Rest Day Departure
Usually I don’t post if it’s a rest day, but with a few little annoyances and pleasures, thought I’d post anyway.
On the annoying end, the fan went out in my computer’s power supply. 24 tiny screws later, I figured out what I needed and ordered another one. Could have just ordered a new power supply, but I’m cheap and repairing stuff has its joys. Meanwhile, I’m just hoping the power supply doesn’t overheat till it comes. On top of that, one of my hard drives is making occasional high-pitched chirping sounds, which usually means hard drive death is imminent, so I have to deal with getting a new one. Yawn.
On happy computer news, not sure what everyone’s using as far as browsers, but I’m a huge Firefox proponent. I finally switched to version 3, which I highly recommened everyone do, it’s speedier than ever and has a lot of lovely features. If you download it, go to this page for the speed tweaks that’ll have that baby absolutely flying.
If despite this, you still have a seemingly sluggish Firefox (I was about to tear my hair out when I first installed it and was going to revert to ver.2), disable your add-ons. Once I did that, it was zoomy as all get-out. I think imacros was the culprit (great add-on, btw).
Tomorrow I have a 12-miler. I was going to visit Smile Hill, but since Sunday will be a 22-miler that I plan to take to the trail (harder run), I think I’ll just use my usual route with some Lemon Hill loops thrown in. That’s a short, steepish hill area closer to home and was a pain in the Philly Marathoners’ asses last year, as it was a new addition to the race. It’s commonly used around here for hill repeats, but I want to stay fresh for Sunday, so just a few easy loops should do.
Looking ahead with PDR in the near future, I’ve been going over the schedule pretty intensely wondering how best to deal with that Half as it sits in the plan. It lands on a 20-miler week, which isn’t so bad, I’ll make that up surrounding it, but I figure it’s best to switch weeks 3 and 4 completely since week 4 accounted for a tune-up race, thus the VO2max is only 600s falling on a Tuesday, as opposed to 1200s on a Wednesday.
The only pain about this is, he schedules the tune-up on Saturday and 17 on Sunday. Since my Half is on Sunday, and I’m racing it full-out, I might just consider the Half a catch-all for both runs and gulp! skip what would have been the 8K tuneup (at least mileage-wise, since the Half totally counts as a tuneup).
Steamtown is the ultimate goal, but PDR has goal qualities for me, too, so it’ll be a balancing act. Not to mention I really want to do my last 20 the weekend after PDR where a 16 is scheduled, but I’ll have to see how I feel after the race to know if that’s a good idea or not.
Ah, the unknown. Either a fun way to pass the time imagining multi-scenarios, or a great reason to lay blame if things don’t turn out right. Gotta love it!
August 21st, 2008 at 12:43 pm
Cool, you are doing the PDR. I just signed up for it yesterday. It was pretty much unavoidable in my case, since it falls perfectly on a cutback week which calls for a 13 mile LR, and it’s on part of the Philly Marathon course (it is, right?). My only dilemma is pacing - my plan calls for MP +20 secs, the responsible part of me says do it at MP, the idiot part of me badly wants a PR. Pretty sure it’s going to be a game day decision.
August 21st, 2008 at 12:44 pm
Flo,
Are you planning a taper for that half? I did a 10-mile hilly trail race in the middle of my marathon program, did not taper for it, and got somewhat draggy in the second half. Pooh! I think next time I’ll not worry too much about keeping my training miles up, since the race itself is a quality run.
Oh, I’m a Firefox fan, too. Still on V2, but I run it on Linux, so have geek points to spare
August 21st, 2008 at 12:57 pm
Progman, cool! There’s a huge FE the night before if you’re interested. Add your name to the thread, it’ll be a lot of fun and many homemade desserts are promised.
Yep, it’s part of the marathon course, kind of. The marathon is really shifty as far as their map being the dumbest crayon-type drawing ever and incorrect on top of it. PDR is much flatter, too (not that Philly is hugely hilly, but compared to PDR it is).
Jim, proudly carry those geek points, Linux Man!
I wish I could taper for the Half but don’t really have a chance to. Also, it was mentioned to me that we shouldn’t be fully tapered for the Pfitz tune-ups anyway, so I’m kind of winging it. At least if I skip the Saturday run, I’ll have an extra day off. Feels so naughty! The only run I’ve missed so far was a measly recovery run due to being out of town. Guess I won’t turn to mush that fast.
