Month: February 2020

BIG HILL BONK – LAST RUNNER STANDING TRAINING REPORT

I’ve been pretty quiet about my training for this dumb running event so I thought I would write a quick update on how everything is going.

To recap, the dumb running event I signed up for is called “The Big Hill Bonk – Last Runner Standing” and consists of 100 runners lining up at 5:30 pm on a Friday night in early April in Beloit, Wisconsin to run 4.16-mile loops, one hour at a time until everyone quits except one last runner.  That runner will be required to run one more 4.16-mile loop and will then be declared the “winner” of this dumb running event.  As a reminder, I will not be that runner.  Based on the results of other Last Runner Standing format races, I’m guessing the winner will more than likely last between 150 and 200 miles.  I will most certainly “bonk” way before the last runner does.  So the whole challenge for me to run this dumb running event is to see if I can get to a distance that qualifies as an “ultramarathon” distance, typically 50K (about 31 miles) and run farther than I ever have run before.

When I signed up for this dumb running event in May 2019, I was training for my fourth Ironman and feeling pretty good.  Then I did the Ironman, followed it up with a marathon a couple weeks later, raced an 8-mile race pretty hard and finished in the top 10, and then ran a turkey trot on Thanksgiving Day.  Suddenly, after two months of pushing myself, I wasn’t feeling so good anymore.  My muscles ached, my flexibility was gone, and in general, I was in need of some serious recovery time.  Then the back of my leg behind the knee area started to hurt, especially after running, so I self-diagnosed myself with the worst possible running injury and decided to cool it for a while.  I took some time off and worked on making my leg feel better.

I had gifted my son a muscle massage gun for Christmas and he and his running partner/girlfriend raved about it, so I thought it might help me as well.  Then I remembered how much those suckers cost and wondered if there was a cheaper option.  I saw a post online about someone saying they had built their own version of a massage gun out of a jigsaw and a lacrosse ball with an adapter.  After looking at a few do-it-yourself videos, I figured I had nothing to lose.  After finding the jigsaw on Amazon, I discovered some smarter than me entrepreneurs had already come up with a set of four massage end pieces and a couple of adapters that you could buy and not have to build your own.  So for a little more than $100, I had myself a cheap, albeit LOUD, muscle massager.

I had to re-edit my training plan a few times to give me some extra rest to recover from the sore leg issues, so some of the high mileage weeks that I had originally planned for were removed.  The plan now more resembles a typical marathon training plan and will have to do.

Slowing down my running tempo and massaging and stretching really helped my leg feel better, so I think I will be prepared enough to at least make a good attempt at reaching my goal for this dumb running event.  I’ve got about 5 weeks left to train and hopefully will see some good running weather soon.  I hate running in the cold and on the treadmill.

A couple of things I have learned so far:

• Although I have been feeling pretty good while running, I had been finishing the last mile or two of my long runs feeling pretty wiped out.  I realized that I hadn’t been taking any nutrition with me for runs bordering 1.5 to 2 hours in length.  No wonder I was feeling so wiped out at the end.  I haven’t been bringing hydration with me either.  Time to correct those mistakes.
• My midweek training run this week called for a 10 to 12-mile run.  It was cold outside and I was dreading that as well as having to run inside.  But then I thought  “Why not do a practice run-through of the dumb running event format on the treadmill instead of a straight 10-miler?”  So that’s what I did.  I ran 4.16 miles at 9:22 min/mile and finished in 39 minutes.  Then I sat around on a bench with sweat dripping off of me for twenty minutes.  My plan for the dumb running event was to run about this pace and give myself some rest and recovery time, but now I’m not so sure that’s a great idea.  As that twenty minutes of rest ended, I hopped back on the treadmill and held the same pace again for another 4.16 miles.  I quickly realized that I now smell pretty bad.  I’m not sure I want to run with myself smelling like B.O. for another 4.16 miles, but I pressed on.  At the end of that loop, I took a bathroom break and then changed into a clean and dry shirt and visor.  I also put some deodorant on and felt much better about myself.  I did one more 4.16-mile loop and added just a little extra to finish with a total of 12.5 miles.  I really felt dehydrated after that workout and spent the rest of the afternoon being thirsty and trying to drink more fluids.  It was a worthwhile workout, though.  I learned that I will stink after one loop and that I better drink more.
• I saw a post on the Facebook page for this dumb running event that mentioned a group run to get a preview of the course that we will be running on.  I clicked that I would attend and look forward to getting in some practice running on that particular trail.  My plan calls for a 16-mile run that day, so four loops of the course would be the plan.  I’ll see what my friend Jodi has planned for that day and play it by ear.  We may carpool up there.  I wonder how she will feel about smelling my sweaty self in a car for a couple hours driving back home.
• Ironman Louisville training is supposed to start in the second week of March, but I think that I will just let the first few weeks slide, finish my dumb running event, give myself some time to recover and then jump into the plan on whatever training week of the 30-weeks I’m supposed to be on.

 

So there you have it.  If I find something interesting to post in the upcoming weeks I will certainly do so.  Lastly, there are less than ten spots left in this dumb running event.  Why not join me and sign up?  It’ll be fun!