2016 is Officially Underway

This past weekend, I competed in the 17th edition of the Achilles St. Patrick's Day 5km run in downtown Toronto. When planning my race season for the year, the goal was to choose A-list races with good competition to push myself to improve and to see how I really stack up against the elite. Although I think smaller races have their place in a season's schedule, and even though it's fun to win races by huge margins, my performance times would eventually start to plateau if I never really needed to push myself truly out of comfort zone. Plus the bigger races have the added bonus of giving me more recognition in the running community, and will really help for me to get my name out there, as well as the brand I represent, Skechers. I was having a discussion earlier today, about how many people fail to see the big picture and not capitalize on opportunities with regards to education, but I think the same type of philosophy can be applied to my running. I don't want to be a elite runner who people at races or in the community don't really know. I want to be someone who race directors approach before races to ask about how training has been going, and when other runners look at the confirmation list and see my name they know who I am, and what I'm capable of. This status would not be possible if I restrict myself to small B-list races. I look at the opportunities that running may lead to, and for my soon to be career as a physiotherapist where having connections means everything, getting my name on the map will be incredibly beneficial. That being said, I'm not saying I'm never going to run smaller races ever again. Small races have their place in the year's schedule for a number of reasons. Firstly, when planning a season it is critical to periodize both your training in terms of having different and distinct training phases, as well as periodize your races. In a full season, you should really only have a few A races. Races that you are planning, and structuring your training around. A races are the ones you will do a full taper for, whereas B races you may do a very small taper, and C priority race are races that you will just train right through, and really just use as glorified training days. Second, smaller races which you could win by a big margin can help boost your confidence, going into other races, and help to indicate if your training is on the right track or not. Third, smaller races can be great for practicing some things during the race that you may not in a bigger race, such as starting very fast and seeing if you can hold on, or being able to change up into a bigger gear when your running solo, which may come in handy in the later stages of big races once the pack has broken. Lastly, small races can be a lot of fun, have some nice prizes, and let you run in some towns which you probably have never run in or heard of sometimes before. So to sum it up, this year I'm really going to try to have a good mix of racing on the big stage as often as I can, as well as smaller races for the above reasons. 

So onto the race. The weeks leading up to the race, training was really starting to come around. Was nailing pretty much every workout, was logging a good amount of run mileage, as well as a good amount of overall training stress with big bike workouts (5x per week) and swimming (2x/week) mixed in. At 10:30 the race was underway. My main competition would be Matt Leduc, Robert Brouliette, Predrag, and former Canadian national team runner Alex Hutchinson. Going into the race, I had not run a road race since last Canada day, and hadn't raced period since Queens 10k cross country in October. With that in mind, my goal was pretty conservative, with my A goal of being under 15:45, and B goal under 16. Sounds extremely conservative, but really I just wanted to get in a good strong effort, and shake out some of the cobwebs that built up since last October. The conditions on race day initially seemed pretty good. It was around 6 degrees which was perfect, however the wind from the east was hollowing. We started and headed west as a big group over to Spadina, and as we crested the hill Leduc surged ahead, and I let him go. It was only about 800m into the race, and I got a little nervous that I was already running solo, with a gap building between Leduc and myself, and me and those behind me. Hit the first kilometre in a comfortable 3:08 (uphill majority of the way), and rounded the turn onto Wellington going east passing the 1 mile mark in 5:01. This is when things got a little crazy, as that stretch on Wellington was the equivalent of running in a wind tunnel. The pace slowed but kept saying to myself I would catch Leduc on the way back. Hit the second kilometre in 3:04, and then the third in 3:06. As we turned back (out and back course) with the wind at my back I started winding it up and really turning my legs over to try to catch Leduc. The two mile mark came at 5:00 (3:06/km), and then the third mile with the wind at my back was a 4:46 (2:56/km). Then turned onto Bremner again with a few hundred meters to go until the finish. I had significantly closed the gap between Leduc and myself, but going back into the wind at that point made it really difficult to put a real assertive sprint to catch him before the line. I was still able to grind out 2:47/km pace for the last few hundred meters, and finished in 15:27, I have video proof now of 15:27 even though the gun time said 15:29. But whatever, I accomplished my goal finished second overall, Leduc was 15:15, won some money, and Skechers athletes finished 1, 2 so it was a great way to start the season. 

The last thing I wanted to talk about was about my improved mindset for training and racing. About a month and a half ago I purchased a training software called TrainerRoad which I can say legitimately revolutionized my approach to training. The software has over 800 bike workouts to be used with an indoor bike trainer, and many different training plans. Currently, I just finished week 5 of 8 of the Half Ironman High Volume Base Phase plan, next up will be the 8 week build phase, and then the Speciality phase before my A ironman races. The week finished with a solid 3 hour, 105km ride on Friday night. Besides hugely improving my physical fitness level, my VO2 max last measured at 86 ml/kg/min (same number Lance Armstrong achieved with some added help), it has completely changed my mindset and ability to cope with discomfort and pain during a workout (by pain I don't mean something like bone pain or anything thank god, just pain from lactate surging through my legs, my heart feeling like it's going to beat out of my chest, and overall building metabolic fatigue). In the past, I would go into a hard workout knowing that it would hurt, and during a workout only being able to recognize that yes I was in fact hurting and that was the end of it. TrainerRoad though has taught me that it's not only about recognizing the pain, but instead being able to do something about it, and not dwelling on the fact that your in pain/discomfort. It has essentially taught me how to cope with the pain to be able to finish the workout strong. For example, strategies such as saying to yourself within a 20 minute interval, "This is hard but I can do another 30 seconds" and then 30 seconds later saying it again, and so on. And eventually, before you know it, that interval will be done. Or another strategy during that same 20 minute intervals when you've reached the 18 minute mark, is reminding yourself that at this point with 90% of the interval completed there is no physiological reason that could possibly stop you from completing the interval, so there is no excuse to give up and not finish this strong. Another example of what I've found to be an especially useful coping strategy is to hide your discomfort. Imagine that there is another competitor right beside you, and you do not want them to see how much pain your in. You want to make it seem to them that you're churning out watt every watt effortlessly, instead of making it look like your about to break. This one really tricks the body into thinking and believing that you're not actually going as hard as you may be, and will really help you to maintain that high level of effort. There are numerous other strategies that I've now learned to be able to say okay your in pain, but now what are you going to do about it, and I even used some of these during the race. Such as at the 2 mile mark saying to myself, this is hard but I can last another half mile, and then half mile down the road saying it again. And then at the about the 13 minute mark of the race saying to myself that there is no physiological reason why I can't finish this strong, so suck it up and push hard until the finish line. 

