Free Stuff (if you are in Victoria)!!

This stuff works and I use it daily.  Don't take my word for it, though - ask Kyle Jones (or Whitfield, or Lauren Groves, or Jasper Blake....)

Tomorrow I’ll be spending the day with 7Systems at Frontrunners Victoria. We’ll have a booth set-up from 10-5. Come down to see us and you can sample 7Ssytems for FREE!

I’ve been taking 7Sytems for about 10 months and have noticed a significant difference in my recovery and overall energy throughout the day. I would strongly recommend it to anyone looking for that extra edge on their competition!

Come see us tomorrow and find out why 7Systems is the choice supplement of Olympic Champion Simon Whitfield, Olympians Lauren Groves, Erinne Willock, and Malcolm Howard, Ironman Champion Jasper Blake and many other notable endurance athletes. (from Kyle Jones' blog)

And great luck to Jasper in Kona and everyone racing (VFACers notably) in the Royal Victoria marathon races this weekend.  Not for me this year (slight hamstring pull and being careful about it, thus the lack of running updates, well, that and swamped teaching) but I will be thinking of all of you tomorrow morning!

MA

Having felt a little twinge in the hamstring nearing the end of Sunday's workout, I have tried to be the smart athlete and take some down time to allow it to heal.  My training has been solid for the past few weeks and a few days of rest and easy running is not going to affect the 8k in October.  So with that in mind, I have gone out for an easy run (where I ran into Gord and Sarah, in whose basement I used to reside) and gone to the mainland an back to watch Sonja's defense of her Masters thesis on internet usage in BC classrooms.  It is always amazing to watch people who excel at something, whether it is a pianist playing Beethoven, a swimmer slicing through a 400m freestyle, or an Ethiopian gliding effortlessly over the ground.  To watch Sonja in the academic environment was humbling and inspiring, as she was able to converse easily and with incredible depth about the work she had done, yielding no ground to the examiners and impressing them with her study and her understanding of the subject.  She is now a full fledged Masters of Arts (MA), and I am a proud future-husband.

Speaking of future husbands, congrats to Adamo and Lauren!   It has been a good couple of days around Victoria and and tomorrow I will ease back into things and see how the hammy is going.

A Sunday at the Lakes

It has been a long while since I showed my face at Elk/Beaver Lake, but Sunday felt like 6 years ago. I pulled up to the gravel parking lot, meeting Simon to help him out with a workout. What I didn't expect to see was the rest of the triathletes preparing for the Grand Final in Australia. Old training partners with new coaches and all of us, older and wiser(?). My schedule called for a long run of 18k or so, so I decided to run the 18k with some fast km's thrown in. Earlier in the week, I had mentioned to Simon that if he needed a running partner for some workouts, I would be happy to help however I could. He emailed back syaing "Great! 6 x 1 mile on Sunday. See you there!" What that ends up looking like is me running 1k repeats while Simon completes 1 mile repeats on 1 minute rest. This means I run less and get more rest which allows me to stay just ahead of him for the middle km of the mile repeat (and I give myself a 150m lead as well). I ran hard and to try to stay away, trying to stay with him as long as I could each time he caught me. It was fun to run with a purpose greater than just trying to get faster.

But, man, it was hard. And it was fun. The day definitely reminded me of why I used to love training at the NTC; working hard with friends in the pursuit of excellence. I know that sounds cliche, but after watching Jasper and Tereza (both old training partners) have great races at Ironman Canada this past weekend and seeing Jordan Rapp (who trained with Simon and Team BAMF last year) win it, there is definitely a way to find excellence. Knowing that I would never attain the highest echelons of sport, I relished the role of teammate, doing what I could to help my friends in their pursuit. And Sunday reminded me of those times as I was, once again, happy to be a teammate.

Guitar Hero World Championships (and a track workout)

It was too bad that Simon left early, because I am pretty sure he would have wanted to play the drums. We had a bunch of friends over last night to hang out with Craig during his short visit out to Victoria. We shared BBQ and guitar, and for the brave, some Guitar Hero World Tour. Good times were had by all - especially Mr. Dags who demonstrated some mad drumming skills.

