Long Time, No See... Two Races

It has been quite some time since my last post. Now time for the excuses... Post Boston I was a little burnt out, busy at work and just could not summon myself to blog. So what happened since the last post... well plenty.

Boston went well. Going into it I had set 3 goals - any of which I would be satisfied with. The first goal I had was to simply PR in Boston, a second goal would have been to break 3:10 and a high water stretch goal would be to break 3:07. Based on the training I was putting in I would have thought that, up until a month out from from the race, any of them were possible. That said, starting about a month out from the race, I started to struggle a little and was actually getting slower - not sure why, but just was not feeling on top of my game. So how did things go?

First off, a big shout out to my buddy, nemesis and virtual training partner's aunt who allowed us to stay with her. Her location... about a 20 minute drive from the start line was ideal. It kept us out of the city and allowed us to focus entirely on getting ready for the race as opposed to getting caught up in all the other hoopla. Her hospitality was beyond compare and she and her husband ensured that we were well taken care of and ready for the race. From a logistics standpoint things could not have gone better.

The race itself was quite the experience. Prior to Boston, the biggest marathon I participated in had 150 people in it and the largest race I had ever been in had about 2000 people in it. Boston was quite the animal for me in that just negotiating the number of bodies on the course would prove to take much more effort than I ever could have imagined. I was also impressed by the level of organization that surrounded the race. I suppose they have had 113 years to work out the kinks, but it was still amazing how well organized it was.

As to the race itself, I arrived at the start line feeling ok, but not amazing.... strike one. Once the gun went off, however, Keith and I were discipline and ran at our pre-appointed pace and stuck with it. We started out at 7:33 min / mile pace and ran the first 20 miles varying from 7:06 - 7:33 pace. You can see the damage here.


Not much to report in the first 20... oddly enough things were going just like clockwork. The thing that really struck me was the number of people crashing and burning on Heartbreak Hill. The downhill pounding of the first 16 miles really takes a toll and by the time people reach the last of the uphill Newton Hills (Heartbreak Hill) from mile 16 - 20 , you can see it really begin to take a big chunk out of people's will. Much better runners than I, succumbed to the pain here and were relegated to walking/limping it home. I think the temptation to gain time on the downhill portion is too great for some and by the time they hit the uphill there was simply nothing left in the tank.

It was Heartbreak Hill that the course took a piece out of me as well. Just as I was about to crest it, I felt a big twinge in my left hamstring and battled it until the end. From this point on, whenever I tried to up my pace, I could feel a twinge that appeared to be a precursor to a hamstring pull. Wanting to finish as best I could I eased it in from here. At mile 24, Keith, as we had previously arranged, turned on the jets as he was feeling good. I could not answer the bell here.

In the end, Keith finished in 3:11:48 and I finished in 3:13:33. I had lost the battle against my friend, but I think you could call my battle with the course a draw. I didn't slay it, but I didn't get slayed in the process either.

How did I do against my goals. I managed to PR, so all was not lost, however, I didn't hit my other goals.... I will hold on to them for another day. All in all, it was a wonderful experience - one that I am glad to have taken part in.

The other race that I refer to was run yesterday... the Blue Nose 10K. I didn't really prepare for this one as I have been slowly been upping my training since Boston. I did put in a pretty good showing however.... 13th overall and 2nd in my age group with a time of 39:32. My placing was aided by the fact that the Blue Nose runs 4 races at the same time: a 5K, 10K, 1/2 marathon and full marathon all go at the same time. The splitting of the better runners in the Atlantic region between these races, as well as, having many runners who were in Boston take a pass on the Blue Nose due to its proximity to Boston in terms of time allowed me to sneak in to a age group finish... Hey, I will take what I can get.

On the horizon is the Johnny Miles next month. At this stage I think I will run the 1/2 marathon. By the way, this race is the best deal in all of running in my mind. Registration, a technical shirt, a hat, carbo loading and post-race meal, finish line photo and probably other stuff I am probably forgetting for $45. As well, a children's running event is run for free the previous day. Looking forward to it.

Tortoise and the Hare

It has been a while since I posted anything on the blog - I have been trying to pay a little more attention to other things in life and right now, while I am really enjoying running, it would be really boring to create reports on a regular basis - at least more than it normally is. Here is why it would be so boring to report on. I am currently base training for the lead up to the Boston Marathon. With this approach, I am running all of my runs at a pace in which I can remain conversational the entire time. Read, no real speed. What I am doing is trying to get a good aerobic base in over the next couple of months with an aim towards speed specific training in the 2009. So for now, I am the proverbial tortoise.

This leads me to the Hare. For those of you who have read my profile, or the earliest of my postings, you will recall the reason I got into this whole running thing is to become competitive with my childhood friend. In our first race together, he paced me and almost got me to a Boston Qualifying time. That first marathon was completed after only 9 weeks of training - the result of him seeing a picture of me in a 5K I had signed up for on a whim without real training and making the comment in response that my time was "not bad for a guy carrying two hams around his waist". I took the comment as a challenge and as a result of the relative ease in which he paced me, I felt the need to at some point challenge him.

So here we are one year later. I have qualified for Boston and we are going to run it together. The intention at this point is for us to run the first 24 miles together pacing each other and then, in a form of childishness that is rampant in middle-aged males, we are going to race the final 2.2 miles in a fight for bragging and/or Last rights. Seriously, I am really looking forward to this. Running has allowed us to share something in the past 1 1/2 years that would not have been possible otherwise given our geographic dislocation - goals. So while I will be pushing myself as much as possible from the start in Hopkinton to the finish in Boston, I will also be in the moment with more than a few memories of when we were side by side on the same line playing hockey as kids. Who knew we would be still competitive in sports 30 years later.

Perhaps the message in all of this is that running is my mid-life crisis - if it is, I think I could have chosen worse.