La Jolla 5k Post-Mortem

34:59

I was shooting for 30:00.

Ultimately, I underestimated the HUGE descent at the beginning. I'm very careful about putting excess pounding on my joints, so I don't even train downhills. As you'd imagine, the 6-9% grade whomped a hurting on me. I knew there was some hills, but I underestimated the severity of the initial decline and what it would do to me.
Basically, I saw the elevation color coding and flagged the red part as "this'll be tough" but essentially looked past the green. Green's a friendly color, right? Green says "go!". Green, generally, doesn't say "I will mash your quads into hamburger and make your lower-legs malfunction."

Generally.

All-in-all, while it was great to go down to San Diego, this race was not a good one for me.

I am still determined to break 30:00, so I'm going to find and register for the closest flat-course 5k I can find. The sooner the better. I want to redeem myself.


Exeunt.

(Oh, quick side-note: @MapleJen handled the hill better than me and beat me in the race. Kudos! Also: @RussellNuts absolutely blew through the half-marathon course, clocking in somewhere under 1:32:00. Truly impressive stuff. Again, kudos!)


Elevation image courtesy the fantastic MapMyRun.com

Day 25: Turning on the Afterburners

I think I've found a new sub-goal. A meta-goal, if you will.

I think I'd like to get faster. More specifically, I think I'd like to get good at hustling through 5ks.

In my gait analysis session Halima (the wicked-awesome running guru) told me "marathons aren't really for everyone; a lot of people would be better off running shorter races." And you know, I'm thinking she's right.

Sure, I want to develop a huge cardio base. But I don't particularly want to deal with the wear that marathon training seems to have on your body. Knees, hips, feet—if I can get a good workout running shorter races and still feel on top of my game, then I'd like to do that.

And, I'd like to do that faster.

This is all really coming about due to a sort of challenge thrown down by our buddy @MapleJen, who is running the La Jolla 5k with us. She's shooting for a sub-30:00 time. And while I was happy to plug away and come in at around 33:00, it got me thinking. It got my competitive juices flowing.

So today I went out with the goal of opening it up, pushing it and seeing just how fast I could knock 5k out.

I increased my stride rate right out of the gate and basically kept the hammer down the whole time. There was a stiff headwind at Crissy Field on the way out, and that kicked my ass a little, but that turned into a tailwind on the way back so I can't claim any great disadvantage—especially on such a short run.

My finishing time was 30:22. That's (unofficially) my fastest 5k ever. Honestly, I feel pretty good about it.

While I was doing it I was so busy focusing on pushing myself that I didn't even think about quitting, which I am plagued with doing. And yes, 5k is a short distance, but I have quit during a short run before.

So, instead of having the goal of "completing" X distance when I run (and possible not toughing out the distance for whatever reason), my new goal is to do X distance in a specific time. If I am focusing on time, I'll be too busy to be thinking about quitting.

I'm gonna have to get some fartleks in before the La Jolla 5k in the hopes of shaving those 22 seconds off my 5k time. After that, I'm gonna try to crank down my 5k times minute by minute.

It'll be cool.

Day 24: Notice a Bit of a Gap? *sigh*

Oy kids. I slacked. I got off-track. Sucks.

I am an asshat.

An object at rest tends to stay at rest and an object in motion tends to stay in motion with the same speed and in the same direction unless acted upon by an unbalanced force. — Ike Newton

I have no real excuse. I had a nice "long" 5m run on Sunday the 5th, and then basically the "unbalanced force" of—for lack of a better word—laziness led me to slacking.

Today I got back into the swing. I haven't eaten right, but I did hop on the bike today and go for about a 40 minute ride. It was actually really pretty tough, and it felt great.

I basically just headed down to Crissy Field for an out-and-back. There was a pretty good headwind coming in from the ocean through the Golden Gate Bridge span, and riding into a headwind is tougher than running into it. Seriously. I got a pretty hearty pump going in my legs, and I was sucking a bit of wind. On the other hand, I liked being able to huff-and-puff on the bike versus getting winded in the pool. You can breathe all you want on a bike.

