A Declaration...!?


One thing I don't think I've talked about in this blog so far, is "what does success look like?".  Perhaps it's because there was still a small, very small, part of me that was sceptical that I could really get faster.  And at 49 years old, I'm not talking about breaking some of the personal-best times I set in my early 20's!


Should I measure success as "best ever age graded run at a particular distance"?  I quickly dismissed this as a soft target; I've been increasing my age grading over the past few years anyway (as a function of not slowing down as rapidly as I am getting older!).


Of course, success will involve a race, of a certain distance, covered in a certain time.  I guess success could also be declared with another 800m national title (or better!), but that rather relies on the relative condition of the other competitors on the day (i.e. having fewer injuries in training than them)!


In terms of what distance, I am cognisant that I embarked on this journey for the sake of shaving a second or two off my 800m time, so, in theory, only a 2:02 or 2:01 at 800m could qualify as success against the primary goal.  That hasn't changed.  I've had an immense amount of fun running longer distances, learned a lot about myself, about running gait, and about shoes, but I still consider myself an 800m runner.  So, success is a 2:02 (or better) over 800m.  Right?


However....


...as an interim, tentative, declaration of success, a performance last Sunday can't go without mention.  On 27th Nov I ran my 3rd fastest ever 10 mile race ever, just 31s off my pb set in January 1990, almost 27 years ago.  My second fastest was back in 2005.


The graph shows, in blue, my best time for a 10 mile race that year.  The red dot is the age grade % for that performance.

 

I don't wear a watch when I'm racing properly, so I had no idea as I hit the final few meters what my time would be.  I run on feel during races, and of course these days I'm concentrating on style rather than attempting to calculate splits!  I consciously went out to hurt myself, and was only ever going to be happy with a sub-hour time.  But to say that I was surprised as the finish clock came into focus would be an understatement.


So I think I am going to allow myself a little luxury, to declare success!  Huge thanks to Keith Bateman and Heidi Jones, authors of Older Yet Faster, to Jon Tilt my coach, and Mrs.B for letting me go out running so much!


That's a week shy of 16 months since the first Older Yet Faster run in Lyon.  What a journey!


Below, just some of the successful Southampton AC team at the Hayling 10 on Suday.  Thanks to Sarah for the pic.

...just for fun...

Anyone who's had the misfortune to be subjected to my ramblings will know that I joke that anything over 1500m is a fun run.  So today I ran the Gosport Half Marathon.  As it happens, this was the venue of my all time personal best about 9 or 10 years ago, before I re-set as an 800m runner.

The race rounded off a 90 mile training block over the last 9 days, so I really was expecting to be tired.  And the 15+mph wind wasn't going to help either.

On the day, a 1:25:27, I bagged my fastest half marathon time since September 2009.  Not unhappy with that!

Makes me think the changes are working!

With time to reflect...

You're gonna need patience for the journey.

The New Gait is well and truly embedded now.  I'm not having to think about it very much, and on the occasion that I do mental check, I find everything is in order.


In fact, in terms of running style, I AM The Fonz, in this clip:

However, not everybody is happy.

Here I am, 15 months into the Older Yet Faster journey.  The big skeletal muscles are fine - in fact they've complained very little since the beginning.  Perhaps some tenderness in the calves, but then they are twice the size that they were 15 months ago (and 3 times as powerful)(ish).
But some of the connecting tissues, ligaments, tendons, are having a little moan now and again.  There are some that are regular whingers, and some that seem out-of-sorts for a day or two tops.  None of them stop me running, and believe me, I'm the first runner to "down tools" at the first sign of trouble!! 
Some examples (from the past couple of weeks) include: pain behind the left knee (a coupe of days off sorted that one), trapped nerve in the top of the right foot (a quick stretch mid-run resolves it), some complaint deep inside the front of the right hip (proving harder to shake off, but doesn't hurt when I'm running).


I'm not too worried.  In fact, I'm not worried at all.  I have to remember, many parts of my body (particularly lower half)  are relatively new to running.  As far as some of my small connecting muscles are concerned, I've only been running 15 months, and I'm asking them to run at some silly speeds, when they have little base training.  The big long muscles are fine with this.  They don't understand that some of the little ones are playing catch-up to support my new style.


