Week Twelve in Half Marathon Training Plan

You have finally made it to the final week of training for the Half Marathon. This last week will seem almost pedestrian after the last 11 weeks that you've put in. But cutting back this week is the most important thing you can do. In fact, you can pick out one of the four days of running I have listed below and take that off if you are not feeling strong throughout the week (which you should be).

Week Twelve program:

Sunday, Friday - off
Monday, 4 mile Easy Run (under 70% HRM)
Tuesday, 4 miles easy (under 70% HRM)
Wednesday - 5 miles Tempo (80-88% HRM) This you will do by warming up one mile under 70% MHR, then alternate between 2 minutes under 70% HRM and 10 minutes 80-88%, then again between 2 minutes under 70% HRM and 10 minutes 80-88%of your HRM, etc., to a distance of 4.5 miles and then a half mile cool down.

Thursday - 4 miles easy (under 70% HRM)

Saturday – Half Marathon Race Day!

I will have some last minute race tips for you before Saturday in my updates. For now, just remember to drink at least 64 ounces of water each day throughout the week. Don't worry that it's putting water weight on your body frame; you have more risk of dehydration than being water-logged for a race. Remember this especially if your race in going to be in weather that the predicted temperature is 60 degrees or above (like 90 plus percent of races this time of year).

Earth Day Running Tip 5: Run Away From Home

Happy Earth Day [and Good Friday to all my Christian followers]!

I hope that there isn't any teen age runners following my blog, read the title, and think that I'm giving them sage advice on leaving home. Today's Earth Day's Tip is referencing where you run when you do run. Think about making your home your starting point of your week day run, and run from home.

Many of us check the weather map and start weighing the 50/50 odds of the weather turning south and end up going to the club to run on a treadmill. There are also those of us that have a favorite 10 mile route that is part of the [fill in the missing blank: New York City/Chicago/Twin Cities/Houston/etc.] Marathon. Some of us just enjoy going to a wooded trail that runs next to the lake or river in a nearby town.

I don't want to spoil anyone favorite running haunt, but when possible, run leaving your driveway. If you haven't explored a running trail a mile or two away – run there from home, figure out a circuit, and then bring yourself on that route back home. If you do feel the need to run at a starting point away from home, car pool with a running friend instead of meeting them there. It saves both of you gas money, gives you companionship, and an opportunity to multi-task – catching up on the past week with a friend and a coffee/lunch on the way home. This is also true of any races that you plan – do it with a friend and car pool.

If you are interested in making it fun, take the distance that you plan on running and see if you can't challenge yourself to see if you can get to a certain spot and back. If the weather holds up tomorrow, I am going to try to run from my doorstep to the doorstep of Mall of America and back [approx. 20 miles as the crow flies]. You don't need to try that kind of distance but planning and preparing for any distance can be fun especially if it's not something you've run before. One note of caution for anyone trying this, don't forget to bring a cellphone to call for rescue, planned water stops to refill your reusable water bottle, and a GPS [if you have a smart phone] wouldn't be a bad idea.

Again, Happy Earth Day! Get out there and celebrate it on your favorite running trail!

Earth Day Running Tip 4: Before you shower each day, run.

I will admit this tip could be hard for all runners. But for those of you where this can work, do it. I am fortunate to be in a job where I work from home. So I can plan my day so that if I have a meeting later in the day, I can get my breakfast in, run in, prep work done and shower before I have to run into a soul. But when you think of your water use from taking two showers each day [when it begins and later after your run] there's a lot of water being heated and used. Two biggest energy uses in a home are furnace/air conditioner and hot water heater.

I realize this is asking some runners to become early morning runners, so I understand that this tip doesn't work for everyone. But if you do work from home, you can make this practice a habit regardless of when you run in the day. So when feasible, wait for that shower until after you run.

Earth Day Running Tip 3: Recycle Your Shoes… more than once.

I know that many of you probably follow this practice, but if not, why not? I have a phasing out of my running shoes. I go through shoes on a quarterly basis. When you are putting in 30 plus running miles a week, it doesn't take long for your shoes to break down. And at my weight, 500 miles is usually the breaking point. But I recycle my shoes three times. The first use of my shoes is for 3 months. During the next three months, after I am running with next pair of new shoes, I wear the prior pair for that same three months – only not in a running situation. Around work, around home, for walks, they become my casual shoe. I actually put in marker on the tongue of the shoe, the month and year that I wore the shoes as running shoes. I am currently wearing "11 10" shoes. This means I started wearing them in November 2010. When I started running in my new shoes "02 11", these became my new casual shoe. The shoes I wear for cutting the grass are "08 10" (August 2010) shoes. Thus, the shoes for cutting the grass are my second recycling of the shoes.

