Another adventure in Gatineau Park...

Now I realize this is a blog about training for a marathon, but my "real" training doesn't start until January so I am taking every opportunity to just get out there and run. Today was no different, and after last week's run up in Gatineau Park, I was anxious to get up there again before the snow makes it impossible to run on the trails.

I am not going to bore you with every run I do, but this one was a lot of fun and I stopped often to take pictures.

I decided beforehand to park at P7 (Kingsmere) and run up #30 to #1 and then take #4 to #32, after that #36 to Lac Meech and then turn around and come back the way I came. As you will see from the map below I took a wrong turn and ended up running past Ski Camp Fortune before getting back on track and joining #36 (the right-hand portion of what looks like a loop). I figured it out and came back the right way, but the sign-posting is not that good at that intersection on the trails.

Plenty of ups and downs, #36 and #32 were pretty steep and then the first part of #4 coming back was a killer.

Looking up #4, the incline was severe and a good dusting of snow, but my trusty Hawk-2's didn't let me down.

Coming down #4 just before I made my wrong turn.

Found this rather nice stream while I was looking for #32 by Ski Camp Fortune. Unfortunately as I found out on the way back, #32 was actually on the other side of the hill.

Someone on Running Mania posted about this great bridge over a small inlet of Lac Meech. I stopped here for a while and enjoyed the views. A fantastic little quiet spot on trail #36 just after the O'Brien Beach car park (heading towards #50).

Another shot of Lac Meech from the bridge. It was about minus 5°C and sunny, great day for running trails.

Sun was starting to go down over Lac Meech, this was my cue to head back to Kingsmere. I was 8 kilometers away from my start-point, so I had plenty time but I didn't want to push my luck too much.

It really is a great little spot. If you are local to the National Capital Region (or in the area) you can drive up to O'Brien Beach car park (Gatineau Park Trail Map) and the bridge is about 1 kilometer down the trail (there is a bit of up hill and a huge downhill stretch, so be warned).

This is trail #32 heading up to the summit before heading down towards Lac Fortune. It is here that my left knee started to hurt. I think the hard fast downhills on hard frozen ground had taken their toll. I managed to get to an intensity level that allowed me to get back to Kingsmere before the sun went down, although the final 1 kilometer downhill stretch was a killer. The knee is fine now, just iced it and rested it up. However, this serves as a warning to put a few extra items in my pack (headlamp, extra food, some warmer clothes etc.) next time just in case.

Total mileage for this run was 15.42 kilometers with ~500 meters (~1600 feet) of elevation gain. Hopefully I will get another opportunity to run again up there before the snow makes it too difficult, I fancy checking out the rest of #36 towards #50 and #52.

Trail run in the Gatineau Hills

As I mentioned in a previous article, I had itchy feet to head up to to the Gatineau Hills for a "real" trail run on some more technical trails. This weekend I seized on the opportunity and headed up there as the sun was rising. It was minus 6°C when I left so I layered up and equipped myself with my light running pack, a copy of a small section of the trail map, a whistle (just in case I ran into any black bears or coyotes), plenty of water and snacks, gloves, hat, and of course, my trusty trail shoes.

I drove up to the park and parked my car at P7 (Kingsmere). My plan was to head up #30 to #1 and then do the Skyline Trail (#6) followed by a loop of #17/#8 and then back to the car park (link to Gatineau Park trail map).

It was frozen underfoot so took it pretty easy and walked up some of the steeper inclines, stopping often to enjoy the spectacular views from Skyline Trail in particular. My route covered 8.85 kilometers and  nearly 300 meters (~985 feet) of elevation gain.

The trails themselves were everything I had imagined, loads of roots, rocks, streams, some big steep slopes, really gnarly in places so a lot of fun. I am extremely new to trail running so I kept the pace right down as I had to keep watchful eye on the trail a few feet in front of me so I could step over the safest route. 

Here are a few examples of the terrain I was running over:

A decent incline here with plenty of rocks and a huge rock at the top. Those huge rocks are commonplace in Gatineau Park, I assume that they were left behind when the glaciers melted at the end of the ice age, some of them are absolutely huge.

A nice sweeping bend with few obstructions, I met another runner coming down as I was heading up and he was absolutely flying down the slope.

