Necessary evils

Over the past week I made the decision to up my training a notch (or two) and put all of these hard miles towards a concrete goal: I'm planning on running my eighth marathon this May.

On Monday I kicked off Week One of training with a solid six miles in the Park. My pace was good, my heart rate better than expected, and I finished feeling strong and refreshed. Unfortunately the same cannot be said of Tuesday's workout, which called for 43 minutes and 44 seconds of aerobic cross-training (at an average heart rate of 150). Indeed, Tuesday morning's trip to the gym was a bit of a debacle.

To be sure, I despise cross-training (unless it's cycling, which is unfortunately not possible this time of year), and it's definitely the worst part about a marathon training plan: the elliptical trainer may be the dullest exercise machine ever invented; the stationary bikes in the gym are not positioned at all like real road bikes; swimming takes too long when you count the extra 45 minutes it requires to get to and from the pool. I've yet to try that seated thing that works only my arms, but someday if I suffer a serious leg injury I may have to consider giving it a go.

On Tuesday I picked the lesser of all evils and settled in on the elliptical (with upper body levers) for 44 mind-numbing minutes. To keep myself semi-distracted, I plugged my headset into the Today Show, which happened to be showing a story about a golden retriever named Angel who saved his 11 year-old master from a cougar attack in British Columbia. Watching this adorable puppy with all of his wounds being lifted on to the operating table and hearing how he almost gave his life to protect the little boy was a lot for me to handle while my legs whirled round and round. Suddenly, without warning, I felt an enormous lump in my throat, and then I was shedding tears on the elliptical machine in the middle of the JCC gym.

Fortunately, my allotted 44 minutes were almost over, so I was able to dab my eyes and get off the machine soon after my emotional meltdown. I then proceeded to do 2x20 lunges around the gym -- a workout I haven't done since last year's marathon training. It was somewhere around the third and fourth reps of the second set that I appear to have pulled all of the major muscle groups in both legs, and I figured this was the signal to get out of gym altogether. As a result of my pulled muscles, yesterday morning's six mile tempo was anything was pleasant.

All of this leads me to question whether exercise really does reduce stress like common theory would suggest. On further consideration, though, I don't think I've ever cried while doing a loop in Central Park (although the wind does cause my eyes to tear incessantly), and I rarely pull muscles during regular runs. This morning I had the perfect four mile fartlek around the Central Park reservoir: a quick, satisfying workout in clear, cold weather. I can only conclude that it must be the indoor gym environment that stresses me out. (At the very least, I could be subconsciously stressing over the fact that I go to the gym so infrequently and pay so much for my membership that every single visit averages to about $50). As if I didn't have enough reasons to dislike cross-training.

Will run for syrup

I have a coworker whose running accomplishments and race-day logistics are definitely worthy of a quick mention. I was reminded of this today because the coworker in question just told me about the marathon he ran yesterday, and, as is typical for him, he posted an enviable, sub-elite time under chaotic and amusing conditions.

My coworker is tall, lanky, and most definitely a natural runner. I am short, not lanky, and try very hard when running. I first realized that he and I ran in different universes one evening in the Park last summer. On this particular run, I was out for a five mile fartlek, and I happened to be in the quick portion of my run (my fartleks alternate one minute of hard running with two minutes of easy running) when I saw him running towards me. When we reached one another, he promptly switched directions and began running alongside me, asking me all sorts of questions like where I was running and for how long. I realized then that he had been tricked into thinking my average pace was a lot faster than it really was, and that he would be sorely disappointed when the 60 seconds were up and I brought it down to a (much) lower gear. Through short breaths, I said, "I…can't…run…this…fast…for…very…long... I...just...need...to...fart--" and with that, he turned around, waved goodbye, and continued on his way! The next day at work, when I bumped into him in at the coffee machine, he told me, somewhat incredulously, that he was just out for eighteen miles (at 7:30 pm on a Wednesday night!) and that, when he got home, he ate a whole third of a watermelon!! A whole third of a watermelon?? Really? Yes, there's a reason that he's lanky.

