14 Weeks to Go... ACHE....Illies

I have not posted much over the last few weeks as there has not been much positive to talk about. The week prior to Club Champs, I tweaked my achilles during the 3-4 inch snow fall we got. I continued the workout and ran probably my best workout (with the conditions) that i have run in 2 years. I was plugging off sub 5 pace through snow and on muddy footing over the fields of Germantown Soccer plex (600m XC loop). During my cooldown is when i really noticed my achilles pulling on me. Got in 14 miles for the day.

The next day I was scheduled for an easy 16. I got to 6 and the pain started to set in. by 9 miles, i had to stop. It was effecting my running gate at that point (esp on uphills).

I took monday totally off. Tuesday was an easy 5 miler (it was tolerable but still there).

Wednesday I was about to get in an 8 mile run which included 8 x 200 meters on the Northwest H.S track. The 200's were pure hell... Pace wise, I was good to go... I hit 34, 33, 32, 31, 32, 31, 31, 28. (100 rest in between intervals). I felt phenomenal during the intervals cardio wise... My achilles was terrible however. I actually ran my 100 rest in about 22/25 seconds (for the 4 through 7th at least)... I noticed that my achilles hurt worse at the start of the next interval if I did a slow recovery jog... I almost had to stay in stride for the pain to be tolerable.

Thursday, I was able to get in 8 miles with the same pain as wednesday, easy pace (6:50 min/mile avg).

Friday, I woke up at 3:30 in the morning with a terrible sore throat, chest congestion and chills. I didn't have a thermometer but knew a fever was present with the sweat I woke up in. I was able to fall back asleep for about 3 more hours before I threw myself out of bed and put the tights and a long sleeve and hoodie on to go outside for a 5 mile shake out. I got out 1 mile and felt absolutely horrendous. I knew at that point, I could not make this trip and survive. I got back to the house and immediately called Jake and Karl... It was hard to make the call to withdrawal from the trip i was anxiously awaiting for weeks... With all the stuff that has been going on recently in my life, it was something I had to look forward to. I will probably not run this event or sign up for this event again... I always seem to get sick the week prior or in this years case the day before the USATF XC Club championships. The two years prior, the same thing happened. Bronchitis plus a hip injury in 2007, Flu in 2008.

Saturday I did not run at all.

Sunday I again did not run at all.

Monday I again did not run at all.

Tuesday I ran 5 miles and felt like crap.

Wednesday I ran 7 miles. My achilles was super tight and hurt every step after the first 15 minutes. I find this to be both frustrating and peculiar. It would make sense that the achilles would hurt bad to start and subside as the run progresses... My situation is the complete opposite... Hopefully over my winter break stay in PA, My go to doctor will diagnose and kick it in the rear as he did last year with my injuries... I saw him 9 times in the 10 week lead up i had for PDR. He keeps me healthy... I just wish he would accept my offer to move down to the MD with me....

Thursday I ran 6 miles. Had some pain but it was tolerable (more so than yesterday).

Friday I ran 5.5 miles. It is frustrating looking at what I should be running mileage right now and not getting close. I am trying to be smart with progressing back up to where I should be... The thinking I have with this is I run PR's off of 40 mile weeks... I don't necessarily need to pound the high miles... Now, to reach my potential down the road... I MUST DO THIS. Right now, it can only hurt me... my muscles/tendons from past experiences cannot handle aggressive progressions in mileage... has to be gradual. Next week i will do a 15% increase and go from there... Plateau at a mileage level for 2 weeks then up it. I am not looking at still getting 1 or 2 90 mile weeks going into my marathon but not hitting the 105 goal that I had on my workout template.

Saturday. I took off in PA... the snow that started at midnight was sooo tempting as its my most favorite running conditions... at the same time, the achilles was injured as a result of these conditions... I had to be smart. Instead I shoveled and plowed my parents and their neighbors driveways/walkways for my workout... Im jacked... Not really.

Sunday: I took off in PA again...

Monday: I ran 5 miles back in Maryland... almost killed myself on the icy conditions on the back roads around montgomery village.

Tuesday:

