Running in Winter winds

 For some reason I've been feeling inspired to pick up running, though it's still cold and wintery outside. Ontop of this the spring winds don't make it anymore appealing to head out for an evening run. Well, I'm not sure actually  about the weather, it's warmer and sunnier than during winter, it is actually spring season, but the wind is icy-cold and once it succeeds to penetrate under my clothes it cools me down real quick. 

 Work related stress is probably one of the reasons I want to run, it's either going to end in me screaming at someone I shouldn't or a freaking bad stomach ulcer. So as a responsible adult I'll take care of my own stuff and sweat out some of the buildup stress. 

 It's just the first ten minutes though, once I get warmed-up the cold wind doesn't bother me anymore. The runners high feels good and gives me new strength to head out for a future run. 

 

Running? Back on the road...

I have not ran for a good two years. For various reasons obviously, but few seem to matter at this time. Not sure if I should or want to stirr up the past and write a post about it. Maybe it is more interesting to read about my current and future running. Most readers are runners and would probably care more for positive and encouraging posts than an excuse to quit running. 

So here goes; I'm running or actually more like jogging once or twice a week depending on the weather and my mood I guess. I still have my gear and a new pair of running shoes, so when the wind blows the right way, I could be out on the road. Unfortunately not for too long though... I can run for twenty minutes.   

I am just going out there to shake off some of my work stress and a few pounds around my waist which I could do without. I could always use some encouraging words from other runners, so if you have some, pls leave a comment. 

Run less Run faster

After almost a year of no running, I want to start again. One reason is that I enjoyed it so much and the other is that it is too cold to go cycling. Ready for a new challenge I ordered a copy of "Run less Run faster." It will give me freedom to do some cross training on my stationary bike and enjoy running a couple of times a week.

It feels really good to do these intense workouts instead of running the same distance and intensity every day which I used to do before. The book has great advise and helpful feedback from many new and experienced runners.

Hot summer running

I have run through two crazy hot summers with outrageous humidity levels. I learned that no matter how often you practice running in the heat, it doesn't make it any easier or safer. Becoming dehydrated or over-heated is always a possibility. The difference is that someone used to the hot weather would notice the symptoms that tell him or her to slow down or take other preventive measures to maintain a healthy condition.

The decision to cancel the 13.1 Chicago race was an appropriate one and might have saved some lives.

As I did last year, I plan to get up around 4 A.M. to go out for my morning run. It is a beautiful sweaty run and has to be done at no more than 80 persent power. The only disadvantage is having to go to bed early at night when it hasn't cooled down properly yet. It takes a while before being able to fall asleep but it feels great to wakeup when it is warm.

Throughout the day I have to keep an eye on my water consumption and the amount of electrolites (from salty food) I get inside me. But I love it, even though it is tough it is way better than winter.
 

Unlucky

This morning I woke up early because I had gone to bed faster than usual. We’ve been suffering from stormy weather due to the typhoon that is raging over Japan. Usually I don’t mind the wind but the rain is a pain in the bottom. This morning when I opened my eyes I couldn’t hear any rain, so I went downstairs and opened the curtains to confirm that it was not raining. I dressed in long trainers and long sleeve under-shirt under my running t-shirt and ran out the door. After a 5 minute warm-up jog and some stretching I continued with an easy run.

However, as you can guess from the title things didn’t go as hoped for after that. Ten minutes into my run some rain began to fall, and within 15 second it was raining cats and dogs as if the clouds just came crashing down. I considered going back but at this stage and this heavy rain I would be soaked anyway so I continued to run the rest of my run. Some puddles I couldn’t avoid came up to my ankles and made my shoes really heavy. I tried to keep good posture and landing on the ball of my foot but with both strong wind and rain it was hard to do. When I came home I washed my shoes and clothes and noticed my knees and upper legs were a bit soar from probably a combination of the added weight and the resistance from wet running wear.

It wasn’t too cold so I could finish my run with a smile.

