Fall Recap

Thanks to my friends and family who have kept up with my blog. I've found it helpful to offload the approach I've taken to training and racing, in addition to the emotions and techniques that have gotten me through my races. I hope that looking back at my running entries will better prepare me for future races - both physically and mentally. It means a lot to hear from a different people - both runners & non-runners - that they've enjoyed hearing my thoughts. Maybe a few people can learn from my approach, just as I've learned from listening to so many other runners. For those of you who were bored to tears by my long rambling recaps - I'm sorry & thanks for sparing my feelings by not telling me that (although constructive criticism is welcome).

With the decade, year, training cycle, and cross country + road seasons over, it's the perfect time to recap and reflect on this year. I'll save statistics till the end, but wanted to start with a qualitative analysis.

Things that went well:

• A more aggressive training approach: Last Spring I was too conservative on easy days. This year I still logged some easy days and days off when I felt run down, but for the most part, I replaced easy days with moderate effort runs.
• More consistent workouts: Prior to this season, I would consistently attend the WVTC Tuesday workouts, but struggled to get a second weekly workout in (especially for non-race weeks). It's not surprising that my race results hit a plateau last Spring. This Fall, I had at least 2 hard efforts every week, and occasionally a 3rd speed oriented session.
• Tempo runs: Tempos were almost non-existent prior to this season, so it's not a shock that I frequently faded toward the end of the year. Last summer, I made tempo work the cornerstone of my base buildup period. This led to stronger XC efforts - especially toward the end of races, as well as success at the half marathon and 30K distances.
• Relaxed racing approach. Sure I was a bit nervous before Club Nats and the PA Championships, but I did a great job of waking up "loose" on race mornings, and showing up to the starting line relaxed.
• Confident racing approach. Being confident makes it so much easier to be tough. It also makes it easier to be patient.
• I enjoyed it! This might be the most important aspect - seriously... I loved the workouts, the training runs, the long runs, the races, the camaraderie, and the competition. At this point in my life - I'm not running for money or Olympic glory. So if I'm not enjoying this sport and the people I'm running with, then there's no point in doing it.

Things that could go better: Luckily this list is shorter, but there is always room for improvement.

• The 5K distance. The 5K is the monkey on my back right now! It's driving me nuts that my post college PR is 16:07, and that my best over the past year has been 16:15. I've run so much better at longer distances, and even shown some speed in Kezar stadium (running a 2:00 for 800 meters the Tuesday after Club Nats). So why can't I run a damn 5K? My one serious attempt this Fall was 4 days after a demanding 6 mile XC race at the PA Champs. I was tired, but that didn't stop other people who ran both races from running well. I think the longer races are easier to plan, because what you do the first couple miles just don't matter as much (as long as you don't go out way too fast). But in the 5K that first 2 miles are 2/3 of the race! My plan is to run a few track races to get some 1500 / mile speed back in my legs, and then perhaps run a 5K on the track, where it's much easier to pace yourself intelligently.
• Over-racing. As I found myself learning to race well again, I kept wanting to run as many as I could! Over the cross country & road race season, I only took a pass on 1 event between the two circuits (not counting one XC race I was out of town for). I don't think there were any dire consequences to racing so often, but I do think I would have been better prepared for Club Nats if I'd had more time to recover and train between races.

Now for some stats & race specific comments:

