Tyler’s Training: Week of January 13, 2014

Weekly Summary –152 miles in 14 runs. Super solid week! A great track workout (10x mile at 4’58 at altitude) and a great ultra-marathon (28 mile) long run on Sunday. 12 weeks to the Boston Marathon! PS – stay tuned for a BIG announcement coming in the next week or two!!

Just another day at the office

Lunes, 13 Enero, 2014 – 11am: Slept super late. Probably about 13 hours. Very tired from yesterday. Ran VERY easy regeneration. Just jogging to get the legs moving. Mostly on grass around the park and then finished up to the market to get some groceries. Total run 10.5M in about 90’.

5pm: Another very easy run. Surprised to see I was running under 8’00 pace. Felt much better than the morning. Finished at the gym to do upper body. Total run 11.5M in 90’.

XT: Upper body. Pretty much same as last week.

Martes, 14 Enero, 2014 -9am: Felt pretty good this morning. Ran a bit longer and was surprised to see the pace was quicker ~72’ through 10M. Still running by feel. Ended up running just under 13M. Total run was 20km+, 12M++ in 1’28.

4pm: Another easy run around the park, mostly on grass. Felt good. Forced myself a bit slower with a workout tomorrow. Total run 10M+ in 76’.

XT: Hips.

Miercoles, 15 Enero, 2014 – 9am: Easy pre-workout shakeout. Felt fine. Very slow on grass. Total run 6km.

1pm: Workout Wednesday! Easy warm-up 5km around the park and then drills and strides. Workout was more intervals at 105-110% of MP (or around 3’00-3’10/km or 4’50-5’05/mile). Last week I did 15x1000m; this week the goal was 10x Mile. The rest was 400m jog in about 2’00-2’15.

This definitely felt a bit harder than last week, but I was super pleased with the result. All the reps were super consistent, though the effort certainly got heavier as I got into the second half. After rep 1 (5’00.3), all were under 5’00, with most around 4’58. Number 10 was 4’56.5 thanks to kicking in the last 150m or so, but that was about all I had.

Still, this was a super strong workout. It used to be very hard for me to run under 5’00 at this altitude and now I’m able run 10 in a row, which is pretty awesome. I think part of it is that having lived at altitude for almost 8 consecutive months at this point, I’m able to run at a higher level here relative to sea level. And I think part of it is just that I am getting quite fit.

Cooled down short and to the gym for legs.

Total run 18M+.

Splits

Avg: 4’58.5

6pm: Very easy shakeout around the park on grass. Good to shake out. Total run 5km, 3M++.

XT: Legs after intervals. Tough but felt strong today.

Jueves, 16 Enero, 2014 – 9am: Very easy run around the park. Good shakeout, very slow. Total run 10M+.

3pm: Ran early to finish and head to the airport to pick up Mariana. Another easy run but felt much better than the morning. Total run 10M+.

XT: Core.

Viernes, 17 Enero, 2014 -11am: Ran easy around the park with Mariana on bike. Felt very good and ran quicker. Stopped at the track and did drills and 8x long strides (~180m) on grass. Felt good running but a little tired still on strides. Still, good to move the legs a bit. Very hot today. Total run 11M+, 10M in 65’ or so.

5pm: Easy run solo around the park. Felt good, easier than the morning. Total run 9M+.

XT: Core.

Sabado, 18 Enero, 2014 – 10am: Easy run before heading down to Banos for long run tomorrow. Holding back for most. Let go a bit the last mile or two at around 4’/km. Felt good. Total run 9M+.

6pm: Took forever to get to banos. Ran when we got here with Mariana very slow and easy out/back on the road to Puyo. Felt good after a long bus ride. Good shakeout. Total run 5M, NT.

XT: Off.

Domingo, 19 Enero, 2014 – 3am: Woke up, had breakfast of bread, Nutella,1 large banana, 1 cup of black coffee, some animal crackers. Left at 6am. Jog very easy about 2km out to the road and then did some drills and strides.

