Another Marathon Down the Hatch! Completed the Inaugural Santa Barbara Marathon!

Today is Tuesday and I'm still a bit sore from my 29.2 mile day on Sunday. 

Yes, I ran and completed the Inaugural Santa Barbara Marathon two days ago! I think it was my 26th marathon.

Yes, I did run 29.2 miles. 26.2 mile marathon plus 3 miles of running before the race. But more on that later.

On Saturday morning I said that my goal for the race was to finish with a smile on my face.  Goal achieved! I also said that, based on my level of training, my goal was to run something under 3 1/2 hours...I finished this one in 3:16...the other goal achieved.

That's not to say that I wasn't disappointed with a few things.  But hold that thought.

So Saturday morning I ran 2 miles, after 3.5 mile runs on Thursday and Friday.  Yes, for those paying attention, you are correct, I did not heed my own advice and take at least one day completely off.

I stopped by Fresh & Easy in Newbury Park to pick up some stuff to bring for my overnight stay in Santa Barbara....mmmm...chocolate chunk muffins for breakfast (at 5 a.m. I eat whatever will go down), water, Gatorade, snacks, etc. I also opted to grab a pre-made turkey sandwich, chips, fruit, trail mix and ice tea for the lunchtime drive to Santa Barbara.

Ah yes, eating a 4 course meal in the car reminds me of this humorous video spoof on our hands free cell phone law.

Race number pickup was at Santa Barbara City College.  The expo was not particularly large but everyone was really nice and it was fun to walk around.  I met up with my friend Chaz (congrats on your 3:38 dude!).

View of the Pacific right next to the BacaraI splurged and decided to stay at the fancy schmancy Bacara Resort in Goleta, just 1 1/2 miles from the start of the race.  I spent an extra $100 on this place but my rationale was that I could sleep a little longer and walk to the start of the race. Most people took busses leaving by 5:15 am for the start of the 6:30 am race.  I also thought it would be fun to convince my wife to come with, but she opted not to.

So here I am at this fancy hotel all alone with no place to go. Yeah!!! The cell phone didn't work there, nor did the wireless access! But luckily they had "free" high speed internet access (offset by the $24 they charged me to park the car for one measly day).

One thing I DID do right on Saturday was immediately unpack my stuff and arrange it for Sunday morning.  I untied my shoes, I attached the timer chip to the shoes (and tried it on to make sure the chip didn't impede my running), affixed the bib number to my race shirt, laid out my shorts, socks, additional layers and cap. Then I laid out my race bag (used to transport items to the finish line), 2 bandaids (to cover up the nipplage), petroleum jelly (to slather on my toes, heel and chafe-worth body parts), room key and watch.

What to do for dinner?  I started getting hungry at 5 pm and opted to venture out into Goleta. A few miles down the road I found civilization...including a completely packed Costco store (there was a long line at the food stands outside too!).

Most people try to carb up the night before a marathon by eating pasta.  But I wasn't in a pasta mood.  So naturally I, uh, stopped by the Baja Fresh adjacent to Costco and ordered quesadilla with chicken and an order of rice.  Probably not the best choice the night before a marathon.  In fact, in hindsight it was a pretty lame choice as I rarely eat that much cheese at one sitting.

So as I notice as I get in the car that stomach is gurgling and the seat belt feels tighter.  Yes, cheese quesadilla w/chicken probably not the wisest choice for final pre-race meal. But heck, it tasted good!

I spent the rest of the night sending mostly obnoxious (as usual) tweets from my http://twitter.com/ConejoJoe Twitter page and caught many episodes of that great MSNBC documentary "Lockup."

Time passed by and I before I know it my wife is sending me emails telling me what an idiot I am for staying up so late the night before a marathon.  OK, she was right.  So at 11 pm I went to bed.  But not until I had a chocolate chunk muffin for dessert.

YA KNOW, THIS POST IS GETTING KINDA LONG. I SHALL CONTINUE IN THE NEXT POST!

The Day Before a Marathon is the Time to Relax and Reflect

Today is Saturday and tomorrow is the Inaugural Santa Barbara Marathon.  My goal for this marathon is to finish this marathon with a smile on my face.

Today I'll drive up to Santa Barbara, visit the race expo to pick up my bib number and check out the cool running stuff for sale by vendors, check into my hotel and basically vedge out.

