Oh, Spags, what have I done

I signed up for the Rock 'n' Roll Marathon yesterday. The difference between it and the Half was a whole $10, so I ponied up the the extra cash. I'm going to do it this time. I'm a little nervous and very out of shape - in terms of running a marathon, at least. Fortunately, I've got 8 months to get there.

Where's Waldo?

So, it's not like I haven't been running or keeping up with this divine physique I've been granted. It's just that runs on the 'mill aren't all that interesting. Really, go try one. I'll wait.

Done? Good. See, there's nothing all that interesting to say about it. You get on the belt, ramp up to your cruising speed and stay there until your time runs out. Other than "this sucks" there's not a whole helluva lot to say.

I've been experimenting with my runs to find the right way, for me, to work on inclines and speed while Seattle gets over it's darkness and cold problems. I think I may have hit on a good pattern, but I might need to extend my time another 5 minutes. I'm doing a 5-minute warmup followed by 3 minutes hard and two minutes easy. So for my speed intervals I'm doing 6 mph for the warmup, then 6.5/6, 7.0/6, 7.5/6, 7.0/6, 6.5/6. For the hills I go 6 mph for the warmup at 0 inlcine, then 1/0, 2/0, 3/0, 4/0, 3/0, 2/0. It's worked out nicely so far.

I've been doing the spin class on Tuesdays, and that's a mutha. It hurts while you're doing it and the hurt just keeps on coming the next day when you go to sit down. Whoever designed bicycle seats was a sadist, and I can't believe that cyclists haven't come up with a better solution by now.

I've also added a weights regimen following my runs. I'm not too intense about it. I only do one set of a few exercises. I don't want to bulk up or anything; I just want to have a little bit of strength. Allegedly, that's the sort of thing that helps you out while running. We shall see. I do somehow manage to crank out 100 abdomen exercises: 40 regular crunches, 20 to the right obliques, 20 to the left obliques, and 20 leg lifts to hit the lower abs. I'm not the least bit ashamed to say that I'm ridiculously proud of myself. They're not all great crunches, but they're close enough for government work.

I think this weekend is supposed to be nice(ish). The temperature at least. I don't know what kind of moisture will be in the air - probably rain (sigh) and definitely not snow (boo!). Maybe if it's clear, dry and not too cold I'll go outside this weekend. Otherwise I guess I'll be inside running on the wheel.

Xmas is coming up soon. The weatherman is saying we're going to have temps in the 40s or 50s on Xmas day. That means no snow :( I was looking forward to another snowpocalypse like we had last year, but I guess not. We're not even going to get the flakes that fall and melt a foot above the ground like we had for our first Xmas here. Very disappointing.

I'm back baby!!!

Quick note.

I went on my first run since my surgery tonight, and I'm pretty damn happy with myself right now. I went 3.1 miles in 30 minutes. I think if I were on the road instead of the treadmill I would have had an official 5K time of around 28 minutes. I always go faster on the road instead as opposed to the hamster mill.

Weights went well too. It's been a long time since I lifted anything, so today was a bit of figuring how much I could do. For some of the weights I was right on; for others I was off by a bit one way or the other.

But the important thing is that I'm back in the saddle, and I'm so glad to be back.

The race that wasn't

Yesterday should have been my day of triumph. It wasn't. Instead it was a day of sleeping late, eating too much, and playing games. What should have been a day of high physical activity followed by a sense of accomplishment was instead a normal Sunday.

I almost ran it, by the way. I had my follow-up visit with my surgeon on Friday morning and he said I was cleared to go do whatever it is I do with no restrictions. I spent a good part of Friday night seriously considering my options. I could do the marathon as planned or, since it had been a while since I ran, I could scale back and do the half. In the end, after consultation with Lisa, we decided that "no restrictions" did not necessarily mean that I could go out and run 13 or 26 miles. So I collected my bib and chip and promptly turned my chip in at the expo. I got my shirt though. Some may think that it's uncool to wear a shirt for a race you didn't run, but if I didn't run all my $120 entry fee was going to get me was a goody bag with not much in it and a long sleeve technical shirt. I'm taking my damn shirt, and the next time I run outside in long sleeve weather I'm wearing it. It's a butt-ugly shirt for $120.

