St Paddy's 8K

I hadn't planned on running the St Paddy's 8K this year, but I changed my mind the day before the race for a few reasons:
1. I had been confined to the treadmill while working in New York for the week before the race.
2. The weather forecast for Saturday (race day) was rain and storms, and I thought I'd be more likely to run a race hard than I would be to drag myself to the track for my speed work.
3. My 8K PR of 41:30 (8:20/mile) from 2009 was laughable compared to my other more recent PR's

Liz, Jack and I went downtown to register the night before the race and we decided that they wouldn't come down to watch the race as it was going to be rainy and the 3pm start time was in the middle of Jack's afternoon nap.

On Saturday, I arrived downtown at 2:30pm, parked and then began my warmup. For a long time, I had never bothered running more than a few hundred yards as a warmup for a race, but I had had good success with the Run for Young and Run for the Roses after I had run a couple of miles as a warmup that I wanted to keep using what seemed to be working.

I ran a couple of easy miles, stopping occasionally for some stretching and got to the start line 3 minutes before the start of the race, warmed up and ready to go.

I knew there were plenty of rolling hills on the course and that the last mile was more up hill than any of the other miles, so I wanted to leave enough in the tank to finish strongly. Taking that in to account, I thought I'd be able to break 35 minutes and have an average pace of 7:00/mile or faster.

The race started promptly at 3pm and I was probably in the 4th or 5th row of runners to cross the starting line.

I don't remember a huge amount about the individual miles, but here are some thoughts that I do remember:

Mile 1: (6:39) I wanted to start quickly but not too fast and the slight uphill start followed by a nice steady downhill section meant I was able to get off to a good start and around some of the turns (there were lots of turns on this course!) before we came to the first of the rolling hills. I remember telling myself to relax on the uphill part and then run the downhill part harder instead of using up lots of energy going uphill and having nothing for the easier part - this is something that I think most runners struggle with, but I think I am getting better at it.

Mile 2: (7:00) This mile was rolling hill after rolling hill as we twisted and turned our way through Raleigh. The runners had spread out by this point, but I was in a little group with 3 or 4 other runners and I found it interesting that I was the only one dropping off the back of the group on the uphills and rejoining them on the downhills

Mile 3: (7:02) The course began to loop around the Oakwood Cemetery at the start of this mile and was mostly flat which was a nice change.

Mile 4: (7:12) As we completed the loop of the Cemetery we descended to the lowest point on the course and began the climb back to the finish. The climb was about 70ft over 0.6 of a mile and as I there wasn't much downhill left on the course, I knew I had to run the uphill harder or I wouldn't be under 35 minutes.

Mile 5: (7:14) The last mile was tough. The climb continued another third of a mile before a short downhill section and another quick climb as we made the final turn on to Blount Street. I knew my pace was dropping but I was about 10 seconds ahead of where I needed to be to break 35 minutes when the finish line came in to view. I waited until I had about 400 meters to go and kicked as hard as I could while watching the clock tick up. It seemed to take me forever to get to the finish line but the official clock was still in the 34:40's when I crossed.

Official Time: 34:43 (6:59/mile)
Overall: 56/2135
Age Group: 8/145

I had achieved all of my goals for the race - I broke 35 minutes and even ended up with a 6:59/mile average. I also ran a race where I had just enough for a finishing kick and ran most of the hills intelligently, so I was very happy with my afternoon's work!

Very tired about to cross the finish line!

My Current Shoes

I have three different pairs of running shoes that I wear at the moment, depending on what type of workout I am doing and I feel that they are a great combination for me at the moment.

For trail running, I have a pair of New Balance Minimus Trail (MT10) shoes. I bought these shoes a year ago and it took my legs (calves) a while to get used to the 4mm heel-toe drop and very minimal design. I have been running once a week (6-7 miles) on the trails since the start of the year and I feel like it has improved my form and leg strength.

New Balance MT10

For track running, I have a pair of Nike Free 3.0 v3 shoes. These are a more minimal, lower to the ground with less support version of the Nike Free Run that I have been running in since 2010. I had a different pair of the 3.0's in 2011, but they were a half size too small and I found them uncomfortable to run in.

Nike Free 3.0 v3

For tempo, easy and long runs, I have a pair of Brooks Pure Flow shows. The "Pure" line is Brooks' most minimal line of running shoes and I decided to give them a try after reading lots of good things about them on other blogs. So far I have put 64 miles on them including long runs of 12 and 14 miles and can safely say that I can't imagine running these workouts in any other shoe now as they are comfortable and while I can still feel the road, my calves feel great at the end of a long run.

