So He's Human After All

This morning could have gone either way. This was a drop down week for mileage and I slept pretty late so just getting out the door was a challenge. Once I was going it turned into a great 10.5 mile run. Lots of people out running, biking and walking. I didn't wear a watch and I added my Sadie loop to add a couple of modest hills. Yesterday was 15.6 on the Lady Bird Lake Trail. I ended the week with 56.7 miles, my lowest mileage since the week before Boston.

After my run yesterday, I looked up the Stockholm Marathon site to track Mike's day. He has continued to say he was going for a sub 3 hour attempt. I have had a hard time training with Mike since he announced his plan to go for 3 at Stockholm. As much as I would like to support his effort, I felt that he was setting himself up for a major disappointment or injury going hard again so soon after Boston. That said, he amazed me with his run at Boston and I know for a fact that he will own a sub 3 marathon time. So, for the past several weeks, I have held my thoughts while others on the team joined him for long runs and special workouts to prepare. I've remained silent while others offered support and encouragement. At times, I even thought I should simply tell him he was ready and could take it. So, Mike, if you read this, I appologize for not being able to get behind you 100% in this endeavor. I'm very happy that you found a way to make it a positive experience. I'm very glad you are going to take a well deserved break. I look forward to having you back for workouts later this summer. I'm also glad to learn that you are in fact human because I was having a hard time trying to keep up with Super Man.

Seconds Anyone?

I felt much better through the day yesterday after my morning run. I knew that I wouldn't get a run in today or tomorrow so I joined Ruth Anne and the evening group for an 11 mile run last night. I have wanted to know how two a days would feel for some time. I started out thimking I might bag it but after 2 miles I felt good and had a great run. I ran with Kent and Jim averaging a 7:35 pace. Headed to all day training today and to Ft. Worth tomorrow.

Running with the Green Monster

Yesterday morning started with a pounding headache and painful stomach cramps. I deceided to skip the team workout and run later. Well, later never happened. I was feeling puny all day. As I headed to bed last night, it occured to me that this was the start of my semi annual sinus infection. I did a sinus irrigation before going to bed and managed to get some sleep. The main thing that did was reduce the drainage so my stomach didn't hurt this morning. I decided to see if I could run through the Green Monster (snot) and figured it might actually help. Eileen wanted to rinde her scooter to school so I accompanied her and started my run from the school. It took 3 miles to get things loosenend up but it turned into a decent run of 9.5 miles.

Did I tell you the one about...

I forgot to mention the highlight of yesterday's run. I was headed east on 34th St about to cross over the little Shoal Creek bridge and needed to get off the street to avoid a line of cars. What happened next all occurred during one stride:

I left the ground pushing off with my left foot from the street jumping the curb. As I scanned for a landing spot, I saw SNAKE! I have this Homer Simpson squeal that I reserve exclusively for SNAKES that escaped about that time. Once the squeal was out of the way, I noted that the SNAKE was about 6 feet long and I was going to land about 2 inches from it's head. The first evasive action was to tuck my legs up underneath me to gain hang time. Then I executed a very nice straddle split but realized that I couldn't land with my legs out to the side. So, I retracted the legs and went for a maximum forward stretch with my right foot. While I was about 4 inches away from landing, I noted that the SNAKE had not moved. I had not seen any visible injuries but I was in the process of concluding that Mr. SNAKE was in fact dead as I landed.

I next executed the fastest rebound stride of my life and began to try to restart my heart. It restarted and revved up to about 680 bpm for 2 or 3 seconds before returning to "normal". Did I mention that I have a thing about SNAKES?

Today was 10 miles easy. We are headed out to the farm to ride the trail horses and hang out a bit. Happy Memorial Day 2009!

Got it going

I have a busy week coming up so I planned for this week to be a hard week and the upcoming week to be a recovery week. To finish off this week, I decided to run from my house to Whole Foods downtown and meet Ruth Anne. She was meeting with a nutritionist about some issues and they planned to be done by noon. I wanted to get there, have brunch and do some shopping and be ready to leave at noon. So I plotted my course on gmap-pedometer coming up with 13.9 miles door to door. I estimated I would run a 7:30 pace which worked out to 1 hour 44 minutes running time. I needed to leave at 9:30 to get there by 11:15 leaving 45 minutes to eat and shop. I through some pants, shirt and sandals in Ruth Anne's car along with my phone and wallet. I carried a car key, $2.00 and my 5oz flask of Carbo-Pro. I walked out the door at 9:30 and stopped my watch at the Whole Foods door in 1:43:27 at 11:15 on the dot. I didn't wear a Garmin and there are no mile markers along the way so I ran a 7:27 pace by feel for 14 miles. That is a huge thing for me since pace awareness has been one of the hardest things for me to find. The week total was 76.4 miles on 6 days of running. So since Boston, I've posted weekly totals of 25, 63, 81, 70, 76. I will likely miss 2 days this week and total less than 50 miles for the week. I am beginning to gain some confidence in my new hydration/nutrition plan. If the runs continue to go well and the nutrition gives me what I need to close on race day, I am setting up for a great race year. Goals: <3:10 at Portland in October and <3:00 at Boston next April. All I can say right now is: I got it going!

