Week 1 – Philadelphia Marathon Training

Today is the day! I started my 18-week training plan for the Philadelphia Marathon today.

Health Check: I feel well-rested and excited. My calves are a little sore since I’ve been trying to change my form and land on my midfoot. My quads are also a bit sore from yesterday’s somewhat hilly run.

Today’s Workout: 4 Miles - Easy

I’ve been building my base for several weeks now, keeping my mileage relatively high so that training wouldn’t come as a shock. Running too much too fast can cause injury – so I’ve been sticking to the 10% rule (increase your mileage by 10% each week. i.e. if you ran 20 miles last week, you can safely run 22 miles this week).

I enjoyed my last few pre-training runs, and have been trying to focus on my form. I had a summer Friday last week (lksjdfl I LOVE SUMMER FRIDAYS!), so I changed it up and did my long run that day so I could enjoy more weekend carousing.

Let me start off by saying that nutrition is probably the most important part of my pre-long-run routine (I would guess this is true for most, but I don’t claim to be an expert on this stuff). I can run a race on little sleep (as I almost always do), I can use music or podcasts to readjust my mental game, and I can promise myself the fruitful rewards of a bagel sandwich and an iced coffee to get me through almost any distance. But there is no way to overcome poor pre-run nutrition.

Thursday night dinner: 4 draft beers + 1 hot dog = uncomfortable long run

I got a little overzealous about having the next day off, so I wasn’t thinking about how those draft beers would feel in 80 degree heat the next morning. I also ate too much right before my run, and didn’t leave enough time between eating and running. As I suffered through the miles, I came up with a Wise Tip of the Day - remove hot dogs from any pre-run meal and you should be good to go.

I ran the first half without music, trying to power through my rumbly tummy and dehydrated muscles. I ran over the Williamsburg Bridge, and I can tell I am getting into slightly better shape since I didn’t feel like collapsing at the end of each incline. I kept my pace easy, and didn’t really look at my watch except to count down the miles to my iced coffee.

*I did in fact run 8 full miles, but my Garmin mistakenly clocked my first mile too quickly. I know my routes well enough to know where the general mile markers are, and I DEFINITELY know that I did not run that first terrible mile at a 7:24 pace.

I spent my day off cleaning, reading, and treating myself to a new pretty dress from Dalaga. As much as I love Summer Fridays, I dislike seeing all of the other people sitting in coffee shops doing absolutely nothing. WHAT do you all do for a living? I DON’T understand this counter-culture in Brooklyn.

Typical.

I went home to Connecticut this past weekend with Keith, and we traveled up to the Brimfield Antique Show with his mom.

We went last year, and I picked up a few great pieces for my apartment (including a rustic red trunk that is supposedly from the 1890s – it now doubles as a coffee table and my nail salon). We each had our responsibilities for the day - Keith was the negotiator and overall strongman, Mrs. Langlais was our go-to decision-maker, and I fulfilled the important role of initiating snack time and pee time.

Probably thinking about my next snack.

We definitely left with fewer items this year, but each purchased a few cool things. I got a set of orange Fiestaware salt & pepper shakers that I’m obsessed with, Keith got a pennant from the 1969 Pasadena Bowl Boston University played in (a rare find considering BU no longer has a football team…), and Mrs. Langlais got a picnic basket. 

Our picnic! Initiated by me.

We picked up some goodies on the way home from antiquing, and had ourselves a perfect summer evening.

Perhaps my finest photography to date.

I did a quick run on Sunday morning to add to my weekly mileage for last week, and I ended it by running the last quarter mile without my shoes on. I wanted to check how my form was, and I ended up kind of liking it! I certainly don’t have that luxury in my neighborhood, which is often littered with erroneous trash from hipsters and bums alike, but I’m hoping to add it into my routine at the track.

Ok back to today’s momentous occasion – the marathon!!!

Truth be told, I am a bit nervous. Before today, I was remembering mostly the negative effects of training – spending countless hours running on Saturday mornings, cutting down on social outings to fit in workouts, FATIGUE, and the overall effect of how marathon training slowly takes over your life. I’m adding two weeks onto my training compared to last year, and I’m often worrying about whether it will be enough, or more likely, too much.

But this morning for some reason, I woke up with a big smile on my face, and remembered all of the AWESOME parts of training – eating in excess without guilt, laying low on Friday nights to carb-load, enjoying lots of time to yourself and with Harry Potter audiobooks, and the overall sense of accomplishment from completing a feat that most people never do. Also, I found out last night that my super-running cousins also signed up for Philly!!!! So many things to look forward to.

