Back in the late fall, we had a little stretch of seasonally warm weather. I recall reading a long term weather report that said if the weather was that warm that late in the season, it meant we were in for a pretty mild winter. It was right around the time my participation in the marathon was confirmed, and I can remember thinking to myself that it might not be that bad training outside this winter. All that I have to say to the person that came up with that theory is that you should never predict the weather again....ever.
This weekend was brutal. Having reviewed the forecast earlier in the week, I decided to skip Saturday morning (0 degrees with the windchill) , and wait for the afternoon, when it was supposed to warm up to a July-like 20 degrees.
I missed a run earlier this week and decided to make up for it by going the full 14 miles. I decided that, due to the relatively low mileage for a weekend run, I'd hit the hilly course I did a few weeks ago and extend it out a bit by adding a tough hill at the end.
I felt lousy for the first 2 miles. I felt slow, my shins started to hurt and it was just damned cold. But, once I hit the 4th mile and the GU started to kick in, I started to warm up and feel better and stronger. But as I got to the 9th mile, it started to get cold again as it started to get dark. I had to keep pulling my face mask up over my mouth, as it was starting to get numb and had trouble moving my jaw.
I also had to contend with an unbelievable number of pine cones that we lining the sidewalk along Route 30. I never realized that these things could be so treacherous, until I slipped on one and then found another lodged within the outer sole of my Mizunos which was there for about a 1/4 of a mile.
As I pulled into my driveway at the end of the run, I was exhausted, even more so than from last week's 16 miler. I still ended up with a decent time, but my splits were still far from negative. This is obviously something I still need to work on. Not having a lot of experience at mileage like this, I still need to figure out how to keep things in check on the front end so that I have something left in the tank on the back end.
http://connect.garmin.com/activity/23571505
I'm looking forward to a week of sticking to the schedule and gearing up for the 18 miles next Saturday will bring. It's kind of a nice feeling to set a new personal record each week related to distance. Right now, the forecast looks pretty good, but we all know how that goes...
On the donation front, I received a few more contributions this week which was terrific. It's pretty amazing that these have still been coming in, and I haven't even sent out a follow up notice since my first one went out in the beginning of December. Thank you again to everyone for helping up to this point.
Sunday, January 31, 2010
Wednesday, January 27, 2010
Monday, January 25, 2010
Little By Little
Saturday's group run brought us out to scenic Wayland and the Longfellow Club. The location was perfect due to the fact that the club was a 10 minute ride from my house, which allowed me to leave the house a little later than usual.
As I signed in, I took the leap to write down a "16" next to the anticipated mileage. Having never run further than 13 miles up to this point, I was a little nervous bumping that up by 3 miles in one shot. After stretching, saying our hellos to our fellow runners, receiving a few team updates from Jan and route instructions from Jack, we were on our way.
It was a fairly cold morning, with a start time temperature of about 15, but there was no wind and the sun was out so it felt warmer than that. I started out with Mike and Aimee, both of whom have experience running Boston, as well as the route we were running on this day. I was a little nervous running with them due to the fact that that their normal pace is quite a bit faster than my 8:30/9:00 per mile, but they assured me that they weren't going to push it on a long training run and that negative splits were on the docket for today. That was music to my ears. As we started out down Route 20 and took a hard right around Sky Restaurant, the pace was easy and everyone in the group was able to have a casual conversation.
As we made it out to the first water stop, I felt great. Our splits were a little on the fast side, but within reason. We continued on past Lincoln-Sudbury High School and made our way down Lincoln Rd. to Concord Rd. After not having my bearings for the first quarter of the run, I suddenly realized where I was, as Katie takes the same back roads to work on occasion. As we made it to the second water stop, I still felt great. The last couple of miles had us running at sub 8:30 splits, which may have not been too fast for Mike and Aimee, but was approaching the orange zone for me for a long run. We started to slow things down as we left the stop and headed towards Rt. 117. We made it up to the final water stop and the halfway point in 1:11:46, which had us at an 8:45 avg pace to that point. I kept my Garming going at the water stops so it was probably showing a slower pace than what was really the case.
This is where things started to hit a bit of a bump for me. As I went past Verrill Farm, my stomach started to feel lousy and I had to slow down a bit. It subsided somewhat as I kept going, but it ended up being something that I needed to manage myself through for the entire second half of the run by walking a few times here and there. This was the second run in a row for me where this happened with no history of this in the past, so I may need to get in front of this moving forward. I tried to hang with Mike and Aimee as we kept going, but I told them to take off once we hit the final water stop with about 3.2 miles left. I was able to keep them within sight for most of the way back to club, which was a moral victory for me. I also screwed myself up ealrier thinking that I could see Rt. 20 in the distance, when it was really Rt. 27, which meant I had more than the mile left that I initially thought. Shoot.....!
