On Strike

Been enjoying my off season/recovery month.  Perfect weather, the nicest fall I can remember ever, anywhere.  Lots of hiking, walks w/ dogs, Kangoo jump boots, even some agility - I know, shock horror.  I've been doing my strength training at the playground.  Very fun.  Very challenging.  First time I tried it I did 20 minutes worth and it felt like nothing then I woke up the next morning and couldn't move for 2 days.  Lots of little experiments planned.  Too many in fact, had to cut down and I think the first one getting the axe for now is ketosis.  Partly because I'd have to pony up just over $100 for a ketosis meter but mostly because - Sweet Potato Season!  I love sweet potatoes.  But they don't go with ketosis so much.  Again I could buy a meter and see how much if any I could eat and stay in ketosis but . . . yeah, too much money and hassle for now.  It's still on my list of experiments, just moved to the bottom.

The big thing I'm working on right now is my running.  It's the one thing that didn't improve this year despite what felt like a lot of hard speed work.  So I've decided to focus on form this fall and there are lots of methods to choose from.  For now I've decided on Kelly Starrett's 'Ready to Run' book, hot off the presses.

He's a bit controversial I think, especially amongst triathlon folks/runners probably because his focus is Crossfit.  But I like his 'systems approach' to running.  He outlines 12 steps to take to prepare the body for running and these include mobility exercises for various systems of the body to improve range of motion, restore function, etc.  I have a suspicion that these range of motion limitations are a big part of what's holding me back.

Step number 2 of this program involves building up strength in the foot by walking around barefoot when possible and otherwise wearing flat (zero drop), minimally or uncushioned shoes with the end result of being able to run in such shoes.  And I suspect this will be the biggest issue for me because right now I have mega-cushioned stability shoes and custom orthotics.  And despite several years of trying to change my stride I'm still a heel striker.  Big time.  My feet are not so fabulous either.  I'll spare you the tedious details of all my issues but I've had foot surgery that included sawing through my big toe and reattaching it with pins and plates.  And I've got broken sesmoid bones in both feet (the sesmoid bones are in the forefoot).  So I've spent maybe 20 years avoiding landing on my forefoot in addition to 14 years of cushioned stability shoes and custom orthotics.

The podiatrist told me my foot problems arose as a result of wearing flat, unsupportive shoes so I'm very leery of drinking the Kool-Aid of minimalist running shoes.  And don't even get me started about the myth of it's impossible to heel strike in a pair of uncushioned, flat shoes or while running barefoot.  Because I just saw a video of an agility competitor running in 3 different styles of flat shoes including the Vibram 5 Fingers and she was heel striking in all 3 of them.  One of the runners in the promo video for Kelly's own book is heel striking!

Check out the runner heel striking at around 44 seconds.


And how big of an issue is heel striking anyway?  I honestly don't know.  There are disadvantages to forefoot striking.  Plus for me all the hardware and broken bones in my forefoot.

But I do like the idea of building up strength in my feet and if I have any complaints about the book so far it's that there are only mobility exercise for the foot, no specific foot strengthening exercises.  You're supposed to rely on barefoot walking and minimalist shoe usage to build up the strength.  So I set out yesterday to get a pair of cheapo flat gym shoes at the local Payless only to discover that it's fallen victim to the mansionification of Boulder, ie rich folk don't buy their shoes at Payless and Boulder is so overrun with rich folks.  Middle class/working class pretty much gone.  And real estate prices/rentals are going through the roof again.  Not sure what I'm still doing here but that's a post for another day.

Anyway I ended up at Boulder Running Company which is the last place I wanted to end up somehow it sucked me in and I ended up with a ridiculously expensive pair of zero drop but minimally cushioned shoes.

Very comfy, very purple.  I do love the purple.  Probably too much cushion for what Kelly was intending but the only zero drop shoes in the joint and they're probably a good transition for me given all my issues.  Something in between the super minimalist and the super cushion.  Might not build up the foot strength as much at first but again maybe a good transition for now until I get used to the taste of the Kool-Aid.

But despite the minimal drop and lighter cushioning, I'm still heel striking though admittedly not nearly as bad as in my regular shoes.

