a new trail

It is said that we are nothing more than the sum of our experiences.

And I believe this to be pretty true.
This could prove to be prophetic because several times this weekend, I saw a ‘new trail’ through my experiences. Not all times was this pleasant, but thankfully, all times was recognized.

The first ‘new trail’ is this on going n=1 study of building a faster yet effective aerobic base by primarily emphasizing anaerobic training with controlled recovery periods. The tests are the weekend LSDs which broke the 2-hour window Saturday with a 121 minute bike with relatively little difficulty this early in the season and virtually no residual effects. I also must add that this has been the least amount of time for training this much this early and could easily be incorporated into the winter training schedule moving forward. Yes, it is bike erging, but this is intriguing.

Saturday morning whilst I was busting along on my Air-Dyne, C-mom popped on the Dion snowshoes and did a jaunt along the Scantic. Reportedly, most enjoyable. Knowing that this would be a challenging weekend for me (see below), she suggested I do the same Sunday morning. She was right. I had enjoyed this short and simple river trail numerous times since we moved here, but never with 6-9 inches of packed white stuff along the route. It was a fantastic experience although doing this 24 hours after my weekly LSD made this 3 mile journey take almost 30 minutes of considerable effort. It made me see this whole ‘new trail’ out of something 1 mile from my house. I felt obliged to share photos. Something to add to the repertoire.


Finally, it is a rare time when you can see an old and beloved experience end. Just as there is no such thing as a love affair ‘mutually ended’, nothing you feel passionately about ever ends without a significant, heartfelt ‘loss’. A huge part of my life for 14 years most likely ended today (and this is *not* my marriage, although that might be saved because of this...) New owners, who knows?

But as they say, when one door closes, another opens.

To those that I shared that experience with, the memory of my experiences will never tarnish nor be forgotten. I hope the same holds for the 200 players or so that shared that with me.

I think I see some new trails.

happy beginnings?

The will to win is nothing without the will to prepare.
For anyone to believe any extended endeavor ~ physical or mental ~ is achieved without some degree of preparation is fool-hardy. The more preparation, usually the more successful and enjoyable the result.
With 2 months before Northern Nipmuck, the serious preparation has begun: looking at footwear choices for the season, clothing, food, fluid, gear,
And getting in a foundation.
Although weekends are almost tailor-made for a once-weekly LSD event, the other training only seems plausible for me at a time I despise ~ mornings before work.
Ugh.
This means getting up earlier, departing for work earlier, starting to hurt earlier and taunting my office-mates with my serious stinky funk before I can take a shower at some point around 11am.
And this isn’t just getting a lightweight s&g jog in.
As I mentioned earlier, this year, I advise doing something a bit different based upon some of the data from the NSCA course I attended in June: the extensive utilization of controlled recovery / HEP-based bursts as a means to improve speed, power output and also aerobic threshold (yes, *aerobic*).
What this means is once warmed up (after 6-10 minutes of a sub maximal jog), head into a series of near maximal 20-30 second sprints with a controlled recovery ratio initially 3:1 and tapering down to 2:1.
For now (8 weeks out), that means thrice-weekly morning workouts with 10 minutes of jogging, then 15 near-max sprints for 25-30 seconds with a 50-65 second recovery jog between.
Before work and whatever fitness classes / hockey etc. after work.
This is *not* easy stuff. But it seems to be really working and quite an efficient manner for development.
We'll find out how efficient in less than 2 months.

putting it down in writin'

Here is goes. It is down in writing.
Orange are the races I know I can and want to do.
Red are the ones that I want to do, but not sure if they work into my schedule yet.

My 2008 Season

Northern Nipmuck 16 mi (#1)
Union, CT
Saturday April 5, 2008

Merrimack River 10 mi (#2)
Andover, MA
Saturday April 12, 2008

Muddy Moose 14 mi
Wolfeboro, NH
TBD April 19th? 26th?

