50 minutes of recovery running

It was the day after and despite running relatively fast yesterday my legs felt really good today. I walked Amber for a warm up and then went out and ran 50 easy minutes. I made the mistake of running over to the college and "ran" (excuse the pun) right into some sort of cycling, running event that had the whole campus tied up. I doubled back and ran back to my favorite and reliable railroad tracks and circled the lake by the 7-11 and then jogged around until I was finally at 35 minutes and about 15 minutes from home.

Yes, I could have gone longer and yes, I could have run faster but right now things are working rather well so I have decided to hold things at this level. Later on I will up some of my runs to 60 minutes. Just not now.

4 x 400 again

On May 2nd I ran 4 x 400 in 92-90-90-88.

This morning I did them in 88-87-86-84. Not only were they faster but I felt stronger. I was hissing at Dimitri over the last two to pick up the last 200. Jake ran the workout too and didn't do too badly hitting all of them in the mid to high 90's with the last in 93. His fastest in a long time.

I ran 23 minutes beforehand with Jake, did some striders and ran another 10 minutes afterward.

I doubt I hit 40 minutes total. As Jake said, "Count the walking." ;-)

The Puma

Wednesday: Ran an easy 50 minutes in the morning.

I had a strange dream Wednesday night. For some reason I was on foot near El Camino Real in San Carlos. I was trying to get home to San Mateo where Sue and I first lived when we were married. I stopped to rest in the hallway of a building and must have dozed off because when I opened my eyes there was a puma standing over me. It wasn't snarling at all. Just wanting to play like a big cat. I felt some concern but no real fear and in the end I scratched its muzzle and behind its ears and it seemed content. Others came and wanted to harm it but I told them to leave the puma alone.

I woke up.....My first thought.

Coffee.

Thursday: Joined Jake at Forbes and ran two up and backs. The first was dam slow. 30 miniutes from my car. The second was a hair over 24 flat and I really felt good throughout.

Total of 54 minutes of running.

3rd day in a row

I may try some easy hills pretty soon






Jogged out the front door on this morning's run keeping it as slow as I could but after about 5 minutes I realized that I felt OK. Picked it up a touch and ran 50 minutes. Could easily have gone further. I actually passed a runner on the track!

Hallelujah

Left thigh a bit sore from God knows what. OK. Running. But I don't feel it when running. Just getting up from a chair or rolling off my other favorite perch, the bed. I took some Advil. Will ice later on.

The Big Bear Stayed Away

I went out the door on Sunday morning expecting to run 50 minutes but stayed to run an hour. My ol' legs felt recovered from yesterday and that surprised me. I kept waiting for the big bear to jump me like last week but it never came.

The air was that early morning crisp that sometimes descends heavily on the south bay this time of year. Almost like at Vashon running the peninsula. You can run it in t-shirt and shorts but you could wear gloves and long sleeves and come out as well. That's what today was like. To me this is summer. Not that hot, baking, sunlit "I love the heat" sort of day that people seem to crave.

4:46

I drove over the WVC but Dimitri and Jake told me that the track was closed (again) so we high tailed it over to Prospect. Very quiet track. Think empty. I warmed up with Jake for 23 minutes (having already done 5 minutes at home). Did some quick striders. Once again Dimitri and I agreed to 3:16-17 at the 800 and then whatever.

We went out in 96 which was a tad too fast but what the hey I thought. I kept my trap shut and Dimitri over corrected us down in the second lap so that we came through in 3:17. I came up on his shoulder which is a sign that we can pick it up. Then we went, gradually increasing the effort over the last 400 and came across the line in 4:46. An 89 second last lap.

Warmed down for 7 minutes with a few more striders and called it a day.

Jake faced the truth that he was not ready to run a 7 pace for 1200 meters and defaulted to a 200 meter workout.

Dimitri added in his usual 400 skimming to a 60 flat. Of course, like us all he wants faster.

I want faster because I feel that time is running out for me to do this sort of thing (run sub 6). I can feel the weight of aging but I also think of fast guys in their mid to late 60's and realize that I can shoehorn in more time if I stay the course.

Get under 6:20

Then get under 6:10

Then you'll know.


Anyway, I age graded the run. It's worth a 3:37 as an open runner.

Masters T&F Age-Graded Tables

The Age-Graded Factor in the 1500m for gender/age group M64 is 0.7598

A performance of 4:46 corresponds to an Open (ages 20-30) equivalent of 3:37.30

3:37 is what I would expect to be able to do if I was running a 4:50 mile.

