The Fit Test

 So I determined that if I want to PR in my next race I would need to run 12 miles in 1.5 hours. That would be a 45 min 6 miler. I was going to run a 10k just to see if I could hit the 45 but then I thought about it. In the race I would be running 13.1 miles. Testing myself at 6 miles with fresh legs will tell me nothing about what I can do after 8-10 miles. So I decided on a 12 mile test run. And I had to run it in such a way that I felt that I could run the next 1.1 miles at at least the average pace of the 12 miles. After all, if I burnt myself out and had to walk the last mile, the effort of the previous 12 miles would be undone.

Mother nature blessed me with a day in the mid 50s, light breeze (my planned race will likely be breezy so this was a good thing) and plenty of sunshine.

Time?

1:28:40

Pace 7:21/mile

9 seconds per mile faster than planned. Included stopping to kick a ball back to some volleyball players and a relatively slow start due to fumbling with my phone.

And unlike last March, my heart rate never approached max. Which means there was plenty in the tank for the last mile and to drop some seconds in the second half. 

With the upcoming winter training, these numbers should improve by March.

The one disappointment is my cadence. It's way too low for what I want to do. There is definitely some efficiency work that I need to do.

$60 Carbon Plate? Yes Please

 So after watching a YouTube video by a runner who went to various discount stores to score running sneakers, I decided to make the same trip. What did I locate? Well the first score as a Boston 8, in blue. There were a lot of pink ones. Sorry, I don't do pink shoes. Period. Stop with that. Those were $35. When I purchased my first pair last spring I paid way more than that. 

So I decided to see what else was out there and I ran across the following:

Yeah, it's "old" tech when compared to the current Nike offerings but:

1)  I'm not being paid to run
2) I'm not being paid to review sneakers on YouTube.

Also, while carbon plate shoes will give you some extra speed, the fact of the matter is that running efficiency and training is what's responsible for most of your performance. You gotta do the work. Period.

But back to the sneaker. $60. For a carbon plate shoe. This originally retailed for $130. Why would I pay that?  However; one of the problems with this shoe showed up rather quickly. After a 5 miler to see how they feel, the sole was already showing signs of wear.  Clearly then I cannot do any kind of regular running with it. The plan now is to buy another pair and reserve them for racing days ONLY.

Word is that you should NOT wear these things regularly because it will change your gait. I don't know how true that is but I don't plan on wearing these for anything less than a fit tests and speedwork.

Also, these people were not lying about how stiff these things are. You cannot bend this shoe at all. Also, turning doesn't inspire confidence. I'll be honest, it didn't feel much different from my current rotation. It's light like my Pegs and Bostons. They are high but I wasn't feeling the "it felt like it was pushing me" thing that I've watched and read. Maybe it's because they are "old" tech. 

Anyway, assuming the Sham is not cancelled again (announcement on Dec 15), I'll probably run it in these. I was originally going to run in the Pegs but if these add a little bit I'll take it. Especially for $60.

Yes please.

And Now, We Fast

 So last year I decided to train differently for the Shamrok-Anthem half marathon. That is I decided to train sanely. I took up MAF training and by late March, I saw results. It's now November and I'm seeing even more results. I'll probably be posting on that in the future as I hope these folks don't cancel the 2021 race via announcement in December. Anyway, I've added a new twist: Intermittent fasting.

One of the goals of the MAF training was to get my body to burn fat for fuel rather than sugar. You can go longer on fat than sugar so for a long distance race, this change would be very helpful. But the one thing I noticed is that I continue to carry a significant amount of abdominal fat. Now I'm not a spring chicken so I know that as we age we generally pack in fat but the thing is that for the amount of running and biking I do, it didn't make sense. 

So I had to confess. I snack. Yes. Yes I do. So even though I eat sensible food, the snacking was undoing the gains, particularly the night snacking where since I'm not doing anything, the food is turned into fat for storage. I had to put a stop to this. Clearly will power was not going to work so I needed an incentive:

16-8 daily intermittent fasting. 

Since I'm not actually trying to lose weight (I am, but very targetted) the idea here for me is not to reduce calories. For the amount of running I do it's not healthy. But to eliminate the extra eating by blocking off 16 hours. Basically, after dinner, there is no eating again until the next day whenever 16 hours is up.

Honestly, the worst part is the last 3 hours. And really the reason why is because generally, I'm not doing anything that takes attention away from the fact that I'm USED to eating by that time. I'm on week three and have dropped weight and actually can tell the difference between what I weigh when I've eaten and when my stomach is empty. 

