Wonderland Lake run

It's a beautiful day, and this morning I went out for an easy run on the trails behind my house in North Boulder. The Wonderland Lake Loop is one of my old standbies. Head south on the Foothills Trail, take the loop around the lake, and come back. It's all on well-maintained dirt trails, and it's relatively flat by Boulder standards.

I brought a camera today and stopped often for photographs. Here's a nice view of Green Mountain, Bear Peak, and the Flatirons.

P-daddy-dawg hanging out while his two baby p-dawgs play an engaging game of patty cakes behind him.

Wonderland Lake.

Mt. Sanitas from the lake.

There were tons of paragliders out today. I think they were part of a beginner's class.

Run summary: 4.0 miles in 36:19 (9:05 per mile).

Tomorrow is the big day!

Taper Week Update

It's been a pretty easy week for me. I ran a shorter long run on Sunday, and I've done some easier track workouts in the days since. Here's a quick summary of my most recent runs:

Sunday: Easy long run on the creek path. Total: 9.1 miles in 1:17:02 (8:27 pace).

Tuesday: 4x400 at 10k goal pace (around 96 seconds). This was an easy workout meant to keep the legs moving and solidify my goal pace. I ended up running these in 93.5, 94.2, 94.7, and 95.6 seconds. Although I got slower between the first and last intervals, this was a deliberate effort to hone in on the proper pace. Total for the day: 4.3 miles in 33:08 (average pace 7:42).

Wednesday: 4.1 miles easy, with 5x100m strides. Total time 32:55 (8:01 pace).

Friday (today): 8x100 at a quick pace. I thought I would run these in about 20 seconds, but my slowest turned out to be 18.8 seconds, and the fastest was 16.9. They felt pretty good, but that's the fastest running I've done all year. Hopefully it won't hurt my taper! Total for the day: 4.2 miles in 39:28 (average pace 9:23, although that counts some non-running time between reps).

Weekly total: 21.7 miles

Interesting thing spotted on the run

On Tuesday I saw a couple guys on the tennis court playing a new sport, a "mash-up" of soccer and tennis. It was played with a soccer ball and no hands (just like soccer). One guy would serve by dropping the ball and then kicking it over the net. The other guy had to kick it back before it bounced twice, which usually meant catching it with his feet and dribbling the ball (is that the right term?) a few times before kicking it back. They were keeping score and everything. Pretty cool!

Weekend plans

Saturday I'll be helping my friend Mark celebrate his 40th birthday. Like most Boulderites who've reached that distinctive age, you'd never know it. Earlier in the day, I'm hoping to borrow a friend's kayak and take a few runs on Boulder Creek. I'm planning to sign up for the Ultimate Mountain Challenge at the Teva Mountain Games in Vail. It's coming up next weekend and I really should do some paddling (and mountain biking, and road biking) before this 4-stage race. Sunday I'll go for an easy 3-4 mile run and probably check out the Boulder Creek Festival a little bit. And Monday...well, that's the Bolder Boulder, of course (the whole focus of this blog)!

How to taper for a 10k

With just over a week to go before racing the Bolder Boulder, it's time to taper. But how, specifically, should I do it? It seems like every running guru and coach has a different idea. I poked around the net to see what I could find.

I found an article by Pete Pfitzinger on copacabanarunners.net about tapering. It answered some key questions.

The first question about tapering should be, does it work? The answer, according to Pfitzinger and numerous studies, is a definite yes. Tapering can result in a 2-8% performance improvement, with 3% being about typical. For someone who runs a 10k in 40 minutes, that would mean over a minute improvement. Sounds pretty good to me!

Regarding the length of the ideal taper, Pfitzinger goes on to recommend a 7-10 day taper for 5k and 10k races. That's right at the point I'm at now.

The big question about tapering (and the only one I've seen significant disagreement about...see below) is whether you should taper volume or intensity, or both. Pfitzinger says, "The scientific evidence clearly indicates that the key to effective tapering is to substantially cut back your mileage, but to maintain the intensity of your training." He recommends cutting back to 50% of normal mileage for the week leading up to a goal 10k race.

Bob Cooper from Runner's World agrees, and goes a step further by offering specific workouts for a taper in the following:

Tapering isn't just for marathoners. In fact, one recent study showed a huge performance benefit when subjects tapered for a 5K. Here's how to taper for four road-racing distances:

5K:

Cut your normal mileage in half the week before your race, but maintain some intensity. Early in the week, run 4 x 400 meters at your 5K goal pace with a 200-meter jog between repeats. Later in the week, jog 2 miles, then run 6 or 8 x 100-meter strides at 90 percent of maximum speed. Run easy the other days. 10K:

Same as 5K taper, except run your 400-meter repeats at your 10K goal pace.

On the other hand, Coach Tinman from therunzone.com recommends just the opposite.

"distance runners should avoid tapering weekly mileage and, instead, reduce the amount of fast running they do so that their legs feel fresher."

In this thread, Tinman claims that the vast majority of runners do not need to taper much at all. To prove his point, Tinman discusses a hypothetical runner who cuts his mileage to a third of his normal volume for two weeks before a goal 5k race. Tinman says that this taper would not be effective because the runner would lose aerobic endurance.

I'm not convinced that Tinman is correct. First of all, Tinman's example runner is not tapering as anyone (as far as I know) would recommend. Pfitzinger and Cooper would say to cut mileage by only 20% two weeks before the race, and 50% in the final week. Tinman's runner cut mileage by a whopping 67% for both weeks, dropping from 65 miles per week to 25. Second, Tinman says the runner would lose aerobic endurance, but doesn't offer any scientific explanation or cite any relevant studies that show this to be correct.

