Amazingly, things are still stepping up well. My body is feeling the push a lot more and is asking for more rest, but the weak hints of potential injuries gave way to healthiness. There is no stopping the everlasting determination. I have figured something out: I need a nickname. There are too many possibilities.
This is what happened throughout the week
13 weeks to go
Monday: Taekwondo practice (1:20)
Tuesday: 9 miles at 7:35 min/mile pace then 2 hours of olympic lifting/core work
Wednesday: TKD practice (1:20)
Thursday: Core Craziness Type 2, 4 sets (last without pushups)
Friday: Lazy day (rest)
Saturday: 68 minute run (roughly 7:30 min/mile pace)
Sunday: Biking (3:01)
Weight: Low 173.2 and median 174.6
Core Craziness Type 2
7 pushups
30 crunches with a 1 second hold on top (lift full spine off the ground)
7 pushups
30 side crunches with the 1s hold
7 pushups
30 other side
7 pushups
30 leg lifts
7 pushups
30 supermans
Why oh why do this to myself?
The major thing that you may notice about this week is that I took two days off my legs in a row. That was in response to my body calling out, "Please stop. Please stop!" Each long run was getting harder and even though I was stepping up distance, I was forced to take small steps back in speed and intensity. My body just needed a couple days off my feet. Two days entirely off would be just a mistake and I've been neglecting the core work that is so necessary for the obstacles, so I worked my cardio and built up those critical muscles with the Core Craziness. I didn't do pushups on the last set because my pushup muscles were already exhausted. If you've worked a muscle to failure, it's a good time to stop. You're not getting much out of it if you try to push it harder. Remember, that muscle needs to recover before it'll be able to work for you.
The other major change was motivated by the previous one: I did two long workouts in a row. If you've noticed, I've been almost religiously keeping to hard-"easy" day routine. That's because of the well established literature that your body takes 24 hours to be at the trough of performance after a hard workout then the second 24 hours is building back up. Once you get to 48 hours out, your body is ready to go again, and stronger. So why the two workouts in a row? Did I forget good science and unabashedly ignore that strong reasoning? Of course not! As a scientist, that would be unheard of. Instead, I'm looking ahead to my toughest workout in my future: 15+ miles of running on Friday evening, 4 hours of biking on Saturday morning and 15+ miles of running on Saturday evening. That'll make me prepped to run roughly 45 mile-equivalents on race day. But, in order to complete that crazy training, I need to get my mind used to going back two days in a row and working hard.
Progression towards the sky. As advertized last week, I am increasing the distance on my runs more slowly now. I was at 8 miles last week and now I've graduated (yay) to 9 miles. The first run at 9 miles felt quite bad to start with. I was running 7:45's and my legs hurt bad. They just were complaining until around mile 4 to 5 when they started relaxing. The pace quickened and I got into a groove. The last mile was around 7:10 pace (with a 200m kick, as always). That was part of why I knew that my body needed rest. Coming back after that rest, the 9 miles (68 min) on soft ground was a breeze. I came back afterwards feeling like I could do more and faster. It was just so relaxing and smooth. Rest is good. The plan for this week: 10 miles. You may say "Ooh, double digits" but in the grand scheme of things, I'm ready. Bring it on.
Goals for the future
I've already talked about the goal for the lazy insane set of training workouts (30+ miles running, 4 hours biking in 24 hours). That's motivated by my distance goal. The winner (Pak-man) last year completed 7 laps. He also slept for around 6 hours, did his first 8 mile lap in 1:37, and had some people claiming that he skipped obstacles. No such weakness is in my plan.
One of my key plans is to just keep on Rollin'. There will be no sleeping. Resting is characterized by walking continually and just making the effort when I reach an obstacle. Sleeping is for Sunday, after I cross that finish line the last time. That said, I understand why Pak-man stopped. His race plan was to stay in front the whole time and keep it that way. Admirable, but when you're going for distance, you've got to let those young whippersnappers beat you on the first couple laps. That means if your goal is 12 laps, you better get that first lap done somewhere around 1:30 to 2 hours. Pak-man did 7, so he was going too fast on the first lap.
About the claim of skipping obstacles, I really hope that they are false reports. It's not in the mudder spirit to cheap out. The obstacles are what we're there for. Everyone who trains can run 56 miles in 24 hours. The 24-hour races generally cover around 100 miles. My goal is to exemplify a true mudder. I was presented a short stick (obstacle in the way). No one else would take that stick. I did. I took that stick and... that's worth somethin'.
That bring us to the last topic of this week: training for obstacles. You may notice that I'm not doing focused training for obstacles yet. For one, we can only guess what the obstacles are going to be until we show up on race day and go over them. You can say that I can prepare for the known obstacles (mud mile, Berlin wall, rings, monkey bars, etc..). I would say that "Congratulations! You're right." The lifting, Taekwondo and core work are great preparation for obstacles. For one, Berlin Wall is just an uber-pull-up. We're doing lots of pull-ups. That said, I fully plan on going to Venice beach and spending some good time on the rings and also on UCLA's Drake Track for the monkey bars. The thing is that I don't really need to do that yet. I've got the technique for each of those key obstacles down, so once we get like 4-8 weeks out, I'll start working on my grip and technique for those specific obstacles. I'll have the huge base of fitness to work from and the obstacles themselves are not they key difficulty in the run. Well... that's my opinion. We'll see if it'll hold up on race day.
So... that bring me to the goal for race day: 8+ laps. That's 64+ miles. That's 1 lap more than Pak-man (winner last year). If I am prepped to run 45 miles in roughly 8 hours then I should be able to walk 19 more miles and do obstacles in the remaining 16. If that wins me the race, so be it. If I end out doing more on race day, power to me. That's the high bar I set for myself and we'll see if I soar over it with many many steps of pain or if I come short.