Still, all is not lost. I have a plan, albeit a somewhat fluid one. I will still have my day of triumph, it just won't be yesterday. Instead, it will be (most likely) at the end of June when I do Seattle's installment of the Rock N Roll Marathon. Other options include the Vancouver Marathon (or half) in May or the Royal Victoria Marathon (or half) in October. October sounds a little too far off, although it would give me the BEST months for training and be reasonably cool on race day most likely. I jokingly said that I would do multiple marathons next year to make up for missing Seattle, and maybe I will.

I've got to admit that as disappointed as I am for not doing the Seattle Marathon, I'm glad I'll be able to work towards RnR on my terms rather than Mother Nature's or astrophysics' terms. The week that included my surgery was supposed to include my longest run pre-marathon, 20 miles. It was also the week that we had the time change, so thanks to our lofty latitude it started getting dark around here even earlier. Seriously, it's as dark at 4:30pm now as it is at 9:00pm, and that's just not what I want the world to look like when I'm out running in it. Think about the trails that are largely unlit and the streets with the crazy drivers that I'd have to cross. If that's not enough, think of the freaking cold. I hate the cold. I would have either had to be out in that or I would have had to get up way early (for me) to start and finish my run while it was still daylight. I know that just because the time changes or the movement of the seasons causes the dark to come early doesn't mean that the day is any shorter, but it feels like that.

Another... issue, for lack of a better word, I had was that I wasn't in love with my training plan. I need to do two things. First, I need to find a training plan that I like better, and since this time I'll probably be working with a training partner I'll need to find one that both of us like. I'd prefer something with with at least two 20 or 20+ runs, but that's going to be subject to negotiation with said partner, she may or may not agree with that. Second, whatever plan I go with I'll need to modify somewhat. I want to be able to double up on most of the weeks, although probably not the weeks where the plan calls for 20 or 20+ miles and probably not the step-back weeks either. I think anything up to about 17-18 miles should be done twice.

And another thing! I've read all the lit that says that a first time marathoner's goal should only be to finish and not have any time component, but I'm not satisfied with that. I really, really, really want to finish in under 4 hours. I'll be perfectly content to finish at 3:59:59.59, but a milisecond over that is too long. So I've got to work on building up speed and maintaining speed for the long haul. I believe that will be a large part of my focus for the next two or three months.

So today I will resume normal activity. Actually, I will resume super-normal activity. For the next couple of months, I'm going to do both cardio and weights, and I'm planning on doing them on the same day. Two days a week I'm going to run half an hour. I'm not going to put any speed or distance requirements on that, although I may choose to make one of those a speed run and one a hill run. After that I'm going to go pick up heavy things for about an hour. Then, most likely on Thursdays, I'm going to work in a little flexibility by going to do some yoga at this little studio downtown. For my weekend activity, I'll do a one-hour long run on Saturday. Again, no speed requirement or pressure, I just want to run for an hour. I'll also do some weights, but I don't know if I'll do the weights on Friday or Saturday. So the schedule for this week is:

Monday - 30 minute run followed by weights
Tuesday - nothing (going to a musical)
Wednesday - 30 minute run followed by weights
Thursday - hot hatha yoga
Friday - rest (or weights?)
Saturday - 1 hour run (followed by weights?)
Sunday - rest

That's probably going to be my schedule in general for a while. Seeing it written out like that I kind of like it. I'm active 4-5 days a week, which is good. I might do my Saturday weights on Fridays though. I'll probably try it both ways and see which I like better. I should also consider something long-term for Tuesdays. I used to go to this great spin class on Tuesdays but I stopped when I started seriously training for the marathon. It's possible that it's time to pick that up again. THAT was a great workout.