Got Something Right

After my gastric distress last week, I knew I needed change something. I decided to try 2 things (I know, not very scientific) different today. I mixed the Carbo-Pro mixture a little stronger and ended up with 10 oz instead of the 16 oz I drank last week. Then I took only a small sip before the run started and waited until I had run the first 6 miles before I started taking sips from the bottle. I also took smaller sips more frequently today than last week. I won't know for a few weeks if this is the complete answer but as for today's run, it was GREAT. I met up with Damon at 4:50am (that hurts just writing it). We did the prescribed stretching and set out to log 6 miles. We didn't map out a route and just started running. We kept an easy 7:50 pace and had just enough time to find the rest of the BSSW crew and head out for the group 14 miler. We started out easy enough, 7:30 pace, but after the 3 mile water stop, the "big boys" as they like to refer to themselves began seriously pushing the pace. At about mile 7 Sean and I were running a sub 7 minute pace and the lead group was quickly pulling away. Steve caught us about this time and said he was going to put a stop to the runaway train. At the next water stop we regrouped and ran the remainder of the run as a group of nearly 20. The pace was comfortably quick, the conversation fairly clean and the 40 blocks of Duval downhill! At the last water stop I decided that when the group leaders started to close the final 2 or 3 miles I was going to go with them and see if I could stick. The push started 2.5 miles out and got serious when we hit the San Jacinto hill. I was right in the middle of the pack as it began to string out and lost only 100 meters on the lead group over the last mile! I was easily clocking a 6:20 pace and felt good. I'm going to stick with the same Carbo-Pro strength for a few weeks and repeat the consumption strategy. Overall pace for the 20 today was 7:11 so the 14 mile pace works out to a 6:56!

After the run, I delivered a "First Aid" care package for Russ. Mike is going to meet up with Russ while he is in Sweden for the Stockholm Marathon. I'm excited to see how much of a lift it will be for Russ to have Mike hook up during a leg of his incredible journey.

After the post run stretching, 78 pushups and 78 crunches, I began to wonder where Ruth Anne was. She had planned to run 10 or 12 miles and I expected to see by this time. I finally aksed Carolyn if she had seen her on the course. Carolyn remembered then that Ruth Anne had told her to pass on that she was going to run the full 14! That really got me excited. Ruth Anne's comeback took a hit last week with a sinus infection and I wasn't sure if she would be able to get back to full mileage that quick. I'm getting excited about her prospects for a BQ at Portland.

Coach Geezer

I find it interesting what your brain will decide to think about on a long run. I've got about a billion different things I'm working on right now that I would expect to be on the front of my brain, but today I was thinking about how I'm going to coach the upcoming Austin Marathon group for Rogue. The running part is easy, Steve, Ruth and Carolyn plan out the workouts and long runs for the whole 24 weeks. What I'm talking about is the motivational componant. Last season a couple of runners dropped or changed groups within a week or two of the start of the program. Everyone else started and finished the Austin Marathon. Of those several had PRs and several BQ'd. So, how can I build on that? No definite answers yet but I've got some ideas that I'll be thinking about.

Ran my 10 mile D K Ranch route today. No watch. Didn't see any of my regulars but I did pass a couple out running. I passed them from behind and said Hi as I went by. As I was rounding the corner, I heard her say "did you see how fast he passed us?" That's what I call an ego boost!

De Train, De Train!

