I do a lot of running with my headphones. It means I get to listen to a lot of different stuff. When I want to be inspired, maybe it’s a running podcast or some music. When I want to learn something, maybe it’s also a running podcast but certainly not music. When I don’t know what I want to listen to I let Spotify choose for me and it’s usually some classic rock but not always.
Lately, I’ve been falling back into The Doors and one song in particular is getting a heavy workout.
I always thought the Roadhouse Blues was only about heading to a Roadhouse. After this week, and listening to it a fair few times, I think there’s both a Roadhouse and that marathon training itself can be the Roadhouse Blues.
This week was the third week in a row I was aiming to run at least 195km’s. That’s also on the back of six other weeks averaging around 155km’s. The most mileage I’ve ever accumulated in a 9-week period. When building up mileage it’s very exciting to be running further each week. That game in itself motivates me to push it further. And with no major muscular aches or pains I was enjoying feeling like a winner at that game (despite finishing second in a 10km). It all catches up with you at some point though and this week I had a table for one at the Roadhouse.
Oh, keep your eyes on the road, your hand upon the wheel
Roadhouse Blues – The Doors.
Keep your eyes on the road, your hand upon the wheel
Yeah, we’re goin’ to the Roadhouse, gonna have a real, a good time
On Monday after the race I kept my eyes on maintaining my consistency through running for an hour with Georgia in the parklands in Adelaide. Georgia’s running is coming along well and to be able to get 16km’s on the board with some company got me off to a good start. I had run 12km the night before after my race earlier in the day and hadn’t pulled up sore or anything. Goes to show the benefits of running high mileage and not racing a technical trail course can bring. Monday afternoon I went out for another easy jog. I was having a real, good time as I kept my eyes and feet on the road.
Tuesday morning I joined in a RunAsOne session for the first time. I’d been invited out a few times and finally took them up on the offer. I wanted to see what this popular group is all about and plus, training with others went well about a month ago so it was nice to get the opportunity to do it again. In my head I knew coming off the 10km race I wouldn’t be too flash but I could get through 8km’s of intensity. The run was meant to be a progression run on a 1.25km loop with the aim of progressively getting quicker each lap. A pretty straightforward session coming off a race. I ran with Jacob Cocks, older brother of Riley who beat me two days earlier, and he had planned to do 8 laps. That’s 10km. Fuck me, I’m running another 10km with the other Cocks brother. We started out at 3:30/km pace before winding it up to 3:06/km pace on laps 5 and 6. Having gone into the run with the mindset of only doing 8k’s of work I was stretching it to get to 10km’s mentally. On laps 5 and 6 I could feel I was dropping off Jacob’s shoulder at times while it was getting harder and harder up the short rise. I told Jacob towards the end of lap 6 I’d only be making it one more lap and focused on hanging on him as best I could. We’d stopped progressing our times on each lap but the response from my body had certainly progressed to a point that was becoming unmanageable. I had hit the desired training stimulus so called it at the end of lap 7 while Jacob completed an 8th. Beaten again by a Cocks. Maybe I could’ve gone the extra 8th lap but I also didn’t need to push too hard and fall into a hole just after a race. Giving the following couple of days, maybe I did do just that.
After that session I put together some work for The Blue Line and drove back to Quorn. Another successful trip to Adelaide in the end, good race, good runs, good spectating at the Adelaide Invitational and even found time for a physio and Dr.’s appointment. Arriving back at Quorn I squeaked out an easy 40 minutes in some windy conditions. Nothing like ‘welcome home’ than high temperatures and high wind.
Let it roll, baby, roll
Roadhouse Blues – The Doors
Let it roll, baby, roll
There’s only one thing to do though when you’ve got 200km’s to run in a week and it’s going to be windy. You guessed it, you just have to roll out the door and get it started. Which is what I did on Wednesday morning as I began my planned 25km morning run. When it’s forecast to be windy and hot I spend the whole morning stressing about getting as much done as possible before it gets windy and hot. Usually means my running isn’t very relaxed. In addition to that, the ankle issue I sought treatment for last week was still really stiff and sore and didn’t seem to warm up much. I had entered the Roadhouse Blues.
Maybe I should stop. This isn’t much fun. Is this just the come down from a good weekend in Adelaide. You just haven’t gotten into the rhythm of Quorn life yet. That’s how it went for about 1 hr and 45 minutes until I ticked off the planned 25km’s. My body relaxed a bit after that, ah I’ve got it done despite the wind. I relaxed so much I rewarded myself with an extra 2km’s to make it to 2hrs. When the first 25km’s feels hard and the last 2km’s easy it just shows that I was losing the game of trying to chase the same mileage. It’s far easier to build it but you can’t build it to infinitum so here I was instead, hanging on to try and maintain my high mileage and my positive attitude to training for a couple more weeks.
When I came inside after this eventual 27km run I could feel I had zero energy in my arms to carry even my shoes or drink bottle. I needed to lie down so I listened to my inner little voice this time and slept on my bed for 10 minutes. Boy that was a good sleep. All I had to do now was recover, do some work on the computer and then get out the door for an easy afternoon run. I had to let it roll.
