Archive for the ‘recovery’ Category

« Older Entries

Three solid days of running

Friday, July 15th, 2011

Three good runs, all sort of different. The distances were all the same, each around 6 and a quarter miles. But each had their own focus.

The run on Tuesday was a pretty standard junk run. It was cool out and I didn’t even bring water with me. My pace was pretty slow, I think I was considering it sort of a recovery from a tempo run I did on Saturday. It was a pretty nothing run, but six miles none the less.

Wednesday was a day at the track. A two mile warm up brought me to the track. I had been talking to a friend about different types of interval workouts. One of the was a ladder workout and I was thinking I had never done that before. So I tried it. The first lap consisted of two straights and curves. Got my HR jump started. Next came two 220s followed each by another 220 of recovery for what was now 3 laps total. Then the top of the ladder, two 440s followed by 220 recovery. Total lap count now is at 6. Then back down the ladder for three more laps. A tenth made for a last lap of recovery before I headed off another mile and a half to Trader Joes.

This was a tough workout and several times I felt like passing out, especially after the 220s. I ran the 440 intervals not too fast, but the first 220s I worked it pretty hard. It was kind of cool, but several of the other runners joined me in doing there own intervals. Kind of fun having all of us doing them.

Today’s run was sort of a recovery run, though I didn’t try too hard to stay under 144. My avg was 148 as opposed to 141 on Tuesday. So maybe that was the true recovery and this was more junk.

The thing about these three runs was that they all followed the easy-hard-easy pattern that seems to work so well. So I guess that means I am up for a hard run tomorrow. I am sort of feeling like a LSD run would be really good for me. we’ll see. Hills sounds pretty good also.

Posted in intervals, junk run, recovery | No Comments »

Almost perfect recovery run

Saturday, March 5th, 2011

I really buckled down today to take my recovery runs seriously. While I was doing my whole warm up run I kept my HR under my recovery ceiling of 144 (or so I thought, actually I hit 145 in the first mile according to my Garmin). So since I thought I was “perfect” in my recovery run I worked hard to keep the HR low. Mostly I had it around 130 or lower, I really slowed down. I even made it up lower reed’s hill under 144. As I crossed the bridge over the canyon I heard what turned out to be an organized rugby game with a pretty large crowd and as it turned out two guys playing catch with lacrosse equipment who wouldn’t move over and let me by. So, my HR shot up to 151 and my perfection run was blown. Still I got it back down and on my way to trader jos. From there a mile home with my purchases of two bags; one of cooking greens and the other a bag of kettle corn (balancing “good for you” with bad…) It was an interesting juggling act getting them home.

Over all my HR averaged 135, so a very successful recovery run. My avg pace was 11:45, so super slow. I think I could do this pace for the full 26.2, the question is will I be happy with a five hour time? I think I need to pick up my pace a bit.

Tags: , ,
Posted in heart rate monitor, recovery, recovery ceiling | No Comments »

Recovery run, sixth running day in a row

Tuesday, October 5th, 2010

This morning I faced the chilly morning and went for a nice easy recovery run. For the first half mile or so my HR was pushing higher than my recovery ceiling, but soon it settled down into a nice relaxed sub 144 HR. From there everything went smoothly. I resisted the urge to add miles to the run several times. Big part of that could be I ran out of juice for my radio, so I was alone with the winds and slightly bored. Then my watch ran out of its charge as well. I am all for rechargeable items, but it does suck when they die on you! When I got home I went to add my run into my manual journal (since the Garmin record would be off). I had to add several days and I noticed that today was six days in a row. I have plans to run tomorrow evening, so that will make seven!

Tags:
Posted in recovery | No Comments »

NE tour

Saturday, October 2nd, 2010



So my run in NE with my running partner started with a bus ride to her neighborhood, so here was my view.

The plan was to run six relatively slow miles and we stuck to plan. The run was just what I needed for the day. The one thing we noticed that is becoming an issue is the light left in the day. That is all starting to change rather quickly and we soon found ourselves running in the dark. The sidewalks are a little rough mostly because of tree roots pushing up. Got to get used to that high-stepping running pattern to avoid tripping. Not the best thing to do, but better than face planting on the sidewalk.

So I had been reading Matt Fitzgerald’s latest book (or one of them, he’s come out with two). The Runner’s Edge promised to be an interesting look at the science behind training and I had hopes that it would dovetail perfectly with what I have been doing with my own training. It covers choosing a smartwatch pretty well, I could have used that a year ago when I was researching mine, fortunately the conclusion they drew was the very one I did. Polar is really good, but Garmin is tops. The book then moved into how to use your running data to determine what is happening to your body. It started to get somewhat confusing and technical, but that is what I was looking for. Then the focus changed again, this time to the use of a specific training stats program. It got really specific and detailed about how to use it. Hmmm, is this the real agenda of the book? Yes, yes it it. The software, Training Peaks is available for $200. Ahhh, well I am not that interested in shelling out that kind of cash for a new piece of running software. So with the books focus being on that I have decided to pick up Fitzgerald’s other book RUN: The Mind-Body Method of Running by Feel which is apparently sort of a follow-up to his Brain Training book that I really liked. Fitzgerald mentions in the forward that there are several books he wished he had never written and I suspect he may have been talking about the The Runner’s Edge, I wonder. I would love to ask him.

