Coming out of Ironman UK, I decided to concentrate on my running. I suppose I decided that I wanted to be a runner to some extent. That lead me to the track at Franklin Field where I started doing sprint sessions. Little did I know I would meet my arch rival (and friend) Renato. Little did I know, I would meet my coach there. A month or two later, my old Japan colleague Chris would convince me that I should run a marathon in Death Valley, California. Looking back on it now, everything just fell into place.

I already coached myself to running up to 21 miles when I signed on with my coach who is from EAST Michigan (not Michigan as I had written previously). But once I signed on the dotted line, I let him take over. Some of the changes he made were instead of me running 3 days with high mileage, I ran 4-5 days dispersed out. I guess this improves durability. It got to the point where I was running over 40 miles a week. No longer did I have to figure out my training plan for the following week; it came to my inbox every day.

I’ve never been to California, or Vegas for that matter (the airport I flew into).  It was three years ago when I last saw Chris but it was good to see him again. Chris brought along a friend by the name of Ali. Ali is an amazing cyclist/lawyer/soon to be Ironman Canada finisher based in Seattle.

Race Day

Before we arrived to Furnace Creek Ranch, we were notified that we were running the alternate course (mentioned in earlier post) due to the rainfall in the previous weeks. That meant instead of running up to 5000+ feet, we were going to do an out and back on pretty much a flat trail.

As we boarded the buses that would take us to the race course, it was cold and windy. People were putting on plastic trash bags to dampen the wind effect and I even put on my fleece. Any clothes we decided to shed we could drop them off at the aid stations which were located every 3 miles. After a power gel and some water, I stretched and prepared for my first stand-alone marathon.

Mile 1-6

Like any race, the first few miles always feel great. Now, going into this, I guess I should have had a game plan. I sort of had a game plan, but not really. I knew I wanted to go under 4 hours but how I was going to do that…I had no idea. You have to understand, I began my triathlon/running career just a few years back with the Miyako-Jima Strongman. At that time, I ran my first 10k in 1 hour 20 minutes. At that time, Chris was a seasoned athlete. I didn’t know how much I’d improved my run compared to Chris, but my goal was to keep him in my sight for as long as I could. From the start, I was able to keep him within 50 yards of me. It’s wasn’t difficult to spot his wirey 6 ft 8′ inch frame. I couldn’t tell though…was he taking it easy or running in a concentrated effort? All I know is that I was running 8:30-:845 miles and feeling good. But could I hold it?

This situation was all new to me. I felt I was holding back, but just not sure if I was holding back enough. I passed the first aid station without getting anything and just used my water bottle of Enervitene strapped around my waist. When I came to Mile 6, I stopped to ditch my fleece and ran with arm warmers as it was still pretty chilly. The only bad thing about stopping and taking off my fleece off was that I lost about 30 seconds which put Chris almost out of sight.The Death Valley Marathon also had a 30k option. I was surprised to see Ali jump ahead of both of us, but considering she was running the 30k, it made sense.

Mile 7-13.1

I’m trucking along pretty well, feeling good. I’m trying not to get too excited because I know this is going to be a long day. That’s the problem with long distance racing: “almost there” is so subjective. I’ve caught myself saying that a few times: I’m almost at the half way point, or I’m almost almost at the finish; this has gotten me into trouble a few times.  Mile 9 is the 30k turn around and head back (30k=18 miles). I was  expecting to see Ali running towards me around mile 7 or 8 since that is what she signed up for, however after awhile I wondering,  “Did she decide to just do the marathon”? As participant’s true pace started to show, one of the more interesting things I saw were people carrying backpacks, and carrying multiple Powerbars in a fuelbelt-like contraption! Dude, its’ a marathon, not Survivor. I actually thought of asking that fellow if I can take one of those off him.

