Archive for March, 2008

So my chance at Zenfullness will have to wait – the beer fun run I mentioned in the previous post has been canceled due to crappy weather this weekend. It’s been rescheduled for next weekend, but I have the Adrenaline 5K that day, so I can’t do it. I’m excited for the race though, so no real loss, just some Zen points (and brewskies) missed.

I need your help though. Lara is just on the edge of saying she’ll do the Adrenaline 5K with me which would be fabu since the only race we ever did together was my first 5K, back in April. She’s joining me for the anniversary of that race next month, but I’d love to have her also join me for next Saturday’s race, too.

How can you help? Post a comment to either:
A) excite her into doing this race
B) guilt her into it
C) embarrass her into doing it
D) use whatever means you have to try and talk her into it

I should mention, we get an ugly kelly green tech shirt and neither of us will likely place because there are preternaturally speedy women who enter this race.

OK, have a go kids…

P.S. I just had a fabulous easy 9.14 in the rain today @ 8:43/mi. Totally off subject, but it’s my blog so I get to do non sequitur shit like that.

What a perfect day for Intervals; sunny, 52F, no wind, birds chirping, it was bound to be a lovely session, and aside from squirting myself a couple times due to my take-no-prisoners effort, it was!

Starting with yesterday, Nick and I finally got to the mall to try on my belated Valentines Day present – a fancy pair of running sunglasses. Since mid-February, I’ve been itching to order some online, but due to their high pricetag and my large nose, thought it best to try on before purchasing. Good thing I did! I had been counting on a pair of Oakleys, but they looked terrible on me and didn’t fit well at all. So we left the mall and ended up at EMS for a better selection.

My requirements were removable lenses, polarized and clear. The clear is for windy and rainy days since at my age, I don’t need to encourage more facial lines by squinting. So anyway, tried on a bunch and ended up with some Smith Factors. They look and fit fabulously, the lenses are a snap to change, and they’re a hands-down improvement over my Target Ironman pair, so that was Good Thing #1.

Then today, after my morning coffee (I know, dumb to do it after coffee, but that’s what I do), I checked my Heart Rate and it was 49 for the first time in weeks. Good Thing #2

Strange thing #1, I woke up with the weirdest cramp today, the same kind you get when you run too fast, right below my right ribs, but all I’d been doing before I awoke was dreaming. It wasn’t even a running dream, it was a dirty one…still, that shouldn’t cause a cramp. Anyway, I was worried that it would interfere with my workout since it was there until I left, but once I started running, I forgot all about it. Good Thing #3

On my warmup jog, I passed the museum where my resident construction worker cheerleader guy yelled out from yards away, “You GO, Girl!” Can’t help it, but that’s Good Thing #4 (hey, who doesn’t like a personal cheerleader?)

The interval session went very well. It was my first one in a month due to that sick shit, so I was really nervous about where I’d end up.

If you remember from my last interval report, I had decided to walk between intervals instead of jogging, with a reduced recovery period. But after posting a question about it on the Training forum at RW (because there are so many ways to recover…half the distance, 50-100% the time, HR returns to 120, etc.), I changed my tact, since one of the trustable wise men there, Go Long, made this comment:

“If you are training for maximum speed – then rest between Intervals. If you are training for both speed and increased tolerance for speed [endurance] then jog between Intervals.”

Makes sense to me, so I think it’ll do me more good to return to jogging as recovery, and that is what I did on my 6xhalf-miles today.

I programmed my Garmin for 3:30 recoveries, since I expected to do around 3:40 intervals. Aside from my 5th interval at 3:35, all the others were between 3:41 and 3:42, so I was right on target for the workout. So now I have some solid numbers to build upon. Good Thing #5

As for Good Thing #6, I have to thank Lara for that. She knew I was searching out a more Zen-like approach to my running, less goal-oriented (if that’s possible), so she came up with the perfect answer this Saturday. It’s a fun run called, “In The Pursuit of Hoppiness”, where we’ll meet with a group at the Museum and do a 5-mile easy run culminating at Dock Street Brewery for beer and food. There are already 30 people signed up so it should be a blast.

