I work! I work!

So, I went for my first run in...three days?

Everything turned right back on and worked, which is good news. I was slow, which is bad, and my hopes of cutting about 20 minutes off of my time from last year, which, while more than a little optimistic, was pretty in line with the shape I was in before all these shenanigans began. But I'll be ok to go on Saturday so long as I stretch and keep on doing what I'm doing.

Disaster averted. Phew.

Withdrawl Pains

I am going through serious, serious running withdrawl.

If you noticed my posting absence, it's got to do with that.

I was at home for spring break, and therefore distracted, last week, and somehow fell off of the proverbial cliff on Wednesday.

I was running twelve miles, and...well, it didn't go so well.

I thought maybe it was a nutritional problem, or a hydration issue, or even the difference in terrain from where I'm at in Danville.

I fixed those, took some extra rest, and had the same thing happen Saturday during a 20-miler. Then again Monday.

Today I went to the doctor, and found out I'm 10 pounds lighter than I tought I was, and thirty down from two months ago; I think it's possible that even while I was being good about taking rest days, I created "dead legs" and the rest of typical overtraining conditions for myself by not taking in enough calories. Which would more than explain the weight loss. Just to make sure, I'm getting bloodwork done, and taking two days off (AHHHHHHRRRRGGGGGHHHHH).

More running, and presumably the resumption of normal posting, Thursday. Then cross-training Friday, the ten-miler, and back in the saddle again.

Or catastrophic failure, and a delay in my marathon plan. You know, one or the other. But I finish the triple crown Satruday if they have to carry me off the course.

City Run Recap

Isn't it nice when I recap an event in the same seven days that it happened?

Don't worry, it's only happening because I'm up early and waiting for NCAA tournament games to start. Speaking of which, I've only missed 4 games, and am winning a pool with 1,184 people in it. Just thought you'd all like to know. In that same category, I just saw a commercial for American Gladiators on ESPN Classic. I'll never study again.

But on to the race: Another record-breaking turnout, and I suspect it would have been even more than the 6,000+ if the temperature had been a little higher. You know what, I'm lazy. Let's do the rest of this in a cheers and jeers format.

Cheers: My new PR, which is 47:22 now--the old one was 55:45.
Jeers: The sheer terror I felt at the 5K mark when I realized that if I'd stopped right then, it would be a 5K PR. I thought about backing off...and then kept going. The back half would have been a 5K PR, too. Booya.

Cheers: Race organizers, for getting shuttles back to the start area this year. Nice touch.
Jeers: Race orgainzers, for still not getting this "pace group" idea down. At least the Anthem had pace signs, although they were facing outside of the fenced-off starting area. This race had no pace signs, and no segregated area for walkers...some of who felt the need to be in the front of the pack. I welcome the walkers, and hope they turn out for the last two races of the "Grand Slam"...but there's no reason I should pass them. Ever.

Cheers: Everybody who turned out to watch despite the cold; you all get gold stars, a'la 1st grade.
Jeers: Yeah, no counterpart to this, except for the people who chose to ignore their friends, family, or in some cases, 6,000 people running by their door...boo to you. Of course, I say this, and didn't tell most of my family I was running, and was told not to let that happen again. So jeers to me, too.

Believe what they say about distance running making you faster...

Running Makes Me Happy; Midterms Don't

Don't know if I'll be able to make it out today; just wanted to drop an "I'm alive" note, and talk a little about last night's run, which was interesting for two reasons, which I'll enumerate, and then shut up, because history and hinduism are both beckoning:
1) I still moved really, really fast over my first mile, but this was disturbing, not happy, like the night before, because I wasn't trying to. Now I'm going to worry a little about coming out of the gate too hard on Saturday and wheezing my way through the 10K. I ran 4 miles, but at farr too a pedestrian a pace considering how my 1st mile went.
2) Because my religion class had some guest musicians come in, I felt compelled to load up ye olde iPod with something called dhrupad, which is Indian/Hindu music. It was actually really cool, and did a lot help me maintain focus, and I think I'll have to make it become a permanent fixture...also, the guys that were in my class, were on itunes, which was worth mention. But it definitely helped me reign in my adrenaline.