It is 9 am right now and before I make the drive, I will run a mile or two, but that's about it.  I didn't practice my own advice and ran about 3.5 miles each of the last few days, but I ran slowly.  I have a hard time taking an entire day off from running solely for the purpose of resting.  Call it obsessive-compulsive, but I prefer to save up my rest days for injuries and illnesses.

Last time I ran a competitive marathon was just over 5 years ago, when I ran a 2:48 at the age of 40.  I trained 70 to 80 miles per week for that marathon and it paid off.

Since then, my life has been a blur.  While I never stopped running, I did stop serious training as my family grew in size and simply put, I got too busy and tired to train hard.  I did run the L.A. Marathon as a "training run" in 2005 and I believe that is my last full marathon until, hopefully, tomorrow!

I've been training for this marathon since late April. Early on I set a goal of peaking at 60 to 70 miles per week in September/October, but I never managed to get over 60.  In fact, my mileage was way down in these critical pre-marathon months due to swine flu, back spasms and other lame excuses.

So while I'd love to run even just a sub 3 hour marathon, I know from past experience (25 marathons) that I CANNOT FOOL MY BODY in the marathon.  The marathon distance is unforgiving.  I haven't been training at a 6:52 pace, which is the pace required to break 3 hours.  If I go out at that pace from the start, no doubt I'll be hurting big time at mile 20.

My goal is to ignore my pace, my watch and other runners.  The marathon is a highly individual sport. We all have our own goals. I know there will be other 45 year old runners there who I should beat handily if my training had been stronger, but they will be ahead of me tomorrow if they've done their homework!

And that's o.k. with me because I've aligned my expectations with the reality of my training. I ain't gonna run a 2:45 marathon tomorrow.  My expectation is to run something under 3 1/2 hours, which is still good (heck, that time will get me into the Boston Marathon).

All that said, maybe, just maybe, I'll get lucky, feel amazing good at the 20 mile mark, pick up the pace a bit, start passing runners who went out too hard, and finish in under 3 hours.

Ya just never know.

Beaten by a 15 Year Old Girl?? I Don't Think So!

Well the good news is that last week I upped my mileage to 50.  The bad news is that I'm running out of training time for the Santa Barbara Marathon, now less than a month away. In fact, I generally plan to have all of my long, hard training done 3 weeks prior to the marathon, so as to taper off the mileage gradually over the final 3 weeks.  I won't be needing much of a taper this time around.

While I didn't get around (yet again) to doing a long run, I did make it to the Calabasas Classic 10K on Sunday.  I highly recommend this well run local event.  It is HUGE with over 1,900 runners in various events and well organized. The goodie bags have a really nice "technical" shirt made out of a breathable material.  This is the only event I can think of that offers up such a nice non-cotton shirt.

As has been the case on a recurring basis over the last 6 months of training, I encountered some challenges this weekend. For the umpteenth time, I caught yet another scratchy throat and cold from my little guy on Saturday.  So in my haste I decided to down about 10 chewable 500 mg vitamin C tablets on Saturday. Big mistake I'll later find out.

I get to bed at 11 pm and am awakened by something around 1 am but I can't remember what.  Playing to my favor was the recent time change, which provided an extra hour of sleep and helped me wake up feeling more refreshed. But my throat felt nasty and I would have loved to continue sleeping.

But I got up and out, grabbing a large coffee from 7 Eleven (I hate Starbucks because they don't offer the flavored cream that I like) and a blueberry muffin.  Breakfast of champions.

My goal was to get some mileage in by warming up for a few miles, running the 5K at 8 am at a moderate pace, running the 10K at 9 am a solid pace, then cooling down.  I succeeded in my goal.

The normal pre-race routine consists of the following: park, get race number, get timer chip (for larger races like this), get goodie bag, bring stuff back to car, pin number to race shirt, tie timer chip to shoelaces, drink, eat, visit the porta-potty, warm-up, change shoes, change shirt, chat with fellow runners, then get to the start of the race.  This all pretty much worked out for me.

But after jogging the 5K in about 21 minutes, the 5,000 mg of vitamin C combined with jumbo cup of coffee worked a number on me. Seems I had a bit too much acid in my innards. So with about 5 minutes to spare before the start of the 10K, I would have liked to head right into the head.  But even with 15 beautiful, sky-blue porta-johns sparkling in the sunlight of the Calabasas City Hall parking lot this fine morning, there were 30 other people with the same goal in mind.

