Tuesday, May 6, 2008

Planning to Anchorage

Looking ahead - I've got 6.5 weeks until the Major's Anchorage Marathon. Guess I need to start thinking about training for this thing. Last week was mostly a rest week with 3 days of no running, 2 days of easy "recovery" days and a couple good weekend runs. I'm feeling about 100% recovered from Boston and ready to go climb the next mountain. I went out last weekend and got a new treadmill to enable working out thru the heat of Houston (paid 30% less than listed). As much as I hated running on the treadmill last summer - somehow enough time has gone by that I'm kinda enjoying it so far - give it a couple months and that should change.

Race events planned before Anchorage:

1) Beach to Bay Relay - 5/18 - I should get a little over 4 miles of that marathon (I'm thinking we have a very competetive team - probably top 2 for Masters)
2) Corporate Meet Duel with Chevron - 5/31 - a "practice" meet for the real one in a couple weeks - probably get to race a few relays - guessing 3k, 1-mile, 800m
3) USCAA Regional Corporate Track & Field Championship – 6/14 - again - probably get to race a few relays - guessing 3k, 1-mile, 800m.

I think those races alone should provide enough speed work on this mini-training cycle. Sketching out the rest of the training plan I make-up as I type (base, endurance, taper):

5/5 75 6 GA runs, 1LR15w3MP (Base)
5/12 75 1MLR12w3MP, 4 Mile Race, 1LR15w3MP(Endurance)
5/19 75 1Progressive,1MLR12w3MP, 1LR18w3MP_Tempo(Endurance)
5/26 75 1MLR12w3MP, Track Meet, 1LR20w5MP(Endurance)
6/2 70 1Progressive,1MLR12w3MP, 1LR18w5MP(Endurance)
6/9 45 1MLR12w3MP, Track Meet, daily MP(Taper)
6/16 30 Short daily MP(Taper - 5 days pre-race) Marathon Saturday

I haven't firmly decided my goals for this race - may not decide until race day. I've studied the course layout a bit and figure I should loose about 100 seconds from the hills (short sections as steep as 7% grades up and down) and 100 seconds from an 8 mile trail about 75% described as Loose Gravel tough on the feet (no racing flats for this race) and 25% Hard packed Dirt - so I'll call the handicap on this race about a 3 1/3 minutes vs a flat race + whatever weather factor.

Looking at past results - appears the race attracts ~1500 - I think it would have been tought to have placed last year with 3rd place at 2:40:51 but prior years I see 2:49/2:42/2:53 3rd places - so I might have a shot - I think I'm probably good for somewhere in the 2:40-2ish range if the stars are aligned on training/weather and I push it hard so I just might have a shot at placing depending on who shows up. Masters for this race starts at age 45 so I must compete for Open.

The plan was for this to be a fun race but the more I think about it...what's the fun in that :-).

This will be a fast stop in Anchorage - flying in midnight before the race and out again about 4-5 hours after the race is done. From here I will be spending the week fishing in Yakutat with my Dad, Brother and 2 Brother-in-laws among others.

A couple pictures from the last trip up about 2 years ago:




That icy cold water is gonna feel very good post marathon :-).

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Man, 3 marathons in 3 months and 5 in 7? You're turning into the next Mike Wardian.

kayry said...

Hey kanny,

I supposed it would be 3 in 4 months (march, april, june - took may off) and 5 in 8 months(nov, jan, march, april, june) - but same difference. Always having a next race keeps me training which I think gives me the cumulative benefits. I dream to be in low 2:30s at next Houston so want to keep progress for the next 7 months and racing keeps me motivated although granted it might not be the most optimum training strategy. I'll take staying motivated over optimum.

As some point I said I was going to keep it down to 3 this year - Houston, Boston, and something in the fall. Then I threw in a training marathon in March (does that really count?) and a fun-run marathon in June (which I probably will run harder than for fun) - but I may or may not do one in the fall.

True I did already register for Marine Corp Marathon - but it was only $85 bucks and I really just wanted to reserve a spot just in case I decide to run it :-).