Death Valley is what you expect it to be: pretty bleak. The trail is a mix of rocks and gravel which is hard to attain traction at times; I know I almost tripped a few times. Coming into the turnaround, the total elapsed time was 1 hour 53 minutes. Right before I got there, I saw Chris running towards me and he looked fresh, talking with some fellow runners, looking happy. Bastard.  I also saw Ali coming the opposite way a little further back meaning Chris had already passed here. Yep, she decided to do the marathon. She however, wasn’t talking with anyone.

Mile 13.1 – 21

Things got a little interesting at the half way point (as they always do). Ali looked steady, and as I started to catch up to her, I thought about patting her on the butt. We had joked before the race that if Chris or I passed her, we would pat her on the butt and make a joke. However, I didn’t know her that well and the thought of it just made me uncomfortable. After the aid station at mile 15  and passing Ali, I looked at my Garmin and noticed while I was running a 8:36 mile; my heart-rate was at a 165. I felt 165 was way too high. To not risk blowing up at mile 20, I decided to bring my pace down considerably. I’ve been asked, “Well, how did you feel at the moment?”  I felt good, but I wasn’t confident looking at my heart rate I could hold that for much longer.

Back when I was in college, I was on the crew team. My coach always talked about gaining strength from each other while doing erg pieces. He use to say when you are in perfect sync, things become easier, and there is a certain type of “thing” that goes on where you gather strength from one another. Well, I don’t know if that happened, but around mile 17, I started running with a gentleman in his 40’s. I’ll call him Jim. Jim an I ran together in sync for about 6 miles at a about a 9:20ish pace. We didn’t say a word to each other the entire time. It was quiet, we were hurting, but we just stayed in stride.

Mile 21-24

Jim and I were still together. Foot striking the dirt and gravel at the same time. I can hear him breathe, and he I. He would run ahead a little, keeping the pace true, and I’d catch up, and I’d do the same in return. We were two men on a mission. At mile 22-23, you can see the finish line in the distance as you are on top of a small peak before you go downhill and then uphill to the finish.  A little before the last aid station at mile 24, a women passed us and looked quite strong, but had to use to port-a-potty which was located at the same place as the aid station. As Jim and I arrived to the last aid station, the woman popped out of the port-a-potty and resumed running.  Jim and I, getting his last feed at the aid station looked at me and said,

“Go get her, no reason, to hold back for me.”

I was  hurting, but I felt I had an extra spurt left in the tank. I really thought I could negative split the rest of the last two miles and finish under four hours, but it would be close.

I gave Jim a nod and I went after her. It just so happened at this point the course started to go back uphill. My watch alarmed when I hit the 25 mile mark (as it does for every mile) and I started to walk. 173 my heart rate read. Looking at my watch, I knew it’d be really close to breaking 4 hours. I guess looking back on it I probably should have ran each mile a little faster. I stayed with her running from about a 9:20 mile with Jim, to running a 8 min mile. After 3/4th of a mile I fell apart. Trying to stay with the port-a-potty woman was equivalent to me running and all out sprint. I started to run again but then I just stopped. I crashed and burned. My hip-flexors were tight, my right shin was hurting, and the top of my left quad was burning.  With my hands on my knees, I looked up from the ground, looked at my watch (3:57), and started to walk.  The finish was in reasonable distance (yet still up hill) and I could start to  hear the people cheering at the finish line over the seering wind.

After crossing the finish line, I looked at my watch, it said 3:59:30. I was pretty happy with that, but I knew it wasn’t the real time. One thing I forgot to do before the race was to turn off the “auto stop/start” feature on my Garmin 305. This is a great feature when you are running in the city, and you have to stop at red lights and such. It lets you accurately judge your distance and time. But the clock doesn’t stop in a race. I can only guesstimate, but I’m assuming the watch stopped when I took of my fleece around mile 6 to give to the aid station volunteer, and when I stopped at aid stations. Overall, my time was 4:01:36. 5th in my age group. You gotta love small scale marathons.

Post race and Vegas

I got cold pretty quickly. I didn’t have the strength to put my running tights on but I did find my fleece. I brought my Rx4 recovery drink power and drank it rather quickly. I grabbed some bananas and got on the bus.

