went running this morning. it was a lovely day, and I was glad I went.

It was also a bit rough, but I added a good hill and still managed about 3 miles in 33 minutes, so I felt okay about it! Danny wrote a pretty important article awhile ago about running hills. Read it here, it’s a great set of focuses/thoughts to get you through the tough ones.

The thing about running is that I can do it now and not feeling like I am dying. Really, when I was running along today, (jogging, really) I realized that I didn’t hurt. I didn’t want to die, I didn’t want to curl up and sit on a bench and not take another step. Even though my poor heart and lungs are feeling a bit creaky, I could still do it, I could still feel good about getting up early to go running, to see the sun rise. My muscles felt fine, and I just tried to take it easy.

Danny has a great video blog on avoiding heel strike when running, which he says is best done by not stepping past your hip. When he first told me about this last fall, I didn’t like it. It didn’t seem natural, but now, as I keep my core engaged, keep my head tall, and take small, baby steps, I can feel what he is talking about.

I focused on keeping my neck long, crown high, arm swing at a true 45 on flats, using an exaggerated arm swing on the uphills, and on some of the hills I ran sideways, as described in the book.

Here’s to never giving up running. I will get out there again soon.

I have one word: Rough.

Don’t ever stop running. I am totally motivated now to not take such a long ‘break’ from running. I could totally feel it today, and even though we only really ran about 3 miles, it was rough. We weren’t particularly slow (given my lack of training) but still, it was uncomfortable.

But, I still felt leagues better and more efficient than I used to when I was a non-enlightened runner.

We ran this route, which I have run before, but we shortened it just a bit. It was probably closer to 3.4 or 3.5 miles, which STILL put us at a good 10 minute pace, but I could just feel it.

At the end of my training for the first 1/2 marathon, I had about a 165-170 HR and fairly low PRE (4 or 5 on a scale of 10) for a similar run. This time, my heart rate peaked at 185 and my PRE was about 6, pushing 7. I even got a little nauseated at the end, which was annoying and alarming.

This route has some pretty minor false flats, but I could feel them, and just used my arms as best I could to keep my momentum going. I concentrated on high ankles to create a midfoot strike. I tried to stay nice and tall, too, which I noticed at the end really helped my lean be more efficient and I had a last minute burst of quickness to finish off the run.

I am gonna get out there again tomorrow, I believe. Apparently Seattle is not the flatest route, and I have great training tools here in Asheville with all of these crazy hills.

There are a bunch of ChiRunners participating with me at the Expo and the race, so please holler if you’re going to be there, too.

Here’s to NEVER STOPPING. Ever. It’s way too hard to start again.

If you’re not familiar with what I’m talking about, here it is in a nutshell. The most economical way to run is to vary your stride length relative to the speed you’re running. One exception to this would be for sprinters, who need to have very quick acceleration and therefore need to have an exceptionally high cadence relative to distance runners.

Slow running = Short strides
As a rule of thumb, your stride should be the shortest when you’re running at slow speeds. We recommend this because running at slow speeds with a long stride creates too much contact time with the ground, overworking your leg muscles.

Fast running = Long strides
As you increase your speed, your stride length should get longer. Watch the Kenyans (or any other highly efficient runners) when they’re racing and you’ll see what I mean by how long their stride is.

One of the revolutionary aspects of the ChiRunning technique is that your stride length changes with your speed while your cadence, with only a few exceptions, remains constant.

Running with a metronome beeping away keeps me honest (not to mention consistent) with my cadence…no matter what I’m doing. Having my cadence always remain steady, prompts me to lengthen and shorten my stride depending on what my body needs, or the terrain dictates. When I’m running uphill it shortens…heading downhill, it lengthens…when I slow down, it shortens…going faster, it lengthens again.

I’ve learned more about how to work with my stride length from this device than from all the running coaches I’ve ever met, and I’ll probably never stop touting its praises. Running to a rhythmical beat adds a wonderful ease to your stride, and the depth of understanding of how your stride works best, will never be the same.

I don’t run with my metronome beeping all the time. That would drive me a little crazy. I use it for the first few minutes at the beginning of each run and then check in with it periodically to see how I’m doing.

Click here for a very thorough article on specifically how to use the metronome. If you’d like to see what it looks like, the ChiRunning DVD shows a great split-frame video of a person running at four different speeds with the constant beep of a metronome in the background.

Try it yourself and you’ll see what I mean.

Danny

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Tsk, tsk.

I won’t even try to come up with excuses, though I want desperately to describe for you everything else that has been occupying my time… I think that those of you hard core runners will have no sympathy.

Also, I won’t have any sympathy for myself either, when I get to race day on June 27th and have the jitterbugs in my belly.

I actually caught myself saying this morning, “Oh, I’ll be okay. It’s only 13 miles. I can just run one long run a week and a few others and I’ll be fine.”

Yep, I actually said that. It’s incredible! And totally unreasonable!

I’ll get out there. Hopefully this weekend, in the rain. It was 65 here yesterday, 70 the day before that, and today, it’s COLD and overcast. Bummer.

But how lovely is it that I can go out and run in the Blue Ridge Mountains any time I like?? That’s pretty awesome.

Over ‘n out.

Here’s how I run hill intervals.
I start at the top of the loop and begin by running down to the halfway mark. In this section I’m trying keep my upper body as far forward as I can while at the same time allowing my pelvis to rotate as much as possible to absorb the shock of running downhill at a fast pace. If I do it right, I don’t feel like I’m expending any energy. In fact, I feel like I’m resting even though I’m going at a very fast pace.