Today's workout was on the track with a group of what appeared to be Bootcamp participants. I wasn't sure how this was going to play out as they were taking up all the lanes on the small Oak Bay track (only four lanes wide around the full 400m). As I performed my drills and strides, the group finished their warm up and began to line up for the 100m sprints, opening up the inside lane for me. This was a pleasing development as I didn't want to run anyone over, nor did I want to pull the track etiquette card out either - thankfully, neither occurred.

The workout today would have been a lot of fun with VFAC. Lots of fast running at different distances, with the boys, in the sun, on a good track, good times would have been had. As it was, I was on my own at Oak Bay and running the intervals, imagining what it would be like to be Usain Bolt.

The workout was a 400m warm up lap, followed by 200m all out, and then an 800m and then a 400m and ending with a 200m all out. I was excited about the workout as a chance to see where I was at on my own. I knew pretty quickly, on the warm up, that I would do alright when I split the first 200m of the 400m warm up in 29 seconds. A little fast for a warm up, so I settled down to run a 65s first 400m. The recovery between the intervals was anywhere from 400-800m, but sufficient to feel pretty recovered.

The first real interval was the 200m, which worked out well because the back stretch had a bit of a tailwind. I am not sure that it would have negated a world record had I come close, but it was nice to have the little push as it was getting difficult. I ran the curve with purpose and then imagined myself to be Bolt, and tried to accelerate along the back stretch. The interval was a self-timed 26s, which is pretty good for getting into the workout.

The 800m was interesting. After two good opening intervals, this was supposed to be run bewteen 2:13 - 2:17. I tried to go out controlled, but apparently it was a little too controlled because I split the 400m in 69s, which was a little slow for the 2:15 I was hoping for. I tried to push the pace in the final 400m, but pretty much held my split, finishing the second 400m in 70s for a 2:19 - a little off the goal time, but not too bad. This meant more motivation for the upcoming 400m.

Coach John had me down for a 59 if I was running with someone and a 61 if I was on my own. I knew I wanted a little bit of redemption for making the mistake of going out too slow in the 800m, so I really used the tailwind on the backstretch to push the pace and focussed on remaining relaxed and smooth as I came down the home stretch into the headwind. Breathlessly, I hit my watch, crossing the 400m in 58s. This was more pleasing and I cast my thoughts toward the final 200m.

Knowing that I had run 26 previously, I wanted to try to match that at the end of the workout. This is the part where it would be easier to let up, convincing myself that it is ok to be slower at the end of a workout. While many workouts are structured in such a way that times will become slower as you get toward the end, I had plenty of rest and this was all supposed to be fast stuff. So, once again, I ran the corner hard and focussed on being smooth down the back stretch, hitting 26s again in the process.

A good workout overall and nice to be done quickly. While I miss the VFAC crew on days like this, I much prefer my 12 minute run to the Oak Bay track vs my 40 minute drive to the Pt. Grey track. Based on the 5k of a few weeks ago, I have also turned my sights towards the Lands End Half Marathon and 10k. In past years, I have used Lands End as a tune up for the Royal Victoria Half and Full marathon and I will do so again this year; however, I will race the 10k this time as preparation for the 8k at RVM. I have not run the 10k here before, but I know that there have been some fast times run by friends, so I will definitely be looking for a PB here. As with every race on the island, you never know where you will place because if everyone shows up, I would be fortunate to be Top 20; with that in mind, I am only looking for my own time and hopefully there will be some people that I will be to work with on the course in order to achieve it.

I must now go practice Guitar Hero so that Scotty Dagnall doesn't get better than me in that as well.

The last week of summer

Unofficially, of course. But this will be my last full week of summer vacation and it has been a good one, to be sure.

1. New (old) town.
2. New house.
3. New kitten.
4. New 5k PB.
5. New job.

The last one occurred yesterday, when I received the long hoped for call from the Victoria School District offering me a position at Reynolds Secondary. I will once again be teaching English and Social Studies, but will have some Phys Ed thrown into the mix as well. I am very excited about getting to once again work in the Flex program at Reynolds and with the great staff there (although I will miss my crew from New Westminster Secondary).

We are currently in the midst of beginning to host a number of friends and family members over the coming months. Craig Taylor is the first to come out west to visit us as he helps prepare a couple of his athletes for the World Triathlon Championships. After that we have some cousins and parental units and more friends. Exciting times!


The Ogden Point stretch of Dallas Rd.