Later that night we had the awards ceremony. Chris finished at 3 hours 40 min (bastard!) and Ali came in at 4:15: Not too shabby for not hardly training for it. She was listed in the 30k time as 4:15, but had she registered for the marathon, she would have won her age group! I’m sure she’ll kick major booty in Ironman Canada in August.  I ended up having (lots of) beers with some folks from California. These were some serious runners and triathletes. I think we stayed in Furnace Creek Bar from about 7pm till 3! There’s no better recovery food than pub fare!

This was my first time in Vegas. Not sure what I expected but it’s a pretty cool city. Since the old saying goes “What happens in Vegas, stays in Vegas” I’ll leave it as so. But, I will say is that I saw Phantom of the Opera at the Venetian (a must see!!), and flew out down only $40 bucks!

Taper week is going well I guess. I’m doing my best not to eat as much as I usually do. I’m not going to run more than 15 miles this week. Just light Zone 1 (140 and below) stuff. Maybe a little biking and a short 1500 meter swim.  Stretching for sure! It’s hard to tell how you’re feeling when running in sub freezing temperatures.  I leave Thursday so tomorrow I need to run, pack, get my nutrition sorted out, swim?, and try to get to bed at a reasonable hour. I’ll probably cut out the swim.

I guess the only thing is to go out there and do your best and have a good time. The vacation couldn’t come at a better time where personal stuff, future uncertainty, and athletic goals are all starting to get confused. I like compartmentalizing if I can. A big part of me doesn’t even want to go out there as it’s just been one thing after another. Maybe it’s the weather, maybe it’s the city, but I just need a change of scene.

I feel something brewing…

It's not fun running in the cold

POWER TEST

If you read anything on cycling training, almost everyone is moving towards training with a power meter. Training with power is an objective measurement to how much work you are doing and how much stronger you are becoming. You can focus on training in different intensities that which are very black and white. This is much better than training predominately with heart rate as so much can affect how that measurement: caffeine, lack of sleep, diet, etc. The power test basically consists of you sitting on your bike, and going as hard as you can with the maximum amount of watts you can sustain over that time.  As I sat on my bike along the other 19 riders at my training center, I was a little intimidated as I didn’t know what number to shoot for. I went with the plan to go out at “about a 7″ intensity and negative split the last 4 minutes or so.  Overall, I put out a 232 watts per average average. Now here’s the interesting part: having this number  now allows me to figure out my power to weight ratio. Check out the following graph:

When I took the test, I weighed in WITH SHOES, which put me around 183 pounds. 183 pounds in kgs is 83 kgs.  232/83 = 2.79. Without shoes, I was 170 which would put me around a 2.83. So looking at the chart, I am a atop of the Cat. 5 racers…which isn’t that great. But this is good news! I can now objectively assess my progress and hope to climb the ladder in this chart. After the first few weeks of training, I have already loss 3 lbs, and my watts have been increasingly gotten higher and higher. In fact, when doing workouts, I’m consistently up in the 250 range. I think the p90x is helping as well.

VO2 Max Test (running)

To keep it short and simple, a “VO2 Max is a measure of how fit an athlete is: It expresses the volume of oxygen a body consumes per minute.” The test is an experience all in it’s own. I get the shop and I start warming up on the treadmill. I’m instructed that they will be putting a mask on my face to measure the carbon dioxide vs. something. I wasn’t really sure how much this was going to hurt, but all I could think about was the episode of the Cosby show were Cliff Huxtable is taking a health test and he’s fine in the beginning being all funny but by the time the treadmill really starts running fast he’s almost about collapse. One of the funniest episodes ever!! Check out the clip below.

