A little tired, softball and a sore throat

I don't get sick. I do not do well when I am sick. I don't like being sick. I refuse to be sick.

I hate it so much that I have not allowed myself to be sick for years. Not one or two but dozens of years. Maybe I define sick as something different. Sick is when you have to change your schedule - when you can't do the things that you want to do. Sure - I have been hurt, cut, bruised, bleeding and in so much pain that I could not do the things that I want to do - but not sick.

I'm not sick right now. On a scale of 1 to 10 I am at a 1. I have a scratchy throat. I did not sleep well last night. I was cold. I wanted to get up in the middle of the night and take a steaming hot bath even though the temperature in the house was in the 70's. But I'm not sick - far from it!

The softball game (the playoffs) was fun but it is over now. Many of us were already developing the 'Bad News Bears take the pennet' story lines. At our level of play it is just too darn hard to win games when you do not field a complete team. Automatic outs in the line up will kill you every time.

By the way - I really am not sick - just a tickle in my throat - but I do hate being sick.

Road race to recovery

I have read that recovery after a road race takes approximately 1 day per mile raced. This being said then the 1/2 marathon race last Saturday would take about 2 weeks to completely recover. This was the longest road race that I have competed in (I have done triathlons where the total time was longer - for example - The Heart of Dixie was 1/2 mile swim, 27 mile bike, and 7 mile run - 2:22). I do not remember the recovery for that race lasting more than just a few days.

So this week following the 1/2 marathon last Saturday my legs have been hurting and very tired. I only swam or rode the bike trainer until Wednesday (4 days after the race). On Wednesday I ran 6 miles into work at a very conservative pace. This run should not have had hardly any effect on me. It was probably one of my worsts runs ever. I felt as if I was dragging my legs every step of the way. My time was at about an 8 1/2 minute per mile pace - any average training run.

Later that day is when we got out on the field for a little football. This was humbling. I run a lot - long runs, fast runs, intervals, etc, but just running around the field was hard. There is a different intensity when you are chasing someone and even more so when someone is chasing you.

Everyone was sore the rest of the week. I stayed off of my legs. So at this point I am not sure if I was sore after the football because of the lack of recovery from the 1/2 marathon or if the intensity of the football was really that high.

My training plan called for 1:45 minute run today. I was not sure how this was going to go and I was not looking forward to it. The temperature was low for Mississippi at about 35 degrees. I bundled up and hit the trail. Surprisingly the run went well. My legs worked themselves out and I was able to complete the prescribed 1 hour and 45 minute run with few difficulties. My right hamstring did get tight at the 10 mile mark but it worked itself out. Total mileage for the run was 12.5 miles for a just under 8 1/2 minute per mile pace.

I have been planning a full marathon for the spring of next year. Considering the recovery I am now having second thoughts. The recovery for a full marathon could cause my fitness to suffer.

Gulf Coast Half Marathon

It rained and stormed all night last night. Thunder and lightening and the works. Woke up at 5AM and did the morning routine plus oatmeal. The Gulf Coast 1/2 Marathon would start in about 3 hours so I filled the tank. Checked the weather for the Stennis Space Center and it said that there was a 1% chance of rain at 8AM. You have to love these 'Rocket Scientists' - I am sure that they thought that there is never a 0% chance. Hit the road right on time at 6AM and headed south for the just over one hour drive. They checked our ID's at the guard station to enter the 'Space Center'.

Registration went quick and we lined up for the start of the race - the 5K, 1/2 marathon and Full marathon all would start at the same time. I took a gel with caffeine just before 8AM, however, due to some late arrivers they delayed the start of the race by about 15 minutes.

Jodie and I walked around for a little bit and then lined back up at the start and we were off. I intentionally started very slow. I surely did not want to get caught up in the 5k fast group and burn out. I watched my heart rate and kept it low and slow. Even though the pace was slow my right hamstring started to feel tight and ache just a little - this was in the first mile!

I was clicking along at 7:30+ / mile pace. I was trying to pace off of one of the fast women - I believe that she was in first or close to first place. She looked serious - running belt with numerous gels and a GPS watch that she was pacing off of. I was not going to let her slip away and tailed her for most of the race.