After my brief and decidedly non-comprehensive review of tapering strategies on the net, I'm going with Pfitzinger's and Cooper's approach. I will run 4x400 in 96 seconds per lap on Tuesday, then run 8x100 quick on Thursday, with a few easy days of running thrown in. Instead of cutting my mileage in half, however, I'll probably just drop to around 20 miles (1/3 less than usual). That's because I'm a relatively low mileage runner, so it seems to make sense that I shouldn't cut volume quite so drastically.

Today's run

I had a nice, easy 9-miler today on the creek path. Instead of sky-high temperatures as I expected, there was a nice cloud cover that kept things reasonable. I ran around 8.5 minute miles and felt decent, but not super. Tomorrow I'll go for a swim instead of running.

Last quality workout

Today I finished my last real quality workout before next week's taper. But first I'll give a breakdown of yesterday's run...

Thursday's Workout

This was meant to be a threshold interval workout. As a recap, I've been doing two different types of threshold, or tempo, runs. The first is a standard 20-minute run at T-pace. I did one of these last Thursday, when I ran a 5k at the track. These tempo runs can be a bit demanding, so Daniels recommends alternating with something he calls "Cruise Intervals," also known as threshold intervals.

The idea is that you run repeats of 1000 meters, 1200 meters, or miles at T-pace, with 1-2 minutes rest between each workbout. That way you get the same amount of running (or even more) at the proper pace, but without as much stress as a steady 20-minute run would cause. This makes threshold intervals a good choice when approaching the final taper week before a goal race, as I'm doing at the moment.

Now to decide on the proper T-pace. This week's 5k result actually bumps me up to the next level on the VDOT scale, which puts me at 51. However, I want to be just a little bit conservative, so instead of using the training paces associated with a 51 VDOT, I'm picking paces somewhere between 50 and 51.

What exactly does this mean? Well, after looking it up in the VDOT Training Paces table, T-pace for those VDOT values would be 4:11 to 4:15 for a 1000 meter Cruise Interval. I find myself consulting the VDOT tables constantly these days! But they do seem to work...

To get to the actual run, I settled on 4 x 1000 on 4:11-4:15 with 2-minutes recovery.

Here were my results:

Distance	Time	Mile pace
1000	4:12.2	6:46
1000	4:13.4	6:48
1000	4:12.2	6:46
1000	4:10.5	6:43

I felt ok, but not great. My legs may have been recovering from Tuesday's race, and felt a little stiff. Also, it was a bit hot at the track. All in all, a successful workout nonetheless.

Today's workout

Today I essentially repeated last Friday's workout that I did with Clint and John. Unfortunately, we didn't get organized ahead of time, so I found myself alone at the track during my lunch hour.

This was another mix workout. I wanted to decrease the volume slightly from last week, since I'm about to start my taper. Last week I had done the following:

• 3x1200 in 5:04 (T-pace)
• 2x1200 in 4:41 (I-pace)
• 4x200 in 0:42 (R-pace)

Today I was shooting for this:

• 2x1000 in 4:11 - 4:15 (T-pace)
• 2x1000 in 3:51 - 3:55 (I-pace)
• 4x200 in 0:42 (R-pace)

I would take 2 minutes rest between the easier 1000s, 3 minutes between the harder 1000s, and around 2 minutes between each 200-meter rep. You may notice that my I-pace has gotten slightly faster as well. Last week I was running 1200s in 4:41, which is equivalent to 3:55 per 1000. This week I dropped it to somewhere between 3:51 and 3:55, to go along with my new VDOT. Rep pace stayed the same.

Here were my results:

Distance	Type	Time	Mile pace
1000	Tempo	4:10.9	6:44
1000	Tempo	4:09.8	6:42
1000	VO2 Max	3:52.1	6:14
1000	VO2 Max	3:48.5	6:08
200	Rep	39.7	5:20
200	Rep	41.5	5:34
200	Rep	41.1	5:31
200	Rep	41.2	5:32

I ran each rep a little on the fast side, but for the most part I felt pretty good. Even though it was even hotter than yesterday, I felt better. My last 1000 in 3:48.5 felt pretty fast (i.e., hard), though!

Running the South Switzerland Trail

Sunday's long run was something a little different -- the South Switzerland Trail, off Sugarloaf Road. It's a dirt road that climbs gradually from 8400 feet to 9000 feet over 5.5 miles. That was perfect for a nice 11-mile out-and-back run.

Since the trail winds along a high ridge, you have alternating views in all four directions. You can see Long's Peak (a 14'er) to the north, the snow-covered Continental Divide to the west and south, and occasional views of Boulder and Denver to the east. In short, the scenery is fantastic.

Luckily, I had a bike-riding photographer to keep me company.

In spite of the altitude, I felt great. I'd been running for thirty minutes before I even noticed. There were storm cells moving all over the place, but it wasn't windy and I never felt any rain. In fact, the sun broke through a few times on my return trip.

This is an excellent run, and I highly recommend it!

Today's summary: 11 miles in 1:37 (average pace 8:47).

A Daniels-style "Mix" Workout

What a beautiful day to be outside. That is, if you were outside at seven in the morning, like me. It's pretty hot out there now. 82 degrees (28 C, for those who prefer), and it's only mid-May!

