Stability Through Motion

Untangle those headphones and pop them on your head:

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Stereo recording with Olympus LS-10, Sound Devices Mix Pre mixer and two DPA 4060 omni mics, stuck on the ends of a coathanger!

Yes, this is the tried and tested method recommended by Chris Watson on his day-long workshop at Kew Gardens this Monday. Thanks to Sound and Music for setting these events up – it was a fantastic day with a lovely bunch of film makers, composers and audio artists, and of course Chris Watson himself. It’s all à propos his installation in the Palm House, Whispering in the Leaves, which you really should try to hear – it’s on until September 5th.

Those DPA mics are coming my way soon. Officially this arrangment is known as spaced omnis, in this case spaced out along a coathanger. The mics are extremely small. I already have a coathanger fortunately.

Hello running fans.

My left foot continues to improve, but I’m sticking at 25 miles per week running at the moment, nothing longer than 13 miles, and the rest of the time is spent cycling – 70 to 100 miles a week. Now then, I ran the High Wycombe Half Marathon last Sunday. Due to my lack of long runs, the Brussels marathon is in some doubt, but my fitness levels felt good, so I thought I’d combine my two current exercise regimes in one day by biking to High Wycombe, running the Half then biking home.

Below is the route I devised, a thirty mile trip one-way along lovely quiet leafy roads, particularly early on the Sunday morning, or at least it was quiet until it hit West Wycombe when it becomes the nightmare that is the A40 for just a few miles.

The little road from Stanton St John to Worminghall is definitely amongst the quietest roads I’ve ever biked along – skirting the beautiful Bernwood Forest, Shabbington Wood and Hell Coppice. I say quiet, but it crosses the M40, so it’s out as far as sound recording locations goes. When out cycling these days, I’ve always got half an ear open for sound locations, and half an eye open for video locations – summer breezes wafting through treetops, fields of wheat, that sort of thing.

So I arrived in good time for the start, parked the bike, ate a marine oat bar (thanks Alex), made the outrageous decision to run in my cycling shorts and stood around about half way back from the start line. The sensible plan was to go round at training pace, perhaps speeding up a bit for the second half if I still felt good, and if the foot felt okay. Of course I just couldn’t resist the temptation to overtake people, and starting so far back there were quite a few people to overtake. After chatting to a few runners for a while, there was a sharp descent and I got a bit carried away. My legs certainly wouldn’t let me run sub 7 minute miles after that bike ride, but things went well enough for me to record a 1:39 time and not suffer too badly. At this point I was absolutely famished and ate my way through the generous goody bag handed out to finishers: mini mars bar, mini fruit bar, apple, along with the Mule bar, home made oat bars and banana that I’d brought myself. After a five minute stretch I jumped back on the bike and wove my way home. My legs pretty much gave up when I got to the Stanton St John hill climb, there was just nothing there!

Recovery – well that just consists of lots of food, water, and a bit more biking. Honestly, I really didn’t want to, but we ended up cycling another 8 miles in the evening, and another six or so the day after. They do say, they do, that a bit of light exercise is the best form of recovery from hard exercise, and I do reckon, I do, that it’s true. The principle is that it gets the blood moving through the damaged muscle tissues, helping repairs. However, I’m not sure what all this biking is doing for certain creative parts of my body, perhaps we will never find out.

I’ve now returned from a foot inspection at the physio and have been passed fit, although with instructions to strengthen my foot, which just means clenching your toes a lot through the day. Weak feet, bah, how many other stupid bits of my body do I have to exercise! I’m completely losing track of which exercise does what, grrr.

I’m going to attempt a longer run at last this coming weekend, and the biking mileage can reduce to sensible levels. It’s been fantastic while the weather was good, travelling along quiet country roads and covering so much more ground than you can with just your feet alone. I feel a lot more confident on a bike, though still unwilling to take it seriously as a sport, as it just might require too much kit or bike mending knowledge.

So after all this, the Brussels plan is still up in the air – I certainly won’t be aiming at a PB if I do run it, and then I’m still registered for the Snowdonia marathon at the end of October. In the meantime there are some 5k and 10k races around that I could target, and shock news, after six or so years I’ve finally joined a running club – the Headington Road Runners. The hope is that this’ll spur me on to greater effort for a year or so until I retreat to the lonely hills. Speaking of which, I’ve been reading of Arthur Machen again recently. Remember, fairies are not to be taken lightly.