Running through radiation

As you must know by now, I live in Japan at about 150K from the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant. Here in my town the radiation levels are still a little higher than areas further to the south including Tokyo. Somehow life has returned to semi-normal conditions and most Japanese seem the believe or have accepted that life can and must go on as it was before. There is no way around the radiation that is in the air so people are running as usual and so am I. After a long winter break, the spring has given me wings and I just wanna go outside and run. My wife is very worried but doesn't tell me to stay inside or avoid running/ cycling. The only advantage that we have is the fact that we avoid tap water which has increased levels of radiation by ordering bottled water from far far away and also our vegetables come from the far south where the amount of contamination is minuscule.
Yesterday was my first interval run in a very long time, I practiced constraint but I do feel a little stiff. Again today it is about 25C so I hope to go out for another run or maybe a bicycle ride.

Forum for Runners

I’ve created a forum for runners from all over the world. It’s caller Runners Talk. There are some forums for running out there on the web already but I just felt it would be nice to have a general forum for marathon runners.

Currently there are only a few categories, but there is room for expansion if forum members express a idea for new category titles. There are two main forum categories, “marathon” and “country and continents.” These are subdivided into sub-categories which relate to the main categories. I guess that both the main and sub-categories can be adjusted and increased if a certain number of forum members deem it appropriate.

I am hoping that many people will sign up for my runner’s forum. For any beginning forum there is the thing that people post their topics but only a few members can reply to them. Maybe we just have to be patient…

Runners Talk home

Runners Talk Registration page

Hope to see you all on the forum.

Earthquake hit Japan

I'm all right. I live 200KM from the epicenter of the march 11 earthquake and roughly 120KM from the Fukushima nuclear plant here in Japan. For three days we didn't have water and electricity which was quite uncomfortable. Can't go back to work because the gas stands have long waiting lines and new supplies are not scheduled. Most of the gasoline is being used for emergency services and other vehicles which support important life-lines such as food and water.

 This is definitely not a time for running. On the other side of my town people are still without water and some even without electricity. Many stone fences and roof tiles have fallen on the street which would make for dodgy running. On top of that there is an extremely high amount of radioactive dust blowing through town because the wind is very unfortunately carrying it our way. The government has suggested to stay inside or either get inside asap for those who are outside. Even in my town the level of Sievert per hour is many times higher than is good for us.

Race results

It's been already two months ago since I ran my marathon. Probably the reason for not blogging for a while. My aim was to break the "magic" four hours. At mile 13 I was running at 1:50 so completely on track and feeling good. But of course there has to come an "however" otherwise this entry would have been written much sooner after reaching my goal. At mile 14 my stomach started to feel funny, never had that feeling before. Maybe it was all the excitement, adrenaline, and my breakfast which mixed into a deadly ball of pain. As i look back on the whole event I know what went wrong. It was just being too nervous and not planning enough, though I thought I did. I usually don't have breakfast before running, I always train on an empty stomach because food and running always gives me trouble the next day... But on marathon race day the troubles came at mile 14 and never went away. The stomach pain was so serious that I had to walk at intervals. This resulted in a five hour marathon. Very depressing to run more than an hour longer that your goal time.

The worst was that I had sacrificed so much of my social life for my training. Almost everyday on the road just to run miles. On the weekends doing long runs left me constantly exhausted and not interested in spending time with my family or friends.

So, the motivation is gone.

And it is winter (cold, snow, wind) so there's not much running. I go out once a week for 10K or some interval running, but I don't think there will be another marathon. I'm thinking of running 10K races instead. Less training and more enjoying running. It could have been my competitiveness that made me suffer so much. Even thinking of running a 10K race makes my mind set high goals.

I'll try to keep everyone updated on how thing unfold.

Holiday Running

 

Holiday season is here with lots of time for running. Christmas running and family running and new year running. For me, I hope to catch up on my running because the cold weather tells me not to go outside. But hopefully around Christmas I can run in the daytime without freezing to the tracks. After my last marathon in November I have lost my appetite to run. No goals and cold weather besides a busy work schedule keeps my running shoes in the closet.