I'm tentatively planning on the Jingle Bell Run (5K) on December 13. That will give me a couple of weeks to get back into fighting shape and a goal to achieve in December. It's not a marathon, but it's something.

The last 7 miles...

On Sunday I was supposed to do a 15 mile run, but after 3.5 miles I decided that I wasn't interested in doing the whole thing. Right now I'm wondering how the rest of my week would have turned out if I had kept going. Would it be better or worse?

I aggravated an old injury either during my run or soon after, but however I did it I basically got no sleep on Sunday or Monday night. The pain was so bad that at 7:00am Tuesday I was up calling the doctor to get in to see her as soon as possible. My doc was all booked up, so I ended up seeing a nurse practitioner. She took one look at my problem and said "I can't do anything about this. We need to get you in to see a surgeon."

Whatever I expected out of my Tuesday, it wasn't to be talking to a surgeon.

I got really lucky. The surgeon had a free appointment time right then, so I took an elevator ride down a few floors and got seen immediately. He took a look at the problem then gave me two options. Option 1 was a more invasive procedure that would result in approximately two weeks of excruciating pain with probably another month of moderate pain after that. But after those six weeks were done my problem would effectively be taken care of. Option 2 was a less invasive procedure that had less pain associated with it, but for 20-40% of people who have it done the problem is not completely resolved. I'd already done quite a bit of research on both, so none of it came as a huge surprise. The doc suggested we go with option 2 and I agreed.

Due to some twist of fate (I swear I wasn't planning ahead for this) I hadn't had anything to eat since around 9pm the night before and nothing to drink since around midnight. That means that my body was already effectively ready for surgery. Doc asked if it could wait until the next morning and I said I'd prefer it to happen as soon as possible. So at 2:00pm I checked into the surgery center and at 4:00 they took me back to get prepped. There are some really fantastic people working in medicine. Everyone I met was friendly, helpful, and they all laughed at my jokes. I make jokes when I'm excited, happy, or nervous. Actually, if I'm not trying to make a joke about something you could probably assume that there's some bad stuff going down. I kept Nurse Rockstar (he just had that look) in stitches while he was rooting around in my arms for a vein to stick the IV in.

After an hour or so of prep work they wheeled me into the OR. The anesthesiologist slapped a mask over my face, I tried to make another joke or two and then I was out. OUT. I sort of woke up in the recovery room and the doctor tried to confuse me with medical jargon. The only thing I took out of it was that they started off trying to do the surgery we agreed on but determined that it wasn't going to be possible and went for the more invasive procedure.

So, what is this going to mean for me? Well, obviously I'm going to have to take it easy for a couple of weeks. The marathon is in roughly 3 weeks. It's just not going to happen this year. I'm of two minds about this, to be completely honest. I'm disappointed because I've been dreaming about how good it will feel to cross the finish line since June. I've put in a lot of work toward this thing, and I'm not going to be able to follow through with it. On the other hand, the last few weeks of running have shown me that I'm not thrilled with some aspects of my training and I've lost a little of the excitement for doing the marathon because of it.

So what's the new plan? Well, I'm going to take it easy for a little while. I'll count the cost of the marathon as a sunk cost. I'm not going to run it, but I am going to pick up my t-shirt. I paid $100 for this marathon, if I'm not getting to run my 26.2 I'm at least getting the t-shirt I paid for out of it. And I'll wear it too on days that it's cool and I'm training outside. After I've had some time to heal, I'm going to start working on hitting that 26.2 goal again. I'm going to mix in at least one half marathon sometime in the first half of 2010, maybe Vancouver. I've never been there and I hear it's nice. The new goal is to run the Rock 'n Roll Marathon in July. Of course, I'll also have a couple of 8ks along the way (Beat the Bridge and Torchlight). We'll see if we can't work in a few 5ks as well.