Best yet, we’ve got our men (who are both bicycle freaks) driving there with their bikes and dry clothes for us, so they’ll park at the brewery and ride around till we get there and when we do, we’ll have clean duds awaiting us! How perfect is that?? The other cool thing is I’ve never run through that part of the city, plus it’s on sidewalks, which I’d like to get over my fear of, leading to more exploration of the city in future.

And now I’m looking forward to Good Thing #7, Mexican food tonight with Lara and Jeff at a place I’ve never been to. I love Mexican food but eat it so rarely, this’ll be a treat.

In the meantime, I’ll keep looking for Good Things, I think there are probably a few more hiding out here – like, I read a fun novel yesterday (haven’t done that in forever) and I got another voiceover job for next week and….enough already. It’s all good.

Yesterday, I did an easy 9. It was a gorgeous, sunny, 60 degree day, though truthfully, only the first half of the run qualified as easy. The latter half was Flo vs. the wind – add to that the previous day’s 10K and the fact that 9 miles was my longest run in 3 weeks…I was pretty beat when I got home.

Then today, it was warm out again (how I love thee, oh shorts and tanktop) so in my mind, 6 easy should have been, well…easy. But again, I’m still spitting up little yellow chunks and my head is so infested with negative self-talk, like bon mots such as, “I need to rethink all my running goals, the downswing has stopped and now I’m fucked” kind of stuff.

Guess I’m not 100% yet; sleeping 10 hours a night and Nick made a fine point to say that if I’m still spitting up crap, my lungs are spending at least a little energy on things besides my fine aerobic system. I want to agree, but that doesn’t stop the endless hateful chatter in my brain.

I’ll be attempting intervals this Thursday, so that should give me a better idea of what my status actually is. I’m so hoping for a strongish session because I have a 5K on the 15th that I really want to do well at. It’ll be so disconcerting if, after a winter of great mileage, I can’t come up with any quantifiable improvement. That said, the 5K I most care about is in April, so I gotta give myself a break if this first one doesn’t kick it for me.

On to other, less whiny subjects: tonight, my dear friends Yvonne and Craig and Nick and I are going to Yvonne’s parent’s house in New Jersey, so that Nick and I can spy on their living situation while the parental units are away at their timeshare. Apparently, Vonny’s mom is a certified obsessive packrat and their stuffed-to-the-gills house and non-working van in the driveway (also filled with masses of stuff) must be seen in person to be believed. I consider it a museum trip.

Afterwards, it’s Sagami for the best Japanese food in the area. I stick with Tempura, sushi scaredy-cat that I am, but everyone insists it’s the best sushi around, so I have to believe ‘em.

Tomorrow, it’s a day off and then crossing fingers, Thursday shows me that I’m not all washed up. Yet.

I live about 3/4 mile from the race site, so I bundled up for the 27 degree windchill and walked down to meet “my crew” who were already busy chatting away; MattW1970 and his wife Marianne, Foxbite2, WCRunner and JoeMC.

That, right there, was such a great way to start the morning, this cluster of friends born of a running forum of all things…it defies sense and I love it.

Anyway, I’ve been nervous about choosing a goal since I’d had that 11 day span without running and was just getting back in the saddle this week. Still, I figured a PR was inevitable, since my weekly mileage was mid-50s before the flu, and that previous PR was over a big-ass bridge while this flat race is where I run daily, so of course I will PR today.

My goal was sub-48 to beat my last PR of 49:23. Since my pre-sick tempo runs were 4 miles @ 7:47, I thought I’d subtract a couple seconds for race environment and even then, it wouldn’t be a killing effort since tempo pace is slower than race pace anyway, blah, blah, blah…

I line up next to WCRunner (George), who has a lesser goal than mine but very close so we begin the race running together and I must say, it’s sweet to be racing next to someone you know. About a mile in though, George says to go ahead, he’s not feeling it today so I continue on.

Soon after I begin wondering why I’m doing this to myself, I’m miserable, it hurts, I’m tired, why am I slowing, 10Ks suck, this is too long, but then a bit of a cheerup comes when I see Joe coming the other way and then Matt soon after (again, cool to see your friends at a race especially when they’re kicking ass).

I reach the 1/2 point and am instantly back to hating it, with the added bonus of hearing myself start the mega-weeze that accompanies me to the end. Seriously, I was embarrassed by how loudly (desperately) I was breathing.