Brooks Pure Flow

New 5K PR

I took a decent sized step towards my goal of running a sub 20 minute 5K yesterday by completing the Run for the Roses 5K in 20:27 (a PR by 15 seconds).

Although my Garmin data only reports 91 feet of elevation gain, the up hill portions of the final mile certainly felt larger than that yesterday! It was a bitterly cold day (41F, 3C) with gusting winds of around 15 miles per hour so I warmed up wearing lots of layers and stripped down to my shorts, short sleeved shirt and gloves just before the start of the race.

I banked 30 seconds or so in the first mile (6:07) when the course was mostly flat or downhill and we were protected from the wind and there was actually a point when I wondered whether I needed my gloves on or not. At the half way point the course took a turn and the up hill portions of the race began just as the wind appeared - I was glad I hadn't taken off my gloves now!

Mile 2 was steady (6:39) as I tried to maintain some speed but reserve some energy for the final mile. The final mile has a section that looks like a "S" where we turned left, right, right, left and then left in less than 0.4 of a mile which is then followed by a up hill section. I tried to keep my cadence high through this section knowing that I could easily lose 10-15 seconds if I backed off at this point. I passed a few runners in mile 3 (and didn't get passed by anyone) and didn't even notice a 6:57 split beep on my watch as we rounded the final corner and headed for the finish line.

I could see finish line clock ticking up as I made my way through the final 0.1 of a mile and I knew I'd PR. NCRC volunteers cheered for me by name as I ran towards the finish line. The clock read 20:28 as I crossed the timing mats and I hit stop on my watch. I'd later find out that my chip time was 20:27!

I didn't run the Run for the Roses last year, but the year before I had run a 22:28 and wondered if I'd ever get under 22 minutes - I think I've come a long way in 2 years! Now I just need to find another 28 second improvement from somewhere.

Joining the 1000 Mile Club

At the first quarter NCRC club meeting, the club members that had set themselves a target of running at least 1000 miles in 2011 (and succeeded) got a chance to celebrate their success and received a cool shirt from Capital RunWalk as a reward. I ran 1200 miles in 2011, so for the first time I was included! It was a fun evening and we all got together for a group photo.

The 2011 NCRC 1000 mile club

I have set myself a goal of 1200 miles (100 miles per month) again for 2012 and started out with 124 in January.

Run for Young 5K

Given that one of my goals for 2012 is to run a 19:XX 5K I decided to run the Run for Young 5K this past weekend to see what my starting point was before I start actually training!

I ran the Run for Young in 2010 and finished in 23:02 on a freezing cold day, so I knew what the course looked like and was prepared for the rolling hills of Hillsborough Street. The weather this year was much nicer (50F) and I managed to get downtown early enough to warm up for a couple of miles and do some stretching (something I very rarely manage to do before a race).

I set the Virtual Partner on my watch to 6:45 pace (which would be a finishing time of 20:58) just to help me track my pace as I really didn't think I was in good enough shape to break 21 minutes on the back of a couple of tempo runs @ 7:10 pace and one track workout. I also wore my foot pod so I could track my cadence as I was curious how well I would be able to maintain my form as I got tired towards the end of the race.

I didn't manage to weave my way to the front of the corral before the race started, so I was a little slow away from the start when the race started and had to navigate around some slower runners who just had to start at the front! The first mile seemed to take forever as we went down the hill on Edenton and then up the hill on to Hillsborough Street where we continued the slow climb to the turn around. I went through the first mile in 6:45 and felt pretty good. The second mile included a course change from 2010 where we now went around two roundabouts before heading back down Hillsborough Street. By the time we made it to the roundabouts, I was already beginning to feel the pace catching up with me and was spending more and more time focusing on my form.

My watch beeped for a 6:53 mile for mile 2 which I was really happy with as I had been working hard and would have been disheartened to see a 7:XX pop up. By this point I was part of a little group of about 5-7 runners that all appeared to be running around the same pace. Running in a group helped me through the next three quarters of a mile as I was struggling to maintain the pace and staying in or around the group became my focus. As we got to the downhill/uphill intersection of Hillsborough/Edenton, I relaxed as much as I could going up the hill and was surprised at how I wasn't left behind my the other runners who attacked the hill and just as the hill crested I kicked for the finish line with about 200 meters to go and managed to pass all of the other runners in the group to finish in 21:07. I had run mile 3 in 6:50 and the last .11 in 38 seconds.

I finished in my 5th age group and 46th overall.


The race seemed well organized with a good Police presence at the major intersections and plenty of High School students at the finish line to hand out refreshments. Precision Race Timing provided the timing and used their "disposable bib-chip timing" system (the same system that was used at the City of Oaks Marathon) and again came up short. The "check your time" system again wasn't working and when someone typed my bib number in for me, I was given a time of 20:37 which was 30 seconds off. I checked with some friends that were also running and they had received text messages with incorrect times as well. For some weird reason, only age group winners were given awards (not the usual top three in each age group) and the final results that were posted on line showed only the gun time and not the chip time.