I digress. The VO2 max is great because it sets your training zones so now I know what range my heart rate should be for endurance runs, tempo runs, sprints, etc.  The test hurt pretty bad. I started out going slow then he ramped up the speed over a few minutes to a 8:00/min mile pace. I was feeling pretty comfortable there. Then he started ramping up the incline. 3 percent, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8 percent. At around 8 percent incline I think my heart rate was about 175 (still going at an 8 min mile pace don’t forget). The sound of me breathing into the mask started to sound like Dark Vader almost. 8.5,9 percent…I can could see the computer screen in my peripheral vision showing my heart rate creep up: 178,179, 180. Finally he put it at 10% incline and told me that 10% was going to be the highest he would go but the longer I went, the better data they could obtain. I ended up tapping out at 184 beats per minute. My coach who was looking on told me I was starting to move all over the band and to try to concentrate on staying in the center. However, I think what made me stop was that I started to feel something rise out of stomach and I didn’t want to push it to where I vomited.

I didn’t know how much my effort was”good” or not, but I scored a 60.4 which ranks me in the “excellent” in fitness for my age group. Check out the following graph below. I guess it’s all relative. But it’s good to know what my potential is. I know already that it must be higher now as I’ve lost weight being on p90x. All in all, I’m enjoying the data collection and and science behind becoming a better and faster triathlete. I can’t wait for the next round of tests!

I am the owner of a 60.4 VO2 max

I like how they advertise it’s not a quick fix to being fit, and the host Tony Horton makes it clear it’s not a couch-to-fitness program. Looking at their website, participant’s results seem amazing. People have lost double digit body fat percentages, weight, and increased strength and flexibility…all the things I’ve been talking about. I think what appealed to me most is that I don’t have to think about what workout is coming next; I can just look at the p90x calender, and follow the program. Add this with my triathlon coaching that starts off  next week.

P90X - X is for Xtreme.

After day 1, I can totally feel the tightness in my muscles in my back and chest. I think doing all the pull-ups well definitely help with the swim. Today is plyometrics. I was thinking about substituting this for a swim, bike or run, but after some research, many runners who are doing p90x say this workout is invaluable as it works your weaknesses and makes you more of a explosive runner. So be it.

I’m concerned about all the workouts. During my winter break, it’s not a big deal. However, with my coaching beginning next week, marathon build up, it’ll be a little tough getting all the workouts in. Doesn’t look like there will much sleeping in come 2010. The p90x program tells you to take before and after pics at day 1,30,60, and 90. I did take my before photos, but due to lack of narcissism that I have, I’m not gonna post them online till the end.   Overall, I”m pretty excited with everything moving in the right direction

When it came to higher intensity workouts, the polar  foot-pod just wasn’t accurate. The main problem with Polar’s inertia based technology is  it calibrates based on  pace which you originally calibrate it. In other words, I walked around the track 4 times to calibrate it, but when I run with it, the accuracy is off because the stride difference between each step is so much larger (see River Run Race report). Add the fact that my heart rate strap stopped working, I just felt it was time for a change. Now, I don’t want to trash the company (not like my opinion matters anyway); the 625x lasted me 4 years without a problem. But being that I’m OCD on accuracy of distance and time, I felt the GPS unit was best. But which unit?

Polar 625x - Thanks for the memories

I had been researching the Garmin 305 forerunner for some time; listening to advice on various websites. I wasn’t sure if I’d go with the 310x or the 305 at first. The 310x is a machine in and of itself. You can even swim with it and track distances — while in the water (which is pretty darn cool). But do I really need all that? Triathletes in general are over compulsive in their gizmos and their data collection, but I’ve gotten to the point where I know what I want and what I need (see previous post on that too).

The main issue between the 310x and 305 was the battery life, and price. The 310x has a battery life of 20 hours or so. The 305 has a battery life of 10 hours. That’s not even enough to get you through an Ironman! At least not now yet. The 310x went for $369 while the 305 went for $150. Additionally, considering I will only be doing nothing longer than half IM this year, I felt that when I do get back to IM distance, I’ll have a Power Tap by that time; so I decided on the 305.  When I go get back to full IM racing, the strategy will be:  no watch on the swim, Power tap computer on the bike, and use the Garmin on the run. While I’d like to have an over all clock, I’m not really that worried about it.

