Achilles. Heat. Boston.

I have multiple topics to cover in this blog. First, my Achilles Tendinopathy has flared up in both feet. Second, I have ramped up my training in the heat. Third, I'm going to comment on the Boston Marathon letting additional qualifiers in. 

Achilles
My insertional achilles tendonitis (or tendinopathy, more correctly) flared up at the end of last week due to repeated treadmill runs. I have been battling Achilles tenderness and stiffness off and on since 2017. It goes away completely when I take a break from running (like with my recent 8-week lay off), but comes right back the moment I resume training. I try to stay on top of my rehab exercises--eccentric weighted heel drops--but I admittedly have not been doing them every single day.

For whatever reason (lack of variation, change of gait, amount of impact), my Achilles tendons do not like the treadmill. Last week it was abnormally warm and humid so I ran on the treadmill Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday. And then on Saturday I did my long run outdoors, which is never really Achilles-friendly!

The good thing about insertional Achilles tendinopathy is that you aren't at risk for rupturing the tendon when you run. And it doesn't hurt that much while running. What sucks about it is that it's very difficult to cure 100%, and walking can be painful, particularly barefoot around the house. 

I went to my doctor on Tuesday for a follow up on my groin injury, and while I was there, we talked about my Achilles issues. He did an ultrasound and we could see where there was irritation and small little holes in the tendons. He recommended I have a procedure done called ultrasound-guided tendon scraping. I am having this done in a few weeks. He will go into both Achilles tendons with a needle, using an ultrasound, and create space in between blood vessels that are rubbing together and creating friction. (This might not be a 100% accurate description, but it's how I remember him describing it.) The recovery is only a few days and then I can start running again. He says he does this procedure frequently and if my symptoms are caused by what is seen on the ultrasound, it will provide immediate relief. 

Of course the only way to really recover is 8-12 weeks of the PT exercises every day, twice a day. I am committed to doing them, but they sure are time consuming and boring. My physical therapist theorizes that because my glutes still don't always fire, I'm pushing off with my calf, creating tension in the soleus, resulting in the irritation of the tendon at the insertion point. He dry needled my glutes on Friday and also gave me a painful calf massage. Later that day I was walking around without pain, so it definitely worked.

My plan is to continue training on it (since it's not at risk for rupture), do the PT exercises, go to PT weekly to get needling and massage, and have the procedure in mid-September. 

Training in the Humidity
Because the treadmill had caused such a flare up, I did not use the treadmill at all this week. I would have liked to because we had dew points at 72-73 each morning and the air was incredibly thick. My solution was to run extremely slowly (except for the one track workout) and drink loads of water + electrolytes throughout the day. 

Compression socks support the Achilles

I was able to knock out 49 miles this week with most of them being slower than a 9:00 pace. But in this weather, it's all about effort, time on my feet, and not over-exerting myself. We won't see the heat and humidity drop until Thursday, so unfortunately I'll have to do another speed workout in the heat on Monday. If my Achilles are feeling okay, I might resort to the treadmill Tuesday or Wednesday. 

Last weekend, I knocked out 14 miles at an average pace of 9:00. Yesterday, I ran 14 miles at an average pace of 8:59. Both were progression runs starting in the 10's and ending in the low 8's. It's always good to NOT bonk in the heat and still have a little more to give in that final mile. The Richmond Marathon is on November 13, so my long runs will start getting longer very soon. I'm also running a half marathon on October 3. At this point I really don't think I will be in half marathon shape, but a decent amount of fitness can be built over 5 weeks. (Well - 4 weeks excluding the taper week leading up to the race). 

It's actually hard to know what kind of shape I'm in with all of my runs being in such crazy humidity and I am just trying to survive them. But I have only done one lactate threshold workout since returning from injury + the two 5Ks. Why? Because my coach and I prioritized coming back safely rather than pushing me into tempo runs right away. It was the right approach but unfortunately doesn't bode well for my confidence at least as of today!

The Boston Marathon
Recently, the Boston Marathon allowed all qualifiers who were registered for the virtual race to run the live race. This decision definitely ruffled some feathers among those who had qualified, missed the cutoff, but did not register for the virtual race. For example, if someone qualified with a cushion of 2 minutes and registered for the virtual, they were invited to run the live race. But if someone qualified with a cushion of 5 minutes but did not register for the virtual, they were not invited. 