I ran with Clint and John again this morning. Since I normally run alone, I tend to forget how much fun it is to run with friends. We met at the Fairview High School track, my first time there. It's one of the nicest tracks I've ever seen, judging by the views alone. The Flatirons are right there.

I think the views may have distracted me, as I kept relaxing my pace on the first three tempo intervals. Today's workout was a mix of Tempo, VO2 Max, and Rep paces. The plan was:

• 3x1200 in 5:04 (T-pace)
• 2x1200 in 4:41 (I-pace)
• 4x200 in 0:42 (R-pace)

Here's how we did:

Distance	Type	Time	Mile pace
1200	Tempo	5:06.1	6:51
1200	Tempo	5:05.4	6:50
1200	Tempo	5:07.3	6:52
1200	VO2 Max	4:46.6	6:24
1200	VO2 Max	4:40.7	6:17
200	Rep	40.0	5:22
200	Rep	40.0	5:22
200	Rep	40.8	5:28
200	Rep	40.8	5:28

Actually, those were my times. Clint was way off the front, as he should be. John hung back with me for most of them, just to be social, I suspected. But then on the third 200 he took off like a shot and ran past Clint like he was standing still, finishing in 29 seconds. Clint was ready for him on the last one, and when John made his move, Clint matched his pace and then accelerated, beating John to the line. I was happy to watch all this unfold from 10 seconds back!

Today's totals: 7.3 miles in 1:10:23.

Why I still think I can do it

I'm obviously happy about Tuesday's race, but here's the deal. My 19:47 5k result predicts a 41-minute 10k. That's still a long ways away from a sub-40. Some would say a really long ways.

Why am I still optimistic? Good question. Here are my reasons (to steal from something I already posted on the Coolrunning forums):

• I wasn't tapered for Tuesday's race. I will be tapered at the Bolder Boulder.
• Temperatures will almost certainly be cooler (and thus faster) at the Bolder Boulder, which has a 7 AM start.
• I paced poorly at Tuesday's race. With better pacing I could hope to run a 19:30(?) on my current fitness.
• I still have almost three weeks before my goal race. By then, the workouts I'm doing right now will be transformed into better fitness. That's the idea, at least!
• I've always suspected the course from Tuesday's 5k is slow, due to the dirt/gravel surface. In 2005 I raced three times on this course, finishing in 21:15, 20:55, and 20:44. That would have predicted a 43-minute 10k, but in fact I ran 40:39 at the Bolder Boulder two weeks later. My 5k splits in the race were 20:19 and 20:20, both faster than any of my 5k races on the dirt course.

Instead of giving up after consulting various race predictors on the internet, I'm just gonna ignore them. After all, those charts don't run the race FOR you!

Today's Run

Another quality workout today. 5000 meters at tempo pace on the track (6:47 per mile). Funny, the schedule called for a 20-minute tempo run, so I was going to do 4800 meters. But why not just go an extra 200 for the full 5k, I thought? I came in at 21:03, running pretty even splits the whole way, and never feeling stressed. Nice. That beat my 5k result from last month, and this time I was running at tempo, not race pace. To be honest, conditions were much worse at the race in April, so it's probably not a good comparison.

I followed that by 4x200 at R-pace. My rep pace is supposed to be 42-43 seconds per 200. Somehow I have trouble hitting that. I'm always afraid I'll be too slow, so I keep the pace high and come in too fast. I finished the 200s at 40.0, 41.1, 41.0, and 41.1. At least I stayed pretty consistent.

Today's totals: 7.2 miles in 1:02:47, including 5km at T-pace and 4x200 at R-pace.

Interesting thing -- on my way to the track, I found the creek path blocked off with police tape. They had shut down the entire high school due to suspected terrorist activities. It turns out a cafeteria worker had seen two guys dressed in camo and ski masks this morning, so police were being very cautious and checking things out thoroughly. I had to run way around to finally get to the track, and all the students got the day off of school, but so far it looks like that's the extent of the incident. Sign of the times, I guess.

Weekly Run Totals

I'm in Steamboat Springs this weekend for a wedding. After the 4-hour drive I decided to go for a short recovery run just to loosen up the legs a bit.

There's a nice path along the Yampa River that goes straight through town for five miles or so. I only had 25 minutes to run before getting ready for the wedding, but it's a nice area and I'd love to come back and run the whole path sometime.

Here is a summary of my running this week:

Sunday - 11.4 miles easy
Monday - off
Tuesday - 6.9 miles, including a 5k race in 20:11, plus warmup/cooldown
Wednesday - 6.8 miles, with 3x1600 at T-pace, plus 4x100 strides
Thursday - off
Friday - 6.7 miles, with 5x1000 in 3:55 with 3-min recoveries
Saturday - 2.7 miles at recovery pace
TOTAL - 34.5 miles

It was a good, hard week, and with today's run it's the most I've run in a week all year. In fact, it's the most I've run since my marathon a year ago. Also, my race on Tuesday was only 11 seconds off my all-time PR at the 5k distance. So far (knock on wood) I'm injury-free and feeling pretty good.

Signed up for the BB

Yesterday I finally registered for the Bolder Boulder and picked up my race packet. It included a shirt, calendar, race number, snack bag ticket, beer ticket, and (new this year) an IPICO Sports timing tag.

The timing tag is different from the Champion Chips we're all used to seeing at races these days. Ipico Sports claims it is, "more accurate, more reliable, less expensive and easier to use than other systems currently used to collect data during active sports events." It's certainly smaller. Instead of velcroing around your ankle, you use small zip-ties to attach it to your shoe. The Bolder Boulder has never used a timing chip system before, so it will be interesting to see how this works on 47,000 runners. It will be nice to have mile splits, which they will be providing, as well.

