Recently in Running Category

Two Saturdays ago, I had the awesome opportunity to do a run with Dean Karnazes who is part of the Zozi Guru program.

The day was beautiful and the run was out in Big Sur. We ran through groves of poison oak which was not fun, but the day was sunny and not cold and more than made up for stressing about whether or not I was going to get a ton of itchy blisters.

I've been following his exploits ever since he wrote Ultramarathon Man which is a great read. Since then, he's been an inspiration to me as an Ironman triathlete and marathoner. Endurance events take a certain mindset; some people can't enjoy the long hours on the road but you gotta be able to last to the end. Somehow, I've come to enjoy the long hours out on my bike, or running on the road. After I fixed most of my running issues, I too have come to just love running for the sake of running.

Thus, it was a real treat to run with him and hear some of his philosophies on running and on life. Here were some of the stand outs:

Technology is Great for Kids Especially in Keeping in Touch

Dean recounted a conversation with his wife on whether or not to give their kids mobile phones at such an early age. His wife was skeptical, but he prevailed. Later, he travelled away to race and after the long race, he texted a picture of himself at the finish line and his kids responded within seconds! Since then, his wife became a believer. Since Dean spends a lot of time away from home, technology has helped keep in touch with his family no matter where he is.

Overspend on Bringing Family to Races, Make it Something to Look Forward To, Not Dread

Dean likes to make each race he attends a major event for his family. Since he does so many of them and sometimes they are in very remote places, he overspends on them to make them extra special. In this way, he makes his races something his family looks forward to, rather than avoiding because they aren't fun to go to.

Training Distance is Very Individual

I asked Dean about typical training programs for ultramarathoning. I noted that some of them I found on the internet ran never over marathon distance. Was that enough to complete a 100 mile race? He told me that in his travels, he has met some great runners who only train up to marathon distance, and some that train nearly up to the distance of the race itself. He is of the opinion that some can race well by training only marathon distance, but some need to train longer distances. It is very individual and the only way to find out is to try it yourself.

Runs with High Leg Turnover

This is consistent with current run form teachings - higher turnover prevents overstriding and is less stressful on the legs.

For Downhill He Uses Wider Stance

This is something I discovered myself. When I go downhill, I take a wider stance and run down hills almost crab-like. This was in reaction to the fact that I sprained both ankles, one after another about 2-3 months apart when I trained for the Honolulu Marathon (and didn't run because of it). I attributed to the fact that my feet were too close together and as a result, when I caught the edge of my running shoe, it caused a sprain. With my feet further apart, this was much less likely to happen. It is also more stable when you are moving fast downhill.

I am glad he tells me he does this too.

Balance in Life is Overrated

I found this to be the best comment of all.

He mentioned that he would go run a marathon nearly every day out of joy and for training. But then he pointed out he had kids, a wife, and a full time job - not to mention travelling and doing speaking gigs. We then wondered - how the heck does he find time to run a marathon every day?

That's when he gave us the secret. Yep. Balance in life is overrated, especially when you love what you're doing. Just suck it up and do it all.

Love it.

OK so I'm a believer and now I'm going to give it a try. For the last 4 weeks, I started barefoot running, or more accurately running in Vibram FiveFingers. My favorite is the Sprint but it doesn't look like they make those any more since they are not on the Vibram site - they may have been replaced by the Seeya.

The Sprints are great because they are easy to get my feet into and have the strap across the instep to give a little assurance that they do not fly off when I run. Otherwise, I would have bought the Classics. Well, we'll see when I have to buy new ones...

So I chose to start out REAL slow. I went out running 10 minutes only, with 30 seconds running and 30 seconds walking. I did this only twice a week. It was definitely enough to start - I was already having minor adaptation issues.

My sports medicine guy and I have been talking about the potential adaptation issues that may come up when starting barefoot running. Of course I began to exhibit some of those issues.

The arch of my foot began to be sore intermittently. My flexor hallucis longus (click on the little 15) was very tight on and off, starting from my foot arch, running around my ankle, and up the back of my lower leg up and into the calf.

My sports medicine guy and I talked about springs. Recent research is starting to show that we store a lot of energy in our muscles and utilize it to help us move when we release that energy. When we run barefoot, we want to run on the balls of our feet. This makes our arch structures work harder, harder than they are used to because we've been walking in shoes for decades. Plus, we've probably been heel striking so much and our nervous systems for walking have totally wasted away. So I've been waking the nervous system up in my feet and legs, to get them slowly to adjust to running barefoot. But during that adaptation process, it can mean tight and sore muscles. And if I ran too much too soon, then it could mean all sorts of problems that could take weeks or months to recover from.

I read The Barefoot Running Book First Edition: A Practical Guide to the Art and Science of Barefoot and Minimalist Shoe Running by Jason Robillard which had some great advice on how to start out. But I chose to start out even slower than that. But also, they advised staying as relaxed as possible.

After 4 weeks I've managed to get to 15 minutes of running, with 1 minute of running and then 30 seconds of walking. When I ran, I focused on relaxing to the max. I ran with my feet just gliding over the road, with each step I made sure I placed my feet gently down to the ground to minimize contact forces as much as possible. I made sure my legs were moving exactly the way I wanted them to.

Every week I see my sports medicine guy who works my muscles with ART and Graston technique. He gets my tight muscles to release and make sure they are loose and functional again. My enemy is the buildup of this tightness with no release, which will surely cause problems later. When I cannot see him, I hit my muscles with rollers and my own Graston-like tools.

After only 4 weeks, I feel that I am just gliding fast across the road. No more stomping, or relying on the cushion of my running shoes to compensate for muscles which refuse to absorb shock any more. In fact, I feel that my stride has improved a lot when I do not run in shoes, meaning the path that my legs move through when I run.

I will report back after a few more weeks of this. I hope to be running upwards of 1 to 1.5 hours by the end of the year, and also hitting the track for sprinting as well.

Well it's been almost a week since I ran the LA Marathon last Sunday. Last year, I ran it in a rainstorm and nearly went hypothermic (see LA Marathon Race Report 3-20-11: Misery Redefined. I had hoped to redeem myself this year but it was not redemption I got.

The forecast was for rain again and my brain just sulked at the prospect of running it yet again in cold rain. Saturday before the race, the rain came down midday and I looked out the window at cloudy, wet skies and really was not psyched to run at all. If I had woken up to rain race morning, I was determined to just stay home and quit.

Here was my first rookie mistake: how can you run a race when you've already psyched yourself out before it even started?

Training before the race had not progressed well. About 2 months before, I was doing some Turkish Get-Ups with kettlebells and managed to strain some muscles in/around my left quad at the knee. This set off a chain reaction in my nervous system where if it started to get sore, my fascia would clamp down on my knee - first my left, and then a complementary reaction in my right knee. I never let the strained muscle heal completely; my time was short to the race and had little time to take off. So I trained through it. However, it was exacerbated by the fact that I added weekly mileage too fast. Normally I would add about 15 minutes each week. During this build, I decided to just add about 25-35 minutes each week. Looking back, I'm sure that this build was too much for my strained muscle and it kept bothering me, creating tension that would arise in response to high stress during the latter part of my long runs.

Second rookie mistake: Adding too much mileage during the training build.

This all caused my nervous system to flare up. By the time race week came, my quads were in a perpetual state of flex. Never felt anything like it. I did no running at all in the last week just to let them calm down. They finally came down to some semblance of relaxation before the race, but they needed a full detraining to reset them from flexing too much in response to race stress.

Add to that the fact that I wasn't sleeping well in the weeks before all added up to a heightened nervous system that always ready to go, but never let me calm down enough to recover. There was also stress in finding time to run 3 hours; winter training meant reduced day time hours, as did responsibilities with my family. I managed three 18 milers but I usually like to do at least one 20+ miler, if not two, before a marathon.

Heading into Sunday morning, I woke up at 330am, wishing that it was raining so I could just call it quits. But the roads were dry so I got myself up and prepped, and drove out to catch the bus to the start.

The race itself was not very eventful in memory. I was not psyched to start, so I went out easy although I hit the half way mark past 1:50 so I was on pace for a sub-4 hour finish.

As for the rain, it turned out to be a nice sunny but cool day with whipping winds but thankfully no rain at all. I was very happy to be wearing a cool waterproof running jacket by REI called the REI Airflyte Running Jacket with eVent Fabric. Although it was not raining, the jacket was very breathable and it cut the wind amazingly well.

The sub-4 hour time was not to be. My nervous system acted up at around mile 16 when muscles around my right knee started tightening up. This lead to successive tightening up and down the kinetic chain, into the anterior tibialis and up my inner quad up to my hip. There was also stiffness and pain in my right foot arch and around the inner ankle bone.

The tightness in my right leg soon caused a reaction in my left leg in nearly the same places although not as worse. Soon it became painful to even move my right leg in running form; I had to stop and walk every few steps to calm it down. Then I would run and it would tighten up again. I tried to find some movement pattern where it would not flare up in tightness and pain and tried to vary it in little ways, but to no avail. This went on all the way to the finish line where I finished in my worst marathon in years at 4:46.

Well, no such luck with redemption. But it's OK. I resolved to semi-retire after this race in any case. Having kids and being back in the work force just made long runs too hard to manage. I already gave up on triathlons and Ironmans, and now I'm passing on marathons and focusing on my swimming and half marathons, Total Immersion swim coaching, and my strength building work. Time for new challenges and phases in life....

Back in April of last year, I wrote a post on Deadlifting for Faster Running. A reader commented and asked:

10 months on, how have you progressed?

It has been an interesting 10 months for sure! After the LA Marathon 2011, I found time to concentrate on weightlifting and to try out ASRspeed.com which has worked pretty well. I had to back off ASRspeed and lifting when I managed to get into the NYC Marathon 2011. I raced that and then got back onto ASRspeed and strength development.

I started with a measly deadlift max of 175 lbs and now I'm at 215 lbs. My goal is 2x my body weight which makes my goal 290 lbs for 2 reps. In reading a lot of strength books like Easy Strength by Pavel and Dan John, I have found that if you can deadlift 2x your body weight, then you're a decent athlete. OK so now I have a goal. Still, I wasn't a very strong kid and never had any real strength training - only bodybuilding which didn't do diddly for my ability to generate power for things like running.

In other strength metrics, I regularly practice jumping up to an 18" plyo bench. Still not too impressive, but for a skinny guy like me it's pretty good.

The real measure of success was my running. I used the 200m distance as a measure of sprinting speed.

When I started running 200m for time, I did it in 45 seconds.

I then altered my running form which was to adjust my body lean to get my center of gravity forward of my legs. This magically dropped my speed to 39-40 seconds in one session.

Subsequent strength work and using the ASRspeed protocol then slashed my 200m time to 34-36 seconds where it stands now - and that's even after running 800s in between the 200s in a structured workout.

I am gratified that Barry Ross's theories have proven true for myself. In the past, I have dabbled in weightlifting for triathlon but was going about it all wrong.

I hope to see even more improvement in speed as I approach my goal of 2x my body weight in the deadlift.

I've pretty much come to the realization that gluteal amnesia has been a major cause of leg problems during my running and cycling.

All we have done all our lives is just sit around. Surely that is what I have done up to now. I sat in class, I sat to study, I sat in front of a TV, I sat in my office in front of a computer for countless hours. And all that resulted in my glutes forgetting how to fire. The fact that my glutes are not participating in any of the kinetic chains related to running or cycling means other muscles are overworked, get injured faster, cramp up during a race, and a host other problems.

By reactivating the glutes, the whole kinetic chain of muscles works more efficiently and better, being more resistant and tolerant of heavy and long efforts. By the way, you'll also run/cycle faster too; isn't that our real end goal?

To combat this, I started on a program of getting my glutes to activate in the kinetic chain again. Here are the things I've done:

1. First, I learned how to Hip Hinge. Hip Hinging is critical for performing the exercises that will activate the glutes. If you can't Hip Hinge, any potential exercises you would do for glute activation endanger your spine and back so make sure you learn how to do this.

Prevention of proper Hip Hinging can be the result of a nervous system which is unused to letting the hips hinge like that, and tight and/or weak muscles in and around the hips. It is possible that a program of stretching and physical therapy is required to help speed the muscles and nervous system to allowing this movement to happen.

I managed to figure this out on my own, but there are a number of exercises to help pattern the movement. Here is a good one:

I practice Hip Hinging whenever I can, especially if I am squatting down like when I'm playing with my kid. Or if I'm reaching down for something on the ground. Or going from standing to sitting. I make sure that my hips are hinging correctly in any kind of squatting type movement.

2. I then had to learn how to flex and tighten my glutes. Pavel describes this as "closing off the sphincter." It's not a bad way to start learning, but ultimately the glutes are to the side of the sphincter but you can start figuring out what nerves to fire in order to flex the glutes. I practiced flexing both at the same time, and also each one side separately.

3. Next come exercises to engage and activate the glutes, whereas previously they were completely inactive and other muscles were taking up the load. The core exercises I use, in terms of movement, are the deadlift, Bulgarian single leg deadlift, and the Romanian single leg deadlift.

It would be highly advisable to rehearse the movements with only body weight before you try extra weights like dumbbells, kettlebells or barbells. Go to a gym and perform the movements in front of a mirror multiple times. Make sure your form is perfect each time. Then once you have some mastery of the form, then you can move on to using weights.

If you don't rehearse the movements with body weight only, you could really hurt yourself. This is what happened to me when I tried to find my 1 Rep Maximum in deadlift and didn't have proper form nailed down. The moment I stopped and found help was the day after I hit a max and my back was bending down due to the heavy weight, and my back was very sore for 2 days afterwards. This was completely avoidable. I could have really messed something up badly in my back.

This is why I mention this now before I list some demonstration videos of the deadlift, Bulgarian single leg deadlift, and the Romanian single leg deadlift which all show weights being used. But read onwards to see how each one is done, and practice them without weights first, and master the form before adding weights.

4. After I get the hang of Hip Hinging, then I started into deadlifting via Tim Ferriss's 4 Hour Body, Pavel Tsatsouline's Power to the People, and Barry Ross's Underground Secrets for Faster Running. My blog posts on this subject are: Deadlifting for Faster Running and I also give a description of deadlift form in Deadlifting is HARD (and Dangerous). A great video on form is here:

The key here is to squeeze your glutes at the top of the lift. This really helps the body learn how to engage them during the lift. Later, you can attempt to maintain flexure of the glutes all the way from the bottom of the lift to the top. If you can do that, your glutes are on their way to be activated.

5. I also started doing some single leg exercises to isolate the glutes on each side. The first is the Bulgarian single leg deadlift. Check this video out:

Key point again is to squeeze the glute at the top of the movement, a bit awkward with this exercise, but still doable. Also, there is a temptation to flex the quads in an attempt to get up. Resist this and focus on the glutes instead. You will be amazed that you can get up by using more glutes, and without doing what feels more natural which is to use your quads.

This is also a great balance exercise, so do each movement deliberately and slowly so that you don't lose your balance and tip to either side.

Start with no weights, practice/master the form, then try very low weights, like 10-20 lbs and move up from there. A lot of people like to use 2 dumbbells, one in each hand. I like to use one dumbbell, held by the hand that is opposite the leg that is forward. This provides a bit more stability challenge to the core and body which I like.

I started with only 4 reps with body weight each side and my glutes were sore the day after! So start with low reps and body weight, do only one set on each side to start and then move up from there.

6. The second glute isolation is the Romanian single leg deadlift. Check this video out:

The person in the video is using two dumbbells which you can graduate to after you practice and master form without weights. Once again, I like using one dumbbell for more of a balance/stability challenge, the dumbbell held by the hand opposite the leg that is placed on the ground.

Key points are, keep that slight curve in the back and do not let it curl forward - very bad! You can bend the knee of the leg that is on the ground. Watch your balance, use your leg behind you to help counterbalance your body going forward. Maintain focus on your glutes during this movement.

Again, I started only with 4 reps with body weight on each side. Start low and move from there. Always maintain strict form; fatigue is the enemy of form! If your form falters due to concentration/focus or fatigue, stop immediately and take a break.

The bigger brother to the Romanian single leg deadlift is using a barbell with both legs on the ground, bending down with the bar and then standing straight up while keeping both legs in a slightly bent, braced position. I would recommend mastering the dumbbell version first and on one leg before attempting this one. This move is much more advanced and requires more mastery of bracing your upper body and back against the stress of a heavy barbell held with both hands. I do not think it is necessary, however, in a program to help runners or cyclists. The single leg deadlift is more than adequate.

7. This one is really tough but awesome. It's the Natural Glute Ham Raise. Check this video out:

This move is REALLY HARD. The first time I tried it I could not even lift my nose off the ground at all! If you try from the high position and lower yourself down, you'll end up face planting for sure. To do this move requires not only strength, but also activation of a chain of muscles down your back, glutes, and hamstrings that you've probably never ever used before. But as Barry Ross says, people with strong hamstrings never ever get injured during running. So this is worth aspiring to. For a better process to mastering this move, see this video which shows the Assisted Glute Ham Raise using a pole or lat pulldown bar:

Much safer to start with as you won't faceplant and embarass yourself in the gym!

8. I'm not in love with other movements on the ground but you can try them and see if they work for you. I've tried these:

Bridge Exercise
Quadruped Hip Extension
Single Leg Bridge Exercise

I haven't found them to be as effective as the deadlifts and glute ham raises. Nowadays I mainly use them when I'm travelling or not at a gym, or just want to switch things up. There are many others that you'll find if you search on the internet.

9. After you start on a program of glute activation, now you need to integrate this into your daily life or else they'll just get amnesia again!

First, stop sitting. Stand or squat if possible. Hard for sedentary workers, but do what you can. Sitting is the enemy of activated glutes.

Second, whenever you squat or bend down, practice your hip hinging. When you bend or stand back up, focus on the glutes as you come up. Resist flexing the quads to get up. Keep activating those glutes!

So far so good. I've been doing all this since about March this year and things are looking up. My speed on the low end is climbing, and I think the glute's contribution to the kinetic chain is showing in the speed increase as well as less muscle problems.

Chris McDougall is the author of one of the most awesome running books ever, "Born to Run". I'm a big propenent of running on the forefoot and I'm trying to perfect my running mechanics to make myself run injury free and also with maximum efficiency. This simple exercise/drill called the 100 Up helps with training your nervous system and muscles to run with more efficient and injury proof form.

I'm going to start to incorporate this simple exercise/drill into my weekly routine.

This is a bit late but finally getting to this!

To recap, the build to this NYC Marathon was only about 2 months. Very short, but I got there without too many problems in my muscles.

NYC was very chilly, although there was a warming trend. The morning of the marathon was still very chilly - 42 degrees or so! I got out there early as usual. Nearing the start of the race, I of course butted my way up as far to the front of the line as I could get. But with 45,000+ people racing, I realized that the field was going to be full no matter where I would be - there was just too many people.

Everything was going great until I hit mile 18.5. Here is a screen shot of my pacing from my Garmin 305 watch.

I was at a very fast pace, just racing by perceived effort to the edge of my threshold pace. But as my pacing showed, and what I remembered from the feeling in my legs which were getting tighter and tighter, I was slowing down bit by bit.

I did manage to hit mile 13 at 1:43, or about 1:42 at my chip time. This was on pace for a sub-3:30 finish, assuming I could hold that. But of course I could not.