First of all, I am skeptical that the race will actually happen. We are already seeing marathons being cancelled and Massachusetts is one of the more risk-averse states. But regardless if the live race happens or not, my thoughts are as follows.

The Boston Athletic Association (B.A.A.) can do whatever they want. It's their race, and they aren't obligated to be fair. I do believe they try to be as fair as possible, but there are many other factors that come into play. We, as runners, don't have visibility into their decision making process so it's impossible to know exactly what they were dealing with. They are already having to deal with towns like Brookline threatening to deny them a permit if they don't meet certain demands. 

Is it entirely fair that someone with a 2:00 buffer gets to run the live race and someone with a 5:00 does

Boston Marathon 2016

not? Maybe, maybe not. Maybe it is fair because the person with the 2:00 buffer committed to Boston. They paid for the virtual race. They said "I will run Boston no matter what, even if it's virtual!". There is a lot to be said for that level of commitment to the spirit of the Boston Marathon. And they did, in fact, qualify for the race. This doesn't follow the traditional method of "fastest first" - but that doesn't mean it's not a viable method for selecting race entrants. 

What most likely happened is that the Boston Marathon had some spots open up, and that number of spots was similar to the number of virtual entrants, so boom- it was logistically easy. And they even offered up spots to those who missed the cutoff by 20 seconds or less. And imagine how happy those virtual runners must be! The B.A.A. didn't have to release any extra slots. But they did, and now more people get to run it, which holistically is a good thing.

I feel badly for the 2020 entrants who didn't get into 2021 and don't have a qualifying time for 2022. That sucks, especially if it will be difficult for them to ever qualify in the future. I do believe that the majority of the qualifiers WILL be able to qualify again, it just requires more hard work and more patience. 

Life isn't always fair. We can't expect the B.A.A. to always do the most fair thing. All we can do is train our hardest and try our best. 

Boston Qualifying Times Are Now 5 Minutes Faster

On Thursday of this week the Boston Athletic Association (B. A. A.) announced that they have changed the qualifying standards for the 2020 race. Each age/gender group must now run 5 minutes faster to qualify. They made this change due to the increasing demand for the race, with 2019 qualifiers have to run 4 minutes and 52 seconds faster than their qualifying standard to gain entry.

I'm not surprised by this change, and since the "buffer" has been increasing each year for the last three years, it is doubtful that anyone running less than five minutes faster than their standard would be accepted anyway. With these new standards, the B. A. A. won't need to turn down as many applicants. They turned down about 7,200 qualifiers for 2019. If I were in that group, I think I would be pretty disappointed. My prediction is that for the 2020 race, runners will still need to run faster than their qualifying standard, but maybe only by a minute or so.

My personal experience
I didn't register for the 2019 race, despite having qualified by over 18 minutes. As I've mentioned in previous posts, I plan to run Boston every two years so that I have the opportunity to experience other spring races. When I first started trying to BQ at the age of 29, I needed to run 3:40. When I turned 35, instead of getting an extra five minutes, the qualifying times were lowered so my target remained 3:40. Now that I am turning 40, they times have again been lowered, and so my BQ target remains 3:40. Thankfully, I have gotten faster with age, so I don't need the extra 5-10 minutes.

Age groups in the race results vs. age groups in qualifying

I ran in the 18-39 division; there is no 34-39 division

One thing I find odd is this: in the official Boston Marathon results, and on my finisher's certificate, the youngest division is 18-39. It is not 18-34. So if 35-39 year-olds are competing against the 18-34 year olds, why does that group get an extra five minutes on their qualifying time? For the 2020 race, 18-34 year old women will need to run 3:30 or faster, and 35-39 year-old women will need to run 3:35 or faster. So on one hand, the B. A. A. is saying that 35-39 year olds should compete in the same age group as the younger ones, but on the other hand, they are saying that they can gain entry into the race by running 5 minutes slower. I think that they should either eliminate the extra 5 minutes that the 35-39 age group receives, or create an age group category for 35-39 year olds in the race results.

BUT, if the B. A. A.'s rationale is that they want to "throw a bone" to the 35-39 age group or increase participation in that demographic, I guess that's a different story. A common misconception that runners have is that the B. A. A. bases their standards on fairness. I'm sure they consider that, but there are many other factors at play beside them trying to create "fair" standards. For example, older runners tend to have more disposable income and likely spend more money in Boston on race weekend. I'm not saying that the B. A. A. is catering to these runners, because the data shows that an approximately even number of people qualify in each age group. However, it would be within their right to do so.

