Sweat in the streets in the town of Manchester
Another week done and another good step in the right direction. When your season is only 9 weeks long and you start out injured and cross-training, each week can be a big difference. I’m really looking forward to taking my time with each step when I resume training in December after Nationals. There won’t be the sense of urgency I feel now to get ready to race.
On Wednesday I’ll fly out to Manchester, Connecticut (ya, not New Haven), race on Thursday and fly home Friday. Yes, I get another Thanksgiving. It’s going to be fun to see friends I haven’t seen since the summer and last year. Running a race with 10 000 people in it and tons of people lining the course is always a blast. There are live bands and lots of drinking going on at 10AM. Porches (and a couple roofs) are filled with people cheering throughout the 4.75 mile race.
Race update should come on Friday here. Results should be posted at http://www.manchesterroadrace.com/
Check out our workout on FLOTRACK.COM
Just keep on pushing hard boy
First off, Congrats to the Guelph Gryphons for their “double double” at CI’s this past weekend. Dave Scott-Thomas did it again, both the Women’s and Men’s team won the National title (for the second year in a row, hence the “double double”). In the past 10 years the Men’s team has finished no worse than second at CI’s and has won 6 titles, not a bad record.
I just finished up another high mileage week yesterday. For the next couple of weeks I’ll bring it down a bit to feel, somewhat, fresh for my two races. I’ll bring it down to the 145km/week range and then even lower for the final week. We did mile reapeats last thursday on a XC type loop and they went well considering it was only my second interval workout in the past 2 months. This whole nap thing hasn’t gone as planned, I got two naps in last week and zero the week before.
The Manchester race looks like it is shaping up to be quite competitive again, they have two Ethiopians (one 7:38 and one 13:07) plus Alistair Cragg, Ian Dobson, Andrew Letherby, Mark Carroll and they always have a bunch more good americans and a couple of Kenyans. This year I plan to race smarter and pace myself properly up the mile-long hill. It’s one of those courses where racing on it previously gives you a decent advantage over rookies because of the massive hill, there’s really no other race like it that I’ve done. www.manchesterroadrace.com
Once Nationals are over I plan to take a week off before embarking on a long season. This will likely include a couple of indoor races, (to keep training interesting), and perhaps a road race while still doing base training. Then in April I will hit the track and try to get the A standard for the 10 000m. My buildup will include a 4 week altitude training camp in Flagstaff and maybe a few weeks in Tallahassee or Auburn (we’re working on accomodations) to get out of the winter.
New York, New York, is everything they say
BAD BOY WRITE UP HERE (updated Nov. 9th)
Big weekend!
Our adventures started off on Thursday evening when seven us left Guelph and drove for 3 hours to spend the night in upstate NY. On Friday we drove another 6 hours (passing through Scranton, PA) to get to NYC. We decided to stay in between Van Cortlandt Park, where we were racing, and Central Park, where we watched the trials. That put us right in the middle of the Bronx in a cheap Howard Johnson.
Watching the trials were tons of fun, so many people were out watching the race. It was crazy to see just how amazing Ryan Hall is at running the Marathon and the battle to make the top three was really interesting. By the end of the marathon we had heard that Ryan Shay might have passed away after running 5.5 miles of the race. I didn’t, nor didn’t want to believe this, but when we got back to the hotel our fears were confirmed when we read the news online. I had run with Ryan earlier this year in Flagstaff and he seemed like a great guy who was ready to work hard. My prayers go out to all his family and friends.
Saturday afternoon we raced the Bad Boy 8km cross country race at Van Cortlandt. Our team, Speed River, went 1,2,3,5,8 to easily capture the team title and I was happy with my second place finish as I felt good and content with how my fitness is coming around. I ran 170 km last week and my body seems to be holding up well. Now that I have a decent effort and a few weeks of building under my belt I can get after it a little more in workouts. I should see some significant gains before my next race in Manchester, CT on Nov, 22.
After a long run sunday morning we saw a couple snipets of the NYC marathon then made our way to lunch in SoHo before our 9 hour drive home.
Instead of writing more about our adventures I put up some video and pics. The Bad Boy pics are courtesy of Susan Pearsall.