Then, when I hit the halfway mark and begin running the uphill section back to the top, I change a number of things. The first thing I do is shorten my stride so I’m running in a lower gear. This saves me a ton of energy without sacrificing a lot of speed. Next, I pull my hands in closer to my chest and swing my arms with a powerful forward/upward motion. Believe it or not, this helps my obliques to drive my pelvis which then drives my legs in the most efficient way. This feels like “whole-body” running, and it should, because I don’t want to rely solely on my legs to get me up the hills…especially those long, steep ones.

Another thing I do on the uphills is lean my column into the hill so that I feel as though I’m falling up the hill. This saves my hamstrings from having to work to “pull” me up the hill.

The most important thing to me when running hill intervals is to keep my perceived rate of exertion (PRE) as consistent as possible on the uphill sections. I’m trying to maintain a PRE of about 7 (on a scale of 1 to 10) on each of the six uphill sections.

Here are my chronological split times for each of the six intervals:
1. 4:27
2. 4:30
3. 4:26
4. 4:18
5. 4:11
6. 4:03

As you can see, each interval with the exception of the second one was faster than the one preceding it. I lost focus on the second one, which is why I lost 3 seconds.  The idea is to have each progressive interval just slightly faster than the one before it…without increasing your PRE to get the job done. By maintaining a very consistent sense of energy expenditure my body will learn to run more efficiently which should always be way at the top of your list if you want to do well in your event.

To keep my energy expenditure constant and my PRE constant I use all the uphill focuses I mentioned above in varying degrees depending on which one I feel will help me most to accomplish that consistency.

Play with this on your own runs or walks, and challenge yourself to run or walk hills faster without changing your effort level. It sort of forces you to practice your focuses…and that’s always a good thing.

For some additional suggestions on how to run hills click here.

Happy Hills,
Danny

I’m [running] in the rain
Just [running] in the rain
What a glorious feelin’
I’m happy again
I’m laughing at clouds
So dark up above
The sun’s in my heart
And I’m ready for [running!]
Let the stormy clouds chase
Everyone from the place
Come on with the rain
I’ve a smile on my face
I [run] down the lane
With a happy refrain
Just [runnin’],
[Runnin’] in the rain

I think it’s perfect. My friend Brynn and I headed out in the cloudy gloom yesterday late afternoon, about 4 pm. It was raining, but fairly light and we thought, why not? Anyway, we tried to go to the Blue Ridge Parkway where a trail leads off the road; I took a little hike there a couple of weeks ago, but unfortunately, when we arrived to the Parkway, it was blocked at the first entrance. We decided to just go ahead and run anyway on the road (no cars, right?!) and go until we were ready to turn around.

It was uphill the entire 1st half of the run, curvy and windy up the mountain. We actually did really well, and I felt surprisingly good for how little I have run in the past couple weeks (sigh). I really started easy and kept it that way for the whole run. I didn’t feel to bad, and the sinus business I have been battling for the last 7 days wasn’t too problematic.

I focused on really keeping creepy slow, small legs, small strides and big arms. I was also really trying to just lean into the hill and feel what it was like to let the gravity and the road pull me along.

I really felt good and today I feel good too. I am not sore, not achey, nada. So wonderful! I STILL can’t believe when I ‘just go out for a run’ that I don’t have any soreness or pain during or afterward. It’s a true miracle. I have a friend who was on the triathlon team with me in college, (maybe I’ve written this before) but she is as astonished as I am with how easy running is for me now.

I can’t wait for the warm weather. I think I’ll be out there more than I have been lately. I have to confess that with the lack of running, I notice that my pants which fit very loosely about 6 weeks suddenly fit again. Hmmm… I suppose I need to do a little something about that!

I have been going to the gym, lifting weights, going on the stationary bike, going to yoga class, etcetera. Running just takes the cake for keeping those few annoying pounds off, though.

Danny wrote a really good article about weight loss and how running/eating habits can work together. Click here to read it.

On the downhill part of yesterday’s run, I kept leaning, kept relaxing, tried to play with my pelvic rotation and keeping my feet behind my hips. Danny did a video blog about that recently. Click here to watch it.

Here’s to keeping on your feet, keeping that body moving, and still enjoying food (but maybe in smaller quantities for Liz!)

It seems odd, but I’ve raced every distance from a half marathon to 100 miles, but I’ve never raced a 10K. So I’ve decided to give it a shot. What I’ll do is blog about my training program, since training for a shorter faster distance is very different than it would be for a marathon or an ultra. I’m in new territory here, so it’ll be fun to see what comes up.

After going online and looking up the winning times for past races, I saw that the fastest times were in the 48 minute range. That means that the fastest, strongest, national-class runners are doing this course at an 8 minute per mile pace, which tells me that to say it’s a challenging course, might be an understatement. The only race I’ve done that could be similar to this one is the annual Dipsea Race held in Marin County California every year. It’s the second oldest footrace in the country (behind the Boston Marathon), with 7.1 mile of distance and 1200′ of vertical gain…followed by the same amount of loss. So, if the National 10K trail championships are anything like this (which I expect), I’m in for quite a ride.

I’ll let you know what I find out about the course from the race director. I’ll also let you know what my training plan will be and when I’ll officially begin to train. I’m thinking that tomorrow might be a good day to start. The race is at the end of August, and I want to be well prepared.

Happy trails,
Danny