A couple of months later, while he was away in Boston on a work-related trip, another one of my colleagues, who was also on the same trip, sent me the following email:

We ended up talking about how he went running yesterday morning before the storm came into town. I asked him where he went, and he said that he took the T to Wonderland and then ran along the beach out there. I told him that that sounded very nice, and he said yes, it was. Especially because, he added, as he was running he noticed a small 5k race about to start and decided to join in. Which he did, and which he then won. The prize was a giant bottle of maple syrup, which he said he then had to run with all the way back to the hotel. [It was a seven mile run back to the hotel.]

Today, he approached me at work to ask about my upcoming race. He then casually mentioned that he just ran a marathon yesterday. It was the Long Island marathon, and he was very disappointed in his time. Not wanting to pry, I asked if the weather was poor or if he was not sufficiently trained, and he then revealed the following: While the weather was drizzly but okay, he found it most difficult that the course was run along the desolate Parkway, and runners were spaced about 400 m apart. He was anticipating Power Gel stations at miles 8 and 18, but there were none, and so he spent most of the intervening miles asking the odd person he came across on the Parkway, "Do you have a gel?" At mile 23, where there actually were Power Gels on offer, he ate three of them (gross). At the finish, there was no shelter and it was, by this time, pouring rain. He had no friends or family to greet him, so he had to get on his bike to cycle three miles to the train station. And his time? A disappointing 2:57. (Never mind that he's pacing a friend at another marathon in three weeks' time for a 3 hour finish. But as he said, this should be "no problem.") Well, at least he didn't have to carry back any maple syrup this time.

(Not) the fast lane

Tonight I have to run intervals. (Since I know that, after doing so, I'm guaranteed to be sitting on my couch with my husband in a Jell-O-like state, beer in hand, watching last night's recorded Lost episode, and since we are off tomorrow to visit my in-laws for Easter, I know this post is now or never.)

If there's any part I dislike about marathon training, speed intervals would be it (hills are a close second). Something about my short, thick legs makes them rather inconducive to rapid turnover, and I'm simply horrible at this aspect of training. When non-runners tell me they don't like running, intervals are the one area in which I can see their point. They're simply work for work's sake. Round and round, back and forth, up and down. I usually start dreading these workouts the night before, thinking about them as I go to sleep. I fear them when I awake on the scheduled day. (It doesn't help that last night we were out late (for me) celebrating a friend's birthday, and I'm still trying to shake off the three glasses of red wine this morning. So far the only thing that Thursday, April 9, 2009 has going for it is the fact that it's gloriously sunny outside, and it's difficult to be in a bad mood with blue skies and sunshine.)

That I am not a good sprinter is not helped by the fact that I don't know how to pace myself. Kevin, my coach, tells me that I should alternate slow-fast-slow-fast, etc., and the last rep should be the fastest. Instead, my reps usually end up looking something like this:

1. very, very fast (for me)
2. very fast
3. fast
4. respectable
5. pathetic
6. embarrassing
7. very fast

The difference between this round of interval training and all those I've done over the last five years is that, this time, my husband is out suffering with me. He's running the Half Marathon in Mississauga, and is therefore following a training plan that looks similar to mine, except that he drops out of every Saturday long run about halfway through (as I like to tell him, he doesn't know the half of it) and he skips one workout, on average, each week (usually the fartlek, in spite of how much he loves to say that word). Running hill repeats or intervals with Zdenek consists mostly of me looking at his backside. He's so much stronger and faster than me that my already slow self feels like the fat kid in gym class, the gap between us ever increasing. It also annoys me that, because he lets me start a few seconds before him and ends up passing me midway through to finish a few seconds ahead of me, his total rest time is longer than mine. This seems profoundly unfair. But I try not to complain because I am grateful for his company; it's true what they say about misery.