For Whom the Dogs Bark

May 04, 2024

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Location:

Cypress,TX,

Member Since:

Oct 10, 2009

Gender:

Male

Goal Type:

Other

Running Accomplishments:

5K: 24:22 (March 2010); 22:33 (October 2010); 20:47 (May 2011); 21:05 (May 2012); 21:33 (September 2012); 21:23 (November, 2013); 22:31 (September 2014)

5M: 39:22 (November, 2012); 35:54 (November, 2013); 36:03 (March, 2015)

10K: 44:08 (November, 2010); 49:20 (July, 2013); 44:07 (April, 2015)

12K: 56:03 (December, 2013); 58:58 (December, 2014)

10M: 1:11:58 (October, 2012); 1:15:24 (October, 2014)

Half Marathon: 1:53:xx (London's Run 2010); 2:05:21 (Cowtown 2010); 1:37:04 (Gusher 2011); 1:42:19 (Huntsville 2011); 1:33:47 (Baytown Jailbreak 2012); 1:33:50 (The Woodlands 2012); 1:42:52 (Texas 2015); 1:49:17 (Jailbreak 2015); 1:38:34 (The Woodlands 2015)

25K: 2:01:47 (Fifth Third River Bank, May 2014)

Marathon: 5:51:35 (Texas Marathon 2009); 6:21:36 (Ogden 2009); 4:58:29 (St. George 2009); 4:13:45 (Texas Marathon 2010); 4:04:12 (Utah Valley Marathon, 2010); 5:11:14 (Hartford ING, 2010); 3:41:43 (Richmond SunTrust, 2010); 3:39:27 (Texas Marathon 2011); 3:41:46 (Utah Valley Marathon, 2011); 3:30:35 (St. George 2011); 3:41:51 (Richmond 2012); 3:49:15 (Texas 2013); 3:46:59 (Paavo Nurmi, 2013); 3:34:04 (St. George 2013); 3:49:51 (Texas 2014); 3:31:59 (Richmond 2014); 3:28:34 (Boston 2015)

Short-Term Running Goals:

3:20, 1:30, 0:20

Long-Term Running Goals:

I'm 60, there is no long term.

Personal:

I live, work and run in Houston, Texas. I have run 17 marathons, some good ones and some others. I prefer straight, flat, cold, sea-level marathons, still waiting for my first one. I feel like there are more PRs out there. When I have them, I am told it is time to dial it back, run for healthy reasons. I'm sure that's right, and I'm sure it won't happen.

My wife and I are from the mountains of the west. We have five kids, three granddaughters and three grandsons. The kids and grandkids are native Texans but we are not -- you have to be born here.

As for my blog title: I run most of my miles before sunrise, sometimes hours before. On the back road of my neighborhood two hours before daylight, I can depend on a pack of mutts behind the boundary fence lighting up when they hear my footsteps. I have wondered what they wanted; but according to Hemingway I needn't ask.

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Miles:	This week:	0.00	Month:	0.00	Year:	0.00

Fri, Oct 15, 2010

Easy Miles	Marathon Pace Miles	Threshold Miles	VO2 Max Miles	Total Distance
6.09	0.00	0.00	0.00	6.09

47F, 92% humidity, wind N 1 mph, clear. Really great running weather. Ran a mile in the neighborhood then took my daughter to seminary and ran 5 more from there before bringing her home. 6.09 miles in 59:58, average pace 9:51, low heart rate and flat shoes, no splits over 10:00. Still feeling good. This is the first time I have done a low heart rate run in the 9s, which was once a fantasy goal for me. Gee, with conditioning like that you would think I must have run a good marathon or something.

Speaking of the marathon (we won't call it by name), I whined to my brother-in-law in Omaha, a cardiologist and a 3:00 marathoner. Actually was curious to see what he would say about the heart rate issue. Here is what he wrote back:

"I think something must have been going on with you during your last race. It is very odd for you to have such a high heart rate in a long race--I have to believe you were suffering from some subclinical illness (ie. your viral cold) or dehydration, or something. You're right, there's no way you would be able to tolerate that kind of rate for 26 miles.

I don't think the HR is the primary problem, just a reflection of something that's not quite right with the body. In a long run like that you would ideally never encroach upon the HR that represents your VO2-max, until you're sprinting for the finish line at 3:45 of course.

Wearing a heart rate monitor, in my view, is not really all that helpful since everybody's rates are so different and there's no such thing as a high rate that's dangerous. Having said that, in your case it may allow you to recognize when you are having an "off" day and adjust accordingly. Perhaps you may find that you need to ratchet back your pace from the start if your rate is too high and see if your body picks up as the miles progress. I don't know. My guess is that you'd have done poorly in your last marathon regardless of what your strategy was--you're body was just not up to running that day.

I find that there are days when my running is just "off," as I'm sure you've also experienced. I feel good before the run, but immediately I find I can't get my speed up comfortably. This happened last spring when I did a half-marathon in Iowa that I'd hoped to smoke. I took off at the pace I was hoping to keep for the entire rate (about 6:30-6:45, the pace I'd been training at) but found right away I couldn't keep it up. I ended up walking at several points and in the end I ran the worst time I've ever posted for a half marathon. I don't know what the deal was, but I can tell you it was demoralizing. I wore my GPS watch but not my heart rate monitor. It's possible that I might have found, like you, that my HR was too high from the start."

Comments

From Burt on Fri, Oct 15, 2010 at 18:59:24 from 206.19.214.144

He sounds like a smart dude.

From flatlander on Sat, Oct 16, 2010 at 11:06:30 from 76.31.26.153

Yeah, one of the smartest guys I know. He has a weekly cardiology blog that is getting picked up by the Omaha paper. Check him out if you want: http://www.blogalegent.com/CardiologyBlog

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