Sunday morning run

Finally I have reached the 30K peak in my marathon training. It has been over one year since I participated in the Kasumigaura marathon in Ibaraki prefecture Japan and ran so long that my legs hurt the next day (today). With my next marathon planned at the end of November, I hope to have to more runs of around 32 to 34K before beginning with tapering. Yesterday was a great day, starting off cool at 17C with clear blue skies the temperature rose to 24C. I choose a 3K course and went round ten times, running in the shadow of trees and in the sun at about same amount of time. The 29th kilometer was hardest and for the last one I gave it all I had.

Maybe if I had eaten a better dinner with more carbohydrates it could have been and easier run. Also, I usually run without having breakfast which could have provided some additional carbs but I’m not sure what it’ll do to my stomach and if I can digest it at all.

Pace Improvement

Finally summers seems to have passed on to other parts of the planet. Early autumn smells good and temperatures are optimal for running. Now every morning I'm fortunate to see the sun come up while running my morning training session. The sky turns red to orange to yellow which is great to gaze at while hearing the birds sing their morning songs. I'm already seeing improvements in my pace since I loose less sweat and my core temperature doesn't go up too high while running. I was becoming worried about my pace not improving much as I ramp up my weekly mileage.

Just two months and a bit before my marathon race. Hopefully I can keep up with my long runs and avoid a burnout. I feel very motivated and ready to set new personal best.

The end of summer?

Tomorrow we'll get some rain in the morning brought by a typhoon. I've had enough summer for one year. One whole month without rain and daily temperatures over 30 degrees centigrade and soaring humidity. It's become increasingly difficult to run because my body is unable to cool down. Breathing either hot air or dry air from air conditioners. draining all fluids when running and trying to replenish during the day.

Tomorrow the winds will make it tough to run but I want to run in cool weather no matter it rains or not... Typhoon running report will come later

Hot Summer

It was hot when I wrote my previous post and it still hot this week. For over three weeks its been over 30 degrees centigrade with the exception of one day, it was 29 degrees. Humidity is between 80 and 90 percent in the morning and becomes less as the sun reaches its peak around one p.m. especially this summer it is hard to run even in the morning because there is little wind and high humidity. Evenings are still hot until 8 or 9 p.m. which is too late for me to run.

Last week the boss was out for three days so there wasn’t anyone to cook me any vegetables. Nor was there anyone to buy and feed me fruit. It really left me tired at the end of the week. On top of that my skin gives me some rash from sweating too much and probably from a vitamin deficiency. This usually happens during summer but this time is worse than recent years…

According to the news this summer is not going to end any time soon, so I’m trying to increase my vegetables and fruit intake.

Running in Summer

Now here in Japan we are going to enter into the third week of the "real" summer. The real summer here means getting slammed with temperatures of more than 30 degrees centigrade (=86F). Most days it has been around 34 to 36 degrees centigrade (=93 to 97F) which wouldn't be too bad if it wasn't for the 80 to 90 percent humidity level! If you've never experienced hot weather with high humidity it could be hard to imagine, but I can tell you that it is not stimulating to go out for a run. Around the country many people do not survive the heat and national warnings are send out through the media to spend your days in air-conditioned places and replace lost fluids frequently.

This week is my first week of an 18-week marathon training schedule which required me to run on five very hot days. I tried to run late in the evening when the sun had gone down around 7pm,but the air was still hot and stale without any wind. Running in the summer is always a challenge,however, running my 5k easy run wasn't a real problem but Wednesday's 8k tempo run caused me to loose more than one kilogram from sweating. I was clever enough to drink lots and lots of fluids throughout the day so it didn't do much damage but this was the most intense sweating I've ever done in my life. Returning home I quickly had sports drinks and fresh orange juice before hitting the cold shower. I've done tempo runs many times before, some even longer and faster but this time I could really feel it in my legs the next day.

Luckily the weekend forecasts some rain which would raise the humidity level to about 90% but the temperature would drop down to the lower 30s. Whatever the weather, I'll have to run my long run on Sunday morning. Lets hope for wind! 

