Starting to get there again!

If you tuned in to my last blog post, you saw just how injuries can and do get to each and every one of us at some point. When you train hard, unfortunately, you are constantly walking the line between injury and health as you push the limits of training. The best thing you can do is to do your best preventative efforts to keep injuries at bay to the best of your ability. This includes things like stretching properly, strengthening adequately, proper nutrition, and training smart.  A part of training smart is to listen to your body. When you feel fatigued for multiple days in a row, it might be time to give yourself a rest day so that your body can complete the regeneration processes.  If you don't, the body will continue to break down and that's when injuries are destined to get you.  That's not the only way injuries can get you though. Sometimes, it's just a freak incident that is out of your control.

My injury occurred from having a lapse in good training judgement for just a few days. Sometimes, that's all it takes to have problems creep in. Fixing the issues takes longer than if you just keep them away from the beginning.

The good news is that over the last two weeks, my rehab has been going extremely well. I felt pretty darn good by Saturday and so I decided I would give the 10 mile tempo run a try. The plan was to do keep going so long as I was able to maintain a solid tempo run pace and so long as I didn't have any discomfort in my knee. Much to my liking, I started the tempo run and was able to hang on to Kimi for the entire way. We smoked the 10 mile tempo run under an hour. I was a bit shocked I was able to hold it together for the entire way.

Last week, I managed a total of 50 miles for the week. This is still much below where I'd hoped to be at this point, but it is much more reasonable than some of the prior weeks had been. Starting the year, I had a goal of 3000 miles.  If I'm going to get there, I'm going to have to start hitting some solid miles pretty soon since I have a lot of ground to make up.

This week's goal-
Keep my streak of consecutive days run alive,
2 hard workouts
2 weights days/rehab days
55+miles

Injuries can get us all. It's how we pick ourselves back up that matter most!

These last few weeks with the snow on the ground were frustrating. Just prior to that, Kimi and I had a stellar week.  I wrote my last blog about the time the snow nailed us good. I had plans to be hitting a lot of miles over the past couple weeks and I was determined to make it happen. The first Monday after the first dump truck of snow, Kimi and I ventured out to go for a run.  We cut it short after we decided that the snow was simply too deep to fight through and get any real benefit.  We jumped in the car and I took Kimi to the gym where she finished up her remaining mileage for the day.While she was doing that, I ventured back outside on the treacherous roads.  That's when everything started to fall apart a bit. With my lack of treadmill access, I will typically make it outdoors or not run at all. Since the snow lingered pretty much all week, I was unable to get outside and do much running whatsoever.  By the weekend, Kimi and I decided (against better judgement) to go to Wilson's Creek Battlefield to run Friday, Saturday, and Sunday because this seemed to be the only place we could find where the roads were completely clear. We ran an easy run Friday of 5 miles.  Then we backed it up Saturday with a smoking fast 6 mile tempo run. And then came Sunday; we were planning to do our long run there and after 1 loop around, I started to feel a tweak in my knee. I'm usually pretty cautious in these scenarios so I immediately called it quit with 5 miles.  Most of the time, these types of things are held at bay by simply not pushing through discomfort and making things worse but not always. I went back out for a run the next day and the knee was good until about 6-7 miles into the run. That's when I finally had to pull the plug and start analyzing exactly what was going on with me physically. I haven't been able to do a lot of running over the last 2 weeks due to the knee and my fear of making it worse by running on the snow and icy conditions.  In the mean time, I did a lot of indoor rehabilitation exercises to start stabilizing my hips and knees since the lack of working out definitely seemed to aggravate my condition. I went 4 straight days with no running (complete torture) and then started back into things last weekend.

Easy 4 mile run on Friday went fine. And much to my surprise, I hadn't lost too much of my fitness on Saturday when I decided to go for a tempo run with Kimi. The plan was to simply keep going as long as I felt good and could keep up. I made it the entire 8 miles at sub 6 pace. We were moving!

I think I'm definitely turning the corner and getting back on track. I don't know that I will be ready for Rock the Parkway in April (at least not how I'd hoped) but so long as I'm ready to roll in May and June, I'll be a happy man.

I wrote this blog to let you know that even when you do your best to take care of yourself, injuries can still occur.  As much as we'd love to completely eliminate them, even when you do preventative injury routines and exercises, injuries can still occur.  The entire philosophy behind injury prevention is to reduce the likelihood though it doesn't always work, it does reduce the frequency of injury. (This is my first limiting injury since 2008).

