25 weeks of training stats.

Although I didn't register for my upcoming race until January, It was on my mind back in September.After time off and resting from my poorly done fat dog attempt in August. I moved at the beginning of october and that was when I laid out a training plan that lead all the way to this race coming up. I didn't follow it exactly, but I felt like I did a decent job of building back up my mileage and feel quite ready. So because I like charts and graphs and stuff. Here is some numbers.

Badger Mountain 25 Week Program
Week	Km	Hours	Elev Gain	Avg Pace	Total Hrs
1	19.92	2.02	723	6.08	2.02
2	70.07	7.35	2191	6.29	7.35
3	26.68	2.92	1035	6.57	2.92
4	55.23	5.25	1485	5.70	5.25
5	65.67	7.00	2020	6.40	8.50
6	77.20	7.83	2068	6.09	7.83
7	90.06	10.38	2357	6.92	11.88
8	53.80	5.98	1907	6.67	5.98
9	68.20	8.43	2600	7.42	8.43
10	81.80	9.42	2913	6.91	12.42
11	93.99	11.68	2608	7.46	11.68
12	21.60	2.58	1087	7.17	2.58
13	90.66	13.15	2960	8.70	13.15
14	113.80	12.85	3578	6.78	12.85
15	69.20	8.42	2198	7.30	8.42
16	92.86	9.88	2311	6.38	13.05
17	100.30	11.13	3338	6.66	11.30
18	85.41	9.85	3678	6.92	9.85
19	40.80	4.20	825	6.18	4.20
20	101.80	9.85	2685	5.81	11.35
21	124.60	14.32	3989	6.90	14.32
22	117.80	13.33	4133	6.79	13.50
23	100.90	10.55	3740	6.27	10.55
24	50.00	5.23	1949	6.28	5.23
25	49.20	5.26	1850	6.41	5.26
Total	1861.55	208.86	60228.00	-	219.87
Average	74.46	8.35	2409.12	6.68	8.79

Week 1 was the start if a new job, and I just moved but didn't have my own place for a couple weeks, so wasn't too much time to run to start. Week 3 my car broke down and I lost the weekend to dealing with that. Week 4 was really the time I started in properly to specified planned training. Week 12 was christmas holidays, didn't fit much running into visiting. Week 18 was a 50 km trail race. Week 19 I was sick. Week 24 I didn't run on the weekend as I was visiting. Any time not spent running in training was basketball or ice hockey.


 
Almost looks like a proper build/rest pattern.



10,000 ft is 3,050 metres. Feels good to be getting above that regularly. Nice arbitrary weekly goal. The park I spent a lot of time running in has some decent climbs.



Yep; that's a graph.



I actually find this one interesting. If nothing else it really is just an indicator of what the weather was like during the last 6 months. The higher my average weekly pace, the more snow I had to run in. That outlier of over 8 minutes per km was a week where I spent 4 hours on a friday night slogging through knee high snow, didn't get far but it was a gooder.

Holy that was an exciting post.

Outlining dnf conditions. Sort of.

"Decide before the race the conditions that will cause you to stop and drop out. You don't want to be out there saying, Well gee, my leg hurts, I'm a little dehydrated, I'm sleepy, I'm tired, and its cold and windy. And talk yourself into quitting. If you are making a decision based on how you feel at that moment, you will probably make the wrong decision." - quote from somebody

I've been told something along these before leading up to longer races. In my first long race I was prepared to do anything to finish. Last year, I DNF'd a 100 km race, a 148 km race, and a 120 mile race. I didn't really have any particularly meaningful reason to run the races themself, I had plenty of reason to train (make sense, I do not know) but nothing stood out as driving me to finish. 

When I ran my 125 km race in 2010 I felt driven by a sort of logic that made me feel like the race itself was a metaphor of sorts for bettering myself in life, and not finishing the race became an unacceptable choice for me, so I was gonna finish. I had some real tough moments, but I did it. 

