Tonight, the tides will rise unusually high. The moon is in perigee (the closest point to earth along its elliptical orbit) and it is full. When it rises this evening, it will be brighter than usual – and it will look huge. Some folks think a moon in perigee disrupts earth’s internal energy systems, causes disasters. It’s doubtful. Nevertheless, I bet police and emergency doctors will have their hands full tonight – the lunatics will be out!
I’m not going to blame the moon, but my running has been ebbing and flowing more radically than usual this week. I went to the track on Tuesday (rather than Wednesday) to do a V02 max workout, and I tanked it. Cliff started me on 1200m at 80s per lap – 3:20/km pace, a pace I could manage okay last year at this time. The first and second were pretty much right on, but I could feel myself giving a bit more than I would’ve liked. For the third and fourth, Cliff had me increase to 1400m – I was barely hanging on to the pace. In fact, for the second one, I fell off the pace for the last lap and a half. Then 800m into the third 1400, Cliff pulled me out of the interval. I had slowed so much on the second lap that he just stopped me cold.
I couldn’t believe it – I’d never been pulled out of an interval since starting with him. But my legs just wouldn’t go. My heart and lungs felt okay, but my legs felt full of lead.
What happened next, though, was vintage Cliff. I’d done 6k worth of volume, but he wanted closer to 8k, and even though he’d pulled me out of the third 1400, he didn’t want me to give up on the workout. This is what he said: “I’m going to make you feel good about yourself now.” I had no idea what he meant. He lined me up and told me I was going to do another mile, but broken up into 4 x 400m with short recoveries. Easy, he said. For the first one, I was supposed to run the same pace – 80s. I came around in 78s. “Too fast,” he said, “which is too bad because you have to run the next one a second faster – just stay smooth.” Off I went on dead legs, eager to please – 74s. He shook his head. “You know the drill – run this one faster than the last.” 72s. I had to stretch for that one. Then he lined me up for the last one and just smiled. I gave what I had left and crossed in 70s. It was great.
Overall, the workout had been a failure, but he managed to squeeze a success out of it. My legs were dead, but even at the end of 7.6k of work my fastest 400m was my last. He’d transformed a broken V02 workout into a successful workout about digging deep. He’s a wise coach.
I took the next day off – which, as he told me today, was a mistake. A recovery run is crucial for getting the junk out of tired legs. Oops. I ran slowly on Thursday and Friday, but my legs didn’t feel fully recovered after either one. There’s some deep fatigue in there. But today, I was able to do over 30min of solid threshold running despite my tired legs. All my mileage has given me guts, but it’s zapped my speed – I just need to be careful on my off days.
Or maybe it’s just the moon messing with me.
Nice workout!! It seems that you are training pretty hard for your goal half marathon, keep up the work!!
ReplyDeleteThanks so much, Cesar! I've noticed that your training is going really well -- not that I can read Spanish, but the numbers tell the story. And you are leaving the watch at home -- impressive. I'm still a bit too attached to my watch. Do you have a spring goal race?
ReplyDeleteI do have a race on April 9th , it is a 5k low key, should run faster than 21:30, I did know that you read my blog, you are the first person that read it, I appreciate it. I am following the Jack daniels training approach, Do you divide up the season in phases or you do every week Threshold work and intervals ?
ReplyDeleteI look forward to seeing your results -- your training has been strong and consistent, so you're in good shape for a spring 5k -- although, as you know, so much depends on the day. I've got a 5k the same day. I'm not expecting a whole lot from it because my V02 stuff has been weaker than I'd like -- should be under 17:30, but a PB is a long shot.
ReplyDeleteDaniels is excellent -- my coach tries to incorporate some of his wisdom, especially the Vdot training paces and training loads. We don't do well-defined phases, although I like the logic of that approach (Lydiard used that, I think) -- but we do emphasize different workouts in relation to a goal race -- for example, we do more shorter, faster stuff closer to a race, but we never abandon threshold entirely. My coach likes to keep working on all systems right through the season.
Thanks for reading my blog too -- it's so much fun seeing what other runners are up to and to learn from other approaches. Best of luck in your 5k -- can't wait to see if you get your goal!
P.S. I meant to ask -- do you take a phase approach? If so, have you gotten good results from it?
ReplyDeleteHi, In 2007 I followed the Daniels formula and got my 10k PR, I was in very good shape. Right now I hope to be in my best shape on June- July, there is where the training is over. The only problem that I find with Daniels is that you do quality work for too long (18 weeks), and some people peak too soon and 18 weeks of workouts would be too long, We will see how it works this time around for me, as you can see in my blog i am running a repetition workout and a threhsold workout( it is much faster than threhsold pace, but i find it confortably hard, but in races i cant maintain that pace), In phase 3 I will do intervals(v02 max) and threshold workout, and in phase 4 I ll do threshold work and 10k race pace stuff, and for the secondary workout I ll do one week intervals, and the next repetition, not identical to daniel but a creative idea. I dont follow the paces on the table, I just follow his philosophy and his phases approach, I like to do the repeats by feel. Out of curiosity why your coach never abandon threshold work? and for how long(weeks) have you been doing workouts(quality training)?
ReplyDeleteYour plan seems very smart. You make an interesting point about peaking too early with such a long program. It's so hard to manage the peak. Our coach has us do quality-type workouts for most of the year. We modulate the volume and the intensity depending on where we are in the year. For example, during winter, it's mostly easy miles to build base, but we also do a fair amount of easy threshold running and even some speed and V02 just to keep those systems on line. As race season approaches, we build the volume and intensity of quality workouts to manage the peak. I find that sometimes it works for me and sometimes not -- I haven't figured out why yet. I'm not exactly sure why we do threshold all year round, but I have found that it really helps build "guts" -- I'm much stronger later in a race than I used to be.
ReplyDeleteI really like that you run by feel. I'm still glued to the watch and the pace chart when I'm on the track -- can't quite give it up yet, although my coach would love me to.
For "time" workouts( i.e. 1 min repeats), I have to look at my watch, but it is run by feel because I dont know the distance. Past Friday, I did my first tempo run ever without looking at my watch, and I was totally surprised at the end, was faster than I thought,and felt quite decent. If you cant leave the watch at home for your easy runs, then do the same as I do, I DONT LOOK AT MY WATCH UNTIL THE END:D
ReplyDeleteCool. I do (for the most part) ignore my watch during easy runs -- I much prefer it. I should ignore my watch during tempo runs because the GPS seems frustratingly inaccurate. Nice to hear you had a good workout without it!
ReplyDelete