Boxes, Boards, and Bricks

On nearly all of my runs I wonder if it's ever going to get easier for me. I guess, after four years (and into my forties), the answer is no! In the past week, though, I've had the fortune of talking to a couple people who really know what they are doing, and it shows in their results.

Angie is only a couple years younger than me, yet the best runner I have ever personally met. I saw her at my race last week, and I hadn't seen her in a while, so I congratulated her on her success. Sometime in the last year while reviewing race results, I noticed she completed a marathon in a sub-three hour time. Incredible! If I remember right, she averaged a 6:30 mile, or something close to that. I can't imagine running that fast, for even a couple miles, let alone 26. We chatted a little, and she offered up some advice. Plyometrics. She said I should do "boxes", and anything to increase my strength and foot speed. I had to look up what "boxes" meant, and it sounds like something I could benefit from (if you don't know it means, I'll let you plug it in the google!).

The second person, Tim, I met on a bike ride a while back. He's a master swimmer, and is very accomplished in long distances (i.e., placing second in Swim Around Key West). We had an interesting bike ride, chatting about swimming technique and Terry Laughlin's Total Immersion philosophies. At the end of the bike ride I flatted, but had an appointment with Tim for a swim lesson. And a lesson it was! I got plenty of laughs at his imitation of my "doggie paddle" (no, that was my real stroke!), and my total "waste of energy". Ha. He had four very specific items for me to work on: arm extension, kick, keeping my head down, and the pattern my arms move in. He gave me specific drills, but thought I should spend 30% of every workout with a kick board. Between perfecting technique (and that's never done), and kicking, he felt I could really increase my speed.

My own conclusion after my last race is that I really have slipped on the brick workouts, and I need to get back to running after I ride. The problem is, I've been riding with people during the week, and afterward... well, afterward, a beer and dinner sound much more appealing than a run! But my last two rides I've stuck with running afterward, and crud... it's hard.

During every run I inevitably think about what I started this post with... does it ever get easier? I always follow that thought with the quote "If it was easy, everyone would do it." Yesterday I rode 30 some odd miles, and followed it with a couple mile run. I came in and decided to watch "A League of Their Own" with Ray... and I laughed when Jimmy (Tom Hanks) used the quote in the movie. Only his character made it even better (and maybe this is a well known part, or the origination, of the quote, but I had never heard it). "It's supposed to be hard. If it wasn't hard, everyone would do it. The hard... is what makes it great."