Seven Sisters 12 mi (#3)
Amherst, MA
Sunday May 4, 2008

Soapstone Mountain 14.5mi (#4)
Stafford Springs, CT
Sunday May 18, 2008

Nipmuck Marathon 26.4 mi (I really *want* this one this year)
Ashford CT,
8am Sunday June 1, 2008

Northfield Mountain 10.3K (#5)
Northfield MA,
9am Saturday June 7, 2008

Greylock Trail Races 13.5 mi (#6)
Adams MA
Sunday June 15, 2008 (Father’s Day)

Rachel Carson Trail Challenge 34 mi
Harrison to North Park (Pittsburgh), PA
Saturday June 21, 2008
The biggest problem here? two camps start that day, plus a home Reds game...plus, I'd have to fly there an back the night before and morning after the event.

Skyline Trail Race 7.2 mi (#7)
Blue Hills in Milton MA,
8am Sunday July 13, 2008

Soapstone Assault
Stafford Springs, CT
Sunday, July 20, 2008

People's Forest Trail 7 mi (#8)
Barkhamsted CT
Saturday August 2, 2008

Oxford Dam Race 10.5 mi (#9)
Oxford MA,
9am Saturday August 9, 2008

Savoy Mountain 20 + 4.5 mi
Florida/Savoy MA,
9am August 17, 2008
If there is a Savoy this year. Apparently, that is still unfortunately TBD.

Mt. Toby 14 mi
Sunderland MA
9:30am August 24, 2008
err..we usually leave for vacation this day.

Breakneck 20K (#10)
Union CT
October 5, 2008

Monroe Dunbar Brook, 10.5 mi (#11)
Monroe MA
October 12, 2008

Hairy Gorilla Half Marathon
Albany NY, John Boyd Thacher State Park,
October 26, 2008

Busa Bushwack, 9.3mi
Framingham MA,
9am November 2, 2008

Stone Cat Ale 26.2 or 50 mi
Ipswich MA, November [TBD]
here lies a *great* chance of an ultra in an ultra-perfect scenario.

Talk about a full plate.

I need time to digest this all.

more musings on the 10% rule

the first 5 is a real effort. Possibly the hardest 5 of the bout.
but gradually, 5 becomes 10
10 becomes 20. my timer stops at 20, so at some point, you use a counter because you might lose track of your 20’s.
So it goes for 4+ cycles of 20 without a break.
There are many so-called axioms for the athlete’s training plan. One of the more common one for runners is the 10% rule. I can’t seem to find the first use of it, but as far back as my old texts and training guides go (a *long* time ago), the rule seems to be to only increase your training volume no more than 10% in any one training week (microcycle).
Although I believe most runners have tweaked this up to a 15% in one week, it usually isn’t something that you can do more than once or twice in a training mesocycle.
So, now that resistance training is tapering off, and the morning sprints continue, the weekends are for my LSD – long (not-so-) slow distance training. For now, they are erg-bike-based until the weather improves. This week, they are 85 minutes in duration.
And I am not sure about the ‘slow’ part of that equation either. One school of thought says sprints increase leg speed, LSD increases leg-muscle glycogen storage and utilization efficiency (store more and utilize less for more). Another says ‘train slow, be slow’.
I am taking a moderate approach: my LSD are at a higher intensity than some believe should be done, plus I am adding 30 minutes of hard sprints 2 to 3 times each week. From the research presented at the NSCA Performance Seminar at UConn last June, control of the recovery from anaerobic bursts should increase endurance better than traditional aerobic training (hence the utilization of morning sprints) and the ‘LnotsoSDs’ should build the aerobic base, without training slow.
Mind you, this is nothing that outstandingly new.
The research seems to be more directed at building a foundation base within the power athlete culture. This would allow short, intense, burst-based athletes to develop faster recoveries without compromising the degree of their power outputs while also not having to run long, slow distances.
I am testing if this works in reverse: If I train with more speed-based bursts and at higher speeds for my endurance, my speed should be higher without compromising my endurance.
just by building 10% each week without losing going any slower.
sounds easy, huh?
April 5th is rapidly approaching and I can’t see the Northern Nipmuck taking any less than 3 hours. Being anything less than fully ready is fool-hardy.
Next week is 98 minutes of hard, fast work.
Time will tell.