• I had a couple goals for the XC season. I accomplished the one I had direct control over and didn't accomplish the one that I did not have as much control over. Goal #1 was knock significant amounts of time off my race times from last year. Ideally up to a minute on some courses. The other goal was to take advantage of less competitive races and score enough points to finish in the top 5 in the series - as the top 5 earns "comp" entry into the next XC season.
• Goal #1: drastic time improvements. I ran 6 races in 2009 that I had run in 2008, and improved my time in every race! For the 6 races, My average time improvement was 64 seconds over an average distance of 4.07 miles. If you throw out the Tamalpa race which was moved to a new (and most likely faster course) it is 50 seconds over 4.03 miles. Not counting Tamalpa (2 minutes 10 seconds but on a different course), my best improvement was the Presidio 3.55 miler in 1 minute 22 seconds, and smallest was the Garin 5K in 22 seconds). Mission accomplished.
• Goal #2: be in the running for a top 5 series finish... not even close! To mirror the nationwide trend, the level of competition really stepped up this year. There were new runners in the series, as well as existing runners who raced the series more frequently. I think the competition is a great thing because it motivates & inspires all of us to run faster. When the dust settled, despite running so much faster than last year, I dropped from 13th in the series in '08 to 16th in '09!
• A consolation to the point above was that last year, my best finish in a single race was 10th at Presidio, while this year, I finished 8th at Presidio and 6th at Willow Hills.

My long road race finishes were a very pleasant surprise

• Humboldt Half Marathon: In the early season, I felt like 1:12 was a stretch goal, but after some good workouts, I decided to pace myself for a faster time, which paid off with a 6th place finish in 1:11:08
• Clarksburg 30K: I thought this was just going to be a hard long run / long tempo run, then I got out there and ran 1:43:57 (5:35 pace for 18.3 miles) finishing with another 6th place run.

Best & Worst:

• Most disappointing race: The obvious answer would be my Turkey Trot 5K, but since that's too obvious I'll say the season opening Santa Cruz XC race. Even though I dropped 47 seconds off the prior year, I should dropped well over a minute considering I hardly slept prior to the '08 race was a bit .. um.. dehydrated. But more so, I ran really tight and nervous, and just didn't have any fight in me late in the race.
• Best regular season XC race: Definitely the Presidio. I had a tough week of running leading up, but ran a smart, tough race plan from the gun to the line and dropped 1 minute 22 seconds over 3.55 miles from the prior year.
• Biggest surprise: The Clarksburg 30K. I had no idea I could run 5:35 pace for 18+ miles... much less that I'd go out and do it!
• Best end of race kick: At the PA Champs, I outkicked several runners, including a teammate who I had never beaten before. Felt like the good old days :)

Looking forward:

• My 2010 racing season will start will actually start on 12/31/09 with a low key New Years Even road race in Chattanooga. I won this race in 1998, 1999, and 2001. Hopefully no college kids show up and I'll have a shot in 2009!
• My focus for the Spring is the 100th Dipsea race. Last year I ran in the Runner's section (i.e. non-Invitation) finishing 3rd in that group, with the 6th fastest time out of everyone. If we had all started with the invitational section my time would have placed me 25th, earning one of the 35 coveted black t-shirts. Single digits for the 100th race?
• I feel like I'm capable of a low 15 minute 5K, but let's start with a mid 15s. This will finally happen!
• As for PA races, I want to build on my success with the long road race series, and notch a good finish in the Redding 10 mile.
• I can't expect to run like I did when I was 21 years old overnight, but I want to keep focusing on knocking down my post college PRs. I feel like every time I step on the road or the track that I'll threaten a PR.

Finally thanks to all the West Valley Kezar crew who I've run with over the past year. T-Rose, Little Mike, Charlesworth, Jonah, Julian, Big Mike, Joe, TK, Mason, Dewey, Sparkle, Big John, Eric, Matty D, Matt, James, as well as out of towners Duke, Ben, Lars, Jann, Marzoff (and sorry if I've I missed some people - I'm sure I have). And of course coach Dr. Jack for all the workouts and coaching... no one can accuse you of being in this for the money!

Happy New Year!!

USATF National Club XC Championships

All good things come to an end! That's certainly how I feel about this past cross country season. I ran quite a few races since late August - 12 in total between cross country, 2 long road races, and the Corp Challenge. Quite a few were good, a couple were bad, and one was ugly, but regardless I improved as a runner, and had just a great time doing it. While the PA season was over, our club had one last piece of business to take care of - the USATF National Club XC Championships. Club 'Nats is team focused race (with individual bragging rights of course) that features many of the best semi-pro and amateur runners & clubs from across the country.

