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Time: ~10 minutes
Distance: ~1 mile
I didn't get to recap much of the USATF Club XC meet in my Thunder Road Marathon entry and I won't really do so here. But, I can say that the ladies of CRC held their own against some firmly established club teams like the NYAC, BAA, and Atlanta Track Club. It was a great day for cross-country out at McAlpine and taking in the action was awesome. The men's race saw Dave Nightingale place 3rd overall and Queens' runner Mike Crouch one spot back in 4th. I struggled to get from the mile mark, to the base of the hill, to the backside of the hill on tired legs. At times I was so wrapped up in the running that I forgot about the stiffness in my quads.
The post-race awards banquet for the club race was at Whisky River (why is this place purposely misspelled?). I was in attendance with friends and got to mingle with some other buddies that I had completely forgotten to look out for in the race. It was good catching up with now Hansons-Brooks' runner Zac Hine (formerly of Cornell and was in Japan with me), Sam Luff now of the Georgetown Running Company (also went to Japan this year), Dave Burnham also of the Georgetown Running Company (attended Dartmouth but was on my recruiting trip to Brown when we were both seniors in high school), Lucas Meyer of the Boston Athletic Association (formerly of Yale and went to Japan two years ago) and of course Dave Nightingale who now runs for New Balance. The usual local suspects were in attendance including Caitlin, Meagan, Tanya, Mike and Sarah Porter (new local), Pezz, Paul, Compton, Thomas, Jenna and several more. I also met Ruth who helped Caitlin out at Twin Cities Marathon and her friend Addie Bracy. Lets also not forget Scott Simmons and Camille Herron (I know her from Oklahoma) who just won the Dallas White Rock Marathon.
Why all the name dropping? Well, with all the friends around things got a little out of hand. It was a fun time despite being in a terrible establishment. There is a definite reason as to why I don't patron the Epicenter. I was more surprised to see that people were paying the cover to actually attend a place like Whisky Dick. The whole night left me a world of hurt the next morning. I woke up feeling fine, just a little dehydrated. I didn't get to eat much of a dinner which was ultimately my downfall. I spent about an hour sitting in front of the tv drinking Nuun when things took a turn for the worse. I ended up driving the big white bus a couple of times before grabbing another hour of sleep. Normally this wouldn't be a big deal as I didn't have to run much today, but I did have to board a plane later in the afternoon.
I got my act together with enough time to shower, pack and get to the airport. I was destined for Philly where I would meet up with my boss and our rep from Chicago. We were all going to the GORE Running Wear and GORE Bike Wear sales meeting in Newark, Delaware. Delaware!? That's right the first state of the union. The night included a bite to eat at Geno's Steaks and a drop at the hotel. I got thoughts in my head that it would be good for me to shake out the legs on the treadmill and that's exactly what I did. While my boss was going to bed and the Canadian reps mingled by the fireplace, I hopped on the treadmill for an incredibly slow jog where I covered a mile in just over 10 minutes. By the end of it I was feeling a little less stiff and was able to stretch my tight calves.
Everybody loves a good cheesesteak.
Time: 60:32
Distance: 8.66 miles
Pace: 6:59
Map
I took another spin on the legs this evening with Mike Crouch and Meagan. It wasn't quite as hot as it's been in recent weeks which made for a much more enjoyable outing. Mike is getting ready to race at Peachtree and the NACAC meet in Florida. The first 4 miles of the run were pretty slow and the pace gradually picked up the final half. By the time we finished I was feeling fresh again. My calves have been a little tight since running 4 miles in spikes during Tuesday night's racing.
Time: 89:47
Distance: 13.50 miles
Pace: 6:39
Map
Long run at McAlpine with friends. That's the skinny. I didn't have any pick ups and was just able to run comfortably the entire way. I ran the first 8 or 9 miles with Mike Crouch and Futsum. I felt fine as the pace wasn't too tough. When they peeled off to head back to Boyce, I added on some miles and dropped the pace. For whatever reason, I felt better running solo than I did running with those guys.
