Not All At Once

Last week, I was on the phone with the mom of an alumna with whom I remain close and we were talking about balance and the tendency of some women to take on too much. She remarked that she once heard Madeline Kunin (former Governor of Vermont and generally incredible woman) say that “Of course women can have it all. Just not at once.” That quote has hung with me since our conversation.

I am rarely overwhelmed by my schedule. In the past week, however, I’ve felt a bit overbooked and increasingly like I’m doing a sh*tty job at all my commitments. As I struggled out the door for my workout on Monday, feeling like I should remain tied to my desk instead of running, I finally admitted that something had to give, at least for the next few weeks.

Right now, my priorities are the Boards and MMU Nordic. The former is self-evident from a career perspective. The latter reflects a core priority in my life: give back to the community that raised me. Every season of coaching is special but when a State Championship is likely and you have three and four year skiers who have given their all to get here, they deserve your all right back.

By the end of my workout, I’d come up with a temporary solution (which I suppose made the whole run worth it). Until the end of ski season, I’ll use ski practice as my recovery days. I have two days a week slotted in as recovery runs and since the purpose of a recovery run is to just move, skiing will do just fine. This saves me a double workout twice a week and takes some pressure off. Is it the most specific workout for running? No. But it will have to do. Yesterday was an incredible day of skiing and it was made even better by being able to enjoy it for what it was, not worrying about when I was going to get my run in.

What compromises have you made to better fit running into your life?

Good Coach/Bad Coach

It’s no big secret that I love being a coach. I tell my girls almost daily that my time with them is always the highlight of my day and there’s little in my life that has rivaled my last four years at MMU. I had a physiologically “good” coach in high school, but he certainly wasn’t a cuddly guy and compliments were rare. When I took the job at MMU, my biggest goal was to make sure that every single one of my runners gained a lifelong love of activity and knew how proud I was of them, regardless of performance or outcome. The reality is that very few of my runners will go on to run in college. MMU is not a D1 production house. And that’s ok with me. My success as a coach is measured in how many of my girls leave MMU and still want to run. It’s measured in the bonds that form between generations of MMU runners. It’s measured in smiles that stay on our cheeks long after the races are over.

Coaching requires constant learning and adaptation, especially at the high school level. Although science says an exponential rapid drop taper is best, I learned the hard way last year that it doesn’t work as well with high school athletes who rarely get enough recovery due to outside forces. Over the past 4 years, I’ve kept a coaching log where I write up reflections on workouts, race performances and season patterns. This way, I don’t panic when we have a week in mid-September where the whole team is sick or injured.

I was interested to read this article on Coach Wetmore of Colorado last week. Wetmore is a fantastic coach (CU is arguably the most successful XC program in the US) but isn’t known for being warm and fuzzy. I found it interesting that despite this, his athletes love running for him. I especially loved the story of him walking away as an athlete won a national championship because Wetmore already knew he would. He didn’t need to watch the final stretch to see it happen.

I was appalled to read this article about a coach in South Carolina who drove a vehicle full of athletes while drunk. Driving athletes is terrifying. I drove a car full of girls to Manchester recently and have rarely paid more attention to the road. Precious cargo! I cannot fathom the decision making process that coach must have gone through that led to this news story.

Finally, I loved this article on why some kids try harder than others. Although it was more applicable to parenting, I can certainly see applications to coaching. The premise is that there are two mindsets: fixed (what you’re born with for talent is what you have) and growth (talent can be developed with hard work). Coaching relies heavily on a belief on the latter; if talent was all that mattered, we wouldn’t need coaches.

If you’re a coach, what’s your favorite part of coaching? Who is your favorite “famous” coach and why?

This Is Why We Love XC

We had the pleasure of volunteering at the middle school race today and although we may not have been professional starters (we had a small airhorn glitch for the girls), we had a blast cheering on the up and coming runners. I won’t lie, I was also scouting heavily and like what I’ll inherit next year.

While we were there, we happened upon a bunch of motivational signs in the utility shed and it inspired a photo shoot. Joking aside, this really is why running is just the best sport to coach, to participate in and to watch.

“You Have Beautiful Form!”

As most runners know, people love to yell things at us. Usually it’s some iteration of Run Forrest Runnnnnn or a slew of angry words because they had to stop at a crosswalk. Yesterday, however, I had an utterly fantastic experience that made my run.