Another cool addition this year is the option to buy a so-called "technical" shirt instead of the usual cotton t-shirt. It was only a $10 upgrade, and the shirts are quite nice Pearl Izumi numbers, so I went for it. Props to my friend Bob at Pearl...you guys make great stuff!

The beer ticket is kind of funny, considering I'm usually picking up my beer around 7:45 in the morning. I always drink it, though. It's a BB tradition!

The official BB calendar, chock full of coupons to places like the Boulder Running Company, race dates, and training tips, already hangs on my wall.

Running

Enough about race packets. Here's how the running has been going the last few days...pretty darn well! On Wednesday I ran tempo intervals: 3x1600 at 6:51 mile pace with 200m jog recoveries, followed by 4x100m strides in about 20 seconds each. My legs felt a little fatigued after my race, but still capable.

Today I did another interval workout with my friends Clint and John. Clint has run a 37-minute 10k in a triathlon, and John has already run three marathons this year. I was just hoping they'd go easy on me. Actually, I was planning to do my own workout regardless, but in fact they both amiably ran with me, at my pace, the whole time. Pretty cool!

We did 5x1000 on 3:55 with 3-minute recoveries. I did nearly this same workout two years ago on May 24, only six days before the Bolder Boulder, but I used 1:30 recoveries, which made it tougher, of course. That day I came in at 3:53.5, 3:55.0, 3:56.3, 3:53.6, and 3:56.5. I remember struggling a bit towards the end.

Today, I had these results:

interval	time	mile pace
1	3:56.0	6:19
2	3:54.9	6:18
3	3:54.3	6:17
4	3:52.4	6:14
5	3:52.9	6:14

It was a successful workout, especially since I never felt particularly stressed. On the final 1000, John sprinted to the finish, then promptly emptied the contents of his stomach at the side of the track.

"It's not a proper track workout unless someone pukes," he said wryly.

Thanks, John, for taking one for the team!

Feeling poor today

I think yesterday's workout took a lot out of me. My legs have that dead feeling that every runner knows so well. I still needed to get out and do my Sunday long run, though.

I've been running 10 miles for my long runs the last four weeks (not counting the time I was in Costa Rica, when I completely skipped them). I want to increase that a little bit over the next couple of weeks, so today I ran a bit over 11 miles.

Again, I not-so-wisely chose the heat of the day, and again we had record high temperatures. I think it hit 84 degrees or more. I struggled through it, never trying to push the pace. Even so, my "easy" pace felt hard. Tomorrow I'll rest.

Today's run totals: 11.4 miles, 1:38:40 (average pace 8:39).

Getting faster

One good thing about interval workouts is that they can be easily compared. Sort of. If you do the exact same workout under exactly the same conditions, including weather, wind, and state of recovery, you can tell whether you're getting faster or not. Of course, you'll never repeat two workouts under the exact same conditions, but you can get close enough.

Today's interval workout was similar in some ways to workouts I've done before, but different enough that it's a little hard to compare. It had two phases: 1) a VO2 max interval phase, and 2) a Repetition phase. That's not counting my warmup and cooldown.

For the first phase, I decided to run 3 x 1000 meters with 3 minutes rest. This is a change from my previous 5 x 1000 with 1:30 rest. I switched to only 3 intervals because this was my 2nd interval session of the week, and Daniels recommends no more than 6% of total weekly mileage for this session. That would be 2.9 km, so I rounded up to 3000 meters. I also increased my recovery period based on Daniels recommendation that recoveries "should be equal to, or a little less than, the time spent performing the preceding workbout." I had a hard time running 3:55's on Tuesday with only 1:30 rest (in fact I couldn't do it), so I decided to see what I could do when following the recommendation.

How did it go?

Fantastic. I ran my 1000s in 3:52.9, 3:50.5, and 3:53.3. More importantly, I never felt stressed to my limits, as I did on Tuesday. I am sure I could have completed two more at that pace. I wasn't really trying to beat 3:55 by that much; I was just trying to maintain pace in a controlled way to the finish of each interval.

Following the VO2 max interval phase of the workout, Daniels recommended 4-6 x 200 at R-pace, which should be around 44 seconds for me (I'm still guessing that my VDOT is anywhere from 48-50 right now). These reps felt good as well, and I ran them a little fast at 41.4, 41.9, 42.0, and 41.3 seconds.

In spite of feeling great about today's workout, I got home and felt pretty trashed. In retrospect I think I accidentally allowed myself to get dehydrated in the record heat. It got to be around 80 degrees today, and I started my run in the heat of the day at 1:15 PM. Perhaps not too smart, but I told myself it would be good for heat acclimatization.

Tempo Session

After yesterday's tough interval session, I felt slightly concerned about tonight's workout, a 20-minute tempo run. I was looking for the elusive "comfortably hard" pace. I would warmup for 2.5 miles, run 3 miles at my tempo pace of about 6:55 per mile, and then cool down for another half mile. At least that was the idea. I thought about heading for the track again, but opted to just stick to the creek path. The miles are all marked on the path, and seem pretty accurate.

The weather had thankfully improved, and it was a near-perfect 52 degrees and sunny when I set out at 6:40 PM. The sun was sinking lower, but there were still plenty of people out enjoying the evening. Spring is in full gear here in Boulder. The creek is nearly overflowing its banks, the grass is green, and everywhere the trees are blooming in red, white, or pink blossums that smell wonderful.