Trains train and training. Today was another cool (did I really see gloves out there today?) running morning. I arrived too late to leave with the 14 miler group so I headed out with the 10 miler group planning to complete the 12 mile version of St. Eds on my own. Kamran, Jason and I cruised easy up to St. Eds campus and cut over to 5th street where we parted. Jason was waffling on the distance but ended up opting for 10. I figured I could run 7 on my own and continued out on the course. In the 40 times I've run the S. Austin Ramble or St. Eds loops I've never been stopped by a train on Banister Dr but as I turned the corner a LONG freight train was heading inbound. About a block from the tracks, I noticed the 14 mile group had been caught and picked up the pace to try to catch them. I was about 100m back when the gates lifted so it took me another mile or so to catch up. Where I caught them was about 1/2 mile from the 12/14 mile route split. I was feeling really good, appeared to have plenty of time and thought I would prefer the company so I decided to run in with the 14ers. The sun was just coming up, the sky was clear, the air was crisp and the conversation was mostly clean. It was pretty much a perfect group run. The Garminators where tracking the mileage and informed the rest of us that we were going to come up short (do ya think? Even the Garminless can tell we weren't doing 6:30s) so we added a half mile further on the trail before heading back toward Rogue. As we turned north onto Waller, I could hear the light rail train horn and projected that we might get stopped by yet another train. There was a CapMetro crew waiting at the crossing as we approached, I could hear the train coming but the gates didn't lower. However, as we turned the corner, the gates went down at I-35 while the train was still 1/2 mile out. I never actually saw the gates go down on Waller. This light rail is turning into a huge disaster. Not only that, but have you heard the horn on these things? Its loud. The urban dwellers are going to quickly tire of the noise. Assuming it actually goes into service before the urban dwellers move back to California where real estate is cheap.

I'm Lovin It

This cool, breezy, sunny weather is GREAT! I am going to run a full schedule this week then take a recovery week next week if the heat comes back in full force. I started playing with the concentration of Carbo-Pro this morning mixing 2 scoops with 1oz of water. Since I can get water on any course, I want to carry the smallest possible quantity. Today's mixture had 224 calories in 2oz fluid volume. That means I should be able to carry a full marathon's needs in 4 fluid oz and supplement water from the course. I think I can manage that.

Oh yeah, today was the first payoff for learning names of the interesting folks on my running routes. 20 minutes into my run, it occured to me that the spreadsheet I had helped format for Ruth Anne to use in a listing presentation was missing an important label. I somehow needed to contact her to let her know but I couldn't possibly make it home before her appointment. I was a mile or so from Sadie and Chad's place but I don't know the house number. I was wondering if Sadie would notice me out in her street hollering for her when I noticed Skip's garage door up. I headed that way and saw him crossing the street back home. I asked to use his phone and he gladly let me in. He of course heard my side of the conversation and proceeded to ask me about what the market was doing and what he might get for his house. I've not yet received my license but I HAVE read about the penalty for acting like an agent without having a license so I promised him that I would have Ruth Anne do a market analysis and get back to him. So, I caught Ruth Anne before her meeting AND possibly got a client for her. Whooo Hoooo.

13 Cool Ones

Slept late this morning and after feeding the horse, dogs, chickens and daughter I pulled on my running shorts and headed out for a run. I was generally following my 10-12 mile route but made a couple of spontaneous turns and ended up running 13. I felt great for all but a 1/2 mile around mile 10 when I developed a side stitch. With temperatures in the low 60s there were lots of folks out running, walking and riding. I was even escorted by a large bulldog for 3/4 mile or so. I logged 70 miles for the week even taking a day off on Wednesday. I'm going to play with the concentrations and amounts of Carbo-Pro to see if there is a combination that will work. My stomach is now the only thing between me and 3 hours.

Signs of trouble

Today was the first test of my Carbo-Pro hydration/nutrition at distance. I met Damon for a 6 mile run before the 14 mile group run which turned out to be 14.6 by my calculations. I made up 3 - 6oz bottles of Carbo-Pro. I drank 1 driving down, number 2 during the 6 mile run and was working on the 3rd during the 14 mile portion. About 9 miles into the 14 mile portion I developed a side stitch and began falling behind the group. By mile 10 I felt nauseous and could not pick up the pace for the close. I finished without actually throwing up and felt fine once I stopped running. Overall pace for the 20.6 miles was 7:32, 7:20 for the 14 miles, so it was a valid test of how this is going to work. I am going to give it a few more weeks before going back but I will play with the strength of the Carbo-Pro mixture over the next few weeks. During the post run stretching, my feet and quads were cramping up. I may have not hydrated adequately yesterday and that may have contributed. I'll work on that next week.

Running with the big boys

A handful of the former Black Short Shirtless Wonders have taken to referring to themselves as the Big Dogs. I really don't want to get caught up in that way of thinking and blow up halfway through the training but today I felt great from the get go and headed out with Ken Damon and Muss for whatever they had planned. When I'm feeling good it's kind of fun to start out a run not knowing how far or how fast we're going. Turns out we went 10 miles at a 6:54 pace. I was easily conversational until the final 2 mile push but even that felt good. I am enjoying the stretching routine and hope that it becomes part of my routine. The Carbo-Pro nutrition/hydration seems to be working well. The only problem is carrying a flask. I'm going to work on carrying dry powder and mixing on the road. Gotta go feed the horse and check on the chickens now.

