.

I know there is tons more this handy device has to offer.  I am still exploring and learning.  But I am a fan already.  And that might just get me through that next long bike.  

Karen's Journey

That's Karen on the right, the tiny runner with the turnover of a  turbine engine.

I didn't physically become a runner until I was 40 years old, but mentally I've been a runner since age 10. That's the year I made a personal goal to someday run the Boston Marathon.

I remember it as if it was yesterday. I was watching a made-for-TV movie about a woman from Boston who was going through a rough patch in her life. 

Joanne Woodward starred in the movie in 1977

She decided to regain control of it by training for and running the Boston Marathon. This was before one had to quality to enter. The story was inspiring for me and running the Boston Marathon was immediately added to my non-written bucket list.

Thirty years later, my friends in the neighborhood were talking about running the St. George Marathon. I was in! We trained, ran and I was hooked. What a rush! I had never felt so liberated. My old dream of Boston soared to the surface of my memory.

It took 5 more years and two more marathons to finally realize my dream, but there I was on April 18th, 2011 in Hopkinton, Mass. with 26,000 runners, among them my handsome husband of 25 year that week. I cried twice that day: Once as I crossed the start line when our friend Mike yelled, "Look around, you're running the Boston Marathon!" And again as a yellow and blue ribboned medal was placed around my neck. 

Boston Marathon: check.

This Is How It's Done

Here are some of my thoughts and opinions about running training and race day strategy.  I recognize that these are not original ideas.  With all the information out there, we all pick and choose what we think works best for us.  This is what I've adapted to over the last six years.
--Ben

My first endurance event was the Salt Lake City Marathon in 2005.  My time was 3:17, missing qualifying for Boston by 2 minutes.  After getting advice from many friends who were experienced runners and training hard, I feel like I had alot of room for improvement.  My next race was 6 months later in St. George.  I finished in 2:58.

I feel like my two best individual performances were at St. George in 2009 (2:37) and last week at the Boston Marathon (2:48).  Boston was my 18th marathon.  These are the factors that, for me, made for great experiences at these races:

Training.

This is the most important element.  No matter how great a race strategy you can come up with, it has to be based on the reality of how fast you can physically go.  A good training program will help you become faster and have greater endurance.  It will also reveal to you the reality of how fast you should try to go during the race.  It will help you make a realistic goal.

For recent races, I haven't followed anyone's specific training program.  I've made up my own, following a few principles, and then adapting to my schedule (family vacation, work and church meetings, scout campouts, etc..)

Going into training, I'm usually coming off a previous race 1-2 months earlier.  The training time is usually 2-3 months and I typically start with a good base and am running 30-40 miles a week.  So I may have a 6 week build up and a 3 week taper.  Here are the elements of my training:

A.  Long Run
Once per week, 20+ miles.  I'll do six of these over the building phase.  I believe the single most important thing I can do in training is build up to do a 28-30 miles run 3 weeks before the race.  This has to be much slower than race pace with several walk breaks.  For Boston, I did a 29 miler three weeks before the race and averaged 9min/mile (this included walking and stopping breaks, I probably averaged 8-8:30min/mile when running)

B.  Speed Work
The last couple of years I've gotten away from running around the track.  For Boston I did three 10 miles runs (once a week during the last month of training) where every other mile was hard (5:45-6min/mile)and the other miles slower (7:30).  About two weeks before the race, I do a 10K "race" from Recker/Thomas to the top of Las Sendas and back (6:10min/mile).  *This route is an out-and-back route with a gradual uphill in the first half. 

C.  Tempo Runs
The mid week 8-12 miles runs get progressively closer to marathon pace through the training period.  The most important time to really lock in on this is during the first two weeks of the taper (from three weeks to one week before the race).  For Boston, every run during those two weeks was at 6:30-7min/mile pace.  Most people will be able to go faster during the race than they can seem to go during this taper period.  For example, in a training run two weeks before the race, I struggled to average 6:50 pace for a 10 miles run (not fully tapered) but then averaged 6:24 for the actual race.  In summary, don't get discouraged.  You can probably go 20-30 sec/mile faster in the race compared to these tempo runs.

D.  Total Weekly Mileage
For most of training I'll run Mon, Tues, Thurs, Sat.  4 days/week.  The first 4 of six week build phase I'll do 8-12 miles Mon, Tues, Thurs and 20-24 on Sat.  During weeks 5 and 6 (peak) the schedule looks more like: Mon (10), Tues (15), Thurs (15), Sat (26-30) for a total weekly mileage of 65-70 miles.

E.  Train For The Terrain Of The Race
If it's going to be hilly, at least one run/week needs to be on hills.  For St. George, we spent alot of time in Las Sendas doing repeats up and down.  We'd drop water at the top and bottom during the summer.  For Boston training in cooler weather, long runs would start from our neighborhood up canal to Granite Reef Dam, up King Kong, through Hawes trails (great hills on trails), come out at top of Las Sendas, back to home.