Start spreading the news
New York, New York
I want to wake up in the city that never sleeps
To find I’m king of the hill, top of the heap
The Speed River Crew (Eric Gillis, Cleve Thorson, Taylor Murphy, Scott Arnald, Rob Watson, Allan Brett and myself) is leaving tomorrow for New York City. We’ll be racing the “Bad Boy” 8km Cross Country race Saturday afternoon at Van Cortlandt Park in the Bronx. I’m in no way ready to race after less than a month of running so the “I’m king of the hill” does not refer in any way to my upcoming performance. I do feel, however, that the Speed River team could very well be king of the hill. Maybe Sinatra has a version where he sings “we’re”?
Once again, training is coming around and things are looking better by the week. The previous Sunday I laboured on an hour 47min run and then struggled with workout the next day. This past Sunday I felt great on a 2 hour run and then workout on Monday (same volume as last Monday) went much better. I ramped up mileage pretty quick and was over 160km last week and I’ll increase a tad more for the next two weeks. Taylor Milne and Eric Gillis are in great shape right now and I have to remember to do the work I need to do and not just try and catch them. The big races aren’t until next April so workouts should be run with that in mind.
Halloween
Milne as Kermit and myself as… I don’t really have a title, but I obviously would have ruled in the early ’90’s. It took three weeks of growing out a beard to get that ‘stache.
Woke up, got out of bed, Dragged a comb across my head
When I talk to people about being a full-time runner they usually ask me what my day consists of. When I used to work 30 hours a week right after University I would be much more efficient at errands such as grocery shopping, laundry etc. Now those are events in my day. Also, since I have the time, meal preparation takes longer and I’ll bake cookies instead of buy them, those kind of things.
Normal day…My Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays are pretty much the same. Tuesdays and Thursdays are pretty much the same and Saturdays and Sundays are similar. I’ll give and overview of Monday and Tuesday this week.
Monday:
8:00 – woke up, had breakfast, read the paper, brushed teeth etc, checked email
9:00 – 30 minute run, 30 minute of stretching (I probably get 10 minutes of good stretching in that 30 min)
10:00 – shower
10:15 – Internet: FloTrack, Letsrun, TnFNorth, Eliterunning, e-mails
11am – Grocery shopping – I do this 3 times a week, everything fresh – I almost always ride my bike or walk
12:00 – lunch
12:30 – read a book
1:00 – Nap, 1 hour
2:00 – today I worked on Athletes Now Fund Application, if I have nothing on the go it’s usually something like watching Entourage or Prison Break, lately it’s been updating www.guelphrunning.ca or getting stuff ready for National XC
3:15 – Prepare dinner so when I get back from practice I only have to heat it up
4:00 – leave for practice – biking to school only takes 10 minutes
4:30 – get the workout from Dave but we usually don’t leave until 4:45
– 20 minute warm-up, cruise tempo of 10 minuters where I got my ass handed to me by my training group. I’m out of shape right now, but it will come around in a couple of weeks.
– 20 minute cool down
– strides, drills, stretching
– cold tub, shower, bike home
8:00 – dinner time
– usually screw around on the computer watching shows, or hanging out with roommates
10:30 – get to bed, sometimes it’s 11:00
– I read for 30 minutes or so, depends on how tired I am.
Tuesday – Since I woke up at 7am yesterday and had an 8:30 meeting and went to work from 3-7 I’m going to give more of an average day. 95% of the time I work it’s from 12-4pm.
8:00 – wake up, have breakfast, read the paper, brush teeth etc, check email
9:00 – 30 minute run
9:30 – stretching and core routine (from January to Sept that also includes weights)
10:30 – snack,shower
11:00 – Internet again, check emails and sites
11:30 – lunch
12:00 – Work at the Running Room until 4pm – I usually work once a week in the fall, more towards Christmas and less during the summer track season. Once every week or two I schedule a massage for a Tuesday or Thursday afternoon. Sometimes I go to Chapters and read magazines if I have nothing on the go.
4:30 – off-day run with the group or solo for 60-70 minutes
– sometimes I do my core routine after this run
6:00 – shower
6:30 – make and eat dinner
7:30 – normal evening stuff that anyone would do, Internet, movie, read, phone, hang out with friends
– on a Thursday I go to the Moulton Distance Project and watch the Office (I don’t have cable)
10:30 – try to lay down for reading before I sleep
I usually have something going on for the weekend and when I don’t I head home to Hamilton. Saturday and Sunday I only run once a day. Short on Saturday with core (unless I take a day off) and long on Sunday, up to two hours.
So that’s what it looks like.