When it was all said and done, I had a really good run. The total distance ended up at 16.35 and I even finished with a sub 9:00/mile pace which I was really happy about.
http://connect.garmin.com/activity/23015584
Lessons learned from this run include:
1. I need to work on my negative splits. Jack made a point about this during the run prep, but did I listen......???
2. I need to eat a little lighter before my runs.
3. I can push myself a little more than I thought on the long runs, as long as I'm smart about it and listen to myself when I start to hit the wall.
The run ended just in time for me to meet my gang in the lobby of the club for John's weekly swim lesson. Mike was able to hang around for a while (which John was really excited about) and see his little cousin make his way up and down the pool with his 3 other little friends for the 1/2 hour lesson. John and Audrey were also the lucky recipients of cookies on the way out once the lesson was done, courtesy of Jan who was still there in the lobby closing up shop after the run (thanks, Jan.)
I took Sunday off completely and I'm planning to just do some more stretching today. I'll move this week's runs back a day each leading up to Saturday's long run. Have a good week.
As I signed in, I took the leap to write down a "16" next to the anticipated mileage. Having never run further than 13 miles up to this point, I was a little nervous bumping that up by 3 miles in one shot. After stretching, saying our hellos to our fellow runners, receiving a few team updates from Jan and route instructions from Jack, we were on our way.
It was a fairly cold morning, with a start time temperature of about 15, but there was no wind and the sun was out so it felt warmer than that. I started out with Mike and Aimee, both of whom have experience running Boston, as well as the route we were running on this day. I was a little nervous running with them due to the fact that that their normal pace is quite a bit faster than my 8:30/9:00 per mile, but they assured me that they weren't going to push it on a long training run and that negative splits were on the docket for today. That was music to my ears. As we started out down Route 20 and took a hard right around Sky Restaurant, the pace was easy and everyone in the group was able to have a casual conversation.
As we made it out to the first water stop, I felt great. Our splits were a little on the fast side, but within reason. We continued on past Lincoln-Sudbury High School and made our way down Lincoln Rd. to Concord Rd. After not having my bearings for the first quarter of the run, I suddenly realized where I was, as Katie takes the same back roads to work on occasion. As we made it to the second water stop, I still felt great. The last couple of miles had us running at sub 8:30 splits, which may have not been too fast for Mike and Aimee, but was approaching the orange zone for me for a long run. We started to slow things down as we left the stop and headed towards Rt. 117. We made it up to the final water stop and the halfway point in 1:11:46, which had us at an 8:45 avg pace to that point. I kept my Garming going at the water stops so it was probably showing a slower pace than what was really the case.
This is where things started to hit a bit of a bump for me. As I went past Verrill Farm, my stomach started to feel lousy and I had to slow down a bit. It subsided somewhat as I kept going, but it ended up being something that I needed to manage myself through for the entire second half of the run by walking a few times here and there. This was the second run in a row for me where this happened with no history of this in the past, so I may need to get in front of this moving forward. I tried to hang with Mike and Aimee as we kept going, but I told them to take off once we hit the final water stop with about 3.2 miles left. I was able to keep them within sight for most of the way back to club, which was a moral victory for me. I also screwed myself up ealrier thinking that I could see Rt. 20 in the distance, when it was really Rt. 27, which meant I had more than the mile left that I initially thought. Shoot.....!
When it was all said and done, I had a really good run. The total distance ended up at 16.35 and I even finished with a sub 9:00/mile pace which I was really happy about.
http://connect.garmin.com/activity/23015584
Lessons learned from this run include:
1. I need to work on my negative splits. Jack made a point about this during the run prep, but did I listen......???
2. I need to eat a little lighter before my runs.
3. I can push myself a little more than I thought on the long runs, as long as I'm smart about it and listen to myself when I start to hit the wall.
The run ended just in time for me to meet my gang in the lobby of the club for John's weekly swim lesson. Mike was able to hang around for a while (which John was really excited about) and see his little cousin make his way up and down the pool with his 3 other little friends for the 1/2 hour lesson. John and Audrey were also the lucky recipients of cookies on the way out once the lesson was done, courtesy of Jan who was still there in the lobby closing up shop after the run (thanks, Jan.)
I took Sunday off completely and I'm planning to just do some more stretching today. I'll move this week's runs back a day each leading up to Saturday's long run. Have a good week.