Anyways so the season is off to a great start, the next big race up will be the Race Roster Spring run off in Toronto. Until next time, happy running. 

From the Ashes

Date of this post: Feb 1

My goodness it's been a long time since I updated my blog. Why has it been so long? Well I was tired (and probably you too) of constantly doing negative blog posts. Of course sometimes it's necessary to write those kinds of posts, because if I only write about the positive and totally disregard the negatives then I'm being dishonest, and the blog was really intended to be a place where I can be quite open about my feelings. However, this time around its all positives. As you may or may not have remembered last summer I had signed up for the Houston Marathon in January of this year. I'm not going to go too much into this because that's not the purpose of this post, but essentially during my build up, I dragged myself through severe pain from a number of injuries from my persistent hip pain that had been going on since March 2015, knee pain that came on suddenly at the end of October, and a stress fracture that was developing in my left tibia as usual. On December 6th the pain had become so severe in my left tibia that I could only manage a few steps starting my long run, and had to limp back to the car, and call it right there. I was down and felt horrible. But after a couple weeks of sulking and healing, I started back up again. My first week back I managed 100k, week 2: 120, and since then averaged 140k for the last 4 weeks. In fact, since i started running again on December 21st, I have not taken a day off running. I've been biking 5 days per week Monday to Friday on the trainer for 70-90 minutes in the evening, doing a half hour of core/strength everyday, and on weekends swimming Saturday and Sunday morning. On Saturday I've been doing a double run, where I'll run 10 miles back from the pool, then hop in the car and run 10 miles on the AlterG treadmill (video below) for a nice 20 mile, or 32k day. The AlterG has really been a critical part to my comeback since during the week I haven't been doing any run workouts on the road. On the AlterG I run at 83% of my body weight, and that little bit of weight reduction means I can incorporate speed workouts relatively safely into my week. So for example, I've done a ladder type workout, I've done 400s on the machine, and just last weekend I did a tempo run which turned into a 31:40 10k run. On the road I've really just been trying to get back to being able to run consistently, and be able to build my strength to end this 2 year long cycle of injuries.

That being said, I'm not going out there and mindlessly running 20k at snail pace. In fact, last week my average run speed throughout the week was the fastest it has been since July of 2014, after coming back from altitude. Sure I'm not doing structured workouts like mile repeats or anything, but I've tried just running purely by feel, and well I've been feeling quite well recently. Essentially, I looked back to what I had done early in my running career, and discovered that all my runs, workouts or not, were at a pretty fast pace. Although, studies indicate that at faster speeds there is greater impact forces on the tibias (primary weight bearing leg bone) for example, I don't think those studies take into account the impact of running economy. My theory is that when I run at slower "recovery" type speeds, my form breaks down since I'm holding myself back the entire run. Basically, I'm running with one foot on the brake. Now when I'm feeling good I just run to my desire and don't worry about whether the pace is "too fast" or not. This is exactly what I did when I first started running where I would just go outside and run. When I got to a hill I would gallop up it and then blast down the other side. And honestly, this is the first time since crossing the line at the Scotiabank Marathon in 2013, that I am loving running again and believing that this is what I was born to do. In contrast, the past two years, after trying to get myself psyched up to go out and run dreading it, out on the run I would be looking at my watch again and again counting down how many miles were left. Now I go out and can feel some new energy surging through my entire body, making me want to go faster and faster, and further and further. I'll get to the end of my 12 mile run, and say to myself hey we still got some time before class still, lets pump out another mile. Concurrent to my re-kindled passion for running, I've been improving significantly on the bike. The past three weeks my average power has been the highest it's ever been overall, and I've even seen significant improvement during individual workouts from week to week.

 In terms of my game plan for season, I am enjoying running so much at this point that a part of me doesn't really want to ruin that feeling by gearing up for another race. I do love the feeling of testing myself in races, and pushing my limits, and being able to reach another gear that I would not normally have on a usual training day. I will still obviously be racing this year not only to get this feeling, but also I kind of have to given that it is in my contract with my amazing sponsor Skechers. I've been re-signed by Skechers just recently, and I'm excited to represent them once again this year. Looks like they have some amazing new shoes coming out this year, and I'm looking forward to trying everything. Back to my ongoing internal debate, I think a big part of not wanting to put a race firmly on the schedule is that in the spring time of the last 2 years I've had some really bad luck, and not been able to race a bunch of times for races that I've signed up for. For example, 2 years ago I signed up for the Ottawa marathon, only to get a stress fracture in March, and had to cancel that race. Then last year I had signed up for Mississauga Half and the Toronto Yonge St 10k, and had to pull out of both of those due to the hip injury, also in March (possible pattern?). Then obviously the Houston Marathon recently which I wasn't able to race. As much as its not a huge deal having to pull a race off the schedule, something that needs to be mentioned is that let's face it races these days are not cheap. Anyways, after I've decided what race I want to do in Spring, I'll update you. For now it's looking like early March I'll do a rust-buster of a race probably 10k or if feeling really good maybe a half. Then will likely be doing Around the Bay 30k, then a 10k in mid-April, then Mississuaga Half, then if still injury-free let's hope, a full like the Ottawa full. Then I would be taking a 2 week break off running, but would still aim to train 20-25 hours a week on the bike and in the pool as I transition into all out triathlon training. Planning on two half-ironman's this summer both in the US, and then the USA Age Group National Championships in Omaha, Nebraska in August which I qualified for last year in Penn Yan, NY. Until next time thanks for reading. Below are two AlterG videos.

