Time to Try a Tri

Just do it, says Nike.  OK.  Enough thinking about trying a triathlon.  I am now registered for not one but two olympic distance triathlons -- Rocketts Landing Triathlon in Richmond on July 25 and Naylors Beach Triathlon in Warsaw, Virginia on September 26.  For those who are wondering, an olympic distance triathlon is typically 1.5km swim, 40km bike, and 10km run.

Anyhow, I know how to swim, I know how to bike, and I know how to run.  Now all I have to do is put them all together into one event.  How hard can that be, right????

Weekly Training Summary

Another good week on the road to recovery.  My last week of running just 3 times a week.  I ran nice easy 3.3 milers on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday for a total weekly mileage of 9.98 miles --- and to think, I used to do that in one run.  I also walked 3 miles on Tuesday and Thursday, as well as 1 milers on Monday and Tuesday at home.  My wife is on a mission to walk at least 1 mile a day, in addition to the miles she runs (she's up to 3 weeks now).  We try to walk as a family after dinner -- good exercise for the kids, and keeps them off the TV and computer for at least 15 - 20 minutes!!

Anyhow, I rounded out my exercise with 1600 meters in the pool on Thursday and 3200 meters today (Monday was my youngest daughter's birthday, so I skipped the pool).  I tried out a different wetsuit today.  When my brother was stationed at Camp Pendleton, he competed on the Marine Corps triathlon team.  He lent me a couple of his wetsuits to use at my upcoming 1 mile Chesapeake Bay Swim race -- a Quantaroo and an Orca wetsuit.  Last week, I tried the Quanta, this week the Orca.  Although I think the Orca fit better under the arm, it was a bit tighter around the neck.  Not quite a choke, but I don't think I ever got my breathing right today (I did 3200 meters in 51 minutes with the Quanta, and 53 minutes in the Orca).  So I think I'll race in the Quantaroo suit.  If I ever do triathlons, I'm going to have to learn to get out of the wetsuit a bit quicker.  I swear it took me about 5 minutes of struggling to get that thing off.  How do triathletes have such short T1 times (T1 = transition 1, the time between the end of the swim and the beginning of the bike portion of the race)?

Training summary

Finished my third week since returning to running after the pelvic stress fractures, and I'm pretty happy with my performance so far.  The pubic area still gets sore, but no sharp pains and nothing debilitating.  9.91 miles this week, 9.64 miles the prior week, and 9.38 miles the first week back.

Basically, I've been doing a very slow (average pace 9:34) run along the Mall, from my building to 14th Street and back (about 3.3 miles +/-) three times a week.  Luckily, I've been able to run with friends at work who are keeping me on my pace and keeping my spirits up (when I would otherwise be somewhat depressed that my one-time 6.75 mile runs at a 6:50 pace are, for the present, history).

My doctor told me that my first 4 weeks of returning to running should be no more than 3 miles, 3 times a week, with at least a day in between.  So I've been running Monday, Wednesday, and Friday and walking 3 miles on Tuesday and Thursday.  Meanwhile, my wife and I have been getting a babysitter to walk along the C&O Canal (our version of Date Night).  So I'd like to think I'm getting my running muscles back into shape.

Thoughts on the Boston Marathon

This coming Monday (April 19) is the 114th running of the Boston Marathon. But what is Boston? For most runners, especially longer distance runners, Boston is a sort of Holy Grail or Mecca. To say you’ve run the Boston Marathon (or simply Boston) is to put yourself in a category separate from the rank and file. Few of us runners will ever run in the Olympics or even the Olympic trials, but qualifying for Boston is just within reach, if you work really really hard. The fact that you have to qualify is what adds the allure to the race. Plus the fact that it is the longest continually run annual marathon. Plus the well-known landmarks — the Wellesley tunnel, Heartbreak Hill, the Citgo sign. All add up to one magical race for those who can run a qualifying time. For the under 35 crowd, a qualifying time is a 3:10 marathon (3:40 for women), at age 35 the time goes up 5 minutes, and you get another at age 40, etc. etc. For me (age 43), I need to run a 3:20 marathon (which translates to a 7:38 mile).

My Running History part 9 (2009 to present and injury)

After the 2009 Boston Marathon, I took a week or so off and then back into training mode. However, my right foot on the outside was sore. I went to the orthopedist who diagnosed me with peroneal tendonitis -- most likely from overdoing it on the hill training for Boston and from doing long runs too fast. Most of the summer, I was in physical therapy once a week. My mileage never got back up to quite what it was before Boston, although I was running in the 40+ miles per week level.