I ran my first Club Nationals last year in Spokane & let's just say the race wasn't a great experience. Last year's race features single digit temperatures + howling winds, which combined with an unimpressive fitness level placed me toward the back of the field. I was also super nervous the whole day before the race... bleh. (although it was GREAT to catch up with a couple college teammates the evening after the race).

Anyway, I waffled throughout the fall between continuing my momentum from the half marathon and 30K by running the California International Marathon or traveling to Kentucky for Club Nats. A couple factors tipped me toward Kentucky. One was not wanting to tack a marathon on top of such a busy racing season, and then the deciding factor was getting to see my parents who drove up from Lookout Mountain and my sister Alysia her family who drove from Louisville (sister Debby was going to drive up as well, but got knocked on her back with the flu).

After the PA Champs & Turkey Trot (the latter being the one ugly race) I had a great couple weeks of training. So I headed off to Kentucky exited to finish off the season on a good note. When I headed to the course the day of the race, I was so much more relaxed then last year. I had a race plan, and the confidence to execute it. The 40 degree race day temp felt tropical compared to last year.

The race was 10K total, which consisted of 3 times a 3 kilometer loop (just shy of 2 mile), then 1K mostly uphill to the finish line. The course was challenging with 2 long gradual hills on each loop, but fair & well suitable for a championship race. The grass course was in decent shape, but there were some sloppy sections leftover from a recent snow storm that had melted. A bonus feature was a digital clock at every mile mark.

I witnessed first hand the funniest thing I'd ever seen at the start of the race. Todd Rose, Jonathan Charlesworth, and I took the front row of our assigned starting box. The starter called "runners take your mark" then we waited what seemed like forever for the gun to fire. But how it really went was "runners take your mark" FART!!! Jonathan mistook Todd's flatulence for the starting gun, and almost took off before getting reset behind the line. Finally the gun fired and we took off with Todd & I laughing almost hysterically.

My plan was simply to run a conservative first mile+ then start moving forward - very similar to what I did at the PA Champs. I almost felt like I was running too easily in the first mile, which hit both of the long hills. I stayed relaxed, resisted the urge to shuffle positions, and dropped 10 - 15 meters back from Todd. I hit the split in 5:10 which was a decent pace for a net uphill mile. We headed downhill to the one flat part of the course, where I finally let myself pass a few runners. Throughout the 2nd mile, I started to move up considerably. I hit that split in 5:08. I kept moving through the 3rd mile - now having picked up quite a few spots - and hit the split in 15:28 (a 5:10 split). The 5K distance had been a monkey on back over the past year, and I had just ran my fastest 5K since college - at the half way split of a muddy, hilly, cross country course. I had a great race going, so time to keep rolling.

I passed a few people the 4th mile but slowed down a good bit, hitting the split in 20:58 (a 5:30 mile). I was pretty tired heading into the 5th mile, but just tried to focus and relax. I saw my niece Callie & nephew Conner jumping and cheering, which brought out a smile at a tough part of the race.

As the last loop started, I gave back a few of the many spots I had picked up. That net downhill mile was a more respectable 5:22 (26:20 total). With a mile left to go, I tried to take a deep breath and make a move toward the finish. Unfortunately, that move was short lived, and I just died, or the wheels fell off, or pick your cliche... it was ugly and painful. In the last half mile, I lost many if not most of the positions I had gained. The 6 mile mark was 32:00 (5:40) and a finishing time of 33:13 for 171st of 319 runners. West Valley finished a solid 27th out of 41 teams, beating our PA rivals, the River City Rebels, by just 2 team spots. Jonathan Charlesworth finished 92nd, and Todd finished 110th (exactly a minute in front of me).