Nice and soft underfoot, this is one of the sections that you can throw caution to the wind and really attack the slope.

These trails are full of little steams like this one, the rocks in the middle were coated in a layer of ice, so were pretty treacherous.

Another view of the same stream.

Picking up some decent speed on a snowy section of the trail.

Here is a view from Wattsford's lookout (intersection of #30 and #1) looking down over Gatineau Park towards a sleepy looking Hull and downtown Ottawa. The sun had not long risen. The major road in the middle of the photograph is highway 5.

All in all it was a great run, really challenging and the conditions were excellent. I will definitely head back up here in the next couple of weeks and explore a few of the other trails that the park has to offer.

How to increase speed and endurance...

Every runner wants to get faster, set personal bests, finish higher up the list of finishers, but how do we increase our speed and be able to maintain it for a given distance?

When I started running, I found that I increased in average speed (or more accurately, pace) as I increased my mileage and with it my fitness. But this kind of improvement can't continue to increase and as I ran more the effect was less dramatic.

I asked for advice on an internet forum I frequent (running mania) and was told, "in order to run faster, one must practice running faster".

But how fast and for how long?

The answer, "you run at speeds designed to challenge your physiology at your current fitness".

There is an injury risk to going out and running as hard as you can for as long as you can, or to say "I want to run that 5km race next month in 20 minutes, therefore I should go out and do my running at 4:00/km...". Depending just how far you are fitness-wise from running and maintaining 4:00/km will determine the risk of asking too much of your muscles, tendons, heart, lungs, ligaments, bones etc.

So how do we know how fast to train at to maximize gains and minimize injury?

Simple. Use Jack Daniels' Vdot system to figure out training paces from a recent race. A short race tends to provide more reliable paces. Here is an example of a Vdot calculator with training paces for my personal best 5km time of 22:35.

For that race performance (which was pretty recent) my Vdot is calculated as 43.19 and with it there is a whole series of training paces at different distances.

For example the calculator gives me an easy/long (E/L) pace of 5:57/km. So when doing easy (recovery, base building runs) or long runs, I should run at approximately 5:57/km to get the maximum physiological gains that the workout itself is striving to provide. This is an important pace, as it is this calculated pace that has helped me more than any other. In the past I ran my slow runs too fast, and thus at the fitness level I was at, I had nothing left for the faster-paced training runs. This is a double edged sword as you end up limiting any fitness gains from both the slow-paced and faster-paced workouts as you are unable to stimulate the correct physiological responses. Not surprisingly I became fatigued and eventually I became injured.

Once the penny had dropped about running the E/L runs at a slow enough pace, lo and behold, my fast-paced workouts became manageable, and better still, recovery time decreased and my speed increased.

So what are these faster-paced training runs I keep mentioning? They take the form of threshold runs (T) and interval training (I).

The diagram below (adapted from Daniels) illustrates the relative intensities of each workout type.

Once or twice a week I do threshold repeat (T) runs. A typical workout consists of a 10 minute warm up at E/L pace (5:57/km) followed by mile or kilometer repeats at T pace (4:47/km) with 1 minute rests in between (I use a Garmin GPS so it is easy to monitor and adjust my pace while on the run).

The T pace is designed to push your physiological systems to the edge (threshold) of lactate buffering (i.e. the process by which lactic acid formed in your muscles during anaerobic respiration is taken away in the blood stream and then broken down).

During light- and moderate-intensity exercise, blood concentration of lactate remains low. The body is able to absorb lactate faster than the muscle cells are producing it. However, as exercise intensity increases, there comes a point at which lactate removal fails to keep up with the rate of lactate production. This point is referred to as the lactate threshold and spells the beginning of the end of high-intensity exercise. Excessive blood lactate and the cellular acidity it produces combine to interfere with efficient and proper muscle contraction, and as a result, power output drops, suffering increases, and you are forced to slow down.

Lactate threshold training is designed to increase this threshold and thus allow a runner to run at faster speeds with less lactate buildup and thus less acidity in the muscles and a lower level of  fatigue/suffering.

I (interval) paced runs are faster runs but over shorter distances, often with longer recovery periods.

