Runners high runners low.

There is a concept known to those who run as runners high. It's (in my experience) a flood of endorphins that washes over you, making you feel high and it is amazing. Interestingly I have only experienced this once, and that was week 6 of the c25k program, after I ran for 20 minutes straight for the first time, in my life.

Looking back this achievement was huge, I had committed to something, and worked hard to achieve that goal.

I don't get runners high anymore, but I get lots of runners low. I describe this as when I simply can't run the way I want to.

In some ways I am like a perpetual toddler who is frustrated that he can't walk, he takes a few steps and falls down. This is how running feels to me at times, I make some big achievements but then get injured, or busy or lazy and I don't run the way I need to to get to that next goal.

I have been thinking a lot about goals for next year, what comes next.
Do I focus on longer distances, maybe an 50k or something?
Or do I go shorter and faster, aim for a 1:45 half marathon?
Do I run because running is what I do?
Do I look at tri's?

I just don't know where I want to go with running next year and there really are so many possibilities.

At this stage I am starting to think that I want to maintain a level of fitness so that once a month I can run into work, which involves a 4am wake up, and 3 and a bit hours running, and I think this would be an awesome foundation for next years marathon.

I know I probably focus on the marathon in 2 weeks, and now what happens next, but the setting of my next goal is a part of what will get me through the 42.2k in less than 2 weeks time. Last year after the marathon I experienced an extreme sense of being lost and I attribute this to net having my next goals set.

So my goals right now are:

I am going to run 42.2k on Sunday the 9th of October
Run to work at least once before the end of the year


On an interesting side note, I discovered that the historical distance for the marathon was actually 24miles, not the 26.2miles we run today. This was changed in the early 1900's at the London Olympics as the windsor family wanted the start line at once of their castles and the distance to the finishing line at the stadium was 2.2 miles longer...

Hurting

I just want to be running right now, and that doesn't seem to change.

But i have injured my left leg. And even better this years injury was completely avoidable. There was just no need to be doing flips on the trampoline with the kids, they would have been just as happy with me doing basic jumping with them.

Anyway the leg is healing slowly but surely but the build up to the marathon is becoming a nightmare that feels like it will never end. With 2 and a bit weeks to go until race day I should be running a lot, instead I'm nit running at all. This means 2 things to me, firstly, I may not do much better time wise than last year, and second, I am not dealing with the stress of work, and the build up yo marathon anxiety very well at all.

I have lost my outlet for stress and this is going to be a big problem for me over the next fortnight.

It's ironic really, runners need to taper before a long run, for me in training this usually means the dropping of one run late in the week to "save some running up" for the weekend long run. It's interesting to note that sometimes when I taper I feel like a spring has been wound up really tight in a toy car, and when I do run, I w ant to run really fast and hard until the spring returns to a normal tension.

Tapering for a marathon means very little running for at least the week before, the issue I have with this (and this may just be my personality) is that I get very anxious about the distance, I start with the negative thoughts and this year they are all about wether I can make the distance or not.

The longest run in training has been 30k and I bounced back from that really well, much much better than last year. If fact 3 days after my 30k I was able to run a 10k which last year the time would have been more like 5 days after.

So I am fitter this year and my recovery times are great, but a 30k is more like running half a marathon than 3/4 of one. Last year the hardest part was the last 7k, this is when I really suffered from cramping, emotionally I was just there to push on, cover the distance and to hell with trying for a time.

This year I want to do better, deep down I really do, but I am struggling with the commitment that I need to guarantee I will do better. I can commit emotionally, but I am feeling very time poor at the moment. I have a super supportive family who let me disappear for 1/2 a day every weekend for my long runs, well my wife does, the kids have started to understand that dadda will be out all afternoon running. But I still feel like I am stealing time from my family to fuel my run, and that means I have to be very selfish to run long runs, and with that come guilt. I know that the family understand don't
mind me running but I just can't help feeling guilty.

There is an offset to this, the kids are catching my passion to run. They live to run, they still talk about wanting to do another family run, as we did the mothers day classic as a family this year. I want them to run, I wish that I had grown up with that outlet. To think of all the places I have been as a teenager and young adult and not run breaks my heart sometimes. But I will never force them into it, they need to do it because they want to, all I can do is set the example and see if they follow, and this is the way it must be.

So as the pain in my leg throbs away, hopefully healing my damaged muscle, and the heaviness that is settling on my psyche starts to weigh down on my demeanor, I will try to focus on one thing " I run because I love to, I will run the full 42.2k, I will smile, I will hurt and I will love it"

25 days

With only 25 days until the marathon, the gnawing hound of anxiety is starting show it's face. Like last year it really huts me when I see the MCG which is twice a day on the train to and from work.

Best I take that hound for a run.

Pledge

There are 4 weekends until the marathon, and I have formulated a plan.

