Run to Win

I have been tagged by the Run Faster blog with a running meme, so I thought that I would take the opportunity to answer a few questions about myself that you will hopefully find interesting and useful to your own running. Hopefully you will be able to either relate with these anecdotes or learn something new, and if not then I at least hope that you find some small amount of amusement.
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Thanks for the emails over the weekend; my neck is doing much better tonight than it was a couple days ago. On Friday afternoon, I tweaked or pulled something when I began my run that led to my spending the rest of the afternoon on the couching and requiring assistance to get up. Saturday morning wasn’t quite as painful but wasn’t really much better. Things stretched out throughout the day to the point where I could play with my 3 and 5 year old cousins without being in too much pain, and by Sunday morning when I woke up I could turn my head without anything hurting. I couldn’t turn my head too far, so my wife had to drive home, but it was a definite improvement.

That meant that it was time to try running again this afternoon. I ran a few miles easy with my wife, then picked up the pace when we got to a place in the road where we couldn’t run next to one another safely anyway. I wound up adding 4 loops to the normal route that we were on, which turned an 8 miler into a 12.5 miler. My neck actually felt much better after the run than it did beforehand, which is a definite relief.

I didn’t make my weekly distance quota (95.5km ran of a minimum 100km in store and a preferred 110km penciled in,) but I came close enough and I was so exhausted all weekend that I’m sure the multiple naps helped me heal. This evening’s run leads me to believe that I can get back to my normal running routine tomorrow, although I am going to take a week off from any weight training.

I don’t feel that my training plan has been impacted at all by this minor injury, and I am looking forward to moving closer to my sub-16:00 5k goal for this Summer. I have also made some plans for my next goal race after the 5k races throughout the Summer and Autumn, a 50 miler on January 3^rd.

Last night at the Golden Gala track meet in Rome, Asafa Powell pulled up in the 100 meters with a groin injury. He is the former world record holder and is one of the favorites in Beijing next month.

“He’s OK, but he felt his groin cramp up and stopped running as a precaution,” said Powell’s manager, Paul Doyle. “He’s not going to take any chances. It’s an Olympic year.”

(More Info: Golden Gala - ESPN)

Today reminds me a lot of my birthday a couple of years ago, when I pulled a muscle in my neck and had to cut back on my training for a few weeks.

I didn’t hear any cracks today, and it isn’t nearly as painful, but I managed to tweak or pull something when I started my run today. I was all of about 22 seconds into the run. Now that it is 10 or 11 hours later, it hurts just as much so I don’t expect to run much this weekend, but hopefully it will have improved to the point where I can resume training again next week.

It was not too long ago that Tyson Gay ran the fastest 100 meters that any human has ever done. He had the assistance of a good tailwind, which will keep him out of the record books, but that is still impressive none the less.

Even so, he is stronger in the 200 meter distance than in the 100 meter distance, and was one of the favorites to challenge Usain Bolt and Asafa Powell at the Olympics. Unfortunately, he pulled his hamstring during the Trials and so he won’t be competing.

“Before I went out on the track I felt a little tightness in my hamstring. So I had kind of a bad feeling. When I came off the curve the first two steps were fine, and then I felt it, sort of a pull, about 40 meters in. Once I was on the ground it didn’t hurt as much as when it happened.”

If you haven’t seen Tyson Gay’s fall yet, here’s a video:
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This guest article was written by John Harker, a cardio kickboxing teacher in Santa Cruz, California. I have incorporated Tabata intervals into my workouts for a few years now, and they are a very effective way to get a lot of work done in a very short amount of time.

The Tabata workout is a high-intensity training regimen that produces remarkable results. A Tabata workout is an interval training cycle of 20 seconds of maximum intensity exercise, followed by 10 seconds of rest, repeated without pause 8 times for a total of four minutes. In a group context, you can keep score by counting how many lifts/jumps/whatever you do in each of the 20 second rounds. The round with the smallest number is your score.

Credit for this simple and powerful training method belongs to its namesake, Dr. Izumi Tabata and a team of researchers from the National Institute of Fitness and Sports in Tokyo, Japan. Their groundbreaking 1996 study, published in the journal Medicine and Science in Sports & Exercise, provided documented evidence concerning the dramatic physiological benefits of high-intensity intermittent training. After just 6 weeks of testing, Dr. Tabata noted a 28% increase in anaerobic capacity in his subjects, along with a 14% increase in their ability to consume oxygen (V02Max). These results were witnessed in already physically fit athletes. The conclusion was that just four minutes of Tabata interval training could do more to boost aerobic and anaerobic capacity than an hour of endurance exercise.

