Running More Miles To Improve Your Running

This is my first rant about improving as a runner. The first thing anyone should do is get in the base miles before starting any kind of speed work. The best way to get stronger aerobically and physically is to increase the number of miles you run first. Of course you need to be smart about it and not increase your weekly miles too fast or more than what your body can handle. Sorry about the darkness, I run in the late afternoon and by the time I get home it’s dark this time of the year.

Leg Strength For Runners

It’s amazing how as young kids we could head right out the door and take off running at full speed. We could zig and zag, jump and roll like nothing, never getting hurt or dealing with aches and pains. The next thing you know you are in your 40’s, 50’ or 60’s and there is no way we should try that stuff before getting a proper warm-up. Even then it may not be wise to try. As we age, maintaining our agility and strength becomes more of a chore and it is more difficult to maintain what you have gained.

One major weakness we deal with is leg strength, mainly the Glutes and Hamstring muscles.  If you are a beginning runner or have been running for a long time and you are older, you need to strengthen these muscles. Doing so will help prevent injury and your running performance will benefit.

To use myself as an example, I have had issues with the Piriformis muscle in my right buttocks three times over the last three years from running. I did not start doing any leg strengthening until after the second time. Fortunately while it was literally a pain in the butt I was able to continue running each time. As I have kept up with the strength work I feel I have finally overcome the problem, until my left side started to hurt.

It’s odd that the left side never was a problem before until I was helping my wife clean house. This Piriformis flare-up had nothing to do with running; it was all due to the frequent of squatting and standing while cleaning. The motion was something I was not used to and the muscle let me know that fact. I had done some deep squats while working out but the frequency on that day must have been too much. This time it hurt so badly there was no running. In fact, it was very painful to go through the motion of standing up or sitting down.

It took five days before the pain started to subside and I ventured out for a test run. Gradually increasing mileage over a few days until I was confident it was going to be OK. I think I was lucky I was able to get through it quickly, maybe because of the leg workouts I had been previously doing. So it was a lesson learned that as I have aged I need to be aware of more things than running that may cause some odd injury.

Any way, if you are not doing leg exercises at least twice a week and you want to reduce the chance of injuries you need to start working out now. Think long term, start off slow and increase weight and reps over a period of time as your strength improves. Even body weight exercises are a great way to go if no weights are available. As another benefit, aside from injury reduction, you will become a more efficient runner and improve your speed.

The Year Ahead

OK, so I did not keep up with posting like I wanted. Life has been busy. I said in a post back in October that I wanted to do a 10K, 10 Miler and a 50K in 2016. That has changed; I want to do nothing but 5K races this year. My goals are to get faster and to get as close to the 18 minute mark as possible. My fastest time for the 5K in 2015 was 20:21. I am pretty sure breaking into 19 minutes will be fairly easy (yea right) but getting to the 18 minute range will take some serious work. Even 18:59 would make me happy.

Having said all of that I realize that I am not as young as I used to be and must be cautious with this. I need avoid injury by not overdoing speed work by neither trying too hard nor doing too much of it. Building overall strength will be a priority, especially for the legs. Running slow on those easy days will be a must.

For those of you out there that would fall under the Masters heading that are trying to run a faster 5K hopefully you can benefit from my documenting my goals to include what not to do. And, maybe I can learn a thing or two from the readers.

My best race times for 2015 are … (I only did 5 races this year)

1. 5K: 20:21, Third place age group, Jeff Annas Memorial Firefighter 5K

2. 10 Miles: 1:10:56, First place age group, Wellington Horse Country 10 Miler

3. Marathon: 1:35:50, First place age group, EAU Palm Beach Marathon and Half Marathon

Total mileage for the year: 1,327.25 by Garmin

Using A Logbook

If you are not using a log of some type to keep track of your running progress you should start now. It is  great way to help you reach your goals. Check out this video 
for more.

Now get started logging your running, it does not take that much extra time out of your day!

Longer Tempo Runs for Better Race Results

So, this week I did a 2 X 3 mile Tempo run. You need to do workouts that are specific to the distance you are racing and at the pace you expect to run in that race. You should not run at a pace that you would like to run if it is faster than what you can really do. Does that make sense? Anyway I have never tried doing two back to back 3 mile Tempos runs this way, only two milers, such as 3 X 2 miles.

All day I worried about doing this, could I pull it off? It would be almost like running two 5K races with only a four minute rest between. Turns out it was not as difficult as I thought it would be. I started late in the afternoon and by the time I did my one mile warm-up and got halfway into the first three mile it was getting dark. I use one of those clip-on LED lights for my visor set on strobe and carry a small but powerful LED flashlight for when it’s dark.

By the time I started my second three miles it was completely dark. I have run on this bike path many times but unfortunately both of my lights were getting dim so I had to be extra careful of my steps. This forced me to run a bit slower than I wanted but in the end it was still ok.