Lucky for me there were mostly guys in line. Yes, that sounds bad, but guys take half the time as gals in the bathroom (based on my vast experience).  So the line moved and I found myself quickly entombed in a porta-john, where within seconds my internal combustion vaporized into the scary blue liquid seas below.

But something still didn't feel right, and it wasn't my scratchy throat.  It felt like someone had kicked me in the %^&* and their boot was still lodged in there.

In any case (and without further elaboration), I did make it to the start of the race, felt fine, and actually ran a respectable 38:50, good for 1st place in my age division, and nearly a minute faster than my last 10K time.

The final 2 miles of the race I was running neck and neck with a young kid who I later found out was 17. He ended up beating me by like 9 seconds.  Just couldn't seem to reel him in. But when I saw the race results, somehow a 15 year old girl showed up 3 seconds ahead of me (and right behind the boy).***

Just wait a sec!?  There was no 15 year old girl*** ahead of me!  How the heck did that happen? I contacted the people who did the timing, who reviewed the video and said they did see a female in front of me, though she didn't look 15 and she did not look like someone who could run a sub-39 minute 10K.

This was a double loop 10K. While we were finishing the race, we were passing many of the walkers and slower joggers. What I suspect happened is that she decided to cross the finish line at the end of lap 1. I asked the timers what her 5K "split" was, but they said they weren't tracking splits.

So I KNOW she didn't beat me, THEY know it and I know the other runners in the 10K know it, but anyone else who checks the race results will think this 15 year old girl beat me out*** for 12th place overall in the Calabasas Classic.  At least for now. Darn it!

I'll get over it I guess.

All that said, I feel really good about my performance and more importantly, how I feel.  At this particular moment (Tuesday night 9:30 p.m), I feel GOOD!  And that's what's important :>

*** A post mortem 11/12. Upon further review the race timers determined this young lady, who provided me fuel for the title of this blog posting, was actually in the 5K and was moved from 12th place overall in the 10K to DEAD LAST in the 5K in 1 hour, 38 minutes.  I kid you not! Well I feel kind of sorry for her now but at the same time, I feel vindicated!!

Predicting the Unpredictable: How Do I Feel Today?

Last week's mileage was only 39. Between the heat and general tiredness last week after my half marathon on September 19th, I had kind of an off week.

On Saturday, I ran the Alliance for the Arts 10K in Thousand Oaks.  The 10K was simply a hard training run for me with a goal of sharpening my speed for my December marathon.  I knew I wasn't fully recovered from half marathon, but I signed up awhile back and decided it would be better to run a 10K than to do a long run this weekend.

I was surprised on Saturday morning because when I woke up, I actually felt pretty good...light on my feet and not as overwhelmingly tired as I had felt most of the week.  That was at 6:45 a.m. Two hours until the start of the 10K.

After messing around, socializing, etc., it was finally time for the 10K at 8:45 a.m. By then, it was getting pretty warm out; mid to upper 70s, close to 80.  I was nonchalant all morning, and the only thing I ate was a McDonald's sausage biscuit, hash brown and iced coffee.  (Don't ask...I rarely eat at McD's, but I was impulsive that morning.) In hindsight I should have had more water.

So I started out running pretty well, actually leading the race at the halfway 5K mark in about 18:30, but I started feeling parched somewhere around 2 1/2 miles into the race. But then, all hell broke loose with my body.  I was downright thirsty. And pooped.  A dummy light went on that told me to check my fluid levels. But I wasn't about to stop at that point.  I just dragged my body along to finish. The 2nd 5K was about 21:10.  The winner ran strong and consistently the whole race.  I managed to finish 2nd.

The point of all this is...the body is unpredictable.  I didn't feel good in the days leading up to the 10K. I felt pretty good before the race. But halfway into the race I blew a gasket.

This past Monday, I was so tired I could barely get out the door. Big party at the house on Sunday, up late cleaning, half the family was sick, etc.  I really didn't feel like running off my 5 hours' sleep.

Oddly enough, I felt GOOD on my Monday morning trail run! Heck, I could have run 2 hours (if it weren't for having a job to get to).  I never would have predicted it.  I felt energized and lean all day on Monday.