I ran gradually uphill to the first bridge at Eben Fine Park (site of the 0.0 mile marker) and turned around. I picked up the pace steadily, trying to imagine the pace I could maintain for an hour and no longer. Pacing is a difficult art. I passed the first mile in 7:14, feeling fairly comfortable and breathing in a 3-3 pattern. I picked it up a bit more, shifting to a 2-2 breathing pattern and feeling the effort. Mile two passed in 6:44. I eased up slightly for the last mile, but this one was an out-and-back, with the last half uphill. I finished my last tempo mile in 7:02, for an average pace of exactly 7:00 per mile.

I was satisfied with the workout. It felt challenging, but not too bad.

Run summary: 6.1 miles in 47:21 (7:46 average pace).

Bonus! After the run, I got a free dinner (courtesy of work) at Laudisio, one of Boulder's top Italian restaurants. I had the scallops, and they were delicioso!

Back in Boulder

Costa Rica

I was asked if I was sad to be back from Costa Rica. Honestly, no. That's the beauty of living in Boulder. No matter how great your vacation was (and my trip to Costa Rica was fantastic), it's just impossible to be sad about coming back to Boulder. That's why I live here.

I only ran four out of the eight days I was gone, but I don't feel bad about it. I hiked, swam, biked, paddled, and even surfed a bit. And I took a few well-deserved siestas as well. I found the running to be quite difficult in the heat and humidity. Early morning would have been the best time to run, but I just couldn't get myself out of bed before six everyday. By seven o'clock it was already hot in the sun. I did most of my running in the evening after sunset, but it was still quite humid then.

I spent five days in Samara, on the Pacific coast. It's a lovely little beach town with all the amenities, but it still seems relatively unknown to American tourists. The locals certainly know about it, and it's a popular vacation spot for Costa Ricans, aka Ticos. The beach was perfect for running -- fine, compact sand that's neither too soft nor too hard. And it was long...I'm guessing over two miles from end to end. I was happy just running to both ends of the beach and back each day, which took a little over 40 minutes.

A couple obligatory beach photos...

Friday's track workout

Back in Boulder, I jumped right back into training. On Friday I hit the track for my first VO2 max interval workout, 5 x 1000 meters on 4:00 with 1:30 rest. I keep measuring myself against my performances from two years ago. On May 3, 2005, I did the exact same workout. On that day, I completed the first three intervals in 3:59.4, 4:00.4, and 3:58.1. But I started to die on the 4th interval, which took me 4:04.8, and I had to rest over three minutes before the last one, which I ran in 3:57.8. So, basically, I couldn't complete the workout.

On Friday, I ran the 1000-meter intervals in 3:57.2, 3:58.7, 3:58.5, 3:58.2, and 3:57.7. Only the last one felt hard. It's encouraging because I now have a good indicator that I'm in better shape than I was in 2005, the year I ran a 40:39 Bolder Boulder.

Sunday's long run

I took Saturday off from running (although I did do a mountain bike ride), and Sunday I repeated my 10-mile trail run from four weeks ago. This time I did it in reverse -- up the Beech trail, down Left Hand, around Sage, and back on Eagle. It's a great run with a few decent hills, and it's almost entirely on trails. Last time I ran it in 1:43 in muddy and windy conditions. This time it only took 1:29, although I did have to push a bit at the end to break an hour and a half. I felt good the whole time, like the miles were just ticking by under my feet with very little effort on my part (until the end, of course). It was another good confidence builder.

5k, take 2

Tomorrow I will run the Dash & Dine 5k again. I'm hoping for better conditions this time! I missed last week's race, but I heard conditions were better than two weeks ago, when I ran 21:08. I checked results from last week, and noticed that most runners who competed in the first two races of the series dropped over a minute in the second race. That means I might be close to a 20-minute 5k right now, which would be great. Even if this is true, I still realize it's a long way from a 20-minute 5k to a 40-minute 10k, but I'm working on it!

Hold on...I just checked the weather forecast for tomorrow.

RAIN, SNOW, WIND. HIGH 41 DEGREES. WINDS FROM THE NORTH AT 25-35 MPH, WITH GUSTS OVER 40 MPH.

Are you kidding me? This looks worse than last time! I should have checked the forecast before signing up. Oh well, I guess I'll just have to suck it up. It is kind of disheartening when you're running a race to judge your fitness, not your ability to endure horrible weather.

We'll see how it goes...

Tuneup Race Tomorrow

I dropped by the Boulder Running Company this morning to sign up for tomorrow evening's Dash & Dine 5k. I need a tuneup race to really judge my current fitness; plus, 5k races are great for developing VO2 max, a major component of 10k race performance.

The Dash & Dine races are a great local series at the Boulder Reservoir. They are held every Tuesday night, starting tomorrow, for six weeks, which makes them perfect preparation for the Bolder Boulder at the end of May. The course is an out-and-back on dirt, starting at Coot Lake and following the shore of the Boulder Reservoir. It's pretty flat, which should make it fast, but in my experience the dirt surface and the typical windy conditions usually slow the racers down quite a bit. For example, I did three of the Dash & Dine races in 2005 leading up to the Bolder Boulder. My best time was 20:44. That predicts a 10k of 42:50, but my actual BB finish was 40:39 that year. My 5k splits at the Bolder Boulder were 20:19 and 20:20, better than any of my Dash & Dine 5k results in the weeks leading up to the race.

