Posts Tagged ‘running shoes’

My Garmin Is Sexier Than Yours
I started getting a ton of traffic yesterday to my Anatomy Of A Well-Loved Garmin post.  Apparently, there’s a fetish site called Watch Girls based on women wearing large watches.  Someone on their forum linked to that post with my full name included and a note that it’s an American blog.  It’s definitely a foreign proclivity, hardly any hits from the USA but the rest of the world is well represented, and they’re still coming in droves.  Check out their Models page – too funny!

What Happened At Yesterday’s Race
My finish time was an entire minute slower than expected.  Now esplain me this, Lucy:  just 10 days before the race, I did a 3mi tempo run in 21:06 in 75 degree temps.  That’s a pace of 7:02 compared to yesterday’s 6:59 -  just three seconds slower, same conditions.  I don’t run my tempos at 5K pace, so WTF happened yesterday?  Part of it was this:

These are 1/4 mile splits.  My first 1/4 mile was 6:25 but only because I looked at my Garmin, saw 6:16, freaked and put the brakes on.  As you can see, I kept those brakes on for the next mile!  It wasn’t uphill or anything, I was simply unsure of myself and that did me in.  I didn’t even look at my watch after that first mile, I thought I was going as hard as I could sustain.

So I tend to think it was my brain and lack of race practice that were the real culprits here.

Thus, I spent yesterday afternoon searching out summer races and came up with 6 races from June-Aug: five 5Ks and a 5-miler.  Frankly, I dread each and every one of them – I hate racing in hot weather and these ain’t gonna be cool, but the only way to get over the dread is to face it, or to quote that overused acronym, HTFU.

A final thing worth noting (apologies to my male readers): Last year, a couple weeks after my 5K PR, I raced another 5K and much to my dismay, came in a full minute slower.  That race was 6 days before my period.   Guess what?  I’m expecting my period in 6 days.  So perhaps this was also a possible contributor to the suckage.  Hormones are so confoundedly mysterious.

Saucony Kinvaras!
I’m really not good with shoe reviews, I don’t have smart things to say like “the cushioning felt resistant yet firm while the feedback from arch to blah blah gave a smooth ride and handled blah blah…”  I’m not that observant.  But I’ll say this: I LOVE these shoes!!  Rovatti, you had it right!

Few things: I always wear 1/2 size larger in running shoes, but not in these, they’re size 9s and they feel fantastic.  I have wide-ish feet but they feel very comfortable with enough wiggle room in the toes.  And so incredibly light at 7 oz!  That’s only 1/2 oz. heavier than my racing flats, yet I think they can handle being my regular training shoes from here on in.

I didn’t notice the heel drop per se, though there’s a lot of cushioning on the forefoot and it seemed natural to be running the “new” way in them.  I took ‘em for 7 miles and could have kept going but didn’t want to go too far after a race day.

Design-wise, they have an unusual sheer fabric over the main upper mesh…it’s like running shoe lingerie.  They’re also horribly pink but that’s all the store had.

My Running Gait Video
Memorial Day means nobody was around on the street this morning,  so after my run I took some video to see how my gait’s coming along.  It’s coming along!  Not perfect by any means, but the overstriding is getting under control.  Very pleased.  Btw, I didn’t think much about gait during the race so if I get a photo worth posting, expect to see me overstriding.

This video shows 2 views, 3 speeds for each view.
Edit: for my opinion of what I need to work on from seeing this video, read the comment I made to Jim.

Had a great interval session today.  Was a bit daunting on paper 10x1k@HM/10k, 1min rec’s, especially since most of you know I don’t take well to anything over, say…4 reps.  Kidding, but anything over 6 makes me nervous.  Surprise of surprises, I did this thing without a negative thought in my head (never happens).

The final story was 12.3 miles with the interval paces like this (some wind and small elevation difference explains the “every other”):
7:07,6:51,7:01,6:53,6:59,6:53,7:00,6:57,7:03,6:53…avg 6:57

I also inaugurated my marathon shoes that just came in the mail yesterday.  Fresh Elixirs! Purdy.

Backtracking the last few running days, Tuesday I had a nice MLR, 13.2@8:43.  Took two trips up my mile-long hill so felt very pleased with myself for that.  Then yesterday, I did my slowest recovery run of the cycle 8@9:57.  I enjoyed it quite a bit.  The slower pace was two-fold, the hills the day before and also, my HR has been a bit elevated for a few weeks.

