WFR #17: Recovery | Wed 8th Apr, 7:30pm | Prospect Park Weekly Form Run

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When: Every Wednesday at 7:30 p.m. (run leaves at 7:37 abouts).

Where: Find The Big Red Pointer(TM) (center of the map, click here).

Distance: A single figure 8 lap of Prospect Park, ~4.6139 miles.

Optional Distance Sub-group: 3 miles or less if that's helpful (please let Run Leaders know).

Today's Direction: Right as you face the park at startup.

Pace: Welcome to all. Fun.

AQI: We're monitoring Air Quality Index here and have been asked to not run if the local index exceeds 125.

Where this week's topic fits in:

I dragged this week's bubble ("Recovery") to the top of the topics hierarchy and gave it a good shake. The result was this Bubble Diagram. "Recovery" is supported by "Relax", "Smile", and "Arm Swing". "Kneesles" mutually supports, and is supported by, "Recovery".

Just in case you'd like to explore, here's a pretty QR Code for Week #19:

Towards the end of Week #19 Notes (below "The Mantra"TM) there are links to all the WFR weekly topics.

This week's focus: Recovery (rest, building - week 17 of 19)

TL;DR: If you don't have the strength for anything else... Smile :-)

Congratulations to all who ran the marathon on Sunday, bravely giving up their extra hour of sleep the previous night.

This week's recovery, we'd like to focus on when and how to run on tired legs. Since those ancient days ruled by COVID-19 curfew rules, we've graduated from running a slow obstacle course around our roof (pictured above), with frequent stops for Margaritas in the bleachers. (We've also restarted occasional after-WFR roof get-togethers - a "recovery" of a different kind.)

This post here from Runners Connect has a great breakdown of a necessary balance. While you will need to run on tired legs for any type of training to build, the rest portion is equally important: 

"Be sure to keep your easy runs slow. One of the most common mistakes runners make is running their easy day mileage too fast. This hinders your ability to recover and doesn’t provide any additional aerobic benefit. Research has shown that the most optimal aerobic pace for an easy run is about 65 percent of 5k pace. For a 20-minute 5k runner (6:25 pace for 5k – 7:20 pace marathoner), this would mean about 8:40 per mile on easy days."

"...don’t be afraid to take a down or rest week every five to six weeks where you reduce mileage by 65 to 75 percent and reduce the intensity of your workouts. These down weeks help you fully recover from and absorb previous weeks and months of training so that fatigue doesn’t build-up too much."

If you're into heart rate measurement, the recovery protocol presentation here recommends recovery runs at less than 76% of your max heart rate. You can use your "Arm Swing" turnover rate to set your run effort.

Recovery:

• Recovery is vital to improvement 
  
• If you recovery more quickly, you adapt and progress more quickly 
  
• Easy running and cross-training can improve recovery 
  
• Lifestyle factors (sleep, diet, hydration, stress) affect recovery 
  
• Kenyan secret = no distractions aids recovery 
  
• Recovery training is counterproductive if done too hard
  

Sample workouts: 

• 30-40 min easy run 
  
• 45 min “spin” on windtrainer 
  
• Recovery weeks (decrease mileage and intensity) about every 4 weeks 

ALSO - fast-recovery workouts like: 8 x 400m at 1-2 seconds/per lap faster than 5K pace, punctuated by 200m "recoveries" that are only 15 seconds per lap slower than the intervals. These may be for advanced peeps though: "Pfitzinger agrees that the workouts are probably most useful for elite runners in shorter races, although he extends the range upward to the half marathon." 

For a more day by day workout recovery guide, one of the Fitzgeralds discusses how it's OK to feel some discomfort in recovery:

"...although recovery runs are often referred to as 'easy runs,' if they’re planned and executed properly they usually don’t feel very easy. Speaking from personal experience, while my recovery runs are the shortest and slowest runs I do, I still feel rather miserable in many of them because I am already fatigued when I start them. This miserable feeling is, I think, indicative of the fact that the run is accomplishing some real, productive work that will enhance my fitness perhaps almost as much as the key workout that preceded it." 

Post-long run routine from this post from Jason Fitzgerald. He recommends after a long run: 

• Within 10 minutes, eat protein and simple sugars.
  