Is it fair?
Take a look at the 18-34 men's standards vs. the 18-34 women's standards. For the 2020 race, the men's time decreased from 3:05 (185 minutes) to 3:00 (180 minutes). The youngest men’s group now need to run 2.7% faster than they did in 2019 because 5 minutes is 2.7% of 185 minutes. The women's time decreased from 3:35 (215 minutes) to 3:30 (210 minuets). So the women only need to run 2.3% faster in 2020. A 5 minute decrease is 2.3% of 215 minutes. This is not exactly fair and equal, but as I said above, fairness is not the B. A. A.'s only consideration.

Why are so many people BQing now?
Marathons have become more popular over the years and people are running them faster than ever. World records are still being set. I think this is due to a number of factors:

• More easy-to-access online training resources
• The increasing prevalence of downhill courses (like the Revel series)
• Improved technology (Nike Vaporfly 4%)
• Social media - people sharing their training online and inspiring others
• Social media - people being motivated to tout their accomplishments online 
• The marathoning population has more experience

There was a sharp increase in the popularity of the marathon around 2010. All the people who started running marathons around that time have now been running them for 8 years, which is what some say is when you peak at the marathon distance. Think of those people as the "baby boomers" of running and now many of the baby boomers are fast enough to BQ.

Training to BQ

If Boston didn't exist, would people be running as fast? Let's talk about time goals for a minute. Should you train by effort, to the best of your capacity, and then run the fastest time you can? Or should you target a specific time (potentially driven by the BQ standard) when it might not line up

with your fitness level? I'm of the opinion that runners should choose a goal time based on their abilities, and that goal would probably be more clear about 4-6 weeks out. And then you'd have a long-term goal of qualifying for Boston or hitting some other milestone.

Part of the reason it took me 7 years to qualify was because I always thought the very next marathon had to be the BQ race. I didn't allow myself to gradually chip away at my time, so I stalled out in the 3:50's for years. I fared much better when I decided to train to my fullest capacity and let the time be what it would. I learned to have patience. My marathon time came down from 3:48 to 3:43 to 3:40 to 3:35. And then down to 3:21! Instead of chasing the unicorn, I let the unicorn come to me. I think long-term "big goals" are great, but that with each cycle, we need to be in tune with our current fitness level and capacity to train.

I think many runners disagree with me here. They set their goal times based on the BQ standard-- "I'm training to run a 3:29 because I want to BQ". And I get that. My point is that you can encounter a slippery slope if you train for an externally-set milestone rather than what your fitness indicates.

My next BQ

As I said above, I hope to run Boston in 2020. I need to run slightly faster than 3:40 to do so. Considering I do many of my easy runs at a pace that would yield a 3:40, I am fairly confident about my ability to BQ. However- nothing is guaranteed and if the weather throws me a curve ball or if I am having an off day, I could bonk and not attain the 3:40.

I'm running the Rehoboth Beach Marathon on December 8. As of now, I am targeting a time of 3:15. If all goes as planned, I think that time is well within my reach. If it doesn't happen then, I am running another full marathon in May. 

This week I ran 59 miles, and looking at my schedule, I will be running 60-70 miles a week throughout October. (Except for next week, because I am tapering for the Army Ten Miler). The "real" marathon training will begin on October 28th, just 6 weeks out from the marathon. I anticipate running very high mileage during those six weeks combined with 3-4 high-intensity workouts per week.

April 2020 seems like a long way off, so I'll definitely be enjoying my journey there.

Running Controversies (Part II of III)

And you thought I forgot! This post is a continuation of Part I of the controversial blog series, addressing topics that are often debated among runners. In the previous post, I addressed headphones, barefoot running, and junk miles. Here are a few more.

BQ Times

The Debate: There are actually quite a few debates about the BQ times, and I will tackle two of them. The first is whether or not the women's qualifying times are "softer" then the men's times. Men are obviously built to go faster, but many runners think a 30-minute gap between the men's and women's times is too large. The other debate isn't really a debate, but rather how people are reacting to the new qualifying standards and process for the 2012 event. Many Boston hopefuls are frustrated that their task just got harder, but other runners welcome the new challenge.
My Stance: The movie "The Spirit of the Marathon" provided some history on the Boston Marathon. The qualifying times were set not to make this a prestigious event, but because the number of applications were increasing each year, and they couldn't accommodate anyone. This was before the days of computerized lotteries, so the easiest way to trim down the applicant pool was to set qualifying standards. Over time, those qualifying times have dropped lower and lower as the demand to run this race continues to increase. The prestige factor is simply a byproduct of what the race managers did to control the size of the race.

