ZappoMan.com - Fitness Blog

Maybe I am a runner?

February 3rd, 2007

I planned to do my first speed play workout for the year on Thursday night, so I rode my bike to my local public park with a dirt 400m track. It’s a pretty good setup, not any real facilities to speak of, but there are lights that stay on late into the evening, and a couple of bleachers for the soccer field that the track surrounds. I like to ride my bike and then set up a little base camp next to the bleachers where I lock my bike and leave my water bottle readily accessible for sips between laps. The problem is, when I got to the track, I noticed that the track was completely swamped… It looked like a monster truck rally had been through.

What was I gonna do? I couldn’t run in this… I mean, I’ve run in worse, but it wasn’t going to be a speed workout. Ok, change of plans… I’ll ride back home, and just do a trail run…

So, at this point, my expectations are pretty low. I was originally planning on doing an interval pyramid:

• 400m warm up (8:00/mile)
• 400m in 1:20 (5:21/mile)
• 400m recovery (~10:00/mile)
• 800m in 2:58 (5:58/mile)
• 400m recovery (~10:00/mile)
• 1200m in 4:54 (6:34/mile)
• 400m recovery (~10:00/mile)
• 1600m in 7:20 (7:22/mile)
• 400m recovery (~10:00/mile)
• 1200m in 4:54 (6:34/mile)
• 400m recovery (~10:00/mile)
• 800m in 2:58 (5:58/mile)
• 400m recovery (~10:00/mile)
• 400m in 1:20 (5:21/mile)
• 400m cool down (9:00/mile)

Notice that this comes out to 6.2 miles, which is within the limit of what ”I’ve worked up to” in my comeback from my stress fracture. It has a little bit of a short warm-up, but it assumes I’ve already ridden my bike a couple miles to get to the track. So really the first lap is kinda just a get the legs into a running mood. Next week, I’ll add 800m to the front and 400m to the back and still be in my comfort zone. Anyway, this was my plan, but my plan was shot… so I had to adjust my thinking.

So I got home, dropped off my bike, slipped on my running shoes and headed down to the trail. Since I couldn’t do my speed workout, I figured I’d be trying again on the weekend (in fact, I’ll try this workout tomorrow), and so I decided I’d just go out for a “mellow run”. I had my Garmin, but I wasn’t going to worry about my pace. I was just going to run, slow/fast/whatever, just let my legs take me whatever speed they wanted to run.

As I headed out my gate and onto the sidewalk, I felt pretty relaxed. I trotted down the street getting loose and feeling pretty relaxed. In fact I kinda felt like I was running pretty slow. Which is to say I didn’t feel like I was running hard or pushing, I didn’t really feel strong, I was just comfortable. When I came around the corner and dropped on to the Burke Gilman trail, I check my pace… 6:12/mile… what? no, that can’t be right… well, it’s only the first .3 miles and most of that is downhill enough that I’m fighting not to fall forward. Settle down, just run…

When I came to mile 1, my computer beeped… I know I said I wasn’t going to think about it, but I was intrigued… what does it say…. 7:39/mile… not bad, I feel like I’m jogging… I feel like I’m running slow. Let’s stay slow, let’s save some for my interval workout this weekend. Mile 2…. beep… let’s see… 7:49/mile… ok, that’s more like it… but still under 8:00/mile, feeling really strong, that last mile felt like I was crawling. This is a good sign, right? Mile 3… slightly up hill… beep… 7:35/mile… fastest mile so far, and I don’t even feel like I’m running… ok, gotta turn around here in a little bit, we’ll reset the lap marker at .3 miles and finish on an even mile… these turn-arounds always slow me down… 8:10/mile… running home now… Mile 4.3… 7:26/mile… huh? I still feel like I’m crawling… Mile 5.3: 7:32… easy peasy… What’s left in the tank… let’s run it all out… last effort… Mile 6.3…  6:47/mile! Best speed of 5:47/mile… Whiskey Tango Foxtrot!

So this mellow run, which I honestly felt like I wasn’t really running hard at all, ended up with an average speed of 7:30/mile and a best speed of 5:47/mile. Now, this is not a personal best, I ran essentially that same course at 7:18/mile pace earlier this week… But this time, I really didn’t feel like I was running hard at all.

I know many of you out there run much faster than me… and that’s cool. I figure that last year, I felt like it would be an accomplishment to run at a 9:00/mile pace for long runs… now I feel like that’s a snails pace. Sure, I still have a lot of training to do to extend this to 26.2 miles… but I’m starting to feel more and more like my 3:15 marathon goal is not too crazy.

I thought I hated running? But it turns out, this is starting to become a lot of fun.

By the way, I don’t know if this make any sense, but I actually think that all of my fixed gear cycling is having a positive improvement on my running. Here’s my logic. Last year, when I started running (after a couple years of serious road cycling) I felt like my fatigue would come in the form of tired legs. Which is to say, that I felt strong cardiovascularly, after all I had done several 5 hour max effort cycling rides and even a couple double-century rides that are 9+ hours of serious effort.

But with traditional road cycling, you always have these little mini-recoveries as you coast down a hill. And even if you’re not coasting down a hill, you can always coast on the flat ground and give your legs a little break. But not with a fixie… you have to pedal all the time. There is no rest for those slow twitch muscles, they are forced to continually fire as the generate 100 rpms for 3 hours. If you consider that my bike has a 61″ roll-out and I rode 42 miles today, it means my leg muscles had to fire continuously for 43,625 revolutions over 2.4 hours. (By the way, as I type this, it seems strange, it seems about 2x higher than I’d expect, but still, that’s a lot of continuous revolutions without a break.) The point is, that I really think this fixed gear non-stop riding is really helping my legs get better conditioned to the kinds of demands that running places on them (without the impact and weight baring effects, of course).

For what it’s worth, I’m feeling really strong and fit. I had a busy week with work, and not much training, but that’s probably good. This is like a mini-recovery week, and it’s got me eager for more… which means I’m not over training and my fitness is surely improving. Good times!

Entry Filed under: Fitness, Triathlon, Ironman, Running, Cycling, Marathons, fixie, single-speed, fixed-gear