Running Shorts

WHAT'S THE WORKOUT? 20 minutes at aerobic threshold pace (slightly slower than marathon pace), then 6 x 40 second hill repeats at 3k effort, and finally 4 x 200 at about 34 seconds. WHY ARE YOU DOING THIS? This is a classic tune-up workout. With a race in a week, I don't need to get in any more fitness work, but it's a good idea to reinforce some of the positive steps I've made through my training. I'm a very aerobic runner (meaning I respond best to long-distance effort-based work. The 20-minute AT (run near my marathon pace), is enough to stimulate my aerobic fitness without taxing my body too much (in a typical base-building session, the AT would be 60 minutes). The hills and the 200s are very similar in purpose to one another. While the AT targets aerobic endurance, the latter two parts of the workout target the opposite end of the fitness spectrum -- neuromuscular coordination. They reinforce efficient running form (especially the hills) while improving run...

As I write this, a crisp wind blows a pre-winter chill in from the north. Roiling grey clouds cover the sky as leaves float to the ground signalling the fiery death summer. It's jacket weather. Better yet, it's distance-running weather. Training in the Midwest, you get to deal with four distinct seasons -- which all, in a way, lend themselves to a periodized schedule over the course of the year. Winter represents the hibernation, where the college athletes (and increasingly, high schoolers as well), take to the indoor track. Runs in the gusty winter chill are endured, not enjoyed, knowing they'll make for a stronger, tougher athlete come spring. Spring is the rebirth. As the flora comes back to life, so too do athletic aspirations. Rising from the winter doldrums, we step on the track once again, eager to unleash the speed that has been pent up all winter. As May comes and goes, Spring merges into Summer, and training takes different paths for different runners. F...

This is the first in a hopefully-weekly segment covering the different workouts I'm doing as part of my race preparation. Before I get too far involved, I should mention my basic philosophy on workouts: no one workout is going to make your season; however, one overdone workout can ruin it . The key is to keep everything within a certain level of moderation (as Arthur Lydiard put it, "Train, don't strain") so that each successive workout builds on the previous one. A successful program of workouts should fit together like pieces of a puzzle, building the race you want to run when you want to run it. That said, I thought it'd be cool to give you an idea of the type of work I'm doing, the rationale behind it, and how it all fits together over the course of a season. WHAT'S THE WORKOUT? 4 x 2 Mile at around my lactate threshold (aka, tempo) pace on a bike path. Negative split the intervals as follows: #1 - 10:05-10:10; #2 - 10:00-10:05; #3 - 9:55-10:00; #4 ...

So far this has been the fall of progress. Or, maybe, a return to form. Yesterday, as part of small-town Minster, Ohio's annual Oktoberfest, I ran their 10k in a new road PR of 30:12.5. As a testament to how competitive the race was, I only finished 7th (the winner finished in 28:33). Coming off of base training this summer, I've seen: a solid 10k win in 31:10 (faster than my time from last year's Thanksgiving Day Race), a runner-up 30-second PR at Hudy (my old PR was from 2011), and most recently a road PR in the 10k (my previous PR was 30:40 from 2011), which is a full minute faster than a month ago and is near-equivalent to the sub-30 times I was running on the track in college (track times are almost always faster than road race times). It's been a few years, but my training finally seems to be clicking and I'm seeing the results. As for the race yesterday, I had cautiously optimistic hopes going into it. I pushed too hard in training last Friday-Saturd...

2:02:57. It's official: the marathon has been figured out. The marathon has always had an element of mystique about it: super fast speeds for super far distance. No one really knew how to race it, and even fewer people truly understood how to train for it. In case you hadn't heard, Dennis Kimetto broke the former world record of 2:03:23 in Berlin this weekend, running the above-mentioned time. Oh yeah, and the second-place finisher, Emmanuel Mutai, also ran under the old record time, finishing in 2:03:13. How ridiculous has the marathon become in the past 5 years? Here are some stats: 2:02:57 is 4:41 pace per mile and 14:34 pace per 5k. My road 5k PR is 14:33 . One of his 5k splits was 14:09, faster than I've ever run a 5k (I ran 14:13 on the track once in college). The second place finisher (2:03:13) also broke the previous world record. Talk about bittersweet: you just ran a world record!...But you finished second, so it doesn't actually count . Kimetto ...