1/2 Marathon Training Adventure!

[sakinney]

October 21st, Atlantic City Half Marathon.

I ran the Philadelphia Distance Run (half marathon) about 27 years ago, finishing in 1:42.

My goal is to beat that time this year.

This training program is about 12 weeks long.

Today:
A.M. 8x200m on 2 minutes; cadences from 210 to 214
Tougher than I thought it would be based on my prep work. Heart rate recovery is key, and will get harder as the program progresses and 2 minutes reduces to 90 seconds, to a minute to 30 seconds (not right away)

P.M. KoC delta w/ 25lb Clubbell®

Note: Having got gross mechanics of pose running down, I will continue to refine the technique, with drills and practice.

[sakinney]

Intu-Flow®
Pose running drills in driveway, focus on quiet footwork.

[sakinney]

5K Time Trial: a yucky 26:25 (which I blame at least in part on 80degree temperatures with 80% humidity)
I kept good structure, good mechanics, and was mostly good at maintaining 180 cadence. (I would flick my metronome on at various times to check)

Pose Drills, some practice runs in the driveway
Some strength work.
Focused flexibility.

Notes from the "Read the Instructions" File:
I started reading Dr. Romanov's book on the POSE method and immediately learned that I was doing certain things completely backwards!! I had not really taken in the importance of the 'pull to pose' and relaxation. When I mentally started associating the cadence with the pull instead of the footstrike, my running got much quieter. Not perfect, but better. I also see yoga-ish things to add to my low instensity and flexibility work. Really, it helps to read the directions....

[sakinney]

Intu Flow

2x800m 3 minutes rest in between
Funny story; Originally I read it as 2x800 on 3 minutes, and could not figure out how I was going to be able to do that. I was calculating paces and stride rates in my head, realized something was off, and then re-read my program. In the meantime, my wife was laughing that clearly the race wasn't nearly as important to me as the geekiness of planning a program and working out the details and paces and distances. She's right, of course. The race is just a fixed target, it's the experiment that's important....

[sakinney]

Pose drills
Test-drive of Revive (Coach Sonnon is a genius for the way he re-engineered drills that everyone 'thinks' they know)
Test drive of Thrive flows (ditto...)

[sakinney]

Continued test-drive of Revive (only did half of them yesterday)
Review of upcoming runs needed this week. (thanks for reminding me to plot a 1000m course....)

[sakinney]

A.M.
10x200m, 2 minutes rest between repeats, cadence 210 - 216, good breath recovery through tactical breathing over the 2 minutes. (Bigger challenges on the horizon as cadence/speed increases and the rest time decreases over upcoming sets of 200m repeats) Technique is getting better.

Pose-Fall-Pose-Fall drills, and some practice

P.M.
KoC, delta level, 25lb Clubbell®.

Revive hips and knees, Revive ankles.

[sakinney]

A.M.
4x800m with 3 minutes rest between
started at 200 cadence this was too much, dropped to 190, then 192, then 194 (which might be too much)
3 minutes rest is great! I can get a lot of recovery with tactical breathing, did a little modification the exhale pause turned into a second 4 beat exhale to wring out as much air as possible. Too bad that the rest period will continue to decrease over the program (ha ha ha)
Technique is continuing to improve, running quieter, running smoother, and getting a much clearer link between the cadence and the amount of lean...

P.M.
Pose running drills and brief practice runs
Some strength and balance drills.

[sakinney]

A.M.
5K, comfortable pace (using music instead of a metronome), 25:40
For those keeping track:
June 17th 5K: 27:25 baseline in early part of running prep
July 14th 5K: 25:35 after completing 15:15 repeat protocol and entering 36:36 repeat protocol
Aug. 9th 5K: 26:25 (which I'm still blaming on heat and humidity)
Aug 17th 5K: 25:40, end of 2nd week of program

Pose running drills (which are more challenging if you actually follow the directions in the book, ha ha)

P.M.
King of Clubs Delta w/ 25lb Clubbell®

Next week's runs include a long run of 5 miles, which is playing with my head a little bit. Fear-reactivity isn't just for back-bends anymore (sorry, private yoga joke).
With 1 week's incremental improvement in conditioning and technique, the right music and a break in the weather, though I will be fine...

[sakinney]

Revive (full routine) (embarrassing how shallow my hip rotation is.... ah well)
Additional hip mobility movements from Pose book

Just got "Run Less, Run Faster", which is similar in structure to my current plan (sprint intervals at various distances, longer tempo runs and cross training).
It is also replete with tables for estimating race times at various distances, which are making me question my initial goal of 1:42 for the half marathon. I will have to start monitoring my interval speeds (in addition to cadences) to track this better.