I think I like this. First, doing a summer marathon will give me a lot of time to work up to a reasonable speed. I haven't been thrilled with the idea that it was going to take me 5 hours no matter how much I tried to convince myself otherwise. Second, it's going to give me some freedom to train when I want. I hate that I have to go out on Saturdays or Sundays almost as soon as I wake up in order to get it done before dark. I'll be hitting my long runs hardest around the end of June or beginning of July, so I could leave to go on my long run at 5pm and still get home before dark, even if I have to run 20 miles.

Ok. I've had a setback. I've had to change my plans. But I've got a backup plan that I'm probably more happy with. And I've taken care of a problem that's bothered me for a long time. It's hard to be too disappointed with the way the week has turned out.

A fine 15

I've got something that's majorly distracting right now, so I'm planning for this to be a short, quick update. We'll see how that goes once the sentences start flowing.

Previously on 26.2 I recognized that I was perhaps not eating enough to support my marathon training. My plan for the week was to eat with abandon, and I'm proud to say that I found a plan I can stick with. When I wanted a snack, I had one. I've had some Pepperidge Farm cookies in my desk drawer for months that I wouldn't eat because of their high caloric value. They're gone now. When I wanted the sweet clean taste of a Dr. Pepper, I popped the top with gusto. That 12 pack has been hanging around longer than the cookies, but I'm working my way through it now. I ate without a care in the world all week long, and on Friday I rewarded my sticktoitiveness with a fine steak dinner.

This weekend was another step-back weekend, so I went down from 18 miles to 15. That was nice since I could reasonably figure that it would take me three hours to run on Saturday. The weatherman was pretty clear that I should run on Saturday instead of Sunday. I lounged around in bed luxuriating in the feel of not being mobile for a little while. Then I got up and had a leisurely bacon, egg, and potato breakfast bowl. Since my whole day wasn't going to be sacrificed to the running gods I could sit around for a couple of hours and let the digestion happen. Finally, Lisa and I laced up the shoes and hit the streets. We headed toward Lake Union and the Burke-Gilman Trail.

I took my iPhone with me, but I ran sans music. Sometimes I have a day like that where I just don't want my head cluttered up with the noise. It helps that I'm starting to get bored with my tune selection. I need some new blood before the big day. We chatted a bit as we ran, but I don't recall any interesting sights or events during our three miles together.

After the first three miles I was left to myself. I tried not to go too fast and tire myself out, but I didn't want to go too slow and be bored. I was pretty adamant that I wanted to spend somewhere between 2 hours 45 minutes and 3 hours running.

No one was at the Wall of Death today. It was a little gray, a little wet, and a bit chilly, so maybe that was keeping the skateboarders that usually play there away. Or... maybe they were with the rest of Seattle at the UW football game.

I don't keep up with college football. Some people love it more than the pros because they think it's more pure or the players try harder or something. I don't know. My school didn't have a good football program when I was there and doesn't appear to have a good one now, so I've just never been into it. I like pro ball. At least that way my team can be a winner every once in a while, although my team has been in a rebuilding mode since 1995. So, since I don't keep up with college football I didn't realize that there was a UW game on Saturday that would be in the 4th quarter by time I got there. It did not go well for the Huskys, as evidenced by all the people leaving in the 4th quarter. I dodged a lot of folks. I could tell UW lost because they weren't an overly happy crowd. No real anger or sadness, just not happy. For a team that didn't win a game last year (I only know because it was on the news every night) they've bounced back pretty good (again, on the news every night).

The last time I took this path I must have done (I'm trying real hard here not to say "only done") 14 miles and I started at a different place. Side note: I'm trying real hard to break myself of saying that I only went X miles. Frankly, any distance I run further than down the block is more than most people do. And 10 or 12 or 15 miles, or any other number for that matter, deserve my pride. I didn't only do 15 miles. I did 15 miles y'all! I went much further than I expected to go, but Grendel assures me that I only went 15 miles ("only" in this case is not intended to be self-deprecating, rather it's expressing that I didn't go any further). Still, I saw a part of the path I hadn't been on.