Tuesday night track session have shown this up.  It's taking me 3 days to recover from Tuesday nights.  Last weeks 8x600m had me hobbling on Saturday still!  This is a classic sign of missing base miles.

Don't get me wrong, the new gait is starting to pay off.  Even at what I would estimate as approx. 75% fit, I'm bagging some good results at the start of the XC season, and I recently ran a 17:12 on a parkrun course where my personal best from a few years ago is 17:09.  That PR is going to go in the next 2 months that's for sure.

But given that I've made such a big change to my gait; from horrendous over-strider to, well, the running equivalent of the Fonz; I know that I will still be "combing my hair" for many months to come.  That 17:12 could end up being a 16:40 for all we know....

This summer Track & Field season, and in particular the 800m, was always going to be a quiet (i.e. slow) one. 

I have no winter base (although I did have a high mileage March, on its own not enough), and therefore nothing on which to build any summer speed (he says, in true Lydiard speak) style!) 



Even though I didn't have training from the lower levels of the pyramid in the bag, I still went along to the club on track-sessions, and put in some "Interval Training" and "Speed and Skills", as the diagram calls them!

I did this for three reasons:

1. As I've previously explained, I was pretty certain by early summer that I had my New Gait cracked at the slower paces. I needed to up the speed of the drills and repetitions, and the track has a smooth, firm surface where you can concentrate on style.
2. My coach Jon Tilt is there, and I knew that he could keep an eye on me, do a bit of filming.
3. I missed the crew - I'd been away from the track most of the winter and spring, to make sure I behaved!! 

The plan worked.

I made some mistakes in the early summer - put on too much speed too soon.  I've written about the mistakes in earlier blogs.  But steadily and surely, the speed rose as the style remained.  I was able to run further and faster whilst maintaining good form. 

For example, running 300m repetitions at a 1500m race pace in May ended in poor form.  I could feel it.  I didn't need to be filmed.  But by late August, I was happy that I was maintaining good form over 400m at 800m pace.

And here's the proof.  The linked YouTube video shows the first and second lap, at the bell / at the finish.  I've synched them so that the middle step is aligned, at the point I'm square on to the camera, passing that small traffic cone.

(With thanks to Adrian Harwood for capturing the footage)(oh, and putting me up for the night to avoid a 2 hour drive home!!!)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nuLXaDv4Dm0

I was absolutely blowing (a technical term amongst t&f folk for "completely exhausted of all apparent energy!!!) on the second lap, I'd hit the 800m lactic "wall" at the classic 650m, and was hanging on!!!

So I was very surprised to see that form had not suffered too much!  This, I assume, means that the brain to muscle pathways (the subconscious communications) are firmly established.  The shoulders have rounded a bit, and there's a little more bend at the midriff, but altogether it's not too bad!  Clearly I'm covering more ground on lap 1 - each stride is longer - but I'm happy to see that I wasn't resorting to over striding to compensate.

Finally, I was extremely happy and excited to get this message from Keith and Heidi who had caught the raw video on facebook, and was wearing a grin for the rest of the day!

"We think your transition is complete (as far as the brain goes). We think now it is just a matter of repetition and perfecting with the necessary strength building as you go. Simply using whatever cues work for you to be as balanced as possible each landing :-) You might try two tricks now: 1. starting at lower speeds try accelerating by taking of with slightly more power - encouraging that over any temptation to extend the stride length by reaching forward, and 2. On longer runs try slowing the cadence slightly to encourage a more powerful take off."

I thought I would post a slightly more positive post, as tonight I ran 4x400m, with the first at 3:15/km pace, the second and third at 3:00/km pace, and the last rep at 2:45/km pace.

The following video is at 02:45/km pace, and much better form than the 2:15/km pace, in the last post, from 3 days ago.

In this video, I've frozen the video for 2 seconds at the point of landing fully (foot fully loaded).

I think that the landing is better.  The hips are certainly collapsing less.  And the torso is not bent.

And somehow, the leading leg seems to advance under the body at a nice angle, but then straighten up too much before landing.  Perhaps some strides might help with that??

I think that I could still land a little later, but this is only my third session at this pace, so I have time and room to improve yet.

https://youtu.be/1WkoFRTQciI

Thanks for reading :)

Just for fun.. ...but with a serious learning outcome!