High Motivation can be incredibly Dangerous

I don't know if I have divulged the information yet, but in the summer I committed to running the Houston marathon on January 17. A lot of thought went into my decision, including what it would be like having to run my high-high mileage weeks in the heart of winter in the snow belt. Despite the weather here, and then having to run in 20 degree weather in Houston on the day being a big point of debate for myself, I was really excited to take on the challenge. September was really a great month of training for me, and probably the most consistent amount of time i've been able to train for a really long time. I was consistently logging 100 mile plus weeks with a lot of speed word in the process. My hip pain that has lasted for seemingly forever began to subside early in the month, and was feeling great. Then October rolled around the corner, and I was eager to finish the cross country season with a strong performance in Queens (10k) that would propel me to competing in the Canadian Championships in early November. About 10 days out from Queens though my hip problem re-emerged and got progressively worse by the day. My expectations went from the possibility of running a pb at Queens to maybe not being able to race at all. I had two decent workouts the week leading into the race, and figured that if I warmup up well and got my adrenaline really pumping then I could maybe still run well, maybe not a pb but a decent time. The day was windy and cold, and my mindset just wasn't right. I like to think of it in terms of what my focus is on. For example, at Western (8k) a few weeks before all my focus was on the first 1.5 miles which were all uphill and finished with a very steep hill. My focus was on getting through that bit without stringing myself out too much and then looking to pick off competitor by competitor in the final few miles. That plan worked very well as I was probably in around 80-90th place after the first couple miles and finished in 27th in 26:09. Overall my focus was completely external, compared to just prior to the race start in Queens where focus was entirely internal focusing on nothing about my competition, the battle within our team to make top 7 to be able to represent Mcmaster at nationals, or about the course. Instead my focus was solely about my hip and whether it would blow up or not. The race started at a conservative pace, and ended that way. I got into a rhythm running 3:15/km and even though aerobically speaking it felt incredibly easy, when I looked ahead to the next group up I just kept thinking about what would happen if I started pushing it hard to get up there, would the hip blow up if I started surging and blasting the uphills. So instead I kept the pace the same, and finished 32:30ish according to my watch (there was no chip time). Even though a mid-32 10k is nothing to be ashamed about, I was really upset seeing fellow competitors collapsed huffing and puffing on the ground at the finish, whereas I felt like I had so so much left in the tank. In fact, my Dad said after the race he didn't even think I was sweating and said throughout the race, where he got to see me on many different occasions (it was 4 laps of a winding course so it was great for spectators), and said he hadn't seen me look the comfortable in a race before. Even my coaches after the race said I looked incredibly smooth throughout, but I hate to break it to you all but when I'm racing I usually have a very distinct pain face/style of running. As my Dad said during a big workout in the weeks leading up to the race (the video i posted earlier) I normally look like I'm trying to accelerate more and more throughout a race, or in that case an interval. After the race I started thinking about Houston. I ran on Sunday, but had to cut my long run short because of severe pain in the hip. I figured I'd ice it, take Monday off, and then re-focus for the week ahead. Oddly enough, I ended up being a solid week of training I ran 165 kilometres with 3 workouts including possibly one of the best long run workouts of my life on Sunday. The workout on Sunday, was a new thing I would be trying in this build up to Houston which was focusing the majority of my effort on having high-quality long runs. It was a 20 mile (32k) run, with a 2.5 mile warmup, then 4 mile, 3 mile, 2 mile, and then 1 mile at Marathon pace or a little faster, then a 3.5 mile cooldown. So overall it would be 10 miles (16.1k) of hard running in the midst of a 32km run. My goal set back long before I even signed up for Houston was to run a 2:27:42 marathon which would equate to 3:30/km average pace throughout. The 4 miles (6.4k) was done in 22:39 which is 3:32/km pace, and the 3 miles (just short of 5k) was done in 16:57 also 3:32/km. Both of these repetitions were done on a constant uphill segment of the rail trail, and into the wind that day. Then turned back and did the 2 miles in 10:57 (3:25/km), and the 1 mile in 5:20 (3:20/km) which really made me happy since this was already like 24 or so k into the run so to pump out a 5:20 without a problem was a great feeling. I was so pumped up after this workout, I felt great, the hip was not a problem, and I was feeling incredibly optimistic about Houston. Monday came around, and again I was incredibly pumped to start up another good week, and then that would set me up for a monster week from the Nov 2-8 since I have it off from school just before starting my next placement. Got out of bed, and boom, my left knee, ya I said my left knee not my right hip which was the problem, completely buckled. It felt like someone jabbed and then twisted a knife into my patellar tendon. I couldn't extend my knee without this type of pain, and very nearly fell down the stairs when I had to carry my bike down the stairs of the apartment building to go to school. I pedalled to school that day pretty much one legged, only using the left leg to pull up on the pedal and not at all to push down since extending the knee was the biggest problem. I obviously decided to take the day off running and would bike instead on my cervelo. The knee was not much of a problem on Elektra (that's her name) since when I was in the aero bars my knee was never getting into that painful position. I had so much drive and motivation to keep the build alive for Houston, that I decided to run the workout I had planned early in the morning on Tuesday. The knee hurt bad at the start, but it seemed to loosen up, and was not much of an issue during the 1k intervals at 3:11-3:12/km. In the evening I had another run to do on the schedule, but took one or two strides and said there was no way this would be possible. The knee at this point was in an incredible amount of pain. And my hip was also hurting. I can run through one injury, I've done so many times, but when i don't know which side to limp on I have to call it. Wednesday I took off again from running, and biked on Elektra for 2 hours without any problem. Today, after my final exam and told myself the goal was just 30 minutes. I tried, took a couple strides and again the pain was brutal. Turned back in and started this post. My favourite runner, who I've been following since I started this journey in first year of undergrad, Ryan Hall, said that if you are a big dreamer you need to be very resilient because your going to get knocked down a lot, and right now I feel like I've been taking beating. I thought with this latest string of injuries, in the last 24 months, yes a whole 2 years, I can honestly say that I've been healthy and able to run without limitations, for less than 12 weeks. There was the 4 weeks in Park City, the few weeks afterwards, and a few weeks here in September and early October. When I signed up for Houston and mapped out my build-up to Scotiabank in 2013, compared to my build to Houston to match week to week to give me a gage of where I should be at. According to that this week should have been 185 kilometres, and next week should have been 200k corresponding to the Aug 5-11th week in 2013. Instead this week I am currently sitting at 16k. Training for 2:27:42 was going to be a challenge period, but to have to train with an injury (or multiple injuries in this case) is almost impossible. So the plan at this point is up in the air. If the knee magically gets better overnight then thank God, and maybe I can still manage to run the race even without good training at this critical time point. Many of you might be thinking that I'm over-reacting how is this possibly a critical time point when there is like 11 weeks or so to go until the race. Well let me put it this way, in reality 4 weeks out from the race is my last monstrous 200k+ training week cause then the 3-week taper begins running 180, 150, then race week which was 103 with the race included. In addition since this week would end up now being a tiny mileage week I'm not going to go straight to a 200k week next week. So I would probably want to do 100 mile week to get back into things, then 180, then the 200. But wait that mean 3 weeks to get back, well now its the week before December. The race is january 17, and the taper begins December 28. So really that mean you would only be able to get in 4 weeks of high-quality training. See what I mean, time is tight. Anyways I''ll update you through my twitter if any miracle happens.