I could live with a less tapered (and somewhat slower) Half if I can do that 20 the following week. That’s what worries me most, because if I don’t get that last 20 in 2 weeks before Steamtown, it’ll be 5 weeks before. I think my endurance should hold, but it won’t be optimum.
August 21st, 2008 at 4:15 pm
Feel free to post anytime you want, rest day or not. You know your going to kick butt at PDR? I love racing has training, or is that obvious??
Check out my picture from Sundays race. Almost looks like Im running.
http://www.brightroom.com/view_user_event.asp?EVENTID=38012&BIB=1191&S=230&PWD=
August 21st, 2008 at 4:41 pm
Hey Bruce, great pic! You look really strong. Wish my photos looked that good! Hey, just read the report, your race was as good as the picture, congratulations!!
August 21st, 2008 at 7:51 pm
Flo, you gotta give me insider’s info on the Philly course hills. I know people complained about rolling hills, and I’m finding it hard to hill-train, being in the flat FLAT Midwest where the biggest climb nearby is like a 1% incline. =P
August 21st, 2008 at 9:25 pm
Kai, I only did the Half and mistakenly thought it was going to be just like PDR (flat flat). The course map was never finalized until the Expo, and all they had there was a crappy poster of a xerox copy on an easel.
Hillwise, it’s nothing too scary, at least there are enough people that insist it’s flat still, so that gives you an idea.
Basically there is the long slow incline of 34th St that takes you to a steeper hill on Landsdown ave. The marathoners then had Lemon Hill to contend with, which isn’t huge by any means, just if you’re expecting flat, it’s a nasty joke at mile 14. It’s the steepist bit but it’s short.
Here’s a map made by a member of Philly Runner’s Club
http://www.gmap-pedometer.com/?r=2187741
You might also like this link to the Philly Runner’s forum, if you don’t already have it.
http://pub30.bravenet.com/forum/2500995625/
Don’t know what to tell you, find a bridge, an overpass or do stairs. Not a huge amount, but enough that you won’t be mad when you get to the hills.
August 21st, 2008 at 10:00 pm
I remember there being a hill somewhere around mile 10 that I wasn’t too happy about in the Philly marathon.
By the time I got to lemon hill, I was downright pissed.
Now, I dont mind hills, I run them all the time. But when people are like OOOHHH FLAT!!!! FAST!!! then there’s Lemon Hill with no warning, me no happy.
I’m still figuring out my Philly Half plan. I really think I’m gonna jog there from south philly and make it closer to 20.
August 21st, 2008 at 10:04 pm
Yeah, mile 10 was Lansdown, right after the zoo you go under an arch and there it is, stupid fucking hill.
I did one of my earlier training runs on it and should try it again soon because with that other hill I’ve been working on, it’ll have shrunk in intimidation factor. I was just used to running on small rollers so it felt like a mountain during the race.
Too funny, your PDR plan. You like running a zillion miles before hellish workouts, so that’ll be perfect.
August 21st, 2008 at 10:22 pm
well, here’s the thing. Last year at mile 10 of the philly marathon, my ITB shit the bed. By Lemon hill I was trying to just hang on.
I dropped out at mile 17, the only race I have ever DNFed. And I was in shape to BQ, the weather just killed me.
I yea, I’d like to run the half well, but really all I care about this year is Steamtown. So this will just be another 20 mile run*
*I say that now with no race number pinned on me as I sit on my couch. Race day tactics may vary greatly.
August 21st, 2008 at 10:28 pm
Wow, didn’t know that story! How utterly and horrifically awful. Had you had ITB problems before or was this out of the blue? [asks she, who is very scared of things that happen out of the blue]
Well, that’s some expensive 20-mile run, but at least I’ll get to meet you finally, so I’m glad you’re spending the dough.
Speaking of, come to the FE (link is a few comments above) for Spaghetti Warehouse Magnificence! There’ll be parking!
August 21st, 2008 at 10:46 pm
It was outa the blue. I had had ITB problems years prior, but nothing in my training. It was pretty devistating. Luckily, one of my coaches was with me or I would have done something stupid like tried to finish. I did go on to run RNRAZ in Jan and PR but not BQ.
Yea, it’s pricey (though I did have a coupon!) and I love to run to in Philly.
I think I might come down on Friday.
I dont know if I can handle the FE. Ha, parking, woman, I barely every drive!
August 21st, 2008 at 11:09 pm
That sucks big ones.
August 22nd, 2008 at 12:02 pm
Kai - bridges are pretty good if other hills are scarce. I sometimes run my local bridges when I want something short and steep. Kinda boring going back and forth, but it does the trick.