So far there have been no ill effects on my running, which I didn't expect there to be since I'm not on a starvation diet. I also make sure to take vitamins, etc. during the fast period because of my running and sweating out various elements.

Research says it takes about 3 to 5 weeks for your body to adjust to the schedule. I'm on the tail of week 3. We shall see.

The Swings Of The Game

 Havent' posted much on BlackJack for obvious reasons. Casinos were closed and when they opened I sat it out for a while. Having returned, I have found conditions favorable. EV has gone up because less people can play at once. Yesterday I managed to snag a table to myself. 

Wanted to post a graph showing the swings of the game. This is pretty typical of what I see when playing. 

The x-axis is time from session start. As you see I had a two-hour session most of it consisted of being in the red.  I had a particular goal in mind and a time limit. Knowing the swings when the goal was met, I got up which fortunately was near the end of the shoe, meaning I did not have to waste a positive count.

The reason I know the times is because I exit the game at any -1 count. That's when I record where I stand. So each increment shows me sitting out. You see that -1 counts happen quite frequently in the space of an hour (we had two 10 minutes apart, including the time waiting for a shuffle. 

The takeaways from this post is that yes, there will be losing. In my prior experience, I was coming way underfunded for the expected dips. This can really negatively impact your game as you may never be able to recover to preserve your bankroll. So come prepared.

Secondly, if you are playing a positive expectation game you still need to learn to deal with losing and the higher your stakes the lower those dips will be. Do not panic and manage your stress and keep playing by the math.

Road To The Sham 2021: Back To Stability

 So it's September and I'm back on the road to the March Shamrock Anthem Half Marathon in Virginia Beach.  This means I'm back on the training horse but with some significant changes. First though a note on sneakers.

In the late winter into about July I went on a non-stability shoe spree. I purchased a pair of Nike Vomeros, Nike Pegasus Turbo 2's, the latter was to be used at Shamrock 2020. Obviously that didn't happen. Those sneakers weren't used very much and still sit most of the time. Why? Because they offer no stability at all. I can watch my leg collapse inward with each step (left foot). Even the insert was not helpful. 

The Vomeros were not as bad but they are heavy. I also needed to put the insert in to stabilize my left foot. That sneaker was good. I say was because it's worn now at well over 300 miles AND I can tell that the soles no longer cushion like they did before. 

In late spring i purchased a pair of Adidas Boston 8s. Ooooh nice. Light shoe with a very low profile. Not a lot of cushion but very fast shoe indeed. Best thing was that I didn't need my insert. I think the low profile had a lot to do with it as there wasn't a lot of material to squish. Speaking of squish...

So I purchased a pair of SL20s since I liked to Boston's so much. Big mistake. I hadn't even gotten to 75 miles when I had to retire them from running due to pain in my left leg. I now use them for walking. I'm glad these weren't some $200 shoe. 

So with the weather changing and knowing I cannot use the Boston's for everything and my Vomeros being beat, I decided to go back to my trusty Saucony's and purchased a pair of Guide 13s. 

They. Are. Nice. 

My legs are happy. They put a piece of plastic under the arch. There is no collapsing of my foot. At all. Clearly I need to be on stability shoes. My little experiment with non-stability shoes for every day running is done. Now, It'll be Saucony's for daily MAF running and long runs. Boston's for track speed work or short distance speed work (5 and 10K) and the Pegs for races. Maybe.

Which brings us to the second topic of this update: MAF training.  Last Feb I noted that my street MAF was 8;17/mile (a month out from the expected race). Today I run that at 7:58 with many sections in the low 7s and hitting upper 6s.

I'll hopefully get to do a track session while temps are in the 50s and see where I am there. My intention now is to drop my heart rate by maybe 5 BPM over the winter for MAF runs to see what improvements I can make over the next 6 months. 

I think I'm going to have a great PR in 2021. Here's to hoping.

SL 20s: The Knee Killer

 So I wrote that due to the wet feet in the Boston 8's that I got a pair of SL20s which were more breathable. Indeed they were. Instead of soaked feet I had damp feet. As fate would have it, to make up for the lack of soppiness, these sneakers decided to try to kill my knees.

After a few runs I noticed that the inside tendon on my left knee was sore. My left foot is the "bad" foot. I figured it was due to not using my insert (which I haven't needed in the Boston). I put the insert in and continued to run. Same deal except now I ALSO had knee knock. That is, on occasion my knees were meeting. That doesn't happen to me and I don't have knock knees. This meant that my foot was collapsing inward and that was likely the cause of my tendon pain. 