I could sleep for a thousand years
You could say I’m back into the swing of things as I did three workouts this week and was up to 40 minutes of tempo today. I was still biking and pool running a few times to ease back onto the foot so by the end of the week I’ll have run about 135km with another 2+ hours of pool running and mountain biking. Next week should be a typical mileage week for the fall as I’ll get up around 160km. So far the foot has felt fine.
Every year or so I try and add a new element into my training. In the past seven years it has been things like cold tubing, massage, plyometric drills, morning runs, massage, altitude training, etc. I tried yoga before and it didn’t really click because I had tendinitis at the time but I might give it another go soon. I will try and add naps… maybe one of the easiest things I can even think of. The thing is I have to keep them at an hour maximum and do it before 2pm or I have trouble sleeping at night. Most full-time runners I know incorporate naps but I’ve never really got into a pattern. Napping should help me recover more during the day and I love how laying around might actually help my running!
That leads me to something else… For those of you who wonder what the heck a full-time distance runner’s day looks like I’ll break it down for you in my next post. A day (or two) in my life kinda deal.
Back to the start again I go
Almost done my first week back of substantial running. I’m still in the pool or on the elliptical in the morning but, I’ve been running every afternoon and the foot is doing alright. I also did my first real workout again this afternoon, 5 X 5minutes. Felt a lot different than one month ago when I was on the track! Next week still won’t be full and then the onslaught of mileage begins. Looking forward to it…
I’ve been pretty busy this week updating a new website for Guelph Running (Speed River, National Endurance Centre and Guelph Athletic Society). I’m going to update that website with news for the whole group when we race, such as after the TransCanada 10km tomorrow. The website still needs a bit of updating but you can PREview it now www.guelphrunning.ca.
Scott Cameron found the video of me running at Brussels. It’s pretty funny when I get lapped and the anouncer has to remind everyone that I’m a lapped runner. http://www.sportnet.com/iaaf_brussels.html “seek” or “fast forward” on the tape counter to 2:30:55 for the 10,000 meter venue where it starts 5:06 into the race at the 2,000m mark. 10,000m footage ends at 2:56:20. I’m on the screen at 2:47:11 to 2:52:47.
Legend of Bubba
The following is true tale of the best prank that has ever been played on me. I will start from the beginning so everyone can get an idea of who the players were and why this prank happened.
One spring day in 2003 my university of Guelph roommate, Robin Bourke, came home from the library and showed myself and my other roommate, T-Bone, a note he discovered on his books upon returning from a study break in the library. The note said something on the lines of “Hi, my name in Lindsay. I am in your biology class and I think you’re cute. If you’re interested in getting together to study give me a call at 837-5309.” T-Bone took it upon himself to remember the number in the hopes that I put it to good use. I brought the number over to our Aussie student-exchange friend, Jimbo, as he loves to prank call people. (Side note: When Jimbo first arrived in Guelph he heard about buying a bike at a police auction and he asked us if we knew anything, we didn’t and told him to call the station, he asked for the number, so we told him “911”, the operator was not pleased). Jimbo was a master of voices and had fooled many people from the track team in the year he was here so I thought he was the man for the job. He dialed the number and then all of a sudden threw the phone over to me and insisted that “she’ll detect the accent, mate”. So there I was on the phone, talking to some girl in Robin’s class impersonating Robin. “Ya, I’m so smart babe… I’m an engineer for crying out loud,…I know everything… I pretty much rule because I’m amazing… if you ever need anything explained I’m your man, babe … etc etc.” I pretty much acted like a total show-off and all around knob.
Apparently that call was enough to break the ice as the girl came up to Robin and struck up a conversation in class. Needless to say there was an awkward couple of minutes until Robin figured out she had talked to “him” on the phone the other evening. Right away he asked Jimbo about the call and sure enough Jimbo told him that I had indeed talked to her. Robin made sure I didn’t know that he figured out what happened as he was planning his revenge…
Two weeks later I came home and saw this big blasphemous picture of me up on our fridge. I knew exactly what picture it had originally come from as it had “All-Canadian” written across the bottom….
COPY #2 written across the top in marker?!! If this is copy #2 then where is copy #1?!! I had a good idea since the original picture is up in the foyer of the Athletic Centre. So I got on my bike and raced to the AC. Got inside, looked up, wasn’t there! Phewww that would have been embarrassing. I felt the need to get in touch with Robin as I thought the picture on the fridge was hilarious and he fooled me into believing he had put it up in the AC. Upon entering the computer lab in the main Library I saw one of the screens had the doctored picture set as the background and as I moved to change it I noticed all the screens had the pic. My face turned bright red I got the heck out of there as fast as I could!