Workout Sunday

Just click watch on Youtube so you can change to 720p. The sounds isn't great so if you want to here what I'm saying at start and throughout you'll have to turn volume probably to max. Final Splits: 3:14, 3:17, 3:12, 3:12, 3:07, 3:08, 3:04, 3:03. 

The Road Ahead and how I got here in the first place

This weekend I ticked off another thing on my list of goals to accomplish in running: Compete in a collegiate cross country race and be competitive. You need to understand although I've finished 1st overall in a total of 15 different road races ranging from the 5k to the half marathon, in high school I was a little better than an average runner. Sure I was the fastest distance runner in my high school by a landslide, I remember literally lapping my peers over and over again during "practices," but when it came to the big time races I always finished just outside OFSAA standards. Three times on the track - twice in the 3000 and once in the 2000m steeplechase, I finished 6th when top five made it to OFSAA. In fact during the steeplechase it was a competitor in another heat who beat me to finish 5th by less than 1 second. Then in cross country I finished twice in the teens once 18th once 17th when top 15 made OFSAA. In high school, I never really trained, and never received any help learning how to train. I often think about where I would be today if in high school I went to an athletics focused school like Bill Crothers or Cardinal Carter. It really is amazing to me to see the difference from where I was coming out of high school compared to my teammates. Amazing to think that I am not one of few, no I am the only person on the McMaster roster who did not compete at OFSAA, even more so not only did the guys on my team all go to OFSAA, most have have placed very high in the standings and medalled in the races over the years. Speaking now with all these guys however it makes me realize the incredible difference between our backgrounds and perhaps why I always finished just barely on the outside looking in. In high school, all these guys actually ran. Now what I mean is they actually had a structured training program that they followed, a training program that included base training, a strength based workout stage, and then race-specific workouts leading into various races in cross country or track. They actually ran solid mileage, more than most average marathoners run in their training. With the combination of a solid base of mileage, with strength and speed workouts built on top of it really it isn't a mystery why I could not break through and take these guys when it came to the central meet at york or the regional meet at Boyd Park. You know what my training entailed:

Cross Country Coach (French/Religion Teacher) First practice of the week: Today try to run some laps.
Second Practice of the Week: Today lets aim to run a few laps again. And so on for the rest of the season.

As you can see it was a sophisticated training method. There was no speed work, no base mileage, really no mileage to speak of. I was running only four times a week, and probably a few kilometres (maybe 4-8k at most if I was to guess- I didn't wear a watch or anything) each session. Compare that to most of the rookies on the cross/track team currently who were averaging probably somewhere in the 60-80km range if not more back when they were in high school. But then came my undergrad at York University, and a track and field course that I took. Going into the course I really had no intention of pursuing running competitively. Part of the course entailed running or participating in various track and field events and based on your results you were given a mark out of 10. We completed all the events including triple jump, shot-put, javelin, discus, the 60m dash, 200m, a few others, and then the one everyone dreaded: the mile. I remember everyone in the class shrieking at the thought of having to run a mile, and then being marked on your time. If you ran a sub 5 minute mile (faster than 3:06/km) you received 10/10. The race started, I lapped everyone multiple times, and received 10/10. I don't remember the exact time, but it was sub 5. Afterwards I thought hey maybe I'm better at this running thing then I thought. I knew from cross country practices even in elementary school that I was able to seemingly run forever. Maybe not fast at the time, but the distance of the practice or race was never an issue. Then don't quite know what I was thinking at the time since most at this point may choose to sign up for a local 5k or something, but I decided right then and there that I was going to run the Mississauga Marathon. And no I wasn't going to run just one marathon that year, I signed up for two. This is a guy who at this point had never even competed in a road race before. Sure maybe the Terry Fox run every year, but never a competitive race. I don't think I even knew how far a marathon was. Then I remember watching this documentary called the Spirit of the Marathon which documented 5 runners, two elite and three average runners, and their journeys to the Chicago Marathon. After watching that documentary I can say my life changed. I became absolutely consumed and obsessed by the challenge that the marathon represented. I watched that documentary so many times I could probably recite the lines for you. I don't really remember much about my build to my first in Mississauga in terms of what mileage I was running but I do remember various runs here or there. For example I remember the first time I ran a 32 km long run. I remember everything about it from the route I took to the feeling I got near the end. I really knew absolutely nothing about fuelling at the time, so I took no gels, no water, nothing with me except for my start and stop, no bells or whistles stop watch. And I remember it was the first time I would ever run what now seems like a small incline of a hill up Arnold in Thornhill. I remember making the turn up Arnold from Yonge St, and as I approached the 29-30km of the run, feeling like I couldn't run straight, was getting extremely light headed but battled on and wandered through in a daze-like state the last couple kilometres of that run. But instead of deterring me, that run motivated me even more and a few weeks later completed my first marathon in Mississauga on a cold and rainy morning, qualified for Boston right there, won my age group, and my journey had begun. A few months later, and more training, I took 16 minutes off my time to run 2:56 at the Scotiabank Marathon where I probably could have actually ran 2:50-2:52 if not for my hamstring completely seizing up on me going on the overpass over the DVP - damn DVP, always a pain. Sidebar: didn't even know the splits still existed for that race on sportstats, and didn't actually realize I got to the 10k mark at 39 minutes, then the 30km mark at 1:57!! 1:57 holy smokes that's 3:56/km for 30km. My goodness I ran well,, not to sound too vain. But wow that's with no real structure in a training program, no workouts, just running. Was 2:18 at 35km, then at 38-39ish was when the pace fell off the rails from the hamstring. I remember literally falling to the ground screaming in pain (well swearing/screaming) starting to ball my eyes out than got up and hobbled to the finish line with one hand basically holding/splinting my hamstring in place, and cringing with every movement and every stride.