The New Me

First team workout since Boston. I left the house with 10oz of Carbo-Pro and consumed all of it before completing the 8 mile run. I ran with Sean for most of the run and he advised me toward the end that we had run a 7:12 pace. Steve has adopted a stretching routine for both pre and post run. In the past I typically have avoided stretching as I felt they led to injury rather than preventing them. HOWEVER, since I now think that most "injuries" that runners suffer are not injuries but adaptations I did them all enthusiastically. I actually felt better in the first 3 miles than I have in the early miles of any run since before CALI. We'll see tomorrow if I am experiencing any "adaptations". There was a great deal of defiance from the long time teamers regarding the stretching and the familiar added mileage junkies. I ran the 8 miles prescribed and will attend Happy Office hours tonight with Ruth Anne to discuss my mileage plan with Steve. It is scary how good I felt going into Boston and how good I continue to feel. I'm looking forward to a solid training for Portland that hopefully results in another lowering of my PR. After Portland I am planning to renew my all out assault on 3 hours at Boston 2010.

Dreams Dashed

We didn't make the St. George lottery. So, now it is time to re-assess my short term goals and re-focus on a successful race at Portland. I'm going to give it a few days or maybe even a few weeks before thinking about a definite goal for Portland. Ruth Anne has the same goal for Portland as St. George, go under 4 hours and qualify for Boston. My goals are somewhat less definitive, 3:10 or 3:00 or 3:15 or 3:05? I am looking forward to visiting Portland and will see if we can spend a few extra days after the race to do some sight seeing. We spent our honeymoon in Seattle and Washington State but I've not been to Oregon. Tomorrow is the first team workout and I'm looking forward to getting back into the routine of training. So, here we come Portland!

Anticipation

We entered the lottery for the St. George Marathon last month. Today the results are supposed to be posted at 5pm MST or 6pm local time. My guess is that the site will crash about 6:00:36pm and stay crashed until sometime tomorrow but I will be on my computer trying to get on at 6:00:01pm anyway. Ran my usual 10 this morning with my now typical pre run dose of Carbo-Pro. I will be taking a flask to drink on longer runs to see how I do. Said Hi to Kitchen Timer Tom this morning.

A full week

Completed my first full week with no recovery days needed. Logged 80.6 miles and feel pretty good. The heat is going to take some adjustment but the Carbo-Pro is working so far for hydration and nutrition.

Ughhh

16 miles of ugh. 8:02 pace and that felt hard. This heat is taking its toll. On the positive side, I drank 5oz of Carbo-Pro before the run and 5oz during the run with no problems.

Les Misérables Terme

It might have been the Kobe Burger. It might have been the jalapenos on that Kobe Burger. It might have been the grilled onions on that Kobe Burger with jalapenos. It might have been the tater tots with the Kobe Burger with jalapenos and grilled onions. It might have been the Anejo Smash after the Kobe Burger with jalapenos and grilled onions with tater tots. It may have been the Anajeo Smash before the Kobe Burger with jalapenos and grilled onions with tater tots. It might have been the snack of cheese, jalapeno olives and salami with the Anejo Smash before the Kobe Burger with jalapenos and grilled onions with tater tots followed by an Anejo Smash. It might have been the heat the morning after a snack of cheese, jalapeno olives and salami with the Anejo Smash before the Kobe Burger with jalapenos and grilled onions with tater tots followed by an Anejo Smash. In any case that was a miserable 10 mile run. I'm glad its over.

Grand Canyon Man and The Wild Woman

A year and a half or so ago, before I began this blog, I had an hilarious moment during one of my runs. I was trying to get my pace down to a 3:10 marathon pace and had decided to run that pace every Monday. At that time my weekday runs topped out at 5 miles so I used a zig zag route through my neighborhood. Twice I passed a woman out running going opposite directions and the second time we acknowledged each other with a nod. As I was nearing the 4 mile mark, I was really struggling to hold pace but saw that she was going my direction now up ahead. When I was about 50 yards behind her, she started running like hell and yelling something. It took a moment to realize she was saying that she was not going to let me catch her. So there we were, a forty something woman being "chased" through the neighborhood by a forty something man at 7am in a light rain and she's hollering at the top of her lungs that she won't let me catch her! I nearly had to stop I was laughing so hard. A week or so later, I saw her again and we stopped to introduce ourselves. Her name is Marcella but I can never remember that, thinking of her as the Wild Woman in the hood.