So I spent some time recently standing on a tennis ball, one foot at a time, in an effort to stretch out the soles of my feet. Occassionally I’d felt tightness and cramping in this area, so I figured this would be a good idea.

Then my latest 20 mile run drove me to the pages of Human Anatomy for Artists, which is, well, just much more artistic than Human Anatomy for Runners, and has lovely pictures. Here I found a full description of the Abductor Hallucis, the muscle responsible for my current malaise.

The treatment, as ever, is frequent icing, and no running for at least a week. That’s not a perfect start to the new marathon training schedules. Grrr.

Here’s a recording of Muntjac barking the other day in Whichford woods. This particular Muntjac was standing across the wood about 30 metres away, unmoving, but occasionally pawing the ground with its forefeet. It had definitely seen me creeping about the wood, despite my stealth. In the end I gave up and slunk off into the woodland. I’m a bit dim about wildlife in general but research tells me it’s the Muntjac that barks quite so serially.

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The experiment
————-
I have been a one-man experiment for the last 3-4 months, doggedly following the low-mileage / high intensity schedules from the Furman Institute of Running. I followed Furman schedules for 10k and HM last year with some success.

The task:
==========
Based on 5k PB of 18:19 last year and 10k PB of 37:55, I followed the Furman schedules for a predicted marathon pace of 6:49 (sub 3). This consists of 3-4 runs a week, one speed session, one tempo session, one long run, significantly faster than in most other schedules. These are interspersed with cross-training days, which for me consisted of biking for an hour.
For race day, based on my Half Marathon result (1:25:55) and given a general lack of confidence after a 2 year marathon gap, I aimed at an actual MP (Marathon Pace) of 7 minute miling, which would get me a 3:03 marathon PB.

Shakespeare marathon 2010: 3:11:43
Antwerp marathon 2008: 3:13:02
—–
April 2010
—–
125 miles run, 65 miles biked
hrs (sessions)
bike – 4:25 (4)
run – 15:14 (13)
total cardio:19h39
race pace: 5 in 4h52
avg pace: 7.19
Long runs: 20m @ 7:05

—–
April 2008
—–
124 miles run, 24 miles biked
hrs (sessions)
bike – 1:30 (2)
run – 16:24 (15)
total cardio: 17h54
race pace: 1 in 1h19
avg pace: 7.53
Long runs:  17m @ 8.21

—–
March 2010
—–
159 miles run, 171 miles biked
hrs (sessions)
bike – 11:10 (13)
run – 20:06 (15)
total cardio:31h16
race pace:  4:17h   4 sessions
avg pace: 7.36
Long runs: 15 @ 7.42, 22 @ 7.35, 15 @ 7.14, 20 @ 7.18

—–
March 2008
—–
181 miles run, 92 miles biked
hrs ( sessions)
bike – 5:57 (6)
run – 24:32 (20)
total cardio: 30h29
race pace: 1 @ 1h22
avg pace: 8.07
Long runs: 23 @ 8.00, 21 @ 8.34, 20 @ 2.40, 15 mile race @ 6.51, 19.5 @ 10

Feb 2010
—–
133 miles run, 119 miles biked
—–
hrs (sessions)
bike – 7:44 ( 9)
run – 16:57 (14)
total cardio:24h41
race pace: 1 @ 45 mins
avg pace: 7.38

Long runs: 18 @ 7.50, HM race @ 6.31, 20 @ 7.30, 18 @ 7.30

—–
Feb 2008
—–
175 miles run, 48 miles biked
hrs  (sessions)
bike – 3:00 (3)
run – 23:42 (20)
total cardio:26h42
race pace: none
avg pace: 8.07
Long runs: 20 @ 8.37, 18 @ 9.00, 14 @ 8.34, HM @ 6.43

—–
Jan 2010
—–
164 miles run, 111 miles biked
hrs (sessions)
bike – 7:10 (8)
run – 21:44 (18)
total cardio:28h54
race pace: none
avg pace: 7.55
Long runs: 20 @ 7.54, 17 @ 7.30, 15 @ 7.20, 13 @ 8.18, 17 @ 8.12

—–
Jan 2008
—–
152 miles run,  102 miles biked
hrs (sessions)
bike – 6:30 (7)
run – 21:09 (18)
total cardio:27h39
race pace: none
avg pace: 8.20
Long runs: 21 @ 9.06, 21 @ 8.00, 18 @ 8.34, 13 @ 8.30
————

Phew, right, bit of a mess, but I think that made some kind of sense and was vaguely readable.