I’m not really worried about overtraining because I’m sleeping better than ever (new jackhammer quality earplugs) and I don’t feel irritable or dreading the runs, plus my HR went up near my May Half, so it doesn’t concern me hugely, but obviously it bothers me some.  So anyway, I want to make those slow runs really slow, especially as the mileage and workouts peak.

In other news, I signed up for Boston yesterday!   I was going to wait till after Philly but you can change your qualifying race after the fact and all the cool kids on the 3:20 thread were doing it, so…I did it!   I’ve had the room booked for awhile now (thanks to my Women’s BQ thread pals getting that over with months ago) so now all I’m lacking is an airplane ticket, which I’ll wait a bit longer to deal with.

Hope you’re all having some lovely runs out there.  Later, babies.

So the race is over but my body is still in argumentative mode.  I’ve never had to run three recovery runs in a row, but I have this week.  Monday was a 5mi recovery run @ 9:45, Tues was a 9miler @ 9:25 and today was a 12miler at 9:13 (and I even had side stitches for 3 miles, lol).  Technically, 12 miles is too long to be called recovery but it was slow going, so that’s what I’m calling it.

I don’t feel bad about having to take it slow these past few days, though it is a new one on me to not feel repaired by now.  It could also be that I got my LadyTime yesterday, which might explain some of my discomfort during the race and why I’m feeling so drained and sleepy this week.  I hope so, because otherwise I have SARS.

Thanks to everyone again for all the positive comments about the race.  After all is said and done, I’m pretty pleased with the outcome.  I looked at the 133 females who came in ahead of me and realized that only one woman was older than me (a 51 year-old with an Age Grade of 94.4% who came in at 1:22:13).   So I’ve got absolutely nothing to pout about and it’s all onward and upward from here.

In other news, I had a new injury for a couple weeks that I didn’t mention because it was slight, but I think it’s worth typing out since you never know who might benefit from reading it.  I had my first case of metatarsalgia for a couple weeks there (ball of foot pain), likely due to rotating a couple pairs of shoes with over 400 miles on them.  It was pretty mild as far as injuries go in that I was able to run with it, though one day it really did feel like I had a pebble in my shoe (classic symptom).

I got rid of it without much ado by ordering a new pair of shoes, but more proactively, by simply massaging my foot whenever it started to “feel” (not on the run, but while sitting here at the computer).  Took me about 10 days to figure out that I could knead the painful area without harm, and once I realized I could, it only stuck around a few more days.  So no big story, but worth a mention.

As for the rest of the week, I’m going to attempt a speed session on Friday and then I have my first 20 (22 actually) this Sunday, so here’s hoping I’m back in fighting shape by Friday.  The workout looks like this: 3 easy, 2x(10x400m @ 10k – 5k pace w/1min rec), full recovery between sets, 3miles easy.  400s – not your usual marathon workout but should be fun to do and get some movement back in my legs.  Good stuff.

Now if I can keep my eyes open for the rest of the day, I’ll be a force to be reckoned with (against what I’ve no idea, but it’ll be real forceful, that’s for sure).

After publicly eschewing the idea of buying proper racing shoes so soon after the IT crap, I made an impulsive decision yesterday.  I was all “I said if I broke 21 I’d get to have racing flats, doggone it, I’m gonna go buy me some!”  So I went to Philadelphia Runner and tried on a few pairs.

I always feel like the Princess and the Pea when trying new running shoes on, there’s undoubtedly something that leaves me reticent (the arch on this one, tight toe on this one, too much room in another…) and because these were racers, I was even more anxious to choose the perfect pair.  I finally settled on the Puma Complete Roadracer IIIs, my first neutral shoe.

Once home, I put one on my postal scale, comparing it to my Mizuno Elixirs (the performance trainers I wear for quality runs and racing).  With my big feet (these are Men’s size 8 – I usually wear ladies 9.5 in running shoes), the Puma weighs 6.4 oz. – that’s 2.7 ounces less than the Elixirs – which may sound inconsequential, but my Elixirs are only 1 ounce lighter than my everyday Inspires and I honestly feel that difference, so 2.7 oz qualifies these as magic slippers.

Speaking of shoe weight, I’ve read from several sources that for each ounce you lose off your shoes, it’ll save you one second per mile.  So 5.2 oz total could potentially chop 16 seconds off my 5K.  That’s no small bonus.

