TRAINING

Getting ready to do yet another Nike Women's Marathon is sometimes fun. Then there are the summer mornings when you get up to 75 degrees and 75% humidity at 0500, knowing the temperature will be even higher when you start your training walk at 0700. Last Saturday was one of those days, but Naomi and I got out and did twelve miles with our friends from the National Capital Area Team in Training Chapter. Personally, by the finish there was not a dry piece of clothing on my body - and it had not rained.

This Saturday we are doing "track training", which is an important part of racewalking training in order to increase your speed. My target is 400 meters (1/4 mile) in 3:00 minutes. Have come close at 3:03, but would like to get it down a bit more to a 12 minute per mile pace. Given the expected heat and humidity this weekend, it may or may not happen, but we just keep trying.

Part of my regular training regimen, in addition to "long miles" most weekends, is "speed work" doing 8x400 sets. That means 400 meters 8 times, with a 2:00 rest between each one. Coach & friend Jacque Carter has me doing those with targets of 3:17, 2x 3:13, 2x 3:10, 3:06, 3:03 & 2:58. Try it some time, it's a nice workout. I don't have easy access to a high school track in St. Louis, so do my repeats on the nearly one mile of flat, straight and uncrowded sidewalk along the riverfront below the Arch. Pretty spot where one can do up to 800 meters without a turn.

CONTRIBUTION TIME

Speaking of Team in Training - please consider the following as an unabashed plug for you to make a contribution to my fundraising account. Since you are reading this blog, you may have already contributed and if so I thank you again. If you have not yet made your contribution for 2009, please do so now! Just click on my TNT web site at http://pages.teamintraining.org/nca/nikesf09/tfarnam and make your donation using the secure link. It's tax deductible, but more important helps save lives. My friend Bob Raleigh is still alive today because of a research program funded in part by LLS. By the way, he is recovering nicely, learning to walk again after three months in hospital.

COMING EVENTS - we have one race scheduled before the October 18th Nike Women's Marathon in San Francisco. On August 30th Naomi, our friend Alice Till and I are going to be doing the Quebec City Half Marathon (or more correctly stated "Marathon des Deux Rives SSQ-Lévis/Québec". Naomi has never been to Quebec, it's been at least 25 years since I was there last, and it looked like a fun event. We'll spend a couple of extra days touring the area, and some friends who have done the race in the past said it's a good one. The challenge will be to not eat too much good French food before the race. After the race - les bon temps roulez!

After the Quebec event it's back to training. We will have "tapered off" our long miles before 8/30, then build back up to 20 miles on 9/26 before tapering again before the Nike. The idea is to train the body, not wear it out.

OK, enough for now - just please make a contribution.

Tom 8/5/09