Tuesday, July 21, 2009

Can't delete?

I like that this is the first hit on google for my email. Hah.

17 comments:

Jake Marren said...

One bad day is not the end of the world. I know it sounds painfully obvious, but this sounds like dehydration. Lower blood volume due to dehydration leads to increased stroke rate, fatigue and general death-like symptoms. This why pros get an IV of saline before competition, the extra blood volume takes a lot of stress off your heart.

This would be pretty logical since your sauna sessions could have put you in a pretty deep hole. I imagine that it would be painful to drink enough water to replenish what you put out in even a few minutes at 185. A few days could have incrementally lowered your liquid content, even with a conscientious effort to replenish.

well anyway, my 2. Crazy running man!

Collin said...

Hey,
Actually, that's something that I've kept up with really well. Each session, I've drank 32-40 ounces and I've either maintained weight or slightly gained from over hydrating since I drink a fair amount before and after as well. When I'm lifting, I normally drink a decent amount out of a drinking fountain between every set and today I had a 20 ounce water bottle with me that I filled 3 times, so I had 60 ounces of water in an hour immediately leading up to it. I suppose it's possible, but it seems unlikely.

Travis said...

Are you drinkong water or something with electrolytes in it. Take your own advice, you need to replace sodium etc. even from the sauna. Also, I don't think the the body will absorbe liquids as fast as you are takinging them in. Maybe too much sauna too quick on top of workouts. Need moore time to get stuff back in. Check out "NUUN" I love that stuff.

Steve said...

185? Bah, I set my sauna at 212! I save time that way because I take my dinner in there and cook it at the same time.
(jk)
seriously, the symptoms you are describing are quite similar to how I feel every time I've set foot on the track recently. You can't use my excuse, general decreptitude due to advanced age, so good luck in figuring it out.

You sound pretty technical/scientific, so I'm sure you know of the change only one thing at a time technique. That way when things get better, you know what it was.

Nothing is more aggravating than changing multiple variables at the same time, getting better, and having no idea what it was that actually worked.

Good luck, my vote is cutting out the sauna. Saunas sound fun in the winter, but not so good in the summer!

alyssa said...

unless you're actually training for badwater, there's no need to hit the sauna. Just get out in the middle of the day when it's the hottest and run a lot.

Ben said...

but you can't hook up with dudes running around in the middle of the day!

Jake Marren said...

touche!

RM said...

I had to listen to your voicemail like 10 times last night to break it down - it was quite long. Then I looked at this and I think it's about the same length.

There's one big thing you're overlooking: just run.

Seriously, it's as simple as that. In order to be the best at something I firmly believe you have to be meticulous at everything. That's how LA won 7 Tours, by preparing better, understanding more, analyzing data.

I follow your training reports. You don't take legitimately easy days, and you try to go just a little too hard too many days in a row. Then you'll take days COMPLETELY off and call them rest days. I think if you really want to do well in workouts you have to focus on workouts, and set up your training a little smarter.

If you start thinking about too much shit you're going to cave in mentally. Look at Ryan Hall. The American athletes believed that the conditions in Beijing were going to be so awful they were wearing stupid trash bags, and ice vests, and this and that. I bet the dude that won didn't do any of that.

Ultimately on race day you just prepare for the conditions. Sure, you can hope to acclimate before a race, and certainly it will be easier to do a very hot race if you're used to it - but it doesn't mean you have to try and build your tolerance via sauna.

You have a burden of knowledge and questions, and while it's in human nature (particularly of you engineering/science nerds) to understand "why?" - sometimes you really just have to step back.

Here's a list of a million things that could have disrupted your workout flow:

1. Sounds like it was on an indoor track if it was short like that. Indoor tracks are slow and the air is weird.
2. You're at a new altitude. You've been there for a while but you're going to react differently.
3. You routinely take your shirt off to take pictures of yourself. This takes away from recovery and is a distraction because I bet everytime you pass a mirror you look into it.
4. You stay up really late playing video games. I know this.
5. You're never rested.
6. You also try to lift. A LOT. Probably too much for an endurance runner.

Somebody asked me recently what my "secret" was to success on the bike. Do you have a coach? Do you have a powermeter?