My wife and I were training for Marine Corps, our fifth one (which would qualify us for the Marine Corps Runners Club). This would be my 10th marathon and my wife's 7th marathon. We have a display of our racing medals in the bedroom -- my wife call's it the shrine. Here's a picture:



Anyhow, training when on throughout the summer and early fall of 2009. On Thursday, October 1, I woke with a pain in my abdomen. Did I pull anything? At noon went down to the locker room, got my running gear on and started running. What the ....? I ran about 10 paces when the pain in my abdomen forced me to stop and limp back to the building. First time I had ever not been able to run. On Sunday I was supposed to run a 20 miler. Again, I couldn't run a step. In fact, it was painful just to walk. I took 2 weeks off and then tried to run again. Same debilitating pain.

My Running History part 8 (Boston 2009)

Boston is more than a marathon, it is an event. Boston is the Mecca or Holy Grail for runners. The entire city devotes itself for this weekend.

Myy wife (who also qualified) and I headed out Saturday morning to catch a 12:30 flight from National to Boston. On the shuttle from the economy lot there was another runner on her way to Boston! Waiting at the gate, we saw dozens of runners — all sporting some shirt or jacket from a previous marathon, wearing running shoes (some even in running pants, but we thought that was a bit too much). I’d say that at least half our flight was Boston runners or their families. Of course Logan Airport was full of runners making their way to their various hotels. My wife and I hopped on the T to the Hampton Inn across the Charles in Cambridge. After checking in (around 3:30), we decided to do the expo the next day and took a leisurely 2 mile walk to the center of Cambridge and Harvard University. We went to the Harvard Coop, walked around Harvard Square, rubbed the foot of the John Harvard statue (along with scores of other runners) (and those of you who went to Harvard, I know the statue is nicknamed the Three Lies — it isn’t John Harvard, he wasn’t the founder, and the date is wrong). Lots of touristy things. Then took the bus back to the hotel. Walked across the street for a big pasta meal at Cheesecake Factory.

My Running History part 7 (B&A Trail, MCM, ultras in 2008)

I had finished the JFK50 miler very strong and, but for a sore hamstring, felt strong in the 2007 Marine Corps. I planned to continue some hardcore racing in 2008 in my effort to break 3 hours on the marathon --- first up was the B&A Trail Marathon in Annapolis. After that I was planning to run Frederick Marathon in May, then start up again in the fall marathon season. Training for B&A was good --- I was incorporating weekly speedwork (mile repeats) and running weekly tempo runs as well.

Race day dawned sunny, no wind, and wonderful 40 degree temperatures. The course is mostly flat --- it follows a converted rails to trails path so is mostly railroad grade flat. There is a semi decent hill around mile 7 and then again at around mile 18/21 as the trail went up and over the highway on an overpass.

My Running History part 6 (ultras and MCM in 2007)

After recovering from Boston 2007, I had to decide what to run next. My wife was training for the Frederick Marathon in early May. She forwarded to me an email from one of her running buddies. His company was sponsoring a team in an informal ultramarathon relay race called Tom's Run on June 9, 2007 and they needed more runners. They said they needed to fill 27 more miles and I volunteered to run them all. Tom's Run is a 200 mile relay from Cumberland MD along the C&O Canal then to the Capital Crescent Trail in DC and up to the NIH campus. My leg was from Brunswick MD to Sycamore's Landing, 27.8 miles. Technically in ultramarathon territory although not at any recognized ultra distance (the first common ultra distance is the 50K 31.1 miles). The catch, my estimated start time was 2 am. So I arrived at Brunswick around 11 pm, tried to catnap in the car. Our team captain arrived around 1:30 am to tell me that because of the earlier heat and thunderstorms, we were about an hour behind schedule. I was now up and so just hung out in the dark along the trail with the captain until around 3 or so when we saw the runner and bike escort approach. Not much tell of the actual race. It was foggy from the humidity and there was not much to see outside the cone of light from my headlamp and the bike escort's headlamp. I ran mostly in silence with an occasional conversation with the bike rider. When the sun finally came, there was not much to see with the fog. Anyhow, 3 hours 49 minutes later, I passed the imaginary baton to the next runner, was driven back to my car, drove home, and went to bed. But I did decide I wanted to run a "real" ultra. Come July, I signed up for the JFK 50 miler in November 2007.