Weekend Sept 10/11- 30k run.
Weekend Sept 17/18 - no or short run.
Weekend Sept 24/25 - 35k run.
Weekend Oct 1/2 - 15k run.

This coupled with 2 10k runs during the week, a massage session on Friday the 9th and another one around the 23rd.

The race day anxiety has started to creep up on me, I feel it especially when I go past the MCG on the train. I don't need to tell anyone who runs what a massive undertaking this is for me, but for the non runners, to put it in context, the marathon takes a commitment to pain, suffering and mental anguish. You need to commit to dipping into the extremities of the human body's energy stores and pull out every bit of it....just to pit foot in front of foot.

I find the distance of a marathon interesting, it stems from the roman herald
Pheidippides running to Sparta. He ran 240k in 2 days to the battlefield, then ran another 42.2k to athens, where he dropped dead. The point is that the distance has very old origins, and it's particularly interesting that it's just far enough to test the abilities of most runners.

I ran 30k 2 weekends ago then 3 days later another 10k, last year after the marathon I ran a 10k a week after the marathon, but because I had dug so deep on the day, within hours I got flu like symptoms and ended up in bed for 3 days, in my opinion this is a treat example if what distance does to you.

Aside from the physical aspects and the health benefits, the psychological growth that occurs during marathon training is huge. You learn so much about your self, like what it takes to push on no matter the pain you are feeling, what it takes to kick you own ass out the door to clock up more k's all so you can do it again on race day.

Then race day comes and you start to think about what you have done to get here, the race becomes only a small part of the whole endeavor, and really it is, my running has been shaped around race day for the past 8 months at least, running faster and harder in short runs, and then lately slower and longer to get my body used to punishment for long periods of time.

There is more I could have done to prepare, more k's I could have run, I could have eaten better, cross trained more but all these things require commitment, and I'm digging deep in commitment as it is, family, work, now uni, and running are sucking me dry on that front.

On the day I will run, I will cover the distance and I will do it faster than last year, and that's my commitment to running.

Change of plans

So it seems that my marathon training has not gone as well as I would have liked. By this stage I was hoping to be up to running 30k runs every weekend, and keeping up my 20ks during the week. I don't see this as a failure on my part, its simply because life has gotten in the way of running, which happens.


I still plan on running the 42k, I have just abandoned the concept of doing it in a certain time. I would like to achieve a 4:30hrs marathon, but at the end of the day if I can take 10 minutes of last years time and get in under 5 hours I will be stoked.


So I have 6 training weekends to get sorted out to cover the 42ks. The plan is to run long runs every second weekend (30ks) and 21k runs every other weekend, in addition I plan to keep up the 2x10k runs during lunch breaks up until the Tuesday before the marathon.


I guess deep down there is an element of disappointment in having to change my goals but at the end of the day with everything else on my plate its just not realistic to try and run the k's I need to in order to break the 4 hour mark.


Perhaps next year? who knows?


On that note I am considering a change of goals for the first half of this year and the remainder after the marathon, I am thinking that focusing on the 21k distance could be good for a bit, get really quick over that distance, and try and get my comfortable average pace down to 5/min K's. At the moment I can sustain 5:30min/ks for most of the 21k runs.


This would also feed into bettering my 10k and 5k times, which I would like to get to sub 50mins, and closer to 20 mins respectively.


Anyway I still have 6 weeks of training and 7 weeks till the marathon so anything is possible in that time.


Until then I will keep putting foot in front of foot and clock up as many K's as I can.

Birthday Speech

Im not one to make speeches at occasions aside from those where there is simply no choice....i.e weddings.

But while running today I decided I was going to make a speech for my birthday this year, but as a blog post.

So here goes.

3 Years ago my wife was pregnant with my second child.I weighed in at 106kg, why never diagnosed I probably had high cholesterol, blood pressure issues and was a perfect candidate for type 2 diabetes.

2 Years ago I had started running, I was almost done with the couch to 5k program, and I was preparing myself for my first official event. The timing of the event lined up perfectly for my final run of the c25k, and my first full 5k run. I ran that 5k in about 35 minutes. I weighed in about 95kg and was feeling pretty good about myself.

1 Year ago I was recovering from my rolled ankle, ready to run no matter what medical professional said I couldn't, and was preparing for my first marathon. I started running again just before my birthday and I managed the marathon in 5:08. I weighed about 90kg and had completed about 12 21k training runs, so my confidence in my running was great.

This year things are a bit of a muddle. I am training for my second marathon, so far (touch wood) I have had an injury free year. I currently weigh in at 86kg, and I am confident in my running - to some extent.

The issue this year is one of psychology and confidence. I know I can run, that is for certain but can I run 42k in 8 weeks time? The last 2 training runs I have done have not gone so well. 2 weeks ago I had health issues which were trigger or exacerbated by my 20k run. Today I set out to finally nail the 28k run from Wandin to Warburton which still eludes me, but I was running much better today. The issue was twofold, first I started out too hard, and as such was struggling after 21k to keep going and second I had severe cramping in my legs. I called it a day at 25k and will have yet another bash at it some time soon.