Since I'm hoping to beat my 2005 Bolder Boulder time, naturally I looked at my 2005 Dash & Dine results to see where I should be at this time of year. Here are my three 5k times from 2005:

Date	Time
April 12, 2005	21:15
April 26, 2005	20:55
May 17, 2005	20:44

Looking at these dates and times, it becomes pretty clear that I need to beat 21:15 tomorrow night in order to have a reasonable chance of meeting my goal of a sub-40 10k at the Bolder Boulder. With that in mind, I'm going to try to run a sub-21 5k, which means 6:45 minutes per mile or better. I will, however, try to pace myself by perceived exertion, which will hopefully prevent me from going out too hard. I don't want to repeat my time trial experience from 8 days ago!

Today's run stats: 5 miles total, at an easy pace. 42:54 (8:34 average pace). I'm temporarily abandoning the training plan, because a) I need a rest week, b) I wanted to get in this tuneup race, and c) I'm leaving for Costa Rica in two days. Training will resume in earnest April 23, if not sooner.

Ryan Hall smashes American Half-Marathon Record

This isn't news to any bona fide running fans, but...

I happened to find a video of Ryan Hall winning the Houston Half-Marathon three months ago in an incredible 0:59:43. He took the American record at the distance, smashing the 21-year-old mark by over a minute. Hall is a young upstart and had never raced anything longer than 10 miles before. The video quality is horrible, but aside from that it's still cool to see him tick off mile after mile at an average pace of 4:33. At one point, he climbs a hill as if it isn't even there.

I'd be happy to run just one mile a full minute slower than the pace he maintained for 13 straight. This guy is a real talent. He is going for his marathon debut in London this month, racing against the world's best. I can't wait to see what happens!

The weather was not fit for man nor beast today, but I saw both on my run. It was 31 degrees, with a freezing drizzle. For some reason, I had no problem being motivated. After a day off, I feel nicely recovered, and decided to stick to my (shuffled) schedule for the week. Since I ran the 5k time trial on Sunday, I figured that could replace the "unstructured" interval workout I'd scheduled for today. I did my long run two days ago, so the only workout left for the week was a Ti (Threshold Interval) run.

Two weeks ago I did 3x1600 at 6:40 pace. However, that felt a bit hard. With my recent adjustments, my new T-pace is 6:55. I also decided to do only 2x1600 today, since I felt so tired this week, and 3x1600 does actually exceed Daniels' recommendation of no more than 8% of total mileage for threshold runs.

So, I simply went out and ran 3.5 miles at an easy pace, 2x1600 at my T-pace of 6:55, and 1.5 miles cool down. On the 1600s, I felt like I was working fairly hard, but still comfortable. I'd rate this as "high-end aerobic," which is about right. Despite the rain freezing on my glasses, I felt fine in my tights, long-sleeved shirt, fleece vest, and thin hat and gloves.

Today's run stats: 7 miles total, including 2 miles at threshold pace. 53:37 (7:40 average pace).

Coffee...It makes you poo

Sorry to be so crass, but it's the truth.

I stopped in at Vic's Coffee this morning to discuss next week's trip to Costa Rica with a couple of friends (yes, that's right -- I'm going for 8 days and I'm psyched about it!). We came up with a basic game plan that includes volcanoes, jungles, beaches, and surf. I had a nice big cup of Vic's trademark joe, and I must say it did wonders for my digestive system throughout the morning. As someone who started regularly drinking coffee just recently, this well-known effect is somewhat new to me.

Since I did a 5k time trial on Sunday instead of my long run, I decided to swap the week around and do my 10-mile long run today. I felt light and ready as I hit the path, and the first few miles felt easy and went by quickly. I was determined to just enjoy the run today. It was beautiful, sunny, and 55 degrees out. The birds were chirping, the trees were blooming, and half of Boulder was on the creek path enjoying it all.

Somewhere around mile 4 or 5, my legs started feeling more and more fatigued. My paced slowed, until I felt like I was creeping along. I made a game-day decision to skip my usual striders. My legs just didn't feel up to it. After my turn-around point at the top of Eben Fine Park, I slowly started to feel better. By the end of the run, I was back to my usual pace.

But, my legs are tired, there's no doubt about it. When I finished my run, I had a very strange sensation. Have you ever played that game where you stand in a doorway and push your arms up against the sides of the door frame for one minute, then step away? Your arms feel like they are holding themselves up, like they are floating. Well, when I stopped running and walked for a little, my legs felt like they were moving forward on their own. Weird!

Today's stats: 10 miles, 1:25:09, 8:30 pace.

By the way, looking at the elevation profile of today's run, I think I know why I felt good at the start, progressively worse in the middle, and better at the finish. See if you can guess...

Things spotted on the run:

• A clothesline full of clothes hanging to dry, complete with bike shorts and bike jerseys (that's Boulder for you)
• A mean-looking rottweiler back from a recent trip to the vet; it had a green full-leg cast decorated with delicate pink flowers
• A cat-sized wooden raft on the banks of Boulder Creek (I have no idea if it was built for cats, but it did remind me of the time my brothers and I put our cat on a raft and sent it down the creek, much to its dismay)

The training program

I'm going to be tweaking the program over the next few weeks. I'm taking a couple suggestions to heart, and thus I plan to a) gradually increase the length of my long runs, and b) take some rest weeks. The Costa Rica trip is going to be a rest week for me. I'll run some, but maybe only 15-20 miles. I think I can use the rest.

Back at it

No use worrying about Sunday's time trial. After a nice day off yesterday (well, I did swim), it was time for another Rep workout today.