2012 wasn't quite as magical. After Scotiabank in 2011 I was sidelined for 2 months with my first injury, a stress fracture in my tibia, came back, but soon after had to reduce my training volume again due to IT band syndrome in January and February of 2012. That year I didn't have any huge breakthroughs running 2:52 in Scotiabank in October after I went out little too fast with a 37 minute 10k split, and 1:20 through the halfway point, fell off the rails a bit at the 35-40k split, but did manage to actually finish quite strong. However, that year I did complete my first and second half marathons, and did learn a lot more about training when I started an excel spreadsheet tracking all my runs and mileage. Anyways, 2013 you guys all know about since that's when I started blogging, and when I really had a huge breakthrough season with pb's all over the map, a 1:12:22 half, a 32:40 10k, and finishing with the build and subsequent race of my life at Scotiabank 2013 with a 2:34 marathon.

The point of why I was writing this was showing where I came from and how I started, to last weekend competing in the University of Buffalo Stampede Cross Country Race. You could say I come full circle. 6 or 7 years ago you could ask me if this day would ever come of competing on and scoring points for the second best cross country team in the country, and I would've probably laughed. The race was on Grand Island in New York State. It was pouring rain all day, the course was wet and sloppy, but I felt pretty good to get after it. Well pretty nervous, but I mean the body felt good. We started and rolled quickly through the first mile in 4:58 (3:05/km), and then through 5k in 15:50. Felt good for the majority of the race except 1 stretch from about 5-6 and a bit kilometres (it was an 8km race) where I felt my breathing getting a little out of control, but finished strong for 26 minutes (3:14/km). Overall as I said to my Dad before the race, who came to drop off my passport the night before, if I finished 26 minutes, 28 minutes, or 30 minutes, whatever the time, if at the end of the race I could walk without pain in my tibia/hip I was happy. In the end, 26 minutes for a cross country race is pretty darn good, heck on the road that would be pretty decent. I just looked up a couple 8k races from last year, 26 minutes would give me 4th overall at Harry Spring Run Off even if I didn't take like 30 seconds off the time to estimate what 26 minutes is equivalent to on the road. So now onto this week. As a team we are starting to pound big mileage. This week I'm on track for about 170km. Workouts have been going really well, as I'm starting to feel more an more comfortable with the faster paces. Still this biggest thing I need to improve are my downhills. During the race, I noticed how well most of my competitors took this one very short but steep downhill on the course whereas I jaunted down carefully in comparison. Even one of my coaches commented after the workout on Tuesday that he noticed I'm tensing up on the downhills, and I just have to trust myself and let everything go to accelerate down the hill. Up next is the Western Invitational on the 26th which is one of the most difficult cross country courses in Ontario. Until then I'm continuing to focus on building big mileage and focusing a lot on strength which our new strength and conditioning program designed for our team seems to really be helping with. I won't taper at all for this one since the big one of the year to determine if I get to go to the Ontario and Canadian Championship will be the 10k in Queens on the 17th of October. Here are a few nice pics from the race:

A New Challenge

Hey all how are things. Taking the week off from doing a formal post for the weekly workout series. If your still eager and really want a workout here's a nice one I've done many times, it's a ladder style workout so it is aimed at speed development.

The Workout:

Warmup+Drills
3-5 sets (depending on abilities) of 600, 400, 300, 200 all at around 5k pace

So you run the 600m then 1:15 rest, 400m then 1 min rest, 300 then 45 second rest, then 200m and 1 min rest before starting the next set with the 600. This workout is a very high intensity one because as the speed increases the rest between intervals decreases and the 1 min between the 200m and the subsequent 600 is very difficult. Anticipate that your heart rate will be very high and you'll be breathing hard throughout the workout. Like I said it's ladder or pyramid type workout in this a broken 1500 since the 600+400+300+200 all add up to 1500m, and feel free to go after it anywhere from 3-5 times. If your still relatively new to workouts do three of them so 4.5k total of hard running, if you love pounding big long sets 5 of them will leave you winded and more than satisfied afterwards. Any questions regarding the workout feel free to comment below.