The only thing I’m left wondering about is that I asked the sales girl (a super-fast local runner) if it’d be ok to wear them for, say, a speed session couched within 9 miles total.  She advised against it, but when I got home I read Puma’s sales blurb saying they’re “categorized somewhere between a 100% racer and a lightweight trainer” and “The Roadracer should be worn for weekly fast runs or races, but does not have the support or heel stability to be used for everyday”.  Sounds to me like wearing them for tempo and speedwork should be just fine.

She also said I could consider up to a Half in them, though that’d be pushing it, but the sales copy says “from 5k to marathon”.  Not that I was wanting them for marathons, but still, if I can safely run a Half in them, that’d be great.  I’ll just have to test them and see.

For now, I’ve placed them within the sightline of my computer chair, the better to admire them until raceday.   They remind me of a swimming pool, so pretty.  Yay shoes.

Or rather, getting over it does.

I took yesterday off since all I could stomach on Tuesday was saltines, I knew I needed another day to rest up so I took it without hesitation.  I felt better into the evening and this morning I checked my resting HR to see if I was back to normal and surprise of surprises, it landed on a new low…45!  How fun is that?  I should get sick more often.

I’ll be venturing out for an easy something today, somewhere between 7 and 9, I’ll see once I’m out there.

I got my box of goodies from Runningwarehouse, which I can afford because I no longer buy civilian clothing or shoes.  I got my new model Inspires which are lighter than last year’s model and Elixir 4s, which are lighter by a smidge, but cute with a new mesh upper.  I’ll be taking the Inspires out today for a test run.  I’m thoroughly relieved that they and the Elixirs feel the same as the previous models, standing anyway, so hopefully running in them will be the same, too.

I also got my new small water bottle, which is perfect, about the size of my hand, so that’ll go out with me on the weekend.  Lastly, I got a new pair of light gloves because my Nike’s are fine but they’re basically thick polyester and I wanted some that feel less plasticy (my eyes always tear in the cold and wiping at them with Leisure Suit fabric sucks).   Test run on those today.

So yay, huge relief that this was a short bout (I’ll never forget last year’s chest crap that put me out for a few weeks) and normalcy is returned.   Have a great day, my friends!

Remember how I was going on about wearing my shoes till they got to 500?  Well, I’ve been feeling a little nervous about them since they’ve hit the 400s – I felt an ankle twinge on a couple mornings that disappeared when I wore my newest pair.

So today I did an experiment and put one new shoe (75 miles) on one foot and on the other foot, a 421-miled shoe.  It felt like I had a shorter leg.  Seriously, the old shoe was noticeably compressed.  My 364-miled shoe felt pretty close to the new one, but the 402-miled shoe was almost as bad as the 421. Thus, I tossed the 421 and 401 pair and kept the 364 (which I’ll throw out at 400 miles).

This left me no choice but to go on a shoe shopping spree at Running Warehouse.  Such fun, because both my Mizuno Inspires and lightweight Elixirs have new models (no complaints heard on either yet, knock on wood) and the women’s models are both lighter, so yay.

I also bought a small version (12 oz.) of my Amphipod handheld.  I’ve been ignoring hydration in these cold winter runs – haven’t felt the need to bring anything, but my longer runs could use something, so the little bottle looks perfect.  I might occasionally bring a gel on my long runs again, too, since I’ll have some water to down it with.

Temps look fine for Saturday’s Pickle, 26 degrees windchill, though I could do without the 15mph wind they’re calling for.  Not that it matters, it’s not a real race and I’m just going to go there with fun on my brain (hey, didn’t I give myself this same propaganda pep talk last week?).

On the run menu, yesterday I had 7 w/8 strides, avg pace 8:28.  And I forgot to post the pace on my 7.25 fartlek the other day – even with snowy footing at spots, a very zippy 8:13 avg.  Been a fast week, aside from the recovery run.

Today’s going to be 6 at a modest pace.  Since I’m not tapering for tomorrow, I figure I should at least make today a slower one.  It’ll be my shortest run since Xmas week, I seemed to have stopped doing 5s and 6s these days.

I will close this entry with an embarrassing admission:  I have been using my HR monitor more lately but haven’t been washing the strap when I get home, so over the last few days I’ve developed an annoying rash under my boobage area.   Little red bumps, not itchy, just hot and uncomfortable.  So I’m hereby going to be extra clean with my strap, and no monitoring for me till these little bumps go away.  Just when my HR info was getting interesting, too…

From short legs to rashy bumps.  I know, I know, my hawtness intimidates you.  Deal with it, people.