Last year in my longer races I didn't feel like I had anything particularly driving me. I was just out having fun, messing about having fun. And that attitude doesn't really translate into the necessity of destroying your body in an endurance race. But yeah, I had fun. I just didn't finish my long races. But in terms of finishing the races, I failed three times. 

This race coming up. What conditions will cause me to stop and drop out? Nothing. Absolutely nothing will cause me to stop and drop out. I absolutely want to redeem myself from the feeling of failure I got last year in my long races. Sure, I can rationalize my failings. But in the end I failed to achieve my goals. 

My goal in selecting to do a long race in the early part of the year was built around the goal of finishing. I think I have better prepared myself physically and mentally for this than I did for the races last year. My primary goal throughout training was t o finish a 100 mile race. Could I do better and finish well? Maybe. Will I do worse than my goal and drop out? No. 

You know what they say, hindsight is 20/20. Regret is a very strong driving force. My regretful decision of DNF'ing multiple long races last year has been the driving force behind the last 6 months of my training.

Taper time. Am I ready?

24 days away from 100 mile race. Taper begins. Today was the last day in my last block of training before  taper begins.Am I ready? Have I done enough? Have I been intense enough? Have I done enough crazy things to try and simulate race day feel, forcing suffering upon myself and embracing it. Have my back to backs been hard enough? My back to back to backs; have they been hard enough? Has my fourth day runs been hard enough? Have I pounded out the hills hard enough when I felt tired? Have long runs on friday night been odd enough to make my body think I can do this?

Have I changed my mindset back to a never quit mindset? Have I steeled my resolve enough that when it gets tough I will unflinchingly continue on? Have I pushed my body enough in training that when I get to race day will I be able to just go and have a nice casual day at the races? Have I conditioned myself well enough?

I think the answer is yes. I'm running further, with more elevation gain in this training cycle than ever before. And feel like my body is completely capable of everything that I've asked it to do. By the end of this week I will have had 6 weeks with over 100 km of running in the first 10 weeks of the year. Last year I only hit 4 training weeks of over 100 km. December, January, and February all had elevation gain totals greater than any other moth of training I'd ever done; and doing at pacing that increases every time (the disappearing snow might have something to do with that). The last 4 months cycle of training has been the most solid, and consistent training I've done. And since my last long race attempt last august I've shaken off the soreness, and then felt like my build back up to volume was done at the right level.

I am a little worried about how to attack the race though. I have conflicting thoughts on what to do on race day; race conservatively to finish, or give it a go and try to truly race the race. My main goal for the year was to finish a 100 mile race, and I feel like I should be willing to go to just finish and that should be good enough. I've been told recently "that my time to push my limits is coming, but to be patient" which is good advice, but it's tough to be patient. I feel so very good physically, and am so very tempted to push hard now. What to do, what to do.

I guess it's time to check out the race maps. In the past, at long races I've been very focused on knowing exactly how the race will unfold topographically; this race I've been much less concerned. Yes, I know there will be approximately x amount of ____ feet climbs through the race, but I don't know where they are and don't feel like I will make certain to remember this. I am aware that there is sufficient/excessive amount of aid stations. I am aware that there is good access for my crew, and will make sure to print directions for my crew. But other than that, I feel very unconcerned, almost laid back about it. I feel as though I have prepared my body, and am knowledgeable enough about what food I want and when to be able to last. Cut-off times? Whatever, I am physically capable, and mentally capable, cut-off times are not a concern, if for some reason I don't make a cut-off time something much worse has happened. I will wear my gps, but only for posterity's sake; I won't look at it during the race, I will just run by feel. Whatever may be is whatever may be. 