So I started slow and then by about the 4th mile I picked up my heart rate just a little. I was trying to keep it under 170. I would back off every time it jumped up. I kept this up until right around mile 8 (just under an hour). I allowed my heart rate to increase to the low / mid 170's. I still felt strong but did not want to bonk or to have to slow the pace. In retrospect I should have increased my heart rate much earlier in the race. I was pacing myself off of training heart rates and not race heart rates. During a race my heart rate automatically goes up by 5 - 10 beats per minute. I had been slowly passing people along the way

At mile 12 it was time to go for broke and I gave everything. I ran as hard as I could and passed several more people. Terry, local fast guy from the pine belt pacers, passed me at the water station at this point. I tried to hang with him but he calmly and smoothly pulled away. He had finished second in the 'Hobble then Gobble' race 2 days prior. The thing is - these are training runs for Terry. His race is next weekend - the Baton Rouge Beach Marathon. Terry is just fast.

Okay, back to me. I saw Terry pulling away and I kept my pace up and continued to pass people in those last miles. I tried and tried to pull in this one person that was right in front of me. However, it was to no avail - I finished just a few seconds behind this guy (I mean like 4 seconds). Come to find out that he was in my age group and it looked like I placed 19th overall and 4th in my age group - no awards / no prizes.

During the post race party someone pointed out to me that I had counted the age groupers wrong. One of the people that I counted was female and so that bumped me up to 3rd in my age group - a medal after all!

Shortly after I finished and while Jodie was still on the course it started to rain. And rain hard it did. I had already changed into my dry clean clothes and I got soaked. I can not imagine what the people running the full marathon were thinking when that rain came.

All in all it was a very good experience. My hamstring is hurting again - I will still have to nurse it for a while. I will keep the miles up on the bike and take the running slow and steady.

swimming again

Hit the rollers at home before work on Monday. Just an easy 30 minute ride with a few lite intervals. Nothing taxing just a nice wake up. At lunch I decide to test the Achilles again with another five mile run. I increased the pace just a little after a warm-up (total was 5 miles @ 8:00 minute pace - 40 minutes). I experienced no pain in the Achilles area, however, in the last mile my right hamstring started to fatigue. It got just a little tight. Thinking back a couple of weeks to the 'Death March' I remember the same sensation. I am wondering if the fatigued hamstring altered my running stride and that is what has irritated the Achilles. I have to pay attention to this next time.




On Tuesday I got back into the pool (standard 25 yard pool). This is like only the second time I have been i n the water in 2 months. I miss the early morning routine of seeing the sun come up out in the middle of Lake Serene. This swim was, surprisingly, enjoyable. I started out slow and did a couple of sets of 100 yards and then several sets of 200 yards. I finished off with a steady 700 yard swim (14 laps - there and back or 28 lengths - just there). I did not get too bored swimming back and forth in the pool and just tried to concentrate of correct form. Total swim was 1500 yards. As a side note - for the Ironman swim (2.4 miles) -

1 mile is 1760 yards
2.4 miles = 4224 yards
4224 = 169 lengths of the pool
4224 = 84.5 laps of the pool

Track on Tap - Halloween Edition

I skipped the workout at lunch on Friday since I was doing the Track on Tap (in costume) that evening. I knew that it would not be a 'real' workout but I have been trying to take care of my ankle.

Jodie and I arrived near downtown at about 5:30 PM. Others soon started to gather and there was a photographer from the news paper working the 'Halloween Beat'. We ran down a popular trick or treating street in full get up and caught many eyes. The marines ran ahead (the guys without their shirts) and parted the hordes of ghouls with their swords. Our first stop was the 'Live at Five' concert in the park. The beer wagon had 'Southern Pecan' on tap and I of course par took (I think I par took 3 times at that stop). I also got a little hungry and bought a steak sandwich from a cute nurse (see picture) - and it really was a damn good sandwich.

We trekked over to brownstones and sat out on the balcony for more liquid refreshment. The legs and lips started to loosen up at this point. A few pints later we made it across the street for some pizza.

Charles, the rainbow colored pirate, was lobbing up easy pitches and I, was of course, knocking them out of the park with little mercy - there was no 10 run limit tonight. Lots of laughs. Soon enough the steak sandwich selling nurse was making her rounds and I had, after all, sampled her wares earlier. She stayed and played for a little while and posed for some provocative photos.

We ran past the Sanger Theatre on the way to the vehicles. Audrey was in back and must have been people watching. She was following close behind a runner and did not notice that they moved to the left. Full force, she was clothes lined at the knee cap by a cast iron bench. Ouch! I heard the clang from about 20 feet away. We all stopped. She was able to make it back to the vehicles.

