Another weekly mileage PR at 42mi

Last week I ran 42mi with my first 20mi long run

Another weekly mileage PR at 42mi

Last week I ran 42mi with my first 20mi long run.

400mi mark and couple of fastish longish runs

I ran a solid 7+mi run today at an average of 9:30mpm pace. This was quite fast training run for me but I was feeling pretty strong despite a longish 15mi run yesterday. Today's run also included couple of really fast routines. One was on flat nice grass very short stretch at about 6:30mpm pace. Other was the cat hill going up at 7-8mpm pace. Both efforts took me past 190bpm which hasnt really happened outside races for me. I am sure the 85 degree humid weather didnt hurt(!). After not doing ANY speed work or real hill work for quite a while, I am easing into it by sneaking very short stretches of speed/hill works in regular training runs as long as they do not interfere with long runs. Depending on how these routines proceed, I will have to plan for formal speed/hill sessions soon. If all goes well, I need few weeks of speed training ahead of the fifth avenue one miler about a month from now. I have exactly one race before that which I may skip if it actually helps my preparation for the miler. I want to break 7min in the one miler but we will see how training pans out.

The 15mi long run yesterday was interesting as well. I ran with the flyer group and ran most of it in vibram. As usual, vibrams continue to attract a lot of attention, especially with an article in Runners world this month. I needed 15mi to keep my weekly mileage above shod PR of 39mi which I did. 40mi is still smaller than 41mi I did couple of weeks back but the fact that I survived the 40mi with legs fresh enough to do a 9:30mpm seven miler today is the big difference. Even the 15mi run was relatively fast at 10mpm including the last couple of miles at strong sub-10mpm. In contrast, the 41mi week was followed by early signs of ankle sprain and an very easy 32mi week and the 19mi long run ended with slow couple of miles of 11-12mpm.

I also extended the depth of my barefoot running on bridal path into northern as well as southern end by basically completing the whole stretch. The portion of bridal path outside the reservoir loop is not as nice and has a stretches of sharp industrial gravel which really sucks. Despite developing reasonably strong soles and good form I just have to stop and walk on this gravel. I dont know how I can ever run on this gravel without pain or worse.. damage to sole. I am not convinced that training on this gravel is actually beneficial and I wouldnt run on it just for the sake if it unless it actually helps me. After all is to MINIMIZE the pain while maximizing the benefit not otherway round. That would be just plain nuts:-)

BF in NY for 404mi

Here is the video

My barefoot running is in a video about nyc summer streets!

I am famous! I just saw meself on the streetfilms video about the summer streets. I ran barefeet up and down the park avenue last weekend. I like the video even if I was wasnt in it:-)

BF in NY in 382mi

8mi central park run in pouring rain

Yesterday evening 8mi run was in pouring rain. Usually I prefer to run on soft dirt paths when its raining but yesterday I decided to do the big loop in central park to test my legs on wet road surface. I would think that the races would be wet every couple of miles due to water stops so I need to train for running on wet roads. I was a bit concerned that the soles will become soft and more susceptible to pincture or pain but the rain also washes off all the debris from the road so it was okay. I didnt even get any blisters from running on coarse roads in central park. I think the soles just become flexible lether without loosing strength. I do think wet soles are stickier and more likely to pick dirt or tiny stones if I run through a wet patch into dry dirt. I had been avoiding wet surfaces in races but now I am thinking I should just run through them and see if it actually make any difference.

Today I added 4 miles by running to and back from a central park race I was volunteering. I was a course marshall trying to keep bikers from crossing the race lane. My legs are hurting from standing barefeet (vibram) for 4 hours. I have to do about 17mi rest of the weekend to make the 42mi target. I am still undecided about whether to do one run or two.

BF in NY for 382mi 

My barefoot run in dim evening light (!)

It got a little late for the run yesterday and it started to get a bit dark by the end of the run. I was doing loops around reservior and parts of bridal path; which are not very well lit. I didnt realize it but its a bit different running when it gets too dark to make out terrain details. I had to run blind..quite literally and heighten the sensations in soles while stepping on and feel for any danger. It was a learning experience but was definitely doable. In fact, tip toeing resulted me running a bit faster than usual. But in general there is always some light in manhattan I guess. Why do I get a feeling that as we move into fall, I will be exploring more and more of the running barefoot in darkness?