I took part in a Southampton AC session yesterday (Saturday) morning.

I love Saturday morning sessions.  They last about 2 hours, and we accumulate about 3 minutes running!  Most of the rest of the time we are chatting.  Chatting and warming up, chatting and activating, chatting and stretching!

Anyway, yesterdays session was a 6x150m in two sets of 3.  5 minutes between rep, and 20 mins between sets.

You may recall that I've done no speed this summer at all!  Some speed endurance, but no speed.

My desired outcome for the session was to see if the brain/muscle pathways can be maintained at speeds well beyond what I've already established.

In this regard, the session was a failure!

I ran consistent times between 20.5 and 21.4 - that's 02:15/km (well below target 800m pace of 2:32/km).

This is the result - I'm closest the camera in red.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NTpRLXFrCa0

Here is the bare minimum of what's going wrong (these still frames are from the 5th of 6 reps, and I was getting pretty tired).

On the left, I see bad hip drop - the left (suspended) hip is dropping off to such an extent that the right shoulder is almost coming down to meet the right hip!  I'm surprised my right elbow hasn't bruised the hip!

On the right, I see over-stride, and bent torso.

Of course, it would be nice to have some footage and still frames from a 2:45/km session that I did on Tuesday where I could feel much better style, just to prove (to you, or to me, I don't know) that I have made better progress than this in one year!!

HOWEVER!  Do not despair!  It's a long way from 2:45/km to 2:15/km and I need to work my way down in pace (or, up in speed!) gently, not in one jump.

Finally, I know that it is not good to be doing ANY training in poor style, be that at 2:15/km or 10 mins/km!  But I just wanted to have a blast!

My other motive for this session was just to have some fun, spend some time with some really good friends, and remind myself what it's like to let rip!   In this regard, the session was a MASSIVE success!

I've been talking to my coach, Jon Tilt.  I now have a new proprioceptive cue, and I'm very excited about it!  (I don't get out much any more...)


Jon had been talking to one of the Southampton AC sprint coaches, Gary Gray, about gait.  Bearing in mind this is a third hand quote, please allow for variances in interpretation, but essentially, if Gary sees an athlete's feet drift from a forward orientation to one of pointing outwards ("splayed") then he stops that athlete's session.


I've practiced this cue, in a 4x300m session, and two days later in a 500/1500/2200/1500/500 pyramid, with immediate benefits.  The fastest pace in these sessions was 2:40/km (one of the 300s) and the slowest 3:58/km (the 2200m).


As I ran all these reps, I concentrated on keeping the feet facing forward.  (Bear in mind that I've got 12 months of honing all the other cues around foot landing under hips, torso erect, etc, so I didn't have to think about those).


What I immediately noticed is that, at the higher speeds, there is good improvement in consistency.  I'd been complaining to Jon that, whilst balanced running is 'mine' at speeds of up to 4:00/km, at the faster speeds there's the odd foot placement that causes a leg to wobble, or the shoulders to dip, or a hip to drop.  What I noticed, particularly as I got tired on the 300s, was that I suffered no such issues.


============================================




A week prior to the conversation referred to above, I was talking to Jon about my approach to the next stage in the training. 


Jon highlighted the training variables: speed, distance, and number of reps.  Prior to the session outlined above, I could manage a 300m rep, at 55s pace (3:03/km), with Good Style for 250m, but then the torso bends, the hips dip.  I can manage 5 of these, before I get too tired, and the style breaks down earlier in the repetition. 


Based on this, I should be able to plan 2 or three sessions ahead of time.  The session may be longer and slower, or shorter and faster.  But the aim is to get to the end of the rep without loosing form/style.  As we now know, a new cue has significantly helped with this.


==============================================


Finally, I've just finished Richard Askwith's truly excellent book about Zatopek.  I'm not suggesting that I start hitting 100x400m reps, but there was one picture that caught my eye.  It makes me think that Emil understood the benefit of good form, as he's clearly practicing some sort of cue (apologies for the stolen pic - I just couldn't find any other copies on-line.

And this is the result...

His arms may have been all over the place, but look at the torso in shot 2, foot placement in shot 6! (hard to tell if the foot is loaded in shot 5...)