Now onto the main purpose of this post. A couple weekends ago I traveled to Wilson, New York to compete in my first ever triathlon. This time however, since my hip has continued to give me problems and after the Canada Day 5k I had to take about a week and bit off due to persistent pain in the hip, back and tibia my mileage and speed work was not up to snuff to give the full olympic distance a go. So I decided to compete in the aqua bike event which is the exact same as the olympic triathlon for distance on the swim and bike just no run afterwards. So just the first two legs of the triathlon but still a formal event which many people willingly choose to do because they dislike running, but it also worked great for an injured runner like myself. So the task at hand was a 1500m open water swim in Lake Ontario, then a 40k bike. When I arrived at the race I could see immediately  that the swim leg of the race was going to be brutal. The water had big waves about a 1m high (I think the race director said 3.5 feet) and after doing a tiny warmup swim I was actually scared to go back into the water. This wasn't really the usual pre-race jitters, this was more being downright scared that I was going to choke on water from the huge waves coming towards us on the way out and drown. Heck this was only my second ever open water swim so I was already unexperienced swimming in the open water let alone in such choppy conditions. Suffice to say I was starting to miss the pool lines at the bottom of the clear blue lanes in Thornhill. But I hadn't come all this way to give up. In addition since the water was so dangerous the race director who had already doubled the on-water firefighter staff who would travel alongside the swimmers in a boat in case anyone needed rescue or wanted to quit, and called the coast guard to check if the water was safe-ish for swimming, decided to cut the swim from two laps of the 750m course (1500m total) to one lap. This helped to ease a little bit of the anxiety at least. Soon the gun sounded and we were off. I started off just trying to focus and stay as relaxed as possible. I knew if I started panicking about the choppy conditions I would be in trouble, so I just tried to focus on one thing and one thing only: the orange bouy way out there marking the turn to the right (it was a square loop). I was really unable to find any rhythm whatsoever since the waves kept breaking up my stroke. I would basically reach my arm out to catch for my next pull and would have my hand either meet the water earlier than I anticipated due to a wave, or delayed longer than I anticipated from being at the depression in the water from an oncoming wave. But just kept focusing on the bouy ahead and it did seem like I was moving decently. Made the turn and swimming perpendicular to the waves now I could feel my stroke amping up and was starting to now focus on pulling my hand through the water harder and harder. I started take 4-5 strokes between breaths and was starting to pass bunches of swimmers. Eventually made the turn back to shore and despite having my rhythm throw off again due to the waves, heard the race director as as exited the water say that I was first place out the water. I was pretty stunned and found later that I held 1:28/100m for the 750m swim which I probably could just barely do in a pool let alone choppy open water, so I was stoked.

Ran up the stairs out of transition and did an okay job getting through transition. I was pretty happy how quickly I was able to get my wetsuit off, but was a little slow wasting time grabbing a sip of gatorade. Was through transition and next up was a 40km bike ride. My game plan was to hold my FTP (functional threshold power) which based off an all out 20 minute effort about 3 weeks before the race was 266 watts,  but if multiplied by 0.95 is 252 watts for an hour long effort, which is roughly what I was aiming for. First 5k flew by and I could feel like I was in a really good rhythm. Was about 50m back from the only person ahead of me at this point(the guy had passed me in transition from the water to the bike). I was trying to just hold my wattage not by mashing on my pedals but rather by maintaining a very high cadence at about 106 rpm. As we made the turn back south there was the slightest grade uphill probably 1.5-2% only, and I gathered myself to make a decisive pass. Held about 350 watts for 30 seconds or so then burst passed at 550 watts. From this point on just kept flying at 106 rpm, and one 5k split I had averaged 114 rpm. In the end my average power was exactly 251 watts, but normalized power was 257 watts. I finished first place completing the 40 km bike course in 59:05 which is an average speed of 40.5 km/hr. I was more than happy with this result. It was also a great learning experience to understand what it was like swimming in open water, going through transition, and experiencing the feeling that my legs would go through during a bike race. It was a very different kind of fatigue/hurt than I would experience during road races of various distances. This feeling was more like constantly going back and fourth over the "red line" crossing into anaerobic fuel sources and a kind of burning sensation in the legs throughout the bike portion of the race.

A couple weeks and tempo runs later, I felt I was ready to give the full olympic triathlon a go. The race I chose to compete in was the Peasantman Steel Intermediate (Olympic) Triathlon in Penn Yan, New York - the Finger Lakes region. The Steel race distance prides itself on being just that much more difficult then the ironman distance, in that the leg distances are just slightly longer. So instead of the typical Olympic distance which is 1500m swim, 40km bike, 10km run, the Steel Olympic Distance is a 1 mile swim (1609 m), 47.5 km bike, and a 10.5 km run. Arrived in Penn Yan the day before the race to scout out the course and try my own first wetsuit, the Nineteen Frequency. The water was beautiful but quite warm with the wetsuit on, and was unsure if there would allow wetsuits or not based on the temperature - luckily enough the temperature was just barely wetsuit legal by the USAT standards so I was excited. I had run that morning, and then biked the 47.5 km course to scout it out. What I learned was that the swim was the only flat part of the race course. There was hill after hill out on the course, including one 7 mile long hill (that's 11.2 km). So ya I was kind of now nervous because my bike and its gear ratio was set up to pound a flat course. Also in the back of my mind was the fact that the Tuesday before the race going up a big hill near Hwy 9, my chain had actually snapped into pieces. I must have made a poor gear change and not realized that I had done so and then the added tension now on a misaligned chain/chainring must have been enough to snap it into pieces. So even though it was probably my own fault, and now I had a high end dura-ace chain on the bike, it was still in the back of my mind. My Dad took notes for me at the athlete's meeting which was going on while I was on the bike, gave me the run down in the car on the way back to the hotel and we were set for Sunday.