I was starting my warmup on the bike path and trotting down my pre-workout downward spiral of I feel tired and it’s humid out and my hamstring hurts. For whatever reason, when I’m anxious about a race or a workout, my left hamstring feels tight. I panic about until the workout or race starts, then it magically goes away. Anyway, as I was running along, a biker came up behind me and said “You have beautiful form! I aspire to run like you.” I sputtered something back along the lines of thankssomuchareyoutalkingtome. I was stunned both by the fact that someone speaking to me on my run wasn’t quoting a movie from 20 years ago and that someone thought my form was admirable.

Don’t get me wrong. There are good things about my form. I have a quick cadence and I land lightly. In fact, from the waist down minus poor knee drive, I look pretty darn good. Waist up, well, there were Tyrannosaurus Rex(i?) who once ruled the Earth with better arm carry than me. Still, it made my entire workout to have someone say she aspired to look like me when I ran.

Does this mean I just do really good workouts?

Later in the workout, I was on my last cruise interval when she biked by again and said “You are so fast, is that like a 7 minute pace?” “620ish right now” I huffed back at her. “You are AMAZING.” And with that, my amazing random support biker biked off. As I finished the last interval, I was so touched that a perfect stranger would say something, that she dropped so much kindness and support on some sweaty, ponytailed girl huffing along the bike path. I also wondered if my husband planted her to stop my hissy fit. He claims to know nothing.

She wasn’t wearing a cape but this is basically what she looked like to me.

So to the lady on her bike that made my morning yesterday, you might aspire to have my running form, but I aspire to make other people feel the way you made me feel yesterday.

What’s the best thing someone has ever yelled at you on a run? The worst?

Clear Eyes, Full Heart, Can’t Lose

I’m not sure where all this introspection is coming from this week. Maybe it’s a few solid weeks of training under my belt. Maybe it’s this weird feeling I’ve had lately that things are about to pull together for me athletically. Anyway, one of the scariest things to do is to put yourself out there and admit your goals. When Katie and I were getting ready for VCM the other day, she started hedging her goal. “Well, I’d like to run under 1:27. I should be able to. But I don’t know…” She blew her goal away, running well under 1:27. Sometimes the biggest part of the battle is admitting what you want from a race.

Stating your goals takes courage. It puts your dreams out there and makes a clear marker of success or failure for everyone else to see. Below are my goals organized into the next 18 months, someday and pie in the sky. Some are pie in the sky because although they are theoretically attainable, they’ll take a lot of things pulling together for me. Furthermore, I’ll be just fine if those remain things I worked for my whole life and didn’t quite achieve. My someday goals and next 18 month goals should be closer in reach.

Next 18 Months

PR in the marathon

Break 1:20 in the half and 37 in the 10K

Get a shiny new 5K PR (see also, race a 5K)

 

Someday

Win a marathon

Win a national title (Masters Club Nationals for track is my best bet…)

Run a beer mile

Break 2:45 in the marathon, 1:18 in the half, 36 in the 10K and 17:30 in the 5K

Run a trail marathon

Transition to an excellent masters career

 

Pie in the Sky

Olympic Trials Qualifier in the marathon

Start in the Elite Women’s Corral for the Boston Marathon

Get invited to the USA Running Circuit

Get a mention on Let’s Run or Running Times

 

I put myself out here, now it’s your turn. What are your goals?

 

 

 

A Running SWOT Analysis

In my old life, most projects began with a SWOT analysis. Strengths. Weaknesses. Opportunities. Threats. As I was out for a recovery run the other day, I started to think about my running SWOT analysis. I’m a bit cynical by nature and often focus on my weaknesses, but it occurred to me that acknowledging my strengths might have some value too.

Strengths

• Running Easy Runs Easy: I’ve never been one to race the easy days. Unless my run is a workout or a race, I don’t worry about pace. My long runs are easily 90 seconds slower than my race pace. I wear a heartrate monitor on key recovery days and don’t fret if that under 135 pace is 8:30 or 10:00 pace. I still recall an article from before I loathed Ryan Hall where he talks about running 9 minute miles on recovery days. If it was good enough for Ryan Hall in his heyday, it’s good enough for me.
• Eating Good Food: I’m not perfect. I love anything gummy and most days, salt can get me too. That being said, I eat a mostly excellent diet with enough energy to power my day. I eat more carbohydrates than most people need because of my training load but balance that with high quality protein and good fat. I always refuel within 30 minutes of my runs. For long runs, I have almond milk with protein powder and a whole wheat wrap with almond butter. For shorter runs, I go with water with protein powder.
• Basic Strength: I’ve done the same strength circuit before bed since I was a freshman in college and I reflexively do squats when I brush my teeth. What was once an attempt to maintain beach abs is now a habit. It includes Jane Fondas, crunches, bicycles and pushups. When all else fails and my schedule gets crazy, at least I get a little something in.

