9000KM of training mileage

Today I registered my 9005th kilometers ran into my running log. 5 years of running bring me lots of changes and I am glad that I am still keep going. Now I am using it as a transportation option to work. Daily commuting of 15km thru and fro and I planned to do this 3 to 4 times weekly. This removed some pressure to wake up 4am to login the required training mileage, but on the other hand add in pressure to restart the running momentum before the body fully recovered in the evening. So far, I completed this in past 4 weeks, logging in a decent 60+ km per week. The body seem like going to adapt to the new training approach, but I also observed some over-trained syndrome started to surface. Need to take extra caution to have more rest and stretching to avoid injury.

On the other hand, SCKLM / KSB issue caused me signed up to River Jungle Marathon in September. Now I had 4 full marathons in 3 months. If adding in the half marathon I signed up, I will be racing 4 FM plus 2 HM in the next 94 days. Seem like I am going to have a great time enjoying the rush in adrenaline in all these races, provided if I don’t injure myself. For sure, I won’t survive it I go all out in all 6 races. Some prioritization required here but I am obviously not really good in holding back. Let see how I survived these :) 

Start of a New Racing Season

18 more weeks to my yearly highlight race SCKLM, and now is the best time to start another round of training cycle. The previous training cycle actually dragged much longer than 18 weeks and it’s kind of back to back so often I felt drained after each major event I trained for. This time, I took 2 weeks off (almost totally off) from running, and went for shopping instead.

I got myself a pair of Merrell Bare Access 3, and a pair of Newton Distance 3, with good discount. With the good experience from R68 in Bare Access, I decided to explore my shoes running options. As there are lesser channel nowadays to get VFF in Malaysia, plus the build quality is deteriorating, I need some other options.

Bare Access 3 like its previous version, was a minimalist shoes. But it’s not really that minimalist anymore in this version. It’s heavier and harder soles; narrower in both toe box and arch area; make it more like a racing flat compared to the usual barefoot running shoes.

Distance 3 on the other side, with lots more cushioning and softer soles, flexible toes box (it’s still consider narrow, but the upper layer actually quite flexible and you won’t felt your toes restricted inside), with the strange feeling to running on those 5x lugs system.

Both shoes providing great stimulation to difference part of my legs muscles and also the workouts. Together with the 2 VFF, I am rotating shoes on daily basis. This also helped by taken away some routine from the running. As I am now so used to VFF, I usually just ran. I don’t check my gait, my posture, my form usually. But now I will need to adjust myself in every workout. Not to the extent of changing my gait, posture or form every time, but at least I am going thru my running form check list again. Lower back straight, kept those feet land below my centre of gravity, body lean forward, head upright, kept a high cadences, etc.. But with all these shoes added into my arsenal, now my wife started to question me regarding the number of running shoes I had :P

I will still follow the Hanson Marathon Method 18 weeks advanced training program and SCKLM will be my target race. 2015 SCKLM will be using the same route like 2014, I will be able to estimate and plan better to face the challenge now. Hence I am moving up my goal to finish this marathon in 345. Btw, this year the SCKLM sold out in record pace, only 4 days and all categories were filled. 6500 participants will be running full marathon. As this year the starting pen will be go by estimated finishing time (just estimated, no proof required), I don’t expect to have any issue at the starting point. 

The key challenge like last year, located at 37km when we joining the half marathon participant for the last 5km. I hope my training will allow me to go faster than 345, than the human traffic should still be manageable. The peak actually around 345-415, the full marathoners speeding at 5:20-6:03min/km pace will be facing the half marathoners who will be finishing around 2.5-3 hours with the 7 to 8min/km pace. The 1-2 min/km pace difference is too big so we will be blocked. The water station will be packed. I will make sure I run with my bottle this year, and padded up my elbows!

There are some races lining up in these 18 weeks, total of 2x half marathons (Seremban & Malaysian Day), and 1x full marathon (Kuching). All these races had their own target now aligned to my 345 goal.

Let’s train hard and aim high!

Training must go on

Lately lots of changes happen in my organization and my main project hitting the wall too. Also, I suffered the usual dip in emotion after every big race (failed to score the highly anticipated PB made it worst). To overcome this, I do shopping.

I got myself double doses of endorphin from the books by two famous Japanese Ultra Runners, Hirofumi Ono (a.k.a. the White Radish Costume Runner) and Ryōichi Sekiya (4 times 24hrs Ultra World Champion). I signed up for Seremban Half Marathon, got myself a pair of Drymax Socks (will be running in Bare Access in the coming Challenge68 Ultra), and tentatively get a new pair of Merrell Bare Access later in the RSH Warehouse Sale. The family will have more shopping over this weekend because the bloody GST is coming.