I replied no. I don't have a coach, don't have a powermeter - shoot I don't even have a computer on either of my bikes. I just go out and ride. Same with running, I don't worry about the distance or speed, just the time and effort.

So while you have all these new data sources, you need to step back sometimes and run on feel. If you don't feel good, don't do a workout that day. Save it for when you feel good.

Collin said...

1. Sounds like it was on an indoor track if it was short like that. Indoor tracks are slow and the air is weird. - All my workouts are on this track now. Yeah, the air is a little weird, but it didn't affect me before.
2. You're at a new altitude. You've been there for a while but you're going to react differently. - I've run well at this altitude previously.
3. You routinely take your shirt off to take pictures of yourself. This takes away from recovery and is a distraction because I bet everytime you pass a mirror you look into it. - Is this relevant? haha...
4. You stay up really late playing video games. I know this. - Haha, actually I haven't played a single video game in a long time and I'm usually in bed by midnight and up around 8:00.
5. You're never rested. - I get a lot of sleep (8+ 5-6 times a week and almost never less than 7 or 7 1/2) and I've been smarter with having big on weeks and then easy off weeks lately so I'm never getting super overworked like I was pre Rocky Raccoon.
6. You also try to lift. A LOT. Probably too much for an endurance runner. - That's probably debatable... Serious endurance triathletes are a lot bigger than I am a lot of the time and some of them can run faster marathon splits in an ironman than I can flat out.

I think the dehydration thing might actually be right. My general body has felt horrible the last few days now and my symptoms point to dehydration. I don't know if my weights were accurate since I was still dripping when I got out. I figured that if I increased by 1 pound but was dripping wet, I was about even, but maybe being dripping wet made up more than 1 pound. I'll focus on really hydrating well between now and Friday and we'll see what happens.

As for that nuun stuff, I actually just got 2 of those from my dad recently; not sure where he picked them up, but yeah, they're not bad and it makes things simple since you just have to put one tab in ever water bottle and then keep up with the drinking.

I didn't take S-Caps in the sauna because I figured that I probably have at least a slightly overly salty diet as is and 20-30 minutes of sweating probably doesn't entirely make up for it, but I think I was probably wrong about that. In the future, I'll just start popping S-Caps like candy and see if it does anything.

Alyssa, Badwater is hot, but it's not humid. Races like this that are both hot and humid require decent heat acclimation as well even if they're not nearly as hot straight-temperature wise and I don't think that simply training in the middle of the day (which I can't do on weekdays to begin with) is enough. There're significant changes that take place in the body's cooling mechanisms when you spend a lot of time in a sauna and I frankly need those. I have a history of not being totally acclimated for this type of weather and having some major problems in high heat and humidity. If I think I can get my body's cooling mechanisms working more efficiently, you can bet I'm going to give it a shot.

alyssa said...

Collin you had more to say than anyone I've ever met before.

Ben said...

he was so excited, he couldn't keep it in his mouth.

Collin said...

Haha, I had like 18 people to respond to.

Travis said...

Collin, you still got the same email or new. Finefurniturewoodworking@yahoo.com

Travis

THE KRIS said...

ben is the flava-flav of this post, he just pops in with little quips.

and by quips i mean implying that collin is gay.

and by implying i mean saying.

also, why can't you hook up with dudes running in the middle of the day?

not that i care.

cheese said...

since i'm now living on the other side of the angeles natl forest from mnt disappointment, i feel like i can safely say that no, it's not that humid here.
also, something you overlooked--there is such thing as too much rest. if you had your HR that high, then took 8 1/2 minutes rest, that probably made the next rep harder than if you had stuck with 3:30 recovery. i'm not saying that caused the whole workout to bomb, but it might've contributed.

Collin said...

Well, I didn't want to spew blood on everyone else on the track as I was passing them. haha... Anyway, I've taken a few easy days and I'm racing a 10k tomorrow, but I honestly just still don't feel totally 100%. If I really run poorly tomorrow, I'll probably just go get a quick checkup from a doctor and make sure there's nothing actually wrong with me. Travis, my email's still the same: cander49 @ gmail . com .

Collin said...

Btw, that's good to know that it won't be too humid. I'm still worried about 100+ degree temps though.