Training Update – 6/5/11

Training Update – 6/5/11

            Training this past week has gone pretty well overall. I ended with 88 miles, which is up from 50 last week. My body and legs are taking the increase pretty well, feeling fresh and ready to do more next week. Wednesday, I had my first workout of the season; a 4 mile Steady State with Scott at Buffalo Park. Then on Saturday I did a longer run with Jordan, both went by pretty smooth and easy. Only 3 doubles this week, I’ll be building into those pretty gradually. Here is a look of how my week broke down:

Monday -           AM: Distance Run alone at Cameo Shores, 11 miles in 1:12:35.

Tuesday -          AM: Distance Run in Huntington Beach with Dyson and Jake, 9.5 miles in 58:30

Wednesday -      AM: Steady State Run with Scott at Buffalo Park, 4 miles in 21:09, 3 mile w/u, 3 mile c/d.

PM: Easy Run at Kickstand Kafe, National Running Day Community Run, 4.5 miles in 33:07

Thursday -         AM: Distance Run at Bagel Run, 9.5 miles in 1:05:04

                        PM: Easy Run from Home, 4.5 mile in 29:53

Friday -             AM: Distance Run from Kickstand Kafe w/ Jordan and Brett, 10 miles in 1:07:48.

                        PM: Easy Run from home, 4.5 miles in 30:18

Saturday -          AM: Longer Run with Jordan from Lowell Observatory, 13.5 miles in 1:31:33

Sunday -            AM: Distance Run from Home to Ft. Tuthill, 11 miles in 1:10:09

            Next week will be heading out with my teammates, Jordan, Scott, and Aaron to Carmel, Indiana for the US 8k Road Championships. It should be a good time, the field is looking pretty decent right now and I’m excited as always to go out and race. If you would like to check things out Runnerspace will be showing live coverage of the race, plus plenty of interviews from your favorite US runners.

And now on to other things:

Questions Answered:

In my previous blog Mike asked: Nick,
What types of workouts will you do during your base phase? Longer tempos? Intervals? Etc?
And what kind of warm up do you do prior to a run? Personally, I don't like workouts in the AM because I never feel as warmed up if I just crawl right out of bed, but sometimes life requires them to be done first thing.

Mike: I will do a variety of workouts during my base phase. For this marathon in particular I will have a long base phase since I will be running 100-140 miles per week for the next 10 weeks and have a small 2-week taper before the big race.

The first 5 of those 10 weeks with consist of short track or hill workouts on Mondays to get leg turnover and power (something we don’t want to lose even during heavy mileage training) and Wednesdays will be longer steady state runs of 8-12 miles at 10-15 seconds slower than race pace. Saturdays will be 20-22 mile long runs at a comfortable pace, some having 5-15 minutes close to race pace at the end.

The next 5 weeks will have longer track or hill intervals on Mondays to get faster pace work and strength in and Wednesdays with be Short Tempos Run of 4-8 miles at race pace. Saturdays will alternate from 22-28 mile easy long runs and 15-18 mile steady state runs.  Keep in mind that all of this is being done at altitude, so some times and efforts may be adjusted by about 10-15 seconds per mile.

For each workout I will do about 20 minutes or 3 miles warm up and cool down, with loosening drills and stretches before the workout. As far as doing AM workouts, its something that I have done since high school and then everyday during college, so I am quite used to rolling out of bed and working out half asleep at times. And like you said, life does require them especially being that most races that I run start just after the sun comes up.

Thanks for the questions and thanks for reading! Keep up the training!

Nick