Get ready for Bloomsday (or any race training!)!

[tomq04]

Anyone in the northwest has at least heard of bloomsday in Spokane.  The largest timed race in the US (world occasionally) 55k participants, 7.5 miles.

Here is the challenge, I qualified for the "yellow" group (the best for non-"elite") runners, but my qualification is expiring due to walking with friends/wife the past 3 years (qualification lasts 4 years).  To qualify you must run the race some where between 70-80 min (8.5 min miles or so), which used to be easy...

Fast forward to today, i've had knee issues and frankly have not ran in 2 years.  I'm starting training tomorrow morning at 5:30 with a fancy knee brace and starting easy and slow trying not to aggravate anything along the way.

Goal:
run 3 days/week, short/short/long, bumping up my weekly long run to 7 miles by the middle of april (race is May 4).

I will update after runs, and hopefully not being too stubborn regarding listening to what my knee is telling me.

If you have always wanted to run a 5k or more, sign up for a local race and start training with me!  Tuesday/Thursday/Saturday

[TreeTired]

55k participants, 7.5 miles

good Lord!  Do they have multiple staggered starts?   Otherwise you would be in a crushed walk the entire distance.  LOL!  It probably takes some folks more time to cross the START line than to reach the finish line.   Many years ago I lived in San Francisco and ran the Bay to Breakers.  It was a very heavily attended not very long race, but it was more like a giant party than a road race.

[Melissa]

Good Luck!
 
I will be running several 5Ks this summer but mostly I will be training children/teens for the summer track season).  Looking at running my first 10K but haven't made the commitment to ramping up the training for longer distances.

Keep us updated on your progress

[tomq04]

55k participants, 7.5 miles

good Lord!  Do they have multiple staggered starts?   Otherwise you would be in a crushed walk the entire distance.  LOL!  It probably takes some folks more time to cross the START line than to reach the finish line.   Many years ago I lived in San Francisco and ran the Bay to Breakers.  It was a very heavily attended not very long race, but it was more like a giant party than a road race.

Bay to Breakers is larger, but it isn't timed ;)

Yes, they do staggered starts, the "elites" start at 8 am, and the walkers don't get moving until nearly 10.  I believe there are a total of 8 "waves" all ~10-15 minutes apart.  The yellow group i mentioned is at the start of the batch, and is the only real group to have a shot at running the thing in < 60 minutes.  Yellow group will have nearly 8k people in it, so it is cramped as well.

[bop]

The largest timed race in the US (world occasionally) 55k participants, 7.5 miles.

Here is the challenge, I qualified for the "yellow" group (the best for non-"elite") runners, but my qualification is expiring due to walking with friends/wife the past 3 years (qualification lasts 4 years).  To qualify you must run the race some where between 70-80 min (8.5 min miles or so), which used to be easy...

Good luck!  By the way, to run 7.5 miles in 70 to 80 minutes is more like 10 minutes per mile (not 8.5 minutes per mile), right?

[tomq04]

8.0 min/mile is for an exactly 1 hour race, which was always a dream of mine...but 9 min miles would get me just under the 70 min race.

Did my first light run this morning, 1.5 miles (maybe), quite a bit of walking...certainly lost everything after 4-5 months of doing nothing.

Slightly sore, but in a great way.  I'll update my plan to include a 2 day/week 60 minute walk on my no run days to keep my knee active but without too much stress.

[rocksinmyhead]

nice!! good luck with your goal! sounds like a cool thing, never heard of it but I've also never been to the PNW.

I am training for the OKC half marathon in late April. I did one in Fort Worth at the end of last June with a goal of <2 hrs, but there was less shade than I expected (and it was fucking hot as balls, but I did expect that) so I crashed and burned at mile 9 and finished in 2:00:43. I was super happy to be that close to my goal given how shitty I felt, but I still for some reason have a compulsive desire to actually have a half marathon time that starts with a 1, plus I have a bunch of friends running the half and full so it should be a fun weekend. and OKC in April should hopefully be more pleasant weather :)

long story short, I'm with ya on the training! I'm using a Hal Higdon plan slightly tweaked for my schedule, those have worked well for me in the past... running 5-6 days/week.

[tomq04]

I did my half marathon in 2010 (and promptly quit running seriously after that) 3 weeks after Bloomsday that year, in training up to that I did my standard 3-4 day/week work out, with the general plan being short-short-long and short-short-medium-long  (short = 45 min, medium = 60 min, long = >60 min) and I did decent on my half 2:12:00 which I was thrilled with, but I do think that if i had done 4 days/week consistently I would have had better results and likely wouldn't have totally messed up my knee :)

That being said, the 3day/week plan worked but you need to be more focused than i was, running with a plan so to speak.  I used to just run to run...which is probably good in it's own right :) 

After that rambling, I doubt i'll ever attempt a half marathon again, my body was just too pissed off for too long afterwards, but i certainly will cheer anyone on that starts the training for it and goes out there and finishes strong!

[rocksinmyhead]

That being said, the 3day/week plan worked but you need to be more focused than i was, running with a plan so to speak.  I used to just run to run...which is probably good in it's own right :)

yeah, I also do both. it seems like some runners I know are ALWAYS training for something, one race after the other... I get so burned out and sick of running if I do that. 1-2 races a year is fine by me, the rest of the time I just run however far and fast/slow I feel like :)

one interesting thing that I notice every time I actually put together a training plan based on pro recommendations is that the recommended easy days are slower than I usually run, and fast days are a lot faster. like, if left to my own devices I'll just make every run a sort of middle-of-the-road pace that never really helps me get faster (but is also probably too fast to increase mileage significantly without injury).