Runners Check List

There is a new page for marathon runners with tips and advise for healthy running. Check out these guides and bookmark it for future reference. This quick check list is for beginning and intermediate runners with some experience who are still learning about marathon running a sport and athletic challenge.

Feedback From Fellow Runners

I'm trying to keep up with current technology to promote my blog and my website as much as possible. I hope that blogging about my running experiences would spark comments from fellow runners to help me and others improve by sharing information or personal experiences. I've just finished updating my social link buttons at the bottom of each post to give my whole site a more professional look. Also i have tried to link my RSS feed to my twitter account so that they would be shared with an even greater audience.

To get back to running, my social and official engagements are prohibiting me to run my full training schedule and there has been some serious cutting. Luckily I'm still in the mileage buildup phase, but things really need to settle down in a couple of weeks so that I can start my 18 week training schedule for my full marathon race.

Sore Glutes

Somehow my butt feels a little sore which is probably because of changes in my running form. Inspired by a marathon training video called “evolution running” I’m trying to land more on my forefoot instead of heals or mid-foot. This was something I have been trying to from before I watched this video but at that time I was still trusting off with my upper-legs and toes. After watching this video I got one more clue which was to push off using my gluteus maximus muscle. Because according to the guy on the video this is the largest muscle and this would require less energy to keep our forward momentum. A great side-effect of this push-off is that it allows me to lean more forward and land on my forefoot.

Marathon running is a game of energy efficiency and of staying injury free. And according (not only to the people on this video but ) many professional and amateur runners this kind of foot strike is the most desirable.

This video called Evolution Running delivers some nice advice and shows some interesting drills but is not worth the price they ask for it. On the whole it looks like a video amateur put together a few Youtube videos and taped an explanation for support of his theory.

Those of you who want to know more about this movie/ video or who want to know some of the drills could leave a comment here and I’ll get back to you.

Good luck with your marathon training!

Downpour

My interval training run yesterday was timed with a wonderful downpour of rain. Obviously the rainy season has started with will make my running more difficult than the cold winter winds. I started my warm-up routine as usual by jogging for about five minutes, doing some dynamic stretches before doing my static stretches. Altogether it took me 15 minutes (I timed my warm-up routine for future purposes). Just as I had started running the skies turned darker and darker and wet water came falling down. I was worried about my form so I changed the interval run into Fartlek running.

By the end of my 8K training run I was completely soaked but it felt great because it was still about 25 degrees centigrade. The rain had made me run faster than I had planned because during the first halve I thought I would be able to out-run the rain… The day had turned into a dark evening and only flashes of lightning were reflecting in the massive puddles. I haven’t had a cold for about three years now so the only thing I worried about was my (fairly) new running shoes which were white when I left home. After coming home I took my new Nike’s with me to the shower and cleaned them thoroughly, they seemed to have survived the black puddles…

One more thing: while I was running in this crazy rain I had two cars pull over and inquire if I was alright? Meaning either they were worried about my health or looking to contact the nut house I escaped from. Either way their kind gestures made me happy and running with a broad smile all the way.

Mileage Build-up Injury Prevention

I'm becoming an expert on running injuries and injury prevention/ recovery. With my history of injuries I've had the opportunity to experiment with various recovery strategies. So far the best results in injury recovery have come from rest and icing for muscle inflammation injuries. When the first pain is experienced don't be a stubborn head but take a day or two off. These two days can't do much damage for any level of running. However, continuing for two days in the beginning stages of an injury can eventually retire you for several weeks.

How to prevent injuries depend on many factors such as your experience, weekly total distance, running surface, weather conditions, etc.

While in the building stages of your weekly mileage avoid or minimize hard interval training, hill training, and races longer than a half marathon. What you should do is create a mileage build-up schedule (before starting a marathon training schedule) , using recovery runs between tempo runs and long runs. You should be drinking lots of fluid during the mileage build-up stages to reduce strain on your circulatory systems, providing sufficient blood and nutrition to the working muscles. You should be increasing your weekly mileage by no more than ten percent, this also applies to your long runs.