Today, I ran past Grand Canyon Man. I think his name is Lawrence and he walks around the neighborhood with a 40 pound pack in preparation for hiking the Grand Canyon this fall. I've stopped to talk to him before but found him hard to get talking. I'm finding it quite fun to get to know all of the interesting characters around here.

As for the run today, I am now really experimenting with my nutrition/hydration. I have previously worked up to 6oz of Carbo-Pro prior to running. Since I had problems on Saturday and I drank a few oz of water during the run, I thought I should start figuring out the cause. Is it caused by drinking after I have been running, or is it what I'm drinking that causes the problem. So, today I mixed my 6oz of Carbo-Pro and drank half. Then I carried the rest in a flask and drank 1 oz at mile 3, 5 and 7. I had no problems. During the last 1/4 mile I had some sensations in my gut that could have been the beginning of something but the run was over before it got bad. To test out this line of study, I'm going to try drinking plain water tomorrow, same quantities and places. Then I will alternate for a few days to see if there is a correlation. Today's run was my usual 10 mile route and I did not wear my watch.

Kitchen Timer Tom

I've now met Kitchen Timer Man. His name is Tom (hereinafter referred to as Kitchen Timer Tom) and he walks an hour a day, unless its raining. He stands out from the other neighborhood walkers due to the kitchen timer he wears clipped to his shirt pocket. So now I know Kitchen Timer Tom, Jack On The Bike, Max Clean and Skip the Lawyer. Other than my breif stop to chat with Kitchen Timer Tom, I ran an easy 10 miles on my normal DK Ranch route. I got a late start so it was hot and muggy.

Running/Training/Recovery

Is there a difference between running and training? Does "Recovery" mean no running? I think the answers to these questions are different for every individual and may in fact be different for the same individual at different times of their life.

A Ramon Sighting

Decided to take the extra sleep and run from home today. Elected to run my 12 mile Raincreek/Fireoak hill route. As I was cruising past the Great Hills Starbucks I saw Ramon Acosta and stopped to see how he was doing. He says he hasn't run since Boston and his achilles still hurts. I recommended that he treat it with Aleve or Advil for a week and see if that improved it. He is a typical runner who avoids the meds so I hope he will follow through. He asked me what my route was and he told me he lives off of Raincreek. His house is exactly at the 6 mile mark on my 12 mile loop so we might join up on some of our weekday runs. That would be fun to have a little company every now and then. I had my Carbo-Pro again this morning and had no problems. 12.2 miles in 1:29:42 = 7:20 overall pace.

Chicken Run

I spent Saturday afternoon and all day Sunday constructing the chicken coop. Well technically, I've constructed the chicken run and still need to add the coop and nests, but those are simple cabinet construction that will be hung an the walls of the run. The construction involved a lot of heavy lifting, ladder climbing and endless nailing of wire staples. My hands feel like they've been stepped on by an elephant, my right gluteus maximus has a knot the size of a grapefruit and my back must have been manipulated by a pretzel maker. So my run this morning was a recovery run from chicken run construction. At the start I felt like crap and decided I even looked somewhat like a chicken trying to run. Once I loosened up it actually felt like a pretty decent run. I didn't wear my watch but I'm guessing I averaged better than a 7:30 pace.

I'm in for some suffering

My fuel/hydration problems have always started around the 16 mile mark of long runs. If I drink or eat anything immediately before or during a long run, I develop a side stitch followed by nausea and/or tingling of my extremities and finally tunnel vision and dizziness. I have been drinking Carbo-Pro and water before my runs now for 10 days but today was the first run longer than 10 miles. I drank 6oz of water with Carbo-Pro before the run and 3 drinks of water during the run of approx 3oz each. By mile 12 I had a major side stitch going and contemplated stopping. I held on but had we gone much further I would have been dropped by the group. I am going to give it one full month of attempting to fuel and hydrate during runs. After that, I suppose I will have to adjust my goals or give up the marathon. It was good running with the group again and getting a soak in Barton Springs Pool afterward. The topless chick made her appearance and that always makes for an entertaining round of commentary.

And the weatherman says Ugh.

Ran 10 miles this morning. I felt tired, left the watch at home and it seemed to take forever. I think the heat and humidity was just oppressive and kind of dampened my enthusiasm. Now that Ruth Anne is running again, we have to negotiate times for running on the mornings we both need miles. Tomorrow she needs 12 and I'm planning 15. If Anne can watch Eileen then we can run at the same time otherwise, one of us ends up running in the heat. Ugh.