Stopped at Wal-Mart and got some beer and cookies. The cookies never made it out of the car.

Feeling good with a headache and dehydrated (it must have been the cookies - damn cookies) I decide to go for a long run on Saturday. I was feeling good - really. I hit the turn around point for my twelve miles and pushed on - I was going to turn this into a 15 miler. After the 6 mile turn around point I jumped on the dirt horse trails. The soft surface and uneven terrain is good for the knee and ankle joints. I hit my new turn around point and after 10 miles I jumped back on the asphalt of the Long Leaf Trace. As soon as I did that my Achilles tendon flamed on and shut me down. I had to walk. After a few minutes I ran a little more but I could tell that this was going to end up being a death march. It was easier to transform my run to a heel strike - still this was not going to be pretty. I suppressed my pride and gave Jodie a call and requested an evak. I still had several miles to walk to the next station.

Made good time on the 10 mile run (it was intentionally slow - but a solid run) and horrible time on the 3 mile limp - Total time was 2:13 for 13 miles (a slow 10:13 pace).

There will be lots of recovery this week with little to no running and a lot of ice on the ankle. From experience, this type injury can be very persistent.

The time is now!

Got down to freezing last night and I enjoyed a brisk run into work. It was about 35 degrees when I left the house. I was dressed just about right and got a good workout in without getting chilled or overheating. I have done enough of these runs in the past that I have a pretty good idea of how to manage. I did the 6 miles run in a comfortable pace of 8 minute miles. This is a conversational pace for me and I am just adding base miles. It is much easier to run in cool / cold weather than bike. Many more layers are necessary with a 20 MPH wind chill.

My Achilles tendon started hurt just a little towards the end of the run. I need to baby this so that it does not get out of control and actually affect my training.

At lunch I decided to skip the "Dot Race" (everyone was pretty wussy with the temperature outside anyway) and I rode the exercise bike for 30 minutes. A pretty challenging effort but I was still able to read most of a Women's Fitness magazine - good stuff. After the bike Richard, Chad and I hit the WOZ (workout zone) for arms. I generally do not do isolation exercises so these always kill me.

So, it's true, I am very goal oriented. I firmly believe that if you plan something then you will succeed! Write down what you want to do, make it a priority and you can achieve it (sounds like an infomercial - you'll be saying sham wow everytime). I found a social networking site regarding goals ( http://www.43things.com/ ). Not sure if this is the site for me but I registered and put down my exercise goals - (complete half marathon, complete full marathon, complete half ironman, complete full ironman, lose body fat). You can also encourage others on goals that you believe to be worth while. It might help to motivate a little. BTW - do not do a search for fat girlfriends - you will find this guy - link ... and whatever you do - please do not go to his myspace page - link ...

Anyway - back on track -

A glass of water was knocked over on the alarm clock last night - not sure how that happened - the lights go out early at my house. Anyway I awoke to the 'zero hour'. Wake up call?

zero hour - The scheduled time for the start of an operation or action, especially a combat operation of great size. Thesaurus: A decisive point: climacteric, crisis, crossroad (used in plural), exigence, exigency, head, juncture, pass, turning point. See decide/hesitate.

I used to listen to a podcast from (I think) everydaysystems that had an episode about resolutions not just being for New Year's. Why put everything off to one time of year? Why not do resolutions (forming positive habits / breaking negative habits) all year long. So starting next month I am going to pick a new resolution and attempt to stick to it. They (I don't know who they are) say that it takes 21 days to start / stop a habit. A month should be plenty of time for self improvement. I've got tons of stuff that I would like to improve on - and fortunately I have already started some good ones and broken some pretty bad ones. (I already exercise a lot and I don't smoke anymore - if you do these then this is the place to start - let me know if you need any encouragement or to be slapped around if you slip - I'm good at this.) I'm going to try to stick to a little better diet and lose some body fat. I already eat fairly well but I get into trouble as the week goes on. I get in a calorie deficit and I overcompensate with bad food (binge - I like the cake). I have started tracking everything that eat with http://www.fitday.com again. Complete transparency! - my fitday - I'm going to track everything.

Into the wind...

Sunday was a tough exercise day. I started the day fine but was not feeling the exercise. This sometimes happens, even to me. However, I will always give the outing a fair shake and almost always I will get in the groove. When running I will not call it a day until at least a couple of miles are under my belt. At about the 2 mile mark I will start getting into - the endorphins will start flowing, the neurons will be firing - there will be joy in the world again. I never come back from an exercise session sorry for having done it - even if I am not feeling it mentally I know that it was good for my body!