Looking at the bottom of the sneaker I saw that the inner edge of the front of the sneaker was very worn. This is with 70 miles.  Clearly my foot was doing a lot of rolling.

The SL20s have been retired to walk duty...whenever I wear white. Had I paid full freight for these sneakers I would have been very upset. I didn't so I'm only a little upset. Even the Pegs with a similar mileage (I use it for occasional long run speed tests) weren't that worn.

It goes to show that you have to listen to your body and examine your shoes to make sure you're not headed to injury. I did notice that the SLs moved around more than the Bostons. That should have been a clue.

Your mileage may certainly vary but that's the last SL I'll be purchasing. Fortunately the weather will soon be cooling down and I'll be back to thicker sneakers. So I'll have to find a pair of Vomeros. They are heavy but handled cold weather well, heel wear issue aside.

Running To The Crawl: Not Happening

 So I did not register for the Crawling Crab because I suspected that the currant lunacy around COVID (yes it's lunacy and I've written extensively about it elsewhere), would have resulted in a cancelled race and I didn't want to have reservations to cancel and the like. Sure enough the Crawl is cancelled. Actually it's now a "Hermit" race which I suppose means virtual run. 

No thanks. Not the same. A part of racing is seeing the competition. It's seeing the person ahead of you and saying to yourself: I think I can catch them. It's suffering and seeing that mile marker or clock. It's that big ass finish line banner that makes you dig deep and cut 30 seconds off your last mile.

 So for me the 2020 race season is officially cancelled. Thanks China. 

On the plus side, this allows me to continue to heart rate train for another 6 months. I have already seen benefits and look forward to a MAF test when the weather cools into the 60s. I see no point in MAF testing in hot weather knowing the impact that heat has on your body AND the fact that my last MAF test was in cool(er) weather. The results cannot be comparable.

Run To The Crawl: No Mo' Wet Feet

So per the last post I have a pair of Adidas Boston 8 sneakers. Also it is quite "warm" now. Went for a long run in the 8's and towards the end, say 4 miles, it felt like I had been running in water. When I got home and took off the 8's they were soaked. As if I had dropped them in water.

No bueno.

So given that it wasn't going to be getting any cooler anytime soon and running in wet sneakers was not happening, I had to solve this problem. My saucony's are dead with over 300 miles on them. My Vomero's were dead. They no longer have the "bounce" and as shown in the video the soles are wearing out. The Pegs are for racing and I don't intend to wear them until near race day (last long run before taper) and then on race day. So those were out of the question. Soooooo... I got some Adidas SL20s

As soon as I stepped outside, I felt a breeze on my toes! Yay! They aren't as springy as the Pegs but far softer than the Bostons and far more breathable. Running in 90+ degrees with high humidity has resulted in dampness but not the "been walking in puddles feel that I had in the Bostons. Also, like the Bostons I haven't had to put the inserts into the left shoe. The shoe is pretty stiff. What's better is that they make the Vomeros feel like the anchors they are. I think I'll wait until the weather changes before replacing the Vomeros for winter running (cold feet are not fun).

In other news, even in this hot weather I'm reaching into the 7s for my MAF pace. This bodes well for when the temps drop. If its in the 60s on race morning I should do very well. Virginia is known for being warmer than the northeast so you never know.

Run To The Crawl: What My Sneakers Are Telling Me

Running To The Crawl: Two Fer

Yesterday I saw that the local HS track was open so I planned to do a MAF test today. However; by the time I was ready to run today it was in the 70s and no way I was going to have a good MAF test at such temperatures. So instead I did a two fer:

16 mile bike ride at no more than MAF heart rate followed immediately by a 3 mile run at MAF rate. I haven't done such a thing in years. Tomorrow morning we find out whether I broke my body with an early morning "can't walk" or if I'm fit enough to take that. The latter would bode well for October. Very well.

The NYT Is Trash

Really.

This should have never been OK'd for publication.

Running To The Crawl: Too Hot!

So in a previous post I mentioned that I was going to drop my MAF runs to a lower heart rate. Ha. Jokes on me. Yesterday's 5 miler witnessed me desperately trying to keep at my MAF heart rate while my pace jumped into the....nines.

This was with low 70s. Today I went for a 10 miler and was totally unable to keep MAF rate and so I made it into a threshold run. This means my MAF "runs" this summer are going to feature a whole lot of walking which hasn't happened since January.

So the new plan is, Wake up early (still on lockdown so I don't have to worry about getting ready for a commute) and "run" when it is coolest for most of the week and for faster paced runs I won't worry about time of day. Hopefully this pays off dividends when the temps drop again.