After the Seoul trip, I rested for few days. Only resume my running last Saturday. As I back in Ipoh, I decided to run up the Bukit Kledang as part of the training for the 1900m elevation gain in Challenge68. The training was great. Surprisingly I found a way to keep my effort manageable when scaling the incline, just keep the stable breath by counting it, and never thinking of stopping until you reached the target. My target for this training was simple, 1.5km up (out of the whole 6km road to the TM Tower) with close to 144m elevation gain. Then I walked up another 1.5km, and ran all the way back to start. The descending of 3km over 350m was fun! I clocked 5.5min/km pace in Bare Access. Usually I descend slower than ascending in road race. Now is time to put in some training on how to descend properly with some speed.

Apart from the hill workout, I add in evening run. Challenge68 will start at 6am, no matter how fast I go, come noon I will still be in the race. It preparing my body to endure the heat (plus I planned most of the long run sessions in April to be done in 8/9am-12pm). The usual 6 morning training sessions will still be continued. Evening workouts planned for all easy days (Monday, Friday & Saturday), and Tempo run (Thursday). The easy run was just to building up my endurance. And the tempo run will be a continue session from what I left in the morning. As I need to finish my morning run by 6am, I usually don’t have enough time to cover the planned tempo run distances (especially towards the end of the training program). So the evening session will be filling up the gap and also training the body to restart into target racing pace after some break.

The game plan for this 68km race was ready too. Plan A (711) very aggressive and Plan B (828) relatively conservative. Tentatively I will mix them up and play by ear. The elevation gain doesn’t look very scary as I break it down to average elevation change per KM. But the plan was draw out with the CP elevation. There will be more to be expected in between CPs as the organizer announced 1900m elevation gain in total. I will need to do lot more hill workout in order to follow thru the planned pace.

After putting down all these plans, I felt some relief of my emotional stress. May be I just need to have something to divert my attention and perhaps doing venting helped too.

In short, training (the show) must go on. 6 weeks until my second Ultra road race.

Training report: Training week 8 & 9, Final Preparation and Game Plan

Training week 8 involved the long missed 1.6km speed intervals. The mile repeats is the hardest amongst all speed work cause the length and pace. The last time I did this was more than 7 months ago. Now from the past few speed works, I realized that the training is about the speed during the interval, not the average pace. Hence I started to slow down lots more during the 400m recovery between repeats, from the usual 5:50-6min/km, to 6:15-6:30min/km. It’s helped to maintain the quality of the speed works. And I able to kept the pace I wanted for all 3 repeats. Still the problem of woke up early but started late, most of the workouts are short in distance compared to what planned. Also I started to reduce the load partly due to workload, and it’s getting close to the race. Monday and Friday were off. Sunday was revisiting the Padang Merbuk – Hartamas route at long run pace, and found out that the Sri Hartamas Petronas was closed again for renovation.

Week 8	Program	Done	Remark
Mon	Easy 9.7km	Rest
Tue	Speed 3x 1600m	Speed 3x 1600m	All repeats paced at 4:50min/km
Wed	Rest	5km
Thu	Tempo 11.3km	9km	8km in tempo pace
Fri	Easy 9.7km	Rest
Sat	Easy 16.1km	18km
Sun	Easy 16.1km	20km	Padang Merbuk – Hartamas
Total Done		62km

Training week 9 started with a day off. The back to back 18/20km over the weekend was unintended, but necessary preparation for the Challenge68. Been a while I didn’t do back to back long run, figured that some extra off time will ensure that I don’t inviting any injury. The body started to response to the amount of training, the speed work and tempo run completed rather easy, and another round of back to back 18/18km was done too. Heart rate and effort were moderate during these 18/18km workouts, with around 6min/km pace. This increased my confident to sub-4 in the coming marathon.

Week 9	Program	Done	Remark
Mon	Easy12. 9km	Rest
Tue	Speed 6x 800m	Speed 6x 800m	All repeats paced at 5min/km
Wed	Rest	Rest
Thu	Tempo 12.9km	12.6km	11km in tempo pace
Fri	Easy 11.3km	5km
Sat	Easy 12.9km	18km
Sun	Long 24.2km	18km	Long run pace @ 6min/km
Total Done		64km

I can’t help but kept revise the game plan during the past 2 day’s long run sessions. I read thru some great story about PB in Seoul International Marathon, the key factors the weather adaption and the flat course. The flat course is a fix fact, but the weather is a variable. That’s means I will need to force myself out for a morning run this Friday and Saturday in Seoul, to let myself adjust to the temperature and clothing requirement. I belief the challenge will be the waiting of flag off until 5km in the race. After that, the engine will be warmed enough to keep going. Forecast for 15 March now is cloudy with some shower @ 10degC. Only minimum faith in these weather forecast, I will need the 2 trail runs to fine tune the attire.

