This training is quite relentless. The distances keep adding up and for some reason, my body wants to run even faster despite the increase in distance. I'm starting to feel a little bit more of my destroyed ankle. I'm also looking into the required equipment and finding that there's a lot of stuff and a lot to think about. I've also got more thoughts on the nickname question.
12 weeks to go
Monday: Taekwondo Practice (1:30), 2 sets Core Craziness Type 2 (7/30)
Tuesday: 10 miles (7:13 min/mile pace), Ring pull-ups, Monkey bars, olympic lifting for 2 hours
Wednesday: Taekwondo Practice (1:30)
Thursday: Lazy day
Friday: 76 minute run (7:08 pace for 5 miles, then ran back)
11 weeks to go
Saturday: 6 sets Core Craziness Type 2 (7/50)
Sunday: Biking (3:21)
Weight: Low 169.0, median 171.6.
Core Craizness Type 2 (# pushups=P, # abdominal exercises=A)
P pushups
A crunches
P pushups
A side crunches
P pushups
A side crunches
P pushups
A leg lifts
P pushups
A supermans
This week I did 6 sets all at once, which corresponds to 300 of each ab exercise and 310 pushups. That took around 30 minutes of constant activity.
The Eternal Why
I've explained most of my training strategy in terms of mileage, but there are a lot of other details that I've been leaving out. So I'd thought that I'd share. You also notice that I started doing some of the obstacles (Monkey Bars and Rings). You also may notice that I've ramped up my core workouts when I don't want to be working on my feet. I'm currently thinking about alternative ways to work my heart as hard as running or biking but without running or biking. Experimentation is always necessary.
The first thing is that I'm worrying that I'm not doing enough leg miles. In an ideal world, I'd be out there on my feet most every day and getting those legs used to the intense mileage. However, as I've talked about before, that also means taxing those critical limbs more and, in my opinion, aggravating old wounds. This week has confirmed that suspicion. For both long runs that I did, I was feeling that old injury hurting me slightly for the first couple miles.
At the same time, you may notice that the pace for both runs increased and increased appreciably. You may think that the decrease to 7:15 or 7:10 from 7:30 might be a small difference, but when you multiply over 10 times, that's quite a big difference. This increase in speed wasn't a conscious decision that I made. I simply went out and ran my rough pace and what popped out was an increase in speed. That tells me that even though my ankle is giving me a wee bit of trouble, my training is working. My body is telling me that it's ready for more difficulty and more pace. I'm holding back from giving it a lot more distance all at once. That may be a mistake, but I'm also making sure that my body will hold up until the end.
So, what am I doing to strike that balance? Two words: soft ground. Soft ground is the key to keeping bodies healthy. Especially here in the US, city planners naively think that if they want to make some place more welcoming to runners, they should pave some running trails. That's absolutely the wrong thing. Concrete has no give at all. All of that impact goes into the joints of the people running. That increases the slow damage being dealt to ankles, knees and hips. Even though I can't run on soft ground alone, I try to maximize the amount of distance on green grass or at least brown dirt. I also do a reasonable amount of distance on a running track. While this isn't the softest ground, it gives me a good idea about the actual pace I'm running and also breaks down what is happening with my body by mile.
That brings me to an important point about how things have been going: those last two miles are brutal. I said before that I was used to 8 miles. Even though I've been going faster, those first 8 miles have been passing so easily. Once I get to those last two miles, however, I feel a lot more tired. My shirt is invariably entirely dosed with sweat and my legs start complaining. They can do the increased distance, but my muscles are also getting pushed to their limit. Strangely, I'm actually not feeling like I need to constantly push my limits and practice the mental challenge of keeping on going even when my body hurts. I anticipate that as I get higher in distance and my leg miles increase, I'll have plenty of opportunities to do that soon.
Oh, and to point out something that may be missed. Yes, that's 3 hours and 20 minutes of biking. Three hours is a long time. Yes, that's going up by about 20 minutes each week. It's going to keep doing that. Each hour isn't as hard as a mile of biking simply because my bike isn't good enough to really push that hard and I just don't know how to push myself hard on a bike. That's why I can actually work on my total endurance exercise time by biking. In that way, that really long bike is central to my strategy for getting up to the 24 hour race.
Equipment
The key question is the wetsuit. In order to survive past the first hour of competition, you need a 6mm+ wetsuit with a hood. The thing is that wetsuits are notoriously inflexible and not good to run in. That means that I need to get a maximally flexible wetsuit. Of course, those wetsuits are a lot more expensive. By expensive, I mean $250-500. That's a lot of money. I'm currently looking through a lot of websites and doing some research about the surf stores that I need to visit.
The other thing is gloves. If I go with wetsuit gloves, they get really slippery when they get muddy. That means that I won't be able to hold those rings or monkey bars that I need to go over. I'm starting to think about if I should try to go with mountain climber gloves or something akin to that. The question with those gloves is how to get the proper grip. So many questions and so much data to sift through... good thing I'm getting a degree in data analysis.
Nicknames
Personally, I believe that choosing your own nickname is a no-no. So, I present possible and historical options that all work and allow others to choose one of the below and/or make up something of their own. This is basically a walk down memory-lane for me.