Although Dr. Tabata used a mechanically braked exercise cycle machine, you can apply this protocol to almost any exercise. For example, a basic Tabata workout can be performed with sit-ups. The more muscles used the better, so use full knees-bent sit-ups. Sit-up non-stop for 20-second intervals, followed by 10 seconds of rest. Repeat for a total of 8 cycles.

How effective can just 4 minutes of exercise be? (Click here to continue reading…)

In a continuing collaboration with Scott over at Straight to the Bar, we will be writing about some things that you might be able to do locally throughout the month of April. This week I will wrap things up by sharing some ways to find local races, especially inaugural races.

What is an inaugural race?

Inaugural races refer to the first time that a race is run. That could mean the first race in a series, but it usually refers to a race that has just been organized for the first time. Brand new races can sometimes be hard to find, but it can be worth it when you find a good one.

Why would you want to run an inaugural race?

The best reason to run a local inaugural race is so that you can become a streaker. If the race lasts, and many races don’t, then you can become one of the few people who have run in every single one year after year. After a decade or so, the race organizers will usually start recognizing the folks that have supported them year in and year out.

Another reason to run in an inaugural race is that it may not yet be very popular so it can give you a good opportunity to compete in a good race in a small crowd. That might mean that you can score an easy age group award or even set a course record, which is always worth bragging rights.

One thing to be aware of, though, is that races don’t always get things right in the first year. If the organizers are experienced then you won’t have anything to worry about, but you may want to arrive early and with plenty of your own amenities just in case it takes a long time to register or there isn’t adequate water or post-race refreshments.

How can you find an inaugural race?

There are a few ways to find out about them, and you can use these methods equally well to find out about established races if you aren’t sure what is in your area at any given time of the year.

1. Join a local club, team or running group and make sure that you get their newsletters and are on their email lists. You’ll get notifications about new races and requests to volunteer pretty consistently. Up here, the Maine Track Club is very good about keeping its members informed of any upcoming races or volunteer needs.
2. Keep an eye on your local USATF chapter. I keep track of both the New England and Maine websites and goings on. If you live outside of the United States then you will obviously want to follow your local governing organization instead.
3. Visit a local running shoe store. They may have a bulletin board available for race directors to pin their flyers, and will at least advertise any races that they are involved with or are sponsoring.
4. Go to other local races and always peruse the table set out for fliers belonging to other events. Any race director worth his salt is going to get his race onto the tables at as many other races as possible to drum up some interest. Especially in small local races, there usually aren’t any fees so it may be the only marketing that a new event will be able to afford to do.
5. Subscribe to a local magazine (in my case, New England Runner) and keep an eye on the race calendars listed in the magazine. You can also check their websites. The bonus of subscribing to a regional magazine is that every month or two you can read about the local news and look for pictures of people you know or race against.
6. Look for races on running websites such as MarathonGuide.com, , Active.com and similar sites to see what shows up near you on their calendars.
7. Subscribe to Google Alerts for keywords about races in your area. For example, you might set up a weekly search for “races in Portland, Maine” for local races near me.
8. Keep an eye out in your local newspaper for articles about new races. Most sports sections will list upcoming events on at least a weekly basis.
9. Last but not least - ask fellow runners what they’ve heard of. Runners are a pretty chatty bunch, and if your running partners are starting their own races they might know somebody who is or have at least heard of a new race in your area.

So those are the methods that I use to find out about new races, or any races in my area. Sometimes they can be tough to find out about until after they have happened since new races tend to have small budgets and their is not usually a lot of word-of-mouth buzz around them.

Is there anything that I’ve missed that you think aught to be included on the list?

Leave a comment below.

What do you do when you aren’t motivated to run, or when your schedule gets interrupted and you have to miss a workout? If you are like most runners, then you try to make up that workout later in the week. I definitely recommend against doing that, especially when you are tapering for a goal race such as a marathon.

With Boston out of the way, the Spring marathon season is under full swing. Over the past couple of weeks, I have been getting a lot of questions emailed to me from people who are wondering how best to taper, and what they should do about missing workouts for one reason or another.

In general training, if you miss a workout, then just move on. You really don’t need to worry about 1 or even 2 missed workouts as long as you don’t try to double up later in the week. There’s no reason to risk an injury for one workout. If you are consistently missing workouts, then you should look into rearranging your schedule (either running or otherwise) so that you can find a way to get your workouts in when you are supposed to.

If you are tapering for a race, then any individual workouts that you do are designed just to keep your legs fresh. You aren’t going to get a lot of additional fitness in the last few weeks before a race, while you can easily prevent yourself from recovering from any lingering muscle damage. Trying to double up your speed or long runs right before your race can also prevent you from properly hydrating or restoring your muscle glycogen stores so that you can race at peak efficiency.
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