My thoughts on the race echoed those of several people I talked to afterward, not great, but not terrible. If I hadn't fallen apart in the last mile, I think it would have been pretty good. But still, I ran my fastest post college times from 5K thru 10K. West Valley only brought 5 guys to the race (the minimum required to score a team) & everyone ran well. I thought Todd's race was particularly impressive. Also, congrats to the Aggies and Transports who put numerous runners in the top 50 to finish 4th and 5th respectively in the team competition.

Before the race I had hoped to be close to 100th place, but that might have been a little ambitious given how competitive the nationwide running scene has been. I'm happy with my improvement over last year, moving from the back of the pack to the middle. Just as long as I further improve on it next year!

The official post race party was a dud, but we met up with the Rebels team later in the evening, and had a great time celebrating the end of the season, and a closely contested year long rivalry.

Sunday morning I drove up to Louisville & enjoyed hanging out with Alysia & the family.





Moving up in the 2nd loop



Starting to hurt



Recovering and recapping with the Rebels



A post race treat (left to right: Jonathan Charlesworth, Mike Brandell, Duke Bristow, me, and Nicole Campbell)

PA XC Championships

One of the biggest events of the year in the Bay Area running community are the PA Cross Country Championsips in Golden Gate Park. It's not the biggest in terms of people running - very far from it - but definitely one of the best in terms of competition and excitement. Held the Sunday before Thanksgiving each year, the PA Champs wraps up our fall cross country circuit, as well as attracting some out of town runners. Also, my parents were in town for Thanksgiving, so the saw me race for the first time in a while.

Heading into the meet, I had a very heavy race load through the Fall between running most of the XC races, as well as a couple longer road races. I took a chance by racing hard at the Clarksburg 30K just two weeks prior. My rough rule of thumb for race recovery, (i.e. the number of days until I'm ready for another hard effort) is to take the distance (of the race i just ran) and multiply it by 2 / 3. That's a rough rule, so it's plus or minus a day or two.

I was pretty beat up after the 30K. It's not so much that my legs were tired, but my body was tired. Anytime I tried to push myself - or even ran up a big hill I just found my heartrate picking up and my lungs working more than usual.

But what do you know, on the Thursday before the race, I felt like I had my legs fully under me. I was ready to go! My rule of thumb predicted 12 days to recover, and I made it in 11 (with three days to spare).

The course is a deceptively tough 2 mile loop, which you run 3 times. It starts in a meadow, heads downhill on a dirt path, flattens onto a windy almost single track trail, opens into another meadow, jumps over a log, heads uphill on another single track, opens on a flat & wider dirt hill that ultimately heads back uphill, then a sharp left back to the original downhill dirt path, then the loop ends with a detour into the meadow where you start & finish. And thanks to rain throughout the weekend, the course was very sloppy.

You run loop 3 times, and there's no spot to settle in or get into a rhythm like you would on the road or track. Constantly turning, changing surfaces, shifting gears, etc. Some runners hate that... I love it!

When the gun went off I jumped off the line dashing through the meadow. Todd yelled "JAMEY RELAX." It was good advice. I tucked in a few spots behind him and let quite a few other runners go out too fast in front of me. I stayed pretty far back in the pack, but relaxed, through the first mile. As we hit the first single track train and the meadow around the mile mark, I'm thinking this was the point that I started picking people off & moving up in the 4 mile fall race. But this time I just wasn't feeling it. In fact my legs were feeling pretty heavy. As I ran back uphill I just wasn't happy with how I felt this early. But remember the lesson from earlier in the season - just run!

I finished up the first of three loops without changing my position very much. But the legs were just so heavy I wasn't sure how I could move up. Todd & the pack he was with had slipped away by 30 or 40 meters. But as I left the meadow to start the 2nd loop, I realized that even though my legs felt flat, I wasn't breathing hard at all. Maybe I wasn't going to blow up afterall. So as we head back downhill I look up for the next runner ahead of me. It was Gus Gibbs of the Rebels. It took me more than half a mile to catch him, but I finally caught up. Gus said "what's up" and we ran together for a bit. Then I looked up at the next runner ahead & caught him pretty quickly. Each time I caught somebody, I was already looking at the next runner. Pretty soon I was moving through the field.
