Lesson Learned:  All I know is, it is had to predict how I will feel on a given day. But I suppose what I should focus in on are the factors that I CAN control...get enough sleep, rest, nutrition, etc.

Tuning Up For a Marathon by Running a Half Marathon

Yesterday I ran the Point Mugu Half Marathon* at Naval Base Ventura County. After 20 weeks of training, mostly mileage buildup and long runs, it was good timing to gauge my marathon fitness level by running a half marathon.

Now it wouldn't be prudent to run the half marathon within a month of the marathon date. Since the Santa Barbara Marathon is on December 6th, that wasn't an issue.

The marathon is the "main event" in my training schedule, so I didn't treat yesterday's half marathon too seriously.  If I had, I would have tapered off my mileage for the event to gear up for a top performance.  For a full-blown competitive half marathon performance I might taper off the mileage for a week.  For yesterday's race, I ran light (only 4 miles) the day before the race.

Running a half marathon as a training run provides the opportunity to practice the important skill of taking in fluids on the run.  The art of grabbing a cup of water/sports drink from a volunteer and drinking its contents, is a good one to practice.  I hate stopping during the middle of a race.  It ruins my momentum. So it is important to know how to grab that cup and down it efficiently.

In this race, there were 6 or 7 water stops. I grabbed liquid at all of the stops except the final one (which was only a mile or so from the end of the race).  Each stand had both water and Gatorade.  I was running alone pretty much the entire race, so as I approached the stop, I yelled out " Do you have Gatorade?" This triggered the Seabee volunteer to have a cup ready for me.  Worked fine for me.

The approach that I use to consuming the liquid is to squeese the top of the cup, turn it sideways, and pour it in.  Makes it much easier to drink "on the run."

OK, so back to the race itself.  I'm happy to report that I finished in 3rd place overall in 1 hour, 23 minutes, 53 seconds.  Not a bad showing for the race, particularly given I have done no form of "speed work" on a track or otherwise. 

The "rule of thumb" I've been using for years is, assuming you do adequate long runs, take your half marathon time and multiply by 2.1 to get your full marathon approximate fitness level.  For yesterday's performance, I take 64 (rounded up) minutes x 2.1 = 176.4 minutes = 2 hours, 56 minutes, 24 seconds (.4 minutes x 60 seconds = 24 seconds).

So, all else equal, yesterday's half marathon performance indicates I have the ability to run a sub 3-hour marathon.

Another rule of thumb for estimating marathon time is to take your 10K time and multiply by 4.7. So if you can run a 10K in 45 minutes, assuming you've done your marathon (e.g. long run) training, in theory you are fit to run a 3 1/2 hour marathon.

These are just rules of thumb, but they have always worked pretty well for me. It is also fun to work backwards based on your desired marathon time.  If you're looking to run a 4 hour marathon, divide 240 minutes by 4.7 to determine a 51 minute 10K should get you close to that goal.

That said, I'll we doing 3 or 4 5K and 10K races in these final 11 weeks pre-marathon, interspersed with 2 to 3 more long runs.

* The Point Mugu Half Marathon course has its pros and cons.  Race was completely flat as the entire course is within 1/4 mile of the Pacific Ocean.   Very low key race with less than 100 competitors.  Most of course is nowhere near cars and traffic!  Miles 5 through 9.5 (approximate) were directly adjacent to the ocean!  Race entry fees were extremely low.  Within a minute after the start of the race we were blessed with a live performance of the National Anthem by a Naval band. Well organized, well marked course. And, the entire race was under overcast skies, which was quite nice!

The cons I suppose were that other than close proximity to the ocean, the course is a bit lacking in terms of scenery (in fact, it was quite swampy and smelly over a few sections of the course). Around mile 7 or 8 I heard some target practice going on, which had the unintended effect of pushing my pace to get outta there!

Cloud Cover, In-N-Out Burger and 12 Weeks Until Marathon

Logistics and luck are the recurring themes in my quest for a marathon comeback. In fact, the 2 Ls have been key factors in most all of my prior 2 dozen marathons.  The difference between the two is that Logistics I have some (but not TOTAL) control over. Luck, well, is just that.  Some say you create your own luck by doing the right things at the right time, but that's debatable.

For example, today was my longest planned run to date (and I did do it...more on that later). Logistically I had it all nailed down. All my stuff was ready, bottles filled, hat, sunscreen, watch, bandaids, socks, gels, etc. all in their places.  Got to bed at a "decent" hour.

