No Rest for the Weary

After the last repeat, following the final click on my watch, when I stopped long enough for the humidity to cling to me and the sweat to raise on my slick skin, I could call it finished.
But, oh, how it seemed like this moment might never come! I toiled around the oval in an endless limbo of ragged breaths, straining muscles, and negotiations. Going to the edge, peering over it, pulling back.

I put my hands on my hips and took one final deep breath and walked back to my things, a haphazard pile of clothes, keys, and water bottles. I swapped out my racers for sandals and in the background, baseball fans murmured at the clink! of a pitch being swatted into the outfield. I sat for a moment and thought about how rare these moments can be, the ones after a good, hard run where the tingle of adrenaline lingers, the colors in the sky appear sharper, and you feel delightfully empty.

Of course, you usually have to crawl through hell to get there.

Thirty minutes earlier, I cinched the laces tight on my racers and tossed my t-shirt over the sandals. I began a slow trot around the track doing math in my head and trying to spot any deer grazing along the edge of the woods. A light rain fell over the field, and though the eastern sky looked ominous, the sun peeked through in the west.

After my fourth lap, steam rose from the track and I walked over to lane four to do some drills before committing to the workout. I recently read an article in Running Times about doing “floating” workouts on the track. In other words, there’s a short recovery between intervals where you float, say, 100 meters. It’s not a traditional recovery jog, but rather a slightly faster spell at about half marathon-marathon pace. My dad used to tell me about running 30/40s, or a 30 second 200 followed by a “floating” 200 at 40 seconds.

The workout today was 3-4 sets of 1200m-400m- @10K/5K pace where the hyphens are 100m floats at half marathon pace. After each set, you do a 200m jog…then start all over again. I decided 10K pace would be 5:45 so a 1200 comes out to 4:18, while 5K pace would be 5:35 or about a 1:23, 400.

With nothing left to do, I took one more shot of water, lined up, and clicked the watch. On the first lap, the pace was controlled, the motions fluid. I came through the first lap in 1:24...too fast, but comfortable and decided to lock into that pace. When the third lap came around, I went about preparing myself to not come to a screeching halt when I crossed the line but to, well, float through and keep the momentum going. I barreled down the last stretch, clicked my watch, saw the “4:08” shrugged and kept moving…there was more work to be done. The final 400m proved slightly crueler mentally because where I normally would only have 200m to go, I had 300 to cover. I concentrated on slingshotting around the curve and keeping my feet under me. When I finished the 400, I slipped into half marathon pace for that final 100m float and smiled at the “1:19” on my watch.

Consistency, I preached on those merciful yet too quick 200m. Don’t blow up the workout.

But on the final lap of the second interval, I had 10 seconds to spare and continued to push the pace. The afternoon sun was naked in the sky and bore down upon me. I cleared the wads of spit from my throat as I blasted around the final curve of that 400. The second set read: 4:07/1:20. I grabbed a swig of water to wash my mouth out then set about tackling the third set.

The sun cooked the track into a humid soup. I had the sense on the backstretch of every lap that the finish line seemed so far and I was incredibly lonely back there. I pushed on and felt a quivering in my hamstrings. A foot would scrape its partner’s calf and I’d curse to get myself under control. Be still, I thought trying to quiet the noise in my head. I fought for a 4:06/1:20 third set. The negotiation began on the 200m recovery.

The schedule called for 3-4 sets. You could call it here…or you could forge on and know you’ll be stronger for it… And on it went until about 20m left. I clicked reset...then start and took off behind the goal posts.

The effort felt harder, but the pace was even, and in fact, it felt smoother than number three. The sun disappeared for a moment bringing a merciful reprieve. I’m going to hate the summer, I thought before refocusing.

After my final 100m float, I did come to that screeching halt I tried to avoid on set one so many laps and minutes ago. I sucked in the thick afternoon air and waited for my breathing to return to normal to really appreciate it. Set four: 4:06/1:19.

I swung the backpack over my shoulders and sipped liberally from my water bottle. I could feel the coolish liquid running down my stomach. It felt good.

The Track is Back, Jack!

I believe we all have those friends who we seldom see yet when life brings us back together, we slip into the old routine as if no time has passed. I have this same relationship with trails long since run and that perfectly measured oval known as: the track.

With roughly seven months until the Marine Corps Marathon and no big goal races on the calendar for the foreseeable future, it’s time to have some fun. Because readers, this runner has reached his limit of long tempo runs, 2K and 3K intervals, and 14-18mi training runs. Of course we're defining fun as lung searing, lactic acid storm repeats, the kind where you can feel your stomach getting ready to heave but don’t quite let it, or your hamstrings feel like they might seize after a particularly punishing 400.
No more ogling workouts online or in running magazines only to have to turn the page and sigh knowing that that 10K workout isn’t going to do much good for a marathoner.