The result
=====
3:11:43 achieved in a very painful marathon with a real last-6-mile fade, my first ever.

My previous PB was 3:13 set in Antwerp in April 2008.
There are obviously many other variables, not least the fact that I’m two years older, and over 40 now.

Despite fading from my target drastically (splits of 1:31 and 1:40), in retrospect I’m quite impressed I managed to just PB while following this schedule.

Training time:
————-
The total aerobic training time is really not far out, although the average pace is way up in 2010, as expected from the Furman schedule with its faster running. This puts paid to the idea that Furman is ‘easy’, requiring less time. I gave it as much welly as the Runners World schedule from 2008, and in fact reckon that to get the best results you need to double the amount of time I put in to cycling at least, so it’s not a plan for the short-of-time in search of a PB.

Injuries:
———–
NONE. This was after all the primary reason for starting the plan, after shin splints during a brief toy with a higher mileage Hadd regime last year, so I’m happy with that result. Even when I return to a plan with more running, I’m convinced of the benefits TO ME of cross-training and/or leg strengthening. I have a very sedentary job, and a very sedentary background prior to taking up running 6-7 years ago. Arse on chair for 10 hours per day DOES NOT EQUAL fit for running.

Mental attitude:
—————–
It felt great to be running faster quite a lot, and I enjoyed knowing exactly what I had to do in each session, or if not enjoyed, then I felt challenged and invigorated! Some of those reps were sick-making.

Single race result = lack of conclusive proof of anything at all!

I put all this training into one race of course, and so many things can go wrong or right with a race that it can be hard to judge a training schedule solely on this basis. Stratford 2010 was hotter than I’d have liked. I’d been feeling low on energy for two weeks prior (iron deficiency?). But the sore quads in the race I’d be inclined to think were the result of fewer long runs and less time on feet (no long runs over 2h40). The last long run was a 20 miler faster than I’ve run 20 miles before. I did worry that this took a lot out of me, and looking back at the logs I’d say that it probably did, in combination with an iron-low diet. It felt so good at the time, that a pace of 5 secs per mile faster for a further 4 miles seemed to be an easy task.

I’m confident the Furman schedule could work for me, but I would need to at least double the biking mileage to a respectable level. 30 miles a week is barely reaching a normal commuting level, but the winter this year has been a bit off putting as far as biking outdoors goes. I dislike those ‘I know a guy who . . .‘ type statements, but . . . two guys on the RW forums who I chatted to achieved 2:47 and 2:59 respectively. The key factor seems to be that that they have a good background in triathlon, and generally did a lot more cross-training than I did.

What happens next:
————
Given that finding training time is always a problem, I’ll probably now return to a 5 x running per week schedule + 1 cross-training session. Looking at such schedules now, they just look so nice and easy! I could go for a run and not even bother to look at my watch. Ahhh, this’ll be such fun! If the 5 x per week schedule works out well, who knows, I could finally commit to even higher mileage. There’s always the struggle with lifestyle though, and my underlying knowledge that it’s the hills that will finally lure me, not a road marathon time target.

In conclusion my dear friends, I would definitely use Furman again, especially if any higher-mileage injuries recur. I would recommend it to others too without question for distances lower than marathon, and for the marathon if you’re prepared to commit time to the cross-training, or are already a duathlete or triathlete.

Monday 3rd May – a trip out at 4am to the quietest woods in Oxfordshire again, at Whichford. This time I knew where the birds hung out, so headed straight in their direction, scaring a herd of deer across a field, and was set up by 4.30am ready to record.

In the early evening I ventured out on my first post-marathon run, a ten mile loop of Wytham Woods from home. Oh the bliss of not having to take a watch or worry about time! My quads were quite cross about the steep downhill section out of the woods, and have obviously not recovered yet from Stratford.

The target: 3:03:30 – or 7 minute miling all the way.

This seemed achievable based on the HM conversion and a comfortable 20 miler @ 7:05 miling 3 weeks previously.