F.  Rest Before The Race
If race is on Saturday, I'll run 5 miles on Monday (mile 1,3, and 5 at race pace), 3 miles on Tuesday (easy) and then rest my legs for three days (wed, thurs, fri).  I'll swim on wed and maybe thursday to get some exercise and prevent from going crazy.

G.  Weight/Diet
I believe some research I saw once that says for a marathon, every pound body weight is worth a minute.  Loose 5 pounds, go 5 min faster.  obviously there is a point where this becomes counter productive.  I know for me, my ideal race weight is 172-174.  After Ironman St. George last year I got up to 186.  So for two months before Boston this year I got really disciplined about eating healthy and slowly dropped down to 174 by race day.  


Typical breakfast:  protein shake (with rice milk, bannana, blueberries, large scoop of fage yogurt) a couple of scrambled eggs and a whole wheat bagle.  Lunch is leftovers from whatever we had the night before.  Dinner: Emily is awesome about cooking healthy foods.  I think the main way I really lean up for race day is eliminating restaurant food, sweets, carbonated beverages, late night cereal binges, and try to stop eating when I feel full.  It's also hard to stay disciplined all the way to the race, even when you are on "vacation" sometimes the day or two before the race.

H.  Shoes
Another study showed every ounce in your shoes is worth a minute in a marathon.  I'm a believer.  I've gone from 12-14 ounce shoes that I use to train and race to now using a 5.5 ounce race shoe (Nike Lunaracer) just for races (and during the last couple of weeks of training for tempo runs).

I.  Cross/Core training
I'm not great at this but I try to do a little.  For Boston, I did a 10 min workout 4-5 days/week right after running which included one set each of push ups, curls, military press, triceps press, and sit ups.  I did this for about 3-4 weeks.  I do try to do some basic stretches on my own before I run (hamstring, quad, calf) and in the evening before bed.  In a perfect world with more time, I'd swim 3-4 days/week.

How To Run A Perfect Boston Marathon

I asked my friend Ben to contribute to the ole' blog when his wife told me he felt he ran his perfect race last week in Boston.  Ben is a 2:37 marathoner, an ultra marathoner, a doctor, and father to five kids.  Here are his thoughts on Boston, along with his training plans and tips for successful racing -- but you'll have to stay tuned for those tomorrow.  For now, read on about how to finish Boston with pep in your step!


*  Side Note:  a 2:48 marathon = 6:25 mile pace.  


At Boston, I really tried to discipline myself to follow the recommendations you always hear for all races, but that everyone says especially apply to Boston.  That is, to not go out too fast and to back off until after the Newton Hills.  The "racing" doesn't start until mile 21.  


For me, I knew I could run the first half at 6min/mile pace.  I'd done it before at other races that are more forgiving at the end (St. George).  But I knew that when I ran Boston before, four years earlier (3:02), I totally faded at the end and didn't want that to happen again.  So my plan was to run 6:25 average pace over the first half which would put me at 1:25.  Then, I'd keep the same effort through the next 8 miles, which included 4-5 miles of the famed Newton Hills, culminating in Heartbreak Hill.  Finally, I'd see how I felt for the last 5 miles of downhill-flat, potentially fast terrain.  If I could come in under 2:50, that would be an awesome day.


Weather on race day was about as perfect as you could get.  Temps in the high 40s at the start, high 50s at the finish.  Nice consistent tailwind the entire way.  For this race, I decided to go without an MP3 player because I really wanted to get the full Boston experience, including all the sounds.  


It was interesting that over the first 6 miles, probably 500 runners slowly passed me.  My splits for those miles were: 6:20, 6:19, 6:19, 6:20, 6:30, and 6:24.  I felt I was right on pace and totally relaxed (maybe 80% of maximum effort).  During the next 10 miles, I felt like I kept a constant effort, but I noticed no one was passing me anymore.  Still feeling pretty good.  My splits for those miles were: 6:21, 6:31, 6:31, 6:31, 6:34, 6:28, 6:31, 6:30, 6:33, and 6:22.  


I think by the time we got to the hills I still had enough energy that I could move up them pretty quickly while still remaining pretty relaxed.  Splits for miles 17-21: 6:44, 6:46, 6:33, 6:44, and 6:51.  Then, the payoff for being disciplined in my pacing earlier in the race began.  As soon as we started going downhill and as soon as I allowed myself to start "racing" I realized I'd finish strong.  There was more in the tank than I realized.  I'm sure I passed 500 runners in the last 5 miles.  Splits for those miles were:  6:06, 5:52, 5:52, 5:59, 6:01, and 5:55 (last .2 miles).

The morning of the race I ate a waffle, oatmeal, banana, and chocolate milk (?700cal) 4 hours before the race.  I had more chocolate milk and a cliff bar and another banana 1 hour before the race.  I ate one powergel 10 minutes before the race.  I ate one powergel every 30 min for the first 1:30 of the race and then no other carbs until the finish.  I drank water at all aid stations.  No gatorade.  I didn't walk through any aid stations.  Kept my head wet and cool with water at each aid station.



Ben crossed the finish line at Boston in 2:48.  Nice work, compadre!