trial of miles; miles of trials

Pickup soccer on a small field.

rest day. needing to sleep more,drink more water.

Night run on the middle school track. Stride a little off from all the various aches, need a good stretch tomorrow.

Some days, my normal four-miler from Creekwood just rolls out of my legs like I was born for it, easy and quick and light. My feet fit snugly into my shoes, my stride is natural, my posture is good and I finish feeling rejuvenated.

Today was not one of those days.

On the upswing, convinced Adriaan to run the Secret City half with me, so it looks like I am pretty much in for that. Here's hoping I'm actually capable of finishing; I imagine so but one ought not take those things for granted. I'll be ref'ing this weekend so I don't have time for a proper long run.

Yesterday's run was the longest I've done on such a small track in a long time (it's a standard quarter mile track at the middle school). It was also completely dark by the time I got there at seven, so the first couple laps I almost felt like I was running blind-- sort of a nice feeling, actually. It reminded me of very early in 2008 when a bad breakup had caused me to begin running incessantly on the raised track in our college gym-- it took twenty laps to make a mile, and I'd run 4-6 nearly every day. That must be what the Recover From the Holidays 50k is like-- they run a 3-mile there-and-back ten times (plus an extra mile to finish it off). It sounds absolutely miserable.

 I'm getting a little worried about speed, realizing that I've been running regularly for years but probably haven't done speed training since high school. I think I'll wait til December to get serious about that though, since I don't want to push it until I've got the Secret City Half and the Chattanooga trail run out of the way. Plus, with soccer playing/refereeing/coaching still pummeling me from all sides, I'm getting decent speedwork from the sprints involved in playing forward.

Trail mix is the weirdest effing food. I still can't decide whether I love or hate it. I think I'll have to compile a list of foods I can and can't eat for running. Peanuts are not so good, so I'll have to give them up this winter. Oh well. Eating a lot more sweet potatoes lately, I think they are up there with oatmeal in my "fave running foods." Along with blackberry herbal tea-- tough to explain, but I feel like it helps.

I joined this running blog, instead of another running blog, for a few reason:

 1. I've spent years estimating. I am the flakiest at recording my own physical activity. I tend to think it is enough just to do it, and I have no interest in typing up my splits (or even recording them) or giving people information about my athletic tendencies other than "I am pretty good at soccer," and "yesterday I ran ___ miles."

2. I agree completely with the philosophies espoused by the founder. That is, the running philosophies. As an Episcopalian, I am of course not on board with the whole LDS thing, but that is entirely beside the point. I read Sasha Pachev's "Top Ten Excuses for Missing a Run," and I thought, exactly. Exactly.

Then I read the most common training mistakes article, and realized I am making one. No, it is not the cigarettes (though they, while infrequent, are obviously also a problem). I spend all of my life in a state of maximum stress. Today, I am so stressed I feel dizzy. I am worried about the following: my car, the jerk I thought I was into, needing to buy christmas presents, the project I'm doing at work, spray painting t-shirts for the soccer team I coach, the four tournament games said team has this weekend, whether I slept enough last night, my friend Ashley's birthday on Saturday, the work-related dinner I have to rush to tomorrow after the soccer team party at Cici's Pizza, my weight, the fact that my room is a mess, the fact that my car is a mess, whether I am capable of finishing my half marathon, how far I should run today, whether it is a bad sign that I hate timing myself, my ankle, my back, Christopher McDougall, and whether or not I need to go on a diet.

I don't think this habit is really helping a lot with my training. Or, you know, my sanity. So I just put it down. I put down the fabric spray paint, picked up Mindy Kaling's book (which I bought for myself yesterday) and I am laying in bed, in my running clothes, reading it. I feel like a dead person. When I finally perk up a little (give it half an hour), I'll lace 'em up, head over to the middle school track, and run another five-miler, easy. I will tape my sprained ankle and run my miles and then I will come home, record them, drink a glass of red wine, spray paint the shirts, and go to sleep. But see, I'm planning again! Just doing that makes me freak out.

This is why I don't keep a running log; it makes me insane. But maybe it's time for me to shift my focus and simplify. Maybe it's time for me to read Mindy Kaling, then go for a run, then just wing it for a while. We'll see how it goes.

UPDATE: Yeeeeeesshhhh ankle pain. But I ran my wimpy little two miles and came home. Something is better than nothing.

