Next Steps

It has been almost a week since the TCS NYC Marathon, I’m really excited about my future plans to transition to a more physically fit, Dr. KOS. Dr. KOS has put on a few pounds over the past few months.

Also, I would like to reclaim being a faster running – no more of this 8:30-9:30 min/mi pace business. Pretty much the next few months will be my “off-season” for running; however, I still would like to keep my ability to run long distances during the winter. I have registered for the United Airlines NYC Half Marathon in March and I really want to kill it. More specifically, I want to finish it anywhere between 1:30 – 1:39. Last year, I finished it in 1:46, so it is quite possible that I can accomplish this goal. For a little TMI, I did take about 5-6minutes to poop in a portapotty during the race. Basically, I would like to focus on three things during this off-season (hopefully, it will continue beyond the off-season):

• Maintaining my endurance and improving speed.
• Getting back into the gym for strength training.
• Working on my diet.

I think that I will make separate entries for each of these tasks.

Maintaining Endurance and Improving Speed:

Like I mentioned, I want to keep my base from last week’s marathon . . . even though my base may be a little crappy. To meet this goal, I would like to run 3-4 times a week, while doing some longer runs during the weekend. I still have a few more weekend races sprinkled throughout November and December. I need to register for two more races.

I found a couple of resources the help with this place.

The article, “What should I do doing the off season,” from Runner’s World (***) has a couple of good ideas.

Basically this program recommends having an 18-20 mile base during the offseason. Hell, most of my marathon training weeks only had 18 miles, counting the long runs. 

Repeat this four-week cycle:

Week 1: 6-8 mile Progressive Run

2-3 miles at an easy effort + 2-3 miles at a moderate effort + 2 miles at a hard effort

Week 2: 9-10 miles Long, Slow Run

Run at a truly easy, conversational effort, no matter what the pace.

Week 3: 8-mile Tempo Run

2 miles at an easy effort + 4-5 miles @ Tempo effort + 1-2 miles at an easy effort

Week 4: 11-12 mile Long, Slow Run

Hal Higdon (***) has a great 12-week training guide for spring training. I’m kind of leaning towards doing this program for the next few months. However, I feel that much of this program can count as my prep for my upcoming half-marathon. We’ll see how it goes.

Getting Involved

I have been a member of the NYC chapter or the Front Runners club for a good minute, but I have not really attended too many of the events. It just seemed like too many other things in my schedule conflicted with the group’s events. Often the group would have happy hours at various bars in the cities, but I did not find many of these events very welcoming. Not because the guys and gals were not nice, but the happy hours would be held at popular bars on Fridays around 5-6 PM (you know, prime time happy hour). It would be kind of difficult to meet people, because YOU DID NOT KNOW WHO WERE AND WERE NOT PART OF THE DAMN GROUP. Hell, I went to one happy hour and ended up chatting with some guys who were not a part of the FRNY.  They were really nice, and I even got dinner with one of them after drinks at “da bar”. Ok, this is getting off topic. There was one event on the LES (or was it Alphabet City) where the bar was just open only for FRNY members and that was a better experience for me.

Ok, what is the point of all of this rambling.

This year, I will really try attend to some of the weeknight workouts. I tried to attend the ones with the Brooklyn chapter, but they were held on Tuesday, which were my Zumba nights (No one better not mess with my Zumba schedule)   and I could never seem to get out of work in time for the Thursday workouts. I think, with this new job and the new apartment, it will be easier to make some of the Manhattan weeknight workouts. It will be easier, because my new job will be more of a 9-5/6 gig and the distance/commute from the new job to the Central Park meeting place is shorter than the distance from my previous job to Prospect Park. Let’s see how this goes.

Done!!!

What types of workouts or things do you focus on during your off-season, if you have one? I need some suggestions on what to do between now and March. 

Let me get back to watching my new guilty pleasure, “Deadly Women”.

This show is INTENSE. It is kind of cute listening to the Aussie reenactment actors try to do American accents.

Some of these stories are insane. For example:

• One woman wanted to keep her boyfriend so she lied and said that she was pregnant with twins. So what does this nut do? She befriends another pregnant woman killed her, extracted the baby from the other women, and tried to passed it off as her own. But the baby died. Obviously, when she went to the hospital the doctors were like “Where’s the other baby? You were supposed to have twins.” Also, it is quite simple to tell if a woman has given a vaginal birth. C’mon!!!!
• A women killed her three children, because she did not want her ex-husband to have full custody. THEN, she stabbed herself multiple times – didn’t die. THEN, she tried to strangle herself – didn’t die. THEN, she tried to set herself on fire – didn’t die. THEN, she threw herself off of her apt’s balcony, landed on a car – still didn’t die. HOLY HELL!!!