Quick recap!

It's been a while since I have written so let me catch you up really quickly. The main reason I haven't posted recently is because I haven't felt like there has been all that much to talk about.  That, however, has started to change. Over the last couple weeks, Kimi and I have been logging some pretty good miles. Just last week, we finally made it over the 60 mile/week amount for what should have been the beginning of a nice long string of 60+ mile weeks. We have started adding some acceleration runs and steady tempo runs into the mix so that we can start generating some faster strength before we add in multiple workouts each week. Since Kimi and I both don't really enjoy the cold weather, we are typically just trying to survive the winter with enough miles to be rocking and rolling by April and May.  With Kimi's Olympic Trials race a year away, we have been determined to prove to ourselves that we can reach our goals despite the cold weather. Things had been going extremely well prior to the snow fall that makes it nearly impossible to have quality runs outdoors in Springfield. If only I had the means to plow the trails in the area. I would have got it done the first day and then perhaps I wouldn't have ended up with the tragedy of a week that I had last week.  This week, we are focused on getting back on track.

Up to this point, we have completed a 3 mi, 4 mi, and 6 mi tempo run and they have all been quite impressive.  Last year in the early spring, we had several of our tempo runs where it was all we could do to hit 6 min pace or slightly under. So far this year, we've been cruising closer to 5:50-55 pace which is exactly what we're needing to do to truly be prepped for our April and June goals.

Our goal this week is to hit 70 miles with one acceleration run and one stellar ladder workout on Saturday. I'm pretty excited that I'm now able to start focusing more on my running and finishing up our house remodel now that my weekends won't be full of continuing education seminars for some time now. As much as I love learning new things, I also love my weekends!

This weeks goal - 70 miles
Result= in progress!

2014 Year in Review! Welcoming 2015!

As 2014 comes to a close, I figured I'd write one recap post for the year. This year was an interesting one to say the least. Kimi and I started the year off by training for the Rock the Parkway half marathon in April. It wasn't our best training leading up to that race as we both have a hard time dealing with the cold temperatures and Kimi was sick for a week or two about 5 weeks prior to the half.  That definitely slowed us both down a bit. However, with that in mind, I still managed to run a 1:16:30 and Kimi was still able to win the race outright. The times we ran were a huge eye opener for us though. We knew that we were going to have to get some serious training in for the next two months heading into the Grandma's marathon in June.

This year's Grandma's marathon was one of our best experiences yet. Kimi ran amazing and qualified with a B-standard for the U.S. Olympic Trials Marathon which will be held in February 2016 in L.A. I will never forget the feeling watching her cross the finish line just shortly after me.  She ran a 2:41:54 and I ran a 2:38:05. Both P.R.'s.

After that race, we were both pumped up with the results which caused us to go right back to training with very little rest. This made running for the next few months feel almost like a chore rather than something we just craved doing like before. We still managed to put in some good training but our performances were more hit or miss rather than always being hits like we're used to.

We definitely traveled a bunch this fall.  We went to KC twice, Columbia once, and Tulsa once.  The races didn't all go as planned but we were still able to learn some good lessons from each experience that will help us in 2015.  We capped off our racing season with our annual appearance at the Bass Pro half marathon where Kimi brought home another 1st place effort and I managed a 4th place time.  It was a bittersweet day for me.  I had finished in the top 3 for the past 3 years so this was disappointing to have that streak broken.  However, I am quite proud of my efforts after fighting the side stitch that nearly debilitated me at mile 8.

In all, 2014 was a pretty solid year of running. Our total miles were the least we've run in the past 4 years but our marathon performance makes everything else from this year just not seem as important. We are both looking forward to 2015's running challenges and races. In 2015 we plan to run the Rock the Parkway half again followed by the Grandma's marathon just like this year.  However, the intent is to literally 'rock' Rock the Parkway this time around as prep for our June marathon where we intend to run some new personal bests again this year.

Happy New Year everyone!

Year Recap-
2536 miles
2:38:05 Marathon - New P.R.
1:15:20 Half Marathon
16:30ish 5k

Merry Christmas and Happy Running, from Dr. Marshall Reed

The last couple weeks have been solid. Kimi and I are almost back up to normal mileage amounts for ourselves. Last week, we covered 46 miles without any workouts. We haven't started workouts just yet.  Usually when we don't do workouts, we like to have solid runs that are finished off with the last one fast one rule. This simply means our last mile is about 20 seconds faster than our fastest mile of the run up to that point. We've had multiple 'last one fast one' miles around 6:20 so far. This just helps us to stay out of a training rut as we are simply adding mileage.