Total Time: 54:21
Total Distance: 8.29 miles
Part I: 19:01 for 2.70 miles
Part II: 35:20 for ~5.59 miles
Tonight I was planning on doing some sort of track workout, but opted to stay on my weekly schedule. The idea of running with some Queens athletes appealed to me early in the day, but once I got to the track my ambitions gradually deflated. It wasn't the fact that a youth track meet was being held either. Instead of getting on the track at 7:30 pm our warm up was pushed back to 7:50 pm. The meet concluded around 8:20 and that's when the workouts began. Mike started so quick as to maximize the lights, I was still lacing up my shoes. He was doing 25 x 400 and I was going to tag along with 25 x 300. I took that as a clue to just do my own thing.
I ran a mile backwards in lane 8. Ran a mile jogging the turns and striding the straights in lane 5. Jogged another mile backwards in lane 8. It was truly backwards, rather clockwise around the track. I did 4 x 200 untimed in lane 5 before cooling down a mile clockwise.
My legs felt good to get in a little turnover. I was okay with keeping my weekly schedule the same because the lights went black about 3/4 of the way through the intervals. We also didn't leave the track until nearly 10:00 pm which meant dinner still had to be made and consumed. I've worked out late, late at night before while living in Oklahoma and sleeping afterward is always an issue.
On the plus side, Meagan and Tanya killed it tonight. Mike look strong and Simon ran tough. DII Nationals are only a few weeks away for these guys.
Time: 23:30
Distance: 3.04 miles
Map
Tonight I went over to JCSU with some Queens runners to watch their workout. Everyone was doing 4 x mile with 4 minutes rest. Mike and Futsum were hitting 4:30-4:35, Tanya hovered around 5:05 and Meagan and Jenna were at 5:20. Meagan had a miserable workout that wasn't fun to watch and less fun to run.
Mike hammered the last half of his final mile in 2:01-2:03 which put him at 4:16-4:17. Very fast.
I ended up running two laps of jogging the turns and sprinting the straights. I also did some drills before the strides. The goal was to loosen up the legs and get ready to roll tomorrow night in Uptown.
Time: 57:44
Distance: 8.01 miles
Pace: 7:12
Map
I met up with some peeps from Queens out at the Boyce parking lot for a run. Mike Crouch is back to near top form after his stellar 13:53 5k out at Stanford's Payton Jordan Invitational. He and I put in 8 miles together at a leisurely pace. It's good seeing his confidence back up. He will surely be one of the favorites in a few weeks when he toes the line at DII Nationals here in Charlotte. If it comes down to the final 1k, my money is on Crouch as he doesn't often lose to other DII runners.
Time: 95:12
Distance: 14.44 miles
Pace: 6:35
Map
I met up with Sean and some of the athletes that were still in Charlotte for spring break. We started at Old Bell and made a few loops around the Footlocker Course. It was an enjoyable run and we spent most of the time recapping last night's track action. For those who don't know, I a big time fan of track & field and racing in general. I can sit in front of a screen watching the athletes perform which I don't think many people find interesting.
I love the pre-race routines, the nerves and jitters as the athletes line up for the race. I like comparing the form and strides of the runners while they change gears from a relaxed pace to a sprint. I look at arm carry, forward leans, side to side motion, knee lift and back kick. You can learn a lot from watching both efficient and inefficient runners compete their best. The best part of watching races is seeing the tactics being used against one another and trying to predict who and when the contenders are going to make their moves.
As I mentioned above, there was a lot of track action taking place yesterday. A couple of NCAA meets were being held in two very nice indoor venues. The DI meet took place in Fayetteville, Arkansas while the DII meet was in Albuquerque, New Mexico. Both meets were aired on the CBS Sports website and coverage was actually respectable. There were some great performances at the meets that I'll let Letsrun.com recap. Rojo/Wejo (site founders) pay little to no attention to DII nationals, but my readers should know that Tanya Zeferjahn, Meagan Nedlo and Nelso Mwangi of the Queens University of Charlotte all took home All-American honors.