I took a look at my cadence data and can see that my cadence gradually dropped throughout the race from a starting point of 100-101/minute in the first mile to 95-97/minute in the second mile and 94-96/minute in the third mile (I finished with 101-102/minute in the final kick for the finish line). This backs up my feeling that my form began to break down early in mile #2 and continued throughout the race as I struggled to maintain the pace. Regardless, running at 6:48/mile pace puts me at a great starting point for 2012 and my goal of 6:26/mile and a 19:XX finishing time.

Marathon Recovery - Ouch!

I am sure my one reader wondered where I went after I finished the City of Oaks Marathon on November 6th. Well, the majority of the aches and pains went away two days after the Marathon. In fact, all of the aches and pains that I had been feeling after the Marathon were gone by Wednesday morning. However, that was when I started to feel pain in my left foot.

I initially ignored the pain as I thought it was the result of adjusting the way I was walking due to the aches and pains I had been feeling. The pain was on the top of my foot and was more of a dull ache whenever I put my weight on that foot and a sharper pain when I flexed my toes. I ignored it until Friday morning when it hadn't got any better and I decided to go for a run to see whether it was something that would work itself out. It wasn't.

I turned to my trusted friend Google and went through the symptoms for a stress fracture. I didn't have any noticeable swelling or bruising and I couldn't find a particular spot along any of the metatarsals but I certainly had a continual dull ache and pain whenever I applied weight or flexed my toes. I tried ice, I tried heat, I tried elevation and I even tried cotton balls between my toes but the pain just moved around and never really went away.

After 3 weeks, I went to see Dr Boehm at Raleigh Foot and Ankle and got some X-Rays. Dr Boehm was very knowledgeable and quickly diagnosed me with a 'Stress Reaction' and not a Stress Fracture. He said that I could return to running on soft surfaces and as long as I kept my mileage low, I wouldn't adversely effect my recovery time which he put at 6 weeks from the Marathon. He said that it is very common for first time Marathoners to experience a Stress Reaction which is something that occurs along the way to a Stress Fracture and that if I had continued to run in the first couple of weeks after the Marathon, I would have most likely ended up with a full blown Stress Fracture and a long road to recovery.

I must say that by the time I got to week 5, I was becoming skeptical as I still hadn't seen much improvement and was beginning to get frustrated at being unable to flex my toes without pain. However, by the end of week 5 things had started to improve and I went out for my first run. I felt some discomfort, but certainly not much at all and after stretching and icing at the end of my run I woke up the next day feeling better than I did before the run. By the end of week 6, I was completely pain free... maybe these doctors do know what they are talking about after all!

I have been gradually increasing my mileage and changed the way that I lace my shoes to reduce the pressure on the top of my foot and today I am pain free and ready to start training for something again!

2012 Goals

I struggled for a while to decide on my goals for 2012, mainly because I had been fixated on running a Marathon for such a long time that I hadn't really looked past it.

Before I had even got to the start line of the Marathon, I knew it would be a long time before I trained for and ran another one. It just takes too much time out of my limited time with my family (long runs on Sunday could take 5 hours without adding time for a shower and then an afternoon nap).

With that in mind, I will be sticking to the shorter distances in 2012 and turning my focus to running faster. I feel that I can improve on all of my PR's with some training that is focused on improving my speed (and form). Add in losing 5 lbs and we have the following:

1. Run a 19:XX (or better) 5K. Given that my 5K PR is currently 20:42, this might be too much of an improvement to hope for in one year, but there isn't much point setting a goal that I can achieve easily! There are lots of 5K's in the area so I probably won't train with a particular one in mind (at least in the first half of the year) and will just pick one when I think I am ready.

2. Run a 1:09:XX (or better) 10 miler. I ran a Half Marathon @7:22/mile, so running 10 miles @6:59/mile is certainly achievable on the American Tobacco Trail course. 10 mile races are few and far between, so this attempt will have to be at the ATT 10-miler in October.

3. Run a 1:33:XX (or better) Half Marathon. This would be an improvement of 12 seconds per mile so is probably the most achievable of my running pace goals for 2012. My long term goal for the Half Marathon is to run at sub 7:00/mile, but I think a 22 second per mile improvement in one year is too much to ask for. I am toying with the idea of running a April Half Marathon and am already signed up to run in Richmond, VA in November (which is mostly flat with a downhill finish).

4. Get my weight down to 150lbs and keep it there!