Manatee Express Mentor Group - closed (Page 5)

Wow, Ken's race plan is very detailed.  I'm more of a flakey kinda girl, I guess, flying by the seat of my pants.  I do always calculate the time needed to reach my goal, and when I'm running my splits are usually pretty consistent (so this isn't a bad way for me to figure out what I need to do to achieve my goal). 

I train (or try to train) based on HR, but racing?  I've never even tried to keep my HR down during a race.  In fact, I just went back and checked my average HR on my last three races, and it ranged from 163-169, which is zone 4 for me.  Do you think that is an issue?  I never felt like I couldn't finish any of the races, and actually got PRs in two of them.   

Ken,

That link was very interesting, and thanks for pointing me that way.  I totally agree with Jorge's philosopy (understanding what your body can do and what sort of pace you can maintain for the length of the race).  But certainly that comes with experience, and that experience (for me) came from racing, not training.  It's always amazing to me how much faster I can run during a race, rather than a training run.  Perhaps that's because I allow myself lattitude during training that I don't allow during a race.

I think I will continue my pace-based racing for now.  I especially don't want to make changes in the near term, then fall apart during the HM next week.  But now I do understand better where you are coming from, on keeping an eye on HR during a race (and planning for it).  And I agree that when I'm getting ready for Oly tri, I need to reconsider this philosopy.

As an aside, I haven't really kept track of my miles per year, but I'd be willing to bet that at least for the last three years (since my first HM) I've been putting in that kind of mileage.  I honestly didn't realize that was a "monster run base".   But I did what you suggested and looked at some logs, and I guess I have been over-doing it.   Now if I could just get that kind of base for running and swimming, I might have something going...

And did you see that Jorge has logged 80 miles more than me this year already, and it's just February?  Hmmm... 

I know -- I was just joking, and I guess it didn't go over very well...  I just wish I had the time to do better in the other areas.

My training last week was mostly consumed by running, with a few bikes thrown in for good measure.  No swimming, as usual. 

5 runs, 28+ miles, including some intervals and speedwork

3 bike, 46+ miles (but only one was outdoors -- come on daylight savings time!)

I'm looking forward to next week, after the HM on Sunday.  I'd like to get more balance in my workouts, and plan to start a training plan that does just that.  Doesn't mean that I won't keep running because I love to start out my day that way, but perhaps I'll cut back on the distance and up my biking (and add some swimming?).

Does everyone know that there is a bike challenge next month?  I think I'm going to join.

Got my new Garmin for Christmas, so getting the splits will not be a problem anymore.  However, analyzing the results will be scary...

Can you tell I'm nervous?

I did PR -- by 7 minutes.  And I don't expect to do it again.  But I do want to finish in under 2 hours, and that is making me nervous too.  I just need to have a good day.

You must have seen the runway at Hurlburt Field.  There is a road that goes around it, and that's where the cyclists probably were.  It's a little deceiving to look at from 98, but the riders probably weren't on the runway at all.

I work at Eglin (another base in the area, just north of the bay), and we are not allowed to ride on the main road that goes by the runways but it's because of traffic, not because of the aircraft.  However, there is a less-traveled road around the back side of the runways that I used to ride all the time, but a few months ago they decided we couldn't ride on that one either because of some explosives work that is done there.  Big uproar in the biking community, pointing out how Eglin is supposed to be so athlete-friendly yet they go and do something like this.  Now people can't ride their bikes to get to work, or even do any long rides on the base at all.  Eglin's solution was to provide a map of a cleared 5-mile ride -- can you believe it?  5 miles hardly seems worth it!  I do all of my riding off base now.

Excuse the rant...

So Ken, I'd like to try to analyze my race.  I was consistent until I had to stop, and believe I could have held that pace if I wasn't under extreme duress.   So my pace was good (for me), and very typical of my longer races.  However, you see that my HR was high (but no higher than my other recent races, and I had done well in those).  Do you see an issue?

So then there are the post stop miles.  I actually was doing a test, although I didn't put this in my race report.  I decided that I needed to work on how to hydrate, so I stopped several times for water.  Actually, the first time I grabbed gatorade, gulped it and choked!  And I was past the water station, so now I'm stuck tasting this gunk for awhile.  then I grabbed water at the next station, but choked and ended up walking for awhile.  My stomach hurt!  But I decided to try it one last time, and didn't have any better luck.  How do you get past the stomach thing?  Or does it not bother you?

I know it was a mistake to try the water during a race.  I need to grasp the concept during training first, and not experiment during a race.  But it turns out that whatever I did had no effect on my standings in the race.  The woman who finished first in my age group beat my by 14 minutes!!!!!  I feel so inept.

My HR in a 5K race is very similar to what I had today.  In my 5K PR last November it was 169.  I ran another 5K in December (but I was sick), and my HR avg was 164.  During training it's lower.

The start was crowded, but I lined up with the 8 minute/mile pace.  It took me 40 seconds to cross the start line, which was the difference between the race time being over 2 hours and my run time being under 2 hours.  And I was very happy to get second.

Ken,

Thanks for giving this a try!   I'm going to try to answer each of your bullets:  

o Your pace in your PR race was 8:40 but we don't have any splits to compare from that race. -- It is true that I don't have any official splits.  However, I entertained myself during that run in November by doing the math in my head, and every mile was sub-9 minutes.

o We also don't have mile hr's in other races, only an overll average.  -- also correct.  I just got my Garmin for Christmas, so I was using a cheapo HR monitor before that. 

o Yesterday your pace was 8:40 for the first 7 miles and then you had the potty stop and after that you couldn't get back to that pace the rest of the way.  -- isn't that amazing?  It sure is to me, that my pace was identical to my PR pace last November.  And yes, I just couldn't seem to get it back together again.  Perhaps my body was telling me that it thought it was done because I did stop? 

o I threw out the split for the potty mile and your pace for the last 5.1 was 9:24. -- yes, although mile 9 was 9:08, not too far off from mile 1 (8:55).  I don't remember exactly when I started the water experiment, but it may have been mile 10.  So perhaps I could have gotten it back again if I hadn't decided to experiment.

The questions in my mind are did the potty stop break your pace and slow you down or did the early pace wear you down and even if you hadn't stopped your pace would have dropped. That extra variable really makes this tricky.  -- I suppose it could have been either way.  I don't feel as if I was well prepared for this race as I was in November because I was gone most of January.  I spent half of February getting back to normal.  So the pace could have been too taxing.  However, I didn't feel like I was dropping my pace at all (and the numbers stand by that).  I guess I'm coming around to thinking that the stop really did affect my race.

Are those observations valid and are those the questions we are evaluating? -- definitely

I wish I had a simple solution on the water thing. Do you have tha same problem on a regular run or is it just when racing? Have you ever tried to run with a sport bottle with a cap? -- I have never tried to drink during run training (believe it or not!).  I'm definitely going to start and figure out a way to make it work.  I'm afraid that some day I'll be in a race where I completely fall apart because of hydration problems.  I'm going to try a couple of things -- putting water on my course and carrying it with me.  I'll also try different containers and see what works.

I apologize to everyone else in this group.  I'm sure this a boring post, and all of this potty talk is probably driving you mad.

Thanks Ken, I appreciate whatever observations you give.  I made some poor decisions during my race, so I know I need to toughen up mentally.  I'm thankful that I still made my goal despite these errors and experiments.

Cheri