Thursday, January 21, 2010
Halfway There
With my latest donations this week, I'm more than halfway towards my fundraising goal. I feel really great about it and, even though it's been said a few times in the past, the generosity of my donors has blown me away.
With the team crossing over the $750,000 mark to date, we're past "mile 4" of our collective fundraising goal. We've got a long way to go, but we're off to a great start.
Looking forward to Saturday. The forecast looks a little cool, but good.
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Saturday, January 16, 2010
Fun In the Sun
For those of us that never really have the chance to run when it's light out this time of year (which is about 99% of the runners in New England), it was nice to go for a long run in the middle of the afternoon vs. o' dark hundred. As if that wasn't good enough, the temperatures reached the mid-40's, which given the recent temps around here, felt like July. I decided to forgo the usual 80 layers of clothing and stick to just 2 long-sleeved shirts, shorts and tights. It was nice to actually be able to move when I run and not feel like the little kid from "A Christmas Story".
I decided to tackle a really hilly route that I ran quite a few times when I was getting ready for the half-marathon in October (the total elevation gain is 1,348 feet vs. last week in Newton, which the Garmin calculated to be 856 ft.). It's a fairly quiet route traffic-wise that goes by a golf course, a farm with horses and longhorns and a fruit stand. In other words, pretty rural. Due to the lack of traffic, I decided to use the IPod today, and to make sure it was charged before I went out (unlike last week). After having a great run with the DFMC group last week, I was wondering how it was going to be doing a long run solo this weekend. Having the newly updated mix definitely helped.
As I was starting out, I was a little concerned with how I was going to feel, having done almost 7 miles yesterday. I ended up having a great run and feeling the best I've felt in a while.
http://connect.garmin.com/activity/22503523
I came to the conclusion today that I always feel stronger and faster when I run later than 8:00 am vs. the usual 5:45 am time during the week. Not only was my time and pace better than last week's long run, but I didn't stop once on the hills, which I was never able to do back in the fall. I decided when I was done that the route was one that I'm going to take advantage of in the future in order to help prepare for Newton in April.
As great a day as this was, the weather forecast is bringing me back down to earth, with 4+ inches of snow predicted for Sunday night and temperatures back in the 20's and 30's over the coming week. I'm looking forward to the group run next weekend in Wayland. Johnny has his weekly swim lesson at the same health club we're invading next week, and I'll be finishing up right around the time his lesson begins, so it works out swimmingly (sorry, couldn't resist).
On the fundraising front, I am just about at the $3,000 threshold. THANK YOU to everyone who has donated up to this point. With the economy still on life support and being on the heels of the holidays, it is truly amazing and humbling related to how generous people have been up to this point. I think that it's a solid example of how many people are affected by cancer and what the potential of beating this disease means to each of them.
Have a great week and happy running.
I decided to tackle a really hilly route that I ran quite a few times when I was getting ready for the half-marathon in October (the total elevation gain is 1,348 feet vs. last week in Newton, which the Garmin calculated to be 856 ft.). It's a fairly quiet route traffic-wise that goes by a golf course, a farm with horses and longhorns and a fruit stand. In other words, pretty rural. Due to the lack of traffic, I decided to use the IPod today, and to make sure it was charged before I went out (unlike last week). After having a great run with the DFMC group last week, I was wondering how it was going to be doing a long run solo this weekend. Having the newly updated mix definitely helped.
As I was starting out, I was a little concerned with how I was going to feel, having done almost 7 miles yesterday. I ended up having a great run and feeling the best I've felt in a while.
http://connect.garmin.com/activity/22503523
I came to the conclusion today that I always feel stronger and faster when I run later than 8:00 am vs. the usual 5:45 am time during the week. Not only was my time and pace better than last week's long run, but I didn't stop once on the hills, which I was never able to do back in the fall. I decided when I was done that the route was one that I'm going to take advantage of in the future in order to help prepare for Newton in April.
As great a day as this was, the weather forecast is bringing me back down to earth, with 4+ inches of snow predicted for Sunday night and temperatures back in the 20's and 30's over the coming week. I'm looking forward to the group run next weekend in Wayland. Johnny has his weekly swim lesson at the same health club we're invading next week, and I'll be finishing up right around the time his lesson begins, so it works out swimmingly (sorry, couldn't resist).
On the fundraising front, I am just about at the $3,000 threshold. THANK YOU to everyone who has donated up to this point. With the economy still on life support and being on the heels of the holidays, it is truly amazing and humbling related to how generous people have been up to this point. I think that it's a solid example of how many people are affected by cancer and what the potential of beating this disease means to each of them.
