Season of LSD will be a challenge for me

This off season I will be doing a lot of Long Slow Distance work so that I can get a better base built for next year season. After meeting with Steve and getting the goals for next year set up we spent a fair amount of time talking about how to make me a better endurance athlete. He believes in the LSD approach and talked about having that be a big part of the next 4 months for me. Saturday I had my first chance to give this approach a try. John M said he had a similar workout and would run with me. We decided to run Waterton canyon to the Colorado trail and then run that for a few miles. I wore a Garmin and set an alarm to go off when I exceeded 150bpm. We took off very easy and hearing the beeping would tell us that I needed to slow down. John HR was about 20 beats below mine but was still in the range of what he needed to be doing as well.

I feel that I need to let you know some other facts about my running so you will know why I am so happy. First, I have only run beyond 14 mile 4 times in my life. I ended up having problems last time I put distance on and ended getting hurt. Second I am not one that is able to run slow, I have always trained at a pretty high HR so to keep it 20-35 beats below what I normally train at will be a huge challenge. Last I really never run past 2 hours at a time, long runs are also new.

John was very patient with me and spent the whole time talking so that I could work on keeping my HR down. It was a challenge because in my HR range was a pace of about 12 minute miles. After Slowing down and even walking a good portion of the Colorado trail we made it to the 8 mile mark. I felt really good and my body was not hurting at all. We turned around and started our way back down. I ended up having to slow down to 13min miles then 14min miles and even mixed in a few mile of walk then run, walk then run. John stayed with me the whole time and even seemed like he enjoyed the slow run. The final stats came in at 3:27 in time. 16 miles in distance and a average pace if 13+. My average HR for the run was 146 (perfect) it will be a great challenge to do this all season.

As I am writing this my legs feel good, I have had a few hours think about what this LSD will be able to do for me and my training and I am very excited. I think in the long run it will pay off big and I am willing to give it a try.

Tell next time, happy training and if you see a very slow guy on the trail stop and say hi to me I will be the one trying to keep the HR alarm from beeping.

I love you Anne,

T