The really big time athletes (ones who get paid to race from footwear manufacturers like Nike and Adidas) were competing at the World Indoor Championships in Doha, Qatar. Universal Sports aired the action live which was a treat. I didn't get to see Bernard Lagat run his 3k, but he dominated the field the final 400 meters. I can't find the full day 3 broadcast to watch Lagat's race. I found the 2 minute replay with the American announcers who are utterly terrible in their play by play. The full broadcast uses British announcers that are incredibly knowledgeable about the athletes, the races and what winning means to some countries.
Time: 88:42
Distance: 13.28 miles
Pace: 6:40
Map
The Queens team got back from Louisville late last night which moved the start time for the long run back an hour. The team placed 7th out of about 38 squads and Mike's run put him 4th overall. The team was tired but in good spirits out at McAlpine because they knew the run wasn't going to be fast or as long as it normally is on Sundays. I ran with Mike and heard about how the race unfolded. My lower legs are still overly tight from Friday's workout. So tight, in fact, that I wore my Zensah compression sleeves in hope of some sort of miracle occurring that would leave me pain free. My calves loosened up a little bit over the run but still were sore. I think it won't be until Tuesday when they start to feel better.
When I got done running I was hanging out with Simon, Devin and Tim by the team's van. Simon was bent over stretching in the middle of the street, a little bit in the way of traffic but not overly hazardous. A Buick rolled up with your typical Buick driver behind the wheel. He stopped, rolled down the window and curmudgeonly bemoaned, "What's this supposed to be?"
Simon answered in his German, Arnold Schwarzenegger-esque accent, "Stretching."
The guy just sat there for a few moments staring at the four of us clearly upset that we had parked, ran and stretched on his neighborhood street. Devin finally spoke up and asked, "Can I help you," which finally broke the guy's glare. Grandpa sped up to a crawl and entered his driveway which means now we know where he lives.
Time: ~70 mins
Distance: 10.07 miles
W/u: 20:32 for 3.00 miles
W/o: 4 x mile, 2 x 400
C/d: 15:19 for 1.88 miles
Simmons took us out to a new location this afternoon that is a bit south of the city. We hit up the McMullen Greenway for some miles on a partially dirt/paved/bridged route. Most of the guys on the team were doing a pre-race workout consisting of 2 x mile, 2 x 400 but Oscar was doing 6 x mile that I was hoping to join. We got in our warm up and a few strides before commencing the effort on the first mile of the greenway.
Mile Splits:
4:39 (2:57), 4:48 (2:51), 4:59 (3:14), 5:05 (7:28)
400 Splits:
65.00 (5:35), 64.03
After the second mile interval I knew things were going downhill. My sickness is still troubling me and I guess it was a bit of a mistake to attempt this workout. However, I had already started the effort and was determined to get something in worthwhile. Oscar was running absolutely great which wasn't good for me. I was left in his wake on the second interval after about 600 meters. On the third interval Mike joined us and proceeded to take the pace out in 65 through 400m. I immediately backed off and thought about stopping at 800, 1000 and 1200 meters. I relaxed the last half of the mile and managed to split just under 5 mins. On my final interval I decided to run with one of the groups doing the pre-race. I felt much more comfortable going through 800 in 2:34 and finishing with a 2:31. The 400s at the end were just to get the legs turning over.
Oscar managed to average 4:40s or just a dip under and I think he finished with a 4:34.
The other news on the trail was that Fasil Bizuneh, who is coached by Simmons, was out doing his second big workout of the day. In the morning he ran a 2 mile warm up, 5 miles at 4:28 pace, 8 miles in 39:40ish and cooled down a mile. That's 16 miles total for the morning with some big chunks running really fast. Well, in the afternoon he came back out to McMullen to do the workout over. Yes, he was going to duplicate the effort from the morning to the best of his ability. I'm not sure what he ran the 5 miles hard in, but just as we were about to leave Simmons asked if anybody wanted to run 8 miles at 4:55 pace. There were no takers.
