Monday, January 16, 2012

[1/16-1/22]: GSTC Accepts Invite to MSG's US Open

GSTC Accepts SMR Invite to US Open 
NYC, NY- On Wednesday, the national office of the USATF extended a formal invitation to the Garden State Track Club to participate in one of its most prestigious indoor meets, the US Open.  Citing successes both at the Outdoor National Club Championships and its 3:24 mile relay last weekend at West Point, the invitation to compete in the sprint medley relay in the nationally televised meet is by far the biggest race in club history.  The US Open, the first meet in the 2012 Visa Championship Series, has live coverage on ESPN2 on January 28 from 7pm-9pm.  It is held in the hollowed ground of Madison Square Garden, perhaps the most famous athletic arena in the world.
 
Due to the unusual size of the Garden's track (175m instead of the normal indoor 200m), the relay will be 750m (4 laps)-550m(3)-350m(2)-350m(2).  The Gold will lead off with 4:08 miler and 1500m national club bronze medalist Chris Heibell, then go to Tony Harris, who is undefeated this indoor season.  Ricardo Garcia, who lead-off last week in 50.3, will carry the baton for the first 350m leg, and the anchor will be veteran Mike Brito, a seasoned sprinter who took 3rd at the West Point Invite open 400m last weekend.  GSTC will bring club national 800m qualifier Duval Sewer and club national 400m IH scorer Alan Brussard as alternates. 
 
This group will join an impressive list of Olympians competing at the US Open, including Bernard Lagat, Asafa Powell, Veronica Campbell-Brown, David Oliver, Jenn Suhr, Christian Cantwell, Adam Nelson,Jesse Williams, Dawn Harper, Lolo Jones, Kellie Woods, and Tiffany Ofili-Porter, Justin Gatlin, Trell Kimmons, Richard Thompson, Daniel Bailey, Jason Richardson, and Ryan Whiting.
 
More information about the meet can be found here: http://www.usatf.org/events/2012/VisaChampionshipSeries/index.asp
Interested in attending?  We can get discounted tickets as an invited team- please email us at gardenstatetrackclub@gmail.com.
 
 
 
Dixon Runs PR, Places 8th in Naples Half
Naples, Florida- While we were all freezing our buns off, distance star Mike Dixon continued his superb 2012 season down in the warm confines of Naples, Florida.  Coming off a win at the Westfield Hangover Run and a course record at the Watchung 50k thus far in 2012, Dixon averaged 5:15 a mile to hit the tape at 68:44, good for 8th place overall in a highly competitive field racing for $15,500 in prize money.  Dixon's time is 2nd on the GSTC's all-time list, behind only Jeff Perrella's 68:12 from the 2011 Philadelphia Half Marathon.  Two wins and an all-time PR- not a bad first three weeks of 2012, that's for sure!

 

Dixon, Anis, DeCarlos Announce RR Committments

New Brunswick, NJ- Mike Dixon and Mike Anis announced they will be joining forces for the 2012 Road Relays this February 26th, hoping to challenge Tony "Polite" Harris and Jeff "Quiet Storm" Perrella for the overall open men's title.  "Let's get one thing straight- this isn't a 'coolest nickname' contest- this is a relay race- and we're going for gold," commented a confident Anis during a press conference in his living room early Saturday morning.

The Road Relays is a 10k race whereas each team is comprised of two runners who each run two 1.55  mile legs.  It is the first of three road races hosted by the GSTC, serving as both a fund raiser for the club and a team bonding experience for the entire running community! 

The DeCarlos, Meghan and Rob, have declared their status in the open co-ed division, hoping to take down the year old record set by Adam and Amy Nalven.  They might return to defend their 2011 title, but chances are an eight-month pregnant Amy might slow down the duo considerably, although we are not exactly exonerating them for this!

Oh, and Ricardo Garcia and Mark Parisen have announced they'fre joining forces, but they're just a bunch of half-milers who, after 801m, become fairly soft anyway- although they may give the Rutgers duo Zack "The Attack" Speigel and Dan Teichmann a challenge in the male college division.

Learn more about it, register, etc here: http://www.gardenstatetc.org/roadrelays/rr.html

 

Heibell Accepted to New Balance Invitational Mile

NYC, NY- Clu supastar Chris Heibell, fresh off a first-man performance at club cross country nationals, recently had his application accepted to compete in the New Balance Invitational Mile on February 3rd.  This is a big meet for Mr. Heibell- congrats!


 

Marathon Group in Full Swing

Attached is a picture from this weekend's group run from the GSTC-North Compound up in Saddle Brook.  Drop coach D a line at robbob13@hotmail.com with any questions, or just wait to talk with him in-person at our Road Runner Sports team fund raiser in two weeks!