First 2 clips are in regular shoes the rest are in the new shoes


The plan is baby steps.  I'll spend 2 months just walking in these things, first just a mile on Lola's old dog walk then increasing gradually to a longer, faster Strummer walk.  Then the protocol is for 10% of total distance and gradually increasing I think by 10% each week but I may go even slower than that.  I'm going to wear them for my plyometrics and playground strength training as well.  I'll shoot more video in a month or so to see if there's any improvement.  There's definitely a change in stride with these shoes and I think I'll like it but I'll need to read more in the book to see what else is going on.

Oh for the days of being able to run around like a little kid without so much thought or risk of injury.

Day of Speed I'd say

You know triathlon season is kicking into gear when you have 3 showers in one day. First one was after a morning run with da boyz. I finally made it a full 1/2 hour of 5 mins. run/1 min. walk with only a few twinges of knee pain going up a hill. This was not the speed part of the day by any means but felt faster than I've been going, almost like a run as opposed to a penguin shuffle. Cody was not thrilled, he hates running on leash and Strummer kept trying to stop every 10 yards to sniff and mark but it's good exercise for them so I make them go with me.

Shower #2 was after Tabata sprints on my lunch hour. I'm up to the full 8 reps and wow it is a hard workout for only 2 minutes. My quads have felt like jello all week and about an hour before lunch time I start dreading them but I feel good the rest of the afternoon and my knee's been tolerating them so I've been trying to gut it out.

Shower #3 was after masters swimming workout which was a sprint workout. Lucky me. To be honest I hate sprinting and I'm bad at it and it hurts and wah wah wah but I made it through the whole workout and the coach even said my last sprint of the night looked like a good effort, good form, etc.-Shocking! It was not the normal coach though so I guess I had her fooled. Jane, my normal coach, has given me some good basic pointers for sprinting in the pool and once I remembered to use them I guess was able to fake my way through. I'll post the workout below for my own benefit so I have a benchmark for where I am with my swim times right now. I feel like I'm oh so close to being able to move up a lane but not quite there yet. In the showers I asked someone from the next lane up what their prescribed interval times were and there was no way I could have held them but she said no one in her lane held them either and they ended up swimming the 100's continuously with no rest. Even so, I couldn't have swum at that pace continuously so I've got to keep plugging away for a while longer. The woman from the other lane suggested I move up anyway and sit out for a 50 here and there and draft wherever I can and I'll get better faster swimming in that faster lane but I'm not sure I agree. I think it's better to do the workout you're capable of, get enough rest per interval and put more effort into each swim rather than missing all the intervals and swimming at a continuous pace with no rest the whole workout. I know at least one of the coaches agrees with that, not sure what the research or general consensus is but speaking from personal experience I seem to get more benefit from doing proper intervals.

Today is a rest day except for maybe more Tabata sprints. The protocol calls for 5 days per week but they're so exhausting on top of all the other training that I may have to phase them in. So far I've only done 3 days this week and I think 3 last week. If it wasn't for my knee issues I'd push through today's fatigue but I'm thinking maybe it's best not to push my luck and have a nice solid rest day. Plus I'm not into that whole self-flagellation thing and I'm tired today.

I've got to decide if I want to spend money on races this year and if so which ones. Decisions, decisions.

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Masters Workout April 24, 2009
South Boulder Rec.
Coach: Eenie
All distances in yards

200 on my own pre-workout, mix of free/non-free

Warm-Up:
8x50 on 1:20 (start slow and build up to fast by 4th interval then slow back down)
[my times started at :50 and went down to :45 then back up to :48)
50 easy

Main Set:
All distances on 2:15
As the distance gets shorter, pace gets faster
Work on pacing for the 100's, try to keep them all the same pace
8x100 [my time ranged from 1:42-1:44, mostly at 1:43]
6x75 [these were the hardest, times were 1:14, 1:12, 1:06, 1:07, 1:07, 1:09
big jump in time from 1:12 to 1:06 was because I remembered to use quick
short strokes]
4x50 [times were :44, :42, :44, :43]
2x25 [times were :20, :20 we cheated and took a shorter interval because 2:15 is
too long to sit around for a 25]

Grand Finale:
3x75 on 2nd person rest
Wear fins for all
first 75 is kick with 25 easy, 25 medium, 25 fast
second 75 is kick with 25 fast, 25 medium, 25 easy
third 75 is free, fast

75 cool down

Total: 2450 yards

Not a lot of yardage but a hard set.

