Road Racing and Training-week ending 11/12

One thing that I find interesting is that some of my better races have come in circumstances in which my warm up routine was altered because of having to be in a paddock or coral early, and thus had to do my warm up much earlier and then kind of stood around or was only able to jog a very little bit (all three of my marathons, Cherry Blossom 10 Miler, Penn Relays 5000m). That is part of why I pushed my routine back to start at 55m rather than the 45m I used to use as the starting marker. But I think it is also probably some evidence that you need not stress too much about your routine - it is in large part there to give you comfort.

You better be careful of what you start. The Turkey Trot I go to started out with 5 people and very informal from what I was told. The 3 mile distance maybe 2.8ish miles, no one really cares. The race is on a who shows up basis, no registration, no cost, no shirts, no awards, but bibs are handed out now. Last year was my first year and there were close to 2,000 people, I believe. Way more than the little park can handle.

My turkey trot. Well second year doing it. Is for a charity that gives presents to the kids of first responders and soldiers that died on duty. It's a pretty cool race, and it is flat, which is hard to find around here. Also one of the faster 5ks times wise usually. I'm looking forward to it but will be glad when it's over. Tired of dang 5ks.

Thanks, man - I am really glad you got something out of it. I'll be thinking of you, and hope you do well. Remember to relax when it starts to hurt - that was the most important advice I gave you. The more it hurts, the more you need to "fight" it by relaxing. It's a weird juxtaposition of feelings, but it's the way to go. And speed up your cadence with the quick, shorter stride turnover when it gets really rough at the end. Good luck!

Thanks - Yep, I knew others might chime in about breaking it up differently, mostly due to USA 5k races being broken up in miles. I'm in Canada obviously; and we have km markers, so it makes sense to use them. If I was in the US, I would do EXACTLY what you do. 800m sounds perfect. IMO, only having 3 "markers" (miles) would be too long between indicators of how I was doing, and I would want to cut them in half, basically (800m) just like you do, and go from there.

Also, I know warming up is a very personal thing, and can see how you do it very differently. I definitely start to do long-ish pickups near the end of running the whole course before the race, but not 800m-1600m. More like a few 30 second long pickups to race pace. I do however, time my warmup to end very close to race time (maybe this is why it works for me). I would never want to leave 15 minutes or more! To me, the warmup is the "stretching" part of it. I will run the first two km's of the warmup at a very slow pace (for me, well over 8 minute mile pace if I am planning to race around 17-flat). In a perfect scenario, I will finish the warmup with 3 minutes to go. Funny how everyone is very different with the warmup aspect. Interesting to read your take.

Thanks to everyone else who read my post and made a comment about it - I appreciate it very much! This is a great, supportive thread.

You guys are great! Not only a race plan, but also a prerace routine. I assume post race involves beer?

Seriously, all this advice is great. This is not a serious racefor me, though I will try to do my best. As I mentioned before, it’s more like a time trial event, more like a large group training event I guess then a race, though there are prizes for the top three men and women.

Also, I’m taking a coworker And I’d like to make sure this guy has a good experience. As some of you have mentioned in other posts, occasionally people in your life will notice your dedication to running and become curious. This is the third coworker in the past 12 months who has expressed an interest in learning more, and participating in some races. So, this is more of an experience for this guy, and a training run for me. But of course once those competitive juices get flowing, I won’t be able to resist... i’m serious about putting down those four-minute Kms, So I’ll try to warm up enough to be ready to hammer it from the gun

If all else fails with a km to go and you are falling apart, just think about the race report we are all waiting for. It needs to be a good one after all this! :)

Best of luck - I think you'll do great. And it's nice to try to get a co-worker into it. Maybe you'll end up with a running partner you can pass along wisdom to.

Coach - same thing at my work. I started back running and following my diet and at first people thought it was wierd. Now closing in on two years later and 50+ less pounds. Running pretty well etc people ask me questions about how I train and how I eat. And a couple of the gals are up to you know 3-5miles 4x a week or so. So that is satisfying.

This week has been a little wierd. Just by the way the week went ending up w a tad less mileage and a cross train day and an off day. But probably for the best since I just raced and am racing the trot to close down the year.

Good luck if anyone is racing today!

seriousquestion wrote:

My questions is this? What keeps you going and pushing the limits of your own personal training knowing you're not going to be world or even national class? This is not at all a criticism, as I am racing a marathon in the coming weeks and but in 12 + hours of training per week for as many weeks as I can remember. As I enter my taper though, I am just questioning why? I think it is probably normal to think about things like this during taper time, but curious for the responses from some folks who are seriously getting after it.

This guy says it better than I could.

Crushed my 5 miler this morning. 31:34. New PR. Beat last years run by 1:40. Pumped right now but more shocked than anything. Didn't think I'd get 32:30.

R4F - Booooom! Way to kill it. The RR&T thread mojo continues.

AJ - kill that half tomorrow!

This karma is gonna pay off w some epic turkey trotting for these threaders.

Congrats!!! That's a big drop.

10K at Fernhill Park this morning went well - probably my best race of the series. Ran 35:47 for 74th out of 150, so basically smack in the middle. Got out a lot better than I have in a while. Five loops total, which I wasn't a huge fan of, but it was still a good day. Two hay bales (not sure I want to do the steeple, haha), and one decent hill per loop. Did a good job of maintaining pace on the uphill, need to work on downhill running. Plus I passed a guy in the last little bit, so that made me happy :)

First time racing a 10K not on the track!

Will not be doing a Thanksgiving day race - the coach of the guy I'm going to be training with now is encouraging me to take this week easy, so I think that is what I'll do.

Great races from y'all!

RunningForFun - Awesome race! That is a massive PR!! I would be pleased, too. Very pleased. What do you attribute this unexpected jump from? A different way of training? Just general improvement curve?

Laughlin - very good time for a 10k. I'm hoping to get back to similar times by next summer. I am literally shocked that 35:47 would get you only 74/150.... that is insane! Talk about a loaded field. Around my parts, a 35:47 in a small race like 150 people would get you top 5 if you were lucky, or at the very least, top 10. Definitely no worse than 10th with only 150 people. What was the winning time? Top 3 times? I'd be interested.

Laughlin- turkey trot!!! You can take it easy and still trot hellllllll. Very nice 10k. That's equal to like what a 17:15 5k? .. now I have a time to shoot for!

This thread is killing some races.

Thanks guys! Ontario runner it was a combination of running more miles and more intensities and also racing smarter. Last year I was in better shape than what I ran but I went out way too hard and died Midway through.

Ontario Runner - thank you! The top three went 29:52, 30:35, and 31:06 - pretty fast! This race was the last of the Stumptown XC series (Portland, OR) which gets some pretty good competition. Oregon actually has a pretty good running community. I was pretty happy with it. 1:09 off my track PR with five hills total, and not having done any sharpening work was pretty encouraging.

RRR - you're almost right on - McMillan's calculator puts it equal to 17:14. Granted, this was XC, so I could certainly go faster on a track, but I guess on an equally challenging course that's what I would expect.

Laughlin - that's what I was thinking. Probably worth 16:59 on a flat road course ... if not faster.

You're probably right. Makes me excited to try to break my 10k/5k PRs on the track this spring.

Let it rip at the turkey trot!!! Although maybe try and run even splits this time? :)

F*^•k that. Its my last race of the year. I'm going for broke.