Woke up Sunday had the usual breakfast, and went off to the race site. We arrived in great time checked my bike into transition got my body paint, timing chip and was ready to go. Just as I was about to start body gliding my entire body for the wetsuit about 50 minutes before the race I looked at another competitor who was in the half steel distance getting ready to start his race (it started at 7:30 mine was at 8). I saw him strapping on his goggles, and just then realized that I left my super expensive Speedo Fastskin Elite goggles in the hotel room. Now for legal purposes I won't devulge how far the hotel room was from the race site but my Dad all out sprinted to the car and somehow got back to the hotel and then back to the race site to hand me the goggles with ten minutes to spare before the race. I guess it was good traffic cops were manning the turns on the bike course and not on Pre-Emption Rd back to Geneva. I managed to get my wetsuit on by myself, and other than the minor heart attack when realizing I forgot the goggles, I felt pretty good. Hopped in the water warmed up a little and before you knew it we were off. I started out very fast, and quickly realized that I wouldn't be able to do any bilateral breathing for this race since the sun to the east was just so low still in the sky and too bright to look that way. I started regretting not having more shaded triathlon specific goggles (mine are competitive swimmer goggles) but soon would take advantage of the huge benefit these goggles offer. I started off to the left and when I breathed to the right I could see a few swimmers ahead and to my right. I worked hard to veer that direction and eventually got within a few meters of the two of them. I was breathing hard already at this point but my stroke felt awesome. I felt in control and powerful. Oddly enough although on the bike I prefer to sit in a slightly lower gear and maintain a very high cadence, in the water I prefer a slower stroke per minute rate but pulling hard on each stroke. as we approached the turn the two of them were really pushing hard and I was needed to work very hard to stay up with them. Witnessed some awesome technique by one of them to turn around the bouy, whereby they flipped onto to their back and rotated around the bouy using a couple backstroke pulls. Seemed to help them take the turn really quick and not lose any speed. This will definitely be a strategy that I will use next time. On our way back I started hammering, swimming at 1:07/100m for a bit as the leader seemed to really kick in into high gear on the way back to shore. That's faster than I've ever swam in my life. Then my goggles came into good use. When I caught up with the leader the peripheral vision that my goggles give me due to their design allowed my to see my opponent to the left of me while under water pulling. He was sighting often to swim in a straight line back to shore, so what I did was essentially let him sight for me and swam in his line since my goggles allowed me to keep an eye constantly on him. Eventually I worked my way onto his feet and just sat there until the end of the swim averaging anywhere from 1:12/100m to 1:24/100m which again I normally would not be able to even swim that in a pool. When I arose out of the water I was once again thrilled with my swim and was 2nd out of the water. Only problem was that I got passed in the transition run over to the bike area thanks in large part to some significant orthostatic hypotension when I got up out of the water (lightheadedness due to a drop in blood pressure (BP) that you may feel when getting up off the couch to quickly for example). I was not completely shocked by this since the Friday heading into the race had my BP and resting heart rate taken and it was 82/66 and 45 beats per minute respectively. Apparently this is quite a common feeling for triathletes after the swim since you're going from a supine position to upright position and running in a matter of seconds.

So onto the bike. Transition was pretty smooth this time much better than the last race. My game plan for the race in terms on nutrition was to have a 768 mL bottle of water + 1 Skratch labs hydration mixed into it, and a gel about 15 minutes into the bike then at about the 30km mark. I also planned to have a gel about 2 miles into the run. So I started the bike in third position. The first 5 km or so I felt pretty sluggish. We were heading into the wind and up a constant grade at this point which didn't help, plus I had gone pretty hard on the swim. By about midway through the 5-10km split I started to feel alive again, and my cadence rose from 96 to 102 and speed from 33km average to 38.7. On a slight downhill portion I cruised at 50 km/hr and reached 60.5 km/hr. By this point I had already passed both my competitors. I could just feel on every hill from about 15-40km that I was distancing myself from the rest of the field. I saw so many competitors ahead of me (who were in the steel man and half steel man distance which started before me) using what I think is poor technique for the hills. They were either doing one of two things: either staying in their aerobars for too long on the uphill, or using way too big of a gear. If you stay in your aerobars you are already putting your body at a mechanical disadvantage. In an upright position your glutes can be recruited to a greater degree, and if you own a power meter you can clearly see that in the aerobars for a climb its impossible to achieve the same power output as you can upright. Second, as the DurianRider says (great, informative and funny youtube channel) winners spin. If you've ever watched the tour de france and seen chris froome, you'll see his legs spinning like crazy up a climb. Try it yourself put the bike in a very easy gear and spin up a hill. You'll see the power output soar through the roof and probably pass a lot of other riders. After purchasing my power meter, I feel my climbing has now become one of my biggest strengths despite my tri bike not really being built for climbing. Since I've employed this strategy of spinning up climbs at a super high cadence I can pass so many people. Even just on my Saturday and Sunday rides where there are big groups out riding up north in oak ridges, I pass so many on climbs thanks to this strategy. With power, it has become so much easier to judge my effort level and has helped me from going over my threshold too early in a climb. I can simply say to myself maintain 320 watts on a climb for example and look at nothing at except that number on the garmin and I'm up the hill before you know it.

So back to the race, a cool part of the race was all the Amish folks out and about with horse and buggy, and we were told in the athletes meeting just to pass on the left. It was pretty cool. With about 10k to go on the bike I had a little conversation with myself in my head. I started thinking about the run, and thinking maybe I should ease up a bit to save something for that leg of the race. But I thought the bike at this point was my biggest weapon, so I was going to try to gap my competitors as much as possible heading into the run. So I continued to hammer the last 10 k and for an entire 5 minutes my speed did not dip below 42 km/hr. It rose constantly from 42 km/hr up to 60 km/hr then back down to 50 km/hr. It was one heck of 5 minute span where I felt I may have just locked up a victory knowing I had the run left to go, which despite not being at the same level it was last year after Park City or two years ago before Scotiabank, still is kind of my thing. As I entered the park however, and was mentally gearing up for the run something bizarre, but probably inevitable in hindsight, happened. My hamstrings, calves, quads, hip flexors, pretty much my whole body suddenly started cramping up. I carefully dismounted the bike because I didn't want to make any sudden movement at this point. I had no idea how far ahead I was of 2nd place, but knew this was going take sheer willpower to get through this run. I said inevitably because I vastly underestimated how much I would sweat on the bike since Sunday was just sweltering hot, and also I didn't really think about the fact that I probably came out of the water already about 2% dehydrated since if you've ever been in a wetsuit you'll know it can be steamy hot in there since your essentially wearing a think piece of rubber (neoprene). Also the water remember was just borderline wetsuit legal so I had sweat a lot on the swim leg, and then even more so on the bike thanks to the heat. As my Dad said after the race he could see even from where he was that as I quickly put my shoes on for the run that sweat was pouring off my face and body. So I took the other gel right then instead on waiting and started taking in as much water as I could. I started the run and passed 1k in 3:30. I was actually pretty surprised by that but by the 1 mile marker I was praying to just make it through the run in one piece. Its rare for me but I was actually taking as much water as I could at the aid stations, taking 1 or 2 cups, one to drink the other just to pour over my head since the dehydration mixed with the high heat on the day was really starting to make me overheat. Still though I was running at around 3:30/km pace and the hip and tibia actually felt okay. Really though I wasn't thinking too much about them specifically because I was pretty much running in fear the whole time of my body seizing up on me and having to stop. I got to the turnaround glanced at my watch to mark the time, and then when I saw 2nd place looked at my watch again and calculated that I was 5 minutes and 40 seconds ahead. Now even though I calculated with about 5km to go that it would take a miracle for 2nd place to catch me I still didn't feel that this one was in the bag by any means since I knew my body could just seize up and cramp at any point. In fact, at one point I had actually turned my body to take a quick check behind and felt my opposite hip twinge a little, so I knew with the dehydration still in effect I needed to be careful, run smart, and just stay as smooth as possible until the finish. Finally, I got to the finish and heard my name announced as the Peasantman Steel Distance Triathlon Champion, and I was thrilled. Thrilled but actually too tired to raise up my arms to celebrate my victory. Post race I drank three full gatorades, another bottle of scratch, and three bottles of water all before I had even got to the car to go back to the hotel. So since this is a crazy long post I'm going to wrap it up here. Basically, it was an amazing experience, and I learned so much. In addition I felt I pushed myself to a new limit, and can't wait to race another and push even harder.

