11/11/11 - A good day to start fresh

Very few people know that 11 is my lucky number, or rather, my lucky number twice. :)  So, what better day to start fresh with my training and set some new goals than the one day that is nothing but my lucky number, and also happens to be Veteran's Day, another day that is special to me and my family.

As you know from my previous post that I am learning more about VO2 Max training and using my heart rate as a training indicator. From what I'm reading, I'm really intrigued, and very anxious to see how it will work and if I'll have similar results as others that swear by Daniels' Running Formula.

I plan on running today using his theory, but will not start the plan until Monday.  I know that it will be a challenge to run at a slower pace than I'm used to since I am so time/pace driven, but need to give the plan a shot.  It wants you to start at that slower pace to build a good base for more improvement later.  I think it also has something to do with burning fat and sugar. With the pace that I've been training at lately I'm burning more sugar than fat and will fatigue faster than if I were training my body to burn fat.  So, starting out slow will help me to be able to run longer and eventually as I improve that pace will come up without pushing me into that sugar burning level.  At least that's my understanding of it.  I may need more clarification or perhaps the cliff's notes version. :)

I will try and post my progress here, but we all know I get side-tracked and frequently forget to update this.  Happy Running!

Still learning

I completed my second Half Marathon on Sunday after recovering only 3 weeks ago from Bronchitis.  Needless to say, my performance was not what I was hoping for, but under the circumstances was better than I could have asked for.  My game plan was to try and stay with the 2:15 pace group for as long as I could and hope that I could still beat my original finish time of 2:27:51.  At the 9 mile mark my legs started to give me some real problems and I tried to stretch as best I could and keep going.  This was when I finially lost the pace group.  I only fell off my pace by about 40 seconds per mile.  It felt so much slower than it was strangely.  My legs after the race went into full rebellion and completely stiffened up with my right knee giving me some real problems.  It is still tender.  I haven't run since the race, but I did swim a few laps in the gym pool last night.  The legs are feeling a little better today, but I'm not sure if they're good enough to run on.  I will have to see how I feel in the morning. 

I had a good conversation with a fellow athlete at the gym about VO2 training which has me thinking and curious enough to by the book Flash recommended by Jack Daniels.  It's something to keep me busy while I'm letting my knee heal, and so far has some really interesting information.  I plan to start training using my Heart Rate Monitor to try and build some endurance before I start trying to increase speed again.  From what I've read, this will prevent me from over-training and the injuries that come with it.

I'll try and update this more often so I can document the progress.  Happy Running!