No alarm planned. I decided to let my internal alarm clock wake me up at 6 a.m. I was up at 6:30 a.m. Not too far off. Since I'm training alone, there's no planned start time to my runs. I got up, ready, and here comes my 3 11/12ths year old down the stairs. Uh oh, in the interest of maintaining my marriage, I got the little guy settled, TV on, breakfast ready, toys and games out. But now we're talking a 7 a.m. start for a 2 1/2 hour planned run. A slight curveball had been thrown at my logistics and planning, but I took it in stride without too much impact. Good logistics, bad luck, good outcome.

Last night I succombed to my kids' request and we drove through In-N-Out Burger for dinner (well, ok, they didn't have much arm twisting to do).  The kids had their standard Meat/Cheese/Bun while I ordered a hamburger with everything, including grilled onions. In so doing, I was veering away from my last positive experience of consuming a plain cheeseburger the night before a long run.  As I was downing the burger on the ride home*, I noticed the onions tasted like they had been sitting on the grill for awhile, somewhat (and uncharacteristically) yucky, but not enough to stop the inhalation as I drove.

So of course this morning my bad decision to eat something that didn't quite taste right caused some gastric distraction.  But thanks to good logistical planning this morning's "In-N-Out" performance did not significantly impact my long run. Bad logistics last night, bad luck, good logistics today, no harm no foul.  That's what a training run's all about.

So on to the run itself. Aside from the multiple pit stops, it was even better than last week's great run. Yet another run to PCH from Newbury Park via Sycamore Canyon, turning left onto PCH until my watch hit 1 hour, 17 minutes, then turned back to finish in 2 hours, 36 minutes. Nearly even splits, even with the severe uphill finish.  Started nice, easy and slow, and finished solidly, with little soreness.

An example of good luck today...CLOUD COVER the entire run!  A distance runner's dream! The weather was only mid-60s the entire run and that made it quite enjoyable to not have to deal with heat for once! And yet again I caught several beautiful deer on my descent to the ocean...they seemed to enjoy watching me huffing and puffing as they nibbled their breakfast.

So my mileage estimate for the day is 21.5 miles and for the week was 57 miles. With exactly 12 weeks until the Santa Barbara Marathon, I'm 100% confident that my body is ready for the 26.2 mile distance. The key now is to get a couple more 20 milers in but also to start tuning up my speed a bit now that I know the distance is a non-issue. To that end, my plan is to run the Point Mugu Half Marathon next Saturday, Thousand Oaks Alliance for the Arts 10K on 9/26, Jason's Race 5K on 10/11, Calabasas Classic 10K on 11/8 and perhaps one more half marathon.

*On a side note, I think it is much more dangerous eating an In-N-Out Burger than driving than holding a cell phone up to my head. Reminded me of this humorous video.

Listen to Your Body...And Do What Feel's Right

So today was a comeback of sorts for me.  I ran the Bulldog 25K in Malibu Creek State Park, Calabasas. 

Well, technically I didn't run the Bulldog 25K "race" today.  But I did run the Bulldog 25K. Huh? I was signed up for the 2-loop Bulldog 50K but called it a day after the first loop.  And am very happy about it.

If you've been reading this blog, you may recall that my last long run of 20 miles took place on 7/26, then I took a week's vacation, but 5 days after returning threw out my back in a big way. The last several weeks I've visited a local chiropractor 6 time and, finally, after repeated treatment, am finally past my latest injury.  In the meantime, my training over the last 4 weeks has been light and my fitness level dropped.

So while a month ago I fully intended to run the full Bulldog 50K as a training run for the Santa Barbara Marathon in December, today I was THRILLED just to be able to get out there and run!

Years ago, before my life was overtaken by rugrats, I won the Bulldog 30K (now the 25K) 2 times in 3 years and was 4th the other year running with injury. The nice folks organizing the race sent me a complimentary entry this year.  I figured, what the heck, let's try the 50K.

My training was not geared towards this 50K as some of my runner friends, especially the trail runners, avidly pointed out. The Bulldog 25K is a challenging (some might say BRUTAL), run that starts at Malibu Creek State Park off Las Virgenes and has a net elevation climb of 4,000 feet. There are 2 4-mile climbs up Bulldog Mountain (elevation 2,528 feet)! The 50K is double the net elevation gain...and pain!