Running To The Crawl: Tick Tock, Tick Tock

VA governor Northam is doing his best to keep me from running an official half marathon this year. Apparently he wants to keep the state shut for a year or so. We'll see how long that, and his governorship, lasts if he does that. Anyway

So One of the things for this summer was to up my cadence by running with a metronome. Today was the first 5 miler with it. Started out at 86 BPM and got it up to 89 by the second mile. Average speed dropped by 13 seconds. This is with a 10 step per minute increase. Once I got into it I realized I can probably do a faster cadence but this was a good start. The no music thing is going to be a problem on long runs.

So clear proof, if you need it, that increased cadence will speed up your pace at the same effort (I was doing a MAF run as well). If this keeps up I may be looking at dropping another 20 or so seconds off my half....whenever I get to run one.

Running To The Crawl

I thought Road to The Crawl was dumb so it's Running to The Crawl. So since the Sham was cancelled and I have all this fitness with nothing to do, I decided that I would train for the Crawling Crab held in October. I thought the race was in Norfolk, VA but apparently it's in Hampton, VA. Makes the hotel plans a but more complicated since the Sham doubles as a kind of beachfront holiday.

Currently the Vomeros are showing wear, particularly on my left, problem, foot. For such expensive sneakers to be showing more wear at half the mileage of my cheaper sneakers is not confidence inspiring. The Pegs await fast days and race days so I'm not worried about that pair. But I'll clearly have to invest in another 2 pairs of sneakers prior to October.

On the training front I'm "flattening the MAF" as in I'm dropping my average slow pace heart rate for the slower runs. Instead of trying to push to MAF and stay there, I'm allowing myself to run at a lower rate, not necessarily slower pace. I'm currently testing out a Mi Band 4 which does not have an always on screen. So I have no idea how fast I'm running except for when I get to a mile marker. I recently ran a 12 mile PR under these conditions, which previously required me to run *very* fast for the last two miles. So not knowing how fast I'm running during a run, but only knowing my heart rate, is proving very beneficial.

Lastly, I'm working on my cadence. My band, and watch, has been saying that my cadence is 167 which is very low. Since both of these things do not accurately measure my heart rate I'm concerned that it may be low. So I'm going to do a test to count my cadence. Experts say that I should be at 180. Taller people, like myself, tend to have lower cadences so if I get into the mid 170s I'd be happy. Unfortunately the metronome app I have conflicts with the music app sooo running in silence would be required. I don't like running in silence.

.

No One Said You Had To Use Both

So in my "Closed" post I mentioned that I would attempt a run with the new insert in my left sneaker and nothing in the right. Seems to be a win. I discovered that I was feeling pain at the top of my right foot when I had the insert in. I did an 11 miler today and no pain in the right foot. No pain in the left foot and no pain in either knee.

While I was researching shoes I ran across an article in which a podiatrist said the worst thing about shoes is that they come in pairs. I guess I learned first hand what he meant.

Of course that means I have paid quite a bit for a single insert. Anyone want a right foot stability insert?

Road To The Sham: Local Run

So I ran the distance today which would have been race day. Results:

1) 1:41:01 for 13.22 miles. So 1:40:30 ish for the 13.1 distance Average of 7:38/mile. a full 2 seconds off my per mile pace for my PR. Booo.
2) This would have been a Sham PR which was previously 1:42.

Some caveats:

1) Of course since this wasn't a race there wasn't the pack of people that can cause you to run faster (for better or worse).

2) My nutrition plan went to hell. I have two waist bottles. One had water and the other an electrolyte and sugar mix. At mile 4 I discovered that the electrolyte mix bottle was empty. Apparently it sprung a leak. So I was running without half of my rations. Not good. I started to really feel it around mile 10. My heart rate was higher than training and I was having problems producing power at lower heart rates which cost me average speed.

3) Since this was an out and back run, there was a severe slow down at the turnabout. This kicked up the average time for mile six by a significant amount of seconds. Not making excuses, just saying.

Road To The Sham: Closed

And so the Road to the Sham ends with a cancellation of the race due to Wuhan Corona virus AKA: COVID-19. Don't let these folks bully you into not saying Wuhan virus. All current evidence says it started in Wuhan China and it's not racist to say so. If they want to go down that hole then they need to call the Spanish Flu by it's "science" name, H1N1. But that's not really the point of this post.