This is what happened throughout the week
13 weeks to go
Monday: Taekwondo practice (1:20)
Tuesday: 9 miles at 7:35 min/mile pace then 2 hours of olympic lifting/core work
Wednesday: TKD practice (1:20)
Thursday: Core Craziness Type 2, 4 sets (last without pushups)
Friday: Lazy day (rest)
Saturday: 68 minute run (roughly 7:30 min/mile pace)
Sunday: Biking (3:01)
Weight: Low 173.2 and median 174.6
Core Craziness Type 2
7 pushups
30 crunches with a 1 second hold on top (lift full spine off the ground)
7 pushups
30 side crunches with the 1s hold
7 pushups
30 other side
7 pushups
30 leg lifts
7 pushups
30 supermans
Why oh why do this to myself?
The major thing that you may notice about this week is that I took two days off my legs in a row. That was in response to my body calling out, "Please stop. Please stop!" Each long run was getting harder and even though I was stepping up distance, I was forced to take small steps back in speed and intensity. My body just needed a couple days off my feet. Two days entirely off would be just a mistake and I've been neglecting the core work that is so necessary for the obstacles, so I worked my cardio and built up those critical muscles with the Core Craziness. I didn't do pushups on the last set because my pushup muscles were already exhausted. If you've worked a muscle to failure, it's a good time to stop. You're not getting much out of it if you try to push it harder. Remember, that muscle needs to recover before it'll be able to work for you.
The other major change was motivated by the previous one: I did two long workouts in a row. If you've noticed, I've been almost religiously keeping to hard-"easy" day routine. That's because of the well established literature that your body takes 24 hours to be at the trough of performance after a hard workout then the second 24 hours is building back up. Once you get to 48 hours out, your body is ready to go again, and stronger. So why the two workouts in a row? Did I forget good science and unabashedly ignore that strong reasoning? Of course not! As a scientist, that would be unheard of. Instead, I'm looking ahead to my toughest workout in my future: 15+ miles of running on Friday evening, 4 hours of biking on Saturday morning and 15+ miles of running on Saturday evening. That'll make me prepped to run roughly 45 mile-equivalents on race day. But, in order to complete that crazy training, I need to get my mind used to going back two days in a row and working hard.
Progression towards the sky. As advertized last week, I am increasing the distance on my runs more slowly now. I was at 8 miles last week and now I've graduated (yay) to 9 miles. The first run at 9 miles felt quite bad to start with. I was running 7:45's and my legs hurt bad. They just were complaining until around mile 4 to 5 when they started relaxing. The pace quickened and I got into a groove. The last mile was around 7:10 pace (with a 200m kick, as always). That was part of why I knew that my body needed rest. Coming back after that rest, the 9 miles (68 min) on soft ground was a breeze. I came back afterwards feeling like I could do more and faster. It was just so relaxing and smooth. Rest is good. The plan for this week: 10 miles. You may say "Ooh, double digits" but in the grand scheme of things, I'm ready. Bring it on.
Goals for the future
I've already talked about the goal for the lazy insane set of training workouts (30+ miles running, 4 hours biking in 24 hours). That's motivated by my distance goal. The winner (Pak-man) last year completed 7 laps. He also slept for around 6 hours, did his first 8 mile lap in 1:37, and had some people claiming that he skipped obstacles. No such weakness is in my plan.
One of my key plans is to just keep on Rollin'. There will be no sleeping. Resting is characterized by walking continually and just making the effort when I reach an obstacle. Sleeping is for Sunday, after I cross that finish line the last time. That said, I understand why Pak-man stopped. His race plan was to stay in front the whole time and keep it that way. Admirable, but when you're going for distance, you've got to let those young whippersnappers beat you on the first couple laps. That means if your goal is 12 laps, you better get that first lap done somewhere around 1:30 to 2 hours. Pak-man did 7, so he was going too fast on the first lap.
About the claim of skipping obstacles, I really hope that they are false reports. It's not in the mudder spirit to cheap out. The obstacles are what we're there for. Everyone who trains can run 56 miles in 24 hours. The 24-hour races generally cover around 100 miles. My goal is to exemplify a true mudder. I was presented a short stick (obstacle in the way). No one else would take that stick. I did. I took that stick and... that's worth somethin'.
That bring us to the last topic of this week: training for obstacles. You may notice that I'm not doing focused training for obstacles yet. For one, we can only guess what the obstacles are going to be until we show up on race day and go over them. You can say that I can prepare for the known obstacles (mud mile, Berlin wall, rings, monkey bars, etc..). I would say that "Congratulations! You're right." The lifting, Taekwondo and core work are great preparation for obstacles. For one, Berlin Wall is just an uber-pull-up. We're doing lots of pull-ups. That said, I fully plan on going to Venice beach and spending some good time on the rings and also on UCLA's Drake Track for the monkey bars. The thing is that I don't really need to do that yet. I've got the technique for each of those key obstacles down, so once we get like 4-8 weeks out, I'll start working on my grip and technique for those specific obstacles. I'll have the huge base of fitness to work from and the obstacles themselves are not they key difficulty in the run. Well... that's my opinion. We'll see if it'll hold up on race day.
So... that bring me to the goal for race day: 8+ laps. That's 64+ miles. That's 1 lap more than Pak-man (winner last year). If I am prepped to run 45 miles in roughly 8 hours then I should be able to walk 19 more miles and do obstacles in the remaining 16. If that wins me the race, so be it. If I end out doing more on race day, power to me. That's the high bar I set for myself and we'll see if I soar over it with many many steps of pain or if I come short.
No comments:
Post a Comment