The planned attire,

Running attire, running vest plus running t-shirt, arm sleeves, glove, compress short, cap, running buff and VFF Komodo Sport. Running jacket will be on if light shower.

Waiting for flag off, my running attire, plus a cotton t-shirt, running jacket, poncho and some hand warmer.

Transport from hostel to starting point, all above with additional long pants and light winter jacket.

The long pants and winter jacket (tentatively the running jacket too) will be packed into baggage for after race collection. The cotton t-shirt and the poncho will be disposed after the flag off.

On the other side, the game plan for the marathon is rather simple. Just keep going with faster than 5:40min/km pace, I will be fine. That’s plan A (359 finishing time), plan B will be kick in if I felt great after the first 10km, will push harder gradually and aim for a 350 finish time.

6 more days until the marathon.

Training report: BWM Anniversary, CNY Celebration and Training week 6 & 7

Training week 6 went well except the FB group BWM anniversary celebration on the 15 Feb. The long run was reduced into a 3km short run, with some catching up with fellow barefoot runners and sharing of experiences from the barefoot guru. Some training schedule in week 7 changed too to suit the travel plan and other family chore before and during the CNY. But nonetheless, I recorded some decent mileages for both training weeks, without further stress on my injury.

Week 6	Program	Done	Remark
Mon	Easy 9.7km	4km
Tue	Speed 4x 1200m	Speed 4x 1200m	All repeats paced around 5min/km
Wed	Rest	Rest
Thu	Tempo 11.3km	11.3km	10km in tempo pace
Fri	Easy 9.7km	7km
Sat	Easy 16.1km	10km
Sun	Easy 12.9km	3km	BWM Anniversary
Total Done		45km

Overall week 6 was the low mileage period after the long run in week 5. I seem to have some problem to stick with the planned mileage especially during weekdays. I woke up 4am but usually dragged until 5am only out the gate, and need to return home to prepare the children for school by 6am. The one hour will only enough for 10km and below. I think some improvement needed here to reduce the waiting time from 4-5am  :P

Week 7	Program	Done	Remark
Mon	Easy 9.7km	None
Tue	Speed Progressive	Speed Progressive	All repeats paced around 5min/km
Wed	Rest	10.5km
Thu	Tempo 11.3km	14km	12km in tempo pace
Fri	Easy 11.3km	8.6km
Sat	Easy 12.9km	None
Sun	Long 22.6km	25km	23km in 6min/km
Total Done		73km

The highlight of week 7 was the progressive speed work. You will redo all the distances you concurred in previous speed work at once, plus the longest speed work of 1600m. My CNY holiday started so I can add in extra warm up and cool down. Total mileage for the week was 73km, doing it in the CNY holiday increased the feel good factor. I ran in Polo Ground during the CNY break. This is a great running venue but you will not want to start too early (before 6am, or the first Morning Prayer) cause it will be occupied by Mak Rempit. Also it will be too busy after 7am with lots of people doing their morning walk. So most of the workouts started with few loops in Polo Ground, and then I will venture into the surrounding area.

I put on 3kg extra weight during the injury and the CNY break wasn’t help at all to bring it down. It will run with me during the Seoul International Marathon. But after I checked the weather forecast, I think these extra fats come in handy. The 15 March forecast stated a 5degC high and -2degC low. If this is accurate, it will be way cooler than what I experienced in Munich (10degC). I don’t have any suitable running attire for this temperature. I planned to use the similar approach in Munich Marathon (double top, compress short, cap, arm warmer sleeves & gloves). The challenge will be on the waiting for flag off; like normal I will try to lookout for a disposable poncho and I am thinking to standby my running jacket underneath the poncho. Anyway, I think I will be ok after the engine warmed up. If the body responded well with the cool temperature, I will probably score a PB in this race. For now, I can only hope for the best and continue to fine tune my running pace to the target racing pace.

14 days until my departure to Seoul.

Training report: Long Slow Distance and training week 5

Compared to usual training program to have the Long Slow Distance during the weekend, the Hanson Marathon Method used a Long run for the weekend. The long run improves the anaerobic threshold by running slightly slower than your target marathon pace. I haven’t done any LSD since I started with the Hanson Marathon Method. With the higher target set now (68km race), I think I need some of these extra-long distance training. I am glad that MURA organized this as one of the Titi race practice for those participated in Titi50, 100 or 200. Some adjustment needed to include the LSD, I moved the long run to Saturday, and planned only sightseeing pace for the LSD.