At about mile 18.5, I cramped which ruined my day. You can see the HR drop on these graphs, along with my pace.

After that, it was a constant cycle of walk about 2-3 minutes until the cramp spasm goes away, and then run until the cramp started again.

I still managed a 4:02 chip time but it wrecked my 3:30 goal time.

Observations and learnings:

1. It is possible for me to build to marathon fitness in only 2 months. It verifies my previous coach's teachings, which is that you can build to endurance racing fitness by ramping volume only in the last few months of training, rather than maintaining a volume program for longer periods of time.

I would not recommend this to beginning marathoners. I think there are many variables that make it possible for me to have built successfully to marathon fitness in so short of time, not the least of which that I have now many years of endurance racing under my belt.

I signed up for the LA Marathon 2012 in March next year. I hope to build, starting Jan 1 so I'll have about 2.75 months to build to that race. This is still not the typical 4 months or more that I usually like to have to build to a marathon, but having done so with NYC I feel confident that I can do it again.

2. The cramping problem is one that I have faced for many years. At the NYC Marathon, the day was relatively cool so temperature was probably not the factor in making me sweat too much and lose too many electrolytes. I also was taking electrolyte pills, about 1-2 per hour. My best guess is that I did not have enough strength to maintain my level of effort over the full 26.2 miles.

To remedy this, I am back on my Russian strength building program and hope to be deadlifting over 200 lbs by the time Jan 1 rolls around. I need to be stronger at a 3:30 pace or else I will risk cramping again.

I am back on my ASR Speed program and will be working on my speed, as well as strength building, until the new year. Then I hope to use a fast build to the LA Marathon, like the one I used for the NYC Marathon.

A little under 2 months ago, I posted that I got into the NYC Marathon and was going to attempt to get from zero fitness to marathon fitness in about half the time I would normally allocate to this kind of race.

To recap, on my long run, I planned on building 15 minutes each week starting with one hour but given the 2 months, I could not allocate any weeks for recovery, as per a standard periodization training plan (ie. 2-3 weeks of heavy training, followed by a week of less heavy training to recover, then repeat). So I kept building 15 minutes per week and let the time in between the long runs be more variable as I adjusted for the weeks where I may feel the need to rest more.

Within the week between long runs, I would run a treadmill neuromuscular workout and then a track workout. The treadmill workout would typically be no more than 20 minutes and only functioned to help condition my nervous system to move my legs at faster speeds. These fast speed intervals were no more than 20-30 seconds, and I managed to raise that up to 4 or so intervals at 12-13 MPH, with about a minute rest in between.

The track workouts started with 400m repeats until I got to 8. Then I started on a simple 800m progression which began with 4, and I got up to 6. By this time, there were only 3 weeks left before the marathon and I began doing mile repeats of about 4 times, with about 3-4 minutes of rest in between. Remarkably, I managed to PR on both 400s (1:21), 800s (3:01), and also my mile repeats (6:46).

I find that traditional notions of fitness do not explain thoroughly enough for me of my new PRs in speed. However, I do attribute it to two new things I started this year: the ASRSpeed program and Russian strength training techniques.

Quite frankly, I'm a weakling. I do not have real strength in my legs to withstand the constant activity of running. I may have muscle, but I did not have the ability to activate the strength inherent in them, which is a function of activated muscle tissue and the nervous system. Regular training does not give enough focus to these two areas. After improving my strength and nervous system via fast run training and deadlifting, I am pretty sure this is why I am running faster now as I build towards the marathon.

But when I began the build, I only weightlifted once a week, as opposed to twice a week before. Although the strength training program was supposed to not wipe out my body as traditional bodybuilding might, I still found that strength training often could mean a tough run day the day after lifting. So I chose to just lift one day for maintainance and slow strength build while I focused on running.

I did go to ART every week as long as I was in town. This was to relieve the muscle adhesions that would form from my fast build to the marathon. I also used my TPMassage Roller twice a day. It was important that I did not let my muscles get too tight due to the fast build or else I could really get injured and I could not afford any time off.

For crosstraining, I swim every day in between running. This both helps me recover between runs, and also supports the run training through stimulation of my metabolic system.

So far so good, my body is holding up. I have only 1.5 weeks until the marathon. This week, I am gauging my recovery from my last long run of 21 miles last Friday. If I feel good enough, I may attempt another 21 miler, or if I am not recovering fast enough, then I'll do 18 miles and then have a week long taper. I don't want to arrive on race day with tight legs but am trying to maximize my training and allow enough time to recover fully for a good race. This will be an interesting experiment - normal dogma says that a two week taper is preferred for a marathon, but there are those who are pushing their training up to the limit, gaining training benefit from it, AND still can arrive on race day fresh enough to do well.

We will see...

Right before Labor Day, I got word that there was an entry available to the NYC Marathon. Of course I jumped on it and now I'm entered. The only hitch was...I had only two months to prepare for the race!

Normally, I like at least 4 months to prepare for a marathon. It gives me plenty of time to build, and also use periodization to rest between 3 week build blocks (I use 3 weeks, the usual number is 4 weeks; this is 2 weeks of heavy work and then followed by 1 week of lighter effort to recover). I also like to spend more time at longer distances/longer times (ie. 18-20 miles) building my tolerance to maintain tempo speeds.

But this time, I have only two months to get to marathon shape! The last marathon I ran was back in April: the LA Marathon. But since then, I have not run distance but focused on strength building with deadlifting (see Deadlifting is HARD (and Dangerous)), short distance speed (ASRSpeed.com: Ultimate Speed Training), and swimming as I am going for Total Immersion coach certification soon.

Looking at the calendar, I planned out my next 2 months. For my long run, I knew from past experience that I could build about 15 min/week relatively safely. If I could get up to 3 hours of running at least once, preferably twice, I knew at least I could finish the race.

Thankfully, the calendar looks like there are enough weeks to start at 1 hour for my long run and then building each week by 15 min and then right before the marathon, I should have time for 2 weeks of 3 hour runs. However, I would get no rest via normal periodization training blocks. Thus, I would have to be careful in my build.

Next, I would need to build up my anaerobic speed capacity at the low end. These would fill out the other 2 workouts of the week. One would be a neuromuscular workout on the treadmill, focused on training my nervous system to move my legs as fast as possible. The second would be a track workout, starting gingerly with 400s and hopefully moving to 800s and then a few mile repeats by race day.

For injury prevention during this build, I planned to use my TPMassageBall QuadRoller at least once, preferably twice a day to keep my calves and flexor halicus pliable and not tight. Those muscles seem to get tight very easily and I must make sure they do not get too tight for too long. Otherwise, that might wreck a training week and I don't have time for that. To help further, I am making sure I take Sportlegs supplements and Acid Zappers to keep lactic acid from collecting in my legs and causing further tightness and soreness.

I would continue my deadlift/bench press/weight lifting but drop that back to once a week and maintain my strength.

As of this week, I have run up to 1:45 and things seem OK. I am running conservatively out and then pick it up for a gentle negative split on the way back.

It was painful running 400s. The first day I tried to run 10x400 but ended up only running two laps, even if those my fastest ever 400s. The next week was much better, running 8x400 at slightly slower, but still faster than my fastest, 400s. The speed increase here was definitely gratifing. However, my "stirrup" muscle chain, running from the inside of my left lower leg around the bottom of my foot and back along the outside of my lower leg, was very sore. I had to give time to let that recover.

It will be interesting to see how fast I race NYC marathon on only a two month build. I hope that my LA marathon fitness comes back, and that all my swimming and weight training has paid off.

Once again, the book Four Hour Body by Tim Ferriss has me trying one more new thing!

For the last few months, I've been working on my strength through Russian techniques (see Deadlifting is HARD (and Dangerous) and Deadlifting for Faster Running). I've seen some definite increases in my track workouts, having dropped from 39 seconds to 37 seconds for a 200m run (that after dropping my time from 45 to 39 seconds simply by altering my form and in addition to my normal weekly treadmill neuromuscular speed training).

But having no real race goal in the foreseeable future, I cracked open my copy of Four Hour Body and engaged with ASRSpeed.com, the automated website training program built by Barry Ross using some breakthrough research from Rice University (see High-speed running performance: a new approach to assessment and prediction by Matthew W. Bundle, Reed W. Hoyt, and Peter G. Weyand) which is able to predict the final distance/time or time/distance of a runner from a few meters to a run of about 4 minutes. Then using this algorithm, Barry Ross and his colleague, Ken Jakalski, created a training system which removes two old ways of training:

1. Workouts of set distances and set number of repeats.

They cite the problem here is that a runner is always holding back in order to make sure they make the requisite number of repeats, and therefore, never trains at his maximum potential.

2. Running overdistance.

Running overdistance makes runners too tired and reduces top speed by its very nature to improve the energy system.

They and the researchers at Rice University figured out that for maximum speed, you don't want to train the energy system but rather you want to train the muscles which the energy system fuels and reduce their rate of fatigue.

You first run a time trial. Then the website takes that data and returns workouts for you to perform. The workouts are in the form of distance and a goal time. You are NOT given a set number of repeats to run; instead you run full out each time until you can't achieve the goal time, at which time you stop. If you hit 10 repeats and are still under the goal time, you stop. The website then makes you retest the time trial - in theory, you should be faster this time!

Without any races on the horizon, I decided to give this a go. In theory, if I get faster at short distance, this should make me faster at long distance as well. Also, it would be a complement to my strength building program from the same Barry Ross.

To prep for this, I got some blue masking tape to tape lines on a track. I also bought a Ultrak 495 100 Lap Memory Professional Stopwatch (using a wristwatch timer is OK but not ideal due to button position and pressing them on a full sprint).

Then I also bought a CST - MeasureMark 31-10M Single 4-Inch ABS Plastic Wheel Measuring Wheel in Meters/Decimeters to measure out the workout distances given by the website. You need this because the workout distances are not standard distances of any sort. Plus, I could never figure out track markings no matter what.

It also helps to bring some objects that you can drop on the ground to mark distances before you tape. I actually found some discarded pieces of flat plastic that worked great. Sometimes I end up just using the plastic and not taping the track ground.

I went to the website for my first workout, which was to run the time trial. This was 3 repeats of a 10m run, with a 25m fly-in (headstart, so that you are at full speed when you hit the start of the 10m). The second time trial was a 300m run, with 5m fly-in.

For the 10m run, my times were: 1.42s, 1.50s, and 1.49s for an average of 1.47s. My 300m time was 53.9s. I entered these into the website and then got another workout. The next workout I did the following day as I was not sure about taking days off or frequency of workouts per week. (The workouts seemed short enough that I could potentially run every day or nearly so - well this proved to be false.)

This workout was 40m repeats with a goal time of 6.30s, and rest interval of 4 minutes, and as many as I could before I could not hit the goal time. I used a fly-in of 25m although the website didn't specify exactly how much. My times were:

I was under the target time by about .3s and was able to do this 10 times. So I called it quits and came back to enter the info into the website, at which time it asked me to run the time trial again.

One thing I found out was that this is more stressful on my body than I thought. Even though I had a whopping 4 minute rest interval which allowed almost full recovery, the hours after and certainly the day after left me sore. Full-on sprinting was a new stress on my body and while I tried to do my best at maintaining a soft but rapid footfall, it was still enough to make me more sore than I thought.

I think that I will adapt to this workout, but I don't think that I could do this every day. I think my starting workout week will be ASRSpeed workouts twice a week, and then a 1 hour run added in. In the past, I have found that without at least one 1 hour run per week, it caused my overall fitness to drop where my track workouts were hard to make gains week over week. I will intersperse this with my strength training regimen, which is talked about on the website but gives no details, and my swimming.

More on this later as the months progress - I had entered my goal race as a 400m and my previously my fastest recorded 400m time was 1:27. I am hoping that this training program added to my strength training will improve that time, as well as my marathon times.

Well, my first adventures with the deadlift were enlightening and a bit painful.

I was foolishly naive about the details of deadlifting form and just started into deadlifting without thinking too much about it. I only thought to keep my back in neutral position and then lift the weight. I started by trying the prescribed path in Underground Secrets to Faster Running by Barry Ross which suggests a series of weights to try in order to determine my maximum weights at certain repetitions. It starts at 50% of my body weight and works upwards from there, until you find your one rep max, or 1RM.

I got up to a rather wimpy 195 lbs for 2 reps and then trying 215 I could not budge it at all! This unfortunately strained my back, probably both muscles and my spine, for several days. I then had a session with my physical therapist who ran me through the intricate details of deadlifting form. In fact, around 155 lbs my upper back started to curl and my shoulders could not be kept in position as the weight dragged my upper body down. I should have realized this and not kept going.

I found out that deadlifting is more than what it seems. At first glance, it seems to be just a leg building exercise but it actually builds the entire upper body as well. You need to be able to activate a sequence of upper body muscles to not only lock the spine into neutral position but also to be able to perform the lift and get the weight off the ground and up into its final position.

I found out the hard way that I didn't have the ability to activate my muscles in the right sequence, and also some of my muscles had "amnesia" which meant that my body had forgotten how to activate them when I needed their help in making the lift. This was a problem that had been plaguing me for my running - I know I have "gluteal amnesia" where my glutes would not fire and my hamstrings would get wiped out from running and ultimately cramp up during a race.

But first, the proper sequence, for the sumo version:

1. Take a wide stance, similar to the initial setup position of a sumo wrestler. The feet should be pointing about 45 degrees outward from center. Take as wide a stance as your flexibility allows; this will allow you to get the grip on the bar of the barbell as close to your body's axis as possible, which allows the body to take the weight of the barbell with the spine as vertical as possible.

If you can, lift barefoot or in Vibram Five Fingers. Even the height of the sole can cause instability in the lift.

2. Push your shins up to the bar, touching it. You will want the feeling of scraping the bar up along the shins when you lift up, but also being that close to the bar means the weight is as close to your centerline as possible.

3. Squat down. The flexibility of the leg and hip muscles may prevent you from getting down really low into a low squat, but you want to get as low as you are able. Also, you may find that your muscles are not strong and/or activated enough to be able to lift weight from such a low starting position. You may need to start in a higher squatted position.

4. Hinge the hips such that your butt is sticking out and not curled underneath. If your butt is curled under your spine, that means your spine is not aligned near the bottom which is bad. Lots of bad pressure to your disks if not aligned!

5. Grip the bar. Use opposite grips with the hands, one with the palm facing inward and one with the palm facing outward. With the hands in opposite directions, you can actually lift more.

6. In preparation for the lift, do this:

a. Grip the bar firmly.
b. Load up to right before the lift by extending upward with the body, but maintaining a neutral spine.
c. In loading up, tighten up the core, the back muscles, and the shoulder muscles. This will lock up the body in position and prevent your back/spine from moving out of alignment which will increase the possibility of injury.
d. Grip the ground with your feet and press up to right before the lift, flexing the leg muscles and glutes.
e. Look up at about a 45 degree angle. This will help keep the body in alignment. Looking down could cause your body to curl.

Setting up for the lift is super important. You want to make sure your whole body is locked in for the ultimate effort to lift the weight off the ground.

7. Take a deep breath and hold it. Holding your breath during the lift will help get you maximum effort. Then, as if you're going to force your feet/heels through the ground, press the weight up, rising up on your legs, while keeping your body locked from step 6 above.

8. When you reach full extension of your legs, expel your breath at the top of the lift. Pull your shoulders back slightly, and then shove your hips forward while flexing your glutes. This completes the lift.

9. While the books prescribe dropping the bar, this is nearly impossible in most consumer gyms. You have to be at a real muscle place like Gold's Gym to be able to drop a heavy weight without people or the staff complaining, or even if the floor can take that much of a weight slamming down on it from knee height.

Instead, after expelling your breath, take another breath, lock your body into position and then slowly lower the bar with your legs back to the floor.

10. Repeat steps 1-9 until you finish your set.

Now I practice this with only 135 lbs. Over the last few sessions, I make sure I can do this absolutely right. It is an interesting muscle activation experience.

When I lift, I rehearse the sequence through my brain as it's easy to just forget one of the steps if I move too quickly.

I must maintain control and flexing of a whole set of muscles during the lift. I find that if I lose concentration, I can lose the tightening of any set of muscles which lock my body into position. This is bad and can cause my back to be sore, or cause my disks to fire up other muscles like my hamstrings, glutes, or erectors (back muscles).

Early on, I could feel that certain muscles just weren't firing at all, especially my glutes. I could tell because after the workout, my hamstrings were very tight. Now I also focus on flexing my glutes especially during the lift.

I also have to watch the floor. At the YMCA in NYC, the floor is a rubberized tile. But it is also slippery against the soles of my running shoes, which caused my left foot to slip outward during a lift - very dangerous. I finally just took off my running shoes and socks and lifted barefoot. My sweaty feet nicely gripped the otherwise slippery tiles.

I need to burn the entire steps 1-9 into my brain so that I do it all, in sequence, naturally and every time.

Once I get the steps into my nervous system, then and only then can I start increasing the weight I lift.

Other exercises that are helping:

1. Cable rows, pulling the weight with elbows low.

2. Using a functional trainer or similar (one of those things with weights and cables and adjustable big arms), I row low, pulling my elbows to my sides and then pull my arms downward for triceps extensions.

3. Single leg dumbbell deadlifts, great for glute activation.

4. Single leg supine hip raises, one leg at a time.

Such a simple looking move, but yet so complex! I look forward to advancing in my Russian strength building techniques, and hopefully my running as well.

NOTE: By the way, an amazing back book is this: Ultimate Back Fitness and Performance by Stuart McGill. It's expensive but well worth the read.

The book, Four Hour Body by Tim Ferriss, brings me new insight all the time. After implementing the details on pre-running prep, I started into the chapter on increasing strength for better running. This led me to Underground Secrets to Faster Running by Barry Ross which further describes what to do.

It is a melding of strength training techniques pioneered by the Russians and it's effect on running performance. It basically uses the deadlift as the primary method for increasing strength, but you don't train to failure like I was taught way back when I was really into weightlifting.

So many misconceptions about how to weightlift and why we are doing it. I used to lift weights religiously on the hopes that I would increase muscle and size. I would train to failure and be into that "no pain, no gain" mentality. It would work for a while, but I would often plateau or I would injure myself. Reading the concepts in 4 Hour Body and then Underground Secrets to Faster Running, I finally understood how weightlifting can benefit running.

The idea is to gain strength without increasing your size. Bodybuilders want to look good on stage and on the beach, so they want to increase size and lose fat to increase definition. But that doesn't necessarily make them strong. And often you gain weight while your muscle size increases. Training to failure can make you bigger, but it doesn't necessarily make you stronger. It does increase your chance for injury as your support structures also fatigue during the last few reps.

But us runners want to remain light so that we're not dragging around extra pounds during a race. That's a waste! However, we can get strong without extra weight. With more strength, we can endure the energy sapping conditions of a race better. We can also increase our cycle rate as our legs/feet can rebound off the ground with more energy and do it longer without fatiguing.

I dug into this further in Power to the People by Pavel Tsatsouline. Really interesting concepts into how the Russians have trained for strength for the Olympics. But the focus of this training is more for maximal strength for powerlifting. I needed maximal strength that also didn't leave me fatigued or wiped out for run training afterwards. This was also a problem with training to failure; it would leave me sore and tight on the next day that I could not run effectively.