You gotta beep a gunk a chucha, honk-konk, konk, kadanta
Roadhouse Blues – The Doors
Each ya puna-ney-cha, bap, pa, lula, ni, chao
Pao-pati-cha, ni, saong, kong
Ok, I’m tired and it’s only Wednesday. I’ve just gotta make it through Wednesday arvo’s run, recharge over night, run an hour on Thursday morning and then squeeze in another easy run before work at the pool so I can watch the Maurie Plant Meet and finish off The Blue Line before it gets ‘published’ on Friday morning. Could be a late night. With these internal thoughts I was glad I had only planned easy running around that schedule. Glad at your own planning, give me a break. Thursday morning’s easy run went a lot like those lyrics above. Didn’t make much rhythm or sense at all and I just kind of got it done. Just as I was about to put my shoes on for a run in the middle of the day I got the break I needed. One of the pumps at Quorn’s pool had an issue and the pool was going to remain closed for the day. I didn’t have to work. I could rest some more and do my easy run in the afternoon at a normal time. It was happy hour at the Roadhouse.
With the extra rest on Thursday afternoon I was able to get my work done running and The Blue Line wise with a little less stress. That meant come Friday morning I was in better shape to run my second harder session for the week.
Ayy, and I woke up in morning, I got myself a beer
Roadhouse Blues – The Doors
Ayy, and I woke up in morning and I got myself a beer
I hit publish on The Blue Line just after 6am and almost had a beer. The closest I’ve come to having a beer in the morning is having a non-alcoholic one after a Sunday long run. On Friday morning instead it was black coffee and peanut butter on two bits of white toast. After digesting that I started my run. My ankle was still giving me grief each run even though I was icing it and using some anti inflammatory cream. I was excited for this run though because I was going to use my fast shoes which provide a different level of support so hopefully won’t make my ankle hurt as much (although the pace I was planning on running was obviously going to do more damage I think). After a 4km warmup I had decided on doing 6*1km (instead of 8 like I had been doing) off 60 seconds rest into 4*400, with 60 seconds rest and then 4*200 with 60 seconds rest. The aim was to run the 1km’s at 10km pace, the 400’s at 5km pace or faster and the 200’s all out. If I’m serious about running a 3km in a couple of weeks I need to practice a speed faster than what I have been doing my 1km reps at these next two weeks, hence I needed the 400’s and 200’s. While this might seem like a distraction from the focus of marathon training I think the strength and zappiness I get from running under 3:00/km once a week makes holding my estimated marathon pace, 3:15-3:19/km, a lot easier and gives me confidence. Plus it’s fun and enjoyable to run fast and the more that training is fun and enjoyable the more likely I am to do it and do it well.
After the first rep, uphill, at 3:10/km pace I thought this was going to be a difficult morning. That’s 5 seconds slower than my first rep last week and almost ten seconds slower than my average pace in the 10km race. Back down the hill on rep two I quickened up a bit. I wasn’t much quicker up the hill on rep 3 but I think I was a bit slower this week because I was being gentle with my ankle. Over the next three reps I put in a few faster efforts just to even out the average. The 400’s were next and of course on the first one I went too hard and faded towards the end. Good, this is the practice you need you doofus. Learn to pace yourself over 400m. The next one, with a slight, slight, downhill was better. Again, so was the third and fourth. The ‘200m’ (more like 160m) reps were the best though. No thinking necessary just run as fast as you can and hurt yourself. I was happy with the pace I managed on these and ended the session with confidence. My ankle didn’t really hurt during the fast running and wasn’t too bad in the warm down either.
I wasn’t out of the blues section of the Roadhouse just yet though. I had to keep my eyes on the road and my hands upon the wheel of course. That afternoon I worked up at Hawker and being my first shift back in almost a week it was a little shock to the system. Or I was just tired from the week and cumulative stress of running 195+km’s per week for almost three weeks. I was glad to fit in an easy 7km’s after finishing at the pool at 7pm in Hawker. The result of that late finish is a late entrance to the sleeping section of the Roadhouse but we got there eventually.
Come Saturday, another day I was supposed to be working at Quorn but from a running-recovery point of view I was lucky that the pump is still not serviceable so the pool will remain closed (likely to re-open Tuesday for any Quornies reading this). Another easy day involving a morning run for an hour, some grocery shopping, watering and washing and then relaxing on the couch putting this all together of course. The highlight of this morning’s run was not only the fact that I became the person who gave the briefing at the unofficial Quorn parkrun but it was also the best my ankle’s felt in few days. I made the decision on Friday afternoon to wear my second pair of fast shoes (not my race pair) for my easy jogs for a few days to see if that changes my symptoms.
The future’s uncertain and the end is always near
Roadhouse Blues – The Doors
And with the Monday-Saturday part of this blog together I am now looking forward to my Sunday long run. 35km’s of either easy running or hopefully a mixture of easy and ‘steady’ running in there too. The long run though, all 2.5hrs of it, always starts out with a bit of uncertainty and tomorrow’s no different. Will it get too hot? Will my ankle hurt too much? What about my stomach, will that give out?. And because I enjoy running near my house well, the end is always near.
