Lactic Acid Management

Today (Tuesday) when I started out, I had planned a track session to work on leg turnover.  Let’s see, do about a three mile warm up, hit the track for a couple of sets of 200s to churn the legs and get that lactic acid burn we all love to feel, and then do a final 4 miles to cool down.

I got through the three mile warm up.  But when I reached the track, I saw that the local middle school Girls Track Team had taken it over.  Actually, it could have been the soccer team or lacrosse team for all I knew.  I saw a lot of young girls milling about on the track, a bunch of parents on the bleachers, and lots of red cones.  No one was running on the track so it must have been an orientation.  However, I didn't feel like being a mook, going over and saying, "Excuse me.  Since you guys aren't running today, could you all move over to the bleachers?  I want to use your track to run a couple of 200s".  Yeah, real mook material here.

Easy Marathon Prep With 10 Miler

I took two days off to give my hip a rest, and to avoid Wednesday’s electrical storm. Today was supposed to be another easy day where I could stretch my legs in preparation for more marathon speed work. So that is exactly what I did.

During the first 5 miles, I found it easy to maintain control over my stride, keeping it stretched out and maintaining control over foot placement. I also find that I am running on the balls of my feet more, running through my big toe, and spending less time running through my heels.

Mixing Speed Work And Long Distance

Second speed workout on the road.

I think I should have taken this day off. The run yesterday took more out of me than I thought.

My initial run was slower than my final run the last time I did this circuit. And they just got slower with each run.

Lengthening The Stride Creates An Unplanned Tempo Run

Yesterday began a 10-mile run to relax the legs. I ran a 21-22 mile run on Sunday so I just wanted to take it easy and give the legs an light workout.

I wore the old Asics DXs and by the time I actually started, my mindset had shifted.

First, I wanted to stretch out my stride. I’ve been running on time and not distance since before the Cleveland Marathon and recently I’ve noticed that my stride has shortened. I’ve been spending my mileage shuffling instead of running.

Hill Work for Building Strength in Legs, Hips and Glutes

I did another hill session today. First time I measured the hill and discovered just how much mileage I was putting on my legs during one of these little sessions.

I had first estimated the distance to be about half a track lap, a 220 or about an 8th of a mile (.125 mile). Today, I put it on DailyMile and it came out to about a tenth of a mile, which seems reasonable.

Speed Work On The Road

So today began my new venture in speed workouts.

Using the Dailymile application, I plotted out a small loop around Horseshoe Lake. After my previous run where I realized that my legs were just not providing any power, I decided that I needed a little more than a track workout but not quite up to a full-blown tempo run.

Feeling The Need For Speedwork

Another Hi-Lo day.

Ran the 2 hour loop and tried to put some of my speed work into practice. My thinking was since I’ve been doing all of these hill sprints and some track work, I should be able to cut some time off of the 2 hour loop so I can lengthen it out again.

Boy did I get a shock.

Smokin Speed Workout

I was lacking serious running motivation today. Monday was a zero hour day and I knew that I had to get out and run. But the hip was still bothering me and I had spent the majority of the day in a seated position doing data backups and erasing a hard drive.

Still, I had to get on the road and as it is Tuesday, that means either the track or the hill. The hill makes my hip feel better but I opted for the track since my last track workout was almost two weeks ago.