It was with this in mind yesterday that I laced up my new Nike Elite Zoom kicks and drove to the nearby track. I slung my backpack off my shoulder, moved to the starting line, and started a slow trot around the oval. The sun had begun its descent into the tree line, which did little to shield it from my eyes on the back stretch since not all of the leaves have filled in yet. I felt clunky and out of synch during that four lap warm up, but as the pace quickened on that final lap, I hit the last 100m and felt my canter increase. I caught myself, There’ll be plenty of time for that, I thought.

Remembering my hockey days, a shoddy warm up always meant I had a spectacular performance in store, and for some reason that holds true for my running as well.

Breaking in the new kicks

I moved over to the goal post, went through some dynamic stretches, and then back on the track for some drills. After the last butt kick, I sipped on my water bottle, traded my Elites for my Asics Racers, and there was nothing left to do…except the workout.

I saw this one back in Running Times a few months ago. It’s a Greg McMillan in and out workout where you run 10 laps, using the straightaways to push the pace and the curves to recover. It’s supposed to help increase your turnover, make your stride more efficient, and as the warning said, not be as easy as it might sound.

I set off on my first lap, having already decided to break the workout into five sets of two for mental sanity. I started to sling shot myself around the first turn down the backstretch. When I shut things down heading into turn two, my breath turned raspy, my heart rate thudding. Shit, I thought. This could suck. But before I could ponder it further, it was time to start the second strider.

I barreled down the final 100 and lifted a finger on my left hand to denote number one, set one was indeed in the books.

The workout continued that way. My body settled in after that initial shock, when all signs pointed to STOP!, but the override switch is nearby. And I spent those surges on the straightaways letting the whispers of races past speak to me and perk that adrenaline up some.

When I lifted the final finger, I jogged a mile cool down and finished with some more dynamic stretching. The school was desolate as I walked back to my car. A satisfying ache lingered in my quads and hamstrings that I knew would still be there this morning. A track workout beats you up in ways a marathon workout could never touch.

More fun to come in the next few weeks. I’m just happy to see my old my friend again.

Friday Night Lights

It wasn't your typical Friday night.  No out to dinner.  No movie.  Instead, my date tonight was with the track.  Normally the track means lactic-acid storms and lung-searing intervals.  Tonight was just getting through three miles pain free.  

All week I'd been aiming for this workout.  After my knee flared up again last week, I decided to take a few days, focus on some active rehab, and *gasp* not run.  Hell, it worked.  Suddenly I could go up and down stairs with no pain and wake up in the morning and not have to hobble to the bathroom, waiting for my knee to warm up.

Still, despite feeling better, I was nervous.  My Uncle and I spoke this week and he said, "You need to get to the point where you don't even think about it anymore.  That's when you know it's healed."  Something so simple, yet so right.  I find myself focusing on it, "Was that my knee clicking or my hip? Or ankle?  Does it hurt now? Should I stop? Did I just tweak it?"  And on and on.

Rather than retreat to the treadmill, I remembered that there are other flat, forgiving surfaces out there.  So tonight, I had a date with the track.  I had grand visions of running under the lights, turning quarter after quarter in front of a raucous crowd like I was at Hayward Field.

It was anything but.

First, I never realized that there were no lights around this football field.  Instead, it just became another winter run in the dark.  Or so I thought.

The track bumps up against the outer perimeter of the school's campus.  One side faces a hill that leads up to the lacrosse field.  The other faces woods.  Dusk settled.  The previous few days have been veiled in that flat February light.  Gone are the days when the cold and snow remind us of the holidays, ginger bread lattes, and egg nog.  Instead, we're mired in the gray winter hours that drag on, begging the question of when spring will come.  God, I need a run.  

Today was different.  The sun shone.  The thermometer broke 40.  Not a cloud around.  I laid on the track to stretch out, tilted my head back, and that receding blue sky seemed to reflect the bare black trees as if it were a lake.  

I shed my extra layers and started a slow trot around the track.  The pain I braced for never came.  Coming around the first turn, the ground looked like it started to move.  My heart jumped and I looked over at the pack of deer, more startled than I, leaping back into the woods.

Stars peeked out and though I didn't have the stadium lights, the sliver of half moon lit the path.  

After the first mile, my visitors came back.  Deer made their way across the track to the infield.  When they saw me coming around the turn, a surge of agitation shot the through the group.  Heads lifted, white tails sprung into action.  Some froze.  Others darted for the woods, while more still zig-zagged across the in field.  I thought there were eight to ten, but then realized that the herd was much larger.    Their brown hides were simply camouflaged by the dry, brittle ground.

Daylight disappeared with each lap and as I came to the end of three (relatively) pain free miles, I shut things down, took in the night, and listened to the steady traffic hum far off from the track.  

It had been about 22 minutes of running.  I probably took more time to warmup and cool down then actually workout.  But tonight, this was better than any movie or dinner out.