My friend Steven Kozusko, a member of Charlottesville's Boston Marathon training group (aka "Boston Group"), started writing a blog a few weeks ago profiling local runners who were training for Boston (as well as other endurance athletes) and their Charlottesville lifestyle. The blog, "The Charlottesville Runner" does a great job of introducing local and cyber readers with area endurance runners: who we are, why we live in Charlottesville, what we love about our little town, where we train and, most importantly, where we eat and drink coffee after we train.
It's a cool concept and I am honored to be the focus of The Charlottesville Runner this week! Thank you, Steven!
Monday, March 14, 2011
Tuesday, March 8, 2011
Balance
R2R2R 2005
Ba-lance: noun. "the power or ability to decide an outcome by throwing one's strength, influence, support, or the like, to one side or the other."
I've been thinking a lot lately about how ultrarunning forces me to strive for and keep balance in my life. After nine years of running these crazy fun long distances, I *think* I have found a good balance between home life, work life, and training, but every year brings different challenges. Let's face it---the sport itself is so extreme that talking about "balance" in ultrarunning is an oxymoron. But recently I have gotten a few requests from my blog readers and other runners to share what I have learned about how to maintain balance in my running life, and I am happy to oblige. I learn so much from others' experiences... so I hope this post can be helpful too.
Here's my list, in no particular order, on achieving a healthy balance with running and life:
1. "It has to be organic" My husband coined this phrase when he was talking about his mountain biking training, and it also applies perfectly to ultra training and racing. It has to fit the family schedule, the kids schedule, and the work schedule. If a race is crammed into the space between two or all three, I feel stressed and rushed, and unable to enjoy the moment. For example, I no longer race in April or May (with the exception of Promise Land this year---see below). I have too much going on with the kid's lacrosse seasons, the team that I coach, and work to have any kind of decent, competitive race in those months. It took me a few years and a few DNF's to figure this out, but now it's a no brainer. But it's not just in the springtime: throughout the year, family always comes first.
2. "But if it works, go for it"...another gem from my hubby. Promise Land 50K falls on Easter weekend this year which means no work or lacrosse games Friday night or Saturday...so I am going for it this year. And because I can run PL, I am also able to sign up for the Lynchburg Ultra Series (LUS) which I have never been able to do because of the spring schedule. Woop!
3. Be flexible...probably the greatest lesson of running ultras, learning to be flexible was a tough lesson for this (former) control freak, but one I am happy to embrace now. To me, being flexible means being ready to run in the early a.m. before sunrise or in the late afternoon after practice... being willing to cut a run short when a twinge flares up, or willing to extend the miles when the trail beckons and I feel great...and being consistent and committed about cross training in the gym and in the pool to give my legs a break. I have a few friends who are on the injured reserve list right now, and I feel for them. Being injured stinks but it can also be a huge wake up call. As I have gotten closer to 50, I have figured out that to avoid injury and burn-out, I need at least 1-2 days off per week, at least 2-3 days of pool running and strength training, and that my recovery runs need to be very easy and all on trail.
4. Above all else, SLEEP.. I love to sleep. I especially love to nap. As my kids have gotten older, I have made sure I get at least 8 hours of sleep during the week and at least that, with afternoon naps, on the weekends. I also avoid running too many days at 5:30 am and run in the daylight whenever work and kid schedules permit. Sleep is essential to my recovery and to successful racing. This means I have to run alone a lot, but as I have gotten more sleep, I have also gotten faster. Duh.
Catching up on my sleep at MMT, 2005
5. Eat a lot, and often. I am not a vegan, vegetarian, or committed to a trendy diet. Since I teach health and wellness at my school, I stay fairly current with nutrition trends and fads and what I know is this: to be able to train consistently at 50-70 miles per week and stay balanced emotionally and physically, healthy eating is a must. That means a good dose of plain yogurt, berries and whole grains for breakfast, fruit and protein mid-morning, a healthy, colorful salad and soup for lunch, dark chocolate or decaf skim Mocha from Greenberry's mid-day, then a huge dinner with wine and dessert at home. Or this could mean Margaritas, Red Hot Blues and the Santa Fe Enchilada from Continental Divide, or a sweet potato, Caesar salad and the entire Blooming Onion from Outback the night before Catawba...it doesn't matter. There is delicious food out there. We need to eat it.
6. It takes courage to say no. In the early years of my love affair with ultras, I said "yes" to every run invitation. 35 miles on the Massanutten Trail in late February beginning at 6:00pm and finishing at 8:00am? Sure. 71 miles of the Ring on the Massanutten Trail with very little training and experience? Of course! A midnight run on the (you guessed it) Massanutten Trail in the pouring rain for four hours? Wouldn't miss it! I agreed to all those runs due to a combo of peer pressure, FOMO (Fear of Missing Out), and naivete. As a result, I got burned out, injured, and almost died of hypothermia...and now I absolutely refuse to run on the Massanutten Trail except for once a year. The lesson? Don't be stupid. And see # 7...