The plan described in 4 Hour Body and Underground Secrets involved a combination of pressing motions and plyometrics. In this case, the two main movements would be the bench press and deadlift, with plyometrics. The plan called for 2 reps at 95% 1RM (1 Rep Maximum) and then 5 reps at 85% 1RM. This was both for bench press and deadlift. Then after each set, I would immediately do a set of plyometrics and hit my stopwatch to do nothing for 5 minutes of rest. The 5 minutes of rest was crucial for me to return to a nearly fully recovered state. This would enable me to gain strength by activating the right aspects of my muscles but not stimulate growth in size and weight. Also, given that I was almost fully recovered, my support structures would not be fatigued and thus I would be less prone to injury.

The typical workout would eventually look like this:

Warmup w/ dynamic stretching, not static

Bench Press
1 set 2x 95% 1RM weight
push up plyometrics (or 10 pushups)
rest 5 minutes

1 set 5x 85% 1RM weight
push up plyometrics (or 10 pushups)
rest 5 minutes

Deadlift
1 set 2x 95% 1RM weight
jumping plyometrics
rest 5 minutes

1 set 5x 85% 1RM weight
jumping plyometrics
rest 5 minutes

Other Exercises

Core Exercises

Cool down with static stretching

Note the addition of Other Exercises and Core Exercises to round out the workout.

Other Exercises I do are some combination of:
Reverse Hyperextension using exercise ball and bench
Glute Ham Raise, assisted
Hyperextensions
Supine Hip Raises
Single Leg, Stiff Legged Dumbbell Deadlift, with 1 or 2 dumbbells

For Core Exercises, I keep it simple and use what is suggested in 4 Hour Body which is the Torture Twist. You lay on a sideways bench and hook your feet under a bar or similar. Then lay back and turn to one side to hold for 3 seconds, then turn to the other side and hold for 3 seconds, then repeat for 3 times and then sit up for rest of 30 seconds. Do up to 3 Torture Twists, and then start increasing the hold time from 3 seconds to longer.

As I mentioned, I was into weightlifting back many years ago. However, I knew that I could not jump back into weightlifting without starting out slow. I had to start out slowly and see what my current limits were and build from there. Way back, I knew what my 1RM for bench press was and that was 215 lbs at a body weight of 150. Still, I was out of shape to attempt even close to that now. As for deadlift, I had no idea what my 1RM was at all.

The other complicating factor was that I had never deadlifted at all in the past. I had tried it a few times, but never worked on it. I had no idea how my core and back muscles would take heavy deadlifting.

For the upper body movement, I would just start with pushups for a few workout days and then add in plyometrics for chest, and then go to bench press with plyometrics. For deadlift, Underground Secrets gave a workout sequence for determining my 1RM and I thought I would give it a try. I picked the sumo style of deadlifting versus traditional as it would put my hips closer to the bar and hopefully not stress my back as much as the traditional form.

The workout sequence they gave was to start with some % of your body weight and deadlift for 3 times. Do the plyometrics, rest for 5 minutes after. Then increase weight and deadlift for 2 times and repeat plyometrics and rest. Then increase weight and deadlift for 1 times, repeating plyometrics and rest. The next workout day, you would start with more weight and repeat. Repeat this sequence over a period of many days until you fail on a lift attempt. This would be your 1RM.

I got up to about 155 lbs when I felt like my shoulders were starting to drag forward due to the weight. I had a feeling this would be a problem but I decided to keep going just to see what would happen. I got up to 195 lbs for 2 reps and totally failed at 215 lbs. But after the workout, my lower back was pretty sore since by then shoulders were totally dragging down and my back was beginning to round due to the load of the weight. This was bad!

One problem with all these programs is that they never talk about how to start out. They pre-suppose you having some level of fitness or ability beforehand. They just jump you into the workouts and don't talk much about preparation, which could take months beforehand.

At least 4 Hour Body had a small chapter on pre-run preparation. I do those exercises religiously even though I'm not really starting out as I find they have benefits. The big problem with the strength training is that lifting heavy weights is kind of dangerous if you don't know what you're doing. This is why I started getting afraid when my shoulders started dragging downward and my back started to curl under the heavy weights, and I was right: a sore lower back was not a good thing.

Querying my sports medicine guy, he showed me proper deadlift form. Here is a great video on proper deadlifting form:

He also told me that a lot of it has to do with a super strong upper body and being able to lock it in position even under super heavy load. My upper body was totally unprepared for even a relatively wimpy 200 lbs or so which is not even 1.5x my body weight. I have to be able to pull my shoulders back and down and hold it there while I lift upwards. So proper form, and the strength to hold form, are crucial. I started rowing now to increase my upper back/lat strength for heavier lifting.

For a while I will still deadlift lower weights in/around my weight until I feel that my upper body is starting to get the knack of holding proper form. Then I will increase gradually.

The other thing I changed was the negative/downward motion of the lift. In both 4 Hour Body and Underground Secrets, they prescribe dropping the weight at the top of the lift. Well, the problem with this is that most gyms, especially consumer gyms, hate it when you drop heavy weights. The floors and weights aren't rubberized enough and the other people are too wimpy to like the loud thumping noise of the weights dropping onto the floor. Only true muscle gyms like Gold's or World Gym let you drop the weight like that.

I tried racking the weight on low hooks on a squat cage after lifting to max height which works after a fashion because you lift up and then you shuffle forward slightly to rack the weight. But I was unsure that if I could rack the weight if I was nearing my max weight lifted. I then tried adding the negative/lowering portion of the lift. This definitely put added stress on my legs (because I was more sore afterwards) but at least I could get through my sets faster.

So far, so good. My running times on the track are getting faster and it's unclear whether or not a month of deadlifting was the cause of this speed increase, but I intend to experiment for the better part of this year as I await the lottery drawing to the NYC Marathon later this year.

Actually this is not red hot hell but a frozen hell. Note the wet pavement; you can't see the rain coming down on us in the pictures. You can also see that my shirt is soaked through - that ain't sweat unfortunately! Temps in 50s, high winds, wet race clothes, hands and feet both numb after only 3-4 miles into the race:

Me running past Grumman's Chinese Theater and on Rodeo Drive. Note the dude with no shirt on - he must have been freezing:

After long miles battling muscle cramps, I am resigned to walking...and getting more hypothermic:

Finally the finishing chute along Ocean Ave in Santa Monica. I fight my cramps to have a run-in finish:

First, me happy to have finished! Then, me not so happy with the wind blowing my mylar blanket around and not keeping me warm at all:

Me turning off Runkeeper:

Body temperature dropping after the finish:

Teeth are chattering now, that isn't a smile:

The lone tent under which 50+ people were huddled to escape the rain and wind:

Finally a smile after I change out of my wet clothes and put on a wool shirt and rain jacket. Teeth still chattering behind my lips worse now:

Moving as quickly (and painfully) as possible to my car, which is at least a mile or two away SUCK:

Recovery is going pretty well. I took about 70g of protein powder after the race, through many doses across the rest of the day. Today, race day + 1, I took an additional 80g of protein powder. Both days I drank several packets of Emergen-C to keep throwing vitamin-C and other essential vitamins into my body for recovery.

Currently, after the race, what hurts:

1. My left ankle, but after I adjusted it, the pain went away!

2. My left anterior tibialis is sore. Left ankle area on top is sore when I move/bend the foot.

3. My right anterior tibialis is not sore much. Right ankle area on top is sore when i move/bend the foot.

Re: 2 and 3 - I think that the numbness in feet due to cold contributed to this. I felt like I was running on club feet and could not tell how my feet were landing on the ground. This could mean that my foot contact was not optimal and beating up my ankles and the surrounding structures more than normal.

4. Almost no soreness in either hamstring or glutes. I think those 4 Hour Body exercises are working well!

5. Both quads very sore. I think this was exacerbated by the cramping in both quads. I suspect 3 things that caused the cramping:

a. It was a cold day and I was not drinking much, so less electrolyte contribution from my sports drink. I was gel-ing every 45 min. so that was still on my normal schedule. I had electrolyte tablets with me, but didn't take them until mile 14 after my right quad cramped. By then it was too late. I should have started taking them on my usual schedule, but I was also curious to see if I really needed that much electrolytes, and especially on such a cold day.

b. The cold was driving down my heart rate. I looked at my HR graph from my Garmin 305, and it steadily declined as the day wore on. Some of that was due to my walking, but I could see my HR angling downward even before my first cramping at mile 14.

So I wonder about whether or not less blood flowing through my muscles caused the cramping since they were not getting enough nutrients or electrolytes. Need to look up research on the effect of cold on muscles and cramping.

c. I'm just not strong enough. After I recover, I'm going to start on some suggestions in the 4 Hour Body book from the coach who makes sure his athletes are super strong for running, using lots of deadlifts and similar exercises. I think I'm pretty weak in the quads, and especially if I've been working the hams/glutes with the weights/exercises I've been doing and they have practically no soreness at all.

5. My right shoulder/pec is very sore. It was getting sore towards the latter half of the race. I suspect that carrying my kid too much had something to do with that. It was taking a lot of my concentration to keep that shoulder/pec from tightening up as I ran.

6. I only slept 4 hours the night before. Every night before that, since daylight savings time started, I have not gotten really good nights of sleep at all. So a whole week of not sleeping enough may have left me at not maximum condition at start of the race.

Lots to think about and work on in the next upcoming months.

A buddy of mine sent me this video from the Somax Performance Institute in Tiburon, CA. It showcased some of their research on elite runners from Kenya and in the US:

They conclude that it's not genetics but rather run form/mechanics that determine why Kenyas are consistently winning races versus US runners. It was very eye opening, but also firmed up a belief that I had that most of our own problems in running are not genetic, but rather problems in how crappy we run, and these problems are what get us injured and keep us from getting fast.

Immediately after seeing this video (and replaying it many times over and over again), I dug up some old running video taken last year of me running on the track last June 2010. I took frames out of that video and measured some key angles and my max/min height against those of the elites. Here are my results for 3 of the angles:

Max/Min height of when you run:

Mine was about 2":

Stride Angle:

Here are mine on either side, note the difference:

Toe Lift Angle:

Here are mine on either side, note the difference:

Toe Lift Angle:

Here is mine on the right side:

After I saw this, I knew I had a lot of work to do to get even close to the elites! I pinged my physical therapist and told him we had to get started on these angles ASAP!

In the next few weeks, I'm going to take 2 video cameras to the track and take some video of me running at different speeds. I hope to see an improvement since last June, but also I suspect the angles are different for every running speed.

The LA Marathon for 2011 started very poorly. There was rain in the forecast for LA, but it hit SF first and 1/2 hour before my flight was supposed to take off, AA cancelled my flight due to weather, sunspots, whatever! I got on the phone with their special hotline but they told me everything was booked solid and I could arrive on Tuesday. Well, that works real well, don't it? So they did give me a refund thankfully on Saturday's leg BUT I was panicking on how to get down to LA in time to get to the expo at Dodger Stadium, which was closing at 5pm!

I literally ran over to the Southwest desk, at the end of the next building over, to see if they had something. There was a flight with space, but it was at 310p at Oakland airport! I took it on the chance that I could get to LA in time to get over to Dodger Stadium. It was supposed to arrive at 420p but I thought that the chance of me getting to LAX in time to get in a taxi and get over to Dodger Stadium before 5p was pretty slim if not even possible. But I have no other choice. I hop in a taxi and he huffs it to Oakland.

As I'm sitting in the taxi, I'm starting to panic. Thankfully I find someone in LA to go to pick up my race materials for me. I forward over my race confirmation email, a picture of my license which I amazingly had on my hard drive, and an authorization letter. I get on the Southwest flight and arrive at 430p which meant that I would have never gotten to the expo in time.

I arrive to cold and light drizzle. That was the first part of this miserable experience.

The next morning I got to the race start and it was relatively dry but very overcast. The wind had picked up but all of us were staying within Dodger Stadium to keep out of the cold and wind. I hoped that the weather would just stay overcast without rain. I was wrong.

The race started but it was a big blur due to the weather. Shortly after we start, the rain starts coming down. First it was a drizzle, and it was stopping and starting. I was doing OK, actually going pretty darn fast all things considering. It was probably a mistake to run at that speed though.

At mile 14, my right quad starts threatening to cramp. Up to that point, I had run through many instances of stopping and starting rain, with the rain getting more severe as the day went on, and the wind was picking up also. My hands and fingers were getting numb and I could barely open up my gel packets. I was running through rivers in the roads and my feet were getting numb from being cold and wet. I couldn't tell how my feet were being placed on the ground; they felt like stumps.

My race clothes were getting totally wet and I knew that stopping would be a potentially fatal mistake. Wet clothing in cold weather will suck heat out of your body like nothing else. It could make me hypothermic. So I had to keep moving no matter what.

My quad doesn't get better; it gets worse. I start walking when it seizes up until it calms down. I remember bringing some salt tablets and take those, but it helps not enough. This begins to repeat itself over and over again and I start slowing down considerably, especially when my left quad starts to do the same thing!

By mile 19, my quads were getting screwed and taking longer and longer to calm down. I start walking for longer periods of time until they calm down. By mile 21, I am only walking. And it's raining hard. I start to shiver which is not a good thing. Thoughts of quitting enter my mind, even at mile 21 so close to the finish. I start looking for a medical tent to retreat to in order to quit. I ask around at aid stations where the heck is the next medical tent. They keep pointing down the marathon course. Wonderful. I'm walking, freezing my ass off, on the verge of going hyperthermic, and these guys tell me to keep going.

So I want to quit, but cannot quit. By this time, I start getting mad. I think about the crap I went through the day before. I think about my build to the Honolulu Marathon in December and couldn't race because I sprained my ankle 3 weeks before. And even if I want to quit, I cannot!

At mile 22, I am at about Barrington and San Vincente which is near where a couple I know lives. As I pass through there, I start running because I don't want my friends to see me walking. The things I do to maintain my tough guy illusion.

I get to mile 23 and see a medical tent there but keep walking. I get to mile 24 and figure out that if I walk for a 10 count, and then run for a 20 count, I can actually get my speed up. I reach the home stretch on Ocean Ave in Santa Monica and just start running to look good crossing the finish line. I cross at chip time of 4:15:00.

After crossing the line, I start shivering uncontrollably and I'm limping due to my quads being so tight. The wind at the beach on Ocean Ave is considerably greater than amongst the buildings. Now I'm walking and move quickly to grab a mylar blanket. But the wind is just whipping my blanket around. So it's raining hard, the wind is dropping my body temperature, and I'm walking to my daughter and her mom who have come down in the raging rain to see me at the finish line. I finally find them and now I move/limp to where the expo is...and my race gear bag. After some miserable minutes, we get there and it's a mess getting my race gear. The trucks are chaos and finally they find my bag. I move rapidly back to a tent where about 50 other people are huddled under in the whipping wind and rain. By now I can't stop shivering. I take off my wet clothes and put on some dry stuff. Then it's off to my car where I can barely grip my steering wheel because my hands are numb and get home to a hot shower where I finally can stop shivering.

Before this race, I thought that my most miserable race was Ironman CDA back in 2009. It, too, was a cold, drizzly day and after 12+ hours in that, it was sucked pretty bad. But after running in the whipping rain and wind in 40-50 degree weather, this has become my most miserable race. It's too bad; the course is not bad and I'm sure in decent weather this is a great race. It's easier than NYC Marathon and I think I can set my marathon PR here. But not when the weather is so cold and wet.

My new definition of misery is....LA Marathon 2011.

Analysis:

1. In thinking about what went wrong, I think my race prep was OK.

2. I think I went out too fast, even though I wanted to PR and didn't feel all that bad.

3. Since it was very cold, I think my nutrition could have been better. I did not drink nearly as much fluid, limiting my intake of electrolytes and calories. I also decided to try not taking salt tablets which may have caused or enhanced my cramping.

4. I should have run with wool socks which would have helped even when wet. I also should have worn my gloves which could have helped my hands not be so numb.

5. Cramping hasn't happened to me in a while. But I think I pushed too hard this race, too early. I think I will try some insight from Tim Ferriss's Four Hour Body which was about how a coach first gets his athletes as strong as possible. I think that in general, I am not so strong and need to do this.

6. Maybe I should have just resigned myself to fate and not worked so hard to get to LA the day before and just not raced. Certainly I would have just sat here enjoying the warmth of my apartment while watching the wind and rain through my window.

But then I would have been disappointed to have done another training build to a race that I wasn't able to run. That would have sucked.

All in all, I am glad I finished. It is said that Ironman elites have extreme mental toughness. I think that even though I felt miserable, I think that my fortitude in the face of overwhelming odds was trained significantly. I look forward to applying that in my next marathon.

Besides, I have to maintain the illusion of being an Ironman tough guy amongst my racing friends...

Last week, I went out on the track to run a workout that combines 800s and 200s. The workout looked like this:

2x800 RI 1.5"
2x200 RI Jog 200
2x800 RI 1.5"
2x200 RI Jog 200
800 RI 1.5"
200 RI Jog 200

As I moved my way through the workout, I was recording lap times on my watch and feeling like my times were so dismal. In previous years, I had been able to run 800s and 200s so much faster than that morning, but for some reason I just could not make those speeds in recent weeks. I tried cycling my legs faster, but this just made me hit my aerobic limit that much faster and I risked flaming out before I could hit the end of an interval.

Then towards the last few intervals, I remembered that body positioning can enhance speed. If I lean too far back, I need to exert more energy in my legs to drive my body forward. Leaning forward by bending at the waist puts me off balance which is bad also, and I waste energy trying to maintain my balance. But leaning forward while upright, presenting chest, with shoulders slightly back and head upright as well, then gravity can add its acceleration to the body and create forward speed without expending muscle energy.

On every 200, I was running them at 43-45 seconds. Then on the 2nd to last 200, I decided to run it with more aggressive body lean forward. Unbelievably, I hit 41 seconds, and without addition of effort. I then ran the next 800 and it was faster than any preceding 800.

On the last 200, I maintained not only aggressive forward lean, but also cycled my legs a bit faster, pushing my aerobic capacity. I made it to 200 in only 39 seconds!!

But the whole time I was leaning my body forward in that upright manner, and leaning as far as I could, feeling like my upper body was pushing forward beyond my cycling legs, it felt like my body was sliding off my hips/legs and about to fall off a cliff the entire time I was running - what a weird sensation this was!

Now I will strive to maintain that "upper body is flying off a cliff" feeling during running, which I know is giving me free, effortless speed that requires minimal leg energy. It does give me an immense mental challenge, however; for some reason, focusing on keeping my body in that position is mentally taxing. With training, I know I can increase my mental endurance on maintaining optimal body lean over race distance.

Last year, my coach M2 gave me a set of cycling workouts which changed subtly; knowing that I had progressed many years with him, he knew he could increase their difficulty. The rest intervals now had a small but important change: they would be performed at 100RPM.

Now anyone who has tried to spin at 100 RPMs, even at low wattages, knows that it can be a heart rate raising experience. However, I had trained specifically for this. I had spent weekly sessions for years working on improving my ability to cycle at high RPMs. Given Lance Armstrong's success at pedaling at high RPMs, I was determined to do the same. For recovery workouts, I use M2's Pedaling Efficiency workout which is alternating one legged pedaling at 100 RPMs. It became a regular event every week and over a period of months, I could pedal at 100 RPMs through that workout with barely a rise in heart rate, certainly not approaching my lactate threshold heart rate at all.