16 Weeks till 2010 Shamrock Marathon

Sunday: 18 miles.
While in Pennsylvania for the Thanksgiving weekend, I completed my visit back home with an 18 mile tour of Tyler State Park (My old stomping ground in high school, which has a lot of historical background in the sport of distance running. Some of the best runners in Pennsylvania history used this park as their key training spot. The best way to describe Tyler park is HILLY! There is about a 1 and 1/2 mile stretch that is flat (along the Neshaminy Creek)... The remainder is up and down.
Todays 18 miler consisted of the Polar Bear 8miler loop x2 and then an out 1mile and back in. I felt great the entire run... Which I was surprised... as I ran a 25:36 5miler on thursday (11 in for day), Friday was an easy 8miler, Saturday I ran a 32:14 10k for the victory ($100bucks) also completing a 13 mile day. Thanksgiving break did not consist much of a break but I feel that it will be all worth it come March!
Monday: 8 miles.
I bit my lip and braved the cold rain early this evening in Germantown Park for an 8 mile run. I was hesitant about running in Germantown Park after yesterdays 18 mile tour of Tyler park. Germantown Park (Germantown SoccerPlex Grounds) is a hilly area. I ran the 2 + loop and then treked into the woods on the mountain bike trails for about 1 and half miles. As i entered the dark woods, I noticed some bright orange figures up ahead... HUNTERS!!! I have no idea why they were on the mountain bike trails as I was almost certain that is an area that was off limits to hunters. Either way, I continued on by and gave a wave.... 5 minutes later I was back tracking and this time they did not seem happy to see me... At this time, I was weary about running past these 2 armed men in orange... Just the fact that there are two random guys in an almost dark wooded area standing behind me (no one else around) with loaded shotguns...
Run felt good... got in some nice strides to end it off.

22 weeks until the Shamrock Virginia Beach Marathon

Sunday: 10 miles. Slept in and missed the group run... which after getting out and running, was a good thing. I wanted to run a bit quicker for my 10 miler to see where my fitness is. In the first phase of training, I like to run on my own to see how my fitness is increasing and going off how my body feels... I felt really nice. I hit 6:20 pace for 10 miles and that is with the first 3 miles at 7:00-7:15 pace. Overall, a nice run
Monday: 6 miles in the AM. I ran around Germantown in the milestone neighborhoods. They are light up, which helps at this time of the year... and will definitely be my stomping group for those high mileage weeks coming up.
Tuesday: 6 miles
Wednesday: 8 miles (3 x 2k cruise intervals at Agricultural Park)
Thursday: 6 miles
Friday: 8 miles
Saturday: 6 miles
Week 3 projected mileage = 50 miles

23 WEEKS TO GO

The last 2 weeks I have not done much mileage at all... I took off 5 consecutive days and the runs I have done in the last 16 days have not creeped over 8 miles (avg of 5-6 miles). The purpose of this was to give my legs some added rest before my 24 week marathon build up, which also includes some key lead up races. I have 4 weeks built in from the start that are just easy distance miles that by the 4th week I will be up to 65 miles. Week 5 I make a nice jump up to 80 miles and back down to 70 for week 6. from there I leap up to 85 and for the most part of Phase 2 (of 4), I will be avg 80 miles/week. At the end of phase 2 and leading into phase 3, I will see 3 weeks at 100 miles. This is going to be very very foreign to me as I have not been over 80 miles/week in years. My lead up to philly distance run last year I hit 4 weeks at 80 and the avg for the 3 months leading up was 60. I feel that this has to happen at this time in my career if I want to see how good I can be. It could be humbling... I have a feeling it may start out that way and end on a good note...

Sunday: 6 miles (Easy/Med)... I ran around my old stomping ground in the old Ivyland Industrial Park. This is where I ran virtually every run during the summer going into my frosh year of college at James Madison and into my Soph year when I transferred to Penn state. It gave me a good time to reflect on life. Not just with running, but primarily with running. I came to the conclusion that I am tired of not making running a big priority in my life. I now have a job that allows me to get out more than I ever have been able to before, a wife who tells me I need to get my ass in gear, who is a talented runner. I love to compete... I am realizing that I can only perform at a mediocre level at my age off little training. This has to change... I am dedicating the next two years to getting in high/quality mileage in and see where it takes me. I want to be smart and with the training plan from Jack Daniels that I chose to follow, I feel it is a very challenging but good lead up for me.
Back in PA for the weekend to watch my high school team I coached last year win the Tennent XC Invitational!!! I was so proud of the guys and for Warwick (who is returning as head coach after my departure). I am excited also for the Eagles/Bucs game @ 1pm today. Nice to be around some true, die-hard football fans for a change... YES, THAT WAS A SHOT AT YOU SKINS FANS.

Week 2: 9/6-9/12

Sunday- 9/6: 18 miles !!! Riley's Lock

- I came into the run looking for 15 (which is still more than I have done on average)... Instead I was feeling good so I continued on with Bain and Karl to finish off with an 18 mile long run. I felt great during, great after. Will tomorrow or tuesday be the same story???

Monday- 9/7: 8 miles Ridge Park Loop +

- I ran a medium effort for much of today's run. Ridge park is half dirt trail, half asphalt trail through primarily wooded area. though the park is not big, it is about 2 miles from my house and there is a nice 1.5 mile paved trail that goes from my complex to the park. This trail is nothing but hills, which I feel will be a nice local training tool getting ready for some of my races ahead that have that type of terrain. I was surprised I felt better today than I thought I would. Again, I am a big believer in the 48 hour onset... those 18 miles could finally settle in my legs tomorrow...

