City of Carson 8.5 miles

Current Mile total: 110 miles

What was that? Did that just happen?
I can hear Bill Bowerman say "the point of deepest penetration." Since I saw the movie Without Limits and then read the book Bill Bowerman and the Men of Oregon I have technically understood this concept but never really been able to put it into practice. Last Sunday during my recovery run I experienced just a touch of it as I ran swifly downhill and I remember thinking to myself "is this how it works?" And today on my last mile of my 6 x 1 workout I fully grasped the concept.

SO the concept is basically that if you rotate you hips forward you decrease the amount of resistance your legs experience and can lift them forward easier. Bill Bowerman explains this concept to Steve Prefontane by using the example, "you know, like the point of deepest penetration." It sounds easy but to run that way never really made sense. But as I said, while running downhill on Sunday, I recognized something I do just naturally while running downhill. I have always been able to run very fast downhill and now I'm beginning to wonder if my poor skiing habits actually turned out to be good running habits. In skiing you're suppose to lean downhill, but I was always timid and lean backward. Ok, I was scared and leaned backward on my skiis. Well, turns out, that trait while bad for skiing allows me to move faster downhill. As I said, I recognized this on Sunday and thought that I should apply it later on only to forget. Well, today I remembered and shazam. I ran much faster with a lot less effort.

So tonight was a 6 x 1 workout. Six repeats of one mile with just a minute of rest in between each. I warmed up with a mile and a quarter and started at the road's 2 mile marker. Here was my breakdown.

mile 1 7:20 (all flat, went out a little fast, still not really warmed up, finished out of breath)
mile 2 7:30 (mostly flat ending with slight incline, picked more appropriate pace finished feeling ok )
mile 3 8:00 (all up hill, finished out of breath but finished strong)
turned around here
mile 4 7:00 (all downhill, ran easily not pushing but kept good pace, finished feeling ok)
mile 5 7:20 (slightly downhill to start, finished flat, finished feeling good and)
mile 6 6:45 (all flat, figured out new technique, finished feeling great )

It's such a weird way to run actually. It almost feels like you're leaning backward and logically that doesn't sound like it would work. I mean i've always thought that if you lean forward your body would just use gravity and momentum to generate forward speed. Leaning back seems so contrary to that. It kinda like your legs just get out in front of you. Kinda hard to explain, all I know is that this guy just went a heck of a lot faster tonight(admittedly it's not that fast, just faster for me).

SO hat's off to you Mr. Bowerman. I think I figured it out. It was a great workout night and I even saw some more deer.