Team McAlister

Running is getting easier! Or at least, its suckitude is on the wane. I’m quickly closing in on a sub-7 minute mile. Friday I did four miles in 38:30, with a best mile of 7:03 and an average of 9:50. The new shoes seemed to have been helping, although I never felt like I hit my stride. My feet were doing all sorts of crazy things trying to reconcile my natural gait and the structure of the shoe. I’m new to running, but this just seemed incredibly wrong to me. Then I saw this article: The Painful Truth About Trainers.

I’ve suspected this ever since I began selling running shoes. They’re just not made to complement the foot’s natural shape or motion. How, exactly, did we run away from bears and lions without $100 Nikes? Pretty well, apparently, judging by our survival as a species. Today I left the Sauconies at home and ran in my Mexico 66′s. These have been my go-to sneakers for some time. They’re thin-soled, lightweight, flexible, durable, and stylin’. And they ARE running shoes—They were first made in 1966, and worn in the ’68 Olympics in Mexico. Hence the name.

Since I was running on basically no cushion at all, I opted for an easy mile on the treadmill just to see how it went. 6.8 mph, no incline, easy-peasy. After a mile I was feeling pretty great, so I thought I’d just round it out to 10 minutes. The 10-minute mark came and went. Here’s a brief rundown of the next several decisions I made: “What the heck, let’s do a mile and a half. Still good… maybe 15 minutes. Ok, let’s just do two miles. Still good… I guess I can walk until I hit 20 minutes. Ok, 20 minutes down, let’s just make this a three-miler.” I didn’t get tired until around 2.8 miles, and managed to keep up my pace until I’d done three miles. 27:40… wait a minute, that’s faster than my average from Friday. Granted, it was a mile shorter, but I think I found my new running shoes.

Even using tendons and muscles that have supposedly been weakened through neglect, I felt almost no pain or discomfort during or afer the run. This, for me, was unheard of until today. We’ll see how I feel tomorrow, but for now I’ll be looking for the receipt for those Sauconies…

Tags: equipment, health, running, shoes

Today I did the same run as Sunday, but .06 miles longer and almost three minutes faster. I took 42 seconds off my average mile, and 1:14 off my best mile. Somehow I burned 3 fewer calories. Does this mean I’m in better shape now than I was four days ago? So it would seem.

The new shoes are doing well, but I’m going to have to put my Superfeet in them because today I noticed a definite lack of arch support. I don’t know how I missed that when I tried them on, or on my first run.

Tags: running, shoes

Today was my first run on my new running shoes, and MAN does having the right shoes make a difference! I ran (ok, mostly walked) 4.8 miles in 56 minutes. My best mile, I think, was 9:36. I say I think because I used the iPhone app Fitnio to track my run, and I’m not sure exactly what that “9:36 mile” is referring to. Let’s just go with that being my best mile time. The weather is amazing right now, so I’m very glad to have shoes that don’t constrain me to the treadmill.

The shoes are the Saucony Progrid Guide 2. I was pretty set on getting Adidas, since they were my favorites when I sold them, but the Sauconys just fit better. I tried at least one shoe in every brand at Lombardi’s before I made up my mind. Hopefully it was worth the trouble and I’ll be able to run regularly again without fear of injury. Oh, and the best part? My former boss gave me the employee discount. So now I’m sitting on the exercise ball I got with the money I saved!

Tags: equipment, running, shoes, Weather

Well, I did it. It took me 1 hour and 47 minutes for a blazing 5.05 mph average. I walked a pretty significant chunk of it, because it turns out that running on pavement hurts. I also stopped twice to stretch, for the same reason. This would seem to indicate that I have no idea how fast I’m running or how to pace myself, because if you factor in the walking and the stops I beat the pants off my usual treadmill average. I think I made it through with no injuries, save the beginning of a blister on my big toe. I will definitely have to get new shoes if this is going to be a regular thing. Suggestions are more than welcome!

The route I took is beautiful. I should have taken my camera, maybe I’ll do that next week when I repeat this insanity.

Tags: running, shoes

Last weekend was abysmal.  There were weather issues, there were health issues, there were injury issues, there was all kinds of work-related busy-ness issues.  The long and short of it — short, really — is that I missed both my weekend runs, one of which was an 18-miler.  Now, given that I’ve got two 20-milers scheduled for the rest of this cycle, I’m not too worried about it.

This week was a “step-back” week, meaning the long run is shorter, as are some of the mid-week runs.  It’s meant to help the body catch up and recover in preparation for another push upward in mileage.  Considering that I missed 26 of the miles I was supposed to run last week, I was already kind of stepped back.  But nevertheless, I followed the plan–5 miles each Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, all on the Tropical Rainforest Treadmills in the University of Chicago Amazon Gymnasium.  Well, not really, but they do keep it hot in there.  And when you’ve gotten used to running in like 12 degree weather, 75 is really, really hot.

Yesterday I did an 8-mile pace run, actually beating my projected marathon pace (1:08:32, for an average pace of 8:36, 24 full seconds faster than I hope to run in the race).  It was “warm” outside — 34 degrees — and I used the balmy weather as a chance to practice my pace out of doors and to start to break in my new pair of running shoes, the ones I’ll be racing in in March.

Today I did 13 miles.  I was trying to keep it slow, because, you know, that’s what they tell you to do for the long runs.  I ended up averaging 9:19/mile, which is probably 20 seconds faster than I should have taken it.  But it felt like I was slogging along and would never get anywhere.  I’m tired and all, but I really felt like I could have pushed it harder.  Which is probably how I’m supposed to feel at the end of a relatively easy week.  Today’s run totaled 2:01:02.  Splits after the jump.

My first 20-miler of this cycle is in seven days.  Let’s hope my ankles make it.

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Tags: Chicago, equipment, health, long run, running, shoes

The other day during my five-mile run my left foot started to hurt. I think it was my flexor halucis longus tendon (I had to look that up—running might end up helping me with my anatomy class). The next day when I did three miles (29:33, w00t!) it was fine and it hasn’t bothered me since. I’m going to try for 9 miles tomorrow, and if it’s a problem I may look into getting some more specific running shoes.

I’m wearing New Balance 873s now, which are trail runners, meaning they’re not as cushioned. I also picked them out based on their looks, because they lack that certain running-shoe butt-ugliness and when I got them I didn’t think I’d ever actually be running unless somebody tried to rob me or something. Unfortunately this means I skipped the whole gait-analysis thing so not only do I have the wrong shoes for the surface I run on, they also might be just wrong for me altogether. I will, however, be using them in that half marathon because that sucker includes “a combination of singletrack hiking trails, fire roads, pavement and a beach crossing.”

It being the last day of the month, I went back and read some of my older posts. It’s really encouraging to see how I’ve improved—A couple of weeks ago I was really proud of myself for doing 2.54 miles in 30 minutes. I guess that’s what this blog is for, good to know it’s working!

Tags: injuries, running, shoes

I bought some new shoes today – New Balance, size 15 (!) with some sort of insole to help with my latter stage pronation (or something like that). To stay on schedule, I needed to complete 12 miles.

So, OK, it’s a nice day – chilly, breezy, and sunny. I forgot my headphones! grrrrrrrrr but otherwise was in good shape with my kit. Did the usual 10 minute walking warm-up. I then alternated running with walking on a 60% running, 40% walking mix. That worked out pretty well, mostly.

So the 12.14 miles took 2:54:32 – it appears that I maintain a pace of about 14:20.

No blisters, just some tender feet and one very black toe nail.

Too sleepy to write more…crash…

Tags: equipment, running, shoes, Weather