Given the fact that I hadn't run longer than 6 miles over the last 4 weeks and I'm coming off an injury, it really didn't make sense to run the 50K, which at 31 miles is nearly 5 miles longer than the marathon distance...heck, I've never run over 26.2 miles.

But, I figured I could nail down 15.5 miles, even on the brutally hilly course. My goal was to start the race I see how I felt. It took the 2 climbs to the top of Bulldog Mountain for me to realize that I didn't have 50K in my today...and if I tried, I'd probably injure myself.

So I pulled off my number after 25K with a time of 2 hours, 12 minutes. The time was a little slow for me as I walked up many of the steep hills (as do many others). The race volunteers looked shocked at my departure as I wasn't hobbling in pain or anything.  And I'm pretty sure I was in the top 3 to 5, after having battled a bit with the lead woman in the race who was like a billy goat swallowing up the steep uphills! But I'm happy to be back and to get a good 15 miler in!

If you are looking for a challenge, check out the Bulldog races. They are well organized, the volunteers are very good and they have their act together! The Bulldog 50K has been run since 1992 and is one of the few "ultra" (i.e race longer than the traditional 26.2 mile marathon length) runs near Ventura County.

The 50K starts at 6:30 a.m., which generally means you have to wake up at 5 a.m. to start preparing, drive there, register, etc. I'm not real good about waking up at 5 a.m., but I got there at 6 a.m. and the parking lot was packed with several hundred people.  One might expect to see a cast of crazy offbeat characters willing to put there bodies through this 31 mile fire road early on an August morning. But not at all...in fact, these people were very mainstream looking for a challenge.

Time for some ice...and maybe a beer.

Ace Your Race With the Right Pace

On Sunday I mentioned I ran my first 10K race in a number of years.  While I was pleased with my 38:30 comeback performance, I have to say I worked pretty hard to get that time. 

I have to thank two fellow runners.  Samuel and I stayed together for most of the race, from around the 1 mile mark to about 5 miles, when I started gradually pulling away from him.  He was targeting sub-40 minutes and he finished under 39 minutes. Then 35 year old Eduardo, who was probably 15 seconds behind me at the halfway turnaround, managed to pass me around mile 5.  I stayed behind him, for a bit, caught my breath, and reeled him back in over the last half mile of the race.  We were just 2 seconds apart at the finish.

I was quite happy that I was able to stick with these younger runners (ok, I'm not THAT old).  Running a race well involves both physical and mental exertion.  The physical side as we all know is doing the homework...proper training, sleep, rest and nutrition.

The mental side involves a lot of things, but on race day, I think the key is to HOLD BACK at the start of the race.  Pretty much every single local 5K, 10K race I go to, I can count on 5 to 10 young whippersnappers starting the race as if it were a 100 yard dash.  That's where my elderly wisdom pays off.  It is fun watching them take off, knowing 90% of them will be hurting in about 5 to 10 minutes.  Often one of these young guns wins the race (as 29 year old Joey Snyder did handily on Sunday).  But the rest of them I get to reel in.

So start your daily runs and your races out a bit on the slow side.  Work your way into your runs, and your body will thank you.  But young guns, please ignore this advice and continue bolting out at the start of local races for my comic relief.

As far as the rest of your race, if you can latch on and run with people at or slightly faster than your desired pace, that's the way to go.  Running by yourself in a race is no fun.  Feed off others to help push yourself into a solid rhythm.  And save your best for the latter part of the race.  You'll have fun and gain momentum passing people at the end of the race.

Here's a short video of the start of the Love Run 5K on June 7th. Click "HQ" after the video begins for higher quality viewing.  The obnoxious high-pitched noise in the background is the sound of timer chips affixed to runners' shoes as they crossed the starting mat.

Schedules Schmedules - Set Running Goals and Targets and You'll Be Just Fine!

First off, my mileage last week was 43, including a 10.5 mile long run. I've got a 10K coming up at the Westlake Village Love Run this Saturday so I'll plan NOT to run a long run on Saturday. Perhaps I'll wake up earlier than normal on Wednesday morning and try for a longer run mid-week.

OK, on to business. I won't mince words. I HATE training schedules. Well, that's a bit harsh. Maybe more like, I'm not particularly fond of running schedules. Yeah, that's it...that sounds much more politically correct.

