Week 4

The plan for week 4 was:

	week #	week	M	T	W	Th	F	S	Su	Total
	4	1/25/2016		4	10	4		24	10	52

What I ended up running was:

	week #	week	M	T	W	Th	F	S	Su	Total
	4	1/25/2016		4.1		3.8		19.4		27.3

• Mon Jan 25
• Tue Jan 26
Had to do street running since a great trail I live near is covered in snow. It was a lot of dodging cars because the sidewalks were always clear.
• Wed Jan 27
• Thu Jan 28
Ran along streets in the area. Conditions are better with spotty patches of ice. The shoulders of roads are still covered in snow so not ideal but with low traffic it isn't too bad.
• Fri Jan 29
• Sat Jan 30
Ran Eternal Winter, the fatass winter version of the Eternal Summer 6 hr run, hosted by the Annapolis Striders. Ran with Kristin and Kate for all of it, and Steve for a bit. Wound up running mostly on the road inside the park since the usual path was covered in snow.
• Sat Jan 31

Week 3

The plan for week 3 was:

	week #	week	M	T	W	Th	F	S	Su	Total
	3	1/18/2016		4	8	4		10	6	32

What I ended up running was:

	week #	week	M	T	W	Th	F	S	Su	Total
	3	1/18/2016	5.7			10.3			3.0	19.0

• Mon Jan 18
Had MLK day off so I met up with some friends for a hike in Patapsco Valley State Park.
• Tue Jan 19
• Wed Jan 20
• Thu Jan 21
Had a surprise day off work so I ran at Wincopin.
• Sat Jan 23
• Sun Jan 24
Dug out of the snow and went scouting around my area. Went into Wincopin for 1 mile, which was a big workout through knee deep snow. Only did 3 mi but it took nearly 1:30 due to conditions.

Week 2

The plan for week 2 was:

	week #	week	M	T	W	Th	F	S	Su	Total
	2	1/11/2016		4	8	4		24	10	50

What I ended up running was:

	week #	week	M	T	W	Th	F	S	Su	Total
	2	1/11/2016		6.0				15.8	5.5	27.3

50 mi seems ridiculously high mileage this early! I'm cutting back some runs since I'm really just gearing up for a 50K right now (HAT on Mar 19).

• Tue Jan 12
• Wed Jan 13
I ran 6.0 mi with Kristen along the Baltimore Waterfront.
• Thu Jan 14
• Sat Jan 16
Ran PHUNT, a 25K/50K trail race. We had great conditions - sunny and cool, muddy trails but not too bad as my feet didn't get wet. Butch was at this event but I didn't see him. I did find two other friends, Michele and Liz, and ran with them.
• Sun Jan 17
Slept in and ran 5.5 mi on the Patuxent Branch Trail (I call it the Lake Elkhorn Trail since that's where it leads).

Week 1

The plan for week 1 was:

	week #	week	M	T	W	Th	F	S	Su	Total
	1	1/4/2016		4	8	4		10	6	32

What I ended up running was:

	week #	week	M	T	W	Th	F	S	Su	Total
	1	1/4/2016		8.3				6.1	13.1	27.5

• Tue Jan 5
Due to scheduling logistics, I swapped with tomorrow. I ran 8.2 mi on the Patuxent Branch Trail.
• Wed Jan 6
• Thu Jan 7
The rest of the weekdays didn't go so well. I picked up a cold and decided to get more sleep and otherwise rest. I don't think doing minor exercise (i.e. less than an hour of easy running) will make things worse, but instead the decision was more about getting extra sleep. Not the greatest kickoff to training, but it is early in the plan, there are a lot of weeks left, and I will get back on track this weekend.
• Sat Jan 9
Good run with a meetup group I'm an organizer of (Run, Gap, Gulp, Go). Considering the dreary day, turnout was fantastic. We did one loop of the Mid Maryland 50K route, and saw another group out there obviously running the route as well. I run with Kate tomorrow, 12-13 mi or so, thus I swapped today's and tomorrow's distances.
• Sun Jan 10
Kate and I did our own half-marathon along the C&O.