February

Monthly totals:

Time:
Running: 39 hours 28 minutes
Biking: 10 minutes on a stationary bike
Basketball: 90 minutes
Hockey: 90 minutes

Digits:
Run distance: 265.9 km
Elevation gain: 11,780 metres

So far this year:
Run time: 84 hours 45 minutes
Run distance: 769.47 km (478.15 miles)
Elev gain: 24,160 metres (79,269 feet)

I was sick for a few days near the beginning of the month. I tried to get better by just not running, but even had to take a day off work. Ran for just 3 days that week, and one of those days was only 4 km run. So didn't hit 400 km, which was my random goal. Only got in 41.13 hours exercise this month, compared to 48.58 hours in January, which isn't as much as I'd wanted, but 3 days less in February and being sick for a few days still fells ok.

This weekend coming up is my longest planned weekend of running, four weeks out from my race. It should be a gooder, I'm hoping that I feel good after the weekend of running. I already feel like I am physically ready to race 100 miles, I just want a good tough weekend to mentally reassure myself.

Normal?

Somewhere along the way in the last few years, through my attempts to kick away vices and bad habits and trade habits that represent poor virtue with habits that are of good virtue I've  developed this idea that I want to be normal.

But what is normal? Can I be normal? Or am I already normal? Is my definition of 'different' such that it creates a false opposite definition of normal? Does that even make sense?

Was this thought the most unfleshed out thought I've ever had?

Do I have more random stupid thoughts the more time I spend running? If yes, I fear what sort of odd thoughts will come to me in the next couple weeks as my training ramps up.

Is the number of random thoughts I get directly proportional to the amount of time spent staring at the sun as it sets?

I never grow tired of improving.

Last year I only ran more than 100 km a paltry 6 times in the year. This year (7 weeks in) I've run more than 100 km's 3 times already. This week I ran 102 km in under ten hours, plus a sixth day of exercise playing basketball (and that was hard work, 90 minutes 4 on 4 full court where I"m expected to carry the load in terms of running because the guys know I'm a runner). Plus another week where I hit 92 km in the week while also playing basketball one day and hockey another day.

Something about consistency, I guess.

This morning slept in, didn't go out running until 1 pm. Felt sluggish, so I put on my road flats and hit the roads. Just starting jogging easy. Wasn't killing it at all, when I looked at my watch and saw that I was at 14 km in around an hour I thought I might be able to pick it up a bit and beat my pr for half marathon time. I ended up not  quite doing it, missing out by 4 minutes. But how does one track it on a training run? Do you subtract the 5 minutes spent standing at traffic lights? And do you adjust for lost speed for having to accelerate again at every time you stopped at an intersection? Even so, feels good after running 72 km's and playing basketball in the first 6 days of the week to go out and almost beat my best half marathon time not really pushing full throttle.

Sick day thoughts.

Every year I gain awesomeness in physical capability I forget about physical limitations that don't seem to go away. For example; every spring since living in the interior (26 years) I get sick. Why? Something to do with the changes in the air and my asthma and then my body goes to shit. Well taking a trip down to a spring like place beckons the yearly gift.

And then every year I feel better a week or two later, go on to enjoy the summer, fall, and winter doing fun running and forget that spring is coming and neglect asthma drugs and it happens again.

Sitting here can't sleep, finished reading the book I'm on. Wasting time thinking about trivial things. Scrolling through the junk on my computer reflecting on the past.

             

This is a chart of my half marathon times from October 2006 to March 2012. It would be neat to have tracked my weight for every day of my life during that time, the high point on that chart would be just a few months before the slowest marathon. I weighed 60 pounds more than I did now. Seems as though my half marathon graph would match a weight graph and a happiness graph. As there is less happiness, there is more fat added, and the running takes longer. I've run the same half marathon in Kelowna in March every year since 2007, six years at the same race. My 100 mile race is March 29. The half marathon is April 7; only 8 days later. I don't think I'll be ready to run it.

When I look at the graph, I picture the space underneath it in terms of volume. Volume of my body in terms of fat, volume of my unhappiness, volume of mistakes made, volume of fear that is held too close.  Not that running faster makes me happier, rather as I get happier and learn to live healthier and make better decisions my running times get faster as  reflection of the other things in life being better.