There's this spot about six miles in that I've run by a dozen times but never noticed the water fountain. I've bitched and moaned about there not being any water on the trail, and here's one laughing at me. I'm so glad I found it because I'd been rationing my water for the long slog back and now I realized I wouldn't have to. I planned to hit it when I came back in about about 2.5 miles later. I hit my turnaround spot, dropped a GU, chugged some agua and started back. I made a stop at the water fountain to refill my now empty bottle. Another runner was there and I mentioned how I had never seen it before. He told me it was the only one he knew of for about 10 miles. No wonder I haven't seen any others.

Back by UW, the game was now over and everyone was out on the the trail on their way to their cars or whatnot. I don't know what it is about large groups that makes the individuals forget that the world does not revolve around them, but there were a couple of times where I had to actually talk to make sure I didn't run over someone. I got into a slight, and extremely brief, verbal altercation with one guy. He and his girlfriend were part of a larger group and the group was taking up the whole path. There was no room to get by them. We were heading in opposite directions and I was hugging the right side, which is the correct side for my direction. We're conditioned, thanks to our driving habits, to walk, ride or drive on the right side of the road, so I was following the generally accepted rules of the road by staying as far to the right as I could. The girl part of the couple got distracted, probably by something shiny, and was looking down and to the side. Not at the 165 lb. sweatmonster coming at her. So I said "LOOK OUT!" She looked up just in time to get startled and jump out of my way. Boyfriend must have taken exception to it because he yelled "why don't you look out buddy?!" I didn't stop to chat, but, in what is a startling development for me, I did turn yell over my shoulder "DUDE, how much fucking room do you think I have on this path?" That's the story. I didn't stop to talk any more, he didn't decide to defend his honor and chase me down. Bygones.

Back around Lake Union I started to shift into a run/walk strategy. I'll probably end up doing some of that in the marathon, but hopefully not to the extreme I did this weekend. I walked a quarter mile then ran the next three quarters. I think my pace averaged about 5mph, but I'll have to consult Grendel to be sure.

I stopped at Starbucks on the way home and grabbed some coffee and pastries. Nothing says love like a muffin.

Next weekend is another 15 miles. I'm kind of relieved. I thought that it was a 20-miler. I could do it, but I don't mind admitting that I'd like to put it off another weekend if I can. I think I modified my plan to take advantage of starting it early or having a week off somewhere, which is why I'm repeating. So, this weekend 15 miles and next weekend 20 miles. After that, it's taper time. The marathon is right around the corner.

18 to life

I found "the wall" yesterday. It came up and backhanded me at mile 14, and from then on it was mostly walking with some sporadic jogging until I got home. I'm going to blame hitting the wall on poor nutrition, and I think that's a fairly safe bet. I've proven that I can stick it out, so it's not lack of will. I don't think it's lack of training because I've been steadily increasing my miles for a couple of months now. This week was only two miles longer than last weekend. No, it's got to be the food.

I think the main problem is that I still try to limit my net calories to 1500 per day, which is roughly what a man weighing 160-165 lbs would need to lose 1.5 lbs a week. That's probably a bad idea. I don't think I should be trying to lose weight (not working, btw) while training for a marathon. I'm missing out on valuable carbs and protein to keep me moving. So, new fooding strategy: if it's edible and not actively trying to get away from me I'm going to eat it. Of course, that won't really happen. I'm often too lazy to get up and grab a snack or eat even when I'm hungry, but hopefully giving myself blanket permission to eat anything I want when I want it will end up with me getting more calories. I'm going to place particular emphasis on eating the night before Longrunday. I suspect that part of the problem with the 18-miler was that the night before I ate a very light meal.

Side Note: I completed one of my 7 goals for my 37th year on Saturday. Lisa and I went to a cooking class (it was my birthday gift) and learned how to make some awesome goat cheese appetizers, fettucini with basil pesto, halibut, and espresso creme brulee. It was tons of fun, and I can't wait to do another one. Plus, I now know how to make my own pasta, which is handy. But, you can see how this light eating (I also didn't eat much before the class) might affect my performance on an 18 mile run, right?

