Training for a 200 Mile Race - 3 Months In

 “Its the not the Destination, It's the journey.” -- Ralph Waldo Emerson

On January 1st, I kicked off a 5.5 month training cycle that will ultimately culminate in my 1st 200 mile race, the Tahoe 200.  Now that I am 3 months into the training, I want to share some of the details on how it is going.  

I generally break my training up in 4 week blocks.  Three weeks followed by a recovery week.  For Tahoe, I am following the same strategy and have 6 blocks in total.  

Mnt Towanda / Belmont Track

I kicked off training with a 31 mile run on January 1st.  While this wasn't in the original plan as the 1st was a Sunday and my training weeks typically start on a Monday, I decided to kick off a day early so I could tell everyone I was on pace for 11.3k miles for the year. All and all the run went pretty well and I had company from Doug and Carson at the start, Karalyn in the middle, and Neil finished with me on the track. 

Block 1

Revere Beach

Block 1 was pretty simple; 3 X 90 miles a week with focus simple on staying moving.  No worrying about any speed or any amount of climbing.  Block 1 went really well.  I stayed right on target and even got in 2 more 30+ mile runs (including one up to Revere Beach).  

 

Block 2

After a down week, I began block 2.  For this, I knocked out 3 X 100 mile weeks.  This has been something that has been a goal of my for few years now.  Already, I had entered new territory as the closest I had come before was 297 miles over 3 weeks back in 2019.  Again everything was coming smoothly and I even told a friend that the endurance was coming faster than expected.  

This block also included a 42 mile day (on the coldest day in Massachusetts in 65 years), back to back 25 mile days, and another 30 miler at the tail end of 3rd week.  

My 1st Set Back

Spanish Wells

During that final 30 mile run of block 2, I tripped over and fell on the curb while trying to look at the map on my watch.  When I hit the ground, I felt the wind knocked out of me. As my friends pulled me back up, I said "I think I am ok."  About a mile later, told them I think we were not going to for go any tempo miles that day.  I made it through end of the run, but definitely bruised some ribs.  

Luckily I had a down week (and a trip to the Bahamas) to recover before getting back at it.  It took about a week and half for the pain to subside while running and about 4 weeks for it to fully go away, but happy to say I fully recovered. 

Block 3

Charles River

This is when I started to get really serious.  While one can argue that I don't need to put in the amount of volume I am to train for a race like Tahoe, personally, I feel that I will be better physically and mentally prepared if I put in some of these harder efforts. 

Block 3 included 90, 100, 110 mile weeks with back to back to back 20s, a 20 followed by a 30, and back to back 30s.  

A 200 mile race is roughly equivalent to 4 X 50 mile days.  By putting in these back to back and back to back to back large efforts, I am trying to simulate what it is like to put in that type of effort on a tired body.  

Wright's Tower

Training block 3 also went really well and I even had some speed during those longer runs.  This also coincided nicely with helping some friends who are training for the Boston Marathon.  On 3/18,  I dropped an 8:05 pace 30 mile run while pacing a few of them.  The next day, the final run of the block, I ran another 30 at just over 9 minute pace, which included a climb up to Wright's Tower before sunrise.  At this point, I had never felt so fit.  

My 2nd Set Back

In 1785, Robert Burns wrote "The best laid schemes of Mice and Men oft go awry, And leave us nothing but grief and pain, for promised joy!"

When I started this training plan I knew I was playing with fire. I have been running ultra marathons for 12 years now and am well aware of the concept of overuse injuries.  In this training plan, not only was I putting in long and hard back to back and back to back to back efforts, but I was reaching new mileage high's per week, per month, and probably for the entire year.  If I hit all the miles in my plan, I'll be at 1950 before the race even starts, less than 6 months into the year.  

Icing a Swollen Foot

During my down week, I did something to my left foot, specifically around the joint in the pinky toe and it swelled up.  Unwilling to accept that I might need some down time, I ran 20 miles on it the next day and it got worse.  After that I was forced to take 3 days at just over a mile (a swollen foot was not going to end my 9+ year run streak) and thankfully it improved.  A visit to a doctor and an x-ray revealed that it wasn't broken, but the doctor could not rule out a stress fracture.  

It continued to improve over a few more easy days and by the following weekend I was back up to an 8 mile run.  I am still not sure what caused it swell.  My best guess is that I got stepped on just wrong while playing soccer my son and his friends before school. 

Block 4 and Beyond

Their last long run before Boston

After a forced down week, I started ramping back up during the 2nd week of block 4.  The original goal this week was 116 miles, but I dropped it to 80 and am keeping a close eye on the foot.  

Additionally, as I get closer to Tahoe, I need to start focusing more on climbing as the race has somewhere in the vicinity of 35k'.  

My next scheduled big effort is back to back to back marathons.  I have 50k race scheduled for 5/13 and 2-day Hut Traverse in the White Mountains the weekend after that.  

I still plan on seeing how close can stay to that initial training plan, but I am also planning on being more vigilant about backing off if my body tells me I need to do.  

This has already been one hell of journey so far. 

- Scot