Jarhead's Running Myths & Misadventures

I’ve been taking the tapering process much more seriously this week.  After running the Bazan Bay 5k on Sunday I took Monday off completely.  Went for an easy run on the trails around Thetis Lake with KDF on Tuesday.  I hit the Songhees Walkway yesterday for an easy 6ish km and then did a really easy WOD at Crossfit Zone after work and today was another very easy run on the Songhees of maybe 8 or 9 km but there will be no WOD tonight – I’ll just head home and chill.

Things are feeling good, the legs are feeling potent and I’m ready to give’er!

I finished the Bazan Bay 5k in 19′52″ which met my goal of a sub 20′.

Am I happy?  Yes!
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But -  I’m feeling a little blah about it too, I’ve run it faster.  A 18′50″, over a minute faster, in 2005…

While I obviously realize that I’ve not been concentrating on short distance speed for a few years apparently there is still that ‘thing’ somewhere in the back of my brain that thinks I should be running that fast.

Having said that I also realized on Sunday that I have no real desire to run a bunch of road races, I much prefer to have some mud and dirt under my feet.

My splits from the race.

• 1km: missed it
• 2km: 7′44″
• 3km: 3′58″
• 4km: 4′06″
• 5km: 4′04″

Finish time: 19′52

The other big piece of knowledge I gained from Sunday’s race was that the training I’m getting at Crossfit Zone has definitely produced some changes in my conditioning.  My strength increase is very noticeable and my recovery has been awesome – my legs felt great post race and even better yesterday.

I’ll continue to take it a little easier this week, maybe  an easy WOD or two and a few runs to keep the legs moving and then I’m stoked to be heading to the Dirty Duo this Saturday.

Goal setting is a powerful process for thinking about your future, and for motivating yourself to turn this vision of the future into reality.  Since starting CrossFit I’ve been focusing more on setting goals, specifically fitness goals, for myself and I commonly use the SMART criteria.

The acronym SMART has a few different variations which can be used to provide an extensive definition for goal setting:

• S – specific, significant, stretching
• M – measurable, meaningful, motivational
• A – agreed upon, attainable, achievable, acceptable, action-oriented
• R – realistic, relevant, reasonable, rewarding, results-oriented
• T – time-based, timely, tangible, trackable

I find that my running and CrossFit goals fit into this criteria incredibly well and I’ve been setting multiple goals for myself in both activities.  These goals may change and get modified on occasion like last month; My CrossFit goal was to complete 20 unassisted pull-ups unbroken and I had chosen February 15th as my completion date.  I went in and attempted the feat on that day but my hands started to tear so I stopped at 14.  I jumped off feeling disappointed but knew the strength was there to finish.  While cleaning up I reset my pull-up goal for the 28th and made a second goal to take care of my hands over those next two weeks.  Unfortunately I couldn’t make it into Crossfit Zone on the 28th but I did on March 1st and completed my 20 unassisted pull-ups unbroken then!

My next fitness goal is for the Bazan Bay 5k this Sunday.  It has been a few years since I’ve raced a 5k, the last 5k I ran was in March of 2007 when I finished the Bazan Bay course in 30′59″ (I had run out to the race from James Bay that year), the last time I raced a 5k would have been in 2006 on the same course and I finished in 19′33″.

I’m truly not sure where my 5k speed is at right now but I did run a couple of mile repeats around the Beacon Hill Park loop yesterday to asses just that and from those results I’ve set myself an “A” goal of sub 20′ for Sunday’s race.

I put a bit more thought into tapering today and waited anxiously last night for today’s Crossfit Zone WOD to get posted before deciding on what kind of training to do today, a run or a WOD?

Well to my surprise today’s WOD had a run component in it so it accomplished both very nicely.  The WOD was called “Chasing Isabel”.  “Isabel” is a classic CrossFit named workout that involves 30 snatches (ground to overhead in one smooth motion).  The “Chasing Isabel” version breaks the snatches into 5 rounds of 6 snatches and a 200m run.  The RX snatch weight for both was 135# but as I said, “I put a bit more thought into tapering today”, so went with a much lighter weight of 65# and just hammered through it quickly finishing in 7′18″.  I felt nice and loose after the WOD and ready for some more, a good feeling!

Check out Josh Everett thundering through “Isabel”

I don’t think I’ve ever tapered very well… and this week’s tapering hasn’t started too well.

Packman, Matts and I had discussed tapering for the Dirty Duo during our run on Saturday and  the general consensus was that it should start today by scaling back the WODs at Crossfit Zone and lessening the mileage and intensity of runs over the next two weeks.

So far I’ve been able to follow that advice for the runs, I didn’t run yesterday and I won’t today, but when I went to Crossfit Zone at lunch today I got caught up in the WOD and went at it per usual – with intensity!

The WOD was called “Own the Podium” and was broken down into three parts.

1. 10 minutes to hit a 3 rep max in the Thruster
2. 10 minutes to to hit a 3 rep max in the Overhead Squat
3. 5 rounds for max reps of 30″ pull-ups, 30″ wallballs with 30″ rest between rounds

My scores:

• 3RM Thruster – 115#
• 3RM Overhead Squat – 125#
• Rep count – 81

I also kipped out a new PR for pull-ups getting 20 consecutive during my warm up