Overall, the training week went well. The speed work at 5min/km pace is very manageable, the body is getting back its movement for the 5:40min/km target pace. Some fine tuning still needed to make sure I didn’t drifted to faster pace (in the early stage of the race) or slower pace (towards the end stage of the race). The Saturday long run plus Sunday LSD gave the best opportunity to test out how the body responded at the end stage of the race. As the weekly mileage went above 80km, the body should give me some similar response that I will get at the final 5km of a full marathon. So, my plan for the LSD was simple. Goes by sightseeing pace, and try to push at the final stage to see how far I can go.

The LSD started at 5:45am, the cold breeze, clear sky with sufficient moonlight bring back the great memory of the Titi50 2014. I actually ran up the Bukit Hantu (slow pace around 8-9min/km over the climb), but again ran with the similar speed descending. The route is very familiar and I got Fong ran with me most of the time. Chitchatted and exchanged some running info, we reached the u-turn point at the CP2. Waited a while for the rest, took a group photo and we heading back to the restaurant. Most of the time we maintained a comfortable 6.5-7min/km pace, and we decided to walk up to Bukit Hantu this time. At the peak, we slowly restart the engine to run. But my descending pace was really slow and I had to ask Fong to go ahead. Finally, the route is almost flat and I decided I needed some training on descending. I ramped up the engine and up my pace. The final 5km was done in 5:40-5:50min/km pace. I think I overcome by paradigm of slow descending, but more similar training needed. And the body responded very well on the push, which gave me lots of confident to chase my speed on the coming race. 

Day	Program	Done	Remark
Mon	Easy 9.7km	4km
Tue	Speed 5x 1000m	Speed 5x 1000m	All repeats paced around 5min/km
Wed	Rest	Rest
Thu	Tempo 9.7km	9km	Only 8km in tempo pace
Fri	Easy 11.3km	9km
Sat	Easy 9.7km	17km	Long ran pace @ 6.1min/km
Sun	Long 16.1km	29km	LSD @ Hulu Langat 29km
Total Done		85km

The right ankle seems to be ok now. Only minor swollen after some hard training and its survived the 29km LSD without getting worst. I shifted my treatment from weekend to Tuesday after work. It suits my rest time in my training plan. I felt great and optimistic on archiving my sub-4 target in coming Seoul International Marathon. The only huddle now was the food for Chinese New Year J

Next week, CNY week, but training must go on. Some running will be done in Ipoh. 33 days until the big day and I am excited.

Back in action and my refinement of training plan

The injury treatment caused some down time in my training program. I was only trained like less than 40% planned mileages in for the past 2 months. With some help of the acupuncture, I am back in action. There are still some mild issue on the right ankle with PF, I am going to continue the acupuncture treatment for another few more week and hopefully it will be cured.

Now, with only slightly more and a month left until the SIM, it will be unrealistic to still aim for a 330 FM. I need to adjust my training plan with a slower target time. Also, the Challenge 68 in slightly further down the route, I will need to put up some mileages specified for this race with 1900m elevation climb and 1.62x of the FM distances. As I am now very comfortable to the 400 FM training plan, my adjustment are concentrated to get myself ready to the complete the 68km with the 5:40min/km pace, and complete it with less than 7 hours. This will also enable me to complete SIM around 4 hours. The key challenge now will be how to stay injury free (and stay on the recovery curve from what I am currently suffered).

I started in midway of the new training plan, after a week of slow restart, I will straight jump into the week 5 of typical Hansons Marathon Method program (with 5x 1000km speed intervals). I completed that speed intervals this morning, and I still had the great feeling about the training pace in this plan. After all, I spent about 8 months working in this training regime last year before SCKLM 2014. I think as long as I stay injury free, and the cold weather in Seoul will help me to score another PB (being closer to 400 or even below it). Other key adjustment was increase the length of all Strength Intervals and tempo runs which scheduled after the SIM, plus some back to back 20-25km for most of the long run towards the 68km race.

Finally, I got my running sunglasses. I run with spec and don’t use contact lens, hence it was never consider as one of the essential running gear. But I am going to do more UltraMarathon and it will be great help to reduce the mental stress incurred with running under the hot sun. Anyway, as I usually run early morning, and most of the Malaysia race started early to avoid the heat, I need something slightly special. Wife got me a Rudy Project Impact X2 as Christmas gift. It came with a pair of photochromic lenses that change with UV light. I tested it out for my morning run on yesterday (5am), today (7am), plus some driving around. The lenses are clear enough for the morning run, and dark enough for driving under the hot sun. It will be under full test this Sunday as I plan to join the 30km LSD organized by MURA at Titi50 route. May be I will write out a review after that (put too many promise on gears review, but never materialized).