The basic rundown of this work out started with a one mile warm-up. For the three mile Tempo I wanted to run at my expected Half Marathon pace of 7:14. The first mile ended up being 7:32, the second at 7:18 and for the last I made it down to 7:13. I jogged slowly for four minutes before beginning the second three miles.

As I began the second half my legs where feeling really sluggish but managed a faster first mile over the first Temp run at 7:26. The second mile was slower because of the darkness but I was able to pick it up during the last half mile as I had more surrounding light so I could see better finishing with a 7:13. I finished this work-out with a one mile cool down.

If you are not doing this type of work-out while preparing for a Half or full Marathon you should start. You greatly improve your endurance and find yourself running faster on race day.

Half Marathon Preparation Time

I’ve been getting ready for the Marathon of the Palm Beaches Half Marathon which will be on December 6, 2015. I’m trying to up my mileage a bit and I have been doing Half Marathon specific workouts. What that means is my Tempo runs and such are being done at around or a bit faster than my Half Marathon Pace. The course this year is being changed. I am assuming that it is because of road work going on along a stretch of road normally used for this race. But assuming is not always a good thing to do.

I keep checking the races website to see if they have posted the new course but nothing yet. I did notice however a comment on the site about being able to see the ocean along a portion of the course. In years past the race directors have tried to work with the Town of Palm Beach to have part of the course run through their town on the Island. Maybe they finally succeeded. Anyway it would be nice to know what it is so I and I’m sure others can run a portion of it before the race.

Below is what I have been doing up to this point:

1.The week after my 10 mile race I just ran easy for a total of 21 miles.

2. The following week I started my Half Marathon training with a 4 X one mile on a Wednesday and a 12 miler fast finish on Saturday for a total of 35 plus miles for the week.

3. The next week was 35 miles with a 4 mile Tempo run at 7:21 average pace and 8 X ½ mile repeats. Saturday did a 10.63 miler

4. Today was a 7 mile easy run. The plan for this week is a 2 X 3 mile Tempo on Wednesday and a 15 mile fast finish on Saturday.

I hope to get a couple 40 mile weeks and some good work outs before I taper during the last week before race day. I do my runs on the week days after work, being its getting dark early now it gets dark part way through my runs so I carry a flashlight and use one of those clip-on lights for my visor. The lights help somewhat so I can see and hopefully so someone else running or biking avoids hitting me.

And what is really nice now is the temperature is dropping just a little, not much but you can feel the difference. Another month or two and it should be nice.

10 Mile Race Results

Final sprint to the finish

Yea, I got an age group first place in a 10 mile race today (10/18). This is my last race in the 55 to 59 age group; my next race December 6 will put me in the 60 to 64 group. This race was the Wellington Horse Country 10 Miler and was their 11^th annual race. The course is flat with a couple long straight sections; the temperature was about 70 degrees at the start. My time was 1:10:56 with a 13^th overall finish.

My first mile was 7:18 and gradually worked down to 6:41 at the last mile. It is amazing how we can push ourselves to keep running fast when our mind and body is trying to tell us to do otherwise. I found that if you can keep pace with someone running at your speed it is mentally a little better. They had water at about every two miles and I gulped down a mouthful at each. I also ate a Gel at around the 30 minute mark when approaching a water station.

I took two days off from running and ran 4 miles this evening, my legs a still a bit sore. I now will begin training for the Half Marathon. My plan is to do two weeks of easy running while increasing my mileage then start doing Half Marathon focused workouts up till a week before the race then taper. Hopefully all goes well.

I’ll give a rundown of my last two weeks of training for this race, the training paces were based off the time I was predicted to finish a 10 mile race:

10/5/15 - 6.98 miles, 2 mile warm-up. 5 X 5 minutes tempo run with 60 second jog between. Each 5 minute repeat was around 7:14 pace. 1 ½ mile cool down.

10/6/15 - Off

10/7/15 - 2 mile warm-up. 5 X 800 repeats with about 1 ½ minutes jog between. Each repeat was around 3:34 to 3:37 each. 1.61 mile cool down.

10/8/15 – Off

10/9/15 – 3.56 miles, 33:22 minutes. Easy run around 8:40 pace. 3 short strides after.

10/10/15 – 9.09 miles, 1:29:44 minutes. 9:25 average pace. Easy long run.

Mileage for this week was 35

10/11/15 – 4:04 miles, 37:33 minutes. Started at around 9:20 pace, finished at

8:40 pace. Recovery run from yesterday’s long run.

10/12/15 – 6.13 miles. 2 mile warm-up. 20 minute Tempo run. Picked up pace till I hit 7:03 for about 8 minutes then backed off a little. 1.4 mile cool down.

10/13/15 – Off

10/14/15 - 5.12 miles, 49:24 minutes. Easy run with two fast 1 ½ and one 2 minute pick-ups during the middle.

10/15/15 – Off

10/16/15 – 4.01 miles, 43:22 minutes. Easy run with two short strides after.

10/17/15 – 1.70 miles

10/18/15 – race day