So every three months, the shoes all move on to a new phrase. Next month, May 2011, (or "05 11" for those of you following along), my 08 10 shoes will finally be brought to a race or church drive to be recycled. By then I'm estimating they will probably have 1000 miles on them but I'm sure still enough wear for anyone that has either no shoes at all or in need of any shoes because of the charity they receive them from. I'm guessing those shoes that aren't selected are recycled from what I'm told at race shoe drives, but I'm not counting that as the fourth recycling since I'm not totally sure if they are.

As you can probably tell, I go through a lot of shoes, but you must admit, I do get a lot of use out of them. And except for the winter, at work and maybe the beach, you won't see me in anything but running shoes. I think they are more comfortable than most shoes, and for the most part, keep my legs fresher than shoes that put form before function.

Earth Day Running Tip 2: Support Green Races

This might be a little tougher for you to follow, but every major city has races that support the green movement. Whenever possible, support these races. You might question, how I know if a race is a green race? Send an email to the race organizer. If they get enough of these inquiries [and believe me they do] they start making subtle changes to do what they can to eliminate those items such as 'medals' that are actually engraved wood, running results computers that are solar powered, running goody bags that are recycled and can be used over and over again for shopping, and a recycled shoe drive where you can deposit your old running shoes.

If you are looking for a race that can give you a blue print on what they can do to go green, I am including a link to the most environmental friendly race we have here in Minnesota: http://bit.ly/fc5fxJ The Urban Wildlife Half Marathon & 5K supports the use of all those efforts I've listed above and more. Their running numbers last year were made of a bio degradable material that could be planted for sun flowers. Okay, I'll admit, the rain last year rode havoc on the number staying on us during the race, but the point is they are trying different efforts in an attempt to have runners not leave an environmental footprint in the races we run.

Earth Day Running

In honor of this Friday being Earth Day, I am dedicating a blog post each day on ideas on how to incorporate environmental ideas into your running. My friends and family that know me wouldn't describe me as Mr. Green when it comes to environmental issues. I have questions about many of the claims made on how men or women affect the world environmental system. But regardless of your political bent on ecology, we can all do simple things that help saves the planet for future generations while just making common sense (and cents) at the same time. I'm what you might label an 'economical environmentalist'. If the benefit of the practice outweighs all of the costs, why not do it?

First and foremost, probably the biggest immediate impact you can have – bottled water. For Christmas 2010, bonnie bought me a Kleen Kanteen Bottle. I love the bottle, easy to clean, light metal, cool color and easy to keep in the side pocket of my gym bag. Since the start of the year, I have drunk 1500 ounces from it. I have not used bottled water once this year. Now that's 4 cases of bottled water. I know what you are thinking, 'Sam's Club sells a case of water for $5 a case, big deal." But that's still $20 vs. free. And think of the 100 empty water bottles that would've ended either in a landfill or recycled with additional use of energy. And you want to know something that made this practice a habit? It's easier. When I think of hauling the cases of water that I did in the past from the car, the searching for the bottled water before going to the club, paying $1.50 for water at the club Aquafina machine because I forgot the bottled water, etc. – this is a very easy practice to get into.

So Tip 1 for the Green Runner: Can the use of Bottled Water.

Boston Marathon

Two hours until the start of the Boston Marathon. No, I'm not running it, just waiting for it to begin on TV. I probably have a unique love for the race different than most runners. My second sport love is baseball. And for those of you that may not be aware of this, The Boston Red Sox have a game that starts at 11 am on Patriot's Day (the day the Boston Marathon is run each year). They do this so that the game should finish (barring a tie and extra innings) and have the crowd get out about the same time the leaders of the Boston Marathon are passing the 23 mile mark of the race. Mile 23 is approximately where the Stadium is located.

When I did run Boston, it was one of my favorite memories seeing baseball fans cheering you on, just when you needed it. You could imagine they were cheering you because of your race or if you had just hit the game winning homerun. Or in my case, you could imagine both.

Week Eleven in Half Marathon Training Plan

You made it to the tapering phase of training for the Half Marathon. The next two weeks you will be tapering. I want to warn you that some of you might feel that this is too easy and that you might be losing some conditioning, and therefore try to do more than I'm recommending. Don't. These two weeks are just as important as the ten week base you've already put in. Don't blow it but trying to do too much.

Week Eleven program:

Sunday, Friday - off
Monday, 5 mile Easy Run (under 70% HRM)
Tuesday, 5 miles easy (under 70% HRM)
Wednesday - 7 miles Tempo (80-88% HRM) This you will do by warming up one mile under 70% MHR, then alternate between 2 minutes under 70% HRM and 10 minutes 80-88%, then again between 2 minutes under 70% HRM and 10 minutes 80-88%of your HRM, etc., to a distance of 6.5 miles and then a half mile cool down.