Twice again to the dam

Forbes Mill again on Thursday morning. Beautiful day. Cool and windless. Jake and I ran up to the dam and back twice. I ran the hills but slowly. Slower than slow.

27 and change on the first up and back. 26 and a few on the second. About 53 and half minutes all together.

No calf problems (and how many times have we heard that before?) but the key was that I kept the pace easy and slow and ran the upgrades very slowly.

Breaking You Apart: But not today

Quietly ran 50 minutes this morning. I kept things slow (but then what's new about that?).

Master runners always think they can come back. As Jake said, "I wish my legs felt as good on the run as they felt in the car on the way over."

Nolan Shaheed has it right (IMHO). Just try to beat what you did last year.

You are always in a retreat. Age is relentless that way. Time and wear and tear are trying to break you apart. You win by showing up. So many others have fallen by the wayside. Their knees or hips or backs won't let them run anymore. It'll break you too. Just not today.

Soft Surfaces

I showed up at Forbes this morning and ran for 53 minutes. My legs actually felt reasonably good. I ran up the trail to the dam, getting to the top in 15 minutes (and change) and then came back down in 12 minutes. That added to my endless circling of the high school track kept most of the run on soft surfaces.

I may be overdoing this diet thing. I felt the lack of carbs which led to a slight cratering on my Sunday 60 minute run and again on Monday. I ate pasta last night and again tonight. I want to get my weight down but not at the cost of energy to fuel my so-called running. I am and continue to be a running, idiot savant.

Drag Ass 60 minutes

I beat the worst of the heat and ran a very slow 60 minutes today. I was out on the road around 7:30 AM. My legs were tired from yesterday.

I stumbled on an article about Frank Condon. He ran a 5:12 mile at age 66! Lives up in Chico, California. He runs 4 days a week. Two days in the park and two days on the track. There may be something for me to learn from him. I am obviously not his ability but just to hit my menial goal of breaking 6 minutes will require luck and skill.

If I ran one day of 100's and one day of my rep workout that would be my two days on the track. The other two could be 45-60 minute easy runs on the road. I might be fresher. As it was, I was drag assing around today.

Tough to break 6 but my real goal is 5:48. It will take a year to get there.

2 x 800

I went to WVC this morning, met Dimitri and warmed up for 25 minutes including striders.

The workout was 2 x 800 followed by 1 x 400.

We ran the 800's in 3:10-3:08 with a lap walk in between. Then Dimitri ran a 400 in 60 while I jogged some more. I almost didn't run the 400 but at the last moment I decided that I had to get by this inertia that makes me a coward.

I ran an 83.9 and felt really in control (no pushing).

The total workout including jogging around was 40 minutes.

And another

Ran "another" 50 minutes and felt good. Ran/walked to the dam in 15:30 and then came down in 12 minutes (all the way back to my car). Continued over to the school track jogged over there for a while.

Jake ran today. Whoa! Two days after his arrhythmia procedure. Breakfast afterward.

Talked big about going to 6 days.

Do I really want to do that?

At work (again)
:
I understand that there are 3 levels in my game

1. The cage

2. The habitat

3. The wild

There are good and bad things about all three but in the first two I am fed by someone else. In the last, I kill my own food. Presently, I am in the second level but I need to morph to the 3rd level to be effective.

Another good day

Ran another 50 minutes this morning. Cool and sunny but it's not supposed to remain that way. Heat in the forecast.

Once again my legs felt good. Two days in a row.

Two faster runners on the track. An Asian woman with a welders helmet sun visor and some young whippet who was tearing up the track on the inside lane.

Feeling Good

I rolled out of bed this morning, drank coffee (fuel of choice) and ran 50 minutes but not at the usual slow-slow pace that has become my trademark. I actually moved along after the first 5 minutes and felt pretty good. Who knows what the per mile was on this thing and who cares. It was nice just to feel decent and today I felt good.

The weather co-opted and stayed sunny and cool with almost no wind to speak of. One could go high on the mountain on a day like this.

Ready to go

I took the day off and drove with my son to Santa Rosa. Had lunch with my mother and then drove back. Nice seeing my mother but also sitting in the shade next to a deli and having a Macanudo cigar. It was at Oakmont and it was peaceful and quiet and million miles away from Silicon Valley.

When we got back to the house around 4 pm I went in and took an unplanned nap. Felt even better afterward.

I feel ready to go running-wise. Ready to go.

Jake made a comment at breakfast the other day.

I wish my legs felt as good during a workout as they did while I was driving over to the workout.

That could be the masters mantra but I pretty much have cease to care. The delta between how my legs feel when I am out for a run is very different (as in BIG) than how they feel when I hit the track to actually train.