After my usual 2.5 mile warmup on the Creek Path, I showed up at the BHS track. This place is becoming a regular hangout for me. I think I've doubled my overall lifetime number of track workouts in the last three weeks, or nearly so.

This was a repeat of my rep workout two weeks ago. I did 3x (2x200 + 1x400).

I did adjust my R-pace, based on a new VDOT of 48-49. That means 200s should be run at 44 seconds and 400s at 89-90 seconds. Here are my splits:

	1	2	3
200m	44.4	44.1	43.4
200m	44.4	43.5	39.8
400m	1:28.1	1:29.2	1:28.0

I guess I was pretty close to my target paces for each rep, although overall I did come in just a little fast on several. Actually the last 200 was a lot faster because I got carried away chasing down another guy at the track. Ha!

At just a couple seconds slower than my earlier rep pace, this still didn't feel that easy. On my last 400, I was slow at the 300m mark and had to really hoof it in to the finish. I'm feeling pretty good, though.

It always feels good after a workout.

Time Trial Meltdown!

Today I ran a 5k time trial at the track. I've been bothered by the nagging feeling that I'm training at the wrong paces. That's because I've been using a VDOT (and associated training paces) based on my best 10k performance from two years ago. Thus, I could really use a current, up-to-date measure of my fitness.

I warmed up with around 2 miles of easy running, plus a few 100-meter strides. The day was cool and sunny, but there were also some gusty winds to make conditions less than perfect. After lots of procrastination, I finally started my 12.5 laps of pain.

The plan was to break the run into twenty-five 200-meter segments. If I could average slightly under 48 seconds per 200, I'd break 20 minutes in the 5k. This would be a new personal record for me (my best was 20:00 from four years ago). Ideally, I would finish in 19:45 or slightly faster. This would justify my current VDOT estimate of 51, from which all my recent training paces have been based.

In order to get to 19:45, I planned to run the first 10 segments in 48 seconds each, and the final 15 in 47 seconds each. I figured that would prevent me from going out too fast, while also preventing me from losing too much time in the first half. It was also a plan based on one big assumption -- that I actually could run that fast right now.

The first laps started off well enough. The pace felt hard, and I admit it wasn't long before I began to wonder if I could hold it for 12.5 laps around the track. Still, I was hitting my splits right on the money. The first warning came at 1800 meters, when I was a full second off my 200m split target. I chalked that up to a lack of concentration, and ran the next kilometer in 3:59, just under pace. By this point, I could tell that just breaking 20 minutes would be enough of a challenge, not to mention 19:45.

Nearing the 3-kilometer mark, the effort to maintain pace suddenly shot up. My breathing went from a 2-2 pattern (breathe in for two steps, breathe out for two steps) to a 1-1 pattern, practically hyperventilating. I knew I was way over my lactate threshold, and I still had 2 km to go. I held out to the 3-km mark, but it was too fast. Seconds after that, I got the worst side stitch I've ever had. I was reduced to a painful walk for the next half lap, and then could only manage to jog it in to the finish. My total time was a disappointing 22:26.

Here are my splits:

Meters	Split	Goal Pace	200m Lap	1000m Lap
200	0:47.0	0:48	47.0
400	1:35.2	1:36	48.2
600	2:23.5	2:24	48.3
800	3:11.3	3:12	47.8
1000	3:59.6	4:00	48.3	3:59.6
1200	4:47.6	4:48	48.0
1400	5:36.1	5:36	48.5
1600	6:23.6	6:24	47.5
1800	7:12.7	7:12	49.1
2000	8:00.3	8:00	47.6	4:00.7
2200	8:48.2	8:48	47.9
2400	9:35.8	9:36	47.6
2600	10:23.6	10:24	47.8
2800	11:11.9	11:12	48.3
3000	12:02.2	12:00	50.3	4:01.9
3200	14:15.7	12:48	2:13.5
3400	15:17.5	13:36	1:01.8
3600	16:12.2	14:24	54.7
3800	17:06.6	15:12	54.4
4000	17:58.7	16:00	52.1	5:56.5
4200	18:51.5	16:48	52.8
4400	19:46.3	17:36	54.8
4600	20:38.0	18:24	51.7
4800	21:32.1	19:12	54.1
5000	22:26.1	20:00	54.0	4:27.5

As you can see, things started to break down at 3000 meters, and disintegrated immediately after.

What did I learn from this painful experience? The whole point of running this time trial was to assess my fitness, but I'm not even sure I did a good job of that. Trying to hit an arbitrary goal of sub-20 definitely hurt my chances of running my best 5k on this particular day. I was more worried about hitting every 200 on 48 seconds, and paying less attention to my perceived effort. The signs were all there (that this pace wasn't sustainable), but I ignored them. So, this wasn't a good test of my current best 5k ability.

I think the effort was a better test of my 3k ability, since I don't imagine I could have run a 3k much faster than today's time of 12:02. Plugging this into the VDOT calculator, I get a new VDOT of 48. That's quite a difference from the VDOT of 51 on which I've been basing all my recent training paces!

Should I use this VDOT from now on (at least until my next real race)? I've gotten some feedback on the CoolRunning boards saying if I can run 3-4 kilometers at 4-minutes per km on the track, solo, then I should be able to run sub-20 in a 5k race. I don't know. Perhaps they are right, but it sure didn't feel like I could have done it today, race or not.

