A big, warm “orange-heart-emoji” welcome to everyone!! ? You made it to “week 1” and the first Saturday run, woohoo!!!!!!
We had a great (very biased) PARR kick-off party where over 130+ members were in attendance this past Saturday. We tried our best to provide information to get everyone (especially newbies) started for the season. We continue to have new members join and veteran members rejoin on a daily basis – we’ll be looking to call it a wrap on the registration very soon, so if you know anyone who still hasn’t renewed, urge them to do it NOW! The cleaning out of our Facebook group has already begun!! (and in fact, has become a prompt for many to re-register after they see they’ve been removed….lol!!)
I know this email looks long (sorry, we do try to keep as brief as possible…) If you’re only interested in this Saturday’s details, go to #PARRSaturdayRun and read no further!! If you want to know about group leaders, schedules, communication, and various other sundry items, keep reading beyond that section ?
#PARRSaturdayRun
As far as the schedule (posted on our webpage, link provided later in this email), you’ll notice that we alternate the Hill weeks between the Full Marathon (FM) and Half Marathon (HM) folks. So this week the HM will be doing just a timed run, while the FM folks head to the hills (a.k.a. Bailey Bridge) to do their first Hill Workout.
We will all meet at Turner High School (4717 Bailey Rd, Pearland, TX 77584). There is construction (although not as much as last year) and still plenty of parking – so this will be our meet-up place for this week (and ALL Saturdays that call for a hill workout for either training distance.)
We will meet back at the Turner parking lot for a CORE workout led by Caroline/Kaylin at 7:00ish. BE SURE TO BRING A MAT OR TOWEL. Your elbows and knees will hate you if you don’t.
FM: 5:45 AM – 60 minutes with 6 HILLS on Bailey Bridge + CORE. You’ll run east on Bailey toward Bailey Bridge, do your 6 HILLS and return to Turner Parking lot.
HM: 6:00 AM – 45 minutes EASY RUNNING (1-2 minutes slower than full marathon pace) + CORE. You’ll run west on Bailey and turn around at 22-23 minutes and head back.
Walking group: 6:00 AM – 45 minute walk + CORE. You’ll walk west on Bailey for 22-23 minutes and return to Turner Parking lot.
Water will be provided at Turner and the base of the Bailey bridge. Half marathoners and walkers, please note that there will be no water along the course for you. Please bring additional hydration if you need it along the course.
With regard to running hills, please read Daniel Imreke’s note (one of our Black
Group Runners) below on HILL training:
“There are a variety of ways to tackle hill workouts, but we will keep it simple for the first week. Once you get to Bailey Bridge, run uphill at Marathon Pace (or 60% effort if you don’t know your marathon pace) and then run downhill at a slower, easier pace to recover and relax your breath. Once you have reached the base of the other side of the bridge, immediately turn around and repeat going the opposite direction. Try not to stop unless necessary. One uphill counts as 1 hill. A round trip up, down, and back over will count as 2 hills. Continue this for the assigned workout, 6 hills for this week for marathoners. Once you have completed 6 hills, please run back to Turner at an easy conversational pace to complete your 60 minute workout.
Running hills improves leg and heart strength, central nervous system stamina, and forces you to lift your knees (a desirable trait in running form). Running uphill reduces the impact forces on your feet and legs, but be careful while running downhill to not over stress your knees. While running uphill, your stride should be slightly shorter than on a flat surface and you should be looking directly ahead (not down). While running downhill, be sure to not over stride (try landing with your feet directly beneath your hips and let gravity carry you downhill). One way to accomplish this is to increase your cadence (# of steps per minute) while running downhill. Increasing your cadence/strides downhill will also reduce the impact on your legs.”
#PARRGroupLeaders
When you signed up this year, you opted into one of the 7 pace groups that we’ve organized ourselves into. Our fearless pace group leaders for this year are:
Black Group (< 4:00 marathon, < 9:09 pace): Paul Aleshire
Blue Group (4:00–4:40 marathon, 9:09–10:40 pace): Xochil Hinshaw & Angie Hamann
Silver Group (> 4:40 marathon, > 10:40 pace): Jay Ring
Orange Group (< 2:10 half marathon, < 9:54 pace) : Anahi Villalon
Purple Group (2:10 – 2:40 half marathon, 9:54-12:12 pace): Lori Montgomery
Green Group (> 2:40 half marathon, > 12:12 pace): Olga Somers & Linda Beltran
Walking Group: Maria Albrecht
Didn’t meet your group leader at the kick-off? Come meet them this Saturday morning, or direct message them on Facebook!!