Anyway. Back to studying, and maybe a short run tonight, but definitely not the 12 miles my training plan would have called for.

Bog Snorkeling, and NCAA Brackets Made Me Fast

So my roommate told me today that the British government is seeing decline in tourism from the United States, and as a result is pushing new forms of tourism while in the Isles, to include motorcycling through Scotland (actually sounds very fun) and bog snorkeling (really? I feel like you'd look like the creature from the black lagoon. I told my girlfriend this, and she said you'd BE the creature from the black lagoon...). Anyway, I thought everybody should know that.
Also, apologies for not posting/being distracted/tired/whatever. I've been in the habit of posting right after I run, which means I'm either exhausted or giddy, and maybe both. It's not good writing, and I'll try to bring my "A" game more often. Of course, I'm saying this during midterms, so take that as you may. Also, It's NCAA week, and I'm spending more time with my bracket and a fat stack of statistics than I am any human being that I don't live with or regularly tell how pretty she is. Again, apologies.
All of that said...
Last night was some kind of a career night running. No wind, good temperature, shoes broken all the way in, feeling good, and I only had a 5K on my training plan, so I decided to go burn it up and see how fast I could go. Normally when I do this, I just blow the first mile and then scale back, cause, you know, I'm lazy...
Last night my first mile (flat, on the course I take) was 6:10, and I said, are you kidding, I have to push this as far as I can...I'm not nearly as sure where my 2nd split is, so I don't know how that breaks out, but I can imagine, because I turned in 22:36 for the night. This isn't bad, but it isn't great, either, except that 1) I haven't been that fast on a mile in four years, and 2) I've never been that fast over 3. I know it's nothing official, but hey, I'm pretty proud of myself. Who am I kidding, I was all smiles, and was bouncing up and down like a tennis ball when I hit my finish line (those of you familiar with Centre, it's the wrought iron arch at the warehouse). It only got worse when I actually saw my time, heh.

Oh, and on a side note, how great is this weather right now? I was walking back to my room last night at midnight, and there were people playing football in the street. Isn't college grand?

Anthem 5K Recap

8 Days after the race.
Why? Why not. Today was a rest day, and I don't have any real running stuff to write about, so I may as well talk about that big (record crowd, from what I understand) race everybody did last weekend.
First things first, congrats to what I imagine had to be a reasonable amount of first-timers; beyond that, you get my apologies, because I was "that guy".
See, I had this unrealistic expectation that the pace group signs at the start would face inside the fences, and thereby make it easy for the runners to separate ourselves...
This, plus the big crowd, and my loathing of being cold (read: staying in the car as long as possible) meant that I was backed up pretty far in the pack, and had no idea just how far back in the pack I was. Uh-oh.
So, I bobbed and weaved, and cut back and forth, and generally made like Barry Sanders for the first two miles, because I imagine that while I meant, and had sincerely hoped, to be around the 8:00 group, I probably started with the 10:00s.

All that said, though, it was a beautiful morning, especially compared to the last two years, and I'm glad the snow held off until later in the day. Oh, and I missed PRing by 0:01. Can't decide if I'm happy about that, or if I'm even more frustrated that I spent so much of my time running sideways.

Well, nothing to do about that but take it out on the 10K.

And for the record, as much as I'm tired all over today, nothing hurts after 17 miles yesterday. So that's pretty cool. Maybe this Marathon thing will be more fun than I think.