Then magically, George appears out of nowhere and then I’m like, shit, he told me to “go on” about 2 miles ago and here he is, not even breathing hard – I am really sucking. So that was a good kick in the pants to give me a bit of a move-on.

Then the funniest thing happens: some woman appears by my side and she’s talking to me, “only x minutes” “at least this part is downhill” “what’s your goal, can I ask?” and all I can say is, “I——can’t ——talk”. But she stuck with me anyway (still chatting) and man, she got my ass to keep going, we were together for 3 miles until the finish where I preceded her by a nose. My time: 49:28, so no PR today.

First thing I did was thank the woman who accompanied me in. Then we had a laugh when I realized she was the same gal who beat me in my 5-Mile race last Fall (also by a nose), so it was only fair I got her this time.

And then it’s back to my friends, my forum buddies whom I love so much. Joe and Matt are so speedy, they surpassed both their goals and Joe was #8th O.A. – he got a second place A.G. award. George was right behind my Chatty Cathy, so he did phenomenally well (considering his taper yesterday consisted of a 10-mile run…crazy 61 year old!), and won first in his age group. Dear Mattsky surpassed his own insane goal and got 41:19! Joye and Marianne also beat their goals, so it was big happiness all ’round.

I won 2nd in my AG and got a plaque. Btw, another reason to have friends at a race – when you collect an award you have the bestest boisterous cheering section, so it was pretty dang sweet.

After that, Joe and George left, but Matt, Marianne and Joye came to my house for coffee and funny talk about running and ghosts. A fabulous day, in my book.

Yesterday, I did an easy 8. About a mile into my run, I was passed by a homeless-looking guy wrapped up in thick layers of non-running apparel, none of it fit and his sweatpants were about 6 sizes too big, so the crotch hung well down below his knees. Once he passed, we kept the same pace going, so I was able to watch him for about a mile, until he peeled off to stop and deal with his clothing.

It was so sad/weird the things that went through my mind as I followed him. First off, right after he passed, I thought I smelled him, so I dropped back a little, watching him keep a sure pace despite those insane sweatpants that fell lower and lower as he progressed. After he pulled them up for the nth time, I just wanted to cry.

Here was a guy doing what I was doing, but while I had fancy aerodynamic tights, the finest, lightest wicking fabrics and would never dare to wear even cotton socks, this guy’s outfit was cobbled together by whatever he could find – obviously uncomfortable, cumbersome and not even suited to standing still.

Later that day, I thought about what if I’d had money on me? I’d have liked to have given him some money towards some running pants or even a smaller pair of sweatpants, but how do you say something like that to a stranger?

Well it just so happens, there’s an incredible group in Philly called Back On My Feet to give guys like that the shoes, clothes and motivation they deserve. It was started by 27-year old Anne Mahlum, who passed a group of homeless guys every day on her run, and thought, “I am cheating these guys. Why am I just running past them and leaving them there?’”

She was voted “Person of the Week” by ABC news back in December and if there are angels in this world, she is certainly one of them. Watch the video or read the ABC article here or better yet, if you have some dough to contribute, go to their website http://backonmyfeet.org and send them a few bucks…they’ll even send you a calendar.

The other thing that happened on my run was pretty strange. About 4 miles from home, there’s a huge cemetery across the street, very high up above the road, almost like on a mini-cliff. There were two “somethings” on the cliff part yesterday, squawking or screaming, either fighting or simply trying to keep from falling straight down to the road.

I call them “somethings” because my first thought was they’re huge birds, they were red like roosters, but they couldn’t have been roosters (roosters in an urban cemetery?), but since they were the same exact color, it had to have been a species of something, who knows…maybe a couple foxes?? But I’ll never know because I kept running on.

As I glanced a few times back behind me, wondering what in the world they were and worried they might plop onto the busy road, I realized how ridiculous it was that I didn’t feel I could stop my run to understand what I’d just seen.

So perhaps it’s time to make my runs a more Zen-full experience, relaxing my self-imposed “running rules” (ie. must not stop during a run) to better enjoy the journey, not just the destination (a.k.a. the pursuit of PRs).

Easier to say than do, because I’m a results driven person, but taking a moment to see if there are indeed crazy roosters in the cemetery somehow seems worthwhile and was certainly an opportunity I missed.