The PA Championship field is a lot deeper than our normal weekly races, so I don't know a lot of the runners around me, but green jersey, white jersey, red jersey, I just keep digging to catch and pass the other runners. From the 2 mile mark to the 5 mile, I probably moved up 15 spots. Just before the 5 mile mark, I see the 3rd man on the Rebels. As I'm currently 4th for West Valley, this was an important guy to catch for our team standings. I catch the rebel, then I look up and see teammate Todd Rose right in front of me.

I've always liked intra-team competition. It's a friendly competition, and one that can make us all better runners. You train together, race together, hangout together. But you still want to beat each other. Todd had been my best training partner over the past year. Our workouts are pretty similar, but he's such a good racer, and despite being close a few times, I'd never beaten him. Could I really catch him, pass, and keep going?

Just past the 5 mile mark, I pull up to Todd. And I don't know if there was a mental block of catching a guy who'd I'd never been able to beat, if Todd was responding to runners right in front of him, or if I finally hit some fatigue from my mid-race pace. But as soon as I catch him, I feel myself slow down a bit. As we start heading uphill in the last loop, and I'm just trying to maintain contact. Todd is there, as well two others including our top runner - Jonathan Charlesworth - who is not at his best having recently been sick.

When we head up the last hill, I lean in to give it one last shot to get myself past these three guys. All three are in contact, but Todd leads the group with a hard surge over the crest of the hill. My plan was to make that same move when I crested, but since Todd got there 10 or meters ahead of me, he opened up a gap & was pulling away. So I set my sight on Jonathan and passed him as we made the sharp left.

With about a quarter of a mile to go I completely open my stride up and sprint down the hill. I wasn't sure if I could catch anybody, but I had to try, plus there could always be someone coming from behind. When we hit the last meadow I'd made up some ground on Todd. I find another gear, then another, and then somehow another! I'm reeling Todd in quickly, but the finish line is flying toward us. With one last surge I catch him about 2 stride lengths from the line, and beat him by about a foot. I hadn't been able to kick like that since sometime in college! A funny moment was when my Dad was at the finish yelling GO JAMEY, GO JAMEY, YOU CAN CATCH HIM!" I had to ask him not to alert my competition next time I'm trying to catch them at the finish :)

Final result was 29th place in 32:45 (5:22 pace since the race was slightly more than 6 miles). I was almost a minute faster than last year despite the very sloppy conditions. West Valley finished 3rd in the meet to wrap up 3rd overall for the season (just ahead of the Rebels in both the meet and the final standings) What a great way to cap off what had been a very satisfying cross country season.

After the race I hung out in the park with the other West Valley runners, as well as a large group from the Rebels. It was a great feeling to be celebrating with both my teammates, plus friends I had made from other teams. As I've said before, running has really become fun again!

I wasn't sure how it would go, but I tried a quick turn around to race a super competitive 5K road race 4 days later on Thanksgiving morning. The 5K distance has been a bit of a monkey on my back as I feel certain I'm ready to run in the mid 15 minute range or faster, but have been stuck in the low 16s. Thanksgiving wasn't meant to be my day. I felt really tired running after the XC race. I ran the opening mile of the 5K in 4:50. Even though I was well off the pace of most the field, that split still buried me. I tried to keep it up, but I kept going slower and slower, sputtering across the line in 16:15. I wasn't happy, but I know that's no indication of my fitness. I'll have my day at that distance. I guess this time the 2 / 3 rule of thumb was off by a day.

After the 5K, I was able to really focus on training for the first time in a while as I got a week and a half of solid runs and workouts. One highlight was pacing a friend through the first lap of an 800 meter in 56 seconds! I had no idea I could still run that fast!

Now I'm on my way to Kentucky for the USATF Club XC Nationals with West Valley. My parents and both sisters are meeting me in Lexington.