The O-town Scene

Gone Running | by Danielle Tonner Interval training actually works I am kicking myself for missing an opportunity to celebrate … but I'll get to that later. I ran my first 10K of the year recently during Lobster Fest in Rockport, Maine. (More than 16,000 lbs. of lobster were served at the festival!) I haven't run a longer race since my half marathon in January, but I had been doing pretty well by incorporating interval training into my runs. I was excited about trying out the new method in a race. An hour and eight minutes after starting the 10K, in the pouring rain, I saw my husband standing at the finish line smiling and lining up the camera for a shot of me looking, well, like I had just run 6.2 miles in the pouring rain. I gasped, "One ... hour ... eight … minutes … gotta … walk." I wasn't happy. Not only was I drenched, I did not get a PR (a personal record). I could not imagine going any faster than I did. I thought to myself, "Maybe this interval thing just isn't working." I have mentioned Jeff Galloway before, I'm sure. He is a famous marathon runner, author and awesome dude who inspired me to try interval training. He is a strong supporter of the "run-walk-run" method (Google him!). It was tough to shift to interval running, and the little evil jerk that sat on my shoulder would whisper in my ear, "You're such a wimp _ it's not real running unless you don't stop!" I had started running with the mindset that I needed to build up my endurance so I could run non-stop. This, of course, goes against that line of thinking. However, after several bouts of shin splints, tendinitis, blisters and knee pain I decided to give it a shot. Galloway's method claims that you can run injury free, which I liked the sounds of. So, at the Lobster Fest I set my Garmin GPS watch to three-minute runs with a 30-second recovery pe- riod. I found that taking a full minute recovery walk was counterproductive because I cooled down too much, causing muscle cramps. Using this method I was able to run the last 1.5 miles or so non-stop at a really decent pace, yet I sat there disappointed that I failed to meet my goal. Yesterday I decided to put away my bib. I keep all my race bibs in a journal, along with stats of every race I've ever done (and who I did it with). As I thumbed through the pages, I started look- ing at my past 10K times _ 1 hour, 14 minutes … 1 hour, 12 minutes … 1 hour, 9 minutes, 53 seconds. What?! I actually did have a PR, beating my best time by nearly two minutes! WRITE for the SCENE Writers with journalism experience are sought to write feature articles. Those interested may send two clips and a resume to Editor Cassandra Miller at editor@otownscene.com. 6 O-Town Scene Aug. 18, 2011 The moral to this story is that interval running works. I was faster than running non-stop, and wasn't sore, either. Oh, and the other moral to the story: figure out what your time to beat is before starting your next race. That way you can jump up and down and celebrate-instead of missing it, like me. Danielle Tonner is a higher education professional and an avid runner.

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