100 Training Plan

I have this training plan on Google Docs and also exported it as a table to display here.

The plan is basically a merger of the UltraLadies 50K, 50M, and 100M plans. Those are the plans that seem most realistic to me... the plan out of Field Guild to Ultrarunning is too many days a week, with many split days (run in the morning, run in the evening). The plan out of Relentless Forward Progress, the 50 mile per week version, also looks pretty decent but the timing seems rushed - it has you doing a 50 miler 5 weeks before the 100, and a 50K 5 weeks before that and I couldn't make that fit at all.

So instead, I stitched this together out of the UltraLadies plans. It starts with a 50K plan leading up to HAT and continues with the 50M plan to Montour. After that, it grafts on as much of the 100M plan as fits. Not ideal, but then I don't get to set the dates of all the events I'm using along the way. I think this will work OK. The alternative is to train for 65 weeks (the lengths of the 50K, 50M, and 100M together) plus a few more for recovery in between... more than a year would make for major burn out!

My biggest concern was not having done any 50M to 100K events, so I wanted to be sure to include one. The timing of various events in my area are that Montour, a 24 hour race, is about the correct time, 10 weeks before Yeti.

Since the UltraLadies plans are high mileage. I plan to cut the longer runs by 20% or more. Basically every run longer than 10 mi will be cut to 80%. 

Tue will be running strength/hills day - at 4 mi, a nice run will be the hills with the Crazies (Hilltop and Ilchester, skipping the Grist Mill and River Rd loop). Thu I will try to get to a track and do some sort of speed work, probably 800s at a ~4:00 pace. I'm not big on super complicated ladder workouts and all that stuff; just running faster than normal is all I want and 800s is easy to count and track. For Wed I plan to run with my friend Kristen in Baltimore - she'll need some long runs too, and it'll be nice and lit for us which will be very important until Daylight Saving Time returns in Mar.

Along the way I have a few events planned - a few will help with motivation and add variety, but too many become overwhelming, expensive, and interfere with training. I'm signed up for PHUNT 25K, Eternal Winter, Frozen Heart, HAT, Trap Pond, Laurel Highlands 50K, Montour, and Yeti. I'm set for all the events I plan to do through October of 2016! ;)

Since Frozen Heart falls on a short mileage weekend, I'll swap weeks. EF will be optional and will be a last minute decision; at this point I'm leaning against doing it. Maybe next year when I go a different direction and try a bunch of technical, difficult events. For C&O, I'll volunteer and pace since I have friends doing that one.

If Montour goes very poorly and I don't think I can do Yeti, then the fallback will be the Stone Mill 50 Mile run in Nov. However, by sticking to the plan and getting the training in, I want to make sure that doesn't happen!