7. Run what you love. This was perhaps the best advice I ever got. Achieving balance means being tuned into one's body, mind and spirit. I love to run long distances in the mountains on trails with good friends and beautiful views. Very simple. So, I avoid trails that don't feed my bliss, and I avoid running with negative people. When people say to me, "you HAVE to run _________ race", if it doesn't fit my definition above, I politely decline. Instead, I run races and in places where the trails are fun and fast and the people are full of positive energy. Among my favorites: Highland Sky and the WVMTR crew, Catawba, Grindstone, Western States, R2R2R, Hellgate, and any VHTRC event. Life is too short. Run what you love.
Western States 100, 2006
Sunday, February 13, 2011
Back to Holiday Lake 50K...and paying it forward
David Horton gets very excited at his pre-race talks, especially at Holiday Lake 50K. The race is made up of about 75% new-to-ultras entrants, and he loves to celebrate the excitement that we all felt the night before we ran our first ultra. Remember that feeling? Butterflies, nerves, fitful sleep, and the questions: What do I wear? How do I get my nutrition right? What if I'm last?
David Horton gave a very helpful talk to the first-timers
At the pre-race dinner, Horty was in rare form. Excited, happy, sometimes flip but full of wisdom gleaned from his years on the trails, he talked about his own failures--and warned that "everyone makes mistakes, and you will tomorrow." Afterward, he held a meeting just for newbies, and he did a great job of answering questions, reassuring those who were anxious (pretty much everyone), and erasing doubts. I wish he had held this meeting the night before my first ultra, Holiday Lake 2002. If he had, I would have walked more uphills, paced myself more carefully, and eaten more!
Mark and Harry listen as Horty gives his talk to the newbies. Mark is thinking, "this guy can't be serious...!"
My friends from Charlottesville, Harry Landers and Mark Hampton, were running their first ultra at Holiday Lake. Experienced marathoners, they are in the midst of their Boston training but were curious about trail ultras, so with some tweaking of their Boston training plan (and a course preview run two weeks ago), they arrived at HL ready to experience what ultra life is all about. Horton certainly gave them plenty to think about: "I've pee'd blood in ultras and had my arms swell as big as sausages...but this 'shouldn't' happen to you!" HA!
Race day we had perfect weather: 20s at the start, deep blue winter sky with bright sunshine all day and 40s at the finish. The "new" course, changed in 2009 with more trail and measured out as 33 miles, was dry, fast, and had no snow in sight. Horton predicted records would fall, and he was right. Many PRs for the 50K+ distance were set, and 96% percent of the runners finished. Holiday Lake is truly a perfect first ultra--where else can a newbie get personal advice from one of the sport's great legends and race directors, as well as excellent aid stations, course markings, and a runnable, beautiful trail?
Along a new section of trail
My race plan was to take the first, 16.5 mile loop at an "easy" 50K pace, which is about 10-minute mile pace for me. I started out with Jen Nichols, and we ran a bit with Kerry Owens, Marlin Yoder, Jen Davis before settling into our own comfortable rhythms. At one point I was greeted along the trail by Carter, who introduced himself as a reader of this blog and could not have been nicer...hope you had a great race, Carter! I was happy to pace off of Marlin until we hit the lake trail, where he waved me on. Here we saw the front runners starting their second loop, and they were hammering. Inov-8 teammate and friend Sabrina Moran was in second for the women in hot pursuit of Jennie Belt, and I was in tenth place for the women.
Bill Potts was in charge of the chaos that was the turn around, and he did a great job of getting the 300+ runners in and out quickly.
Potts paying it forward at the turn-around
I was hoping to run a 2:35ish second loop to match loop one's split and to see if I could hold on to a 5:15 finish time. This would be a huge PR on any Holiday Lake course for me, as my best time of 5:17 was run in 2002 and I ran a bunch of 5:20s, :30s and :40s over the next few years. I ate about 750 calories per loop which made a huge difference in my pacing, and I never had a bad patch, except in the last few miles...but I forced myself to eat two Clif Bloks every 10 minutes and this worked like a charm to get my mojo back. I hammered the last half mile of road with no cramping and finished at 5:14:02, a PR by three minutes! The icing was the hug I got from Horton as he shouted, "first old woman!!" which meant I won the Masters age group, which is always a tough thing to do in a race with more than 80 women.
Horton and me at the finish
Many celebrations took place at the finish line, including Sabrina's second place female, and PRs by Martha Wright (first in over-50) and Jen Pharr Davis, who is preparing for her assault on the AT speed record this summer.
Jen, Sabrina, Horty, Martha and me
The best moment, though, was when Mark and Harry ran in together in 5:58, looking like they had only run 10 miles, and Horton yelled, "Mark Hampton and Harry Landers, First Ultra!" Loved that.
Harry, Horton, and Mark at the finish
When Mark and Harry signed up for Holiday Lake a few months ago, I warned them, quite seriously, that their lives would never be the same when they finished. Ultras have a way of getting under our skin whether we like it or not. Case in point: in 2002, as I lay on the wooden bench at the Holiday Lake finish line and moaned "never again!" little did I know what life-changing adventures and friendships were in store for me. Holiday Lake opened up a door to a quirky, obscure sport that I love so much, and especially love to share with others.