• Within 30 minutes, 3 full glasses of water. 
• Within 45-60 minutes, have a full meal focusing on protein, low GI carbs, and healthy fats like olive oil or avocado. 
• Within 90 minutes, shower, continue drinking water, and start winding down. 
• After 2 hours, a 1.5-2 hour nap.
• After the nap, some green tea or coffee. Caffeine speeds recovery and both are perfect running recovery drinks. 
• Then a 10 minute easy walk or do some light drills to loosen up.

A great reminder here is that if we need to take time off for injury, we don't loose too much fitness! Here is some of the data. Remember your Kneesles, which will help you avoid new injury as you recover and return.

To drop some science, contrary to popular belief, soreness is not caused by lactic acid accumulation (which causes immediate muscle discomfort) but by actual microscopic muscle damage. Specifically, cellular damage post-marathon is best measured by the presence and production of Creatinine — a marker that indicates damage to skeletal and muscle tissue (which by itself may indicate chronic kidney issues, since healthy kidneys filter Creatinine) — and increased Myoglobin levels in the blood stream. One study concluded that increased levels of Creatinine persisted more than seven days post-marathon while another study discovered the presence of Myoglobin in the bloodstream for 3-4 days post race. Both of these studies clearly indicate that the body needs rest after a marathon to fully recover from the cellular damage caused during the race.

Related WFR Topics
"Arm Swing" #4 (bubbles), "Relax" #5 (bubbles), "Kneesles" #15 (bubbles), "Smile" #19 (bubbles).

Reading Bubble Diagrams:

Bubbles in the pictures are individually linked to the most recent notes. They are now no longer pictures (hooray), they're auto-generated scalable vector drawings.

Topics are related to each other. Some more or less directly than others. Bubble Diagrams (e.g. this week's topic bubble diagram) illustrate how they are related. Bubbles nearest the top are more directly related to this week's topic. The path to the top illustrates a chain of related topics. Topic bubbles are expanded once in their highest position (most closely related to this week's topic) and are colored blue (or colored black if this is a topic's only appearance). Duplicated bubbles are colored green, which is no less important than a blue colored bubble at the same vertical distance from the root.

Lines that join topic bubbles have been colored. Blue connecting lines illustrate a child topic (lower) supported by its parent topic (upper... think waterfall). Purple connecting lines illustrate the child topic supporting its parent topic. Black connecting lines indicate bi-directional (mutual) topic support. Lightly colored connecting lines indicate topics that are pulled out of the way, as the level they occupy is too crowded. One day 3D (AV) will allow us to walk through bubble diagrams (like tinkling mobiles hanging from your ceilings) and currently lightly-connected bubbles will just be viewable at a different angle (by spinning the view) and not colored differently. One Day... ahhh... One Day.

📢 ANNOUNCEMENTS 📢

What are you doing April 26? How about doing good?! We’re looking for volunteers for the NYCRuns Brooklyn Experience Half at Fluid Station 2 right here in the neighborhood. And, if you volunteer, get $35 in gear credit! 

When: Sunday, April 26 @ 5-10am

How: Sign up on nycruns and use passcode TEAMNBR2026

Join us for trivia April 8! Your New Member coordinators are hosting trivia at 7PM at Other Half Brewing Domino Park. Everyone welcome! Find the event on Heylo here.

Come to our spring town hall meeting on Saturday, April 11th at the Swinging Sixties Senior Center at Manhattan Ave & Ainslie at 10:30. We’ll open at 9:30 with donuts and coffee! Coordinators and the board will give updates on the year so far and there will be time for any questions or concerns you may have.

Wednesday Night Road Run (WNRR) is looking for additional run leaders. WNRR starts at 7:30 PM at McCarren (Tom Stofka Garden) and is generally 4-6 miles, and the paces are 7:30-10:30mm. Email Run Coordinators at training at northbrooklynrunners.org 

with your conversational run pace and a brief intro by EOD, Saturday, 05/02.

Apply for team spots at the 2026 NYCM! Thanks to NBR’s Mile 12 Water Table volunteer effort at last year’s race, the club received 5 spots for non-complementary guaranteed entry to this year’s marathon. Apply by May 1! https://forms.gle/4tSsW35mKHvx62AK7 

What races are you running? Let us know here!

📢 Weekly Daddy Joke 📢

Q: How did a lawyer with a damaged ACL win the marathon?
A: He had power of a-torn-knee.