Have a great week and happy running.
Tuesday, January 12, 2010
Weekly Poll
I decided to shake it up a little bit and add a weekly poll to the blog. I thought it would be interesting to see what the responses would be to various questions related to training for the race and running in general. Feel free to vote and I'll try to come up with some decent questions from week to week between now and when the team toes it up in April.
Sunday, January 10, 2010
Over the Hills and Far Away
With a balmy wake up temperature of 5 degrees in Framingham, I gathered my things, said good-bye to Katie and the kids, and made it out the door on time to get to the Mt. Auburn club in Watertown for 8:00. This was no small feat considering Katie and I were at a 40th birthday party for our good friend and neighbor (sans children) until roughly 1:30 AM (you know it's going to be a late night when you plan in advance to take a taxi in the suburbs). A special thanks goes of to Katie's mom for staying overnight and babysitting. Even though I "paced" myself the night before, I was tired due to only grabbing 5 hours of semi-restful sleep.
By the time we began the run, the temperature had almost tripled to 13 degrees. I had planned to go around 12 miles (if that) at a light pace. That lasted all of about 5 seconds after I told Mike what my plan was. He convinced me that I should shoot for 13 so that I could take advantage of hitting all 3 hills in Newton. Due to the fact that the furthest I had run since the half marathon in October was a little over 8 miles, I was a little reluctant to agree. I said, "We'll see how it goes", knowing inside that I would be going 13 today.
As we started out away from the club, the cold didn't seem that bad with all of my gear on. I was looking around as we made our way through Watertown into Brighton so that I could pick up on landmarks along the way, as this is one of the areas around Boston that I don't know very well. My biggest fear was getting lost on the way back and having to explain to someone what happened. Once we hit Comm Ave., I was able to get my bearings and I knew where I was. Mike and I ran the entire way out to the 6.5 mark at the fire station. And surprisingly, I felt pretty good. I had some goo along the way and grabbed a water at the second stop around B.C. which definitely helped. A big shout out to the water volunteers who froze their faces off today to help us out.
I started to finally feel tired while tackling the hills on way back. I found them to not be too steep, but very long and gradual (which I think is tougher to manage). To make matters worse, my IPod died yet again (second group run in a row) just after I made the turn to head back. This was a classic rookie mistake on my part, having not charged it before I left the house. What a blunder.
Right around the corner of Comm and Walnut, I introduced myself to Larry and Jeff as we waited for traffic to pass. Jeff told me that this was Larry's 15th Boston Marathon with DFMC. The only word that I could think of when I heard that was "commitment". Very impressive. As I pulled away from them after a few strides, Jeff gave me a "Good job, Mike". Considering how I was feeling at that point, those were three very important words and I appreciated the encouragement. I ended up struggling on the way up Heartbreak Hill and walked for about 25 seconds. I gathered my breath and continued to head up and over the hill. I'll get you next time.
Miraculously, the running gods were with me and my IPod made a comeback around B.C. and started working again after it warmed up a bit. I could feel myself getting tired and slowing down, but I tried to keep a steady pace as I continued up Comm through Brighton and back into Watertown. The wind started to pick up a little bit as I got close to the Mass Pike and I caught up to Mark, who, from what I can tell, is only one of two people taller than me on the team. I "drafted" him for about half a mile and caught up to run with him for a minute or two. I ended up going ahead of him, but then found myself at an intersection in Watertown where I wasn't sure where I should go. There was a small group of runners across the boulevard and they looked confused as well. As I looked around and we all looked at each other, I recognized a few apartments across the river from earlier and decided to take a left, which thankfully was the right call.
I pulled back into the club almost 2 hours later. Overall, I had a pretty good run and even though a hamstring was a little tight, I felt great at the end.
http://connect.garmin.com/activity/22064448
Looking back on today, it was a huge help to have others encourage and help you push a little more vs. if you were left to your own devices. There's no way I would have gone into this morning's run and planned to do 13+ on my own. I guess that's what the group runs are all about.
I finally feel like I'm back in a solid training rhythm and I'm happy with where I am physically right now, just inside of 100 days until the race. With another busy week ahead, I'll get to bed early tonight and take tomorrow off (maybe a walk on the treadmill??). It looks like the weather will be calm all week which is great. Maybe the worst of winter is behind us. We'll see.
By the time we began the run, the temperature had almost tripled to 13 degrees. I had planned to go around 12 miles (if that) at a light pace. That lasted all of about 5 seconds after I told Mike what my plan was. He convinced me that I should shoot for 13 so that I could take advantage of hitting all 3 hills in Newton. Due to the fact that the furthest I had run since the half marathon in October was a little over 8 miles, I was a little reluctant to agree. I said, "We'll see how it goes", knowing inside that I would be going 13 today.