Everything until that point in training had been fine and dandy, and I was pretty confident of keeping the 7s all the way through.

For those who don’t know/remember, I’ve been following the FIRST training schedules from the Furman Institute‘s book on the subject. This is based on 3-4 runs a week, never topping 40 miles, but crucially also 2 days of hard-ish cross training (biking mostly).
This has proven very succesful for me in shorter races, but the test was would it work for the aerobically more challenging 26.2 miles. So, to the …

…stats
==========
Mile – pace – (HR) – notes
———–
Miles 1 – 5
———-
1 – 7:03 – (154) – positioned quite far back as usual, but no problems despite the HM field setting off too.
2 – 6:54 – (159) – slight downhill, all going well
3 – 7:08 – (159) – uphill so not worried
4 – 7:09 – (161) – more uphill – sun is getting relentless.
5 – 6:48 – (162) – downhill after Luddington

Miles 6 – 10
—————-
6 – 7:14 – (160) – uphill to Welford
7 – 7:09 – (161) -water stop here and saw the folks
8 – 7:11 – (162) – up steep Rumer Hill
9 – 6:43 – (162) – down steeply then towards the Greenway, flew down here
10 – 7:08 – (160) – steady, chatting with a Half marathoner on for his PB. Felt very hot by now.

Miles 11 – 15
—————
11 – 7.00 – (159) – still chatting
12 – 7.05 – (161) – HM separation point in town – things get lonelier all of a sudden
13 – 7:07 – (161) – fully into the second lap, uphill again
14 – 7:09 – (161) – still uphill gently
15 – 7:18 – (160) – struggling through Luddington a bit, had a scrap with a club runner who kept pushing me into traffic

Miles 16 – 20
————–
16 – 7:00 – (159) – downhill
17 – 7:19 – (160) – climb into Welford
18 – 7:18 – (158) – water stop in the village
19 – 7:36 – (157) – up Rumer Hill again, then down, amazingly slow considering – but no energy at all for the fast descent I enjoyed first time round. Started counting numbers to keep my head in the zone.
20 – 7:27 – (157) – really hitting me now, quads begin to ache – meet last supporters in bleary state. Really want to quit already.

Miles 21 – 26.2
—————
21 – 7:26 – (158) – on the Greenway, endless endless track, still catching runners but oh so slowly
22 – 7:28 – (156) – lonely as hell, quads painful, even lost the ability to count up to 100 here
23 – 8:05 – (152) – chat to 2nd lady who speeds off, but perks me up a bit, 1st and only toilet stop somewhere round here
24 – 7:59 – (152) – catch 2 other runners and we run together for a few
25 – 8:30 – (150) – Long stop for water, reach edge of town, good support, myself and Steve drop the 3rd runner push on in united pain
26 – 8:00 – (150) – too many corners, double backing over bridge – each corner causes more pain – legs just want to go straight
26.2 – 1:30? [unsure, forgot to stop watch as usual!] Steve amazingly sprints for the finish, I’m happy to see the clock at 3.12

The result: 3:11:43 chip time, a PB by over a minute, so not too bad given the blow up. Was that a blow-up? I didn’t walk ever, but did stop for periods at water stations, initially just to make sure I got the water down me in the heat, but then because it felt bloody good not to be running!

Oh, I should mention that I was 45th out of 850 finishers (1100 starters which indicates a high dropout percentage on a hot day). My highest marathon position ever. To be fair, most people seem to want to run the little marathon being held in London on the same day, and only 12 people ran sub 3 hours on Sunday, which tells a tale. The winner’s time was a measly 2:48, ahem, rather than the 2:05 at London.

Despite my dramatic slowdown it tells a story that no one caught me in the last miles, indeed i was still overtaking – so everyone was slowing. Overall I’m very happy, because it’s a very long time since my previous marathon, and I scraped a PB despite a terrible fade. The fade felt better simply because everyone around me was obviously fading too.

Analysis:
———–
Energy levels:
————
Even at the start in the first few miles I knew I was not on for running 6.50 at any point. The jaded feeling I’ve had in training for the previous almost 3 weeks was still there – just no pep or zip or whatever. Did I lose the edge after the fast 20 miler? Over-training iron deficiency – possibly? It can’t have been just the uncomfortable conditions, because my quads have never caused so much trouble in previous marathons. They seem to indicate lack of miles, which points to the Furman plan.