Throwing 100 RPMs into the rest interval of 30 seconds to 1 minute in between high wattage intervals was scary, but I found that my neural muscular training with that Pedaling Efficiency workout really adapted my nervous system to perform even though the system was tiring. It also meant that in cases where I would raise my effort (ie. sprinting, or passing) that I would not collapse completely after that effort and my RPMs would drop after each of those effort. I could maintain RPMs, shift downward, and maintain my previous speed AND recover energy into my muscles. Before this, I would make the effort and then have to lower RPMs to recover or else my system would just keep rising in effort until I would flame out because I could not recover without the low RPMs. During a race this is really important.

Likewise, I started experimenting with high leg cycle rates in running. I would train weekly on the treadmill and do sessions of super high speed for short intervals. This trained my neuromuscular system to be used to high RPMs and to not easily collapse in the face of heavy or long efforts.

This has manifested itself mainly in hills. You hit the bottom of the hill and attempt to maintain speed up the hill. If the hill is long enough, you may find that by the time you get to the top of the hill you are so tired that you need to slow down your legs' cycle rate in order to gain some rest. This is bad for your speed! As you crest the hill, you have nothing left to surge and accelerate again.

These days I practice relaxing completely BUT maintaining or increasing the cycle rate of my legs. I try to relax the muscles and rest them from the effort of the hill climb and then rest as I tell my legs to spin faster. It's amazing that one can train for this; it really helps in not slowing down or collapsing entirely as you crest a hill and then move to the downhill on the other side where you want to keep higher RPMs to keep yourself moving down the hill. Thus, the rest interval happens during the crest and on the downhill.

I attribute this ability to high RPM training on the treadmill, using neuromuscular training intervals to train my nervous system to operate even in conditions of high effort. I also practice this when I'm out during a run through rolling hills; at every crest of a hill, I relax completely to rest but keep my legs' cycle rate high, or try to even cycle them faster. I don't want the nerves to stop firing when fatigued; I want to them to keep going even though my muscles are tired.

Again, the value of neuromuscular training is revealed. Whether on the bike or on the run, training your body to rest while maintaining high RPMs is a valuable tactic to being fast.

Earlier this year, I read Born to Run by Christopher McDougall and found it to be one of the most inspirational running books I've ever read.

One of the most important points the book makes is how our history of running in the modern world has been built up by a bunch of theories which were ultimately proven to be false, which also have been extended by a number of big corporations dedicated to creating running shoes. And all this can be prevented by going back to basics, which is to run barefoot.

But first, what has happened with our affinity for wearing shoes? In this great, detailed and very geek work, Shoes, Sitting, and Lower Body Dysfunctions | Eat. Move. Improve., it shows how we humans have completely atrophied or overstretched and weakened essential muscles which would allow us to run without injury. Not only have we done this simply by wearing shoes of all sorts, but our sedentary, sitting lives have also messed up our bodies quite a bit.

Mostly all these amazing support muscles nature has given us have just wasted away, making running a difficult activity when in fact it should not be.

Enter the barefoot running craze. After reading Born to Run, I went out immediately looking for my pair of Vibram Five Fingers. Anyone who has looked for a pair will note that it is near impossible to find a pair. They are so popular now that you can barely find them anywhere. So far, REI has some occasionally in stock, but if you're down in Los Angeles area, Adventure 16 on Pico Blvd always seems to get a lot every week so check back frequently.

The fit is pretty particular so you need to go in and try them on. I was actually a size larger than the sizing chart recommended so you really have to make sure they fit right. Also, I first bought a pair of KSOs which were pretty good for cooler weather, like sub-60 degree temperatures. But the panel of fabric over the instep made getting them on not so easy. So I also bought a pair of Sprints which were much easier to get on, and I use them for the warm-enough days.

At the moment, I am up to walking around in them as much as I can. I have tried running very, very short distances just to see what it feel like. But I have not quite gotten there yet. I am training for the Honolulu Marathon right now and intend to race in my old dependable ASICS.

I am still a fan however. Many of my friends are starting out trying barefoot running and have asked me about it. So I thought I would post all the resources I've found so far on barefoot running. Here they are:

Born to Run by Christopher McDougall - the best inspirational running book I've read in a while, and big on barefoot running.

Shoes, Sitting, and Lower Body Dysfunctions | Eat. Move. Improve. - again, a very complete analysis of all the atrophy our bodies have undergone due to our shoes and sitting.

Running Times Magazine: Transitioning to Minimalism - a great short article on making the change to barefoot running, and a survey of the minimalist running shoes available now or soon.

12 Step Program to Run Barefoot - nicely setup step by step program to running fully barefoot that you can follow.

I found two books on Amazon that were specifically for barefoot running:

Barefoot Running: How to Run Light and Free by Getting in Touch with the Earth by Michael Sandler and Jessica Lee - I just ordered this one and will check it out.

The Barefoot Running Book: A Practical Guide to the Art and Science of Barefoot and Minimalist Shoe Running by Jason Robillard - I just got this on my Kindle and think it's very concise and excellent.

I think these DVDs are excellent, and I generally like these better than books, which they also have:

Pose Method

ChiRunning

Evolution Running

All of these advocate forefoot running, which is the cornerstone of barefoot running. Forget that heel strike crap that anyone is feeding you. Heel striking just beats up your body.

Most people I talk to angst or whine about how they can't change the way they run. I'm sorry but if you're running wrong, you will end up injuring yourself eventually and then give up. So is it really that "you can't" or "you won't"?

Here are two really great books on getting people to realize that it takes a lot of focus, dedication, and hard work to burn new habits into your body:

This Year I Will...: How to Finally Change a Habit, Keep a Resolution, or Make a Dream Come True by M. J. Ryan - A great step by step and inspirational book to help you figure out how to change, and burn new and better habits into your lives.

Bounce: Mozart, Federer, Picasso, Beckham, and the Science of Success by Matthew Syed - some people think that all these talented people we see out there were born gifted; this book debunks that theory. Many of the things that we see others excel in were simply born out of THOUSANDS of hours of practice. It also means that if we put in the time and effort, we too can be really good at the things we want to be good at....like running injury free.

There you have it; all I can tell you about barefoot running. My hope is that someday I'll get there, although I have short term goals which may mean that my barefoot running training is interspersed with running shod with normal running shoes. Suffice to say that it takes a long time to get there, and the time to adapt is highly dependent on your respective fitness, bodies, and muscles' state.

My program is similar to the 12 Step Program; I will walk for many months. Then I will start jogging short distances and gradually lengthening them. I will watch my body's response to the stress carefully and back off if something is tight or sore.

Already, I go to ART and Graston every week to help restore function to tight muscles. I also use Kinesio Tape and RockTape and the RockTape Taping Method to help the curative process as well as support my muscles during training. During my transition from crappy heel strike running to fore/mid-foot running, it took a lot of work with tape and my sports medicine docs to help me through that in one piece. Now I will go through that process again, going from shoe running to barefoot.

But hey, I'm going to be 45 this year and my body doesn't have the ability to just adapt to new stresses overnight. They take a LOT OF TIME. I am patient, focused, and going as fast as my body allows.

Re-training my muscles is one aspect; re-training my nervous system is the other. Now I am focusing on precise foot placement as I run, putting each foot deliberately down as gently as possible, and trying to keep my feet gliding as low to the ground as possible. Doing this over and over again, and while I get fatigued, means that my nervous system must make this an unconscious habit. Only after hundreds, if not thousands of hours of training, can I burn this new habit into my body.

I am still early in this process and hope to post more about it as the months go by. Good luck in your own adventures with barefoot running!

Twice this year I was asked for some tips by some people running their first marathons. This is what I sent them:

1. It is important that you run 3-4 times a week. 2 is the barest minimum and may mean you will have a painful race.

A nice schedule is 3x a week with cross training in between, like cycling or swimming. If you can tolerate one more, then you can add that in.

2. Generally you run 2 shorter workouts and then have a long run.

3. If you are not running interval, hill, or threshold workouts for your 2 shorter workouts, i would advise you to gradually build from 30 min up to 1.25 hour running for your shorter runs. You will need to substitute longer endurance type workouts for the typical threshold workouts.

4. On the long runs, you should build weekly about 10% in miles. For me, i use time as a metric for training and increase my runs about 15 minutes every week.

5. When you peak for a marathon, you should do a minimum of 2, hopefully 3 at 20+ miles. If you can get to 22-24 miles it will be great training not only for endurance, but for mental training in how your brain deals with being out there so long. One 20+ miler is bare minimum.

6. You should consider a run-walk strategy for the race. I ran my first NYC marathon with a 5 min run :30 walk strategy and it got me in at 5 hours 19 minutes.

If you choose this, you should think about training this way also, so you can get used to running with walk breaks.

7. Somewhere between mile 14 and mile 20, most runners experience the "wall". This is where your body seems to slow down and you're feel like you're moving through molasses, and its hard to go faster. You may experience a mental urge to just quit or slow down and just walk. This is the "wall". During training, you should train within this mileage towards your peak to train your body and mind to deal with working through the "wall". However, note that if you break through the wall, everyone typically experiences new found energy and you can run to the finish. So whatever you do, DON'T QUIT when you experience the wall. Keep moving!

8. You should practice hydration during your training runs.

you should consider getting one of these:

Fuel Belt Enduranace 4-Bottle Belt

and then get some bigger bottles:

Fuel Belt 10 oz Super Flask 2-pack

I typically go through 4 10 oz bottles of fluid during a race, for a 4 hour marathon. this varies greatly on temperatures. I have started drinking more from aid stations so nowadays I only take 2 10 oz bottles with me and just drink along the way.

Then you should get some extra pockets to hold your gels:

Fuel Belt Pockets

You should also pick a good sports drink to drink during the race. I use First Endurance EFS (http://www.trisports.com/1stendurancee3.html) because it has a lot of electrolytes and also some protein. But most importantly, it is whey protein as soy protein has been known to cause stomach problems. You can get EFS from Helen's Cycles on Lincoln in Marina Del Rey. There is another store in Santa Monica. Or order it here at trisports.com

9. You should practice fueling during training. I am a big user of PowerGels because they have a higher electrolyte component, plus I can get some with caffeine for an added kick towards the end of a run race.

But caffeinated gels once threw my stomach into a churn and so I take it sparingly but like the extra kick it gives, but only take it during the last 1/3 of a marathon.

Other gels also work well. You just need to find what your stomach is OK with.

You'll probably want to take one about 10 min before the race starts and wash it down with some fluid. Then you should take one gel every 45-60 min, and take a sip of fluid right after. You should start fueling as soon as the race starts.

Do not let your body get into a depleted state! You won't be able to pull out of it. The body simply cannot work fast enough to replenish your energy stores. Generally, when you race, you're burning more energy than you can take in and process. So it's impossible to replace it all and don't try. Just keep as much as you can going in with the gels and sports drink.

Your body is working hard to keep you going with your athletic activity and is not devoting much resources to digestion. Thus, training will help your body prepare for a long, hard effort but it cannot supply all the energy it needs. Gels and what you get in an energy drink are the easiest to absorb that do not require much from your stomach to do so. But even that has a limit to what it can absorb per hour. Taking more than that can mean some severe gastrointestinal problems, like vomiting, stomach ache, or diarrhea.

Trust me i've been there before and it is the worst feeling to have stomach problems during a race, besides the fact that squating on a port-a-potty is just gross anyways.

What's even worse is to bonk. This is when you've sucked all the glycogen out of your muscles and you have nothing left, and you cant replace it either through fueling. It's the worst feeling ever and you just feel like quitting. You may not even be able to run after you bonk.

10. Lubrication is a good thing to put on. You never know when you get chafing or blisters.

For chafing, i use Bodyglide. For my feet, i use Blistershield roll-on. see all of it here:

Lubricants

Pre-race and during training, rub bodyglide on inside of your upper arms and along your ribs and lats where your swinging arms will rub. Guys get nipple burn but I usually don't hear women getting it, but I rub it on my nipples. I usually only put on lube for training runs longer than about 1.25 hours. Below that, it usually isn't a problem.

I wear these socks to prevent blisters:

WrightSock

But i have found that my form is more predictive of blisters than socks. So in changing/correcting my footstrike to the ground, I have found that I have substantially reduced the chance of blisters, in addition to using Blistershield lube.

11. Another thing you may experience is sore biceps. This is from simply holding your arms up for such a long time. So watch out for this when you train and get used to holding your arms up that long. Learn to relax the whole way and shake out your arms occasionally.

12. Marathon taper is typically about two weeks. You do one more long run/high volume week two weeks before the race and then take two weeks to taper. I would not advise you to do a long run one week before. Experienced athletes are ok with this, but for beginners it's better that you not overtrain, and that you arrive fresh and uninjured on race day.

13. I gave you some DVDs. i think the Pose Method stuff is a bit hokey, but definitely practicing balance by standing on one leg is a good thing. Running on the balls of my feet have eliminated knee problems although it took literally years for my calves to adapt to the stress. Only recently have they not protested in the early season after coming off the off season. ChiRunning is pretty good. Evolution Running was additive although I felt that I learned the most from ChiRunning and Pose.

14. As we mentioned, running into a headwind stinks. Try to find somebody to run behind. You are basically drafting behind.

15. Interval training is great. It allows you to create situations where you can adapt to higher stresses, which equate to handling tough conditions during races. But it is done with short bursts as training at super high intensities for too long, over too long a period of time will only lead to injury and overtraining. So here is one interval sequence that involves neuromuscular training. You should strive to do this sequence every week if possible.

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Neuromuscular training

Description: use of super short intervals, with full recovery in between, but at super high intensity, will train your neuromuscular system to adapt to high efforts, whether they are high speed or high effort or both. Then slower speeds or lower effort will feel almost easy. But most importantly, it trains your neuromuscular system to fire neurons (to make the muscles move) faster and not to tire from simply the effort of firing. This is a source of fatigue and is easily eliminated by workouts like these. These are best done on a treadmill where the relentless nature of the treadmill forces you to keep up or else you'll fly off the back (but please don't!). The treadmill can also be cranked up to speeds that one would normally not be able to achieve, but eventually can adapt to. This will lead to faster speeds overall which may be hard to get to if only doing road or track work.

WORKOUT 1: Discover your workout speed or workout effort

Warm up with this sequence:

4 min easy jog, whatever speed works. For me that is 4 MPH.

Then, do this cycle with each time increasing the speed by .5 MPH:

30 sec @ Speed, then 30 sec rest back to your jog speed.

Keep increasing the speed until you find that it is almost too hard to keep up, but not so hard that you cannot. You may find that you will pass the speed you should be working out at where you will find it took everything you had to just hold on for 30 seconds, which is OK, so make your workout speed .5 MPH less than that number.

Once you find that speed, then if you don't feel too tired, run another 2 intervals at that speed:

:30 @ X MPH, then rest for 1:00 in between intervals.

WORKOUTS AFTER 1: increase the number of times you can repeat speed X for :30, with rest interval of 1:00

Warm up again, 4 min easy jog, then do 30 sec @ speed with 30 sec rest. Increase speed by .5 MPH each time until you hit X MPH. Then take a 1.5 min easy jog.

Start with 4 repeats at :30 @ X MPH, with rest interval of 1:00

Then each workout time afterwards, try to increase by one more repeat. So next workout 5 repeats at :30 @ X MPH, with rest interval of 1:00, then 6 x :30 @ X MPH, RI 1:00, then 7 x :30 @ X MPH, RI 1:00, etc. If you cannot add one more repeat, then just stop at the previous number of repeats.

Total time for these workouts is less than 20 min usually.

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16. The typical marathon before and race day looks like this for me:

Day before:

No training. Check into the race, get your race materials. Make sure you have enough supplies: Clothes, shoes, sports drinks, gels, etc. I also like to buy whatever it is I'm going to eat tomorrow morning.

Prepare everything you're going to race with on the floor. I put my running shoes, hat, sunglasses, shirt, tights or pants, socks, etc. all on the floor and lay it out. I stick gels in my fuel belt. I pin my race number to my shirt or use a race number belt.

That night I eat a big pasta dinner. There is some evidence that you should eat a pasta dinner 2 nights before. I personally like to do both if possible. I think just the night before is probably enough. If it's going to be a warm day, i may also toss salt on the pasta to help with electrolyte loading.

Then i go sit on the toilet and try to crap as much out as possible. I know this sounds bad, but you don't want to go and crap out on the race course. It's the worst feeling.

Morning of Race:

I like to get up about 3 hours before race start. As soon as i get up, I start eating my breakfast and get dressed. My typical breakfast is a hard boiled egg and maybe 1/4 of a bagel, plus a glass of sports recovery drink. This is to carbo load one last time before the race but with something that doesn't upset my stomach. As soon as I finish eating, I go sit on the toilet and try to crap one more time.

I usually try to wear something warm as mornings can be cool depending on where you race. I bring a small pack with me to stuff everything in. Sometimes races will give you a plastic bag. In any case, whatever you bring you should mark it with your name and race number. I also bring a small plastic bottle of water with me, and one gel.

Then I get down to race start. For a marathon, there is usually a truck where you can hand in your backpack or bag of stuff. Thus you can arrive with warm clothes and then take them off and put them in a bag or pack and hand it to the truck guy. The truck then carries all the racer's bags/packs to the finish line where you can pick it up. I stretch and warmup about 30 min before race start. I will run some light short reps back and forth to get my blood going. About 10 min before race i take the gel and sip some water. I try not to drink too much water or else i have to go to the bathroom.

17. Recovery is so important. It's probably the least understood aspect of training. You need to rest your body and brain enough so that you can recover and grow for your next workout. Thus, triathletes are in a constant state of body breakdown and it takes time to adapt to daily stress over a period of 6 straight days of workouts, including double workouts (or triple) on some days. Most people don't rest enough and this can cause dwindling performance and lead to injury and overtraining.

I think you should run 3 days per week with rest days in between, or recovery workouts in between. By recovery workout, i mean you can pedal on a bike or Lifecycle gently for about 20-30 min to help flush out bad stuff in your muscles and bring new nutrients in. Swimming is also a good recovery workout if you don't swim hard. Also, I think you should not run the day after your long run. I think you'll reach a mileage that you'll find you're fairly sore the day after. So take the day off!

You know I'm a fan of ice baths so they help remove soreness, help flush out bad stuff, and get new nutrients into muscles. Since you're right by the beach, you could probably even just walk into the surf up to your upper thighs for about 10 minutes, since the surf is pretty cold.

Also, if you find that you are still very sore on the day after your rest day, take the day off also. Do not be afraid to take an extra day!

During the long training periods of ironman for me, I take one full day off, then the next day i can only do a recovery run and swim. Then on the second day after, I usually do a bike recovery workout. It's only on the third day that I am back to being able to do a full effort workout. Before that it's impossible. So I just accept that fact and rest that long. If I don't, I could get injured and definitely would be pushing my body beyond what it is capable of absorbing at that moment. There was a time when I was pushing very hard and recovery even spilled into the third day and it was on the fourth day that I could finally do a full effort workout. It was only when I discovered protein powder that it almost brought my recovery back by a whopping full 2 days!

