Lisa is so awesome. She knows I need to get back into shape for Regionals, and so has designed a workout to help me as best as possible. I'm so lucky to have friends like Lisa.

Date:    Thu, 16 Sep 2004 10:21:52 -0700
From:  	 Lisa Timmins
To:  	 Kitt Hodsden
Subject: massage & intervals

Hi Kitt,

Couple of things:

I have some time during the day tomorrow (Friday) -- if
you're available for massage, let me know.  I'd love to
promote the healing of your ribs!

And, along those lines, I thought I'd share with you some
ideas for jump-start-you-into-uber-ultimate-shape track 
workouts.  As I mentioned the other night at dinner, I'd 
focus on mid-length intervals (400's and 200's) for now.
That way you can focus more on maintaining a faster pace 
than you would in going out for a 2-3 mile run.  By giving 
yourself minimal rest in between intervals (i.e. not allowing
yourself to recover fully), you are actually boosting your
cardiorespiratory capacity as much as you would by doing
longer endurance runs.  Not to mention that you're doing
so at a race pace that's much more similar to ultimate 
(i.e. fast!) AND increasing your recovery capacity as well.

All workouts begin with 2-3 warm-up laps, light stretching, 
high knees & butt kicks, etc., and a couple 50m accelerators 
(get to a sprint by the end).  They end with 2-3 cool-down 
laps and light stretching.

Stay healthy!  Monitor your injuries and don't put yourself 
over the edge.

Aim for a 90-second pace on the 400s, a 65-second pace on
the 300s, and a 35-40-second pace on the 200s.  Run the
100s as fast as you can move your legs.

I'm listing 3 progressive workouts here, with the idea that
you can squeeze them all in before Regionals (every 5-7 
days) and still have time to "taper."  You can do alternate 
fitness stuff (Gino, easy run, etc.) on the other days.

 
TRACK WORKOUT #1
Warm up.
4x400, rest 75 seconds between each 400.
Break for 2:30.
4x400, rest 75 seconds between each 400 .
Break for 2:30.
4x400, rest 75 seconds between each 400 
  (third set only if you feel like you can handle it).
Cool down.

TRACK WORKOUT #2
Warm up.
4x400, rest 75 seconds between each 400.
Break for 3:00.
4x300, rest 55 seconds between each 300.
Break for 3:00.
6x200, rest 45 seconds between each 200.
Cool down.
 
TRACK WORKOUT #3
Warm up.
4x300, rest 55 seconds between each 300.
Break for 2:30.
4x200, rest 45 seconds between each 200.
Break for 2:30.
4x200, rest 45 seconds between each 200.
Break for 2:30.
4x100, rest 30 seconds between each 100.
Cool down.

Remember that these are pretty tough workouts, so if you're 
feeling like they're not that challenging, either a) you're 
not running hard enough, or b) you're already in good enough 
shape!  I'm not going to say "no pain, no gain," but do 
realize that you have to push your body outside of its usual 
comfort zone in order to achieve results.  Give 'em a try 
and see what you think.

-Lisa 

Given my migraine today, working out at ASA was probably the least intelligent action I've taken in the last year. Well, that coupled with the lack of complete rib healing.

The workout was a fairly easy one, as these things go. I didn't want a hard one. And I didn't want one with a lot of jumping!

We started with ladders. The usual, nothing new this time.

We then progressed to hopping over hurdles for form running. The plan is to run with the feet cocked to minimum lost of momentum on foot plant and extend. My left foot tends to point out, so I concentrated on bringing it in. Despite clearing the tall hurdles by 3-4", I still twisted my left foot in or out.

We did two sets of both feet step between each hurdle, right foot first, then left foot first; then hopping with both feet together; then hopping sideways left foot first, then hopping sideways right foot first, then one foot between each hurdle, starting with the left, then starting with the right.

That might have been better in a list format.

Next came hopping over the hurdles, followed by sprinting forward quickly. Sometimes the bounding felt good, sometimes I knew I was off. I did 10 jumps (5 each way) over the 6" hurdle then sprint forward, repeat 5 times. Kris had to jump over the 12" hurdle 20 times before sprinting.

We alternated the drill of jump up with a weighted ball between and catch the ball at chest level with the drill of jump down from a 12" box landing with both feet and springing up to a 24" box. We did these two drills three times each, alternating, adding the weighted ball on the second and third box hops.

A short shuttle run was next. We started at a cone, then sprinted to the right 5 yards, stopped, turned around and sprinted 10 yards back, then stopped and turned around to sprint back 5 yards to our starting point. Kris' times were around 4.7 to 4.3. Mine were 6.0, 5.8. 5.7, 5.3 and 5.7.

Last we had abs. I was unable to do most of them (read: 95% of them) because of my ribs, so I did what I could, which was little. Kris, on the other hand, caught the full force of the abs and was exhausted at the end.

I'm trying to figure out how I could have possibly made my workout at ASA harder. Let's see, I have a broken rib (okay, mostly strained, with the ligaments/cartilege between the last fixed rib and the first floating rib traumatized), migraine number seven this afternoon, that time of the month yesterday, I haven't exercised much in the last three weeks, and I ate a half sandwich just before I went over to ASA.

I wasn't actually planning on working out, but G's attitude is so infectious, so encouraging, that I just had to try. I did okay, but I'm definitely out of shape.

Yet, I'm still not sure show I could have made the workout any harder.

It's 4:45 in the morning. I've been up all night trying to launch the new UPA website. I'm tired. I know I'm tired. I'm actually quite close to exhaustion. But I need to get (most) of this done. I'm finishing up the last details on the site, and writing the basic documentation for using the site.

A few minutes ago, a dancing light played in my vision. It was, um, interesting. It was a bright, bright pinpoint light that displayed at top middle of my vision. When I looked up, expecting to see a dust particle, it moved. So, I followed it, as it danced in my vision. It lasted all of maybe two seconds, but it was amazing to watch. Very, very bright, and small.

I hope it's not a migraine signal. Could be. Though, the count is currently 6-4, as of yesterday (okay, okay, maybe 6-4.5).

Sho' 'nuff, it's a doozie. This one has zapped my motivation and added large amounts of pain to my day. Officially, this is number five for the year, but number 4 wasn't a real one. It was over before I knew it started, and there was no pain involved.

As of this point, I'm going to call that half one merely break-through bleeding and be done with this half thing. I declare the count to officially be 6 to 4.