The AKC Can Get Bent

Yeah, suuuurrre I'll give you my money so I can go play in the 'special' class with my mix. Sorry but I think we all know how 'separate but equal' turned out. And the clubs don't even have to offer the mixed breed class if they don't want to so you could potentially pay your $35 license fee to AKC and never get to play anyway or maybe only a couple of times a year if most of the clubs in your area opt not to offer the class. I'll take my money elsewhere. Oh wait, I already was taking it elsewhere, never mind.

The truly scary thing about this is how bad the economy must be that the AKC is hurting so severely that they're willing to hold their nose and let us riff raff in even if it is without full use of the clubhouse.

5 Tabata sprints today and my knee seems o.k. After 2 I wasn't sure I could carry on and I know I slowed down for #3 but I think I sped up for #5. Hard to say if it was because I'd warmed up a bit or because I knew I was done or because maybe I started slacking on #4. It's hard to maintain a consistent pace because I'm not a sprinter and I don't have a good sense of pace. Tomorrow I'll shoot for 6 and spend more time warming up to see if that helps.

My regular run with the dogs this morning was not so fabulous after 15 minutes but the same thing happened on Monday before this nonsense took hold of my brain and it feels like an overuse issue so I'll have to keep plugging along slowly and not blame the Tabata spritns. I found that if I took a longer walk break I was able to run again without pain so I think I'll shoot for 15 minutes of my regular walk/run pattern then take a 10 minute walk break then try to complete the other 15 minutes. Ugh, getting old sucks.

Tabata Sprints or Have I Taken All Leave of My Senses?

I've been intrigued with the idea of Tabata Sprints for some time now but my knee, oh what a tale of woe that has been and it's been bad enough living through it I didn't feel like reliving it by writing about it and I know you all have your own tales of woe about your own knees and whatnot so I've been staying off that topic. But finally after 3 rounds of physical therapy and many months of dealing with bursitis, the cure for which seems to be doing nothing to aggravate it, and other issues going on in my knee I'm finally able to start running again. I'm about 5-6 weeks into a back to running program and I'm going about 4-5 minutes run/1 minute walk for 1/2 an hour with warm-up and cool-down walking of course. Today I finally felt confident enough about my knee to give the Tabata Sprints a go. I'm hoping this will help me build some speed for agility (gotta keep up with Strummy and that running dogwalk somehow) as well as some strength for mountain biking and triathlon.

The complete protocol calls for 20 seconds of run like hell (pretend you're chasing Strummer down that dogwalk) then 10 seconds of rest. You repeat for 8 reps which is a total of 4 minutes. Do this 5 times a week and the proponents of this method promise you all kinds of fabulous things like speed and fitness and weight loss and the solution to your bad hair and fashion issues. O.k., maybe that last one is wishful thinking on my part. There are videos all over YouTube showing you how to do this but do you really need a video showing you how to do this? They are about as interesting as watching paint dry which coincidentally is how I spent my weekend-painting my laundry room which is maybe another story for another day but maybe not much more exciting than those videos. The one thing to note from these videos is how the people collapse in a puddle of their former selves at the end. Though I'll admit my idea of fun is perhaps a bit twisted this is not exactly my idea of fun.

Nonetheless, I gave it a go today and it was hard but I survived. I started out with only 4 reps because I read somewhere that you shouldn't start out trying to do the whole protocol. Also I'm worried about how my knee will tolerate this type of intense running so I wanted to start out conservatively. I had no knee problems while doing it and after icing and sitting at my desk for a bit my knee is still fine. At one point I thought my heart was going to explode and it took me a while to get back to breathing normally after I was done but my knee seems to be down with the program so far and that's the main thing. Tomorrow I think I'll go for 5 reps.

Also, I found this cool blog that has mp3 uploads timed for Tabata Sprints. It looks like the first 2 are the theme from Rocky which would drive me well out of my mind but one is just beeps which is perfect. I may have to make my own mp3's one of these days. The one fussy part about this workout was messing with the timer on my stopwatch. Not a huge issue but would be much easier to have beeps/music on an ipod.