#PARRCommunication
Facebook (FB) has been a game changer for PARR – such a great place to communicate, collaborate, coordinate and motivate. We are a running group that is quite social, thus we do engage in social media. While you may have valid concerns about social media, FB does allow our members to effectively and efficiently communicate with each other. If you choose to not get on FB, you will miss out on important posts about daily runs/workouts, and you may not get a chance to meet our inspirational and motivational members. We strongly encourage you to join FB, if nothing else than to join our group.
If you’re not in our private Facebook Group, please request to join here: https://www.facebook.com/groups/246625075376797/
Each pace group also has their individual FB page, so please make sure you get added to your respective group. Feel free to join multiple pace group pages if you’d like to follow along and possibly join other groups on runs!
Black Group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/1733432023585901/
Blue Group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/138589929921692/
Silver Group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/546775725506339/
Orange Group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/874380552695533/
Purple Group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/215856715741355/
Green Group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/950164498462321/
Walking Group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/183842738698909/
Please also post runs to the main PARR FB page so that anyone from any group planning to run your pace can join you!! Your fast day might be someone else’s easy day.
Please also continue to post general running, funny, witty, informational posts and motivational stories to the main PARR FB page. If you travel and take PARR global, please feel free to post your running adventures as you transverse the globe with a hash tag of #parrglobal.
#PARRTrainingSchedule
The entire schedule is posted here: https://goparr.com/schedules/ and please keep in mind that this is subject to change. With 300 of us, there is not one training plan that fits all paces, goals, and wants. So, keep that in mind when you load your printer up to print out this beast.
REMEMBER: the official PARR runs are the Saturday runs. The weekday runs are up to each of us to complete, AND…Lots of folks coordinate those and post these on the main PARR FB page. There are folks who tend to make it out for track on a weekly basis, and there are regular track-goers on Tues, Weds and Thurs (watch for their posts! Some go to the track at Berry Miller/Rogers Middle school on 1128, others have been going to Turner High School Track.) There are some that love the wee hours of the morning (4:30 am), others who prefer evening. Anyone in any group can come! Most of us use this time to do our weekly speed workout but feel free to join to do your own thing. ALL PACES are welcome to the track, and it’s one of the few opportunities for ALL GROUPS regardless of pace or distance to come and run together and not be left behind!! We use Lanes 1 and 2 for running speed intervals, and lanes 3 and higher for recovery and/or walking. We will be trying to switch directions on the track every week to give balanced attention to our right and left legs ?
#PARRDidYouKnow?
HM or FM? – this always means Half Marathon and Full Marathon
What the heck is the PB? The PB is the Professional Building at 2225 County Road 90 where lots of folks meet for weekday runs.
Tempo, Yasso, “race pace”……Oh the agony, can you just tell me what pace should I run? That depends, what kinda workout are you doing? Lol!! You can find your training paces using the VDOT Running Calculator (created by Dr. Jack Daniels) https://runsmartproject.com/calculator/ You can enter in one of your recent races and it’ll provide you with the various training paces, along with your race pace for various distances from a mile to the full marathon. Even if you’re training for the HM, we frequently ask you to run at your FM pace so it’s important for you to know your pace. If you are running for fun, fitness and friends, then you may not feel the need to do this. Are you a New Runner and/or don’t have a recent race pace? Take a day and go out to the track or a familiar route and run 1 mile as fast as you are able – you can use this 1 mile time to derive training and race paces of other distances. (In fact, in early PARR days we’d all take a day and go out to run a “magic mile” at the track for this very reason – this is still a valid way of deriving training paces.)
What is PARR’s mission? PARR is a great group of people who share a love for running. Many long-term friendships have been built within the group. All should remember what it was like to be a “new member” and if you see someone running or walking by themselves, take the opportunity to meet/run/walk with them – it’s what PARR people do. It’s early in the season so pace and distance is not as important as trying to find someone you can run with throughout the season. Introduce yourself to every member, not just people in your own group. If you give a bit of effort in trying to get to know someone new, you may find future long-time friends ?
If you’re still reading, you’ve reached this email finish line, congratulations!
Hydrate up and see you on Saturday!
PARR Leadership