Maasten Up

Key Words: Keith FIT, Sponge Bob Singlets, Maastened
Word Count: 995

Today was, per the schedule, an 11 miler for Chicago and a 12 miler for other HoustonFIT Fall groups, so Patty (she was absent, no Patty Wagon with oranges and water!) setup a 11.88 mile route that we could all run. Small group, as it's a holiday weekend.

I wanted to run this from the heart! No, not with passion, but with a beats per minute limit. The 18 miler seems to have exposed that if my heart is working at 166 or so BPM, that I'm probably working too hard for long distance (13+) mile running. Also, using my recent numbers (see my last post), 80% of my max working heart rate would be around 157 to 166. So I set out to keep the ticker at or under 160.

The goal of my heart rate training is to fine a zone that I can work aerobically in for a long time. The point of long running is, after all, aerobic workout. Successful runners spend about 80% of their miles at a slow speed; that's about the closest thing to universal advice you find in running. So it makes sense that these long runs should be in this slow, aerobic zone. Unfortunately, in the current weather conditions this means running reeeal slow miles. Here's where you buy in or take a pass: minutes per mile are fairly pointless. If I take my best runs from this Summer, even short ones, it seems likely that I will not break five hours in Chicago. Though that would be fine, I don't really believe that, because (hopefully) the conditions in Chicago will be more conducive to easier running. So instead of fixating on pace, I am choosing to fixate on improving my bodies aerobic capacity. I'm buying in that if I make my heart and lungs stronger, that when I get better weather, I'll be able to run faster.

Of course, there is more to running than aerobic capacity. There are two more things really: lactic acid threshold, and VO2 Max. If you only trained in this slow, aerobic zone, guess what, you'd turn into a real slow runner! You have to do more than that; tempo and speed work come in there. Tempo runs push you body into it a zone where it is producing lactic acid at a rate close or in excess of its ability to remove it. This is, perhaps, the greatest threat to distance runners. Your muscles will shut down if drenched in acid; you have to work below this threshold. Therefore, by putting your body at this limit, you hope to improve the limit over time, and thus be able to run faster without a deluge of acid. Speed running makes your body use copious amounts of oxygen because you are going very fast over a decent distance (not a sprint though, because when you truly sprint, your body doesn't use oxygen for running). Your VO2 Max (the amount of oxygen you can use) is, unfortunately, limited by genetics :( However, "they" say you can improve your base level, even if you fit, by about 5 - 10%. Speed training does this.

The above, slow runs in the aerobic zone, speed work at a quick pace, and tempo work is, not surprisingly given its success, the basic USA FIT workout plan. The one thing that I think it lacks is running at marathon pace. That pace is between tempo and aerobic (I call it a fast aerobic), and I think you need some miles in at this speed, not for physiological reasons, but for psychological ones; you need to know what it feels like. That's why I think the recovery runs should be run at marathon pace. There you have it, Keith FIT. My Yellow Group will wear Sponge Bob singlets.

So I'm buying in. After two years of "running", I'm going to start training. Jon and I got into a discussion about this after this mornings run. I think I'm a successful distacne runner in that I'm speedy at short distance, a lil' better than average in the half, and, well, at least I've finished three marathons. However, I may have done that in spite of my training. Well, that's obviously not fully true, but what I mean to convey is that if I train "better", I might have more success. It's easy to keep doing the same old things, but as I've said many times, if you want different results, you have to train differently. It may be as simple as running a little slower on Saturday, and making sure I am religious about tempo, speed, and recovery runs.

As for this morning's run, it was fine. I kept the heart rate where I wanted, and ran about 10:45 - 11:00 minutes miles, maybe a bit faster. It's worth noting that in today's cooler weather, I was able to run about as fast as the 18 miler, but my heart stayed lower. This makes sense, but I wanted to see it happen! A first though, it rained on this run. A lot! As some folks in the South say, I was quite "maastened". Hydration over the last four miles was as simple as looking up and opening your mouth over the last four miles. I cannot remember a run prior to this one where it really rained like this. Other than my shoes getting full of water, it wasn't so bad really. Thankfully the lightening stayed away until I got near the park. Who knows where I would have holed up had that started, and I'm not sure how Jon would have found me (I think I'll start running with a cell phone!).

Adios. Have a good Labor Day!