My Running History part 5 (Boston 2007)

I had run a 3:03:54 at Lower Potomac River Marathon in March 2007, finishing 6th overall and first place in master's category. 2007 Boston was just around the corner. When I first ran Boston in 2004, we had a freak(?) heat wave. Just the opposite this time. The forecast was for a spring noreaster --- near freezing temperatures, wind, and rain. In fact in the days leading up the marathon, there was some concern that there might actually be snow or blizzard conditions. Great.

Anyhow, race day dawned with pouring rain and near freezing temperatures. By some stroke of good fortune, the rain died down as we waited in the Boston public gardens for the buses to take us to Hopkinton (the year before the BAA moved the marathon start from noon to 10 am, which meant we had to catch the buses around 6 am). I was wiser this time around and had packed my pre-marathon meal (PBJ, banana and hard-boiled egg) and did not eat it until 7 am on the bus (3 hours before race start). The rain picked up again as we reached Hopkinton and we scurried from the buses to find a dry spot underneath the large tents that were erected on the Hopkinton HS grounds. Sort of a nice camaraderie as everyone huddled together (like the penguins in that documentary) to block the wind and generate mutual body heat. Around 10:30 the rain let up as we made the ½ mile or so walk from the HS to the starting line. Most of the runners (myself included) were still wearing our "garbage bag" rain coats (take a hefty garbage bag, cut a hole at the bottom and one on either side and presto you have a disposable raincoat). As we were standing in our starting carrels doing last minute stretches some fool runner jinxed us all by commenting out loud that perhaps the rain would hold off after all. Thanks buddy. About two minutes before the start, the sky opened up again.

My Running History part 4 (2006 MCM/2007LPRM)

I finished Boston in 3:43 due to excessive heat. I had yet to run a true Boston qualifying time. But my long distance running went on hold. My wife and I were trying for kid #3 and long distance running may not be the best for fertility. Anyway, for the rest of 2004 and, indeed, 2005, I went back to my 20-30 miles per week of running only during lunch during the week, no long runs on the weekends. In fact, I only ran 2 other races in 2004 — a 10K in October and a 5 miler in December (the Manatee River Run in Sarasota, Florida, where I won my first age group award — 1st place in the 35-39 category). In May 2005, I started running the Tidal Basin 3Ks as an outlet for racing. But even then, I only ran 5 races in 2005 — 2 3Ks, 2 10Ks, and an 8K. My total yearly mileage was also way down — 1042.4 miles in 2004 (mostly thanks to my Boston training) and only 916.62 in 2005.

In the spring 2006 (about a year after kid #3 was born), my wife decided she was ready to try another marathon. She signed up for the First Time Marathon program again to train for the 2006 Marine Corps Marathon and I decided to run as well, although training on my own. My goal was to run that elusive Boston qualifying time (3:15). My training that summer went pretty well. Come race day, I felt very strong and ran a 3:12:12 (coming in 310th out of 20,912 finishers, that’s top 1.5% for the mathematically challenged). Wow! I blew threw the Boston time. At last, I felt like I deserved that Boston run. Anyhow, having qualified I simply had to run Boston again. More importantly, I felt so strong at the finish that I first thought that running a sub 3 hour marathon was within the realm of possibilities.

My Running History part 3 (Boston Marathon 2004)

My first marathon had me on my back with double pneumonia for a week, followed by about a month or so of no running. By mid-December 2003, my doctor said my lungs were OK to start running again. Meanwhile, I was crestfallen in thinking I had missed Boston by 18 seconds. Someone in the club mentioned that the Boston time qualifiers were not just in 5 year increments (i.e. at age 35, the time needed is 3:15, at age 40 the time is 3:20) but that each year gets an additional minute (i.e., at age 36, the time needed is 3:16) and thus I had run a qualifying time. I wasn’t sure if this was quite correct but figured had nothing to lose by submitting my application. I still don’t know if that was correct, but a couple of weeks later I received my postcard from the B.A.A. saying that I had qualified for the 2004 Boston Marathon with a 3:16:17. So in January I began training for Boston. My goal was to run a 3:15 and prove to myself that I could run a qualifying time.

