Making it all better

While I was running today, my running buddy asked me if I was having a good day. He noticed a pep in my step and he thought I was having a really good day. My answer was quite to the contrary. I had an awful day. Work has been really crazy lately and the frustrations are building up. Running is a very good outlet for all that rage and long tempo runs like the one that was on the training plan tonight are the perfect way to end the day and make it all better. Pounding the pavement has deep psychological healing properties for me. Hitting the road and letting my legs roar and fly through the dusk air felt like such a relief after a day of complex scheduling and planning issues. The simplicity of running and the physical effort really made my day!

I didn't even use music on my 8k pre-run before I met the club for our regular Tuesday night run. I took my usual warm-up route into Gatineau through the bridges. It seems that the department of Public Works of our cities just decided to give up on one of the bridges and wait for the warmth of Spring to naturally get rid of the snow, you'll notice the dark blue there on the speed heat map.
By the time I got to the running club meeting point, the frustrations had been channeled through my legs and vaporized into a very decent 8.5km and I was ready to challenge the fresh legs of one of the club's faster runner Mark. We ended up completing our usual 7km canal-side winter route at a very decent pace and I finished up with the final leg home to hit a total of 18km in 1h27m - 3 minutes ahead of my training target of 5m/km or 1h30. I figure that if I add in the extra effort of running in the icy/snowy roads and the slowdown on the bridges and the few red lights, I probably could translate this tempo run into a 1h25 run! It is looking better and better for a new PR in Montreal next month.

Cold and Fast!

I am getting back into the training groove and today's -21 celsius with the windchill didn't stop me from going out for a quick speed workout before my work day starts. I hope this is the last time I have to wear a face mask to run, I feel like Spring should be just around the corner but it's a bit shy in showing itself.

This is my first satisfying intervals training since I came back from Miami. I feel I am finally getting my legs back. Hopefully when the weather improves and I can shed a few layers of clothing / protection, my speed will be back to where it was in the fall. I did my usual 8km loop around the bridges into Gatineau. I really like seeing green on the speed heatmap. Hopefully I can run the whole thing in a green tint or even get some yellows later this season.
Even this early in the day there was still some traffic and not all the lights were collaborating with my speed training. Two of my intervals were impacted by ~15 scconds waiting for the light to change. I can't wait until the paths are clear to return to my routes that do not have interruptions from traffic lights :)
I am getting confident that I will be ready for April 17 in Montreal. I'm hoping for a new PR which should be fairly straightforward (I *will* regret those words, I know!) since my half marathon PR currently stands at 1h43m from 2 years ago.

Super week

Last week was actually a pretty good week for training for me. I am resetting my training for my next marathon (destination undecided at this point, Hamilton and Miami are both leading contenders). That means that the distances that were tempo runs during my last cycle will now be "long slow distance" runs. I ran to work again last week at a respectable pace of 5:26m/km. It's difficult to slow down but I know in the long run it will pay off :)

I had two off days where I procrastinated and found reasons not to train but then I bounced back with an amazing tempo run (10k at 46m27s) on Friday and then a good interval run on Saturday where I finally reached my 4:20m/km goal for average tempo portions. I could probably have had all the intervals under 4:20 if it wasn't for that hill!

• 4:09, 4:11, 4:19, 4:29, 4:14 (average: 4:17m/km!)

Sunday was a bit of a downer, I attempted a long slow run again but had to cut it short when my left calf started to complain. I can see how 2 back to back speed sessions would do that :)

I'm still not exactly where I'd like to be to start my next marathon training but depending on the date I may already be in the cycle :) I'll have to really put in the effort to bump up my speed if this one will be the one where I try to qualify for Boston (the time I need is 3:10, a pace of ~4:30m/km or 7:18m/mile if my math is right)

Sunday Interval

Finally the weather cooperated a little on Sunday morning and I had a window for a very productive workout. I went with a simple formula with kilometer intervals. I did my usual route which is unfortunately a bit hilly on the second half. I have yet to find a flatter route that gives me an almost perfect loop without tracking back.
I still managed decent intervals even if the second half was not quite as fast as I would have wished. I always like to see the color difference on the heatmap:
I am almost at my goal of 4:20m/km for the fast intervals but I'll have to work on my 5:00m/km on the recovery intervals.