The Sunday long run. I hoped to get up and out of the door by 7am to beat the heat. I slept poorly though as the ceiling fan was no match for the warm conditions so only woke up, in a daze at 6:40am. Shit, it’s 6:40 already. Coffee, toast, relax a bit, watch the Run the Bridge livestream (10km race in Hobart I’d be keen to do next year) and than out the door by 7:30am. After writing this all up yesterday I was pretty psyched on running to The Doors for the first part of the long run so I did because that’s what I can do when I run by myself, listen to whatever I bloody want.
Usually I keep the long run pretty gentle for the first hour and a half. Just get it done. Because the marathon is getting closer and because I was wearing my second best fast shoes I got rolling into 4:10-4:00/km a bit earlier than usual. I was also pretty psyched because my ankle wasn’t too bad. Certainly wasn’t 100% but it hadn’t gotten any worse. That meant I was through the first 14km’s in under an hour and started to do the maths of how fast I would need to run to average under 4:00/km for the whole 35km’s or 2hrs 30 min, whatever came first. Doing the maths early in my long run meant I could slowly start winding it up from the 16th km onwards without having to push too early.
By this stage of the long run I had also been listening to The Doors for over an hour. It’s great to get lost in one band for that length of time because you start to notice the subtleties in different songs across their collection. The mood of each song may change but the passion in their music doesn’t. And that’s one of the things I enjoy when listening to music when I run. I choose music where the band or artist are actually playing it like they mean something with it. Not just singing airy fairy into the microphone about how life’s all pretty and that. No, Jim Morrison and The Doors are just one example of a band singing passionately about a whole range of stuff. I hope to translate that energy, be inspired by it, into my running.
At the 20km mark, I decided to start winding it up further. Cue the L.A. Woman mentality. Another Doors classic. I’ve already been grooving along for 1hr and 22 minutes by now so all I had to do was just drop 10-20 seconds per km to hover around 3:30-3:50/km and I’d be content with my effort. It was a warm day and I wasn’t planning on stopping for any gels or fluids as I just wanted to practice grinding out a long fast run without any specific pace goal. Just practice the mentality of the long slow burn. Much like L.A. Woman, a 7:51 minute song that has a long intro before winding it up in the second half. Much like the marathon.
The next three-four kms were great, moving slightly down Arden Vale Rd back into Quorn right on pace around 3:40/km. Going past the 1 hr 30 minute mark I made the decision to switch to a new Spotify playlist for the next 45 minutes as things were getting painful and I needed a new stimulus. This was the burn I was after and not only was I getting it mentally and physically but my skin was probably getting it too.
At the 27km mark I came to my favourite little 2.1km ‘North Quorn parklands’ loop. I hoped to pick up the pace slightly here and sort of did. More importantly though the effort from my body to pick up that pace and then hold it increased dramatically. I was hitting the 2 hour mark and running out of energy pretty quickly. Riding the edge between holding 3:30/km pace and blowing up I felt like I was training right where I wanted to be in the Roadhouse. I floated for a km at 4:00/km pace to get things back under control at the end of the first lap and set myself up for a faster second lap. I needed to adopt the Mr.Mojo Risin’ mentality (lyrics from L.A. Woman).
Lap Two of the North Quorn parklands went better and I was able to dig into that long slow burn mentality. That controlled feeling of riding the edge of my comfort zone much like Jim Morrison and The Doors ride the Mojo Risin lyrics section. Needing only one more km to go to hit 32km’s of hard work (leaving 3km’s for a cool down to make it to 35km) I pushed out the final km at 3:25/km pace. Not quite marathon pace but that doesn’t matter when it’s 32 degrees outside and I haven’t had any sustenance in two and a half hours. What does matter is that I pushed to The End of my training limit without going dangerously over. I ambled through 3km’s of a ‘cool down’ where my heart rate and perceived effort didn’t actually seem to come down at all that much which can tend to happen when it’s hot. Still it did mean my legs and brain had a chance to recover and celebrate the fact I’d pushed them for a good 45 minute tempo after 1 hr 20 of steady running to start with. By the end, I had run for 2hrs 20 minutes and averaged just under 4:00/km. Goal ticked.
With the Sunday long run done the rest of the day will be spent pretty much indoors recuperating. An easy afternoon run will bring me over the 200km mark for the first time ever before I do it all again next week. Speaking of, next week should be pretty standard, no races, a little bit of pool work, an Airbnb guest for two nights and then another easy weekend. Perfect recipe to bang out another 200km week hopefully. After that, I’ll drop it back for a week to race the 3km on the track and a 5km team race the following night. Then it’s only 8 weeks to go until the Ballarat Marathon where I get to put my first real marathon block of training to the test. Between now and then I’m hoping to open and go through as many Doors as possible in finding out what I’m capable over 42.2km. Thanks for reading.
There are things known and things unknown and in between are The Doors
Jim Morrison (lead singer).
Fraser Darcy 
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