Furman analysis
———–
I’m pretty convinced it can work, but think it would need more than the measly 30 miles biking I averaged to achieve 3 hr times. I’d need to double that, which would take up even more hours of training. I’d rather spend less time training, and more running, and am only worried about the concomittant higher risk of injury. On the plus side, the plan kept me focused, improved shorter racing times and caused no injury troubles (the pelvis was from bad posture at work).

Look at that HR too – way down in the last miles, obviously due to speed. I’ve never measured HR in a marathon before, so unsure what to make of it, but it’s not too high at any point, which might indicate it’s just me legs.

Fuel
—–
Fine – carbo loaded for 2 days with no ill effects. Can’t judge the effects during the race as I faded anyway, but took all my gels, was very attentive to water intake, so I felt like I got that right this time. 4 gels in total, one taken every 6 miles, and the last one was caffeinated. Stopped for water pretty much every water station, but didn’t lose too much time until I began to drink it seriously in the second lap. Doused my head and back with water at every one as well.

I don’t like to be alone
————–
On the psychological front I’ve had it confirmed yet again that I run better in company, if I can chat, than having to cope on solo stretches in a strung out group on long unrelenting roads/tracks. As soon as I was in a chatting group, things were fine – my mind picked up and I could ignore the inevitable muscle struggle. Those last miles would have been pure hell without Steve and Houston. I know they don’t fetch (had never heard of it), but thanks guys!

To the future – it’s all ahead of us!
————
Brussels 2010? Will it be a sub 3 attempt, or should I target my still needed sub 3:05? Will I keep with Furman, or switch to higher mileage? Is there a middle way?! More thinking required. A week off running now, then target the local 10k race, and I’ve a month or so of bimbling around woods and trails before the next regime.

A cold start to the day at 3am, driving to Whichford to record a dawn chorus in the quietest wood I could find in Oxfordshire. Here’s a photo from Geograph:

Photograph of Whichford Wood in the spring © Copyright Barrie Eyre and licensed for reuse under this Creative Commons Licence. Please note – the bluebells are not out yet!

After a false start in the pine woods at the top of the hill with some tawny owls, I dropped my tartan blanket (oh no!), was freaked out by a wavering torch light seemingly approaching the woods for about ten minutes then settled in to some gorgeous road free and air free natural sounds.

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All recorded with the trusty Sennheiser ME66/K6 combo, Sound Devices Mix Pre and Olympus LS10.

So with all last week’s sessions put to bed, it’s semi-officially time to taper. That means running progressively fewer miles over the final three weeks to rest the legs ready for the big day. It’s also traditionally the time when you feel restless or lethargic, hungry or dejected, worried, obsessed, twingy (endowed with twinges), sleepy, or any number of other symptoms which might be psychological and might be nothing to do with tapering at all but more to do with incipient death.

Since I forgot to mention it, the big day itself is at Stratford – the Shakespeare marathon on 25th April, when most people in the country will be running in London. As it’s the weekend when Shakespeare is supposed to have been born, I’m wondering if I shouldn’t be learning some sonnets to recite to myself when the going gets tough.

I’ve bought myself yet another bag, groan. But after all, I don’t have a lime green one yet! This is mostly because I hate trying to drink from drink stations, stopping, tripping up over discarded cups or bottles, and need to take some fuel in the form of gels along with me. I can’t seem to run with a belt on, the most obvious solution, but have run marathons with a backpack before (bigger ones) so this lightweight small affair looks like it might just do the job rather well.

This week’s plan:

• Tuesday: 8 x 800m in 2:41 each with 1:30 rest intervals
• Wednesday: 1 hour biking
• Thursday: 5 miles @ 6.26 per mile
• Friday: 1 hour biking
• Saturday: 5 mile easy run
• Sunday: 13 miles @ marathon pace (6:50) on the Stratford route

The plan for Sunday’s run is to make it a race practice, running with the backpack and fuel, at race pace (in fact faster than race pace), on a single loop of the marathon course, including the much hyped Greenway, a straight 5-6 mile stretch of disused railway track.

In other news I took an exam this morning, my first for over ten years, and am now an Adobe Certified Expert in Dreamweaver! In celebration I bought the lime green rucksack pictured above and some caffeinated energy gels. Mmmmmmmmm.