For now, I think I'll just take my medicine and use the slower training paces designated by a 48 VDOT. That means my Easy/Long pace is now 8:31 mpm (it was 8:07 using a 51 VDOT). Threshold runs are now at 7:02 (instead of 6:44). 1000-meter intervals are at 4:03 (formerly 3:51), and 400-meter reps should now be run in 90 seconds instead of 86. I feel like I've been demoted, but in reality I have to admit that I'm just not in as good of shape as I thought.

The other, and perhaps most important, thing I learned was what it feels like to "blow up." I've never done that before, in a race or otherwise. Always when I'm approaching that feeling in a race, I've eased off a bit. That leaves me wondering if I could have pushed "just a little bit harder" and finished a little bit faster. Today I didn't back off the pace, because I was trying to hit my splits. I am going to try to remember exactly what this felt like, because I think it's a useful thing to know. After all, how will I know how hard I can push unless I've experienced pushing too hard in the past?

Well, now I have.

Should I throw out my training plan?

Since I feel like I'm kind of flying solo here, I wanted to get some feedback on my training plan. Is it realistic? Does it have enough easy running? Are the long runs long enough? Is it true to Daniels' philosophies of running? I was looking for a basic sanity check.

So I posted a link to my training plan on the CoolRunning.com forum asking for critiques. I got a few responses, but this one kind of shook me up.

I would change everything.

You ran 40:39 2 yrs ago on 15 miles per week. You are a very good runner.

Just doubling your mileage to 30 miles/week will create a load.

I would change to 13 on Sunday, 5 on Tuesday, 7 on Wednesday, and 5 on Friday.

Drop the intervals/repetitions for now.

Add 1 or 2 miles extra per week. Add it to your long run. When you reach 16, stay at 16, and re-direct the extra mile to your wednesday and friday. Never on Tuesday.

Tuesday should be reserved for hill repeats. 5 miles of it. Hill repeats. Slow and powerful up the hill. It's not a sprint, its not an anaerobic workout. Work the kick, straight leg push, ankles, high knees, arm swings. etc... Note: introduce hill repeats 7 weeks out.

5 weeks out, introduce aerobic Intervals (3:51 per 1000m) x 6 with 1 min. rest on fridays. Also do a few anaerobic intervals (meaning mile pace). Do a few short 400-meter intervals with a 400m jogging recovery. Make sure you continue on afterward to cover your remaining miles.

Every 4th week cut your mileage in two. No intervals, no hills. That is designated as your recovery week. This is where the super compensation takes place.

On Tuesdays, you can alternate between hills one week and a nice 85-90% vo2max run the next. Never go past 5 miles.

Now If I had your best 1-mile time right now or a 5k time, I could attach paces with each day of the week.

Well, this wasn't quite what I was expecting. I was thinking in terms of a tweak here or there, not "change everything!"

The newly-proposed plan actually looked solid, and the poster seemed to know what he was talking about. One thing that was missing was an actual critique of my plan, the very thing I had requested. If I was going to throw out my plan and use this one, I would need to be convinced of two things. First, I wanted to know how this plan was superior to mine. And second, I wanted a few details about the poster's credentials.

In the end, I didn't really get a response to either question. I did find out that the new plan was based on Arthur Lydiard's teachings. Lydiard was a legendary running coach. Far be it from me to question him! But then again, I based my plan on a book by another legendary running coach, Jack Daniels.

So it looks like it comes down to Lydiard vs. Daniels. Since I've read Daniels and haven't read Lydiard, I'm sticking with what I've got for now.

Today's Run

I ran 6 miles today, with three sessions of 2 minutes, 1 minute, and 30 seconds hard. Rests were 1 minute, 30 seconds, and 30 seconds, respectively. This is basically a repeat of last Saturday's run in the rain, but today I did one fewer session. I'm just slightly concerned about doing too much hard running.

Still, I felt pretty good. On my bike ride to work this morning, my legs felt amazingly good. That's not saying too much, because my morning commute is extremely easy, but it's something, at least.

Rep Workout #2

Today's run included my second Repetition workout. This one called for 6x400 at 86 seconds each. I knew this would be a little tougher than last week, because last week had a mix of both 200s and 400s, and the 400s felt significantly harder than the shorter reps!

After warming up for 2.5 miles on the Creek Path, I again found myself at the Boulder High School track. It's so convenient that I can do a track workout on my lunch break, without even hopping on my bike to get there.

The first rep felt ragged. I was pushing hard, but didn't feel smooth at all. I was surprised that my watch said 88.7 seconds, nearly two seconds off pace! And it wasn't for a lack of trying, either.

I jogged another 400 for recovery and then walked around a little, allowing my heart rate to settle back down, before starting the next rep after about 4 minutes total recovery. I ended up using this same recovery period after each rep. As I understand it, the point of repetition workouts is not to stress your VO2 max or your lactate threshold -- it's to improve leg speed and running economy at speed. Thus, full recoveries are necessary in order to insure that each rep can be completed in the same amount of time.

The second rep felt a little bit smoother, and I came in at 86.3 seconds. From there, the rest of my reps just kept feeling better and more in control. I posted the last four in 85.9, 85.7, 85.5, and 86.0 seconds. Actually, the last rep felt so good that I foolishly ran the first 100 in 18 seconds (it should have been 21.5). I consciously slowed it down, though, and finished the 400 right on pace. I jogged another 400 and turned for home. Total mileage for today: 7 miles.

I think next time, it would be worthwhile to pick up the pace a bit toward the end of my warmup. Going from my 8:10 warmup pace straight to my repetition pace of 5:46 minutes per mile is a bit harsh, I guess. Well, I'm learning!