I think the bike will become my usual cross-training activity on nice days (and it was pretty darn gorgeous™ out) and hit the pool when it's crappy. It was fun, and I avoided going over the handlebars and breaking my clavicle. So there's that.

Tomorrow I run and lift. I may skip the lift and focus on the run. I'm actually pretty excited about he La Jolla 5k I have coming up, and I'd like to break 30 minutes. I figure if I get some good fartlek runs in between now and then I just might be able to bust it out.

Yipper skipper.

Total Weight: back to 0

Day 14: Runnin' in the Sun(nin')

 while (john.run.weather() == "sunny") {
  john.mood.happy();
  john.post.insert("GORGEOUS");
 }

That's codeDork™ talk for me reiterating that it was, again, GORGEOUS out again today. Again!

I ran down at Crissy Field. Lots and lots of folks out running, biking and even soaking up some sun at the beach—a relatively rare site up here in San Francisco. It's normally a bit too "nipply" to enjoy the sun, but today was nice and warm.

This was perfect for me, because:

1. I really like the sun
2. I really like warmth
3. I need training experience in warmer weather

The Hal Higdon 10k plan I'm following suggested 3.5 miles today, but since I'm training for a 7 miler and not a 10k, I've been tacking on a little extra each run. As such I put in 5 miles and it felt great.

Nike+ says I averaged 10:24 minute miles across the 5, with little peaks and valleys. I felt like I was going slower than that, but hey, I'll take it.

Incidentally, it looks like I'm running the La Jolla Shores 5k at the end of the month—a bit of an impromptu race, but it fits in nicely with the training plan. A couple things: it'll be good to re-acclimate to race conditions—dodging around people, the crowd, the atmosphere. Also, @MapleJen, the reason @LosBee and I are running the race, said she's shooting for a sub-30:00 time. That's a little quicker than my normal loping Slow Mofo trot, but I'm up for the challenge. I'll have to test-run a couple times and see how I can pace it out for a 5k. Should be doable.

Anyhoo, great run.

My food was a little off-track today—I'm not pigging out, I'm just not eating as macronutrient-balanced in each meal. I also have to get to my abs and hips workout, too. But there's still time in the day, right?

Day 13: Auditions for the Pro Sleep Team

I slept a long time last night, ostensibly recovering from the staying-up-late and the drinky-drinky and the running around of the last couple days.

Then I worked for several hours, and when @LosBee came home from work and took a nap, I thought "hmmmm, that looks lie a good idea!" and took a nap myself.

Of course I passed out and slept until 11pm. Whoops! Oh well.

I reckon today is a bit of a wash, but there are worse things you can do than catch up on a bunch of sleep. Right?

Day 12: Aftermath

Another day with the visitor in town. Good times. As a result, I ate some wicked (meaning good, unhealthy) food at Fred's in Sausalito. I only did a Denver omelet, hash browns and one pancake (which I brought home and snacked on all day), but Fred's is famous for their deep-fried french toast. Yes, you read that right: deep-fried french toast. I had it once, and it's even more overwhelming than it sounds. Didn't eat that today—I wasn't about to go there.

Anyhoo, tomorrow is back on the plan and I'm very, very much looking forward to it. I gotta run off some of this culinary debauchery.

Day 11: Busy Busy, No Workout

Kids, didn't get my workout today. Today was all about running 10,000 errands and then hitting 5,000 social events.

Also, ate a bit off-the-charts since we had a nice dining experience and a visitor in town. A visitor who tends to leave both me and @LosBee with wicked hangovers. I'm not naming any names, but this visitor tends to wreak havok on our livers. In a good way.

Day 10: Strokin'

Stroke: a single completion of the sequence of body movements repeated while swimming in the given style

Good sleep, good food, really really good swim. My endurance in the pool is getting more solid, and I had a lot of good laps doing breaststroke, a little freestyle and flutter kick and frog kick with the kick board.

Felt so good.

We have a visitor tomorrow and I have a lot of running around to do, and then we have several social events that'll probably mildly sabotage my eating, but meh. It's all good. Hopefully I can get my workouts in as planned.

Great. Day.

(Oh, and the weather—if you're curious—was gorgeous. Again.)

Total Weight: -5lbs