Posts Tagged ‘hill repeats’

A gal who makes an entire video wearing a shithead wig and discussing the wiley ways of The Bear has no business running out of dessert on a Wednesday evening and eating a mammoth bowl of frosted shredded wheat as a poor substitute.  Especially if that gal goes on a tempo run the next morning without doing her, er…business, beforehand.

Backtracking, Tuesday was quite a good run – hill reps day -  so 10mi w/5 x.25mi repeats.  When I did these 3 weeks ago, I was pretty satisfied with the workout though if you remember, once home and looking at my logs, realized I’d lost quite a chunk of fitness since last Fall’s buildup.  So this Tuesday was great because it was 10sec faster per rep, had an additional rep than the last time and a lower heart rate, to boot. Plus, they were all into the wind.  A needed confidence booster.

Wednesday was an 8mi recovery, then yesterday, a not-so-hot tempo.  It was 13mi. w/4tempo and I struggled to keep the tempo miles at anything approaching a good pace, they veered from 7:20s to 7:25, which really super sucks but honestly, I was ok with it!

Having Tuesday’s good workout was like, “Ok, this was just an off day, there’s still good things going on beyond this one run.”   I rarely do morning runs in the winter anyway, so maybe I wasn’t all there, but also…the bear! My last tempo mile was crazy fighting that gnarly wooly creature off.  Thankfully, the tempo portion ended just in front of the restrooms.   I guess you need to be careful of what you talk about, or else it might come round to bite you in the ass.  Literally.

Today is a day off, but well spent.  I made a narration demo!  I love Mike and Deb, the studio owners.  They’re a blast to hang with and she makes a mean chicken casserole.  Here are the fruits of our labor.  (warning: it’s not at all thrilling but since I’m such a media whore these days, may as well post it).

Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.

Other than that, I’ve become enamored with Facebook this week. Last night I made a Fan Page for Gifted Runner and it’s already got 50 fans.  Half are my friends while the other half are people I don’t even know and they’re actually going to the website, so this is a very cool development. Didn’t realize just how useful it could be, so if you have a site, I highly recommend making a Page for it. And once you get 25 Fans, you can go to www.facebook.com/username to get a pretty URL for it, so I’ve got www.facebook.com/giftedrunner. Niiice.

There’s very little on the page right now but one thing I posted is a promise of new designs by February 9th. How’s that for a publicly self-imposed kick in the ass? Anyway, if you’d like to become a Fan of Gifted Runner, please do. And while I’m in beggar mode, if you want to add me to your friend pile, I’m game: www.facebook.com/flo.karp (you can get a nice URL for your personal page, too).

And with that, I’m going to enjoy the rest of this frigid day off by doing absolutely nothing and not eating shredded wheat because I have 10 w/8MP tomorrow. Just wish it wasn’t going to be 14 degrees. Winter bites.

Yesterday it rained all day though I managed to find a dryer window early in the morning, only got poured on for a short time.  It was supposed to be my hill rep day but I didn’t feel like going over 12 (and a hard workout, besides) with the threat of rain so I made it a vanilla 8.

Two interesting points about that run. 1. My garmin wasn’t catching on my windowsill so I did something I never do, wore my Timex ironman watch, purchased at the start of C25K and tossed to the side about a week later once I’d bought a Garmin.  Not only was I Garminless, but I had totally forgot how to use the watch and neglected to check the instructions before I left the house, though I did manage to find the Chrono bit, I couldn’t figure out the lap part of it, so basically ran nekkid.  It was a nice change.

Interesting point of the run #2: While running with the watch, simultaneously trying to figure out how it worked, the wind blew my hat off and as I was chasing it down, I fell flat on my ass in the middle of the wet, slippery street.   Didn’t hurt at all, was just funny, though the one guy that saw me pretended not to notice.

Today’s run was even more eventful as I heard a car crash into some trees.  I would have seen it but there is a wall at the point where it happened, so me and a bunch of other runners ran up to the wall after hearing that awful noise and saw the driver get out of her car, so apparently she was ok, but it was still a scary scene.

The run was a goody because it’s the workout I dread the most, hill reps.  I know they’re good for me though, so there was no way I was getting out of it but man, did I dawdle before leaving the apt.  Workout was 12.75 miles with five 3min reps @ 5k effort.  Should have been a 9 mile workout but that ole hill is inconveniently placed a little far from home.

Someone on the Marathon Training Forum mentioned a really good deal on gels and other edibles at REI so I thought I’d post it here.  If you buy at least 12 single serving items of any combination of product, brand or flavor, you get a 20% discount so check out REI (the link will take you directly to that page).

And that’s about it for me today. Hope everyone has a great weekend with some stupendous running, or at the very least, running that doesn’t suck.  Later, my sweets!

