Nailing the Four Aspects of Training
My motivation to get a good 18-mile run in was stronger than my weakness for not getting out in the cold. Instead of starting at 7:00 a.m. though, I made it onto the trail at 10:00 a.m. so the freezing weather the night before had a chance to warm up to a balmy 40-degrees. My plan for the day was to get through 18 miles without stopping and on top of that, feel good after the 18 miles. In past runs the wheels had come off by mile 16. Whether it was due to extreme cold, wind, improper nutrition, shoes wear or whatever, I'd never felt good for a complete 18-mile run.
My run of last week felt bad. I started off feeling great but by the time I hit the 16-mile-mark, I was done and had to walk the last four miles to get the 20 in. I was determined to break it down and analyze what had gone wrong. If you believe running is a combination of physical, mechanical, nutritional and mental aspects, and that you need all four to achieve success, then you need to REALLY look at what's going on with every run and listen to the body. Last weekend I disassociated with my music player and it didn't work for me. Not only was I not able to get back into the mental state once I turned it off, I wasn't able until some time later to figure out what went wrong.
A number of things went wrong on that run. Later in the week I identified a pain in the heel, caused by less than adequate cushioning. I placed a couple of Heal My Heels in the shoes and they worked great! I realized that during the Longhorn Half-Ironman that even in the heat that I was able to keep going by eating Twizzlers and pretzels and water. I packed up two plastic bags full of the red candy and long breadstick-shaped pretzels. I layered my clothing for the cold weather and decided rather than run two, 10-mile loops, I'd run 4 x 4.5-mile loops and that would allow me to drop off clothing or to pick up more nutrition at the car. Lastly, I decided to go music free for the run.
By looking at the run from all four aspects, the changes I made contributed to the first 18-mile run I've done with continuous running and no walking, plus, that I felt great afterwards. I didn't walk like a 100-year-old grandpa. Granted the weather was 35-degrees cooler and that played into things, but the nutrition helped, the lack of music helped, the mechanical changes to the shoes helped and with last week's bad run, there were still 20 miles completed so the body did adapt in some form or fashion to the stress placed on it.
I didn't get a chance to ice the knees so that caused some inflammation throughout yesterday and today. I didn't drink enough water yesterday so I had a strong headache throughout the afternoon and evening. If I can nail down everything...all four aspects and everything within, then the marathon should be a great experience come Feb. 9.
Labels: Heal My Heels, long run
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