Given this, it doesn't really matter if there is a 20-minute difference between the top male and female finisher, but a 30-minute difference in qualifying times. Data shows that approximately the same number of men and women (roughly the top 5%) finish within the current qualifying times. This means the number of male and female runners should be about the same. There would be significantly more male runners if they lowered the women's times. As for the new qualifying standards, this falls inline with what they have done historically. The applicant pool of qualified runners is too large (with the race filling up within 8 hours) so they are tightening things up.

How this affects me:
Two years ago, I would have been upset about the faster qualifying times, and even more frustrated that I bonked at the RnR Arizona marathon because of the heat-- and then again in New Jersey. But now Boston isn't really a focus of mine. Trying to attain a goal that was based on someone else's standard wasn't healthy for me, so now I am just focused on running my best races possible. By my standards. Over the past three years, my fitness level has increased substantially and yet I keep bonking in marathons. If I had listened to my body instead of stubbornly trying to run an 8:23 pace no matter what, I probably would have set some nice PRs. So for my next marathon (Milwaukee Lakefront) I am just going to try my best, listen to my body, and if I qualify, great! If I get a 3:40, it will still be the exact same achievement that it was when it was a "BQ time".

Unauthorized Bib Transfers (running under someone else's name)

The Debate: You registered for a race six months ago and now you're injured and you can't run it. Or you got sick. Or you just don't feel prepared. Do you give your bib to someone else and have them run under your name? The debate is whether or not this is "okay". Some runners do this all the time, and other runners would never dream of it. Some large races have a process in place for officially transferring your bib to another runner, but most smaller races don't allow this. And then there is the question of selling your bib to someone versus just giving it to them.
My Personal Preference: This is a no-no. I would never run a race using someone else's bib and I wouldn't give my bib to another runner, even if I were injured. When "Elizabeth Clor" appears in the race results, I want that to actually be me and to reflect my hard work and training. And if I were to run a fantastic race but then someone else's name appeared in the results, I would be bummed. If it was a PR, I'd almost feel as if I couldn't really claim it as my own.
My Stance: As long as the rules don't forbid it, then I don't really care what other people do. Well, unless I got beat out for an age group award by someone who wasn't running under her own name. That might irk me.  Also, in larger races like the Cherry Blossom 10-miler, where they explicitly say that they accept more people than the course can actually hold because they know people will not show up, then I think it is wrong to break those rules. I'm guessing that at smaller races, the race directors don't care as long as the entry has been paid for.

Weather-Related Shut Downs
The Debate: In 2007, the Chicago race course was shut down in the middle of the event because the temperatures were rising into the upper 80's. One person died. This got a great deal of media attention and since then, race directors have been more cautious about holding races in severe weather conditions. This year, the St. Louis marathon was shutdown early as soon as the temperatures got into the mid 70's. The debate is weather or not races should be shutdown when it gets really hot, and how hot is too hot?
My Personal Preference: I've only been affected by this once (last weekend) and the race wasn't even shut down, it was shortened. So I don't really know how I would feel if I was running a marathon and was told to stop at mile 18. My guess is that I'd be relieved. I DNFed at Shamrock because of the heat. I bonked at RnR Arizona because of the heat, and I sure would have loved for someone to tell me it was okay to walk to the finish! I also ended up in the medical tent after the New Jersey marathon in 2009 with hypothermia. I don't think that race should have been shutdown, but if it had, I probably would have welcomed it. As someone who is heat sensitive, my preference is to shut it down!
My Stance: I can certainly see both sides of the coin here. Even though I DNFed at Shamrock, I don't think that race was hot enough to be shutdown. It really has to do with how prepared they are with emergency medical crews to handle any incidents. Even though I would personally welcome a shutdown if the race was oppressively hot, I really think that shutting down the race should be a last resort. There are many other runners who are willing to tough it or who aren't as effected by the heat as me, and I can see how frustrating it would be for them if they were having a good race.

I also don't like the negative press running gets about it being dangerous and people dying during marathons. Most of the people who have died (and there haven't been many) had pre-existing heart conditions.

What are your thoughts on these hot topics? (No pun intended for topic #3).