Yesterday was a little goofy in that I had hill repeats scheduled, six 2-min ones, which meant I couldn’t do them on my closest hill, because it’s not long enough.

I don’t know if you remember the hill I used for marathon training, dubbed Smile Hill because I used it for mile repeats and kept calling it “that stupid mile hill” which eventually morphed into Smile Hill, but anyway, it’s 4.5 miles from my house – not a problem when you’re marathon training and your repeats are focused on downhill running at marathon pace.  But when the repeats are uphill at 5K effort, a 4.5-mile slog home seems like unnecessary torture.

So I drove to my run, which felt really silly since I parked in a spot I run by daily, but I was glad to have done it.  I ran 4 miles warmup, did the repeats which came out to 3 miles worth and then ran 2 miles back to my car, so 9 miles total.

It was funny because there was this lone crossing guard standing on the sidewalk whom I passed on the way up and down each time.  She was cute, made small talk on my trips down, “how many do you have to do?”  “did you make it to the top?” “tired yet?”  I think she knew not to chat on my way up though, my face one ugly determined grimace fighting against a constant wind.

Much improved pacing this time – when I did 8×1-min repeats @5K effort a couple weeks ago, I started with a 7:31 and by the 8th one could only eek out an 8:46, and if you recall I was so embarrassed by my shitty pacing I kept it from you.  This time I ran the ups in the low 8:00s so they didn’t veer much at all, but I got a solid workout and felt great afterwards.

Today I have 11 easy, or as easy as will be after having consumed vodka shots and wine last night.  We went with friends to a Russian restaurant, a BYOB, which makes getting drunk that much more convenient.  Feeling pretty good actually, considering I was on the verge of puking last night.

Looking ahead, the rest of the week looks downright luxurious with no races on the immediate schedule.  I’ve got 7 easy tomorrow, then Friday it’s 9 w/5 tempo at goal Half pace (ooh, time to decide on race pace), Saturday 7 easy, finishing with a 16-miler on Sunday that includes 15x(90sec.@10k pace w/90 sec recoveries).

Onward and outward, looks like a wonderful 55 degrees out there, just right for a fragile boozer such as myself.

60 seconds. Doesn’t seem long enough to make a person tired, but I am quickly learning that 1 minute, done several times, can be killer.

I first realized the power of a minute last week with the 15x(1min on,1min off) stints from Wednesday and Sunday. Then yesterday I discovered an alternate way to be made miserable in a mere minute: spend it going up a hill. Suddenly 1 minute seems like an eternity.

The run consisted of 6 miles, then 8×1min hill repeats @5k effort w/jogs back to the start, then one mile home. It was a little cooler than I thought it’d be out, so I started the run at a brisk 8:19, then feeling good, averaged 8:06 for the next 5 miles. Then came time for the repeats.

The place I do my hill stuff is called Lemon Hill, right across the street from the river and the boathouses. At the top of Lemon Hill sits an historic mansion and the whole surrounding area is park, so it’s quite lovely. However, as I’ve mentioned in the past, you can also find the occasional condom on the ground and people seem to hang out there in their cars to hide out from their jobs during the day, so it tends to skeeve me out a bit.

When I started my repeats, there was this one SUV with dark windows and motor running that I kept having to pass, leaving me extremely self-conscious since by the time I’d pass it, it was always the end of my repeat (when I appeared to be near death). Maybe they were just in there eating their turkey sandwiches, but luckily, there’s a fork in the road with a similar hill on the opposite side, so after repeat 4, I switched hills.

All I can say is, I wanted it to be over way sooner than the workout actually was – 5k effort on a hill is tough! The last couple repeats had moments in them where I felt I was standing still, my legs wobbling so much. I won’t post my splits because they’re ridiculous, I never neared actual 5K pace and the last two ended up slower than my usual easy pace, but I felt amazing after it was over, like I’d done something especially great for my legs and butt. Final tally for the run: 9.25 miles, avg. 8:23 pace.

Since the last 3 days have included quality work in each of them, it’s a treat to see the next 3 are purely easy, the only strenuous addition are a few strides on Friday. Originally, my schedule called for a tempo run on Friday, but Saturday’s race ends up being the perfect substitute, so it all works out swimmingly.

This afternoon I have 11 easy and a bunch of pushups (eek, 8 sets instead of 5 and only 45 seconds between sets with the last set “at least 40″ – I may need a redo on this week). Speaking of pushups, I’ve been contemplating getting one of those chin-up bars you put in the doorway. I’ve never in my life been able to do a single one so it’d be kind of cool to be able to do a few. Plus, pull-ups are the perfect counter exercise for pushups and would further improve my posture, ultimately improving my running. We’ll see, I have a limit to self-inflicted suffering and chinups might put me over the edge.