• Recovery intervals: 5:04, 5:22, 5:25, 5:22, 5:19, 5:09 (average: 5:17)
  
• Fast intervals: 4:13, 4:18, 4:28, 4:29, 4:31 (average: 4:24)

The satisfaction rating for this workout is very high :)

Custom file in the mix.

Interval Monday

Today's training called for a "short" interval run of 16km. Whew. I'm in really deep when 16km is a short run and I have to do intervals too! You've probably picked up already that I'm not a big fan of intervals. I'd rather run a long tempo than do intervals or track but I understand their usefulness so I set out for a simple program tonight when I got home from work: 1km warmup followed by 7 sets of 1km at 4:30m/km or faster speed followed by 1km of rest hopefully around 5:30m/km and a final slowish km to seal the deal.
I must say I'm pretty proud about my course-making abilities. I decided on the course quickly while I was thinking up how to make a route that would not be too boring and yet safely within the distances of home. I actually missed a turn but it turns out my initial idea was a bit short so the detour made the distance perfect!

While I like seeing so much green on the heatmap, it's the pace chart that tells the full story:
For the number freaks like me, here are the full details of what I think is a pretty awesome performance:

• Speed intervals: 4:11, 4:18, 4:26, 4:19, 4:24, 4:31 & 4:37
• Rest intervals: 5:15, 4:53, 5:20, 5:02, 5:19, 5:23 & 5:39
• Average pace throughout: 4:53m/km

The timing was definitively not the best. Right after work, when everyone is barbecuing their dinners, the smells made me really hungry. Add in the fact that I didn't think it was necessary to bring hydration since it didn't look that hot and you've got one major case of the dry mouth and growling stomach! Still, I'll take this balmy weather over a frozen water bottle run in the dark of winter.

In the mix was the hilarious Guy-Phillipe Wells.

Tuesday Intervals

Leave it to me to schedule two speed workouts back to back! With my busy schedule it's not always obvious to fit all the workouts in but this time I think I did a good job. With the weird weather we had in Ottawa, I didn't quite know how to dress. I had to dig into my winter clothes to make up for the up to 30km/h wind gusts, making the balmy 2 celsius feels more like -5. Fortunately for me, the wet snow that had been falling in the early morning had stopped long enough for the sidewalks to dry up a little bit by lunch time. I borrowed this interval workout from Marlene last time and I liked it enough that I wanted a second crack at it. 1km warmup followed by 4 sets of 2x1km at interval speed with 500m cooldowns.
First set at 4:20 and 5:43. total failure against the wind and going uphill (do I sound like I am exaggerating? I might be a bit!). Second set at 4:22 and 4:47 (much better!), third set at 4:56 and 4:45 (is it over yet?) and last set at 5:04 and 4:30 (finally I'm done!). Not quite as consistent as I'd like but a good showing overall considering the wind gusts and the fact that I ran a track workout the night before! A total of 12km completed in 2 seconds short of 1 hour so I can call it at 4:59m/km, yeah!

You probably already know that I use RunSaturday a lot for all kinds of analysis and mapping. One of the things you may not know about RunSaturday is that it allows you to quickly see how you are doing on a dashboard type page when you log in. I love seeing how far I've trained in the last 30 days and this week I noticed I am above 300km for the last 30 days. Woot woot!
If you are the least bit serious about tracking your training, I recommend you check www.RunSaturday.com out. It supports a whole range of fitness devices and best of all it's free and open. Even if you don't have a device or train indoors, you can still enter all your relevant information manually for running, biking and swimming. I just love it!

If you have a bit of time today, check our RoadBunner's awesome picture review of Big Sur. That's one race I wouldn't mind doing some day!