This has been a great week so far. We fought the urge to stay in bed yesterday morning when the weather was just gross outside. At first, we were a bit worried about slippery conditions but Kimi decided to go outside and check the roads to see if they were slippery or just wet. Fortunately, they were only wet for the most part. There were a few bridges that we crossed that were covered in slush and slowed us a bit but we managed to keep moving right through it.  As much as I love this Christmas and New Year's seasons, that is usually the beginning of the real winter temperatures and weather. On a brighter not, it means that there are only about 60-75 more days of really cold temperatures prior to the weather shifting back to warmer conditions. When you think of it like that, it sure makes things easier to persevere through all the training.

Keep in mind, what you do over the next 2 months sets you up for the rest of the year's training and racing seasons. That usually helps keep you motivated.

I now want to take this time to wish you all a very merry Christmas and a happy New Year. May you have much joy spending time with your families. Have safe travels and may all your wishes come true! That last line sounds kind of lame but I hope you enjoy anyways!

MERRY CHRISTMAS!

(I'll be back after the presents have all been opened!)

Getting back at it!

If you read my last post, you got a good idea of how important rest is and how much we were looking forward to having that rest this year. This is the time of year that is most difficult for Kimi and me to accomplish our runs. The weather turns cold, outdoor conditions (rain/snow/daylight) make it difficult, and our next event isn't for several months. However, this winter we are determined to conquer all of those things and better than we have ever done before.

We both have high aspirations for next year's racing seasons and we don't want to start out the year behind like we did this past year (mostly that was due to a couple sicknesses that set us back). Kimi and I have been running extremely low mileage over the last couple weeks allowing for some much needed rejuvenation prior to hammering the next 6+ months of training. We are planning to venture into mileage amounts higher than we've ever done in order to try to really see just what we are completely capable of. 

Yesterday was our first day to miss running in over 3 weeks. It wasn't due to a lack of wanting to go, but simply from the icy conditions outdoors and our lack of treadmill access. I'm not typically a fan of the treadmill but when used occasionally, it's better than not being able to run at all. I keep telling Kimi that we should have invested in one back in August when I almost bought one for a good price at a Sports Authority going out of business sale. I wish I had done so now.  Unfortunately, that just wasn't in the cards at that time to get one. 

Over the next several weeks, Kimi and I will be returning to normal mileage amounts for us (50+ miles per week).  Then we will venture into the 70's and hopefully by the time mid-May comes around, we'll be rolling in the 80's and 90's. Time will tell, but I think it's going to be a great 2015 of running.  2014 was good but I expect an even better 2015.

The power and importance of rest! (and a quick month recap)

First of all, let's do a quick recap about what's been going on for the last month. The last time I posted, Kimi and I were preparing for her to run the Kansas City Half Marathon.  Headed into the race, I was quite confident in Kimi's abilities as our preparation over the weeks leading into it pointed towards a quality outing. On race day, we headed downtown and were ready to go for what should have been an exciting morning. I was on a bike riding all over the city cheering for Kimi. After 3 miles, Kimi was right in the mix for a top 3 place.  That was the last time I saw her for about 3 more miles. Around the 6 mile mark, I was waiting for her to pass me by when the 3rd and 4th place girls went by and Kimi wasn't anywhere to be seen. I knew immediately that something wasn't right. I waited just a little longer to see if she was on her way or if she had dropped out for some reason. After a little longer, she came around the corner and I could tell immediately that she was upset. She shouted to me that she had fallen at mile 4.  I asked her if she was ok and she said she was.  She continued the race, but at this point, had simply lost too much ground to make up. Kimi finished 5th that day with a time right around 1hr 21 min. She wasn't happy at the finish and I had to reassure her that unfortunate circumstances like these do occur and that she would have been right in it if it weren't for the fall.

Two weeks later, we were both gearing up again for another half marathon. This time, the Bass Pro Cohick half was the goal. This is one of my favorite races each year because it's competitive enough for me to really compete and it usually brings out some of my better racing. I told Kimi prior to the race that I thought she'd be surprised with just how well she would run.  She was a little unsure based on how the KC half ended up. She sure didn't disappoint one bit. She rolled in a 1st place finish with a time of 1:18:35. This isn't her best time, but it was pretty impressive considering the colder temps and strong winds that were out there.