18. Eating is important. Your body needs calories to perform. It will not be able to do so on what you have stored in your body right now. That is because 1) the fat that is stored in your body is not easily accessible to heavy activity, and 2) your body has not stored enough glycogen in the muscles because you haven't trained enough yet, and 3) your body has not yet developed the ability to convert the fat in your body to glycogen. So you should eat afterwards both in protein (to repair the muscle damage sustained in training) and carbs (to be stored in your muscles for use in the next day's of training). You should try to eat within 1-2 hours after workouts to make sure you get enough. Otherwise, the body will start to cannibalize muscle tissue to recover, and you will feel drained because the body is attempting to restore glycogen in muscles but now is sucking it dry and attempting to do so by a much slower process of using other sources such as fat and protein. In fact it is so slow that you will not be recovered by the next day or perhaps even the day after! So eat right after each workout, even if it is a piece of fruit or smoothie for shorter workouts. For a long workout, I would definitely look at eating a larger meal to get protein and carbs back into your body.

Whew!! That's a lot of information to digest! So many things to think about preparing for the race and then during the race itself! It can feel overwhelming but after a while it all comes pretty natural.

Here is a typical marathon build in Google docs. The dates correspond to this year's Honolulu Marathon. Note that this employs a 3 week build, followed by a 1 week recovery week to give your body a break before beginning another 3 weeks of building running time.

If you're reading this and you're a first time marathoner, hopefully you'll find this info useful. If you have any questions/comments/concerns, feel free to comment!

A long time ago in Bicycling magazine, I saw an unflattering side shot of Jan Ullrich at the Tour de France showing his belly jutting out. It was, however, an article on breathing from the diaphragm and how it gives you added ability to get more air into your system. The Jan Ullrich picture was not illustrate that he had developed a beer gut, but rather that he was showing a more effective breathing method. Here are some pics of Lance Armstrong on this post from CyclingNews Forums notice how low his belly hangs. He's also a master of belly breathing.

This came up again just recently for me. I am attempting to build for the Honolulu Marathon at the end of the year right now and just completed my base phase, after about 2 false starts due to having a baby this year and also a nasty allergy attack which set me back about 2 weeks. Previously this year, I had gone out twice to see if I could complete my usual track benchmark of 10x400s RI 1:00. But for some reason, I would seriously wipeout at about 4 400s. I tried both running a little aggressively, and also then tried the second time at a more conservative pace. But no dice. I would get to 4 laps and wipe out.

This was very wrong! In years past, I could always complete my benchmark workout. But this year, I think there was a big difference. This was the fact that I was doing a lot of neuromuscular training on the treadmill. My nervous system is now primed to moving my legs faster than in previous years which is great, but it is unknown how long I can maintain a faster pace since these workouts tend to be a minute maximum with lots of rest, and are more for getting my nervous system used to moving my legs fast and not using extra energy to do that.

So when I hit the track, I was just moving my legs faster given that my nervous system was now OK with that, but I think I hit an upper limit to my lung capacity given the way I was breathing.

All right: I admit it. When I'm out there, I tend to suck in my gut to make myself look better and not like I have a fat belly. But I think this has created an artificial upper bound to my lung capacity because it doesn't allow me to fully engage my diaphragm when I breathe.

Thus, on previous attempts this year, I would run faster 400s which is good, but wipe out a lot sooner as the oxygen in my system got quickly used up due to running at a faster pace.

The clue I received was from my sports medicine person who told me about belly breathing. I thought about my issues with my benchmark track workout and thought this was worth a try.

Yesterday I headed out to the track and decided to emphasize belly breathing. As soon as I took off the starting line, I would begin to breathe deeply through my belly, and not expanding my chest. I would also practice doing full breaths like this more rapidly. This allowed me to get to the end of my 10x400s and not be totally wiped out. Success!

So I sacrificed a little better profile view of my body for faster speed and sustaining a higher effort. Too bad. I'm still glad I'm improving and getting faster.

More on belly/diaphragm breathing at Wikipedia.

Last year, I got hold of a Normatec MVP and immediately fell in love with it. Going through Ironman training with it has been amazing; after my long rides/runs, I would use it for 30-45 minutes and my legs would feel so refreshed and recovered, and help me be ready for the next day's workout.

The other week, my MVP electronics unit died! Training for a marathon right now, I am building up to my usual 3 hour/18 mile runs. But man, I can sure feel the difference even so early in my build. I've only been running about 1 to 1:15 but working hard with a lively negative split each time.

Without the MVP, I am feeling so much more tighter and sore than using it immediately post-workout. Yesterday after running, I started up my ice baths but that was still not enough to match the effects of a 30-45 minute session with the MVP.

I sent it back to be fixed last week and cannot wait to get it back soon...!

One of the tools I use for better running has nothing to do with my feet; it's my ears!

Great running form is nearly soundless. Each footfall should land with barely any noise, signaling that there is no wasted energy directed into the ground and that as much energy as possible is driving the body forward. Also, it means that there is minimal shock transferred back up the leg and into the body.

Every time I run, I strive for soundless running. I try my best to train my legs to have light footfalls, even while they are cycling fast during sprinting.

Whenever I start to hear louder thumping, I know I'm doing something wrong. Maybe I'm getting tired, or getting lazy, and not concentrating on how I'm placing my foot down. Perhaps I'm moving too fast and I need more training for light footfalls at higher cycle rates. Or sometimes I hear a louder thump from one leg than the other; that means that one of my legs is not moving in the same way as the other - something that needs to be fixed!

Training for light footfalls can be difficult. I have to pick up my leg in order to run, but I don't want to pick it up too much or else I raise the chance of thumping the leg on the ground. I try to glide my foot across the ground as low as possible, and the gently place it down on my forefoot as my body moves forward and this motion is repeated on the other side. Sometimes my legs are moving too fast, like during sprinting or tempo running, and I need to focus even harder on placing light footfalls.

As I glide my foot forward, I also strive to maintain an even head height and not let it bounce up and down. Bouncing means that I'm wasting energy moving my body up when it should all be directed towards moving my body forward. Inevitably, bouncing leads to louder running as the legs must absorb the energy of the body coming down on each step.

Hills can be challenge, with downhill being harder. I have to aim my foot at an angle down the slope of the hill, while leaning over the foot to keep them under me. The dropping away of a decline means that I need to compensate for that when my foot moves forward to take a step, but also down the slope of the hill.

Then, training for repeatability of light footfalls over time is next. Maintaining light footfalls may be OK for short runs, but training to maintain light footfalls over the length of a marathon means extending my neuromuscular training over time. When we get tired, the legs don't respond as well and light footfalls may be the first thing to go.

Soundless running is really important to minimize the chance of injury. When you place each foot down with minimal sound, you are landing with minimal shock transmitted back up the leg and into the body. Over time, lots of shock transmitted up the leg will lead to all sorts of problems. Silent running will minimize that shock and allow you to run injury free.

Therefore, whenever I run, my ears are attuned to my footfalls and my goal is to run as silent as possible.

In the last few months, I've been really into Total Immersion and their teaching method. Swimming is one of those activities which require mastery of so many little details that trying to learn swimming all at once is very very difficult. So they do a great job of breaking down technique with drills, and enforcing focus on only one thing at a time so that you can master that without getting confused by other things you're trying to learn. Thus, I've spent the last many months, and plan on for the better part of this year, in breaking down exactly what is wrong with my stroke and working on each individual part one at a time.

This has led me to believe that its teaching concepts in the area of form training can be applied to any other physical activity, especially in the case of cycling and running for me. In thinking about this, I thought I could encapsulate it in the 4 S's of form training:

1. SYSTEM: You must have a system for identifying problems, removing bad habits and imprinting new and correct habits. With TI, they've done all that for you. Running has some great methods now (ie. ChiRunning, Pose Method) that strive to break down running so that you can focus on parts of your form. I have not found that to be true yet of cycling and would love to be pointed to some that discuss cycling form.

Without a system, you will inevitably try to do too much at once and see little or no improvement as old habits remain ingrained, and you can't imprint new correct ones. It also means that you are hampering your brain/body's ability to imprint new habits; someone once told me that you have to do something about 45 days or so to imprint a new habit. This means that you have to perform the new habit in the new way that many times exactly!

2. SENSITIVITY: You need to develop and have a sensitivity to what you're doing wrong and also what you're doing right. When habits become ingrained, they become commonplace and we don't even notice when we're doing something. This is both good and bad. Correct habits ingrained means we're unconsciously performing optimally and not exerting excess energy and brain power to maintain activity. But if we've ingrained a bad habit, we may actually not know we're doing something wrong because we've been doing it that way for so long. So we need to develop the body awareness to know how are bodies are moving both when we're moving slow and especially when we're moving fast. Slow is much easier, but when we're cycling our arms and legs fast this may become too much to easily discern how and where are body parts are moving. Once we can know when we're doing something wrong, then we can take steps to fix that.

3. SUSTAINABILITY: Once we ingrain new habits, we must be able to sustain them over the course of training and during the long hours of a race. Thus, we must be constantly wary of falling into old bad habits especially when we get tired and/or we lose our mental focus. Training only good habits and extending them over time will ingrain good form that is sustainable over a long time, ensuring an efficient race (and probably also injury free).

4. SYMMETRY: One thing that gets sometimes overlooked is the importance of symmetry of habits on each side of your body. We humans are built with two halves, both mirror images of each other. But unfortunately, we often perform the same activity differently on each side of our body due to old habits, favoring our strong side, muscle inbalances, etc. So while our form may be great on one side, we may find that the other side is challenged. Therefore, training to make sure that we even out both sides to equal form is important or else bad form on one side can actually affect performance on the other side.

Going back to the first S which is SYSTEM, it may be hard to find a system for your activity. TI does a great job for swimming and there are some running ones, but for cycling it may be hard. But finding a great SYSTEM will enable SUSTAINABILITY and SYMMETRY more, and help you train your brain to be more SENSITIVE.

In recent months, I've come to realize how much I love the tempo trainer for swimming. It also sparked the realization that I have finally found a method for to ensure measurability and repeatability for swimming.

What's so important about measurability and repeatability?

Repeatability is the ability to come back day after day and train with a certain level of effort, intensity, etc. and ensure that you're creating the same conditions as you had the last time you trained. Measurability allows you to measure those conditions to ensure repeatability.

For example, weight training has both easy measurability and repeatability. That 30 lbs. dumbbell is still going to weigh 30 lbs. the next time you pick it up. Thus, you'll know if you are getting stronger or weaker, depending on how many reps you can curl that dumbbell.

The problem with us triathletes is that it's not so easy to have measurability and repeatability with our three sports. Of the three running is probably the most measurable and repeatable. With cycling and swimming it's not so easy.

If you don't have an accurate way to measure effort and the ability to create conditions to ensure repeatability, you won't know for sure if you're improving over time. For example, you may have increasing effort, but you may be actually performing worse if you're overtraining.

So it's important to be able to measure your training conditions and to recreate them so that you know with some level of certainty that you're improving, or how your body is performing so that you know when to back off or increase effort.

I thought I'd list my favorite training tools to maximize measurability and repeatability:

RUNNING:

Treadmill - The treadmill allows you to recreate running conditions with great accuracy, in both speed, duration, and grade. Its relentless nature doesn't allow you to fall behind; if you do, you either fly off the back of the treadmill or have to keep up. Thus, I can generally know if I'm either improving over time or not, or if I'm just a bit tired and can't repeat a workout on a particular day.

Track or measured distance running - Running a measured distance and recording the time allows you to know if you're improving over that distance and path.

CYCLING:

Power meter - Riding outside with my Powertap allows me to see what my instantaneous power is, as well as for the entire ride. I can compare that over a given path, or even just against other rides, and see how my power output compares to previous rides. With power measurement, I don't necessarily need to ride the same path; I can compare power outputs and see if I was able to increase overall power output or not.

Computrainer - The Computrainer is the best way to repeat workout conditions. After the calibration step, it will give you the same workout conditions as you had last time.

SWIMMING:

Tempo Trainer + Counting Strokes - You would think that swimming intervals was good enough for repeatability. However, swimming is a complex activity that is dependent not only on raw endurance and strength, but also on your technique. If your goal is not simply to just work harder (which I would argue it shouldn't be because you can only go so much faster by more effort and you can do much better by refining and reinforcing technique), then you need to not only measure your interval time but also how well you swam the interval. If you think about it, you can go faster by increasing your stroke rate. But if your technique gets messy, you might swim an interval at the same time as if you had swam it before with better technique but lower stroke rate. Thus, the tempo trainer ensures you are not changing your stroke rate, and counting strokes gives you a measure of how good your technique is.

With these training tools and methods, I can ensure measurability and repeatability of training conditions, giving me a nice picture of how I'm improving (or not!).

I'm running my first 5K tomorrow and noticed they were using RFID embedded plastic timing chips! They're pretty cool:

They sealed an RFID chip into this plastic strip, and there is adhesive on one end to attach it to your running shoe:

I wonder if they will start using these for triathlons. They look like they would be waterproof, but the strap would have to be longer and different to go around your ankle. But definitely they should work for run races.

Looks like they're powered by RFID chips from Impinj.

A buddy of mine asked me how I go out there and just run long, day after day, week after week. Here is the email I sent him:

You have hit on a key element in long distance racing, which is the mental aspect.

Some things to try:

1. Get used to the time. If you do this a lot, pretty soon you'll just be used to being out there that long.

2. Grow to just love running. If you love what you do, you can do it longer!

3. Keep mentally occupied, like having a set of intervals to run which require you to look at your watch, compute times and paces, etc. Pretty soon before you know it, you're through the workout and the time goes by pretty quickly.

4. Music helps although I don't train or race with music generally, since it's not allowed at triathlons. I never run with music, although I do like music while on the bike trainer, but not while I'm out riding as it's dangerous and I can't hear cars coming.

5. Don't focus on pain. This never works for me. I just want to quit! If anything, I try to focus on perfect form, which tends to lessen or remove pain. I never try to get out of perfect form to lessen my pain, which could cause me to hurt somewhere else!

6. Focus on repetition and perfect form for every step. I try to keep aware of each step and try to make each step my perfect step. Get used to repeating for long periods of time.

7. Focus on distance goals, like running out to a point and then back, or saying I'm going to finish this loop. Then mentally you're committed and you will yourself not to quit and turnaround because you said you're going to run somewhere and then back.

8. Interesting terrain helps.

It's one of those things where you need to train this as much as the physical aspects. Most people can get physically capable of finishing a race of any distance; you just need to swim/bike/run the distances and you're pretty much physically there. But many people don't have the mental stamina to finish. This is the will that drives you to the finish line even if your body is screaming for you to quit.

Given all this, there are still some days when you just don't have it mentally. At this point, you should just go home because on some days you'll find you just won't be able to do the workout. But make sure you're quitting for the right reason and not just slacking because you're lazy.

If you're really into some of this stuff, I often use Biorhythms (http://bit.ly/6LV2P) to help give me some forewarning on days when I may not have the right physical or mental attitude for a hard workout. I will post more about this later, but it's an interesting way of looking at your body's energy and how to apply it to training.

I often get asked how I can race year after year and stay relatively injury free. They remark that I am 40+ years old and wonder how I can just keep doing this and get faster each time.

It took me 7 years of tinkering with my own body, trying a multitude of advice and training, even trying a bunch of technology from shoes to straps, before I figured out how to keep my body injury free.

Recently, someone tweeted about an article, The painful truth about trainers: Are running shoes a waste of money? from DailyMail, which really disappointed me. It disappointed me in the fact that we often try to simplify things and try to solve our problems with one thing. But it's not just about one thing, like running shoes as the article suggests, or even the lack of shoes which the article also suggests. Running involves a whole system of muscles, joints, bones, and coordination and how it works during running and over time. You need to address the whole system and not just one thing.

In answering the question of how I stay relatively injury free and race year after year at these long distance events, getting faster every time, I wanted to start with talking about what I have learned in what causes injury. In my next post, I will talk about what I did to address these causes of injury.

Now I will do something that I hate doing, which is to simplify (haha!). I will list a few basic things which I have found cause injury in runners:

Pounding

People talk about how the ground pounds the feet, legs, and body while running. Unfortunately, it's true. Every step you take puts shock back up into your body, and you have to absorb it somehow through your shoes, feet, legs, muscles, bones - whatever. Over time, exceeding the shock absorption qualities of your body relative to your running style will injure you. The object, then, is to reduce and minimize the shock that your body experiences. A combination of reducing the shock experienced AND increasing your body's ability to absorb shock will reduce the possibility of injury.

The Build Up of Tightness and Restrictions in Muscles

Muscles get tired and tight after training. It's natural. Restrictions and adhesions form because the muscle fibers tear during training and they get stronger through this process. Lactate by-products also cause tightness in the muscles and need to get flushed out - the faster they get flushed out, the faster your muscles will recover. Depending on your age and your fitness level, your muscles can loosen up in a few hours, or require days. The intensity of the effort will also affect the amount of tightness experienced and thus also the amount of time to recover.

I have also found that muscles tend to develop a tendency to form certain adhesions or tightness in the same spots until my body adapts to a new training stress. This has happened repeatedly over the course of an entire season; very annoying!

The problem with the buildup of tightness and restrictions is that if they are not removed, they can keep building and building, causing restricted motion and potential strain of the muscles. But there is a more dangerous effect: the tightness in your muscles can seriously reduce their ability to absorb shock, thereby transferring the shock from your muscles to the tendons and ligaments, or ultimately to cartilage and bone, which causes really bad things like fractures.

Cumulative Build-Up of Injury

Related to the previous is actual injury to your body and not letting it heal. You gut your way through pain thinking that is what will build you up, but in actuality you're just causing more and more injury. Finally, something really bad happens, like a tendon gives way, or a real muscle tear happens, or even a fracture.

Not Enough Recovery Time

A lot of people get really gung-ho about training. They raise the amount they do in trying to attain their goal, whether it's to lose a certain amount of weight, prepare for a race, or just get to a fitness level that is consistent with their training friends. They may have gotten a coach, who just delivers a plan that is more valid for young athletes or those that are experienced, but unfortunately may not be appropriate for them. The end result is that in the midst of training, athletes' bodies attempt to keep up but due to some factor(s), they are unable to recover fast enough given their training schedules. The result is a build up of injury and tired muscles which leads to injury.

Many training plans, or following the training plans of others, don't account for individual needs. Everybody has their own recovery time given certain factors and the best training plans account for this.

Failure to recognize one's own recovery needs is a common problem. It's often not clear exactly how much one's body needs, and sometimes not until you get injured. Factors that influence recovery time are:

1. Length and intensity of workouts
2. Age
3. Sleep, ie. did you get enough sleep?
4. Active recovery sessions and techniques
5. Fitness level, both past and present, ie. did you run track in high school or college, or were you sedentary all the way up to the point at which you started now?

Weak Supporting Muscles, Unbalanced Muscles

I never realized how many small muscles are used in supporting running until these muscles got sore during my training. In the past, I weight trained but the result focused on the big muscle groups and didn't really build up smaller supporting muscles. Also, being right handed, my right side was used more resulting in an even bigger imbalance between my two sides.