Yesterday was spent running along the Dallas Rd area of Victoria. Coach John had an 11k tempo on the schedule, so while Craig and Sonja spent time enjoying the sun on the banks of the Pacific Ocean, I warmed up out to Willows Beach, before turning back toward town for the tempo. It started well as I went 3:29 for the first km, but schedule called for 3:35/km, so I eased up a bit. The path I was following is the end of the Royal Victoria Marathon, the Times Colonist 10k and about every other race that Victoria puts on. It is scenic and devoid of stop lights, so it makes for perfect running. But is it not flat. It is not hilly, but it is not flat. So as the km's piled on, I was pleased to see that I was holding around 3:33/km on this pitchy terrain. I turned around once I reached the Inner Harbour and ran back out to Clover Point, where I ended my run and promptly soaked my legs in the ocean while Craig and Sonja worked on crosswords (which Sonja and I are getting better at - she better than me, but what is new?).

After that it was home before a walk back downtown for some food from the Market on Yates (yeah, big containers of Red Curry Paste) and another great meal prepared by Sonja before Guitar Hero - World Tour. We rocked!

Running is coming along and the summer is going well, and contrary to other years (and, I am sure, people), I have felt that this summer has been a perfect length. We have definitely been blessed with weather out here (sorry, Ontario) and that has made the summer feel complete.

Today is an off day before some fun track stuff tomorrow!

2 x 3k on Lochside (part deux)

I could regale you with stories of my 2 x 3k redux of last week's workout, but this is way cooler. I'll leave it at this - without Shawn I went 9:45 and 9:50 - not bad, but not amazing.

Anyway, listen to Adam Campbell!



Adam and Aaron also finished 2nd in today's stage and are now in 4th overall, up against some pretty amazing runners (which goes to show that they are pretty amazing runners!) Kind of wish I was there....

9 x 300m

The track. And soccer.

These are two places I spent much of my childhood. From my 5th year of existence until the end of high school I spent the Ontatio summers running up and down grass pitches across the province. I was ok, as good as someone might be spending 12 years playing a sport, but not ever did I have a chance of playing for the youth team of Moscow Dynamo or anything. Definitely, though, a love of the sport was developed and has stayed with me throughout my adult life. So, after a two year hiatus while on the mainland, I played my first organized soccer game last night with the Gordon Head Div 3 team. It was fun to be on the field and although all the finesse I may have one time had (and it wasn't much as I was more of a runner/hard worker than a subtle touch player), all of it was gone. I had some good plays and just as many poor choices and/or moments where I was undressed by the other team. The game was just a friendly as we go through try-outs, and the score ended 3-3, so the night ended with everyone feeling ok.

This morning I revisited Oak Bay track for a 9 x 300m workout. During my soccer years, I also spent a lot of time at the Oshawa Civic track, running with the Durham X-L's, working with the same hurdling coach that Perdita Felicien worked with in her youth. Durham was a hotbed of hurdlers (as you can see Priscilla Lopes-Schliep comes from Whitby) and again, I was ok. I was able to to do well when my clubmates weren't at races, but we would often sweep medals in many provincial competitions. I also ran the 400m and 400m hurdles, so my background on the track allows my to run workouts on the track that are not consistent with my other times in races. This has always been fun when I am with others, but alone on the track today, it did nothing for me. The workout, as Coach John had written out, was 3 sets of 3 x 300m with my jog recovery descending from 300m to 200m to 100m. I was also to hold 47s for the 300m's which is the pace of about a 63-64s 400m. Jeez. So, with a Radiohead concert on my iPod, I began the circling of the track.

The first interval is always about getting cobwebs out of the legs, and this was not different, unfortunately. I was hoping the second one would be better, and it was, but not much. And thus it continued. The lactic acid started accruing earlier and earlier into each 300m and thus I had to fight to relax more and more, but all the while I was hold between 45 and 47s. I was happy at the end of the workout, but running on my own, without Jay or Paul or Mike to push me was difficult.

After the cool down home and a great breakfast, Sonja and I met Rumon at Koffi for some catch up time and conversation. As we walked up, Rumon was dismounting his steed and all I could think was "I hope Sonja still comes back home with me, because that is pretty cool." I then had my hair chopped off at Uomo and then had a cat nap with Liev, who was pleased to sleep on my neck. Now hosting the neighbours for dinner and Fernwood has definitely shown itself off today. A most pleasing day.

Now, if only I could get a job teaching....