Oh, a great research article about running and longevity at 

http://med.stanford.edu/news_releases/2008/august/running.html

BF in NY for 364mi

This week was a recovery week at 32mi with 11mi and 10mi runs on weekend. Both runs were nice and easy. Yesterday's 11mi was on Park Avenue as the avenue was closed to traffic this weekend. I started the run at 72nd street end at 7am sharp when the streets closed and ran all the way to Brooklyn Bridge and ran back. It was a lot of fun and people cheering me which was great. A guy with fancy camera took a shot of me and said it will be on streetfilms.org. I haven't seen anything yet on the website but it was pretty cool. I don't remember being interviewed ever before, however briefly, in front of a camera. Ironically, right after the interview, a middle aged woman crossing street in front of me shouted at me "Stupid!". That was kind of harsh thing to say, even to a stupid person:) For some reason, it reminded me of Forest Gump when his mom says something about ignoring others when people called Forest stupid... Oh and perhaps there is some kind of symbolism in Forest breaking out of the shackles (read "shoes") and running faster than ever!

On barefooting front, I am having problems with my ankle joint. It feels okay while running but it feels a bit swollen when I sit for a while. There is also a mild pain. I am considering tapping up the ankles while running. Funny thing is that the two ankle wraps I have at home go around ankle as well over the sole so I cant really use them. I am watching various tapped up ankles in olympic games to figure the best way to do this. I am also wondering if the 19miler straight from 12mi long run phase was a major mistake. Thankfully there is no race anytime soon so I can focus on just mileage for next few weeks. On brighter note, the 11mi run on the Park Avenue was like walk in the park. The portion of the road regularly are very smooth, with perhaps a bit oil on it. Running was very pleasant on this smooth surface. Also portion of the Avenue with solid bike lane was even better with a continuous white lines. The first avenue (in marathon course) has a bike lane as well as thats kindda nice. I just now need to test the roads in wet conditions for a longish run as the marathon course will be full of water stops with people throwing water on road (and sticky Gaterade or worse...Gu packets!) Ouch.

BF in NY for 357mi

Taking eazy this week

This week has been very slow after the solid 41miler with the 19mi long run. I ran one 7miler and just a 4mi so far.  This week will probably end with less than 30mi. Perhaps not the worst thing after 7 weeks of almost continuous ramp up from 29mi to 41mi. Also after giving up the idea to run marathon as a training run on 22nd, I now might just do it. The marathon is on a bike path around a lake but has a dirt/grass path (ummm yummm) next to it and is 9 small loops so easy to adjust if necessary. And from the looks of it, its beautiful. I even took the day off (its on a Friday). I will post with an update on this as actual making it to the race is a logistic nightmare without car unless I camp at the start line:-)

On barefoot running front, I still am having hard time believing that the very rough central park loops on the 19mi was a non-issue and no signs of blisters what so ever. I did, however, made small injury on the side of the foot but I have seen much worse after pretty much every long run I had done before. Tomorrow, the Mayor Bloomberg is planning to close the Park Ave from downtown Brooklyn bride to Central park to cars and I am planning on doing a run. This should be a real test of how the NYC marathon might feel like if I venture barefooting in the race.

Finally, with Olympics just beginning, I think its worth mentioning that I will be making all the sports to observe the foot movements and if/how footware affect the movements. Some of the major sports including swimming and gymnastics are barefoot.  I will make a note of any interesting observations.  

BF in NY for 336mi

Recovery morning 6.8mi run today

I took the Sunday off after the awesome 19miler on Saturday and went for a run in early morning today. (yes I got a just 5minutes before FOUR alarm clocks I had set went off. Quite a progress on the early morning wake up routine in last couple of months. About 230mi out of 332mi barefoot have been in the morning). I mixed some coffee and suger in large glass of water to wake me up and get my blood sugar up a bit. But its hard to run straight out of bed.  The legs felt like dead logs. Also the old early ache on left leg outer side had returned (the one which I thought was a false alarm).  Also the sprained ankle seemed to echo faint pain. Of course, I am much more tuned into my foot aches than I used to so these are really minute pains which dont even cause limping. I am guessing the 19miler might have felt good but was big jump up so early in the training. The flyers program called for 16mi last weekend and 20miler this coming weekend. I will probably count the 19miler as my 20mi substitute and run "light" 14-16mi this weekend.