As we started out away from the club, the cold didn't seem that bad with all of my gear on. I was looking around as we made our way through Watertown into Brighton so that I could pick up on landmarks along the way, as this is one of the areas around Boston that I don't know very well. My biggest fear was getting lost on the way back and having to explain to someone what happened. Once we hit Comm Ave., I was able to get my bearings and I knew where I was. Mike and I ran the entire way out to the 6.5 mark at the fire station. And surprisingly, I felt pretty good. I had some goo along the way and grabbed a water at the second stop around B.C. which definitely helped. A big shout out to the water volunteers who froze their faces off today to help us out.
I started to finally feel tired while tackling the hills on way back. I found them to not be too steep, but very long and gradual (which I think is tougher to manage). To make matters worse, my IPod died yet again (second group run in a row) just after I made the turn to head back. This was a classic rookie mistake on my part, having not charged it before I left the house. What a blunder.
Right around the corner of Comm and Walnut, I introduced myself to Larry and Jeff as we waited for traffic to pass. Jeff told me that this was Larry's 15th Boston Marathon with DFMC. The only word that I could think of when I heard that was "commitment". Very impressive. As I pulled away from them after a few strides, Jeff gave me a "Good job, Mike". Considering how I was feeling at that point, those were three very important words and I appreciated the encouragement. I ended up struggling on the way up Heartbreak Hill and walked for about 25 seconds. I gathered my breath and continued to head up and over the hill. I'll get you next time.
Miraculously, the running gods were with me and my IPod made a comeback around B.C. and started working again after it warmed up a bit. I could feel myself getting tired and slowing down, but I tried to keep a steady pace as I continued up Comm through Brighton and back into Watertown. The wind started to pick up a little bit as I got close to the Mass Pike and I caught up to Mark, who, from what I can tell, is only one of two people taller than me on the team. I "drafted" him for about half a mile and caught up to run with him for a minute or two. I ended up going ahead of him, but then found myself at an intersection in Watertown where I wasn't sure where I should go. There was a small group of runners across the boulevard and they looked confused as well. As I looked around and we all looked at each other, I recognized a few apartments across the river from earlier and decided to take a left, which thankfully was the right call.
I pulled back into the club almost 2 hours later. Overall, I had a pretty good run and even though a hamstring was a little tight, I felt great at the end.
http://connect.garmin.com/activity/22064448
Looking back on today, it was a huge help to have others encourage and help you push a little more vs. if you were left to your own devices. There's no way I would have gone into this morning's run and planned to do 13+ on my own. I guess that's what the group runs are all about.
I finally feel like I'm back in a solid training rhythm and I'm happy with where I am physically right now, just inside of 100 days until the race. With another busy week ahead, I'll get to bed early tonight and take tomorrow off (maybe a walk on the treadmill??). It looks like the weather will be calm all week which is great. Maybe the worst of winter is behind us. We'll see.
Friday, January 8, 2010
Saturday, January 2, 2010
Most Wonderful Time of the Year
It's been about 2 weeks since my last post. The holidays were fantastic in so may ways. The kids had an unbelievable time and Santa was way too generous as usual. Katie and I are still assembling, constructing and organizing all of the kid's presents (e.g. I'm about 8 hours into putting together the Lego Death Star and I'm still only 75% done). As a parent, watching Christmas through the eyes of a 5 and 1 year old is a level of fun that really can't be described. New Years was quiet, but fun as well.
Personally, it was a "running" Christmas for me related to my gifts, which included the following:
Due to the fact that I've been on vacation since Christmas Eve, I have been able to get myself into a decent routine over the last week or so. Hopefully, things at work will be more manageable come Monday and I won't have too many issues sticking with the training plan. I've been trying to live somewhere between the "beginner" and "intermediate" plans Jack provided and, so far so good. I was planning to do 10-11 today, but with the snow and wind, that didn't really work out. I plan to hit the treadmill again tomorrow so that I can at least end up with 9-10 for the weekend in total. Not ideal, but given the weather, it's the best I can do. The only bad part is that it's going to make the 12 or so that I want to do next Saturday a little tougher.
On the fundraising front, people continue to be extremely generous and donations are still coming in almost daily, as I'm closing in on $3,000. To those that have already contributed, I can't thank you enough. It really means a lot to me.
It was a crazy 2009 in so many ways and I can already tell that 2010 is going to be a terrific year for all of us.
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