A Passion for Running

Hey everyone!

Thanks for all the encouragement for my race tomorrow! It’s going to be tough to reach my goal but I’m looking forward to giving it my all.

I went for a slow, short run at lunch today. I am definitely going to have to keep an eye on the amount/intensity of biking I do because I’ve got pain in my knee that I haven’t had since before I started. It is a sharp, shooting but very brief pain in my right knee. It happens very rarely and goes away after 5 minutes of warm-up but I still better watch myself or I might regret it.

I got a small run in yesterday and biked today. I might skip my run today and do an easy one at lunch tomorrow.

All this because Thursday is Canada Day and I’ll be in a 15k race and want to be fresh.

I already told Tom that running 20 miles on Saturday is out. The race on Thursday means there is no way I’d be doing that anyway and neither will Tom unless he has a death wish or something!

My goal for Thursday is to run it in 7:45 minute miles.

It’s going to be very very difficult!

Ok Pam – OUTSIDE!

Seems my country-woman Pamalamadingdong has been dis’n song references I’ve been making in my and other blogs.

Pam, Pam Pam – where would we be without a song in our hearts?

Gag, kak, gag, kak. Pardon me, I think that was a hairball (I’ve been hangin’ around the cats a bit too much).

In closing:

1) Pamalamadingdong is a blatant rip-off of a classic song from Animal House. In other words, people who live in glass houses shouldn’t throw stones.
2) Just be glad I haven’t left “hey Mickey you’re so fine, you’re so fine you blow my mind, hey Mickey – ch ch ch hey Mickey ch ch ch” in your head…

…oops.

I arrived 15 minutes early at Scona track yesterday morning and found that Aaron was even earlier and was already warming up. I asked him how his knee was. He answered in a “we’ll see” kinda way.

We chatted about “the plan” which had been to do 2 or 3 mile “intervals” and I told Aaron I wasn’t gonna stick to the plan because of the fatigue I’ve been feeling and because I felt it was too early in the training.

He agreed saying it was too early for both of us and asked what I had in mind so I told him I was going to have some fun with speedwork and do a pyramid workout. Specifically,

200 meter
400 meter
800 meter
1600 meter/1 mile
800 meter
400 meter
200 meter

He seemed pretty happy about the idea but suggested if I dropped th 200’s, he’d feel really comfortable about the workout. I agreed with his reasoning being we’d probably “get stupid” and run the 200’s very fast thereby risking injury.

So – COOL – I was going to have company for my workout!

Then Tom arrived and we broke the news to him. He didn’t look terribly pleased about our decision and we encouraged him to go with what felt right for his training. In the end, he joined us and I think he was happy once we were done.

The workout was perfect. Not too little and not too much. For the most part, we ran each 400 meter lap in 1:45 (a few were faster). So, not particularly fast but a good, disciplined workout nonetheless.

Best of all, recovery on Saturday was quick and I feel mentally and physically much fresher than I did two days ago.

It pays to listen to your body.

As Aaron said, we have a few weeks to play with before we have to ramp things up for October. That’s when “the eye of the Tiger” will return!

Hey everyone! I just realized we can create polls from right within the bulletin board!

Here is the first one suggested by Mike Paus.

Thanks Mike!

He has the nerve (or good taste) to share my name – here is Mark from Flemming’s Running Blog.

Mark, I’ll add you to the big list over the weekend.

Holy Cow – a lotta injuries going on in the Running Blog Family. Aaron, Lesley, Marisa, Richard, Jon and Lara…have I missed any of you?

I did some reading last night and found an interesting statistic that said a majority of runners suffer at least one major injury (major defined as an injury that prevents one from running) each year.

So, I think those of you who are injured can take heart – you are experiencing something which is normal among runners. I know that is easier said than done when you are the one with the injury but – hang in there.

I’ve been lucky lately – especially lucky considering how much running and biking I’ve been doing but I have been feeling “on the verge” of injury lately so I’m going to listen to my body and be careful about things. I haven’t had a leg injury in three years. My problem area is my back which on average goes out badly once or twice a year. Total fatigue coupled with lifting something the wrong way is usually what sets it off so…

…yesterday, I did not run and today I chose not to bike. My body seems to have responded well. I feel good – better than I have in a couple of weeks so backing off a bit for a day or two is obviously the right thing to do.

I’d like to share a conversation I had with my physiotherapist the last time my back went out. I asked her how many runners she treats at any given time. She wasn’t able to give me numbers but she said, “Mark, I see a LOT of runners”. I asked her if she thought we were crazy and her response was quite the opposite. She said, “the injuries runners get are more than offset by the positive outcomes derived from running”. Then she told me to keep running.

Take care of yourselves and keep positive everyone.

I’m playing around testing something…

…click on this and then tell me if you have ideas for more of these!

I spent today putting on a workshop. I won’t get to run so I’ll just share a thought I had last night for you to ponder.

Do you remember running as a child?

What did running mean to you then?

I remember running through the fields of my parents farm imagining I was Steve Austin or Superman.

Back then, running was pure fun and adventure…

…hmmm

Went out and ran my four-hill route today at lunch. The first 10 or 15 minutes felt pretty brutal because my legs were very achy from all the biking. I took it slow and it payed off big time – my legs loosened up and felt really good by the half way point.

I’ve been reading that book you see on the left column of my blog. Last night, I was reading a chapter on correcting form problems. I know I sometimes lean toward being a heal-striker so today, I concentrated hard on landing correctly. I found that a slight forward lean really helped me land better and it made running feel much easier. I’m not sure if it was just a mental trick but I’m going to continue working on that.

More good news – I trucked up the last hill (Bellamy) no problem today. I’m definitely getting stronger. There was a time not long ago when Bellamy had my number and oftened triggered the old “you’ve-been-running-at-95%-for-too-long” gag reflex I’ve experienced occasionally.

Total distance was about 10k – I’m happy about today.