So I decided to go for a bike ride on Sunday. My legs were feeling good even though I had a demanding run the day before. I was not sure how far I was going to ride but to be on the safe side I provisioned enough for a 50 mile ride. (A couple of granola bars.)

I set out on the bike and I was not into it but I was going to shake it out. There was a strong head wind that I was pushing through. On the bright side the sun was shinning and the weather cool - just about perfect. I was travelling at a good clip and blew past several runners and bikers. I quickly decided that I was only going to do a quick 20 mile ride. My heart rate was not reading on my exercise watch so I had to restart it. That blew the opportunity to do a time trial. I like to race against my best times. They are not always comparable (ie. wind, temperature, trace congestion, etc.) but I do enjoy comparing today against my best.

Well the 20 miler changed to a 12 miler and I turned around Epley. I was a little demoralized.

Later in the afternoon Jodie was going for a run. I almost never run with her - when you run with her she feels that you are competing and she can not run at her pace. Anyway, she let me run with her. I raced her to the end of the street and told her to hurry up - lol - that was a joke.

I ran at her pace and at about the 2 mile mark my Achilles tendon started to get tight and hurt. This happened a couple of weeks ago when I switched to a new pair of shoes (New Balance). I had not experienced any pain for about a week and I am not sure why this came back. We ended up with a 4 mile run.

Today, I rode in on the bike - cold and windy (tomorrow the low is 33). Still a lot of discomfort in the tendon. I decide to stay off the foot and only do strength training at lunch. I never follow a plan and attempted my usual Monday routine. I started the 'Alpine Trail' at max 8.5MPH and 12 incline for 45 minutes (last week was 40 minutes).

After the first hill (20 minutes) my foot was aching. I stopped the machine. The rest of the session was chin ups, pull up, back and abs.

The ride home I felt great even though the wind was strong.

Working the plan.

I ran 3 easy miles Tuesday morning with Jodie. The weather was nice but my Achilles tendon on my right foot was aching horribly. I was foolish and strayed to a different brand of shoe. I have tried New Balance in the past and I believe that they are good shoes but they just do not fit me well. Everything is fine with the shoe except the back of the shoe is too stiff. I put about 15 miles on them and my Achilles felt, not stranded or pulled, but bruised. These shoes have been shelved. On a related note I also bought a pair of light and fast Adidas running shoes. Also not a normal shoe for me. These shoes are working great. Against my own advice I continued to run even with the pain just not in the New Balance shoes.

I also ran at lunch with Vic and Chad however I did not participate in the "Dot Race". I ran the course but not the race. I started slow and tried to increase my speed at each 1/4 interval. The last 1/4 mile was an all out 1:22. Pretty good considering the pain and already have run 3/4 of a mile at a 'good' pace.

Woke up this morning feeling good and wanted to run a light tempo run (faster than normal but not all out). I was shooting for about 5 BPM below lactic acid threshold (LT - also called aerobic threshold - this is the level you can sustain without going anaerobic). So after a short 1/2 mile warm up I started at the 5k start / stop point of a known out and back course. I accelerated to a comfortably hard pace. Clicked off the first mile at 6:38. Not anywhere near 1 mile records but feeling strong. During training I have so much difficulty sticking to the PLAN. As I said I was feeling strong and pushed just a little harder - maybe to just above LT. Hit the half way point and charged home. The ground was wet from a light rain the night before and the sun was still not all the way up. I missed the last mile marker so I was unable to get my splits. With about 3/4 mile left I pushed the pace higher. I was now well above LT. Breathing was labored. Still strong but having to push hard. Was about to cross under the final bridge with a 1/4 mile left and I gave everything. Arms were pumping, my stride increased (not always a good thing), and I focused on the goal. Crossed the finish line feeling like I had accomplished something. My day was made. Ended up with an unofficial personal best 5k time of 19:42 - 15 seconds better than my race times. For the record I will add about 10 seconds because the start/stop is not marked exactly - but I will take it.

I guess the time off probably really helped - I tend to have a difficult time taking the easy days easy and I rarely train smart. Something that I have to work on.

I am getting inspired for the 1/2 mary coming up. I had previously only been going through the paces. It is now time to put the goal in permanent marker and work the plan.