I have work schedules, kid drop off and pick up schedules, errand schedules, medical appointment schedules, household chore schedules, schedules to remember to call my parents, tax appointments, lunch schedules, staff meeting schedules, you name it. I've got enough schedules. I'm not alone.

Schedules are good as they help me stay organized. But you know what, I'm NOT gonna force myself into a strict running schedule as schedules tend to take the enjoyment out of things. So instead of precise schedules that you can find plenty of at Runners World, Active.com, Running Times and other websites, I prefer to have certain key goals and target in training for a marathon:

• Gradually ramp up weekly mileage...don't do something drastic (for most people this means increasing mileage more than 10% each week...but I don't measure it that precisely). Aim for peak mileage 4 to 6 weeks prior to the marathon.
• Gradually increase the length of the long run. Generally I target 2 to 3 20-milers, but I don't sweat it if I only reach 16 to 18 and if I feel I can I'll do more than 20.
• Build slack time into the schedule. Take rest days. Plan for bad days and bad weeks. Plan for soreness, illness, injuries and tiredness. But...go for it when you feel good...run more, train harder (psychologically it feels good to "bank" miles for the bad days).
• Place races of varying distances into your schedule...5K, 10K, 10 miler, half marathon, etc. Take races seriously only if that is in your DNA, Type A-ers. Shorter distance races are fun, social events and great practice for your marathon. Not to mention they can provide you a good feel for what your marathon target can be (more in a future post).
• Don't feel compelled to do track workouts when training for a marathon, unless you are aiming for a sub 3 hour performance and feel you really need it (and if so, limit your intervals to 800 meters to mile repeats). My experience is that while speedwork is awesome, it beats up marathoners pretty hard as they need to recover from weekend long runs, not run circles around a track.
• Taper off the mileage over the last 3 to 4 weeks prior to the marathon. Week 3 should be up to 75% of peak mileage. Week 2 50%. Week 1 25%. Last few days should be minimal mileage. Don't go walking around Disneyland the day before the race. Gotta rest.

The key point of this post is, keep running fun. If you feel that a training schedule will keep you motivated and on track, then great, use one. But if you are like me and feel constrained by one, do yourself a favor and remove it from your mental agenda.

1st Time Marathoner? Check Out Another Marathon!

First off, I hate to say this but my training is still mediocre this week.  It's my own fault.  Not getting to bed on time.  Six hours sleep a night just doesn't cut it.  I'm dragging my grumpy self out of bed to run, but it doesn't feel good.  Maybe I'll take my own advice and start getting to bed earlier so I feel more perky in the morning.

So if you're training for a marathon, especially your first marathon, consider watching another marathon in person, or better yet, volunteer for the event.  This will help get you motivated and prepared for your own race.

There are two upcoming Southern California marathons in May - the Los Angeles Marathon on May 25th and the Rock 'n' Roll Marathon in San Diego on May 31st.  Visit www.lamarathon.com and www.rnrmarathon.com for more information about these events.

The Los Angeles Marathon is only 45 minutes from Ventura County and thus is a great choice.  They always are in need of volunteers...how about handing out water cups at the event so you get a close up view of runners in action. 

The L.A. Marathon Expo is another great and FREE (except parking) opportunity to meet other runners, buy stuff and sample goodies.  This expo is held at the L.A. Convention Center on May 23rd and 24th.  Visit the L.A. Marathon website for more information.

Later in the year, there are marathons in Long Beach on October 11th (www.runlongbeach.com) and Santa Clarita on November 8th (www.scmarathon.org).  Each of these two event also have half marathons.  If you are running the Santa Barbara Marathon like me, then consider signing up for the half marathon at one of these events to test yourself.

I have run each of these marathons.  The L.A. Marathon course has changed more times than I can remember over the years, but is still the biggest event in the area.  While it may not be particularly scenic, this course offers you the opportunity to share the energy of a diverse multi-ethnic community.  rock 'n' Roll is like a big party, with live music dispersed along the course. Very popular with the Team-in-Training crowd. 

Santa Clarita is a lower key race that is a nicely done community event, with a marathon, half marathon, 5K and kids fun run.  Long Beach is one of my favorites and I've done the full marathon and half marathon several times down there.  A nice crowd close to the beach.

So strongly consider attending and/or participating in one or more of these great local events!  It will motivate you!