My race was an interesting one. I started out and was shocked by how many guys were really competing for the top 3 spots in the half. This became clear immediately after the break from the Marathon course which was only a mere 1 mile or so into the race. I never gave up hopes that I would be able to finish in the top 3 spots.  I had moved into 4th place by mile 4 and was slowly picking up ground on the  3rd place guy.  As soon as the course started heading back South, I felt it start happening.  I could feel the side stitch creeping into my side. I eased up the pace hoping to hold the stitch at bay and was able to do so for about 3 miles. It was there but not full bore.  Over those 3 miles, I was unable to close the gap on the 3rd place guy but I hadn't really lost anything either. We were both maintaining a consistent pace. That's when I decided to start picking it up again. Just before the 8 mile mark, I had closed the gap significantly.  I still trailed him by probably 10 seconds but that was down from 21 seconds the mile before so I was really gaining confidence.  That's when it happened again. This time, it was instantaneous. "BAAAM!"  Felt like I had taken a knife in the side of my abdomen. This was one of those, 'you aren't running through it' kinds of side stitches.  I had a dilemma on my hands. Do I stop and try to get it to go away, and then continue or suffer to the point that I am forced to a walk anyways. I hit a water station and decided to stop, drink some fluids, and stretch my abdomen out as well as I could. I wasted nearly 30 seconds at this stop but it was well worth it.

I continued on and at this point couldn't see the 3rd place guy anymore. As I was leaving Phelps Grove Park, I was finally to a straight stretch long enough to catch a glimpse of him again. I wasn't sure I would stand a chance to catch him but I'm not one to give up hopes. I was able to get my pace back down to about 5:45 pace. Then 5:35 pace. Then 5:30 pace. I was once again rolling. And by mile 11, I could really tell I was gaining on him and I was gaining fast. There is a pretty good uphill climb just before mile 12 and at this point, I was certain that I was moving fast enough to catch him and perhaps pass right by him. That's precisely what I did. Unfortunately, as I went past him, I could feel myself running out of gas and I knew that if I was going to beat him, I was going to need to put some space between us prior to the last half mile.  I continued pressing but just couldn't shake him. That's when I said to myself, when we turn the corner with .3 to go, I'm going to give it one last all out push to see if he has it in him. I think he was thinking the same thing and unfortunately for me, he really had it and I didn't any longer. He poured it on and I just watch him roll away from me.  It's not like I gave up, but when you have it, you know it, and when you don't, well, you know that too. This was the year that ended my top 3 finishes streak.  Perhaps this will simply motivate me to be even more prepared next year.

And that brings me to my next point. AHHHH REST!!!  Following our June Marathon, Kimi and I didn't take the proper recovery time prior to picking up our training for our next set of races. What a mistake that was. Coming off the high that was our Grandma's Marathon, where we both set personal bests and Kimi qualified for the Olympic Trials, it was extremely difficult to stop training. When you accomplish something like that, and feel so good about it, stopping just doesn't seem like the thing to do. You typically feel like, 'I can do better so let's getting prepping right now!'.  Probably not the best idea.  We learned the hard way on that one. By the time August had come around, both of us were starting to feel mental fatigue and physical fatigue.  That is precisely what made our training for this fall racing season not go exactly how we would have liked it to go. However, thanks to that experience, we have learned our lesson and probably at the perfect time because now we are within 16 months of Kimi's Olympic Marathon Trials.  That means that over the next 16 weeks, everything needs to be scheduled precisely with cycles that allow for adequate training and preparation for the next several racing seasons or else our training for the biggest race of her life, will be a struggle rather than a blast!

So when you ask us how much we're running right now, you'll get the answer that most people would have never guessed. Kimi and I are hitting a whopping 3 miles per day this week following '0', Zero, Notta, Zip, running last week. And next week, we're going to hit an impressive 4 miles per day!  Perhaps by February, we'll be rolling in the miles and won't be feeling bogged down after this nice recovery period.

Don't worry though, I'm sure I'll have plenty of fun stuff to write about over the next several months which will include many cold, dark, and challenging runs as we prep for another trip to the great Grandma's Marathon!