	week #	week	M	T	W	Th	F	S	Su	Total
	1	1/4/2016		4	8	4		10	6	32
	2	1/11/2016		4	8	4		24	10	50	phunt
	3	1/18/2016		4	8	4		10	6	32
	4	1/25/2016		4	10	4		24	10	52	eternal winter
	5	2/1/2016		4	10	4		10	8	36
	6	2/8/2016		4	12	4		26	10	56
	7	2/15/2016		4	10	4		10	8	36	frozen heart
	8	2/22/2016		4	12	4		26	10	56
	9	2/29/2016		4	10	4		10	8	36
	10	3/7/2016		4		6		10		20	(ef)
	11	3/14/2016	4	3	2			31		40	hat
	12	3/21/2016		4	4	4		8	4	24
	13	3/28/2016		4	6	4		20	8	42
	14	4/4/2016		4	6	6		20	10	46
	15	4/11/2016		4	4	4		10	6	28
	16	4/18/2016		4	6	6		22	10	48	trap pond
	17	4/25/2016		4	8	6		22	10	50	c&o
	18	5/2/2016		4	4	6		10	6	30
	19	5/9/2016		4	8	6		24	10	52
	20	5/16/2016		4	8	6		24	10	52
	21	5/23/2016		4	6	6		10	8	34
	22	5/30/2016		4	10	6		26	10	56
	23	6/6/2016		4	10	6		26	10	56	laurel highlands
	24	6/13/2016		4	8	6		10	8	36
	25	6/20/2016		4	12	6		28	12	62
	26	6/27/2016		4	12	6		28	12	62
	27	7/4/2016		4	8	6		10	8	36
	28	7/11/2016		4		6		10		20
	29	7/18/2016	4	3	2			50		59	montour
	30	7/25/2016		4	8	6		10	8	36
	31	8/1/2016		4	15	6		30	15	70
	32	8/8/2016		4	15	6		30	15	70
	33	8/15/2016		4	15	6		30	20	75
	34	8/22/2016		4	8	6		10	8	36
	35	8/29/2016		4	15	6		30	20	75
	36	9/5/2016		4	15	6		30	20	75
	37	9/12/2016		4	10	6		10	10	40
	38	9/19/2016		4		6		10		20
	39	9/26/2016	5	3	2			100		110	yeti

2016 Yeti

I did something crazy and signed up for a 100 mile run - the Yeti 100 Mile Endurance Run.

It came down to choosing between the C&O Canal 100 or Yeti. Both have pros and cons, but Yeti's hugest advantage is the simple fact that it is Sep 30, 2016, 39 weeks into the year, while C&O is Apr 30, 2016, 17 weeks into the year. Given that I'm really going to start training the first full week of Jan, there is no way I would be able to prepare for C&O with 17 week to do it.

I'll follow up with the training plan I put together. For now, a collection of websites so I don't have to search all over to find them again.

References

• How to Train for and Run Your First 100 at the Umstead 100 by Blake Norwood, Umstead RD

• A 100 Mile Training Plan by Sherpa John. The whole series is pretty good with a lot of good tips.

• UltraLadies Run Club, with their 50K, 50M, 100M training plans

• Fellrnr's ultramarathon training plan comparison chart. Lots of good info on the site as well.

• Training for an ultra-marathon, iRunFar

• You can  Run 100 Miles on Marathon Training, Outside Online

• How to Run 100 Miles, Relentless Runner

• UltRunR website, tons of info and links to check out

Inspirational Articles

• How a too-busy doctor trained for a 100-mile race, Washington Post

• What I Have Learned from Running 100 Miles, Jodi Weiss via Huffington Post

Mid Maryland 50K

A nice local winter event is the Mid Maryland 50K. It is entirely within Rockburn Branch park, and consists of 5 loops, 10K each. The race has a solo ultra division, and a relay division which allows a team of 2 to 5 runners.

I'm familiar with the trails, since I run at Rockburn and over to Patapsco Valley State Park all the time. The trails are runnable, with a few roots and rocks along the way, and a minor hill or three. The big issue was thawing - for the first loop, the ground was solid. After a few more loops and sun, it tends to get a bit sloppy and muddy. Particularly the section roughly 2 mi into the loop, over by the neighborhood between Kerger Rd and Talbots Landing. The course passes through a field and by some historic farm building, and that section tends to mud out.

Nevertheless, this is a fun event and what is trail running if you don't have a stream crossing or mud to deal with? ;)

The start/finish passes through a pavilion where aid is setup and I stopped briefly each time to eat/drink and top of my bottle.

I knew lots of people at the event, running it, running on a relay team, or just spectating, so it is a great low key early year event. My friend Mikhail took this awesome pic of me. 

I think next year I'll volunteer at it or look to be part of a relay team. The event is great, it is just that there are some other ones around the same time (plus or minus a week) so next year I want to check out something different.

I was freezing afterwards so after chatting and hanging around a while, I zipped out for a nice cafe mocha at Starbucks.

Mid Maryland 50K 2015