Was there a Copy #1 you ask? Well there was. And it was right where I thought I was going to see it except it had already been taken down and replaced with the original by the afternoon. Early that morning Robin had taken the original down, scanned it, lengthened my forehead, turned up my nose, enlarged my lower lip, crossed an eye and inflated an ear and then put “Bubba” back up on the wall. All with the help of Jimbo, of course. The doctored picture was nicknamed Bubba courtesy of the swollen lower lip. The hideous picture was put up in the foyer of the AC right before 300 people entered to write a final exam in the main gym. My picture happens to sit right above one of the three turnstiles and apparently everyone was pointing and laughing upon entering the AC and that’s how the assistant director noticed it. She brought the picture to the attention of the Athletic Director and my coach who both laughed upon seeing it and could not take the Assistant seriously. Then the AD asked my coach if I would be offended and my coach replied “you’re talking about an athlete who just lit a bag of dog poo on his teammate’s porch the other night. No.”
And that is the legend of Bubba.
Take time with a wounded hand, cause it likes to heal
I just got back from my doctor’s office where I got to see the results from my blood test, X-ray and bone scan. Blood results were good and the X-ray didn’t pick up on anything, no surprises in those departments. The diagnoses from the doctor who looked at the bone scan was that I have a “Probable stress fracture base of the right metatarsal. Probable stress fracture right navicular bone” and “shin splints left tibia.” My doctor had to make sense of “probable”. My foot hasn’t felt this good in a long time as I’ve only run once since September 15th. The plan is to start running this week and ramp-up really slowly and supplement with pool running and biking. I was a little worried that the results would of been worse and I would of had to take more time off, so this is good news as I definitely feel like running on the trails!
My first race back will most likely be an 8km in Van Cortlandt Park on November 3rd in NYC. It will be a fun weekend for the Speed River team to compete as a team in a XC race and also to watch the American Olympic Marathon Trials. Since I’m not even running yet I will likely treat the Nov. 3rd XC race as a workout and then lay it down later in November in Manchester, CT.
Tomorrow I’ll be taking part in the world record attempt for the most people to walk 1 km at the same time. There are tons of sites across Canada that are taking part and I’ll be talking about promoting an active lifestyle at the Fergus site. Later this week I’ll post an entry about the best practical joke ever played on me, always a crowd pleaser.
White light, White light goin’ messin’ up my mind
Something we do in Guelph at the National Endurance Centre is see a doctor for routine check-ups every once in a while. I went in for mine last week and mentioned to the doctor that my foot had been pretty sore. I showed her that when I stand on the outside of my foot it hurt, but when its flat its fine. After she looked it over for a while she decided I should get X-rays and a bone scan just to rule out the possibility of a fracture.
Let me fill you in on my right foot… it has been hurting for about a year and a half, off and on. Never have I missed a run because of it even though I have had a couple sore outings. Last summer while I was warming up for a 1500m in Germany I twisted it badly. Needless to say the race was a little painful but, a week later I was racing fine with spikes. Again, about 5 weeks ago, I twisted it badly and it was very sore if I stepped on an uneven surface but felt fine running normally. A few weeks later I ran Brussels, 10km on a hard (Mondo) track with spikes, and it felt fine. This is why I doubt anything wrong, or too wrong, is going on with my foot.
Yesterday I had my first bone scan in my life. This is where they inject you with a little radionuclide and use a gamma camera to detect bone renewal (ie. blood going to a specific part of the bone to heal it). While I was sitting with my feet on the camera the technician came back and asked if if my feet were sore, I responded that it was just my right foot, she said “that makes sense” as she looked at the screen. I asked her what that meant and she explained there was bright white spots showing up on my right foot but, was not allowed to diagnose the severity. I need to wait to hear from the doctor for an official diagnoses.
While I was sitting there getting more angles taken I started to text Dave on my cell and tell him I’m looking at two friggin’ bright spots on my right foot on the screen. Since my foot actually feels pretty good now he suggested that it may be that I had a stress fracture and that the healing process is still showing up, but either way it would be best not to run until I talk with the doctor. It looks like my two weeks off will be extended a little bit and I’ll start back on the bike and hit the pool in the meantime, no more skateboarding though, haha. Next Tuesday I should know, or have a good idea, what is really going on. Hopefully I can resume running that day!
White heat, Aww white heat it tickle me down to my toes
FLOAT ON 