Time: ~64 mins
Distance: 10.05 miles
W/u: 22:08 for 3.00 miles
W/o: 5 x mile with 3 mins rest
C/d: 16:49 for 2.05 miles
I traveled out to McAlpine with the Queens team for a mile repeat session on a section of the greenway. We arrived to an absolutely packed main parking as several high school squads were racing a meet. I'm not sure which teams were in attendance but for a Tuesday at 4:30 pm, things were pretty serious. I knew that McAlpine is the host location for Footlocker South, but this was something else. The warm up went okay and we found our starting location from the 1.5 to .5 mile markers.
My goal for the workout was to run with Futsum in a relaxed manner. I held off on doing this workout by a day because it was going to be more advantageous to run with a group. Jailhouse had prescribed 4 x mile with the first 800 in 2:30 and getting after the second half with 3 mins rest. The Queens' workout was so similar that it made sense to run with them.
Splits: 4:57.28 (3:04), 4:51.43 (3:20), 4:50.42 (3:08), 4:47.73 (3:19), 4:53.85 for an average of 4:52.14.
I would rank this as one of my better workouts but I was definitely pushing today. I hammered the second half of the 4th repeat and my guess is that we went through mid-way in 2:28-2:30 which means the last 800 was in the 2:20 range. I struggled the last interval as Futsum was able to put a couple of seconds on me by the end of the interval. I was recovering relatively quickly and felt that 3 mins rest was lengthy. The last time I ran mile repeats it was on the track with Carrot Top and I split 5:03.84 (2:02), 4:59.58 (2:00), 4:53.50 (1:57), 4:51.63 (2:30). There has definitely been some improvement in the fitness.
Mike Crouch was running an absolutely stellar effort as I think he averaged 4:33 on the dirt. Pretty sick. He would come rolling by our group with about 300-400 meters to go after starting 15 seconds back. The kid is talented and a tremendous worker. It has been fun watching some of his workouts so far.
Time: 26:16
Distance: ~3.5 miles
I has the opportunity this afternoon to have my gate analyzed by a local chiroprator named Dr. Greenapple. He's the owner of Greenapple Sports & Wellness which is right around the corner from my apartment. Meagan still has a bit of a niggle in her hip region and she has been seeing Dr. Greenapple for about a week now. The bone bender is a great guy who is enthusiastic about running and athletics in general. He brought a video camera to the Queens Sports Complex so that he could film and analyze our running strides.
What I learned:
1. I have a really high back kick.
2. I land on my forefoot and pronate excessively, but have learned to compensate for it.
3. My right side is still probably a little short than my left.
4. I could be more efficient.
After the video gate analysis Mike and I went for a short jog to hit about 4 miles.
Time: 65:26
Distance: 9.95 miles
W/u: 21:25 for 3.0 miles
W/o: 8 x 2 min on/off. 51:34 for 8.18 miles (includes warm up).
C/d: 13:52 for 1.77 miles
My workout schedule is all messed up and it isn't getting any fixes soon. This morning the Queens team was heading out to McAlpine for a light workout on the crushed gravel. They were doing a fartlek consisting of 8 by 2 mins hard/easy. I have a predator run late in the week and thought that I would simply flip/substitute this workout in its place. I warmed up with the men's team for 3 miles and then we ran straight into the first hard effort. Mike Crouch was going to be headlining this workout so I thought that I would hang with him for the duration.
Splits: 1:58 for .42 (4:41 pace), 1:59 for .28 (7:03 pace), 2:00 for .42 (4:49 pace), 1:59 for .29 (6:49), .43 (4:41), .26 (7:36), .42 (4:49), .26 (7:30), .41 (4:55), .26 (7:37), .40 (5:05), .26 (7:43), .38 (5:14), .26 (7:37), .41 (4:59).
I am definitely not recovered from the long trip out here. My calves were still a little sore and my body is tired from lack of sleep. Mike and I ran together for the first four and then I proceeded to get dropped. Alex Schilling joined us on number three and ran a great workout. It was good to have some hard efforts in the beginning of the workout but that left me shot for the remaining efforts. This wasn't my best workout during the 5k cycle but it has its pluses. I'll look to step on the track when I get back to Oklahoma either on Fri or Sat.
Everybody loves a good cheesesteak.
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