Summer Workout Series #4

How ya'll doing? Hope you enjoyed last week's workout and feeling faster by the week. The reason I didn't post earlier in the week is because this week's workout is a little different. Instead of talking about a true speed workout, this week I'm talking about the importance of the long run.

What is it: the concept of having a long run inserted in runners' weekly schedule is not novel. In fact pretty much every single program you will ever look up includes a weekly long run whether you are training track and field all the way to marathons and ultra marathons. The long run is quite simply exactly what it sounds like, it's a longer run (crazy eh). Now there is quite a bit of variance in the distance of the long run, but basically it should be a minimum of 90 minutes to actually get any effect, but its distance should not account for more than 25-30% of your weekly mileage. So if your a 80 mile (130 km) a week runner your long run should't be more than 20 miles (32 km); if only a 40 mile/week runner (65 km) no more than 10 miles (16 km). In terms of scheduling long runs or progressing them it really all depends on your goal race that your training for. For instance if your a 5 km runner the long run's purpose is basically to increase your cardiovascular efficiency as well as to condition and strengthen muscles and tendons to be able to withstand the pounding your body takes during gruelling workouts on the track. In contrast, if your a marathon runner the long run is meant more to prepare your body physically and mentally to be able to withstand the distance of the race. So it will help increase your muscle and liver glycogen storage to be able to last longer in race essentially before bonking, and also to prepare you mentally to be able to stay focused for a sustained period of time. In that sense, since a long run for a track runner or shorter distance runner, 5-10k races, is really only meant to improve your ability to withstand your training on the track or fast road workouts it really doesn't have to be progressed. You may simply insert a 90-120 minute run into your weekly schedule every week. In comparison, a half marathon/marathon runner will work to progress their long run gradually working your way closer and closer to the total distance of the race. Now for progression, this really depends on your level of experience and abilities. For some odd reason runners have this thought ingrained in their minds that for a marathon the goal is to get the long run up to 20 miles (or 32 km) about a month out from their race, although I believe this is nonsense. The long run can be however long you want it to be, 20 miles is not like this magical number where if you make it to there your set to go for 26.2. In fact, I think this is totally inaccurate since based on my own experience in marathons, and other marathoners that I've talked to it's at about 37-38 km where my legs start to shake and my sense of time and place starts to get distorted. Usually at 32 k I kind of feel decently fresh (of course I'm getting tired but still I can still feel my legs, and I feel in control). So why not take it a little further. Really it's up to you, if your experienced give a bit longer of a run a go in the range of 35-36. When gearing up for 2013 Scotiabank I did the following progression a 32k, 32k, 34, 37, 38, 38, 40, 40, 41, 43 (the 43 was done in 2:45 btw), 36, 32, and then smoked a 2:34 42.2 marathon and actually felt pretty decent start to finish which I attribute 100% to being used to doing the long long distance long runs, and being used to being out for that long.

How Fast: Okay well you thought the distance of the long run had a lot of variety, well the pace and structure has even more. Basically, long runs used to be only though of as these LSD runs (long slow distance runs) where you trotted along at a conversational pace. But the long run can be so much more. You can do progression type long runs starting out nice and easy pace and getting faster and faster throughout eventually finishing at or just under marathon pace which helps prepare you to be able to run at that goal speed on tired legs and will simulate the race more closely. I did one long run in 2014 where I started at one pace for the first kilometre and then played a game for the next 35k of the run trying to just beat the previous kilometre's time. It actually made it pretty fun/strategic because I wouldn't want to beat the previous kilometre by too much so say 4:15 to 4:01, because that would mean the next would need to be faster than 4:01 and so on, which would basically start getting too fast too quick. On the other side I wouldn't want to be too too close to the last kilometre time because I gave myself a penalty kilometre if the previous kilometre's time was not beaten having to run the next kilometre under marathon pace. Aww those were fun times.

After progression long runs, there are "workout long runs" where you basically embed interval workouts into the long run and this could really be any workout from fartleks to tempo runs. For example one long run I did last year, I ran the first 30 minutes easy, then for the next 30 minutes alternated running 1 min hard at half marathon pace, 1 min easy (so 15 total hard minutes), then ran easy again for 30 minutes then another set of 1 min hard/1 min easy for 30 minutes, then finished with 30 minutes easy. I've also found throwing a tempo run into the long run is great practice, for instance training for 2013 Scotiabank one of the 38 k ones in there I did a 5 mile (8k) tempo run to the finish which again helps learning the feeling of running hard on tired legs.

In Summary the long run is an essential part of any runners program whether running 3000m to the marathon. And for me for example, it is always my favourite part of any build. I look forward to it every week. My biggest word of advice I can give you for your long run is do not think of one particular long run like the so called golden 32 km mark as the difference maker between a good race and bad. A good race comes from a collection of long runs mixed in with great speed workouts to make a great race. So with that the long run shouldn't take away from your weekly speed workout, if so your either going to far on it, or going to hard. Long runs as I've explained are incredibly flexible on how fast and how far, so you don't have to think I need to do exactly "X" distance or whatever. Again your performance on race day is the culmination of months and months of training. Until next time keep piling on the training.