Weaknesses (so tempting to go on a roll here)

• My head: I am working on this, but I am the master at mentally defeating myself in workouts and in races. By the time I hit the start line, I’ve already assessed who I’m going to lose to. Not a great way to go.
• Sleep: Medical school is kind of ruining this for me, but my sleep has been subpar over the past months and I’m starting to feel it in workouts. I really need a solid 7 hours to feel human but often hum along on 6 and coffee. I’m using SleepCycle to try to reign this in. Although I’m not sold on the science, it is a very good measure of what time I got in bed and how many hours I’m sleeping. I’m often amazed at how much I overestimate my sleep.
• Weight Training: Right now, our gym situation just isn’t that convenient. Because we walk or bus to school, we don’t have a parking permit which means we can’t go to the gym until 3:30 and since one of us coaches through all seasons, this limits our available hours for the gym to about 6 pm til 8 pm, exactly when we eat dinner.

Opportunities

• Our new house (we’re moving in July) has a HUGE basement which means that I can get a treadmill!!! I know no one has ever been excited for a treadmill, but with our schedule, it offers me the opportunity to train regardless of my call schedule. It’s also a half mile jog to the gym, which will hopefully improve my weight lifting weakness from above.
• A surgically repaired foot
• A new PT that I’m really jiving with
• The explosion in interest in Olde Bones and training partners that provides

Threats

• Medical School
• Injury
• Father Time

What is your running SWOT analysis?

 

Spirit of the Marathon II

If you haven’t seen Spirit of the Marathon, it comes highly recommended. I’ve seen it multiple times and still love it. It’s a candid account of why we all do this insane event. There is an opportunity next week to see Spirit of the Marathon II in theaters next Wednesday, so I wanted to share it with you all. 7 pm at the Roxy downtown, tickets are the regular movie price.

Here’s the link!

Boston Marathon 2014

No, I’m not running. I’m hoping I’ll be running by the time Boston rolls around, but I know I’ll be grateful for 2.62 miles in April. As a runner, however, it’s hard to avoid the Boston Marathon buzz at this time of year. On Sunday, I worked on a friend’s training plan for Boston. She ran an absurd number of half marathons this year and it will be her first Boston. I’m so excited to be involved in her training and to cheer for her in April.

They also announced the elite fields today and boast some very strong American runners. I’m personally most excited to see Desi and Serena Burla run. Desi was second the year that I ran Boston, an incredibly high finish for any American woman. She’s also been on the comeback trail and has been humble and patient about that process. Serena Burla is just an incredible story. She had cancer of the thigh and a major surgery that most thought would prevent her from running again, let alone storming forward with top marathon times.

One of my “bucket list” goals is to be an invited female athlete at the Boston Marathon, not on the level of Desi or Serena of course, but one of the 50 or so other women who get to toe the line ahead of the elite men to race from Hopkinton to Boston. Here’s hoping (and working my ass off in 2014).

So Light Em Up

This cycle’s power song courtesy of Fall Out Boy…

Idle Hands (and Feet)

While taper can be a nice time because it lets sore muscles heal and the body rest, it’s a hard transition to go from 70 mile weeks plus all the extras of core, stretching and lifting because suddenly you have nothing but time to think about your upcoming race. Working all week can help, but you still find yourself obsessed with the task ahead. One of my coping mechanisms is to watch old race videos. I watch 1500 meter recaps to remind myself what it looks like to change gears. I watch marathon recaps to see the amazing women who forged on before me and to remind myself that patience is a virtue in the marathon. It’s rare that anything good comes from trying to do too much too soon and given my experience last year, I know that the hard part doesn’t start until well north of Battery.

Here are some of the clips getting me through this week:

The Original (Joanie at the 1984 Olympics)

Deena’s Bronze

Katie Mackey and Mary Cain’s Crazy Oxy Run