I love the fact that not many people can say
'Oh, I went out and ran 20 miles today.' I love how much dedication it takes
and how much you learn a lot about yourself, your physical and mental limits.
There's just something about it. - Shalane Flanagan
Last night was my last double digit run for IMWI training.
As my plan prescribes running for time, I went out for my 105 minute run. As
luck (a better term for bad planning) would have it, my Garmin was completely
out of battery, so I really just ran for time. This morning I clicked away at
mapmyrun and found I ran 11.8 miles, for just under a 9 min/mile pace.
As I’ve mentioned, I’m on the Endurance Nation bandwagon,
but I will freely admit that long runs are one of the times I just ignore the
prescribed workout and do the time at whatever relaxed pace feels right. I love
long runs- they are probably my favorite part of this sport. I’d say the main
reason is that they just make me feel badass. Something about being able to
knock off a 17 miles run like its no big deal (or well, it is, and your legs
tell you it is, but you did it anyway). There is no feeling like going to work
at 8am with compression socks on and knowing you already ran a half marathon. I
know long rides have a similar badass-ness to them, but to me they just don’t
feel the same.
So why do I ignore the prescribed workouts? I feel that long
runs take a certain zen aspect. As most people have found, when you run 30
minutes on a treadmill, if you stare at the screen, it will seem like time stands
still. When I’m running long, I
want to avoid looking at my watch and allow my mind to wander. Of course this
only pseudo works, as I always run on the lakefront and know where every mile
is and my approximate time, and still look at my watch a fair amount. Something
about having to hit intervals takes the fun and freedom out of it. My time ends
up being typically around 9 min/miles, which is faster than my Z1 pace but
slower than my Z2 pace. I feel it
is an optimistic yet realistic approach for my Ironman (well, more on the
optimistic side of that).
Last night’s run went by pretty quickly. After two weeks of 2.5 hr runs, taking
45 minutes off it makes it seem like child’s play. I felt pretty effortless the
whole time. I had some stomach
problems, the cost of eating like crap recently, but I embraced them. I told
myself that come race day, the chances of my stomach feeling calm are about 0%,
so I want the experience of “look, I can run with my stomach sloching,
cramping, etc”. The true sign of just how badly I’ve been (over)eating is that
I went the whole time with no gels.
I guess I had some carbs stored up.
The best news was that my shins survived! After a scare of
repeat shin pain on Monday, I was quite worried. I wore compression sleeves and
had some mild soreness at first, but then nada. With the taper increasing, I
think that I’ll prevent it from becoming an issue.
I’m going back and forth on how bad I think the marathon in
the IM will be. I think I am naïve
to think it will be “good” or “not too bad”. When I think about marathons I’ve
done, the key leading up to them was rest, rest, rest. As a marathon training pace leader, I
use to tell my group to go to the expo on Friday so they would be off their
feet on Saturday. I am next to
positive that swimming 2.4 miles and then biking 112 is much, much, much more
taxing than walking around an expo. I have in general run well off the
bike. My run times for
half-ironman have been pretty good. But a marathon is different. They say the line will come and it will
suck. Hopefully you push the line off as far as possible, and you know you are
in trouble if you meet the line at mile 10. I think the best approach I’ve
heard is to think of it as just running aid station to aid station. Anyone can
run a mile. Just keep stringing
them together.
Today I am driving up to Madison to do my last ride on the
course tomorrow. I never got the
11-28 cassette, and now I’m thinking it is too late. I do have a triple crank,
so I think I have more gearing options than most, but the engineer in me sadly
doesn’t know this stuff very well…
I am putting off today’s swim race rehearsal until
Sunday. Sunday I will discover
just how swimming for 1.5-1.75 hrs feels. Ahh!
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