It occurred to me today while running that I use running as a metaphor for living. I realized that when I turned 32 and was running, I really started living. Before that I endured life but now life is an endurance event :) Training to run marathons is really living, and you don't know what its like to be full of energy until you have given every ounce f what you have to a run, you don't know what it really feels like to give something your all until you have given it.

People talk about giving 100% to something, but I don't believe that its possible unless that something that benefits only you.

I have also decided that running and living is about rhythm. Humans are attracted to music. I'm sure that when you close your eyes and think about it you can hear your favorite song. Running is like this, you find your rhythm and you run to it. People often ask me if I listen to music while I run, and the answer is no, when I tell them this they usually ask how I keep myself entertained for long runs, as if the thought of spending 3 hours inside your own head was like eating roadkill.


when I think about this, I have decided that listening to music while running for me would be like living someone else's life. Of course this is purely my opinion and each to his/her own but I find when I run to music my rhythm settles into the musics beat, and my pace alters slightly with the change of songs, oh and I kind of like spending time inside my own head, with a busy busy job, two little munchkins and a million other things to do, running is a nice escape from the hustle and bustle of everyday.




So I know that this post is a little scattered but so are my thoughts at the moment, I get introspective and a little melancholy when I think about life, and I find that birthdays have me reviewing events to date. On the upside, since I started running my fears are about not being able to run, and how I would be able to survive without running, rather than heart disease and diabetes. 


So Happy Birthday to me!

From 20 to 10 minutes

My first run of the couch to 5k was 20 minutes of intervals. 20 minutes 3 times a week. It all started with 20 minutes, 6 weeks in I ran my first 20 minutes solid block of running.

My first 5k run took about 34 minutes, today I ran 5k in 23:16. This got me thinking about what can be achieved in 10 minutes.

10 minutes with the kids is priceless, 10 minutes at work can seem like a lifetime, 10 minutes can be 2k's of running time or 10 minutes in a marathon can seem like 2 lifetimes.

This blog post has taken weeks to write due to insane work load and a very active home life.

Since starting this post I have developed a new issue. My running mojo has taken a hit, I have health problems and it all seems to be stress related.

For the last 2 weeks I have been performing the tasks of 2-3 people, things like this just happen in IT from time to time and it comes with the territory but this time I haven't done so well coping with the stress. After 2 weeks of long days, no breaks and worst of all mo lunchtime runs I was about ready to collapse. I set myself up for a 28k run on a Sunday, arranged for the wife and kids to meet me at the end and drive me back to the car, all was good.

5ks in I felt sluggish, I just felt like it was way harder than it should be at this point. I persevered and by 17k just knew something was not right. I called my ever understanding wife and arranged to cut my run short. It went from being a 28k to a 19.5k. That was ok by me as I had come to terms with cutting it short from the first k.

The wife and kids met me at a playground where we had a play for a bit. While there I had the first symptoms of a migraine, flashy lights in my vision. At this point I ushered everyone into the car, as I knew what came next.

I got home and collapsed on the bed, covered my head with a pillow and rode the waves of pain that would not abate for anything. I had to drag myself into the shower before I could get into bed proper because 20k of sweat, dust and grime has no home in our bed.

Showered and cleansed, but still wanting to die because of the pain I crawled into bed, and there I stayed for 4 hours after which I felt ok, my brain felt bruised but the majority of the pain was gone.

Monday, I didn't feel too bad, still brain bruised, but not too bad. (brain bruising is how I describe when there is no pain except when you cough or move quickly)

Tuesday saw the return of my headache, this was not so much like a migraine, more like a nasty headache, but I decided to run, and see if that helped. A strange thing happened on my run, I started seeing flashy lights in the periphery of my field of view, the colleague I was running with became invisible as he ran next to me. This lasted for the last 2k of my run and fir about 20 minutes after. Then my headache got angry with me, so I smacked it with some panadene, and all was well.

Wednesday I decided to try and sleep it off. Things weren't going too bad until I got stressed about a trivial matter and then the flashy peripheral vision came back. I slept for a couple of hours and was ok again.

Apart from some short periods of headache, and brain bruising I seem to be ok now. I haven't run since last Tuesday, and I plan to run today with some colleagues incase something happens.

The worst bit is that I'm scared to run, I'm worried about what this means to my marathon preparation and to general wellbeing.

When you drop a lot of weight, and become active something in your psyche tells you that you have become invincible, You see people around you getting sick and your enhanced runner immune system shakes off all but the worst if what's going around.

Then you get sick, and it scares the crap out of you that running might make it worse, and not running might make it worse, all you can see is things getting worse so it's hard to get back on the horse, but you do it all the same.