Goal for today was to run 43-45km at 85-90% of marathon pace (about 3’37-3’48/km or 5’50-6’05/mile). The run would be on the rolling (net down) road from Banos to Puyo at an altitude of about 5,000 ft above sea level. I was lucky enough to have Mariana accompany me on the bike to provide moral support as well as Gatorade every 5km.

The idea was to kind of mimic the Boston course. Thus the run started with a long gradual downhill for about 5km and was then rolling for the remainder, with some big hills near the end.

The start felt fine and I was trying to just relax as much as possible for the first 10-20km. The pace didn’t feel fast and I was running right about 6’00 pace, but I knew if I was even just a bit too strained in these early stages, I would pay later. So, mostly, I tried to just enjoy the incredibly beautiful scenery and let the kilometers tick by.

One of the hardest things about these really long runs (and I imagine it will be similar in a marathon race) is how to mentally deal with the length. One way to do this that I’ve found useful before in long runs or workouts is to break the run up into more manageable feeling chunks or sections. In doing 10x 1 mile, I don’t think about how I’m 10% done after one rep; instead I try to break it up into sets of 3 in my mind.

In the same, I tried to think of each 5km as its own little piece to get through. I didn’t think of how many there were, just that at any point during the run I was some percentage of the way to the next 5km point (and some more fluid/carbohydrate). I tried not to think about how many little sections I had left – it can be intimidating to run 15km (9M+) and realize you still have almost 20 miles to go.

I had some stomach issues in the first half of the run as well – necessitating a brief stop around 12km, but managed to hold it together pretty well from there on. The pace still felt manageable and I often felt like I was reining myself in.

The first 5k was 18’38 and the second 19’02. The 3rd was faster after getting my stop out of the way (18’31). From then, it was very consistent all the way through the end. The terrain became much tougher that point on, but I managed to balance out the pace. The half marathon point was passed in about 1’19 and still felt pretty comfortable.

Around 15M (1’30’03 – 6’00/mile average), it started to get a bit tougher. This was a bit intimidating since I still had 13M to go, but I tried to just continue focusing on each 5k split. The effort became a bit more, but I was still running the same pace (18’48 from 25-30km). At 32km (20 miles) I was just under 2 hours (still right at 6’00/mile) and only had 10km to go to passing the marathon, which actually felt surprisingly manageable.

The last 15km was by far the toughest of the run, which was exacerbated by the fact that the terrain became much more challenging. The road was running along the side of a valley and so it was constantly going up and down the mountain side. 35-40km was the slowest 5k split with these hills (19’07), but I actually managed to speed up after that.

I passed the marathon mark in 2’38’58 and actually felt like I had enough to finish the run. I ran another 3km and finished passing 45km in 2’49’36 (18’50 last 5km, average 6’03/mile, 3’46/km).

A lot of positive things gained from this run. First, it’s great to have run the marathon distance (and then some). It makes it a lot less scary knowing that I can run the whole distance in training.

It’s also super valuable to be able to deal with a run this long mentally. Being able to finish strong even after not feeling great with the stomach in the first 15km is great because it reminds me that this is a very long distance/time and a lot of things can change in 2+ hours of running.

Finally, in terms of pacing, it’s crazy how easy the pace can feel at the beginning and how hard it can feel two and a half hours later. Especially with a downhill start, it’ll be super important to make sure that I’m totally in control and not straining at all for the first 10-15km. There’s so little margin for error in a run like this.

And, of course, I have to end with a huge thanks to Mariana who road all 28+ miles (even through the rain in the last 10km) with me on the bike (including a mildly traumatizing dog encounter around 20 miles) and provided amazing moral support (and Gatorade!) She also got some amazing photos/videos from the run, so I’ll try to have something put together from that in the coming week.

Total run 29M.

Splits:

PM: Off, sleeping.