Someone recently told me that it was inspiring that I maintained running through times of being not so fit, and being out of shape, keeping at it (paraphrasing). I disagree, I look at it in reverse a bit. Rather uninspiring that I allowed myself to wander down the path that took me to those places. I find it more inspiring when I look to the possible future, (maybe the two things are just different ways of saying the same thing) the space left under the graph to the right as it gets closer to the x axis. I still cling to some fears, and hopefully the amount of useless fear I cling to will disappear. I don't regret the mistakes I made that took me to the unhappy places I've been, as there was truly happy moments within those years. And I still have plenty of old habits that I'm still working my way out of.

Looking at the graph the moments of mental paradigm shifts are quite obvious. Sudden dip or increase in time seems to correlate with life choices that indicate change of thought patterns. Half marathon time goes up after I get back together with an old girlfriend whom I shared many years of previous mistakes with. Break up with her and end 8 years of stupidity and the half marathon time instantly drops. Then plateaus. Stop doing drugs and the time drops again and plateaus, hit my first AA meeting and the time drops again. The thing is there is so much more life paradigm shifts I feel I need to make. I'm very much probably currently plateauing. Who knows; but that is what I look forward to. Knowing that there is more  of an untold story. Running results/growth seem to reflect self growth. And knowing that excites me for the future, and knowing that even though I feel like I'm on a plateau right now, not making any major changes, but just consistently maintaining the better version than the past version. But paradigms shifts will come, and the unknown excites, because I have much room to grow, and exciting thought from that is as much room as I have to grow myself, then I''m just getting started in terms of improving in running. The journey has just begun? I hope.

Also interesting are pictures.

Oct 2006.

Feb 2008.

Mar 2008

Oct 2008

Mar 2009

Oct 2009

Mar 2010

Oct 2010

Mar 2011

Mar 2012

And just for fun here are some comparative pictures.

Finish line photo from 10 km road race. Feb 2009 and Feb 2011. 57 minutes and 43 minutes.

Finish line photo from 5 km road race. Mar 2009 and Mar 2011. 27 minutes and 20 minutes.

If a picture says a thousand words...?

Running long distances is not something I see as a physical challenge, it's a mental challenge, and my success / failure at races is a reflection of other things. The reward in the finish line isn't necessarily all the physicality needed to get there, but the mental things that had to change to get there.

Quotes from plato; brief connection to running.

Some quote from "the republic"

- "then he must take the longer way around, and must work as hard at his intellectual training as at his physical; otherwise, as we've just said, he will never finally reach the highest form of knowledge, which should be peculiarly his own"
- "and you know of course that most ordinary people think that pleasure is the good, while the more sophisticated think it is knowledge"
- "the good, then, is the end of all endeavour, the object on which every heart is set, whose existence it divines, though it finds it difficult to grasp just what it isl and because it can't handle it with the same assurance as other things it misses any value those other things have"
- "tell about the child and you can owe us your account of the parent"
- "the sun is not sight itself, it is the cause of sight, and us seen by the sight it causes"
- "when the mind's eye is fixed on on objects illuminated by truth and reality, it understand and knows them, and its possession of intelligence is evident; but when it is fixed on the twilight world of change and decay, it can only form opinions, its vision is confused and its opinions shifting, and it seems to lack intelligence"
- "what gives the objects of knowledge their truth and the knower's mind the power of knowing is the for of the good. it is the cause of knowledge and truth"
- "just as it was right to think of light ad sight as being like the sun, it is right to think of knowledge and truth as being like the good, but still wrong to think of them as being 'the good', whose position must be ranked higher still"
- "the good therefore may be said to be the source not only of intelligibility of the objects knowledge, but also of their bing and reality; yet it is not itself that reality, but is beyond it, and superior to it in dignity and power"
- "there are four states of mind; the top being intelligence, the second reason, the third belief, and the fourth illusion. And you may arrange them in a scale, and assume they have degrees of clarity corresponding to the degree of truth possessed by their subject matter"
- "if he went back to sit in his old seat in the cave, his eyes would be blinded by darkness, because he had come in suddenly out of the sunlight"
- "the realm revealed by sight corresponds to the prison, and the light of the fire in the prison to the power of the sun"