Anyway, the first mile was at a 13:44mpm pace which is quite a "running" pace. But eventually I found my rythem and it was fun finishing strong. The middle loop around reservior included a 400mi at about 8:15mpm which felt surprisingly fast. The new fun aspect of reservior run I discovered today was that the little smooth stone ridge on the lake side is just wide enough to maintain a running balance while barefoot. This is probably pretty difficult with shoes. The only problem is to find a place for arm so that it doesnt hit the fence. Over next few weeks I will play with this to find if there is any optimal way to place hand and sustain run around the reservoir. How cool will it be to run on the smooth rock when the path gets muddy or crowded with people. It also makes me wonder not where else can I run now which I cant/wont run with shoes on. During long run I toyed with running on the square raised border along the central park. It was hard balancing on it I gave after I brushed my heeps on the edge on a turn. It sounded like recepie for ankle sprain. Perhaps later sometime...

BF in NY for 332mi

Warburton scientific article on barefoot running

http://www.sportsci.org/jour/0103/mw.pdf

I voughly remember reading this article about a year back when I was just getting warmed up about the idea of barefootish running. 

It is a very good read with tons of references for digging deeper into the subject. I will reiterate the conclusion:

1. Barefoot running stregthen muscles in foot reducing chances of ankle sprain while shoes increase severity of the sprain by adding to torque.

2. Shoes might be increasing chances of plantar fasciitis but shifting stresses of shock.

3. Shoes could add few percent to oxygen consumption by adding heavy pendulum effect.

4. More research needed to understand why barefoot running is not common in elite runners.

Cheers

BF in NY for 325mi

My long run BF PR @19mi and all-time weekly mileage PR @41mi

Today was the official NYRR long run in central park. I ran 19.2mi ALL BAREFOOT! I am very pleased with the run today. The pace was not too bad either. Excluding about 23min of walking/standing breaks (the GPS stops if I am going slower than 15mpm), actual running pace was sub-10mpm at 9:52 which is much better than most long runs I have done in past. Also the weekly mileage now stands at 41.4mi which beats my mileage PR of 39mi at a peak last year. And its "bare"ly end of first month into the training!

I guess, the new lesson learnt today is that running barefoot REQUIRES full alertness otherwise the form deteriorates and within seconds the feet start hurting. Couple of times I got lazy and that caused abrasion on sole reminding me about being alert. Looking at the positive side of this limitation is that staying in good form and pace made it easy for me to run more than my target 16mi. Even after getting home, I wasnt hurting too bad and could easily balance on one leg while scrubbing the other bent in shower. It sounds weird but i dont think I could do that after my previous long runs in shoes. Balancing is the first thing we loose after long runs. It will become clear in couple of days as I see intensity of DOMS developing. I am pretty sure I am not injured anywhere but limiting DOMS would be so nice.

Other interesting part of my run was that I continued to run very fast on grass portions whenever I could; typically at 8mpm pace. I am now convinced that running fast uses different set of muscles and actually makes the rest of the run easy as long as I get the heart rate to drop back quickly before lactic acid builds up. It was a lot of fun being passed by people only to pass them again in later while running in grass and then again get passed. 

Few cool stats:

Fastest Half marathon distance: 2:05hrs @9:30mpm

Fastest 10K distance: 56:55min @9:09mpm

Fastest mile split 8:26mpm

Fastes half mi split: 7:30mpm

Avg HR: 165bpm (exactly 80% of max...LT is around 175bpm/85%)

Max HR: 188bpm (92% of max!)

Ironically, the only real regret I have is that the run finished before the rain storm. Now its raining outside but obviously I cant go run:-( If it wasnt for the organized run, I probably could have pushed the run till it started raining. I still havent explored if I can run long enough in rain given higher chance or blister/puncture due to softening of skin. But that will have to wait for another day:-)

BF in NY for 325mi