These small muscles are the ones that maintain your form perfectly stride over stride. If these muscles are weak, then over time they will tire and then your form will get sloppy. You subtly adjust your stride to compensate and then problems can occur when your big muscles are taking on the load of moving your body and balancing, not to mention overstraining those supporting muscles in the first place.

The way I discovered my inbalance was twofold. The first was on the Computrainer on the SpinScan where I could see as I pedaled, a graph of my power output. I was clearly dominating the power from my right side! The second way was through racing. Pushing hard through Vineman, my right hip and leg got really sore, tired, and started cramping while my left leg was tired, but relatively cramp free. It became obvious to me that I was just using my right leg more.

Using my right leg more also resulted in more problems for my left leg, showing strain in my calf and IT band, and quads, while my right leg exhibited less issues. It was an issue that has taken a long time to address, and it's still not fully solved.

Inconsistency in Training

In observing friends who train, I find there is a huge inconsistency in their training. They all say they go out and run, but when you ask them daily if they ran, you start to realize that they train only intermittently. Some weeks they'll run 3 times. The next week they run once. Then the week after they don't run at all. The week after that they'll run 2 times. And then it's two weeks of no running. And so on.

Consistency is key in training. Your body does not adapt to something by doing it occasionally. You need to do it regularly such that the body will recognize it needs to adapt to a new level of activity and stress and will do so accordingly.

If you are inconsistent, then you'll inevitably set yourself up for pain and injury as you'll constantly think that you can do more, but in actuality your body hasn't even adapted to what your mind thinks your body can do.

Bad Running Form

I watched my kid run and she has perfect running form. Great body lean forward, arms pumping, barely a thump on the ground for every step, floating on the balls of their feet.

Then we get older and something changes. We get heavier so it takes more effort to run. We don't run constantly enough any more and enjoy sitting in front of the TV or computer screen more than going out and running. We drive cars and take elevators. Our bodies forget how to run efficiently and either we go out for track and train during high school, or we spend those years in high school letting our bodies forget how to run well.

Go out and watch other people run. You'll see people leaning or hunched over. They swing their arms back and forth across their bodies. They pound down the pavement and you wince with every thump on the ground as you imagine the stress their bodies are absorbing. Some lean back while they run, resisting the pull of gravity backward as they try to move forward!

Bad form means body parts don't align when you run. You're putting stress not along the strongest muscles, but against the weaker muscles of the sides of your legs. If you're heel striking, you send the maximal shock up into your leg bones. If you wave your arms across your body, you're not taking advantage of the balancing movement that swinging arms forward and back brings. If you're hunched over, then you're adding stress to your shoulders and back and you can't move efficiently if you're all stiffened up!

All this leads to wasted effort and energy, and can lead to pulled/strained muscles because you're not relaxed and not running efficiently.

Doing Too Much Too Soon

Enthusiasm in runners is great. But many don't listen to their bodies and just do too much too soon. It is often hard to know exactly what our bodies can take before we try. But sometimes, we just exceed what our bodies can do or recover from and that's where injury occurs. We go for a marathon when we should have trained for a 10K and a half marathon first, and over a period of years.

Or, in our competitive zeal, we go out and try to become the fastest humans we can first time out and we get hurt because we didn't get our bodies up to adapting to the stresses yet.

Or we have someone driving us too hard, like an army sargeant coach, or friends who are more faster and experienced who egg you onwards when you go out and run with them. These are people who make you feel bad for going too slow, and you try to rise up to their challenge. Don't get me wrong; some people need this kind of motivation. But it's bad when you try and you don't listen to or know your body and you hurt yourself simply to save face.

Doing Something New

Related to doing too much too soon, doing something new that your body is not adapted to can also lead to injury. Suppose you've never run before. Then your friends tell you it's great and they run, and they want you to go out and run with them. So you do it. Then after a few times, your legs are aching. Now why is that?

Probably because in your desire to keep up with your friends, you go out and try to keep up with people who are used to running more than you. Then your body protests because you're trying to do something that your body is not used to. If you continue to gut your way through it, you might make it to adapting, or you might go downward into injury.

My Painful Path to Ironman

On my path to Ironman, I chose to start with an Olympic triathlon first, working with Team in Training. Then I raced a half ironman, swam the Waikiki Rough Water Swim (2.5 miles), and also ran the NYC Marathon. I did each stage of the full ironman before I did the full thing. But still, it was too much too soon.

Before my first Olympic tri, I had not done any running at all. I cycled intermittently and didn't really know how to swim. My body was not damaged from a previous injury thankfully, but my lack of a history of athletic pursuits, and adding in my age of 37, and the fact that my body adapts to physical stress at a certain rate, all meant that as I built up towards my first triathlon, my body was just not able to keep up.

I was constantly getting too tight and stretching could not alleviate the tightness. I tried to keep up with my Team in Training buddies on the training schedule but that was even too much for me. I kept getting sore legs and my IT bands were really sore. My knees were also getting sore from all the tightness in the surrounding muscles and the shock of my poor heel striking running form. I just thought that I would follow the plan and everything would be all right. It was definitely not, but I did make it through my first triathlon although I thought it really sucked.

After this episode, I resolved to figure this whole thing out. I tried everything and read up on everything I could get my hands on. I found out that most doctors don't know anything about running. I found out that a lot of research has been done, but a lot of it has turned out to be false. I tried technology and that worked sometimes but not all the time. I went for another 2 years of training, gutting through my first half ironman and other Olympic triathlons until 2004 when I left my company and could spend a lot more time trying to figure this out and how to remove all these nagging aches and pains that I experienced.

The journey I went on to solve all this is my next blog post - stay tuned!

A buddy of mine was trying Pose Method running for the first time, and was having problems with calf and shin pain. I sent him these tips on starting out with Pose Method, which is changing to a forefoot runner and improving on form, strength and balance and thought that these tips might be worthy of posting to my blog as well:

1. After watching the Pose video (my buddy also bought and watched the video), I tried some of his drills. Personally I felt that I could get there without many of the drills. The essential take-away from Pose Method is to run more forefoot and to stop heel striking.

2. The static drills I found most useful are those that involve balance and core. These involve standing on one leg for a period of time, standing on one leg and moving the free leg through a running motion, etc. They improve your balance and stability and build up both the large muscles (ie. quads and calves, etc) and the tiny muscles that you never hear about. Often its the tiny muscles that are involved in efficient balance and you want them to be stronger. But if they are not, then they tire out and transfer the stress to the big muscles and once they tire out, your form goes to hell and you eventually can get injured or strained.

3. Form is key. You need to now change the way you're running to a more forward stance. So Pose's leaning concepts and the way they say you should move your legs under you work well. You have to burn this into your brain and body until it's natural. This is what takes time and practice.

4. This unfortunately means some possibly very sore calves, and it sounds like shins, in your case. Pose says this should last about a month. For constant runners and young people, I think this may be true.

But I will tell you that I am an edge case because in the first year it took months for me to adapt, plus weekly physical therapy to work out tightness in my calves. Then each year, after my off season, my calves would become sore again for some months before adapting, with PT working out the tightness. I think after my 3rd year into my 4th my calves FINALLY stopped protesting, although this year I have tightness with my flexor hallicus which is one of those small muscles that runs along the achilles tendon and under the bottom of the big soleus calf muscle. The unfortunate thing is that I can only manage it with PT and never give it time to fully heal; I am training every week and hope it doesn't get worse, which as long as I go to PT it does not.

Non-tight calves and shins are essential for shock absorbtion and the return of spring energy back into the stride so that you are light on your feet and you are running fast. Otherwise, it will feel like your stomping around in army boots, which basically means you're not lightly and efficiently running but transferring a lot of force into the ground, which returns that force back up into your legs, knees, hips and body as pounding stress which will lead to injury.

Other form tips:

Run with a head that is always level and not bouncing up and down.

Move your legs under you as if they are just brushing off the ground and you're not stomping into it. Your stride should feel light and fast. Leg turnover is the name of the game, not lengthening your stride to compensate. Thus your heart rate will rise as more leg turnover raises your heart rate but you will get used to it.

You also want a slight body lean forward to enable gravity to help you in the run, not lean back so that gravity pulls you backward as you're trying to go forward.

Your arms should be held loosely by your side, swinging only forward and back, not side to side across your body like you're trying to do the watoosi (sp?). The arms help you maintain your balance as your legs are moving under the body. Don't hold them stiffly down by your side or tense them.

Your body should be upright with your chest presented proudly, but not overly forward. This helps in the forward lean and also keeps your head up and not hunched over. You should have a slight tension between your shoulder blades to pull your shoulders back slightly; not too tensed but just a little. This also helps in opening up your chest for better breathing and maintaining posture.

5. If you can find an ART practictioner in your area, I would go weekly to work through your calves and shins if you can afford the time and money, until they adapt. Once they adapt you can back off to once every two weeks or once a month plus on demand if things pop up.

6. If regular PT is not for you, then I would get a foam roller (you find one at amazon) or better, the TP Massage Roller. I would get the longer one which is more versatile and gives you more room to roll different parts of your leg. You can then roll your calves and your shins (the meaty muscle part, which are the peroneals and anterior tibalis, not the shin bone). The rolling will help take out the tightness in a big way, and it's also a great way to warm up which is to roll before you stretch and go out and run.

7. Stretching is always good, but often you'll find that you can't stretch out some of the tightness. But keep stretching nevertheless as it's good for you, even if the protesting muscles won't stretch out.

8. I would also start out more moderately. For example, in the balance exercises, he says to balance on the ball of the foot immediately. I think this may be too much for beginners. You can start by just standing there with your foot flat on the ground first. When you get used to balancing, then you can lift the heel up. Also, I would start being more conservative on the time you balance, maybe so short that it feels dumb, like 10 seconds. Your body may need more time building up the strength in a way that doesn't leave you with sore calves and shins. So you can start with 10 seconds for 3X a week for maybe 1-2 weeks and then add 10 seconds to that for another 3X week for 1-2 weeks and so on. Jumping to 30 seconds may be too much.

9. This also goes for running, especially if you're not used to running. You can go to a flat surface like a track and then practice keeping your Pose method form. Run and walk so that you give your calves a break from holding your body up, like run for 20-30 seconds and then walk for a minute. Later you start adding to your run time and reduce your walk time as your strength and fitness builds.

Also you can start out very low in time, like 10 minutes total for running (or run/walk) straight through not counting some drills time. Then keep the 10 minutes for a 1-2 weeks, and then add 5-10 minutes every 2 weeks. I know it sounds so short, but I found during my early days that my body would just keep getting tighter and tighter until something really got sore if I ran normal workouts so early in my training. You really have to listen to your body and do what it needs, and we also have to remember we're older now and recover slower, and build up muscle slower too.

10. Doing core exercises are really good also. I am trying to find a good book which shows a lot of good exercises but don't know of any that are really great. You can try Idiot's Guide to Core Conditioning which is pretty good. I would stick to bridges and planks and avoid the twisting exercises which can stress the discs in your back. I would also go to the section with the medicine ball which has some really great exercises to build up both your stomach and back muscles. Having strong core muscles allows you to hold your body upright and not slouch during running, which ruins your form.

Or you can find a personal trainer as most of them train core these days, if you watch them work with others in a gym.

11. Don't forget to take a day off in between working on this stuff to rest. If your calves are overly sore now, then you might want to take enough days off to make sure they are finally not sore, and then start again. Hopefully this will be in 2-3 days of not running. If you find that after a week they are still sore, you might want to find a PT person to help you out.

Hope these tips help all you beginning runners too!

I've been doing this workout for a long time now. I do it through my offseason to keep my legs moving fast, and I also do it as a recovery workout since it's of such short duration. It incorporates running drills on the treadmill, and then uses the treadmill relentless speed to get your legs moving and get you used to moving them fast with less effort:

This is a great workout to stimulate your neuromuscular system in your legs and get them used to moving at faster speeds. You also practice relaxing so that you move your legs fast but don't burn out your aerobic or your anaerobic capacity.

When you first start out, do Option 1. You'll find that maintaining high speeds is really tough and that your heart rate is leaping to your lactate threshold fast. This is OK and natural. You may find that you have set it too fast to get to 20:00. Keep dialing the max speed until you find that you are able to do repeats out until 20:00. Once you have done this workout at these speeds a few times, then try increasing the max speed.

I found that it has taken me 2-3 years to get to a point where I have maxed out the treadmill. The first time through I could only get to 11-12 MPH by having a 1:00 rest interval. But another year passed and now I could get to 11-12 MPH with only :30 rest interval.

Other details:

1. You may find that your legs feel restricted and that you're having problems moving them fast. If it's a physical problem, you may need extra rest before doing this workout, or it could be a more systemic problem where you have restrictions in your muscles. This was my issue, and I solved it by having a competent ART specialist work my psoas, hip, and glutes to remove the restrictions that have been there for decades and my speed naturally increased once the restriction was gone.

2. In order to gain high speeds, you may find that you want to start doing :15 or :20 intervals at super high speeds - speeds that you can't maintain a :30 interval with. So perhaps an Option 3 would look like:

:30 high speed, :30 RI, keeping increasing the speed until you reach a speed where you can't do the speed for :30 but you can only do :15-:20 with a :45-1:00 RI.

Alternate this workout with workouts that maintain a max speed for :30 only for the entire workout.

Remember: you can't run fast without actually running that fast (if that makes sense).

Once you get into the groove of doing this workout regularly, I guarantee you will find that your normal running times will increase dramatically as your legs and your aerobic system get used to moving your legs fast with minimal effort.

A lot of focus on hill climbing in either running or cycling is on building leg strength, and aerobic capacity to support a strong push up the hill. Hill climbing for me has been a real challenge; I have been training constantly to increase my leg strength. However, I did discover another piece of training that is also important to hill climbing on both running and cycling. This is neuromuscular training.

Ever go sprinting up a hill and you're going anaerobic? Your breath is heaving and your legs are burning. You're using up all that strength and energy to accelerate up that hill and once you get over it, your legs collapse in energy output, just happy to not be exerting any more. You find that as you crest the hill, you have no more left and you just let the back side of the hill accelerate as you coast down the hill. Or worse for running, you find that you can't even move your legs because you wasted them and your aerobic capacity going up the hill and now you can't take advantage of the down hill to speed up because your legs are wiped out.

In the last few months as my leg strength has increased, I have found that neuromuscular training has played a nice role in maintaining and increasing speed as I blast up the hill and crest it. How is this so? It mainly comes from training the legs to continue their movement even while you have used up some anaerobic/aerobic capacity going up the hill. Most of the time, after we crest the hill and after a hard effort, our legs are so wasted that they can't even move any more. But this is bad. They need to keep moving so that we don't lose speed and we can accelerate on the downhill.

Neuromuscular speed training helps us to relax and become accustomed to mvoing our legs very quickly. It becomes second nature to move our legs very fast and we learn how to do it with minimal energy expenditure.

Thus, as we crest the hill, I have found that I can relax the legs to rest after the hard effort up the hill, but keep my neurons firing to cycle the legs and either keep revolutions going on the bike, or keep my legs moving and running downhill. When I relax my legs, they recover from the hard effort and it also lets my aerobic system recover as well. I don't slow down, which is the key thing. I can maintain speed or accelerate but also recover.

It has reinforced the need for neuromuscular training for both the bike and running. Fast one legged sets at 100+ RPM, and super fast short running sets on the treadmill - both of these really brought me some unseen benefits in hill climbing.

In my interactions with my coach M2, I have learned that there are 6 types of training. These are:

1. Neuro-muscular - training of the nervous system to do something either differently, better, or to some form which maximizes efficiency and minimizes effort. Example: super short high speed treadmill intervals for 15-30 seconds per interval, form focus workouts for swimming.

2. Speed - training that results in being faster. Examples: swimming speed sets, sprinting track workouts for running.

3. Strength - training that results in you being stronger, and to put out more energy at the same effort. Examples: hill climbing in running, hill climbing or more watts on the computrainer in cycling.

4. Endurance - training for the ability to race or produce energy output for some length of time. Example: gradually lengthening the duration of a long run over a period of weeks.

4b. Stamina - I make this a sub-section to endurance, which is the ability to maintain a level of speed/strength for a long period of time. Example: gradually increasing the time of your intervals and reducing your rest periods while maintaining the same wattages during Computrainer bike interval workouts.

5. Recovery - stimulation of blood flow by raising heart rate and circulation but not raising effort to flush the body of exercise by-products and promote healing. Example: cycling on a computrainer at negligible watts, but high RPMs for about 20-30min.

It is somewhat obvious that whenever you go out to train, you're most likely training more than one of these areas simultaneously. However, I wanted to point out:

1. You can train to focus on only one of these areas.

2. It's good to have a mix of all 6 areas as you're building for a race. The mix depends on where you are in your training schedule.

3. You have to be aware that potentially you could be detracting other areas if you're not focusing on these areas.

Let's talk about the first point.

Focusing on one thing is possible and many times desirable. Of the 6 training types, I've focused on mostly neuro-muscular, strength, and recovery. It's all based on what you individually need.

For example, over the winter, I did a lot of treadmill training where I'd warmup with track drills, ie. kick backs, skipping, and then started doing 30 min intervals at super high speed, building from 6 MPH to as much as 11 MPH (where the interval drops to 15-20 seconds due to the fact that the treadmill takes too long to accelerate to that speed). By the way, I have not found a gym treadmill that goes faster than 11 MPH, although I have heard that you can actually get treadmills that go that fast. What this achieved for me, is not necessarily the ability to maintain an 11 MPH/5:27 min/mile pace over a race. It does help train my neuromuscular system to fire my muscles quicker so that I get used to running at a higher turnover rate, at paces I can maintain. This results in me being faster simply because my body is accustomed to moving my legs faster.

For strength training, over the last 2 years I started climbing and doing laps on Old La Honda and Kings Mountain. These laps have built up my leg strength considerably and increased their resilience on hill climbs, where I was defeated utterly at Ironman Austria a few years back.

I am also a big user of recovery workouts. I figure out if, for a given workout, I need to back off. If I do need to back off severely, often I'll do a recovery workout. An example of this is a pedaling efficiency workout involving a lot of high RPM one-legged pedaling drills at minimal wattage. It doesn't stress my muscles from a power standpoint, but it raises my heart rate and circulation so that blood is flowing through my muscles and the flushing effect helps my recovery so that the next day I'll be able to perform a normal workout.

Second point: The mix.

Training all in one type means that you're not gaining the full benefits or reaching your potential for a race. If all you're doing is sprinting workouts on the bike, you may not be able to last an entire century. If all you're doing is running at endurance pace every workout, you may find that you aren't increasing your speed, or you don't have enough strength to pass someone when you want to.

You need to mix it up and include all types and improve on them all. You can figure out, as I have, where my deficiencies are, and do some focus on improving some areas. But overall, you need to train all 6 types as you build through your season to the big race.

I tend to focus on neuromuscular workouts during the offseason, as they don't stress my aerobic system and are great for recovery workouts. Then I move from neuromuscular focus as my training season starts to building speed and strength with a lesser endurance emphasis. This is because endurance is easiest to build, but speed and strength take lot more time. As I hit mid-season, I am adding more endurance and stamina into the mix as I try to extend the speed and strength I've built up to longer times.

Third point, watch out for what you're not focusing on and don't let it slide.