Garmin 305 Forerunner - I think this is the start of a beautiful relationship

Yes, with the Polar, I never had to worry about battery life, but I think the trade off for proper distance recording, pacing, etc., is well worth it.

The outside of my shoes are the first to go

As I was planning on buying new shoes anyway, I thought the  timing was perfect. I decided upon a pair of the New Balance 758. What takes a little getting is use to is the lack of cushioning the New Balance has compared to the Kiyano. It also has taken some time to get over the effect of having a shoe designed to push you to the outside. After a week of running, I’m starting to feel myself pushing from the middle of my foot instead of the outside, which hopefully translates to a stronger plant to become a stronger runner.

Post Race Thumbs Up!

The time change has been difficult. Getting out of work at 5pm and running when it’s pitch black is kinda demoralizing. Perhaps the darkness is the reason I have been a little down lately too? Maybe it’s the combination of 25% school, 20% personal life, 30% work, and 15% weather. My motivation has been to put it at best: pathetic. I feel all these things draining my energy to the point where I stay up late to work out in the morning and too tired to workout in the evenings. It’s a vicious circle. Trying to break it.The purchase of the Mac helped and having my first Ipod was great, but I’ve been looking at my bike attached to the trainer every morning, and just say, “nope, not today”. However, I have learned that my bike attached to the trainer is useful as mock clothes dryer such as my wet towel after I take a shower.

November 22nd is the Philadelphia Marathon. I”m not running, but I will be volunteering at a water station all day. I think it’s important to volunteer in athletic events. It’s more of a “pay it forward” or “karma” kind of deal. Maybe that’s a little silly but volunteering at the Philly Triathlon last year really helped my race performance after seeing so many people make the same mistakes over and over again.  The weekend before the Philly Marathon, there is a last warm up race which is a good taper run in a competitive environment.

The only running I’ve been doing is on Wednesdays where I go to the track and do speed intervals with a local triathlon club. Before I went into the doldrums, I was running very often, sometimes twice a day, averaging 40 miles a week. Since I’ve been in this state, I haven’t ran, biked, swam, and no lifting. No nothing. So, I signed up for the race in hopes it would get my ass in gear…provide that spark. Sometimes we just need a push to get moving (unless you are my car). I had been averaging 6:50 minute 800 meter repetitions on Wednesdays and I really hoped that this depression I was in could be used as a taper for this race. My goal was to run it around a 7:45 minute mile and hope that it would feel easy.

Yep, that's me.

Now, unlike my other posts where I try to build up the race and tell you my time at the end, I’ll go ahead and mention now I finished the course in 1:08.21 and I finished 96th out of 260. However, I’m upset because during my race I was pacing myself based on my Polar 625x foot-pod that was telling me I was running 7:30-7:45 minute miles. The time I finished was about a 8.1 minute mile. My watch told me I ran a total of 9 miles, not 8.4…that’s not even close! After the race, I retired my Heart Rate Monitor.  Therefore, I’m now in the market for a new brand; I’ll probably go with a Garmin.

Overall the run felt great besides the last 200 meters when I tried to pick it up at the end (I absolutely have finishing kick) but the overall disappointment is that my training distances and intensity have been off.

I mentioned my new mac. I thought I’d play with the new imovie application… Yes, I took a camera with me to the race and recorded most of it. I thought it’d be fun. So instead of me going through and talking about the race course, which was rather uneventful…I figured it’d be better to watch.  Comments are always appreciated.

Ken

Morning runs...the road to nirvana?

I’ve been adding weight training on a more consistent basis and I can already feel the effects as it takes longer for me to fatigue, especially in my upper body.  However, I think what’s making me enjoy the morning runs so much is that it’s one of the times in my day where I am completely alone…especially on Sundays. In 12 miles of running, I MIGHT see 2 people.  I don’t use my IPOD, there aren’t many cars around so it’s amazingly quiet. I never thought that the sound of my feet against the road could really take me away from the coming week. As I build higher, I don’t see them as training, but more of my weekly “cleansing” session. The fact that I’m adding more miles this Sunday just gives me more time to go to my “happy place”.