Thank you, David, and all the Holiday Lake volunteers, who make it possible for that door to be opened, year after year!
**photos courtesy of Brock Nichols and Mark Hampton
David Horton gave a very helpful talk to the first-timers
At the pre-race dinner, Horty was in rare form. Excited, happy, sometimes flip but full of wisdom gleaned from his years on the trails, he talked about his own failures--and warned that "everyone makes mistakes, and you will tomorrow." Afterward, he held a meeting just for newbies, and he did a great job of answering questions, reassuring those who were anxious (pretty much everyone), and erasing doubts. I wish he had held this meeting the night before my first ultra, Holiday Lake 2002. If he had, I would have walked more uphills, paced myself more carefully, and eaten more!
Mark and Harry listen as Horty gives his talk to the newbies. Mark is thinking, "this guy can't be serious...!"
My friends from Charlottesville, Harry Landers and Mark Hampton, were running their first ultra at Holiday Lake. Experienced marathoners, they are in the midst of their Boston training but were curious about trail ultras, so with some tweaking of their Boston training plan (and a course preview run two weeks ago), they arrived at HL ready to experience what ultra life is all about. Horton certainly gave them plenty to think about: "I've pee'd blood in ultras and had my arms swell as big as sausages...but this 'shouldn't' happen to you!" HA!
Race day we had perfect weather: 20s at the start, deep blue winter sky with bright sunshine all day and 40s at the finish. The "new" course, changed in 2009 with more trail and measured out as 33 miles, was dry, fast, and had no snow in sight. Horton predicted records would fall, and he was right. Many PRs for the 50K+ distance were set, and 96% percent of the runners finished. Holiday Lake is truly a perfect first ultra--where else can a newbie get personal advice from one of the sport's great legends and race directors, as well as excellent aid stations, course markings, and a runnable, beautiful trail?
Along a new section of trail
My race plan was to take the first, 16.5 mile loop at an "easy" 50K pace, which is about 10-minute mile pace for me. I started out with Jen Nichols, and we ran a bit with Kerry Owens, Marlin Yoder, Jen Davis before settling into our own comfortable rhythms. At one point I was greeted along the trail by Carter, who introduced himself as a reader of this blog and could not have been nicer...hope you had a great race, Carter! I was happy to pace off of Marlin until we hit the lake trail, where he waved me on. Here we saw the front runners starting their second loop, and they were hammering. Inov-8 teammate and friend Sabrina Moran was in second for the women in hot pursuit of Jennie Belt, and I was in tenth place for the women.
Bill Potts was in charge of the chaos that was the turn around, and he did a great job of getting the 300+ runners in and out quickly.
Potts paying it forward at the turn-around
I was hoping to run a 2:35ish second loop to match loop one's split and to see if I could hold on to a 5:15 finish time. This would be a huge PR on any Holiday Lake course for me, as my best time of 5:17 was run in 2002 and I ran a bunch of 5:20s, :30s and :40s over the next few years. I ate about 750 calories per loop which made a huge difference in my pacing, and I never had a bad patch, except in the last few miles...but I forced myself to eat two Clif Bloks every 10 minutes and this worked like a charm to get my mojo back. I hammered the last half mile of road with no cramping and finished at 5:14:02, a PR by three minutes! The icing was the hug I got from Horton as he shouted, "first old woman!!" which meant I won the Masters age group, which is always a tough thing to do in a race with more than 80 women.
Horton and me at the finish
Many celebrations took place at the finish line, including Sabrina's second place female, and PRs by Martha Wright (first in over-50) and Jen Pharr Davis, who is preparing for her assault on the AT speed record this summer.
Jen, Sabrina, Horty, Martha and me
The best moment, though, was when Mark and Harry ran in together in 5:58, looking like they had only run 10 miles, and Horton yelled, "Mark Hampton and Harry Landers, First Ultra!" Loved that.
Harry, Horton, and Mark at the finish
When Mark and Harry signed up for Holiday Lake a few months ago, I warned them, quite seriously, that their lives would never be the same when they finished. Ultras have a way of getting under our skin whether we like it or not. Case in point: in 2002, as I lay on the wooden bench at the Holiday Lake finish line and moaned "never again!" little did I know what life-changing adventures and friendships were in store for me. Holiday Lake opened up a door to a quirky, obscure sport that I love so much, and especially love to share with others.
Thank you, David, and all the Holiday Lake volunteers, who make it possible for that door to be opened, year after year!
**photos courtesy of Brock Nichols and Mark Hampton
Sunday, January 2, 2011
New Year, New Trails, New Goals
2010 brought celebrations of life...
and reminders of nature's incredible beauty...
incredible feats of endurance and perseverance...
...shared with the next generation
anaerobic suffering...
...and long runs in the mountains
new trails, adventures, and challenges to explore with my family...
...and with new friends
A few goals I have for 2011:
Welcome change
Seek out adventure
Take a chance at failure
"Because we are never so alive as when we put it on the line." --Lazarus Lake
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