[tomq04]

the "problem" is that if i'm not enjoying an activity, i'm not going to do it... hence following strict running plans would ruin me in no more than a weeks time.

[horsepoor]

I have never heard of Bloomsday, but maybe it will be something to shoot for next year.  I am running a 10K this Saturday, and then doing the Robie Creek half marathon on April 19th.  I haven't been training as seriously as last winter, and just ramped up my training over the last two weeks.  I usually run 3 days per week as well, and do some cross training (strength and rowing machine/jumping rope/kettlebells mixup usually). 

Hoping to break 50:00 on the 10K.  I don't have a specific goal time for Robie this year; last year was 2:09 and change.  Would love to beat that time, but will just follow the training and see what happens.  My long slow distance pace does seem to be naturally faster this year than last year, so hopefully that will transfer to running close to 9:00 miles.  My HM PR is 1:59, but it was on a much gentler course. 

[tomq04]

Bought new shoes last night, closer to "minimalism" but not quite there.

Did 3.8 miles at lunch, 2 run and 1.8 walk, my knee didn't bother me in the least!!  That's a first in the last 2 years, focused strongly on form and staying on the balls of my feet and not letting the heel strike the ground first.  Calves are burning like crazy this afternoon, but I feel awesome!

[horsepoor]

Ran my 10K this morning.  I would have won my age division if they'd had age divisions.  Oh well.  Very happy to have clocked in a 48:57 for about a 7:54 pace.  8:00 miles were my goal.  I was sucking wind the whole way though, so I guess I need to get my butt to the track and log some intervals if I don't want to choke on the Robie Creek hills.

[tomq04]

skipped my run saturday, and instead played as hard as I could with the nephews, neighbor kids, and definitely got a good work out in, despite it not being "focused".  Had a blast the whole time, no regrets!

[horsepoor]

Got 5.4 miles in after work at an easy pace.  I was over feeling sore from my race, but started feeling it within the first mile.  Hopefully the blood flow will help with recovery and I'll be ready for a faster run on Thursday and my 12-miler on Saturday.

[horsepoor]

How are you doing Tomq?  Have you been back out on the street?

My Thursday 4- miler was a mixed bag. Ended up running after dinner, so though my legs felt great, my stomach started objecting during the second half.  Yesterday I knocked out my 12-miler no problem; feeling good about 13.1.  This week I need to get to the north end of town and knock out some hills.

[rocksinmyhead]

Ran my 10K this morning.  I would have won my age division if they'd had age divisions.  Oh well.  Very happy to have clocked in a 48:57 for about a 7:54 pace.  8:00 miles were my goal.  I was sucking wind the whole way though, so I guess I need to get my butt to the track and log some intervals if I don't want to choke on the Robie Creek hills.

that is awesome, congrats!!

I have had a good couple of days of running. did 4 miles at my planned race pace (~9:00/mile) on Friday... that was tough! hopefully it gets easier or I'm not sure I can hang on for 13.1 miles :) then ran 8 easy on Saturday, thankfully I didn't get rained on. met up with my running/walking/drinking club yesterday, I had planned on running really slow and/or walking most of it but that never works out... ended up running most of it so I am taking an extra day off today in addition to my planned day off on Thursday. between the running, yoga on Friday, and wielding a Sawzall like a boss at Habitat for Humanity on Saturday, my body feels like it needs/deserves it :)

[tomq04]

Been biking to work again, that feels good to help get blood moving, the actual running has been non-existent the last week, in the last 2 weeks pre CPA exam and i'm trying to get as much studying and sleeping done as I can.

[horsepoor]

Only two weeks to go!  I missed my last two long runs due to being busy with landscaping and getting our rental ready to sell.  But, I ran 12 miles today at about a little under 10:00 miles and it felt pretty easy, except maybe miles 8 and 11.  But, I don't feel drained at all afterward, so I'm feeling pretty good about beating my 2:09 from last year if I can get a good taper week in, and we have nice weather like last year.  If life or the weather goes pear-shaped between now and then, I'm perfectly satisfied with just finishing, though.

[tomq04]

I've been terrible!  I have ridden my bike into work ~ 2/week, but I'm not too bent out of shape, the next CPA exam is tuesday, and that is a much bigger deal at this point!

I've also ran twice/week, so I don't feel like i've done nothing...just so little that I'm ashamed to come post about it.

My knee is acting up again on any run longer than 2 miles, unsure of how to proceed.  Symptoms sounds like IT band problems, my nutty Chiropractor says its the facet joint where the knee sits, either way it hurts like hell.  I have not been pushing through the pain, last time i did that I couldn't walk for ~3 days.

[horsepoor]

Knee pain sucks!  Wondering if yoga might help?  It seems to do wonder for not only flexibility, but proprioception and those little stabilizer muscles, so that you can run in a way that is less stressful on the knees.  Also, maybe foam rolling and my secret weapon at times is palo santo essential oil.

Good luck with the CPA exam!

[horsepoor]

Today's the big day!  I never got around to doing any hill workouts, so this should be interesting.  Also used some new muscles while riding the last two days trying to correct some of my equitation faults, so I'm starting out the day with sore hips/butt. It's going to be on the warm side today, but I'll take that over howling wind.  After this, I'm taking a week or two off from running, and then refocusing on shorter, speedier running for summer since I'd don't have three hours to spend running on Saturday mornings.