As Boston approached, I kept checking and rechecking the weather channel. Saturday and Sunday and Tuesday were forecast to be relatively cool. Monday, race day, heat wave — highs in the upper 80s. Crap. That week I spent frantically trying to acclimate to warmer temperatures by running in full sweats. I was in Houston filing a case for work to shut down a fraudulent telemarketing boiler room and was running in the afternoon Texas heat in sweat pants and sweat shirt. Chugging liter after liter of Gatorade. I got to Boston a few days early to visit a law school friend and her husband. My wife would call every hour or so reminding me of the heat and saying to not do anything stupid. The BAA had issued several heat advisory warnings. Maybe Monday would be cool.

My Running History part 2 (Marine Corp Marathon 2003)

It’s now early Spring 2002, I’ve been running 25-30 miles a week. Our second child was born in September 2001 and my wife wanted to get back in shape and get back to running. She was interested in doing a speed development program with the Montgomery County Road Runners (a 10K training program that culminates in running the Rockville Pike’s Peak 10K in May). Go for it, I said. Me and the kids cheered my wife at the 10K. After the 10K, she said a group of the runners was continuing to do long weekend runs. Go for it, I said. After about 2 weeks, my wife said that the group was actually part of a marathon training program (called the First Time Marathon program or FTM for short) and she was thinking about doing it. The program’s goal was running the Marine Corps Marathon. Go for it, I said. So that whole summer, my wife would do Wednesday night track work and Sunday morning long runs. Meanwhile, I continued my weekday lunchtime runs with no interest in running any further than I was and bragged, to any of my colleagues I could corner, that my wife was training for the marathon.

My Personal Running History (part 1)

For those who are interested, I thought I’d set down (in serial fashion) how I got to this point... As I mentioned, I’ve been running since 8th grade, running the mile and half mile at Independence Jr. High. I tried out for the hurdles, but the coach suggested I run with the distance boys (I had the form, he said, just not the speed). At Princess Anne High School, I moved up to the mile and two mile during indoor and outdoor track and 5Ks during the fall cross-country season. I was OK, but nothing fabulous, i.e. colleges weren’t beating a path to my door offering me a running scholarship. I think my fastest 5K was 17:22 and my fastest mile was 4:45 and 2 mile was about 10 minutes. But I don’t really remember.

After high school, my running became much more sporadic. Certainly nothing regular and no races other than an occasional charity race in college or during law school. When I started working at a D.C. law firm in 1995, my running slowly became more regular. Not the daily runs I do now though. I probably was on the treadmill 3 or so times a week at lunch, occasionally venturing outside. My roommate was training for the Marine Corps Marathon, and I would sometimes run with him through Glover Park – maybe doing 8 miles.

A little bit about me

Not another running blog. I know, I know, all the world needs is another running blog. But I'm beginning to think, sometimes, that a blog just may mean more to the blogger than to his or her readers. Sort of like a diary that you leave lying around in case someone wants to look. Writing has its therapeutic effects, even if no one else ever reads what is written.

That being said, what is Running my Ashe Off all about? Mainly, it is my online training diary. It started on facebook with my writing about my training for the 2009 Boston Marathon and my goal of breaking 3 hours in the marathon (3:01:27 is my PR). But it turned into more than just how many miles I ran and at what pace. It also became a place to reflect on lessons for life that come from running and racing.

So who am I? I began running in 1980, doing the mile and half-mile at Independence Jr. High. Currently, I am just returning to running after a 6 month "forced break" due to twin pelvic stress fractures that occured during my training for the 2009 Marine Corps Marathon (more about my history of running will come in later entries). For someone who was used to running 40-50 miles per week at a 6:50 pace, I am now thankful to be plodding out 12-15 miles at a 9:30 - 10:00 pace.

I will close by reflecting on an article I read in Blue Ridge Magazine by Dane Rauschenberg (he ran 52 marathons in 2006, one each weekend, to raise money for charity). He commented how some runners complain that they "have" to do a run. The better attitude is to be grateful that you "get" to run. I don't know whether I took running for granted before getting injured. But I know now that I am so thankful that I "get" to run 3 miles.

And that applies to more than just running, folks.

Welcome

This is my first entry. I've been keeping a sort of blog on Facebook using notes called Running My Ashe Off - Notes on Running. I started it in January 2009 to chronicle my training for the 2009 Boston Marathon. Since then, I've kept at it and basically write about running and exercise and related thoughts on life. I intend to keep up those notes, but figures, what the heck, why not just do a real blog.