As you're focusing on certain aspects of training, you have to watch out that you don't reduce other aspects. An easy example is that as you build endurance, you may find that your form (neuromuscular aspect) gets really messy as you get tired. This is very bad! The trick is to maintain form even when you're butt tired, and as you focus on building endurance. Otherwise, you could injure yourself through poor form, as your muscles are tiring and you engage other weaker muscles to compensate.

Another example is when you're supposed to be doing a recovery workout, but yet you feel energized and so you try to push harder and do something with more energy. But then all of a sudden, half way through the workout, you find that you burn through that initial burst of energy which fails you later because you weren't fully recovered and you don't have enough stamina to continue. Recovery when you have to and don't force yourself to do something your body just isn't OK for.

Yet another example is not gradually increasing your workout intervals to improve stamina. You mentally don't feel like doing fast intervals beyond a certain point, and thus your stamina never improves. You hit race day and you find that as you try to maintain speed, you can't and you're slowing down as you move through the miles.

While training typically involves the simultaneous training of all 6 types of training, I think that there is a lot of benefit to identifying where your personal needs are, and coupled with where you are in your training season, you can focus on specific areas which need improvement and advance them greatly. Categorizing the different types of training really helps in thinking about training and how to race faster.

Since I began this heat acclimatization training back in June, I've finally begun to see some nice results. The Bay area has experienced some truly unbelievably hot weather this summer. I've never seen it reach 90+ or even 100 degrees in Palo Alto until this year. However, it's perfect for preparing my body for hard efforts during Ironman.

Every Friday, I've chosen to run mid-afternoon at my favorite park. It's immensely hot, and sometimes I feel foolhardy for training in such hot weather. I prepare my drinks and put extra electrolytes in them. I also back off considerably on pace or else I know I won't make it. Hydration is extremely important and I begin hydrating before I feel thirsty. This has worked well to keep me going. Thankfully, I have also not felt dizzy or nauseaous during running, so a combination of hydration, electrolytes, and heat adaption is definitely working.

This last Friday was a big moment for me. I went out in 95+ degree heat and ran 2:28, finishing 5 loops of my favorite hill loop. I am finding that my mental endurance for the heat has grown a lot, and I don't feel like quitting so much any more due to the oppressiveness of the high temps.

On loop 3, I did begin to worry. One of my discoveries during training in heat was that my legs tend to stiffen up. I think my fascia is protesting the heat and the extra stress it's putting on my body and it starts to lock up and make bending my legs during running a sore affair. I try to loosen up always with some kickbacks during my running and that seems to help. So on loop 3, my legs begin to lock up and I'm worried because I've got 2 more loops to do and I'm wondering whether or not I'm gonna make it.

Miraculously on loop 4, my legs loosen up completely. No more tight fascia at all. Weird. In fact they loosen up so much that I'm able to increase pace for both loops 4 and 5 and am able to complete a nice negative split workout.

All this in 95+ degree weather. Very happy!

I'm not sure that Ironman Florida will be a hot affair. In past years, I've been really lucky at Ironmans that the days have been relatively mild, with the exception of Ironman Austria where the temps were in the mid 80s. But surely I am prepared for a hot race day, as I usually hit the run around 2pm where the day is the hottest.

High temps have been the bane of my racing career and for the first time I think I'm relatively prepared for a hot race day. And if not a hot day, then I'll enjoy running faster in cooler temps.

I hate wild animals.

Ever since I got molested by a monk seal off the Big Island of Hawaii, I just hate wild animals. Can't stand encountering them in the wild. Don't want them near me.

This last Friday, I was running in Rancho San Antonio. I was about 1:30 down in my 2:30 run and I was in my second half of my negative split. I proceeded to enter into my favorite hill loop on Coyote Trail. I feel pretty good and am maintaining a good clip up to the top and right before the top, half in the trail lays about a third of a big ass rattlesnake!

I screeeeeech to a halt.

I see the rattle itself; it's almost 3 inches long and the tail it's attached to is about 2 inches thick. Crap I thought, I don't want to get bit! I look at it. It's just laying there. No movement at all. Is it dead? Or just laying there in the sun. But rattlesnakes are pretty sensitive; it should have picked up my stomping up to it well before I saw it. Still, it's just laying there. Taunting me? About to spring a trap on me? Should I move closer? Check it out? Maybe it's dead. The rattle isn't rattling. Don't rattlesnakes do that to warn off predators and stupid humans like me? Should I try to run past it and maybe it's not fast enough to strike me if I'm sprinting past?

This all goes through my head in about 5 seconds.

I say no way. I do a 180 and hightail it out of there back the way I came. No way am I going to risk getting bit by a poisonous 4 foot rattlesnake!

I hate wild animals.

Last year in the fall, I was running in Rancho San Antonio again. I'm on the trail from the parking lot to the farm and I'm behind this other woman. We're running along and all of a sudden, I hear this clopping of steps from ahead of us. It gets louder and louder and I realize it's a doe, running at full tilt. About a length behind her is this buck, with about 7-8 points on its antlers. I see the woman ahead of me duck to the side and let them pass.

But then, the doe flashes past me and the next thing I see is...antlers! Crud! I leap aside and the buck just races past and my heart rate leaps as I realize that a full speed running buck, probably weighing a few hundred pounds, driving it's antlers ahead of it would have probably put some big holes in my torso and tossed me 15-20 feet behind me. Ack!

I hate wild animals.

You know - you see them in zoos and in the movies. They look so tame and cute. They're always doing good things.

But then reality hits. You see them in the wild and you realize they are really dangerous animals. All of them. Even the plant eaters. They are all schooled in kill or be killed. Us humans, we're stupid. Spoiled. Can't even put up a decent fight against a charging buck or a rattlesnake. Worthless.

I hate wild animals. I run as fast as I can the other way when I see 'em.

If there is one training principle I have come to both love and hate, it's the negative split. It's also one of the most important.

In short, it means that you increase effort and, thus (hopefully) speed, on the second half of your workout or race. Workouts can also be gradual in increasing effort, resulting in descending time so it is some times called descending workouts or intervals (ie. in swimming, you can do a set at descend 1-2-3, which means you descend time over the next three intervals). No matter what you start at one pace, but you end up at increased pace/effort.

Our bodies race like we train. When we go all out during a race, we often put out the most effort and have the highest speed during the first part of the race, when we're fresh. Then when the second half of the race comes, we find ourselves getting more and more tired and often slow down as we hit the finish line.

This is bad! Slowing down as you approach the finish line, often starting from miles out, means:

1. You're getting tired and depleted. Maintaining speed becomes a grinding experience or impossible. Your heart rate starts leaping higher and higher and you have no choice but to slow down or else you'll flame out...or pass out.

2. Your better trained opponents are now passing you. That sucks right? You try to pick it up and you can't!

3. As you get depleted, your muscles get stiffer and stiffer as lactic acid builds up. It just becomes a painful experience as you force your muscles to keep going, and you may be reduced to walking, or weak spinning for cycling, or for swimming your stroke rate just keeps dropping as your arms feel like lead.

4. Mentally, it just makes the race feel like the worst experience ever. You're glad to hit the finish line and you wonder why in the world did you ever subject your body to that kind of torture.

However, training via negative splits or descending intervals means you condition your body to be able to perform while tired and give more energy during the latter half of the race. You learn to pace yourself and not go all out in the beginning, and your body learns to give that extra kick in second half while your energy levels begin to wane.

In every workout I do, I try to always finish with more effort than I begin. I slowly ramp effort and speed throughout a workout and then by the end of the workout, I am sprinting towards the parking lot where my car is. Or I'm on the way home on my bike and after doing laps on Kings Mountain, I'll raise my energy level pedaling and get close to sprinting home on the bike.

It's a tough workout, but over time your body gets used to it. Come race day, you'll be thankful for training this way. During races you're always putting out 100%+ effort and you need to be conditioned to give extra effort even while your energy level is dropping.

What a rush to be accelerating and passing other competitors and feel like a million bucks as you accelerate towards the finish line!

One thing that has always confounded me is percent grade.

When I'm on the treadmill, I always run at 1% grade which supposedly simulates a flat surface due to the fact that the treadmill's moving surface changes the dynamics of running slightly (versus you moving across the ground). When I train hills, I hit the up button on the grade and increase the % percent grade. Seems simple, but when I go outside to run and try to equate a treadmill grade to whatever hill I'm running on, I get confused.

It's the same when I bike. For instance, on the Tour De France, they talk about Category 1 through 4 climbs:

In general terms, Category 4 climbs are short and easy. Category 3 climbs last approximately 5 kilometers (3.1 miles), have an average grade of 5 percent, and ascend 150 meters (500 feet). Category 2 climbs are the same length or longer at an 8 percent grade and ascend 500 meters (1,600 feet). Category 1 climbs last 20 kilometers (12.4 miles) with an average 6 percent grade and ascend 1,500 meters. Beyond category climbs include an altitude difference of at least 1,000 meters (3,280 feet) from start to finish and have an average grade of at least 7 percent.

Since I'm nowhere near a Tour De France class rider, I'm assuming that these climbs are pretty brutal, especially the Category 2 and 1 climbs. I might be able to get up them, but I certainly wouldn't be winning any races anytime soon.

But what do these percentage grades actually feel like? Last year, I did laps on Old La Honda and it's about 3.35 miles long and climbs 1280 ft. According to Stanford Cycling, it averages 7.3% grade.

OK. Old La Honda is tough for me and now I sort of know what 7% grade feels like. Still there are portions which feel even steeper than that.

Now onwards to the computation. I finally figured out that grade is rise in height over a given distance, and then you multiply by 100 to get percent.

So 7% grade is a rise of 7 ft. for every 100 ft. travelled. Hmmm still tough to visualize. Let's convert that to an angle from the horizontal. So taking the arctan of the triangle formed by 7 ft. high over 100 ft of distance, that's an arctan of 7/100, that's about a 4 degree slope from the horizontal. Doesn't seem like much but definitely hell to pedal!

About 3 weeks ago I had a small epiphany. I thought about neuromuscular training for the bike and the workouts I do to make my cycling better. I thought to myself, "isn't there neuromuscular run training?"

I suppose there are things we have done on the track, like strides, skipping, high knee running and the such. But one thing I really wanted to work on was speed this year and felt that there was one area which I hadn't done much of, which was leg turnover and getting used to running fast.

So I hopped on the treadmill and did a warmup, and then proceeded to do 30 seconds run/30 seconds rest while increasing the MPH to 12 MPH. Man that was hard! The first time I reached 12 MPH (the max of my treadmill) I could only keep that up for about 15 seconds! The second time I tried this, I managed two intervals of about 20 seconds (takes 10 seconds for the treadmill to reach 12 MPH) and each time I reached and blew through my LT in that short amount of time.

I realized that this was good. I was training my body to relax and move at that speed. My body and leg turnover were being stressed and forced to maintain that rate by the relentless nature of the treadmill. There is no way to not keep it up; otherwise you'll fly off the back of the treadmill! This can't be repeated effectively outside because you'll always naturally slow down when you get tired.

I told my PT person about this and he related to me that at San Jose State, they do this kind of training all the time. They actually use a cord around the waist to tie someone to the front bar of the treadmill so that it helps keep them on the treadmill and forces you to move your feet under you. It still doesn't prevent you from falling flat on your face, so you gotta move your legs!

I am going to try more of this in my off season before I hit the track for real workouts. I am curious to see if this will have an effect on my run speed, which I really want to work on in the first half of this year. My next goal is to increase the amount of intervals I can achieve at 12 MPH and get my body used to leg turnover, body positioning, and form required to maintain these speeds.

Running for the first time on Thursday morning, I decided to see how fast I would have to move my legs in order to achieve a certain pace. Given this was my first time running after Ironman Brazil, I was going to run a form run but at the end I usually do some fast running for 30 seconds with 30 seconds break.

After 10 minutes of drills, I made it to the second half of my 20 minute run at which time I began my fast short runs. I compacted my stride and proceeded to speed up, rest, speed up, rest. I made it all the way up to 9 MPH which is about a 6:20 min/mile. Boy did my legs cycle! Normally when I run track workouts on the treadmill, I can get almost up to 10 MPH (6:00 min/mile). But that is with my normal stride. Compacting my stride really made my legs churn FAST! I knew that I would have train this specifically to get my body accustomed to such a high cycle rate for my legs.

Then today, I went out for a 2 hour ride. Feeling good upon reaching home, I decided I would start shuffle training today. So I threw on my running shoes and then I shot out the door with two goals in mind. First, I really needed to get my body used to hitting the ground running after the bike so as not to lose time on the run. Second, I ran with the Ironman shuffle as fast as possible to see just how it would feel.

It was tough! My legs were tired from the ride, and I could not lengthen my stride at all. I was forced to run with the shuffle! So I just churned them as fast as I could. I went out into my neighborhood and then around and back for only about 7:30 minutes. I knew after this run that this would take some time and effort to train. Next time I will have to bring my GPS to see how fast I am actually running with the shuffle style.

Someone just asked me about treadmills. After running on several in clubs and owning two, I have these requirements:

1. I often run for over an hour. The timer must be able to deal with that and not reset to zero after it hits an hour. Otherwise I lose count.

2. I want a keypad that can quick jump me to a given incline or speed. Hitting the up and down arrows a million times sucks.

3. It must have a water bottle holder. Gotta drink. Even better if there are two holders.

4. It must go faster than 10 MPH. 10 MPH is a 6:00 mi/min. Someday I hope to run that fast and need to practice running faster than that to achieve that speed.

5. It must go higher than 10% grade. If it can do negative grades, that's fine.

6. It should have a full size running surface and not a compact one. Some of those made for apartments are smaller than normal. If the running surface is too small, I sometimes hit the back edge while striding.

7. HR monitor optional. I don't need it although sometimes it is interesting to take a quick read of your HR.

8. Programs optional. I mostly run with my coach's workouts, so I don't use those pre-programmed workouts.

9. I don't need it to fold up.

Passing that dude at Rancho San Antonio made me think of all the times I've managed to pass people in a race.

It's a weird feeling to pass someone during a race, especially if you are very close in velocity. It isn't like driving a car where you press on the gas and you zoom up behind someone and then you pass them by. Visually, the other car grows in your eyes and then whooshes by and then shrinks behind you.

Since there isn't this acceleration for humans, the visual effect is much different for me. In fact, it's much slower.

I pull up behind someone. I usually think I'm faster than him, but can't tell for sure. I seem to be gaining, but his speed is often shifting as well, so sometimes I gain and sometimes I lose ground. But generally I maintain speed and have confidence that my constant speed is better than surging and wasting energy by accelerating. There is time left in the race and I can slowly overtake this guy. But visually, it seems as though I am barely gaining at all.

That is...until I get about 2-3 feet away. For some reason, as soon as I get to that distance, and still running at constant speed, the guy I'm passing seems to pause, and then rush up all of a sudden. I seem to accelerate and pass him in a flash.

It's weird. But what a rush to pass someone during a race.

Yesterday, I ran Rancho San Antonio and did my painful hill repeats.

The turkeys were out in force. Ten hens with one big male, tail feathers all spread out like he was somethin' else. Peacockin' ain't just for pickup artists! But it was fun flying past them and seeing a whole bunch of wild turkeys struttin' about while I was doing my intervals.

4 loops this time. I was going to do 5, but on the 4th I'm going up the hill and I come up behind another dude. He was running ok but I managed to pass him. I keep going at steady pace, but then I hear steps and his heavy breathing right behind me. I pick it up a bit just to keep ahead, but I hear him breathing and know he is only a few steps behind me. I get a bit more competitive. I pick it up more and he is still just behind me and I'm running hard now but not so hard that I'm flaming out.

He on the other hand is taking heavy breaths. I know his flame out is near and wonder if he will pass me. I pick it up a bit more and then...as I pull up to the top of the hill, I hear Mr. Heavy Breather drop off and know he just flamed out. I soar up and over and proceed fast down the other side.

Turkeys and a bit of pick me up all in one day. Nice.

Today I ran a complete workout without having my feet swell up or get major blisters. Ever since Asics changed their design, I've been going nuts trying to find running shoes that fit me good enough to run in. Everything was either too tight or my foot would flop around inside, causing lots of problems like swelling and blistering.

But today, thank God for Velocy. These cool shoes that help you get into Pose method running also have a shape that fits my feet perfectly without causing them to swell and also blister.

The downside is that Velocy isn't a mainstream shoe. They could go out of business and I'd be back to ground zero on running shoes. Time to go out there and stock up before they disappear!!!!

Yesterday morning, I ran for the first time on my Velocy shoes. If you recall, Velocy running shoes are supposed to be designed such that they help you run on the balls of your feet. How interesting a feel these shoes presented!

It was early morning and I decided to run on the treadmill with a form run, which is a jogging warmup, some drills, and then some quick, short speedwork.

I put on my Velocy shoes and I remembered the first time I put them on at the NYC Marathon expo. They are stiffer than usual and not as much cushion as you would expect from a running shoe. The sole is curved slightly to encourage your foot to roll forward on each stride and thus get you into a forefoot running style. I was not sure I believed that the structure of the shoe could make this happen, but I had to try them to be sure.

Note that I already run with the Pose Method, which is basically a forefoot running style. So I wondered what difference these shoes would make on my running style...? I do admit that when I get tired, my form gets messy. I also acknowledge that my left leg runs slightly different than my right. It's something I've been trying to even out over the last 2 years of running Pose.

Upon hopping on the treadmill, I could immediately sense a difference in running. The arc in the sole definitely put me more forward onto the balls of my feet while running. With each step, I could feel the foot rolling through the arc of the sole. I think for the most part, their claim is true that it does help get into that form. But I also wonder that since I am already running Pose, that the change is not that dramatic. I would love to have someone who runs midfoot or even heel strike to try these shoes and see what happens.

I also wonder if these shoes are acting as a crutch for running a form which I should train my body to naturally do, which is what I've been doing up to now. If I ran on these shoes more often, would I feel worse going back to normal running shoes? Or would I be better at forefoot, aka Pose, running because of them?

Hopefully before the season starts, I can run more on these shoes and be able to compare them to running with normal running shoes.

Alas, I turned in my NYC Marathon timing chip yesterday. I had hoped that some miracle would have happened and my hacking cough would have gone away. But no such luck.

I am very disappointed to be brought down by a sickness. 4 months of training, seeing great track times and growing strength on hill repeats - it was tough to realize that my body would not hold up to 4 hours of max performance in cold weather racing (it's been in the 40s everyday I've been here in NYC; the last 3 years I ran NYC it was in the 70s!).

Rather than risk this developing into something REALLY bad like pneumonia, I elected to not race. It's a first for me: to not race due to sickness and it was bound to happen sometime.

At least I was able to defer my entry until next year. Not sure if I will race it though; I've got my sights on either Ironman Florida or Ironman Western Australia and that may mean that NYC isn't possible. NYC is usually on the same weekend as IM Florida, as it was this year. IM Western Australia is usually on Thanksgiving weekend or the first weekend of December, which means NYC is very close to the race.

Onwards to off season training. I want to work on strength in my legs this winter, in preparation for a strong race season next year.

These last few weeks have been really interesting from a training perspective. I have experienced true "redlining" of my abilities in many of my workouts.

This has really shown up in my track workouts at trying to maintain a super high pace for a given distance, whether it's 800 meters or distance tempo workouts of up to 4000m in length. It also showed up last weekend for the Long Beach Half Marathon where I could feel and, later, see my effort and heart rate rise to super high levels for the entire race.