60 minutes of slow

I ran the slowest of the slow this morning. 60 minutes of jogging. My wife mentioned that she saw me out running and noted that I didn't look very much like the runner she met on the February day 29 years ago. What she meant was that my style of running pretty much stunk out the joint. I agreed with her and mentioned that along with my age related slowdown I had added in my self imposed how slow could I run style.

I admit that I would happy running 3 miles of faster stuff rather than 6 miles of slow-slow but I am worried that I would simply bust my calf again.

The path of the world class master runner is lonely and slow.

2 x 600

West Valley College. Cool but getting warmer rather quickly. I met Dimitri and warmed up for 25 minutes with striders. Then ran 2 x 600 meters in 2:14-2:15. 10 Minute easy jog afterward. 40 minutes total.

The club was running 400's and we got tangled up in their workout at the start line but otherwise it was all good. The first 600 was tougher than the second one. I tend to warm into the workout. I felt like I could have run a 3rd one if I had chose to.

Dimitri then went and ran a 59 second 400 so he had a great day. Mine was on course. I did what I said I wanted to do. I have a long way to go.

Keeping it real

I ran 50 minutes at lunch on Tuesday. It wasn't what I would call HOT but it was in the mid to high 70's and humid. Still the run felt good and I had to hold back. Nice breeze in the Baylands kept it real.

I came right back Thursday morning and slow danced the dam loop and adding in another 15 minutes for a total of 45 easy minutes. Jake did the loop with me walking the hill. It was my first run to the bottom of the dam since late 2008.

Work has been boring lately. We all seem to be waiting for the other sandal to drop but it hasn't.

Rain softly but steadily

The weather has warmed up again while the universe tries to decided if it is spring or still winter.

I rolled out of bed early (for me), had some coffee and went out and ran 50 slow minutes. I got about 100 meters down the road and it began to rain softly but steadily. It wasn't a cold rain so it was actually refreshing.

Do You Want To Be A Millionaire

The following is not mine. It is floating around the web.



Dear Mr. President:

Please find below my suggestion for fixing America's economy.
Instead of giving billions of dollars to companies that will squander
the money on lavish parties and unearned bonuses, use the following plan.
You can call it the Patriotic Retirement Plan:
There are about 40 million people over 50 in the work force.
Pay them $1 million apiece severance for early retirement with the
following stipulations:
1) They MUST retire. Forty million job openings - Unemployment fixed.
2) They MUST buy a new American CAR. Forty million cars ordered - Auto
Industry fixed.
3) They MUST either buy a house or pay off their mortgage - Housing
Crisis fixed.
It can't get any easier than that!
If more money is needed, have all members of Congress and their
constituents pay their taxes...


Of course it is moronic for many reasons. It goes against everything this country believes in (but still, a million dollars...wow!)

Let's see, pay the taxes, end up with about $500,000 apiece. Just enough for a newly minted class of "dumb" millionaires to get into real financial trouble. So I pay off my 250K mortgage (hypothetical) buy a nice big American car and I have around 200K left. How do I live on that with a 0-3% annual return on investment (ROI).

No question the million will have to be tax free. Now you have 700K but still with present interest rates...uh, how do you live on that much money?

So I have to buy an American car?

I have my million and I am still working. How about just you paying off my house, you keep your American car and I will take it from there.

There is no free lunch.

Where is John Galt? (Not who is..but where is?)

Slow is a Bottomless Hole

I finished off the week with a 50 minute very slow run. I find that if I keep it slow enough (and slow is a bottomless, dark hole) I can recover well enough.

4 x 400

I got myself over to West Valley, warmed up for 20 minutes and did some quick striders. Then Dimitri and I launched into my goal pace, let's get used to 90 second pace, 400's. The club was down on the track too doing 200 meters. We avoided getting too tangled up with their workout.

I asked for and got 92-90-90-88. Walked a lap between each. Dimitri did a great job of leading me though. I felt much better than last Saturday. 10 minute slow slow warm down.

Strangely, for May, it is raining even though it held off during the workout. Not heavy rain. More of a lead colored sky with a drizzle machine left on. Even the sky is conserving water.

I own the track

I drove over to Forbes Mill and ran 45 minutes of slow stuff while Jake walked. He ran hard this past weekend and hasn't recovered yet.

The track was almost deserted. Several workout women and personal trainers mostly. I had the track to myself.

At the front: We are not invading the steppes just yet. In my underutilized way I have fallen back from the border and am staying very tactical. It's a good time to sharpen swords and clean our firearms. I need to know the lay of the land. Hard to go on without knowing exactly where Damascus is.