My initial plan was to do this thing on Saturday, but we decided to have "storm of the century" rain so I put it off a day. Sunday had it's own complications though. We had the vet coming by early in the afternoon to give the cats their checkups and poke them with needles (they LOVED that part), so I had to get up early and get this thing done. At 8:00am my alarm went off. I mentally cussed it out and thought briefly about just not going, but after a few minutes feeding my internet addiction I got my lazy ass out of bed and got ready. I hit the street at 9:00 and got moving as soon as Grendel deigned to contact some satellites.

Sometime between last weekend and this weekend fall paid a visit to Seattle. Last weekend, the trees were that ubiquitous green that you don't even notice. This weekend the leaves had turned to a hundred different shades of red, orange, green and even a little brown. At one point I was looking at the ground and it looked like some painter mixed up bunches of paint then just started dabbing dots on the ground. It was really pretty. Texas didn't do fall like Washington does. In Texas the leaves were green and firmly attached to the trees on Monday and by Tuesday they were all a uniform shade of brown and lying on the ground. There was no in-between phase.

Seattle has a dog problem. It's not that there are wild packs of dogs roaming around the streets. It's not that dog-caretakers don't pick up after their pup drops a deuce (some don't but most do). No, the problem is that Seattle sometimes smells like a wet dog. It took me a while to figure that out since I don't have a doggy companion, but some dim memory from my childhood was finally awoken by the third time I said "what's that smell? Is it me?" For the record, it was not me. I took a whiff of my sweat soaked clothes before tossing them in the washing machine, and while my stuff is rank it definitely does not smell like wet dog.

Early morning is the time to run, apparently. I much prefer to do it late but I saw three or four times as many people going early than I do when I go later. There were so many that I asked one guy if there was something going on. He thought it was because we were on part of the marathon route and people were getting a little experience with it, and he didn't know of anything else going on. It turns out that there was a 5k going on at Seward Park. I got there at the end when the last runners had grabbed their goody bag and the stalls were breaking down. I took a couple of minutes for a break and filled up my water bottle before taking off again.

If there is one thing that the 18 miler taught me it is "do not stop and take a rest break." I think it's ok if you supplement some of the running time with walking time, but taking a full-on rest break makes it that much harder to get started again. Plus, the body cools down while you're resting and mine didn't want to warm back up.

At the 14th mile I hit the wall. I tried some GU, but that didn't help. I tried just powering through, but I didn't have anything to give. I thought about having Lisa come pick me up, but I wanted to finish it one way or the other. I walked. There was a little jogging interspersed, but mostly I just walked. I tried to walk fast, but I think my best pace was probably about 3 mph. I have a few complaints about various things from this point on.

- I hate that people can't see my health meter and tell that "Larry needs some food" (that's a Gauntlet reference if you didn't get it). They should know that if I have to stop and wait for them to get out of my way I might not be able start moving again.

- I have two pairs of shoes and right now both of them suck. My Asics have something on the instep that gave me a ridiculous blister last week. If I can find it I'll cut the bastard out. My Brooks are light as a feather but insole is as hard as concrete. I felt like my feet would actually be more comfortable if I wasn't weary any shoes at all!

- WTF, Seattle? What's up with all the damn hills?

- And you, the planners of the Seattle Marathon.... GRRR!! Why would you choose to make us run up Madison at the end when we're already exhausted? Do you just hate people?

In the end, a run I planned on taking no more than 3 hours (6 mph x 3 hrs = 18 miles) took me 3 hours and 45 minutes. I'm almost resigned to the marathon taking 5 hours to finish. I hate that and I hate that I'm so concerned about it. Finishing is the goal, not some arbitrary time measurement.

Next weekend is another step-back weekend. I only have to do an easy 15 miles. Then, the weekend after next will be the longest run of my training plan, 20 miles. Twenty freaking miles. I don't know how I'm supposed to handle that, conceptually.