LSD has blown my mind!

Sorry, but this post won't be as exciting as the title makes it appear. I'm not talking about Woodstock, or anything interesting for that matter, but the LSD in the title is a reference to a certain type of training run. My schedule includes 4 types of runs: tempo runs, fartleks (tee hee!), LSDs (long, slow distance), and recovery runs. Each run has a purpose, and the purpose of LSD is to spend time on your feet, keep your heart rate under control, and increase your endurance. During a LSD, you are supposed to run them much slower than anything else, which is what I have a lot of trouble actually doing. Today was a beautiful (but very windy) Saturday afternoon. I ran just before lunchtime and there was a good bit of traffic out. I couldn't just let all those people see me running slowly. They could have thought I was tired or weak or something.

Last week I got a Garmin Forerunner 305 and have really enjoyed it so far. For those of you that aren't familiar, it is essentially a GPS enabled watch with a built in heart rate monitor. If used properly, the information provided by a Garmin can be invaluable to the development of a training plan. Hopefully, I will learn how to use it someday. Before my Garmin I ran by feel like always, and scheduled my runs according to time and just guessed at distance later. I would run 30 minutes and call that 3 miles (which used to be pretty close to correct). However, my Garmin has shown me that I actually have been running a lot faster than I thought, especially on my shorter runs. Don't get me wrong, I'm still not fast and never will be, but maybe someday fast-ish could be a fair description.

This afternoon I left the house telling Jessi I wanted to run super slow (my goal was 10:30 min/mile). A few minutes later, I ran back home to get the Garmin I forgot to take with me. I left again with a goal to run slower than 10 minute miles, as was still my goal 25 minutes later when I realized I still hadn't turned my Garmin on.

I have been listening to some strange podcasts lately which are focused towards endurance training and nutrition. One in particular is centered around applying Zen ideas and philosophies to triathlon training. A lot of it is a little out there, but I believe that there is real merit in the simplicity of the Zen school of thought. Easy training days are meant to be easy, while hard days are meant to be hard. Training moderately hard every day will not provide the benefit that mixing up your effort levels will do. Everything has its own purpose, which is kind of the point.

I have two Zen quotes that have been bouncing around my head most of the day:

1. "Eat when Hungry, Sleep when tired." -- Our bodies, and life in general, is not nearly as complicated as we make them out to be. This is especially beneficial to a overplanner like myself and hopefully I will be able to incorporate it into my daily schedule a little more. I will only eat when I'm hungry (which is all the time lately), and if I ever actually get tired, I plan to go to sleep.

2. "When washing dishes, just wash dishes." -- O.k. the dishwashing subject of this one really makes it easy to overlook, but there is some real benefit to this statement if you can get past the dishwashing craziness. Focus on what you are doing when you are doing it. It will always result in your best work. That is all there is to it.

*** Today, I ran 85 min. 13 sec. and went 8.73 miles. Tomorrow, I am heading to Oxpatch and riding 40-45 miles with my good buddy Jonny. He drug me all over Abbeville a couple weeks ago, I can't wait to see what he has in store for tomorrow. He did tell me earlier tonight that "active rain cancels my appearance." He has always been a little bit of a diva. He also claims to have Lance Armstrong's time trial bike, so I'm looking forward to seeing that. Anyway, I don't expect rain tomorrow and I'll try and check in . . .

Later. Danny.