The simile of the sun states that the light of the sun gives light to our world in the same way that 'the good' gives light to our knowledge. (very rather simplistic paraphrasing). Plato often speaks about a necessity to maintain a balance of body, mind, and soul. I feel like doing this leads you closer to an understanding of the good. When you run a race, it feels like the crux upon which you are able to stand which makes understanding the power of the good more possible. I like that feeling, of being such that I have an understanding of 'the good' no matter how fleeting that moment may be.

Scattered race thoughts; Orcas

Saturday Feb 2nd: Orcas Island 50 km trail race. Moran State Park, orcas Island, Wa.

The cold hard facts can be seen on strava

Orcas Strava data

I didn't originally plan to do this race, but a runner wasn't planned on going, and the opportunity came up to have the entry transferred, and going on the trip with someone else made for a cheap tune up race. As much as I may have talked myself up with the possibility of pushing hard during the race, it was always going to be a test of preparation and gauge of current fitness for the upcoming badger mountain race. I ran 100 km the week prior to the race, 3 temp runs and a 43 km and 25 km run on the weekend. And then race week I ran Monday through Wednesday, definitely was not tapered, and purposely came in tired. I wanted to try and mimic what I might feel like part way through a much longer race.

The race was fantastic, the scenery was beautiful, the trip was wonderful. On orcas island at the top many spots we could see Mt baker on the mainland, so nice. During the first climb, even though I was feeling good and maintaining a steady pace, I could feel that I was very much coming in tired from not tapering. So I settled back into an easy pace and just went out for a nice comfortable day. It was so hard to not push. There were so many uphills, and so steep, so naturally it left equally many awesome downhills to tear up.... which I didnt tear up at all. I held back, looking to finish the race with a feeling that I could comfortably go back and run a similar race again, and I feel like I did that. But it was sooooooo hard to not chase other runners on the downhills, I love tearing the shit out of the downhills, but I kept it at a casual jog instead.

It was so very hot. Coming from seemingly ever present winter, and I think just two weeks ago I ran in -20 temps for most of the week, it felt like spring. I totally overdressed. I felt like I was overheating with a long sleeve base layer and a shirt over top. the second last aid station I tossed the shirt sleeve, and the last aid station (atop Mt constitution with the most amazingest view) I dropped the base layer, leaving me shirtless for the last 5 miles descent to the finish, it felt so great.

Onto some random thoughts that I wrote down after my post race shower
- avg pace: 7:06 min/km
- elev gain 8400 ft for 50 km (160.8 feet gain / km)
- badger mountain elev gain approx (112.5 feet gain / km)
- perhaps try and maintain for badger average pace of 7:30 - 8:00 min /km
- start out slower
- eat more solids
- more salt, regular gatorade. fuck whatever the race has, bring gatorade mixed the way I want it
- pb/j sandwich before race stayed in stomach good, do it again
- re-affirmed today that not tapering is not helpful (BAD) for a race (shock)
- I forgot that I typically get bothered by asthma issues during spring time, so GET ASTHMA MEDICATION before the badger race
- music o.k. for 2nd half of race, but maybe only use it if absolutely in dumps, felt good to not have it
- didn't look at watch once during race, went by feel whole way, I liked that, do it again


That is all I wrote down before we went on to other things. Maybe I will think of more, but I feel good about the race, I got what I was looking for. Need to tweek a few things for badger, but I'm happy with how my training is going towards my goal race. Also, I need to get new running shorts. The ones I wear hold sweat and get wet and cold.

Quote of the day from the race as shouted from some random dude on the side of the road near the end of the first major climb.

"Today is the perfect day for this, tomorrow definitely would be a worse day for it"