They are run at a 98-100% effort and are by definition, hard. Typically a training run at this intensity is broken down into 400 meter, of 800 meter repeats at I pace (1:46/400m and 3:32/800m) with 400 meter rest periods in between that can be walked or run at E/L pace or slower. A typical number of repeats is 6 to 8 during any given session.

These types of training have improved my running no end, and I have gone from struggling to complete a workout with 5:30/km repeats to completing all my T workouts at a T pace of 4:47/km. I have also had a lot of success with I runs, which is achieved when you can run the final repeat of the workout at the same pace or faster than the first one (i.e. showing no slowdown from repeat to repeat).

The beauty of the Vdot system is that if you end up running a faster race time (as has happened to me several times this year) or when the workouts get easy, you calculate new more challenging paces and thus challenge your physiology all over again.

Trying out my new trail shoes in the woods...

I picked up some Salomon XT Hawk-2 trail shoes from Bushtukah last week and I was anxious to test them out, so I headed out for a nice easy run in the woods near my house. The trails in there are pretty easy and not overly technical, a few downed trees made it interesting as did the boggy mud near the golf course.

I am for the most part a road runner, but you can't beat running trails for sheer excitement and the level of awareness you need to maintain as you bound over logs and rocks, zig-zagging across the trail to avoid roots and debris. It makes a nice change from running at set paces, it is all done at a perceived exertion level that can be several minutes slower per kilometer depending on the terrain.

New shoes were awesome, they are really light, super comfortable, and have excellent traction over loose gravel, roots, logs etc. I got them nice and muddy when I hit a really wet part of the trail near the golf course.

I took my camera with me so I could fire off a few action shots and get to grips with posting reports in this blog. Now I have itchy feet to head up to Gatineau Park and hit some much more technical trails with elevation gains of as much as 1500 feet.

Overall a really nice run and a lot of fun, these woods are nice and close and I have walked in them many times but I definitely wouldn't hesitate to head back there again if I fancy a nice relaxed trail run away from the hustle and bustle of the city.

About Me

A 41 year old husband to a great wife, father to 2 wonderful kids, and a self-confessed running addict.

A break from work in 2008 spurred me to take up running in place of the cycling I did to and from work each day. A former member of the "I only run if I am chasing a ball or being chased by a dog..." brigade, I surprised myself by finding out how liberating, self-gratifying, and fun, running actually is.

Starting off with a regime consisting of 3 repeats of 2 minutes running followed by 3 minutes walking I struggled in my first run, but kept at it, and progressed quickly to 5 minutes running and 1 minute walking, and then 9 minutes running, and so on and so forth until I ran my first ever 5km race in September 2008 clocking just under 30 minutes. I was hooked, and I haven't looked back.

Since then, I have run numerous races up to and including marathon distance (42.2 kms). My main goals now are to get under 3:30 for a Marathon; under 1:40 for a Half Marathon; under 44 for a 10km; and under 21 for a 5km.

This blog will track my progress, the highs, the lows, the training, running thoughts, and reports of races run during the training.

2010

Feb 21 - Winterman 10km - 57:24

Mar 13 - St Patrick's 5km - 26:22

Apr 25 - Minto Run for Reach Half Marathon - 1:56:39

May 30 - Ottawa Race Weekend Half Marathon - 1:59:56

Jun 20 - Alterna Do it for Dad 10km - 50:15

Jul 1 - Canada Day Run 5km - 23:41

Sep 19 - Army Run Half Marathon - 1:48:50

Oct 7 - GCWCC Wellness Challenge 5km - 22:35

Oct 24 - Rattle me Bones 10km - 49:22

Gear

Road Shoes (Icy/Snow conditions) - Mizuno Wave Creation 10 (now on my 3rd pair) - RETIRED!

Long/Med Shoes - Saucony Progrid Kinvara - RETIRED

2009

May 23 - Ottawa Race Weekend 10km - 58:52

Sep 20 - Army Run Half Marathon - 2:06:29

Oct 11 - Ottawa Fall Colours 10km - 53:55

Oct 31 - Beat Beethoven 8km - 42:03

Trail Shoes - Salomon XT Hawk 2 - CURRENT

GPS - Garmin Forerunner 410

2008

Sep 14 - Heart and Stroke Québec 5km - 29:55

Gregory Miwok backpack