Tags:
Posted in recovery | No Comments »

Fastest tempo run yet and then rain

Thursday, September 16th, 2010

Yesterday I set out to do a tempo run. I wasn’t feeling to into it and the air quality was really poor from either a forest fire or more likely wood burning that has become so popular in the area. If its wood (or even looks like wood) burn it! No regard for pollution, just burn it! Anyway, I could rant for hours about this but I have a run to talk about. So my breathing was not great and I had to keep coughing to remove my neighbors enjoyable fires from my lungs (wait, I said I wouldn’t rant anymore.) So as I was going through a warm up and approaching my tempo route I was none to confident in my abilities. Still, I forged on, I really wanted to get this out of the way in my schedule of quality runs.

The first mile came really easily to me and I recorded a 7:33. I was feeling it in my lungs, but I still felt pretty strong. As I pulled through the second mile I realized I had to slow down. Seems I went out to fast for that first mile. So I paced it down a bit, but still kept pushing it. It was tough, but my second mile was not to bad at 8:13. At the start of the third mile I kept thinking about something my running partner heard at her boot camp. If you are doing a quality run and can’t keep up then its not a bad idea to bag it. The thinking with that being that you aren’t getting the benefit from the activity if you aren’t doing it properly. It was starting to sound like a really good idea. But, I remembered my philosophy of powering through difficulty to build yourself for the future. Sort of a variation of ‘no pain, no gain’. While I disagree with Nike’s motto I am all for powering pushing myself through the hard parts. So I kept at it albeit slower yet. In the end I finished my third mile at 8:40 which wasn’t nearly as bad as I thought it was going to be and as it turns out the fastest I have done my three mile tempo run yet. So I was really happy with the run. I finished up with a run through the canyon and home.

This morning I got up early to go for a run with my running partner. She is not much for the rains and it is even harder for her to get through that first wet run. So was prepared for the text saying she was bagging it. So alone I headed out for eight miles of recovery. It was a good run, slow and easy and a nice change from the previous days tempo. I didn’t mind the rains too much even though it was too warm to wear my running jacket. So I stripped it off and got soaked. Still it was a nice run. I was actually surprised at the number of runners I ran into in teh rain. Good to see everyone keeping up with it. Now I just need to work on my running partner. She’ll come around!

Tags: , ,
Posted in rain, recovery, tempo runs | 2 Comments »

Another recovery run, two in a row

Tuesday, September 7th, 2010

In an attempt to wipe out my feeling of being wiped out I did a second recovery run today both coming after my 15.5 mi long run on Sunday. I think I could use several more! Today I tried a different route that I have been thinking about. It actually had a good mile of uphill as I attacked Mt Tabor from the west side. I didn’t go all the way to the top though and kept the run to six miles, easy miles other than the hilly portion. The last third was pretty much downhill and relatively easy going, but I was feeling so worn out that it was actually somewhat excruciating. My feet hurt and my legs were tired but I really wanted to run in the rain today. It was so nice and cool. I brought my rain shell for the first time in a long while, but it wasn’t cool enough to keep it on so around the waste it went. It makes a good reflector there.

Tags: ,
Posted in rain, recovery | No Comments »

Labor Day recovery

Monday, September 6th, 2010

Well not a recovery from Labor Day, that sounds more like a hangover. This recovery was from yesterday’s 15.5 miles of hard road. I awoke feeling a bit worn out from yesterday. A bit might be an understatement, I was sore and felt pretty sluggish. So getting up I decided to have my usual two cups of coffee (as opposed to only one I would have right before a morning run) and a full compliment of toast and honey. I think the combination of breakfast and yesterday’s eating I recovered pretty solidly and was able to take off for a 5 mile recovery run by 10:30. Makes me think I am still up for a marathon training program. That said I am still pretty worn from the long run. My big toe (with the torn nail) is still hurting, but not bleeding nearly as much as it has been. Add on general foot weariness and I begin to paint a picture of my biggest obstacle to marathon training.

My feet seem to be the most effected part of my health from the ms. I do place the blame for a lot of that on running. Still I believe the benefits of running (and more to the point the high level at which I am doing it) far outweigh any discomfort I am feeling. I suppose I may have to change that assessment down the road, but for now all is good (well mostly all).

So back to the recovery run. I started out with a high HR often approaching 160 before I had even gone a half mile. As warmed up (and/or my heart monitor received a better signal due to sweating) the HR dropped down to a more normal place. I have noticed the high HR at the start of runs in the past. I don’t think it is a misread by the monitor as my heart rate does feel elevated even though I am not putting in the effort. Interestingly when I first started feeling the major ms symptoms, they would always seem to come on heavy at the start of my runs. At first one of my hopeful theories was that I was allergic to some sort of plant in the area as the episodes would occur on the same stretch of blocks. Could it have been the higher HR that brought the stumbling/mumbling episodes on? Nothing else made sense, so this could have been the trigger? Though hills and picking up the pace later in the runs didn’t seem to have anything to do with it.

