Cruising in the Metroparks

Tuesday, June 22, 2010

I was driving to the park for a run having made the decision to shake it up. I’d been feeling horrible during (and after) workouts for the last three days, and with the thermometer hovering around 90, things weren’t looking too promising this evening either.

Tuesday is typically speed day for the runners I coach, so if they can do it, why can’t I? I decided I would run five 1,000’s (1000 meters) at cruise pace.

Jack Daniels, PhD., is the originator of the cruise/threshold training terminology. I have been reading his stuff since the early ‘80’s and always found it made a great deal of sense for runners ranging from recreational to elite. I had met with Don Alexander recently to talk about his son Colby’s training regimen (Colby won the Ohio Division I 1600 meter race a couple of weeks ago and finished 4th in the nation at the same distance this past weekend). Don and Rae (his wife) are two of the most successful distance coaches in the history of Ohio high school running. He feels that the key to Colby’s season was the once per week cruise workout and blasters (more on that another time). They go by the Daniels’ cruise chart for determining pace during the workout (all based on your pr).

I really don’t have a mile pr anymore – I haven’t run for time in almost 20 years – but I decided to use 6 minutes for mine. That meant I’d be running around 4 and a half minutes at per 1,000. Now, I ran these on the trails and I know effort pretty well. I determined that I’d run at my threshold pace (I can’t talk and if I went any faster, I couldn’t hold the pace) for a little over 4 minutes. I would do this 5 times with 1.5 to 2 minutes walk/jog recovery. I suppose it was as much a fartlek as a cruise, but it would be faster than normal and that was my objective.

When you do speed workouts like this, you build lactic acid in your muscles. The more often you do this, the better you tolerate running with it and the faster you can run. It’s a tried and true method of improving speed – interval workouts – and something I thought I’d never do again. My last time was age 36 when I was the Athletic Director for the Cleveland Athletic Club and set all my running pr’s. Then I became the manager, let my training intensity slip, and I’ve never been the same. That’s what this blog is all about…returning to that time.

Anyway, I did the workout. The first pick-up was the worst. I needed more of a warm-up before rolling into it, but didn’t want too much running at a slow pace in the heat. By the third pick-up, I was enjoying running fast (a relative term) and knowing the workout would be over soon. I did my fifth and jogged easily to the car…the entire workout taking only 30 minutes, but easily as hard as any one-hour run I had done. I know my body got more from it, too.

I’ll probably keep doing some version of speed workouts: cruise intervals, hills, fartleks, and threshold runs to mix up the training. I have no plans for racing now – the reason one would normally do these things, but I need the change of pace and if I lose all the weight and decide to race, well, I’ll be ready.
For more information on cruising, google Jack Daniels cruise control.
Run duration: 30 minutes.

Training Heart Rate: 150.

Calories burned during workout: 550.