In July I started teaching yoga at my local YMCA and one of the perks of teaching for the Y is that my gym membership comes as part of my contract. While my membership wasn’t a huge cost, I like the idea of investing in my health and fitness, so after thinking and talking about it, I decided to invest that money (plus a little bit more) into my running. I’ve been working with a running coach for the past 3-4 months and I’ve discovered something amazing- running fast is kind of fun!
I got paired with Coach Michael through McKirdy Trained thanks to a shout out from Mario Fraioli on The Morning Shakeout newsletter and podcast (which all runners should be reading/listening to!).
I sent the folks at McKirdy Trained a short message on their website and James McKirdy himself immediately got back to me and offered a phone call to talk through my concerns. After 20 minutes on the phone with him, I was sold. A week later I got set up with Coach Michael after filling out a questionnaire about my racing and training history, a little bit about my goals and what I wanted out of a coaching program. Coach Michael and I talked for about an hour on the phone and planned out my fall race plan- go for a Half Marathon PR at the Richmond Half Marathon in November- with a 10k along the way and a Turkey Trot afterwards. (I also had Blue Ridge Relay to team captain along the way in early September.) We even tentatively came up with my winter/spring plan of training for the Mt. Mitchell Challenge if I got in (I did!)
We started my training with a reset- low mileage at an easy pace for a week. I honestly didn’t do much of a reset after Quest for the Crest, because I was still trying to get in 30-40 mile weeks in order to make sure I hit my 2018 goal of running 2018 miles. This re-set came mid-July and was probably a nice break for my body. It was still a 20 mile week but with my mentality, I felt kind of lazy… not that many weeks later though I was putting in 50+ mile weeks for multiple weeks in a row. The only time in the past I have gotten that high (as high as 60) was during ultra-training which usually included weekend back to back long runs. Now I am doing more work mid-week and none of my weekend runs have been longer than 16 miles (for the time being.) I am also doing speedwork. Tempo runs, threshold runs, intervals for time or distance, and I’m having fun! I’m hitting paces for extended periods of time that I never thought I could hit, let alone sustain.
I’m not blazing fast. I look at elite runners and am still in disbelief that they can sustain those paces for as long as they can, (including my coach’s wife, Sarah Crouch, who was the first American woman at the Chicago marathon this year and is an absolutely inspiring runner and person!) I do tempo runs at sub-7:40 min/mile pace and shorter intervals at 6:30 min/mile pace. In the past I thought anytime I ran in the 8’s was a quick run (and it still is for a lot of people!)
The mind really can be your biggest limitation and after just a couple of months of working with Coach Michael, I’ve been able to believe in myself as a ‘fast’ runner. I was preparing for my last run at the Blue Ridge Relay this year, an 9+ mile leg that is downhill on gravel road for 6 then flat on pavement for 3-ish miles. This is after having already run 3 legs in the relay and racked up 22 miles in under 20 hours. I had already shaved over 3 minutes off of my Grandfather Mountain 10 mile leg compared to the year before. My teammate looked at me and asked if I was going for 8’s on the leg. I looked at him and said, sub 8’s. I ran 7:35 min/mile pace and got a new downhill 10k PR. I previously had a mindset of not being fast, but here I was with a new mindset telling my teammate to expect me to be fast.
This past Saturday I ran a 10k race just 36 hours after getting back to the US from a conference on another continent. I had the added pleasure of flying home right into the path of Hurricane/Tropical Storm Michael. I dutifully woke up, ate oatmeal, and Mike and I drove with Tucker to Winston-Salem, NC for the race. Because of the storm, a lot of trees were down on the course so it had to be rerouted. I knew nothing about the course, but I was assured that it still had hills- that was my first real indication that it would not be a flat course. I warmed up as Coach Michael had directed, 2 miles of running then dynamic drills and strides.
For the first time in my life, I started at the front, just behind the start line. We started and I took off with the front-runners. A group of men quickly took off in a pack of their own and I used the downhill start to my advantage but tried not to go too fast. The first two miles had a lot of downhill so I went faster than I meant to/wanted to. We wound our way through this neighborhood and at one point pretty early on a spectator tells me ‘you’re the second woman!’ I thought maybe there was one other woman in front but I guess not. The middle two miles I was able to hold a little more conservative of a pace through the rolling hills. As instructed by the race plan that coach Michael had sent me, I picked up the pace every half mile until the finish. About ¾ of a mile into doing this, I reeled in the only woman in front of me and continued to surge. Near where I passed her I heard a young girl yelling ‘it’s the women, it’s the first two women!” I hope this memory will make me smile forever.
The race finished uphill (coming back from where we started.) My legs kept churning as my lungs seared. I was so afraid that I would lose steam going up that hill. I crossed the finish line- first place woman in 44:13!
My watch GPS had the race a little short, I’m sure due to the re-route, but I finished as first woman and 15th overall! I hesitate to say that I have a new official 10k PR because the course was short, but had the course been a full 10k, I would have a new 10k PR of just over 45 minutes. (For the record this is even faster than the downhill 10k I got during the Blue Ridge Relay which was 46:39.)
Less than 4 months into working with Coach Michael and the coaching program I have a new belief in myself and my running ability. I knew I could endure distance. Now I know I may get to a stage where I can endure distance with some speed. I’m beyond excited to see where this takes me and cant wait to see what I can do at Richmond next month!
postgradjourney 