Tuesday-9/8: 8 miles Ridge Park Loop +

- I ran an Easy/Medium effort for much of this run. I got out late and this run provides a nice amount of street lights along the way, so I repeated this run from yesterday. It has a nice mix of steep uphills/down hills, gradual ups and downs and a nice long flat section... The soft surface for close to a mile in the middle is a nice break from the roads/blacktop path. I will be doing a workout at Bethesda-Chevy Chase High School tomorrow evening with the team. We are looking to do repeat 1000's and finish up with some quality speed.

Wednesday-9/9: 10 miles (Workout) Capitol Crescent Trail

-The plan was to get in a track workout (repeat 1000's/800's) Starting out comfortably hard and working down to a very hard effort. As is life, you must be ready to change plans from time-to-time. We arrived around 6:15 for the 6:30 workout and found that there was a varsity soccer game beginning at 7:00pm. Luckily, with the convenient location of BCC high school, the Capitol Crescent Trail is about a 5 minute run down the road. Myself, Karl, Bain, Murphy, Dickson, and Jimmy made our way. This is a paved trail that is not open to motorized vehicles. It goes through primarily wooded area and heads from Bethesda and wraps around D.C. We decided to utilize this for our workout. We ran a 2.5 mile warm up. and went into a 5 minute, 4 min, 3 min , 2 min, 1 min step down workout with equal recovery. Karl and I took the 5 minute out aggressively. It was the type of effort where cardiovascularly you are fine but the quick pace made your legs feel like they were not under you... We both felt that was probably too quick for the first long interval in the workout... At the same time, if you want to run against the best, you must learn to get out hard and bite down on your competition like a pit bull and hold on for dear life. The 4 minute interval felt more comfortable but the pace did not subside... We kept it hard. Interval 3 was the ball buster. We turned around this point and headed back up to the start of the Cap Crescent. The way down was downhill... our 3 minute interval was not only going to be the point that really measured mental toughness, it was going to be uphill on top of that. We pushed through the 3min and got it down in a hard effort. the 2 minute interval was the toughest for me, primarily because i began to get a stomach cramp with 30 seconds to go in the interval. I was able to get it to subside for the final 1minute hard and we took it home. Everyone ran a nice workout. The group we had made the workout for sure. It is so nice to have people to workout with again. It has been a LONG time since I did a group workout. Actually, no joke... the last time was 2006! We finished up with 2.5 miles of cooldown

Thursday-9/10: 0. OFF.

-I had to stay late at work and though I should of pushed myself out the door... I felt that I was going to get sick if I didn't get to sleep by 10:30pm.

Friday-9/11: 8 miles. Ridge Park Loop +

- In the steady rain, I got out and ran an easy 8 miles prior to driving back to Pennsylvania. My wife is going to my cousin Erin's baby shower on saturday afternoon... Plus, we still have a few items in our old apartment in PA that we need to fit in the cars... So, i made the trip as well. Legs felt great but due to the petty day off on Thursday... Still frustrates me.

Saturday-9/12: 10 miles. 5.3 mile tempo run. in Tyler Park.

-Back in the old stomping ground... Details to come...

Week Total =62 miles in 6 days.

Week 1: 8/30-9/5

Sunday: 0 miles... Busy day I wasn't too happy to miss my long run.

Monday: 6 miles...Ridge Park loop. Medium effort... felt good
In the AM I performed a 10 station circuit (x2) at my school during my break. Like a moron I incorporated squat thrust, mountain climbers, scissors and frog hops within the circuit that also included abdominal and upper body emphasis (which I do need). I don't think this will feel good the next few days....

Tuesday: 9 miles...Germantown Park. Didn't do the standard loop that combines the mountain bike trails and the back roads surrounding the park. I just neandered around the park and surrounding neighborhoods. Easy effort but felt harder as my quads felt like jelly.

Wednesday: 9 miles... TRACK WORKOUT. 2.5 up. 6 x 800 w/200m rest between first 3 800's. 400 rest after the first 3 intervals and then 200 rest again between final 3 800's.
2:20, 2:20, 2:19 400 rest 2:19, 2:17, 2:11. 2.5 miles cool down on turf.
- Workout felt great for first track workout in 2 months. Before the workout, I didn't think I was going to have a good experience as my legs were like lead and my hamstrings felt like they were going to ball up on me if I over-extended my workout. It wound up being tolerable and I was excited to get back on the track and really pumped to be able to have Karl to get through the workout with.

Thursday: 8 miles... Went out and back 4 miles on the tow path. Felt good. I wanted a soft, flat surface for today's run as my legs were beat up from yesterdays workout combined with the foolish circuit i put myself through on monday. Legs didn't feel good and it was hard to get into a rhythm.