I kicked off my training with a 4-Mile run – without my Garmin. I brought my iPod for a little companionship, but also to remind myself to go at an EASY pace. I am following my self-imposed rule from last week to devote one easy run a week without pace-checking technology. I gave my sore legs an easy warm-up mile, and then did the rest at a comfortable pace.

So here’s to 18 weeks of long runs, sore muscles, and pasta. And good luck to everyone who’s also starting to train for fall marathons!!!

Barefoot Running, and the Eye-Opening Watch Debacle

As I mentioned last week, I have made it my goal to lose the plantar fasciitis that has been bugging me for over a year. I got a new pair of minimalist shoes (which are all the rage in the running community) to help me alter my running form. I am a shameful heel striker, and I am on a mission to change that.

I tried out my new (PURPLE) sneakers, and they felt great. I also tried landing on my midfoot on a treadmill, and that felt OK too. But overall, it still felt pretty awkward. I didn’t know where to bend, what to bend, or where to land. As it turns out, changing your running form after years of wearing cushioned sneakers does not happen overnight.

So I decided to do some research. I Googled “Barefoot Running,” and came across a book written by a guy appropriately named “Barefoot Ken Bob.” The book, Barefoot Running Step by Step, chronicles how Ken, who is widely considered as the Guru of barefoot running, came to run 76 marathons (you guessed it) – barefoot. I didn’t actually buy the book, but Amazon's preview gives you quite a bit of pages to read without dipping into your electronic wallet.

Ken’s “Most Important Lesson” in the book to help you run barefoot – bend your knees. It seems so simple. But then I thought about it, and remembered this photo from the Brooklyn Half-Marathon:

My legs are almost completely straight. What happens when your legs are straight? You heel strike. What happens when your legs are bent? You land on the balls of your feet.

When I got home from work, I tried on a pair of Nike Frees that Keith lent me to try out, and went for a bent-knees run. And it worked!

Ken talks about how bending your knees fixes a lot of problems all at once – it makes you land on the balls of your feet (which absorbs the shock, and in turn decreases the chance of injury), and you are automatically set up to run in a forward motion. It was incredible to me how bending my knees naturally made me go faster, and it felt effortless. I was intending to go out for an easy jog since I did a five-mile run yesterday morning, but I ended up clocking in at an 8:33 pace (which is on the quicker side for me).

Barefoot Ken - notice the bent knees.

So what’s next? Well as most running rules go, do everything in moderation. My body isn’t used to this new form, so I’m going to try and ease into it. I want to try out running barefoot on the track by my apartment, and slowly incorporate this new technique into my daily runs. Also, marathon training starts next week (!!!), and I want to be as injury-free as possible. I have noticed, however, that my IT band that is normally a little sore, feels much better this week. A byproduct of the midfoot strike? Perhaps.

**(For more info on barefoot running, check out Ken’s book or his website, barefootrunning.com. I do not claim to be an expert on this stuff, or on anything really, so the above is just what I saw as the key takeaways).

After my first bent-knee run, I plugged my Garmin watch into my computer to upload both my morning and evening runs. While I do love my watch, it has a really hard time reading a charge or connecting to my computer. It takes me about five minutes to figure out how to connect it to anything, and it gives me serious rage that normally only comes from a crowded subway ride. During last night’s fit, my Garmin went completely blank. More rage. Keith and I tried fiddling with it, but nothing happened.

I became slightly dramatic, and was trying to plot out the time it would take for the manufacturer to fix it. JUST as I am about to embark on an 18-week long running voyage, my amazing GPS, pace-keeping watch decides to pucker out. My life is so hard.

At the end of my rant, Keith said very wisely, “You know, people were running before there was technology.” Bam. The birds began to sing, and the stars aligned. I began to think about his comment more, and I realized that I did my entire marathon training last year with my cheap, pink Timex watch. No GPS, no pace updates. Often times, I left it at home. During the actual marathon, I think I only looked at it three times.

In a dramatic statement that I will probably regret later, I have decided to run one day a week without a watch. I will need it for speed work, and I will probably want it on my long runs to see how many more times I need to run over the Williamsburg Bridge to make 18 miles, but I’m going to pick one easy run and forego my beloved technology.

I don’t want to become a slave to my paces or lose sight of why I started running – for fun. I truly loved training last year, and while it was a bit tiring at times, I never lost sight of why I signed up in the first place. I wanted to complete a marathon, and I wanted to enjoy it.

Starting next week, I will begin ramping up my mileage quite a bit, and to avoid becoming burned out, I’m going to check into the mindset that worked for me so well last year. I’m going to train for a marathon, and it’s going to be awesome.

(In case you were worried, I figured out how to turn my watch back on. Google solves everything)