Anyway. Months of training for this particular event was not in vain. No, I won't be racing so I won't get the PR, well, shot at the PR, but I am much fitter than before and I've had eye opening experiences some of which I'll review below:

1) Current MAF training results: I have dropped between 30 seconds to a minute on my MAF runs. Hills that spiked my heart rate well over MAF limits are now manageable. That is I still slow down but I no longer have to walk to maintain my MAF number.

2) I have been able to run over 100 miles a month without injury. This is something that was impossible to do prior to MAF training and being very strict about speed during rest days. Matter of fact HAVING rest days. Now the pros are doing 100 miles a week. I'm not there yet particularly since I'm not doing marathons, but I'll definitely be doing more mileage as the months go along to maintain this fitness.

3) I have a bad arch in my left foot. In February I purchased a new sneaker: Nike Vomero 14.

This was the first non-stability shoe I have run in since the early 2000s. I got into stability shoes after knee, Achilles and a heel spur. Looking back I figured that it was my sneakers rather than my form (I heel struck). In the past 5 years or so I adjusted to a mid-foot strike but I still wore stability shoes with inserts. Problems went away. So I thought that perhaps now that I was running in better form that I could wear a neutral show. Yes I did try the Vaporfly 4%. It was very springy but had nothing under my arches. I thought it to be a bad idea to spend on that if I couldn't run in it for long due to arch issues. Glad I didn't.

Anyway Vomeros were and are very comfortable. Very springy and make my stability shoes feel like well...shoes. Since I was still comfortable I got the idea to get a lighter shoe for the faster runs and race day. I settled on the Nike Pegasus Turbo 2.

Soooo..very light. Very springy. Even less arch support.

Did a few tempo and threshold runs in them. Great.

Then the pains started. Particularly in one foot. Exactly what I was afraid of. I noticed at the end of the run while walking that my left foot was collapsing inward. Something that doesn't happen in my stability shoes. Boooooo. I put my old insert into the Vomeros but they made the problem worse because now the shoe was too tight. But that's when I noticed it was only one foot that had issues. Just to confirm, I put the inserts into my stability shoe, which I had stopped using since they felt like garbage compared to the Nikes, and took another run where I found the inserts helped with the impacts, making them closer to the Nikes but now I had no foot pain (which honestly usually went away after a mile or so in the Nikes)

My next experiment will be to put the insole into the left Vomero and nothing in the right since that foot doesn't seem to have problems. But now that the race is cancelled I don't need to wear the faster shoes since given the current public scare it's unlikely to be running any races until the fall. Perhaps this will give me the chance to get custom inserts from one of those stores that I can use in the Nikes.

Right now the summer plans are to go heavy into the MAF training, including my bike rides in order to increase my aerobic capacity. The faster I can run at low heart rates the faster I can run in race conditions.

Thanks for following.

The Peak Before The Taper

So the Sham is March 20, or 5 weeks out. I hit max distance 2 weeks ago so by the time it's 2 weeks out I'll have done the distance, and most importantly, the time quite a few time. It also means speedwork is on the table. One of the things with heart rate training is that there are a LOT of miles where you are running well below race pace so fast running becomes foreign. Running by feel becomes slow because you "feel" fine. So speedwork is what's on the table. Essentially all runs from now on will be half MAF running and half race pace or better. Listening to the body so that I don't get injured. Speaking of which, the huge benefit of my current training is that I have totally avoided the injuries I usually have by now (usually knee pain but sometimes foot too).

What's also nice is that I now know my expected heart rates for different paces and supposedly I can keep out of the red at a pace that's about 20-30sec/mile faster than my target pace. This means there is a strong chance of a PR. We shall see.

Road To The Sham: Hitting Sevens

So we had a bit of warm weather which allowed me to run in less clothes. Mid 50s is great running weather and it showed. On a previous post I noted that my "street MAF" average time was 9:20/ mile. Well yesterday I ran a MAF of 8:16/mile with many dips into the 7s. I won't do a track test until March. The great thing here is that I'll likely be able to maintain my target speed at a low heart rate relative to last time. If so, I should be able to hit my PR. The one "problem" now is that I'm running faster than I intended to. I may end up having to actually slow down on purpose as to avoid injury as I'm now over 100 miles/month (which I've only done 3 times before).

Road To The Sham: Polar Moments

On suspicion that my Amazefit Bip was not accurately measuring my heart rate, I purchased a polar chest strap. Today on my treadmill run I was pleasantly surprised to see that my monitor connected to the machine. Found out that the Amazefit was off by as much as 22 BPM!!!! With an average of 12 BPM

Here I was thinking I had the aerobic fitness of a 90 year old.

So the lesson here for people getting into heart rate training is to get the chest strap monitor.