Friday: 6 miles easy around germantown. Legs felt terrible. I took a cold bath after run and then took a hot bath later on, hoping to get the junk out of my legs.

Saturday: 10 miles total RACE: Kentlands/Lakelands 5k (Gaithersburg).
5th place with 15:30.
* Warm up of 2 miles felt fine. I was poised and ready to get out after a competitive field. I knew going into it I was lacking strength from low mileage and a consistency of 4-6 runs/week for majority of the summer. Usually if I run smart, I can still dish out a good performance on lower mileage. I went out easy and the plan was to go after the last mile and hope there was people fading ahead of me I could zero in on. I went out in 4:51 and came through deuce in 9:37. Karl and I worked with one another through 2 miles and just past 2 miles, the 3rd place kenyan who we were bringing in looked back and dropped out of the race. At that point, Karl surged and I was not able to respond... In fact, at that point I was unable to even keep my current race pace...The last mile of that race took forever... as my time explains... 9:37 at 2... 15:30 at finish. I am excited that I was able to get through 2 miles at that pace and feel comfortable... Usually when I suddenly get the bear on the back and it is not a gradual onset, it means I am just lacking strength... I cooled down 4 miles with Karl, Mike (Karl's friend from college) and a kenyan named Joel Mwaura (2nd place overall: just arrived in the states only 3 weeks ago from Nairobi).

Week 1 Mileage = 46 miles in 6 days.

The plan

Week 1: The Build up...
- I have decided to take the approach of using the Sunday to Saturday plan for recording my training. The majority of my long runs will fall on sunday's, so i feel it will be nice to see that bulk of my week's distance out of the way, right off the bat.
- Monday's will alternate week after week between a hill emphasis workout and an easy day of running.
- Tuesday's will be an easy distance day which will progress to a double run when my mileage exceeds 70 miles/week.
- Wednesday's will alternate between a track session (speed/strength or both...depending on race distance that is approaching) and a tempo/progression run. If I have a hill workout scheduled monday, I will have a tempo on wed. Easy day mon = track specific on wed...
- Thursday's will be another easy distance day which will progress to a double run when my mileage exceeds 70 miles/week.
- Friday will replicate Tuesday and Thursday if no race is scheduled for Saturday.
- Saturday will be a distance run day with some quality (if no race scheduled sat or sun).
(ex of quality: progression run, fartlek, high volume of hills within run)
*** The idea is having a 28 week plan that will end on March 21st in Virginia Beach.
***Mileage will increase to 110 miles/week but the idea is to average 75 miles over the 28 week span... This is completely foreign to me as I have only been averaging 40 miles/week for the last few years... I have good weeks at 65-70... then bad weeks at 30... With my new job and the flexibility, there are no excuses...
* Focus races for the remainder of the year include:
1. USATF Club XC Championships

* Focus races in 2010 include:
1. Shamrock Marathon (March 21st, 2010)
2. USA Mountain Running Championships (June)
***Along with focus races, I will jump in several local races in the MD/D.C area as well as in the Philly area.

The Transition

Well, I am officially settled in my new home. It has been one of those changes that has both positives and negatives (I am not referring to my own personal running here). Positives: I love my school that I teach at, I am really pumped to be running for the GRC club team once again and my wife and I love the social atmosphere around the Maryland/D.C area. Top of the list in the negatives are being away from family. This was the reason why Holly and I decided to move back to Pennsylvania. At the same time, looking long term, it was going to be almost impossible to make it financially with the job market in the Phila area in our respective professional work fields. Along with family, my first and only high school cross country and track and field team that I ever had the opportunity to coach (Council Rock SOUTH), will sorely be missed. I never will be able to replicate the team I had the honor of coaching at South at any other school. With a couple of schools in need for a high school coach in the county down here, I decided to not coach and concentrate on my teaching and own personal running for the next 3 years. The team at Rock South is in the best hands as possible with Coach Warwick at the helm. He, along with my long time friend Mike Gross built this program in fall of 2002 (year that CR South was built). I would be uneasy if anyone else outside to the CR South XC family came in to coach this program... The guys are very lucky and I know they are going to continue on what they built last year... For a very successful Season!!!
My wife Holly begins her new job the day after labor day (Sept 8th). She is excited to be back at her old workplace in Rockville, MD where she worked in our previous stint in the MD/D.C area. Along with beginning work, Holly is finding more time for her own training. As much as my training has been hindered in the last 4 years, Holly has had a really tough time with her work schedule/commute and finding time to run while we were in PA. Her along with several other area women runners are putting together a GRC women's team that hopefully will be represented at the USATF club XC championships in December down in Kentucky.
I hope to keep this blog updated daily with details of my training, future plans and any points on life worthy of a post. Please feel free to post via comment under a post to let me know how everyone is doing (especially back home)...

Joey