It's a weird experience being in a redlined state for a long time. At points during my track intervals, I have gotten to the point of almost feeling dizzy and passing out, and then backing off a tad to maintain as high a pace as possible. In the longer distance tempo workouts, I have focused on leg turnover and, in maintaining a certain leg turnover rate, my HR jumps to a really high level.

It's good practice. Pushing my tolerance to higher thresholds allows me to keep performance high for longer periods of time and maxes my output.

It's potentially bad in that one of these days I may push over some physical limit and pass out during a race. That would definitely NOT be good.

Afterwards, I find that my body is a bit slower in recovering after these workouts. I have maintained my effort so close to my lactate threshold for so long that I feel it in my lungs and body for days afterwards.

I don't know of any other way of training to push my performance higher; I need to continually push my body to the edge to eke out that last bit of speed. As long as I don't push over the edge, it seems that my body recovers and learns so that next time I improve and it's not so bad.

I look forward to seeing what happens at NYC in two weeks when I will maintain this level of output at marathon distance.

Yesterday, I ran my favorite hill loop, the Coyote Trail, in Rancho San Antonio. Well, favorite is a controversial term. I ran the loop seven times logging in 17 miles, legs burning out on the last two loops as I up my intensity, and feet getting totally abused on the steeper downhill coming down off Coyote Trail back to the starting area. Total time, 2 hours and 42 minutes.

Although it hurts (got blisters on both feet from the downhill action), I can't think of a better way to prepare myself for the five bridges in the NYC course - my nemesis on the last three NYC marathons.

The NYC course, sans the bridges, is relatively flat to rolling with long, gradual uphills at times. Some smaller steep hills exist as you cross into Central Park, but that's about it. What makes this course hard is the fact that there are five bridges in the course which cross back and forth from borough to borough. These annoying bridges are relatively steep hill climbs and interrupt your normal tempo rhythm through the city streets. Last year, it was the 59th Street bridge which literally sucked the energy out of my sails, and initiated the longest "wall" I've encountered to date - about 9 miles worth!

My hope is that doing those hill repeats, I can get strong enough to tackle the hills at speed and have enough left over to finish the race. I am optimistic now that I've done 7 relatively strong hill repeats which are all steeper than the bridges by far.

Yesterday, I weighed in at 150 lbs with clothes on. Wow. Dropping fast. That means I am about 148-149 lbs without clothes on. Last year at the beginning of the NYC Marathon, I was 147 lbs the morning of. I wonder if I'll be less this year with a month left to go, and the most intense endurance training coming up.

The less I weigh, the less I carry around with me, and I waste less energy because I'm not carrying around useless weight.

Onwards to more speedwork during the week, crossing over into long tempo sessions. Then, long endurance fartlek intervals on the weekends to round out the training.

I live in this apartment building. When I emerge from the elevator with my kid, she takes off running down the hallway because she wants to hide and then scare the heck out of me when I turn the corner.

Just recently, I can't help but study her running.

Her torso is very still and relaxed. It does not sway from side to side. Her arms pump easily as she takes off down the hallway. They move backwards and forwards and do not waste in side to side motion. She runs a natural Pose Method, completely on the balls of her feet and I watch her legs kick in perfect form backward, and no wasted side motion at all, on each stride.

This is the way kids run. They have an instinctive way of moving and it is very economical and efficient. Somehow, they just know how to do this. There is no learning, just doing. It is the way that we, as adults, apparently are trying to learn again, and we call this the Pose Method, or any one of many names we can call the perfect running form.

I marvel at what we've lost as we grow to be adults. Ever watch other people run? You see people's torsos bent over like the Hunchback of Notre Dame. You see arms sway back and forth across their bodies, like they're doing the watusi. Their legs churn, but yet they heel strike or have some weird foot flopping as the leg kicks backward on each stride. Watch other people run and see. Then do something really radical like videotaping yourself and...shudder....

As we grow older, we've lost that instinctive way of running in the most efficient and effective way. We learn new habits like sitting on couches and watching TV and doing that REALLY WELL. We forget what it's like to be a kid anymore, in more ways than one. Whether it's running or being creative, or being silly, or just laughing your heart out, we've lost the kids in ourselves.

People always say we have a lot to learn from our kids, and athletics is no exception.

For years I've been running in Asics Gel Nimbus running shoes. They are neutral (no motion control) and supposedly have the most cushioning of any running shoe. And they worked great for 3 years. Until now.

This year, they decided to make the toe box narrower and the tongue has padding in it. This combination meant that all of a sudden, my foot was bound by the shoe more tighter than before. After about half an hour of running, my foot started to swell and then caused bruising against the edge of my hard orthotics. Bruising the ball of your foot is no fun. You can't really run hard until it goes away and it's pretty painful to walk on.

This went on for about 3 weeks with me trying to figure out what was wrong. After 3 weeks of trying new tying methods, taping the orthotics down, new padding, etc. it boiled down to the change in the basic design of the shoe.

ARG!

I had 3 weeks of painful running because Asics chose to change the design of their shoe! The old design was fine. Why did they mess with it?

So I tried out the new Adidas A3 Microride which is extremely cushy in the forefoot, due to its cushioning cylinders which run along the bottom of the shoe. And they don't bind my foot and make it swell.

Sorry Asics. I made the switch. You and other manufacturers should learn that you shouldn't have keep messing with a working formula.

OK so after I found out about Yasso 800s, I told my coach about it and he gave me a workout progression based on 800s. I started running 800s and now I'm doing that at about 3:05-3:19 per 800.

My new (CRAZY) goal: run a marathon in 3 hours. YIKES. But given my 800 times, it looks like I can get close...?

I'm psyched and going for it!

Today I traded emails with a buddy of mine who is a sub-3 hour marathoner.

If you do the calculation, to run a 3 hour marathon, you'd have to maintain a pace of 6:52/mile the whole way, and that's not counting dealing with the terrain and environment (ie. if it's hilly or hot/humid day).

That's pretty freakin' fast.

So I asked my friend about how fast your track paces would have to be in order to have a chance of running a 3 hour marathon. My sub-3 hour friends are running 400s at about 65-75 seconds and 800s at about 2:30-2:45, and able to maintain that over as many as ten repeats.

In fact, some guy named Bart Yasso, the race services manager at Runner's World magazine, came up with this workout of 10x800 on the track, and if you can run this workout at fairly even pace, you can get a prediction on your marathon time. Another writer named this the "Yasso 800" workout. So basically, if you can maintain a pace of minutes:seconds for each of ten 800s, then your predicted marathon pace would be about (minutes->hours):(seconds->minutes). My friends on the track who are sub-3 hour marathoners typically can run 10x800 at about 2:30-2:45 per 800, so that would mean a predicted marathon finish time of 2 hours and 30 minutes to 2 hours and 45 minutes.

Ugh. Currently I could probably sustain a 400 of about 1:32 and 800 of about 3:35-3:40! Good prediction of a 3:40-ish marathon finish time so not bad. But a far cry from 3 hours!

This morning I did 10x400 and was redlining towards the end of the last few 400s to make a ~1:32 finish!

At least now I have a rough measuring stick on how to improve. To get from 1:32 on a 400 to 65 seconds, I merely need to run that twice as fast. To get from 3:35 800s to 2:30 800s, I just have to run about a third faster. Easy.

...(sigh)....

A buddy of mine just started a new site called dailystrength.org. It is a place where you can get support and advice for various problems or issues you may have in a multitude of areas of your life.

There was a post about running and knee problems, and how people were down on running and didn't know how to solve those problems.

So I posted my 3 big solutions to my running problems, as the combination of these has basically kept me running injury free for about 2 years now. In addition to that, there are 2 more solutions which also contributed to my injury free state:

The big 3:

1. I use hard orthotics. Not the soft kind you find at a shoe store, but ones that are created from plaster molds of your feet. They basically remove any and all possibility of pronation and, thus, one source of strain to your knees and muscles.

2. I run using the Pose Method, which teaches running on the balls of your feet and definitely NO HEEL STRIKING. Running on the balls of your feet means that there is one extra joint to absorb impact and has been shown through some studies to reduce impact stress by as much as 50%.

3. Every week I go to get ART and Graston Technique. The two methods of massaging your muscles remove adhesions that form and build up over time. If they build up over time, then your muscles get less flexible and the possibility of injury increases as the muscles get tighter and tighter until all sorts of bad things happen.

The 2 other things are:

1. The old method of training meant beating up your body again and again until it breaks down to the point of injury. The new way has recognized that you don't need to beat up your body as much as previously thought in order for peak performance. Your body needs rest and time to grow stronger. So no more overtraining leading to pain and injury!

2. Crossover training effects from swimming and cycling have immensely affected my running ability. It has also meant that I don't need to break down my body by running alone in order to be at some high level of fitness. I can improve my abilities through other less impact activities and run faster.

Freeze My Willies

After the race, I jump in a bathtub of ice cubes for 10 minutes. Thankfully it numbs everything and I can only stand it for 10 minutes. But on Monday, I hop in again but this time for 15 minutes. Definitely nerves are getting killed off in the icy water, or maybe I'm just getting better at being a tough guy...

The ice bath really helps flush my muscles of the lactic acid and reduces inflammation.

Delayed Onset Soreness

Whoo hoo - big time! After my first ice bath, I am pain free! BUT...the next day that all changes. My calves seize up in a lactic acid frenzy and going up and down stairs is pure torture. Also, the rest of my body aches....

Never Forget Your Salt Tablets

I think I figured out why I feel so abused after this race. I think it's because I didn't have enough electrolytes and salt during the race, which causes my muscles to perform poorly and under more stress.

After the race, I felt my skin and it was real gritty from the salt that I sweated out. Definitely something to keep fine tuning.

Nike Triax Foot Pod Off

So I wore a Nike Triax watch with foot pod and heart rate monitor for the race. I would have worn a GPS but it doesn't work very well in Manhattan with the buildings blocking the satellites.

Unfortunately, looking at my paces on the website and what was recorded by the watch, the Nike Triax is definitely off, even after I calibrated it on a track.

The Nike Triax said I ran only 25.3 miles. During the race, I remember looking at it and despairing at the pace it was showing me, which turns out to be slower than what the website said I ran.

How annoying to be thinking I was totally cratering when in fact I was not!

New Fighting Weight

Post-marathon weigh-in has me now at 147.8 lbs, versus 151 weigh-in at Ironman New Zealand. Now I have a new benchmark for what I should weigh during long endurance races....

Wise Quote

Tim Noakes in Lore of Running states:

"In a marathon, the race really begins from 32km onward, during the last 10km. From here to the finish, the marathoner's brain speaks of logic and therefore appeals to the first voice, which will argue that there is no justifiable reason to continue. The marathoner's only recourse is to call on the spirit, which forutnately functions independently of logic. It accepts that marathon training goes beyond logic - that humans were not designed to race marathons any more than they were designed to scale Everest. And the human spirit soon learns that the marathon is one way for ordinary people to define irrevocably their own physical, mental, and spiritual limits. By the 32km marker, the marathoner must be ready to define these personal limits."

Such a truism. I ran literally a 9 mile "wall" and many times felt like quitting. But it was worthwhile as I broke through the damn wall at mile 24 to speed up to the finish.

When I tell people I ran the NYC Marathon, often the first thing that comes out of their mouths is, "Oh I can never do that."

How easy it is for someone to define their limits under such favorable conditions. Is that the true test of the human spirit, to be defined on the couch in front of a TV?

I say NO.

Our growth comes from trials, and we really grow when we test our limits. Busting through a 9 mile wall was one of the hardest things I've ever done, with body aching, IT band protesting, right quad cramping, even both forearms threatening to cramp under electrolyte loss. It hardens my spirit like nothing else!

It's 430am and I get up to prepare for the race. The night before I lay out just about everything I need so that I won't forget anything. But of course, I already find out that I don't have any electrolyte tablets in my apartment, a fact that will prove critical in the race later.

But I fill up my race bottles with flat Coca-Cola, put GU gel in my fuel belt, get my race number belt ready with the race number and attach my timing chip to my running shoe. I double check that and then I throw everything into my bag and off I go.

I arrive at the NYC Public Library and it's still pitch dark. The stars are shining in the sky so I know it's going to be a warm day, as it has been the last few days.

I sit on the bus next to a guy from Oregon. He says he's trying to get to 50 marathons, one for each state. More power to him. I am not sure my bod could take so many marathons in so short a time, or else I'm gonna die before I hit 50 states worth of marathons.

The sun finally starts coming up as we get over to the starting line in Staten Island. Different starting area this year. I don't see the usual half-a-huge-PVC pipe pee-ing station. And it's organized more by color too - I am in the Blue section, so they have their own food and UPS trucks to take our stuff to the finish line.

I chat with this woman from Iowa who is running her first marathon in NYC. Hope she finishes OK.

So my pacing really sucks, and this year I decide to follow some of the pace leaders. For kicks, I decide to follow the 3:40 group since I am thinking I will finish in 3:45; but who knows, maybe I'll have a great day and finish in 3:40!

In the start of these races, my mind is usually filled with so many emotions and thoughts. I think about my goals in this race and wonder if I will do OK or crater somewhere in the middle. I think about my whole life surrounding racing and what it means to me.

I think about support, of which I don't have any live support this year, but yet so many others have friends and family to cheer people on. But I've told people not to come; NYC Marathon is not an easy one to watch for your friends. You need to plan very well. And the last two years I've been totally off my time estimates and I am sure supporting spectators would have been wondering if they missed me or not. But somehow, it is nice to have support if it's there.

I think about my daughter and how much she means to me, and missing her very much. I also think about my new life in this startup and wonder where that will go.

My brain is a jumble, but it all returns to race focus as soon as the cannon goes off.

The crowd surges forward. I am ahead of the 3:40 group for a while, but not for long. With so many people, it's impossible to keep pace. I blow right through and around people trying to get back on track, and I see the 3:40 pace leader doing the same.

The Verrazano Bridge serves to be a heavy duty warm up - it is an annoying long hill, and we are glad to see the other side where we increase our pace to make up lost time.

The next 12 miles are a blur. I manage to pull ahead of the 3:40 pace leader and the group and keep that lead until a mile or two after mile 13.1. I hit that at 1:51, a bit slow for 3:40, but in range for a 3:45 finish.

Then I reach the 59th Street Bridge and my ass is kicked. It is fairly steep and it drains me going up and over. The 3:40 pace leader has joined up with his buddy who is also leading another 3:40 group. They blow by me and I lose them.

But I never get my pace back. The climb wipes me and I don't get a chance to recover. The following miles are a series of gradual, grinding uphills where I don't get the chance to recover and rest.

At mile 20, my right quad starts twitching like it's gonna cramp. This is where those electrolyte tablets would have made a HUGE difference.

I don't get my groove back until about mile 24 when all of a sudden I find some more energy, and I get my pace back up to about 9:00-ish per mile. And miraculously, the cramping subsides as well. I manage to finish following the 3:50 pace leader and my time is 3:51, which I am very happy for. It is a new PR for me and a substantial improvement from my last year's time of 4:24.

But man, I hurt all over. For some reason, this year's race was more taxing on my bod than last year. I move through the finish line with everyone else and my legs feel very abused. I make it to where I pick up our race stuff and I change out of my sweaty, smelly race clothes, and into some clean clothes.

As I move (verrrrryyyy slowly) out of the meeting area, I reflect on the fact that I can't move very fast at all. My legs and feet hurt a lot, and I say to myself that I can't do this race again next year. I need a break!

All the while, I am wishing that some strong, muscular guy would come over and carry me home.

Don't you ever wish that this would happen to you?...No?...Never?

Hmmm...well I was just kidding then...really...

I am not in California any more. I am on the plains of Africa. The wind blows across the grasslands, the sun is high in the sky. I glide effortlessly across the land, each footfall moving me forward, the hills around me racing past my eyes.

I hear the roar of lions, and a lion is now running next to me, leaping through the brush as my legs cycle fast and endlessly, the grass whipping by me and the lion leaps....

I see the flames of a black dragon, its wings beating down above me. I feel the raw power of its jaws, its claws as it bursts down from the heavens, accompanying me on my run across a barren landscape where it dwells...

I feel the heat of the jet engine, a MIG-29 accelerates alongside me as I speed through the sky, the cloudscape racing past, and in the fury of my passing through the sound barrier they explode...

And now I am Rocky Balboa and I am running towards the city square, the crowd behind me surging with me but they cannot catch me, because I will win, I am a champion, I mount the stairs and with several bounds I am on top, and they scream Rocky Rocky Rocky...

...Motivational delusions from the Long Beach Half Marathon, 10-16-05.

I wore my favorite long sleeve shirt today by Nike. It's got this incredibly cool slogan on it - "Run Like There is no Finish Line". Wow. What a great motivator! I got this shirt last year at the NYC Marathon.

One problem though. It's black. So I put it on because there is this huge fog bank hanging over the bay area around 7:30am. By the time I get to Rancho San Antonio at around 8am, the fog is almost all burnt off.

Boom. The temperature rises about 15 degrees and now I'm roasting....!

Hard run today. My coach has me doing long intervals at speed to get my stamina up. Here's the workout:

20 min build from easy to steady
30 min broken into 9 min steady, 1 min easy -- continuous
30 min broken into 20 min steady, 5 min mod-hard, 5 min easy
15 min broken into 5 min mod-hard, 10 min steady
15 min broken into 5 min mod-hard, 10 min steady
10 mins easy

Ugh. Major pacing problems in the rolling hills of Rancho. Especially as I get into the mod-hard intervals. The last one was grueling in the heat of the morning. Gotta get more acclimatized to running in heat. If I ever make it to Kona this year, I'll need to be able to function at peak condition in 90 degree/90% humidity conditions....

But this was my third time doing this workout, and the second time on this path in Rancho. I have one more workout of this sequence and hopefully by then I'll have gotten adjusted to the pacing and the built my stamina up to handle the short choppy (annoying!) hills as well as summer heat.

On Friday I went to Metrosports to pick up another pair of my favorite trail running shoes, the Asics Gel Eagle Trail IIIs. But another pair of running shoes caught my eye this time - the NIKE Free.

Created by NIKE to allow your feet to be protected but still have the biomechanical benefits of running barefoot, the NIKE Free can take your feet from the pampered, protected environment of the nicely insulated, cushioned, supported surroundings of a century of innovation in running/walking shoes to the scary, open place of running with naked feet.

I had read a lot about barefoot running lately. Many experts tout the benefits of strengthening the muscles in your feet to reduce the probability of injury. It also changes your running stance because heel strikes are not possible (they are painful!) and you need to run on the balls of your feet. This also provides an added benefit of an extra shock absorption joint into your kinetic chain.

I took them out for a brick run after my grueling King's Mountain ascent and definitely there was a difference from these shoes to my normal Asics Gel Nimbus shoes, which are Asics's most cushioned neutral shoe. Definitely more pounding on the feet as the NIKE Free's do not have much adding at all, and also definitely more flexing of the shoe due to the slices through the bottom sole rubber.

I hope to run more on these shoes over the next few months to build up my foot muscles. They recommend a gradual buildup over the next few months, and certainly not at distances/speeds as you would normally run.

It will be an interesting experiment.