Other than the initial spike, not much interesting happened on this run. I kept the HR at an acceptable level pretty much throughout. The last hill out of reed pushed me over, but I was busy keeping a decent pace to run past coeds… I think I may do another recovery run tomorrow and save any sort of speed work until Wednesday. It is sort of a necessity with band rehearsal Tues night, gotta keep the mind mostly alert for that.

Tags: , , ,
Posted in feet, ms, recovery, running | No Comments »

Recovery from straights and curves

Friday, August 20th, 2010

Today was an eight mile recovery run that for the most part I managed to do under my ceiling. I had a couple of hills where I pushed it and jumped up to high 50s and into the low 60s. I have added onto my trail running in the canyon by doing a full lap and through the eastern  part of the north side. I took off a little bit of my East Moreland portion and I need to find a good path after coming up from the golf course. I felt pretty strong through most of the run which I didn’t really expect after my intervals I ran the day before.

At the track 24 hours previous I managed to finish nine laps of straights and curves, so a total of 18 sprints. The track was pretty empty for the most part with one fast distance guy doing a couple laps. There was also a woman in a walker that was doing a pretty good pace around our track doing arm exercises. I was pretty impressed.

As for my run, my heart rate never got too high mostly in the high 160s and I felt like my sprint paces were pretty decent as well with the first four and most of the rest peaking under 6 minute miles. I also did the 1.5 canyon run that day as well and ended up putting in teh miles at just under nine miles.

There is a group that runs on Sundays that I might try. They have it broken up into 12 mile and then eight additional mile chunks. A 20 miler sounds pretty challenging, but I might go for it if the weather is going to be cool. I am not much of a group runner but it could be fun especially if any of my regulars I see are doing it.

Tags: , ,
Posted in recovery, recovery ceiling, straights and curves, trail running | No Comments »

Couple days of rest and running

Wednesday, August 11th, 2010

After running for eight days in a row, personal record for me I took two days off. At first I was just going to skip one day, but convenience turned into two. Monday morning I ran out with a vague plan of a tempo run. As I warmed up my pace felt good and I decided to go for it. I forgot to set my lap at the start of the tempo portion so the first quarter mile got factored in with my slower warm up. Miles one and two were almost identical at 8:16 and 8:17. The pace felt good and like I could step it up if needed, but the third mile is just grueling and slow as I slowed down and then did all the uphill at the end. Next time I think I’ll just do laps on the reed college strip until I hit three miles, should be about two laps, maybe a bit more.

Today I felt enthused to go out and run a recovery run. I did a good job of keeping the heart Rate under 70% of max. There is even a hill as I climb away from East Moreland Golf Course that I always get up into the 150′s. Today I did the entire hill under 144. I really focused on breathing from the belly, I think it makes a big difference.

Also I was listening to the moody electronic trance of William Orbit on the first part of the run. Then when I hit the canyon I switched to Talking Heads and there went the HR. But it is a harder run as well, but I still think music has a huge effect on a workout.

Tags: , , , ,
Posted in ms, multiple sclerosis, recovery, running, tempo runs | No Comments »

Short eighth run and breathing right on seven

Saturday, August 7th, 2010

Today I bused up to NE to run in my running partner’s hood. It marked eight days in a row of running. I don’t think I’ll be able to continue as I have a gig tomorrow and I don’t like to run on days when I am playing in the band. Its too hard to play for two hours, my fingers get really tired and lazy.

The run today was nice with plenty of breaks. It was a great way to recover further (this is my second recover run in a row, though the nearly eight miles I did yesterday was faster than a true recovery run.) If I do manage to run in the evening after the show tomorrow, I think I will repeat the effort of today.

Yesterday and odd thing happened. I came to a corner with a older guy on a bike to my left with a stop sign. I crossed in front of him and nodded as I passed. He was staring at my as if studying me. I thought it odd, but continued on my way. A couple of blocks later he pulls up along side me and begs an interruption. I take off my headphones and he apologizes and assures me that it will be worth it. He tells me I could improve my running posture by bringing my nose down and looking ahead “like a cockroach.” I didn’t ask him to explain, I just listened to him. I didn’t even find out what the benefit was going to be from doing this. And then just as suddenly as we met, we parted ways; me wanting to run and he probably embarrassed for stopping me and giving me a lecture.

After the encounter I tried the old guy’s advice. For the entire run I aimed down slightly and then looked ahead with roach eyes. My breathing felt clearer! I was able to breath through my nose and exhale through my mouth, sometimes a combo of both. I am not sure if my sinuses were especially clear before the run or if it was just mental, but I felt better, felt like I ran faster and definitely pushed the pace a bit on what was supposed to be a recovery run.

I researched (and my running partner did as well) and we couldn’t find anything about it. Some advice to the contrary (in general breathing advice seems to go against itself with one sure fire method negating another) saying don’t look down, hold your head up, look straight ahead. I think it comes down to doing what feels natural.

Tags: , ,
Posted in posture, recovery | No Comments »

« Older Entries