Weekly Diet Tip: Shawnee Naughton (snaught@eden.rutgers.edu)

So what is all the hype about with organic, local,  raw, and minimally processed food diets? Well, good health begins with plants and animals raised in healthy ways on mineral-rich soil; and with meats, eggs, milk products, fish, grains, legumes, fruits and vegetables that are packaged in ways that preserve and enhance their naturally occurring nutrients. By choosing foods that are organic, locally grown from a reputable source, and/or foods that can be consumed raw are the best options for attaining a nutrient dense diet that will not only help you to reach your goals, but that will also keep the environment healthy for all of our futures. Contact me if you would like some helpful tools in finding the healthiest foods in your area.

 

Team Runs This Week
Monday: 3:00 @ 10 Dennis Street (NB)
Tuesday-Thursday: 5:30 @ RSC
Friday: 4:30 @ Rutgers Student Center
Saturday: GSTC Ladies Run @ Buccleuch Park (email claire.tafelski@gmail.com for more info)
Sunday: 9:30am @ Westfield Running Company 

Save The Dates...
Thursday, January 19: Thursday Night at the Races (Armory)
Thursday, January 26: GSTC-Rutgers Team Meeting
Friday, January 27: GSTC Fund Raiser @ Road Runner Sports (Keynote Speaker: Rob DeCarlo)
Saturday, January 28: US Open @ Madison Square Garden
Sunday, January 29: Team Meeting @ Claire's House (after team run at 9:30)
Saturday, February 11: Millrose Games (GSTC invited in DMR, SMR, 4x200)
Sunday, February 26: Road Relays (11am, Buccleuch Park, team-hosted race)
Sunday, March 11: Music for Miles 20k (first NJ-USATF Grand Prix race)

 
This Week in Training
Distance
This week, you should hold your volume from last week - we'll take another bump next week.  A few quick notes:

1) If you need a day off here or there, take it.  Don't feel forced to hit mileage totals if your body tells you otherwise.  Remember the ultimate purpose of training is to race well, not to hit mileage counts.  If your body is telling you to cut a run short, or take a day off, do it.  You will train better from that day forward if you do, and that will lead to better race performance than slogging through the training because that what the plan states.

2) We've hit a stretch of rugged conditions.  Modify the interval times accordingly for very cold and/or windy conditions.  Your body doesn't know times, your body knows effort.  The purpose of each workout is to run at a particular effort for a particular duration of time.  So if it's so cold that you're wearing an extra layer, you need to modify the times.  If you're faced with a headwind, modify the times.  It's about working smart, not just hard.

3) I'm going to include times for intervals from now on.  It was brought up to me that there is a very wide range of abilities following this training plan.  Clearly a person running 400 intervals at 68 is running a very different workout than a person running the same distance in 95 seconds with the same level of effort.  Again, it's about effort and duration.  So if the purpose is to run 65-75 seconds at mile pace, running 90-95 seconds at the same  effort is a MUCH harder workout - it's 50% more time at the same running effort!  So it makes sense then that the runner who runs these intervals at 95 seconds would be better off running 300s at mile pace so the duration is back down to the duration it should be.

Monday - Comfortable run + 8x80m strides (substitute the strides for 6x8-10sec all-out hill sprints if possible)

Tuesday - Ladder - 2x200 with 200 jog in between, 2x400 with 200 jog in between, 2x800 with 300 jog in between, 2x400 with 200 jog in between 2x200 with 200 jog in between.  The 200s and should be at 800m pace, the 400s at mile pace, and the 800s at 2-mile pace.  If he 200s are longer than 40 seconds, run 150s instead.  If the 400s are longer than 80 seconds, run 300s instead, if the 800s are longer than 3:00, run 600s instead.

Wednesday - medium progression run (75% of long run duration)  Start out very comfortable and drop it down.  These runs are all about learning to run on feel. These runs can be fun to do if you have a Garmin, but you don't need one to know that you're upping the tempo every mile.  In fact, having a device like that can take a lot of the fun out of doing something that's can just as easily be done off the clock.

Thursday - Super easy 40-50 minutes (or off day if you need it!)

Friday - Fartlek run of 8x2:00 on/3:00 off.  The key is to run the "off" segments at an honest pace, like what you would run for the comfortable runs on Monday and Saturday.  Don't drag through these the way you would for the jog recoveries during an interval run on the track.  Try to get 5-10 minutes of warmup and cool down on either side of the fartlek work.

Saturday - Comfortable run + 8x80m strides (substitute the strides for 6x8-10sec all-out hill sprints if possible)

Sunday - Long run 90-120 minutes.

 
Sprinters
Monday-  (5:45 @ Bishop Ahr) 400: 3x300 @ 800m; 8x 50 @ 200m; 800: 1x1200 @ 2 mile; 6 x 200 @ 600m  
Tuesday- 12x100 stride; LIFT
Wednesday- OFF
Thursday-  Race @ Armory (800/ 4x400)
Friday- 10x150 stride; LIFT
Saturday- (1:00am @ Bishop Ahr) 400:  2 x (12x100) 800m: Michigan 600s (you'll see...)
Sunday- 400: 16x100 stride; 800: 60-70min run


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