Thursday - 4 miles easy (under 70% HRM)

Saturday - 6 miles (under 70% first 8 miles, 70-80% last two miles)

You will no doubt feel more rested at the end of this week just from the mileage decrease. Watch your diet these last two weeks. Runners tend put to pick up weight from trying to store extra carbos for the race, but it is really unnecessary,

iPod Nano... After the wash and rinse cycle...

Well I do have to admit, I've gone through my share of Nanos during it's product life but they finally got small enough for me to have this happen.

Yes, I left it in my marathon running shorts that went not only through the wash and rinse cycle, but showed up on the bottom of the dryer (wonder how that rolling around helped..).

If any of you have ideas for me to dry this out, I'm all ears. Right now I'm having it sit in a sealed bag of rice. That worked once when I had an older model shut down during a rain storm. But I am open to other ideas.

Otherwise, the screen is probably going to keep the 'wave action' look that I'm getting for some time to come.


- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad

Energizer AP 1201 for iPhone 4

Finished a 20 miler this past weekend with a great rechargeable battery for my Verizon iPhone. If you aren't the type of runner that uses GPS for any of the apps they use for running, this might not mean a lot to you, but for everyone else, this should be good information.

I've found that my iPhone/iPod can usually last 2-2 ½ hours on a full charge if I'm using my GPS. I use the RunKeeper app for my long distance runs as it is pretty reliable on the mileage tracking. But as we all know, the GPS on any phone just drains it at double the rate of normal use. So I have been plugging in a reserve pack for any of those runs going more than 2 ½ hours. But no need to with the Energizer AP 1201.

The battery bills itself as giving your iPhone double the battery life. But I found that you actually get more than that, probably 5 ½ to 6 hours life. What I really like is that it's a silicon case that also protects the iPhone. If you get caught in a quick rain, it's nice to flip the phone in a pocket or on your sleeve so that it isn't getting water directly, which just kills an iPhone.

One of the other advantages of the unit is that it you can plug your iPhone into it, then plug both them into a wall socket and charge them both at the same time (no charging them individually). The iPhone automatically charges first, and when it gets full, the unit then starts taking the charge, pretty slick.

Again, if any of you that need to take an iPhone with you on a long run (because of using a running GPS app, a phone to call for a pickup if you die on your run, or as protection in running in an unknown area) the Energizer AP 1201 is a great accessory. I would give it 5 out of 5 in this category.

If you are interested in buying this, Best Buy has them available at a discount price, but I found the best deal on Amazon for less than $30. See:

http://amzn.to/f8zXVE

Week Eleven in Half Marathon Training Plan

You made it to the tapering phase of training for the Half Marathon. The next two weeks you will be tapering. I want to warn you that some of you might feel that this is too easy and that you might be losing some conditioning, and therefore try to do more than I'm recommending. Don't. These two weeks are just as important as the ten week base you've already put in. Don't blow it but trying to do too much.

Week Eleven program:

Sunday, Friday - off
Monday, 5 mile Easy Run (under 70% HRM)
Tuesday, 5 miles easy (under 70% HRM)
Wednesday - 7 miles Tempo (80-88% HRM) This you will do by warming up one mile under 70% MHR, then alternate between 2 minutes under 70% HRM and 10 minutes 80-88%, then again between 2 minutes under 70% HRM and 10 minutes 80-88%of your HRM, etc., to a distance of 6.5 miles and then a half mile cool down.

Thursday - 4 miles easy (under 70% HRM)

Saturday - 6 miles (under 70% first 8 miles, 70-80% last two miles)

You will no doubt feel more rested at the end of this week just from the mileage decrease. Watch your diet these last two weeks. Runners tend put to pick up weight from trying to store extra carbos for the race, but it is really unnecessary, you will get these from the drop in mileage, but not to the point of bloating yourself. Again, don't change anything in your diet by eating too much or cutting back. Just eat like you have for the past few weeks.

Week Nine of Half Marathon Training

Alright, you just got an easy week, time to get back to endurance training.

Week Nine program:

Sunday, Friday - off
Monday, 5 mile Easy Run (under 70% HRM)
Tuesday, Thursday - 4 miles easy (under 70% HRM)
Wednesday - 7 miles Tempo (80-88% HRM) This you will do by warming up one mile under 70% MHR, then alternate between 2 minutes under 70% HRM and 10 minutes 80-88%, then again between 2 minutes under 70% HRM and 10 minutes 80-88%of your HRM, etc., to a distance of 6.5 miles and then a half mile cool down.
Saturday - 12 miles (under 70% first 8 miles, 70-80% last two miles)

You have now built up to 10 minutes for a Tempo Workout.