Winter Ski Training Continues

The snow has not been heavy, but sufficient to continue some cross country ski training over the weekend. I did 2.5 miles Sunday, and a full 5K today at a local park with some decent hills. Today's pace wasn't bad....about 11:43 per mile. It was inspiring today, going out cross country skiing immediately after watching the Olympic 15K freestyle cross country ski race. Of course, bit depressing that the pace for 15K on hills was close to 4 minutes per mile!!! (about 34 minutes for 15K), compared to my paltry 11:43 per mile. Of course, mine was the traditional style (non-skating), so maybe that's where the difference lies.....................

Mark

Winter Interlude

As you all know (the many, many readers of the this blog), I've been on a winter break of sorts for the past few weeks. Partly due to cold weather, but also a switch in my evening grandson babysitting duties. Overall, I think my body needed the rest, and I'm doing some weight workouts for upper body strength. I did run once last week, and then cross country skiid 30 minutes on Saturday. I ran Sunday to start the week out, about 4 miles, easy 8:45 per mile pace. I hope to run tonight, and will try to consistently either run or cross country ski 3 to 4 times per week now. I am still taking it a bit easy, as I find that my body works better when it has at least a couple interludes between "seasons." WHAAAT seasons, my wife would say!

Mark

Vintage Eric!

The photos say it all! Yes, this was Eric Kaplan as a young Dr. K Strider.






As you can see, the Striders maintained a strong nationwide presence throughout the late 70s.


Just recently, Eric admitted that the hair may have actually caused some wind resistance, resulting in slower than optimal times. It might actually be fair to adjust his PRs (see right column of blog) by 2 or 3 seconds per mile.

Winter Training Update: more of the same!

With continued cold and snow, cross country ski conditions have been great. I got out again Saturday and Sunday for about 2.5 miles each time, including some rolling hills. On Sunday, my time was faster, averaging 11:43/mile for 2.5 miles. For comparison, my usual 4-mile training runs are about 8 to 8:30 per mile. In fact, I had to work a bit harder to hit 11:43 for a 30-minute workout than a comparable 30-minute run at 8:20 or 8:30 pace. Part of this is probably that I am not a great skiier. The other part is the rolling hills and turns in the park. Hopefully, this is keeping me in shape for Spring running, and yet another year of attempting the elusive Sub-5 mile...........(it's easy to talk about a fast mile in the dead of winter while puttering around on skis).

Mark

Winter Training!

Winter training is in full force. By that I mean, not much running, finally doing some strength and weight training, and yes............cross country skiing. So far this week, I have XC skiid 3 times. The last time out (Wednesday), I did 2.44 miles, averaging 12:35 per mile, including some hills, and plowing through some fresh snow. The second lap around the park was faster, once the trail was blazed. Hope to get out again tonight, and over the weekend, as we received significant snow last weekend, then a couple inches here and there throughout the week.

Next week I may go downhill skiing. That doesn't count a whole lot towards workouts (all downhill), but it definitely is exercise.

I am curious what the other numerous blog readers/authors are doing for training this winter.

Vintage Striders

Seeing Neil's recent post, I just had to put this photo up...............I may have posted this in the past, but Neil, in case Bonnie hasn't seen this, I'm sure she'll get a good chortle out of it.........

Mark

December accomplishments

I actually planned to run a 5K over Thanksgiving, but my mother passed away (after a long illness) so had to scratch that idea. So instead last weekend on went on two snow shoe hikes. Both in New Hampshire White MOuntains

On Saturday climbed Mt Isolation which was 14 miles and over 2,500 ft of evelation gain. Took about 9 hours.

On Sunday did North and Middle Tripryamid about 9.6 miles again over 2,500 ft of evelation gain. Took about 8 hours.

Not quite the exertion of running a marathon, but certainly a good solid effort.

Mile Run Aborted: Winter Training Mode Begins

With the 1-2 punch of being sick for a few days, and winter storms covering up the track, I decided to take a well-deserved rest from hard training and racing for a few weeks. Thus, although the multitude of blog readers will be disappointed, I am bowing out of the indoor mile race on December 26.

In summary, 2010 was a great year for running. I ran 10 mile attempts, with a best of 5:20.7, and also ran 2 5ks in 18:48 (track) and 18:54 (winter road race with a couple hills). In addition, I managed a 3rd place overall in a very hilly trail 10K trail run (albeit with a slow time of 45:03, 7:15 per mile). My mile and 5K times were my fastest by far since 2000 and 2001, and my 5K time of 18:48, when age graded, was a substantially better performance than my 18:21 5k in 2000.

And no, I am not giving up on the 5-minute mile quest. Although it literally becomes harder each year, I feel that this year I made good progress, and plan to continue that into 2010, with perhaps more emphasis on mileage as a base, especially in the winter and spring.

For the next couple of months, I hope to run about 3 to 4 times per week, 4 to 5 miles per run, but weekend "runs" may be substituted with cross country ski outings whenever possible.

Oh, and C'mon Harry!!

Annual Reindeer Run 5K Results!

(No. 399, all black in photos)

Under excellent conditions given the time of year, I met both of my goals for this race (well, I think I did). (1) Break into the top 10 overall, a fairly lofty goal in a race that usually exceeds 400, and had 599 finishers this year. (2) Sub-19 - a reasonable goal, given my 18:48 on the track by myself two weeks ago.

(2nd from right, No. 399 in photo)


The results: 10th overall out of 599, 1st in the 50 to 54 age group, and a time of 18:54 (6:03/mile).
Conditions were much better than typical for this race, with temperatures near freezing and NO wind. The cemetery had a lot of ice before the race during my warmup, but apparently they salted it just prior to the race, and it was no problem. Although in Buffalo, the race had a couple small hills, and lots of twists and turns. I decided to get out fairly fast, because the easiest part of the race is the first mile, on city streets. I passed the mile at about 5:57, the 2 mile at 12:07, then must have maintained about a 6:05 pace for the final mile.

(right top of photo, No. 399, turning final corner)


In the final 400 meters, I moved into 9th place. In reality, when I set my goal of top 10, I was thinking below 10th, or single digits, so I'm not sure I can claim that goal. Anyway, it was a youngster (maybe 15 years old). When I passed him, he said very politely "nice job sir!" Most teenagers these days don't call us codgers sir, so I was quite impressed.....until he blew by me like I was standing still in the last 100 meters!

Anyway, this has always been one of my favorite races. The 18:54 was my second fastest time since I first ran it in 2000 (9 years ago) and ran 18:21. I imagine that with age grading, this might be my best performance.





Now, I'm still thinking about that indoor mile on December 26, if I don't retire from racing before then!

Mark





http://www.buffalorunners.com/results%5C2009%5Creindeer09.htm