That’s for now, happy running.

Look back 2014 & welcome 2015

The 2014 ended with an injury. Not really a new injury thought. The right foot was suffering with plantar fasciitis since mid of the year. I didn’t seek out for any treatment because from the reading, I knew that the situation is difficult to treat and I can only relief it by stretching it. During this period of time, I still scored my PB in FM (4:08:30 in SCKLM), 10K (49:16 in CICM) and unofficially sub 2 three times in HM distances.

2014 total mileage of 2389km

As a whole, 2014 was a great year in my running career, with all 2014 running target accomplished. Followed a great training plan, achieved the speed and the distances that I can only dreamed of previously. I started to dream even bigger target, to achieve 330 in FM, and in the hindsight, it will be my indicator if I could continue to pursue an even faster FM, for example, 310 for the Boston Qualifying timing.

After I completed APBIM, I took up the 330 training immediately. The PF issue was bearable back then. But after 3 weeks into the demanding 330 program, the ankle started swollen after every run, but recovered on time for the next day training. Still can continue cause of not pain, but I decided to stop for 2 weeks in conjunction of my business / family travel. The break didn’t result any progress on recovery hence I decided to seek for some help. The ultra-lady Fujii introduced Tony Wang who working in a Chinese traditional treatment center in Taman Mayang. Tony is an ultra-runner too. Visited Tony last Sunday and this is what I got at the end of the session.

The right ankle was wrapped with some Chinese traditional medicine after the acupuncture session. Need to off for 3 weeks hence my first DNS (did not start) race will be awarded to Dragon Back 2015. Still not very sure about the effectiveness of the treatment, but the PF issue is at ease at least for this morning. Hopefully it will work and I can continue my training plan by end January. It will be a scaled back plan compared to the aggressive 330.

As usual, I will plan my target in order to welcome 2015. Like 2014, I will only race in few events.

1. Complete a sub 4 marathon.

2. Complete an official sub 2 half marathon.

3. Reduce the weight to 63kg.

The rest will be having fun in training and may be in some selected races.

Of course, these will be fun if only the injury recovered.

Wish all my runners friend a safe and injury free running year ahead.

Training report: Seoul International Marathon and training week 3

The highlight of training week 3 is the start of the tempo run and the long run. If you compared to the usual training program, Hanson method used slightly difference terms in this two key workout. In short, tempo run will be practicing targeted marathon pace, and long run is working on anaerobic threshold.

I was doing fine in week 3. The speed repeats completed without too much of issue with all 8x done faster than 4.5min/km pace. Anyway, I wasn’t able to complete the planned tempo run and long run. I only managed to hold up that pace for part of the planned distances. The pace was selected at 5min/km and 5.4min/km respectively. Not a very fast pace but it will still hurt if doing it for long enough. I am not very worry about this cause it is normal when you aimed to take down a pace that obviously beyond your existing capacity. The body just need time and practice to getting used to the pace and intensity. Like how it handles in the previous program. If it’s ok to take the pace, it will slowly ease into it. If it’s not ok to take the pace, it will show some sign to tell me to stop the abuse. I just need to listen closely to my body now.

Day	Program	Done	Remark
Mon	Easy 9.7km	10km
Tue	Speed 8x 600m	Speed 8x 600m	All repeats faster than 4.5min/km
Wed	Rest	Rest
Thu	Tempo 9.7km	10km	Only 5km in tempo pace
Fri	Easy 11.3km	8km
Sat	Easy 9.7km	10km
Sun	Long 16.1km	16km	Only 9km in long run pace
Total Done		67km	Right ankle & PF issue

The right ankle seems to have some pain from the tempo run last week. I suspect that is a PF issue. The intensity of the training is taken its toll on the body. Calves felt tights most of the time and I had a hard time to loosen them in my every night stretching. Anyway the training intensity in the coming weeks will be reduced as I will be traveling from this Thursday onwards. I plan to continue with the 6 days training but change all into 10km easy run. Hopefully I can still maintain the momentum during my trip.

Today the long waited Seoul International Marathon registration has started. The fees increased to USD50 but still one of the most affordable IAAF GOLD label marathon. Flat course with 10-15degC weather are the big plus if you are chasing your PB. Furthermore, you will finish the marathon like a champion after the final lap inside the Jamsil Olympic Stadium (for 1988 Olympic Game). Click the picture below to the official website.