Oh, Wow

So, this hurts. After yesterday's wonderful weather, which was so pretty it inspired me to not only not go the gym to cross train, but to count being outside in the sun walking around ant talking about how pretty it was AS my cross training, I was really pretty excited to run 17 miles today, being rested and fresh, and antsy as always after I take a day off.
Of course, today's weather was dark, and windy, and rainy. Figures. And today was one of those days that I just couldn't get my calves going with stetches, so I had to run the rust off of them with the first three miles...so, ew. That, plus a headwind...well, yuck.
Yes, me talking like a valley girl is a sign of distress.
Oh, and it rained on me after I got a few miles out, too. But I didn't mind that so much because I had brought a jacket. In any event, I'm just in too much pain to be witty/fun right now.
I made the rookie mistake of only taking the water I could carry on my fuel belt, and not stashing bottles. Dumb, dumb, dumb. Not like anybody's going to snatch them in between Danville and Perryville.
Speaking of Danville and Perryville...love the course. I am going to be SO ready for the parks this year.

Oh, and 5K recap tomorrow, because I haven't yet, and I realized that while running. Maybe I won't be so scattered, then.

Know why you shouldn't post when you're tired?

It makes you scatter-brained.
The more I run this year, the more evident it is to me that I trained not at all in the years prior. I mean, I meant to train; I went out, and I ran a little bit every few nights, and I would, indeed, run until I was tired, or cold, and experiment with my route a little bit...but it strikes me that I probably never once, in my previous two Triple Crown/mini seasons, went more than five miles at a stretch if it wasn't a race.
This explains SO much of my previous loathing of the ten miler. Also why I'm feeling like a well-oiled machine this year, when I'm bothering to go out every day, cross-train, etc, etc. Amazing what the threat of 26 miles hanging over your head will do for your motivation. Oh, and I'm better at my route planning, too. The utility on usatf.org is like magic.

Also, I think it's worth mention that with Danville and Centre both being so small, you can't help but pass your professors homes, cars, etc, and I really, really keep wanting it to be weird, because let's be honest, both parties know I pay more attention to running than I do class.
That said, it's not. The profs that see me/know about my obsession are actually very supportive-- ask about it a lot, wave that sort of thing. I'd like to make a remark about it being weird because it's not weird, but I'm not articulate enough, and it's not strange at all; I just think it's wonderful that even at a place so bent on making us the smartest humans alive (it seems) they'll give me room to work on something else.

Oh, and I'd like to add that it's still windy here. This is good, because the girlfriend and I have invested in a kite; bad because it's still a magic headwind (Mercifully, this hasn't been true on the long runs). Cross-Training tomorrow; hopefully there's no breeze inside the gym.

New Shoes!

Very briefly, hi, everybody! I'm Ben, and if you've got too many questions about who I am, well, there's a novel of a biography in the column to the right.
I have to confess, I was pretty upset with Brooks for making the Adrenaline what I lovingly refer to as "Tennessee Orange" last year; I was still hoping that I could hold off on replacing them until AFTER the marathon, though. This, as it turns out, was not to be.
So I'm "training", have been since January, and haven't had any health problems at all. Three days ago I was churning down Main Street Danville (which is kind of like Main Street Mayberry, and I mean that in the best way), and felt this pain in my, uh, hind quarters.
I called my physical therapist mother (conversation shortened for brevity).
"Mom, my (redacted) is broke"
"Ok, it's probably your sciatic nerve. I'll send you some stretches"
She did, and it helped make sure that I could run on it, but it didn't go away forever/stop happening, and it was in both legs. Well, I finally looked at my shoes, and...yeah, it looked like I had taken the impact points at the heels off with a file.
Quick trip to the running store down here, which I hit every chance I get, on the grounds that doing that keeps a running store in a town like this. Seven miles in the new BLUE Adrenaline 7s last night, and everything felt perfect, except I was craving a Krispy Kreme when I got home.

In related news (related, meaning, running): The weather yesterday was WONDERFUL until the temperature fell 12 degrees in an hour when the sun went down. Also, I've given up on the wind in Danville--whichever way I turn when I'm downtown, I'm going into it. Oh, and was anybody else arrogant enough to think to themselves that all the people that were jogging yesterday in the 60 degree weather that weren't out in the crud before were posers? I need to chill out.
In nutritional news, I've given up beer--actually all forms of alcohol--until the end of the Marathon, where I'm pretty sure I recall there being free beer in years past. I didn't miss this until I had wings two nights ago. The self-imposed ice cream ban...that was more immediate...