Sunday, August 6, 2017

Shake out / day off

Actually did go to the Fowler Center today and did a full warmup and some drills and hops, but no real running.  I looked at my archived workouts prior to some of my successful races in '15 and '16 that showed I pretty much adhered to the every other day regime, and since I did significant work yesterday and my feet were a bit sore, I just settled for a long bike ride today after my warmup.

IAAF
I'm enjoying watching the IAAF World Championships.  Seeing LaShawn Merritt go down today in the 400m Semis reminded me how even an experienced guy like that can run himself out in the first 200.  I could see it happen to him... right when he hit about 270m, his stride changed a bit and I could tell he was losing fluidity.  Having Van Niekerk making up the stagger on him also didn't help.  It also happened to Fred Kerley, who seemed to go out too fast, running against faster guys than he's used to seeing.  He ran about a half second slower in his semi.   Unlike Merritt, Kerley was lucky to make it to the finals.

Watching Merritt and Kerley today reminds me... it's a fine line and you never know how the body is going to react after the first 300m.   I do like the fact that the track in Toronto is an IAAF with short straightaways, unlike what I normally train on and the track at LSU that had 100m straights.  I sometimes wonder what intangibles go into finding that perfect balance and executing.  I think I'm able to only pull it off 2 or 3 times a year.  Daegu '17 (55.17) was one, Albuquerque '16 (55.22), and Jacksonville '15 (55.29) and Vanderbilt '15 (55.11) were my best executed races.  It's all about getting to that 300m mark with the least amount of effort and the most amount of speed.  What is interesting is that my indoor times 3 yrs in a row were faster than anything I did outdoor.  It's kinda strange.  If you include the indoor season, I had the fastest M55 400m times in the US, 3 years in a row 2015-17.  (In 2016 Corey ran 55.28 outdoor, I ran 55.22 indoor, World #1 for '16  indoor season M55).

I was happy to see the USA bring home sprint titles in both the Men and Women's 100m.  First time in a while, I think more than a decade.  Kudos Justin and Tori.   Sad to see people still demonizing Justin.  Pathetic really.  Wanted to see Bolt win, but was happy for Justin, he earned it.  Perhaps the USA can get their act together and beat the world in the 4x100s.

Back on track tomorrow.  Blocks and turns.




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