Historical nicknames
12 weeks to go
Monday: Taekwondo Practice (1:30), 2 sets Core Craziness Type 2 (7/30)
Tuesday: 10 miles (7:13 min/mile pace), Ring pull-ups, Monkey bars, olympic lifting for 2 hours
Wednesday: Taekwondo Practice (1:30)
Thursday: Lazy day
Friday: 76 minute run (7:08 pace for 5 miles, then ran back)
11 weeks to go
Saturday: 6 sets Core Craziness Type 2 (7/50)
Sunday: Biking (3:21)
Weight: Low 169.0, median 171.6.
Core Craizness Type 2 (# pushups=P, # abdominal exercises=A)
P pushups
A crunches
P pushups
A side crunches
P pushups
A side crunches
P pushups
A leg lifts
P pushups
A supermans
This week I did 6 sets all at once, which corresponds to 300 of each ab exercise and 310 pushups. That took around 30 minutes of constant activity.
The Eternal Why
I've explained most of my training strategy in terms of mileage, but there are a lot of other details that I've been leaving out. So I'd thought that I'd share. You also notice that I started doing some of the obstacles (Monkey Bars and Rings). You also may notice that I've ramped up my core workouts when I don't want to be working on my feet. I'm currently thinking about alternative ways to work my heart as hard as running or biking but without running or biking. Experimentation is always necessary.
The first thing is that I'm worrying that I'm not doing enough leg miles. In an ideal world, I'd be out there on my feet most every day and getting those legs used to the intense mileage. However, as I've talked about before, that also means taxing those critical limbs more and, in my opinion, aggravating old wounds. This week has confirmed that suspicion. For both long runs that I did, I was feeling that old injury hurting me slightly for the first couple miles.
At the same time, you may notice that the pace for both runs increased and increased appreciably. You may think that the decrease to 7:15 or 7:10 from 7:30 might be a small difference, but when you multiply over 10 times, that's quite a big difference. This increase in speed wasn't a conscious decision that I made. I simply went out and ran my rough pace and what popped out was an increase in speed. That tells me that even though my ankle is giving me a wee bit of trouble, my training is working. My body is telling me that it's ready for more difficulty and more pace. I'm holding back from giving it a lot more distance all at once. That may be a mistake, but I'm also making sure that my body will hold up until the end.
So, what am I doing to strike that balance? Two words: soft ground. Soft ground is the key to keeping bodies healthy. Especially here in the US, city planners naively think that if they want to make some place more welcoming to runners, they should pave some running trails. That's absolutely the wrong thing. Concrete has no give at all. All of that impact goes into the joints of the people running. That increases the slow damage being dealt to ankles, knees and hips. Even though I can't run on soft ground alone, I try to maximize the amount of distance on green grass or at least brown dirt. I also do a reasonable amount of distance on a running track. While this isn't the softest ground, it gives me a good idea about the actual pace I'm running and also breaks down what is happening with my body by mile.
That brings me to an important point about how things have been going: those last two miles are brutal. I said before that I was used to 8 miles. Even though I've been going faster, those first 8 miles have been passing so easily. Once I get to those last two miles, however, I feel a lot more tired. My shirt is invariably entirely dosed with sweat and my legs start complaining. They can do the increased distance, but my muscles are also getting pushed to their limit. Strangely, I'm actually not feeling like I need to constantly push my limits and practice the mental challenge of keeping on going even when my body hurts. I anticipate that as I get higher in distance and my leg miles increase, I'll have plenty of opportunities to do that soon.
Oh, and to point out something that may be missed. Yes, that's 3 hours and 20 minutes of biking. Three hours is a long time. Yes, that's going up by about 20 minutes each week. It's going to keep doing that. Each hour isn't as hard as a mile of biking simply because my bike isn't good enough to really push that hard and I just don't know how to push myself hard on a bike. That's why I can actually work on my total endurance exercise time by biking. In that way, that really long bike is central to my strategy for getting up to the 24 hour race.
Equipment
The key question is the wetsuit. In order to survive past the first hour of competition, you need a 6mm+ wetsuit with a hood. The thing is that wetsuits are notoriously inflexible and not good to run in. That means that I need to get a maximally flexible wetsuit. Of course, those wetsuits are a lot more expensive. By expensive, I mean $250-500. That's a lot of money. I'm currently looking through a lot of websites and doing some research about the surf stores that I need to visit.
The other thing is gloves. If I go with wetsuit gloves, they get really slippery when they get muddy. That means that I won't be able to hold those rings or monkey bars that I need to go over. I'm starting to think about if I should try to go with mountain climber gloves or something akin to that. The question with those gloves is how to get the proper grip. So many questions and so much data to sift through... good thing I'm getting a degree in data analysis.
Nicknames
Personally, I believe that choosing your own nickname is a no-no. So, I present possible and historical options that all work and allow others to choose one of the below and/or make up something of their own. This is basically a walk down memory-lane for me.
Historical nicknames
- Fuzzihead
- Whisker
- Bearded one
- Panda
- Ensign Hotpants
This is actually the most prevasive of all the nicknames. It was officially chosen for me as part of the frisbee team. Hotpants because I used to be a runner and still wore my running shorts to practice. Ensign because the only person in Star Wars (or Trek) with my name is an Ensign. I was also a freshman in college at the time, so it was appropriate.
Potential nicknames
- Crazy Panda
- Blogger
This one makes sense because of.. well... this.
Anyone have other suggestions?
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