Quite the busy day! Squeezed in a brisk little run between spray painting the t-shirts for the soccer girls and going to the team party. I have loved coaching, but it got a little overwhelming these past few weeks and I am just one person.

I accidentally (ha ha) registered for the Secret City Half Marathon on the twentieth. I seriously do not have any idea whether I can do it. I figure that worst case scenario the time cap is three hours, so worst case scenario is that I run/walk for three hours. That sounds healthy.

I work with this girl who has run at least two half marathons, and both times she ran with no training. I can not even imagine doing that. Both times, they were the rock 'n roll half marathon, which has a huge turnout and a different band at every mile. She's told me she doesn't think she would have been able to do it without the crowd and bands, which is interesting-- one's capabilities really do change dramatically based on the environment, which is somewhat determined by our literal surroundings and somewhat determined by our inner landscape.

I am cheating a little because I didn't "go for a run" today. It was the first day of our Area Tournament, and I got up at 6:30 am to take a shower, make my game plan for the girls' two games, and drive down to the fields. It was incredibly foggy outside, the same dim kind of pea soup I remember seeing nearly every day over the fields when we lived in Vermont. At 7:00 on a Saturday, not too many people are driving around, and I always feel a bit strong and brave with my black under armor and completely ridiculous bright orange hunting beanie (we always wore them on the sailing team). 

I got to the fields at 7:40, just in time to check in and get the 8:00 game started. The fog was still definitely present on the field, but luckily not thick enough to make me stay any closer to the play than I normally would. I knew it would be a long day, so I didn't want to use up all my energy early and burn out later-- I knew I had to be awake for twenty hours at the minimum, and that I wouldn't get any nap time. I had signed up for an ambitious schedule: ref'ing at 8:00, an hour of downtime, then warming up the girls at 10:15 for our 10:45 game. After our game, I was to ref the 12:00, then drive home, change, and head downtown for family photos with a photographer hired by my aunt, at 14:00. From there, I had about an hour to put together my game plan for the second game, at 16:15 back at the park. Then, my luck ran out: both my friend Ashley's birthday and the annual meeting of my yacht club were scheduled for 6pm. But never fear, I was prepared: putting in an appearance at the yacht club was a reasonable compromise, as was missing the first part of Ashley's birthday, dinner.

I have a severely unreasonable habit of planning days like this on a very regular basis, and the more physical stress they require, the better they tend to go. I just really enjoy being busy, running around from task to task and entangling myself in a million concurrent projects. I can't say no. It's pathological.

In any event, the first game went well. I usually referee U14, the same age division I coach, but I like to referee the boys, since I coach the girls-- it lets me be a little more out of the game, and guarantees my impartiality. Also, though I wouldn't tell them this, the boys are a little better than the girls, so I get to see better soccer. And finally, the boys are a little rougher, and I like the increased challenge.

Generally, a competent player on a full field will run about 5 miles in a game of soccer. That makes sense when you think about it-- a full game for adults is 90 minutes, and if you are not moving at least 80% of the time, you are probably not a competent player. On top of that, nobody runs a 10-minute-mile pace during a soccer game unless they are jogging off the field at halftime. Similarly, as a referee I am probably moving a little slower, but I have to sprint some portion of the field about once every two minutes. This age group plays 35-minute halves, and their field is about four feet narrower than standard (the length, however, is the same, and is probably more relevant to the running done by the referee). My point is: I gave myself four miles per game, which I think is about right.

All the cutting and sprinting and sudden stops and starts did not do much for my poor sprained ankle, which has been healing VERY slowly. I forgot my white athletic tape and had only kinesio tape on it, which is great for everyday and usually sufficient for flat paved trail running, but not for soccer or anything involving uneven surfaces. Fortunately, the field was smoother than our usual field, but it was bothering me quite a bit by the middle of the second game. Also both my calves were cramping, which is very unusual for me. I probably did not drink enough water, I'm often guilty of that when I'm rushing straight from physical activity to social events. Which is most of the time.

Still not really sure what to think/say about soccer activities taking the place of normal running. I suppose we'll see what kind of results I get from it, but at this point in my life I think conditioning is conditioning, and ref'ing two games in a day while spending the whole day running around the park might be better endurance training than if I'd run six straight on the greenway. Am I a heretic? (I guess it wouldn't be the first time).