What are you thankful for?

In a world riddled with change, we all seek constants in our lives. For some, it is the unconditional love by their spouse, parents, or even their dogs. For others, it is the security offered by a nice bank balance or even being able to enjoy a bowl of mac 'n' cheese any time of the day they wish. We love constants and we seek for them all our lives. Despite of your ups and downs this year, if you look back, you can always rely on the comforts of the constants you hold dear. It's the time of the year when we celebrate those constants and be thankful for them. 

The one constant I have had in my life in recent years is running. Even if everything in my life is going crazy, I know that in just a few moments I can lace up and run, and forget all about it for an hour or two or more. I'm thankful for that. Ever since I started blogging my runs, early this year, I put a meter to track the miles I've been running with a goal of running at least 2010 miles this year. Today my meter reads "1965 miles" and I think I'm pretty close to my goal. Call me crazy but if my running were to anthropomorphize into a person, I would marry it. Running, I'm thankful to you. I'm also thankful to all the friends I've ran with, all the non-running friends who had to bear with my running talk, thankful to all my shoes which accompanied me through some pretty rough times, thankful to life in general for not stopping me from running.

It's never too early to say thanks. Happy Thanksgiving everyone!

Running for Running Sake

With all the marathons for this year behind me -- cancelled Tucson due to a conference travel conflict -- I'm now back to running for running sake. No planned workout, no speed drills, no intervals, no nothing. Just lace up and run. That's what I've been doing all of last week. Although the effects of Chicago still linger, I've put that behind me and started enjoying running like I did before becoming competitive.

I still use a GPS watch to track my time and distance for every run because I'm a nerd and I like numbers. I did a 20 mile run yesterday and realized how much more enjoyable it was when I did not look at my watch every few minutes to check my splits like I did while training for the spring and fall seasons.

The rest of the year will continue these mellow enjoyable runs. The only race now on my list is the Knickerbocker 60K. This is a low-key ultra organized by the New York Road Runners annually before Thanksgiving. The course itself is 9 loops around Central Park adding up to 37.2 miles with a fair bit of rolling hills. I will be running this as a end-of-the-year celebratory run as opposed to racing it.

Looking Forward

So yes, I'm one year closer to my grave today and Boston registration opened at 9am and closed at 5pm like a government clerk. It's time to move on with new goals, new expectations and new thrills in running. I spent last week evaluating my running goals and what it meant to me after the  dismal  encouraging performance at Chicago. I think I'm now closer to BQ than ever but BQ is merely a milestone (an important one) than a goal. So if you run, spend sometime thinking what your running "goal" is/should be?

I did and finally it stuck with me as "achieve a lifetime of running". I want to keep running till I look like this and probably even worse.

I'm grateful that I've been able to run as much as I have this year and hope godess Nike will continue to bless me. Have a safe and injury free running experience everyone!

Chasing the elusive 3:10

A few days before the Chicago marathon I woke up dreaming that I was wearing the famed blue singlet with "Boston Athletic Association" on it. I was on Heartbreak Hill pounding my way to the finish line. Last Sunday, I was at the start line of another great marathon in downtown Chicago feeling a bit nervous but confident of all those grueling training sessions I had put in. The long runs in freezing cold winter and the tempo runs and track workouts even in 100+ degree Baltimore heat should pay off, right? Nada. Doesn't matter. All that matters is what you do after the starter gun goes off. Dreams don't count, passion is only for the movies, and certainly no extra points for sucking up the IT band pain in Chinatown (mile 21) and continuing to run. You either make it or end up 10 minutes late -- 3:20:54.

*Wisconsin was a training run

As a runner the best you can hope for is continuous improvement. Goals change but training never ends. Looking back on all the marathons I've done in a year, all I have is to look forward to the next marathon knowing that my qualifying time might just be a marathon away. Or two.

Why do I want to qualify? 3:10 seems like an arbitrary goal. Why not 3:00 or even 2:50? Preparing and running for a BQ to me has been much more than that. It is knowing what I'm made of. It was the same thing that made me run a 50 miler in June.

Watch and learn

Sometimes you can just learn by watching something over and over.

Back in the game!

Today's 8 mile run in the morning was more than that. It was to test if I still had it in me to meet my expectations. The run was an exercise that I call "Speed Game" for lack of ideas. (Speed Play is already taken -- aka Fartlek.) I broke the run into several components including a progression and a tempo run with sprints added in between. At the end of the tempo run were couple of surge exercises to simulate the race finish line conditions. I met all planned goals and my legs feel great. Irrespective of my original race goal for Chicago and my recent setbacks, I now feel very confident to put a decent show. The days following will be mellow but calculated.

In more Chicago news, my corral assignment got messed up and I recently found out that I will be running in the "OPEN" category. Apparently, their "system" will not allow changes now. WTF! To give a perspective, Chicago is not like your ordinary city marathon -- with tens of thousands of runners, a bad corral assignment or the worst case ("OPEN") like mine, would mean slow milling for the first few miles from start. Also, all the dodging slow runners etc will take energy that could have been well spent racing. Bad race strategy but can't do much about it other than trying to be there early and have a wider negative split.

Running a marathon as a training run

This might sound crazy but at some point you feel comfortable with the marathon distance and start running that distance  (or even longer) during training runs. So, why not run a marathon as a training run and get a t-shirt for your already overflowing closet? This is certainly not a new idea and many seasoned runners do it regularly.

Caveat: As with everything in running, attempt it only if you feel comfortable with idea and if your current level of fitness will permit. Level of fitness includes your current training volume and the recovery time needed for long distances. Ideally, you should be a high mileage runner (>> 50mpw).

With that out the way, here are a few tips to run a training marathon:

1. Plan well: Schedule this well in advance so you'll have sufficient time to recover for your goal race. 'Sufficient' depends on your fitness levels. A minimum of 3-5 weeks should be reasonable.

2. Keep the goal in mind: In the training marathon, the goal is not the finish line of that marathon but your goal race. So, avoid exerting too much when you don't have to and run it according your training goals. For instance if you're trying to achieve a certain pace or split try to replicate it as faithfully as possible but over a shorter distance.

3. Dress rehearsal: Run with the same running gear as you plan to use in your goal marathon. This would also be a good time to test something new and see if it agrees with you.

4. Start slow: This should hold for your goal race too but it's very important to not run too hard in the first few miles. Keep in mind that every mile you run hard requires a certain period of recovery. Typical long distance runs for marathons are lesser than 26 miles. So, plan to go very easy for the excess miles or even walk it off.

5. Ignore everyone: Remember a training run is not competitive. This is your training run. Don't get carried away in the marathon atmosphere and let someone else set the pace for you.

6. No taper: There should not be any taper period for the training marathon. Treat this as a regular long run except take a day off before and after to compensate for the extra distance, if required.

7. Recovery: Practice good recovery routines. This goes for any run you do but especially important for training marathons. Running 26.2 has its toll on the body irrespective of the pace you set. Eat well before and after and sleep well.

8. Be prepared to DNF: Listen to your body. If you don't feel good stop! This is just a training run. While doing a DNF before a goal race might sound bad it's really a confidence booster. When you ask yourself "What if .." and imagine the worst case and be prepared for it, all nervousness should go away.

9. Enjoy your run: Take advantage of the social setting, talk to people while running and have a good time. Otherwise you might as well run alone and save some money.

Of course, this applies to all distances and not just marathons except longer the distance more the recovery time needed.