In the mix was Children of Paradise's Urban Alien.

Wednesday Speed Play

Today's training session was a Fartlek. While it may sound like a body malfunction, Fartlek actually means "Speed Play". I haven't done a lot of these because I don't really enjoy them. I prefer a constant speedy (tempo) run than the burst of speed that Fartlek calls for. I'm not even sure if I do them properly, looking at my pace chart I'm kinda satisfied that I did some burst of speed. I may try to sustain the bursts for longer periods next time I get around to doing another speed play session. I shortened the duration a bit since I didn't have enough time to do the entire distance prescribed by my training plan.
I think that the out of breath and close to collapsing feeling is normal for this type of workout. If there were two things I would like to see on my next chart is a more constant pace for the easy sections and a longer burst duration. Other than that I'm fairly happy with ~49 minutes for 10 kms. One thing I never know when I do these types of speed workout is how the total time is supposed to compare to a tempo run.

How weird street fair in the mix.

Sunday at the Track

I should have known better than to try to combine a long distance workout with a speed workout. Today's cold weather reminded me that the track will soon be covered in snow and my schedule wanted a long run so I designed a 16km run that would include a pyramid track workout of 2, 3, 4, 3 and 2 laps with 2 resting laps between each. While I am satisfied with the overall pace (~5:30m/km) I felt really slow at the track where I even got attacked by a dog!
The track itself was a mix of dry, frozen and mud. At the second lap, my mp3 player decided to give up, forcing me to be free earing for the remainder of the work out.

The laps still went by quickly with a bit of effort. Lap times in red are supposedly the fast laps :) 1:59, 2:00, 2:18, 2:16, 2:03, 2:03, 2:04, 2:19, 2:12, 2:00, 2:11, 2:06, 2:18, 2:26, 2:24, 2:01, 2:11, 2:14, 2:29, 2:25, 2:16 and 2:21.

With the ~3.5km that it takes to get to the track, my total today was 16.5 km. Not bad in 1:31:06. I think I'm slowly getting my mojo back.

Track run + weekly digest

I read this very interesting post on Marlene's Mission to a(nother) marathon blog. It inspired me to try the same track workout yesterday. I knew there was a track at Holy Trinity High School and it's a nice distance from the house so it made for a perfect warmup/cooldown before and after the speed session.
I think I did pretty well but I have to agree with Marlene that this sounds much more fun than it is and it is much tougher than it looks.

The session in question is 3 repeats of 4 laps (400m each) with breaks of 2 recover laps.

My warmup was 3.4km at 16m44s and then I started with the track:

First set 1:46, 1:42, 1:44, 1:45.
Recovery: 2:06, 1:58

The first set was fun, I didn't know I could be that fast!

The the second set: 1:47, 1:49, 1:49, 1:48
Recovery: 2:05, 2:04

The second set was pretty tough but I toughed it out knowing there were two recovery set coming. I never knew I'd look forward to running slower, hehehe.

Third set: 1:49, 1:50, 1:53, 1:55
Recovery: 2:18, 1:56

The last set, I just couldn't hold my speed even if I gave it all I got. I did as best as I could. Then, during my last recovery lap, something interesting thing happenned, some kids on their bikes wanted to race me, so I showed them runners are not to be messed with by passing them and holding up until they gave up. Maybe what I need to increase my speed is get my competitive edge and run against kids on bikes ;)

A final cooldown of 13:15 (2.57km) and I was done. I stretched, showered and went for a well deserved brunch after with some friends.

Other training I did last week was 2 sessions of swimming where I set a new time for my fastest 750m set at 17m30s and two indoor biking sessions just to not feel so guilty about slacking off my training and blogging while I adapt to the new schedule.

I'm hoping I can figure out my new schedule and have enough of my stuff moved to my new office to take my bike this week. They got a really sweet setup with a keycard-locked bike cage, assigned lockers (already got mine reserved!) and even an ironing board and iron in the shower room so I don't need to look all wrinkly...