12 wins, 5 CR's, plus four 2nd, five 3rd, 4th, 4th, 5th, 5th, 9th, 16th, 20th, 28th, 38th, and 62nd place, with 1 DNF
Short-Term Running Goals:
Goals
Enjoy running, stay fit (and maybe lose a few pounds). Play ultimate frisbee.
4 year coach of Langston Middle School- love it
Long-Term Running Goals:
Unretire at some point
Run a sub-6 hr 50 miler
Win a 100 mile ultramarathon
Personal:
I have five cute kids. And I have some rockin short green racing shorts- I wear them mainly because it embarrasses my wife so much. I like ultimate frisbee, trail running, reading, and cheering for the Denver Broncos! And I have the absolute best wife in the world. And I used to run for the now-disbanded national Team Pearl Izumi- Ultra!
Quick race report- Felt good first 2 hrs, then felt like crap (well, puking, more accurately) the next 1.5 hrs. Not fun. Finally recovered and tried to catch the one guy ahead of me. Made up lots of time but 2 wrong turns and some ill-time pit stops did me in. Finished in second, 83 seconds behind the very elated victor, Mike Mason. Well done race with good course. Course was pretty technical and muddy (by East Coast standards, which are more difficult than Utah standards), moreso than expected, 6k+ ft of non-stop hills, with intermittent rain and chilly temps. Good workout for Umstead, but not super as a race- I was hoping to be a fair amount faster. I'll give it a solid "meh"- full race report later.
A short Ron Paul clip to watch while you wait for my race report. Warning: humorous, and no mention of the Fed. Link courtesy of Rob.
PM- didn't go at lunch cause the drains backed up, flooding the locker rooms and giving Ken a big headache. So ran in the afternoon. Good to be running again- and my abs hurt more than my knee, so that's good. 6 miles.
Is there any difference between Romney and Obama? Judge Napolitano discusses:
Jun, I have no idea why you say you can't see the trail in my race photos from Sat. It's plain as day. Besides, it's not the leaf strewn trail you have to worry about. It's the rocks hiding under the leaves. You just kind of hope you're landing on dirt rather than rock, and you get used to twisted ankles. See, take a look:
AM- Ran with Justin and first run with Jeremy Waldrop, in town from NC for a week. We ran the Blue Wall and Poinsett Passage sections of the Palmetto trail. I had never been on this trail and found it quite nice, plus it was only 45 min from home- pretty close. Had a good mix of climbing (800 ft in mile 4, 1800 ft in 3 miles), flat, technical, and smooth. Chilly and windy, with a few minutes of light snow flurries (first time I've seen snow this winter). Legs felt better than I thought they would post-race, except for the thorn scratches hurting a bit in the shower afterwards. Fun time. Hope we can do it again, guys. Finished with 20 miles on the dot, just under 3.5 hrs and 4400 ft climbing (SportTracks and Garmin Connect actually agreed for once). Even carried the camera, hoping to see a bear eventually. Didn't see one, but a few pics below. 14 miles Mon thru Wed, 54 Thur thru Sat. Full mileage next week.
AM- Treadmill BW- 3 mile warm up, then tinman tempo- started at 6:07 pace, then slowly increased pace to 6:00 by mile 5, 5:53 by mile 9.Felt great today.During BW, I normally feel ok yet am working hard, but today it felt easy.When I finished the run, there wasn’t even any sweat that had dripped on the treadmill.In fact, the faster I went, the better I felt.5:50 pace felt easier than 6:05 pace.Decided to add an extra mile to end of tempo with rapidly increasing pace, finishing at 5:00 pace for the last 200 yards, still feeling great. I wanted to keep going but knew I should be cautious.2 mile cooldown.16 miles total in about 1:42, with 11 tempo in about 66 min.Good start to the week.
Lunch- 7 more. Tired and sore now- feels like I almost ran a marathon. 3 hrs between runs is never enough.
Here is some interesting info. If you want to know who a candidate will favor if elected, just look at what companies contribute to them (well, the employees). For Romney: his top contributors are Wall Street, banks, investment firms, etc. And their contributions are huge $$$$ For Ron Paul: his top contributors are military members. It looks like our military members like Paul's ideas of bringing the troops home and not fighting in costly, dangerous wars overseas. So, Romney = more bailouts and favoritism towards banks/Wall Street. Ron Paul = bring troops home out of harms way, which they support.
AM- 10
PM- 10.5 with Justin on a chilly night at PM. Tired and slow- 97 miles in my last 5 days of running, which is obviously a lot. Trails are always nice. But definitely slower when it is dark. Hardly anyone out- maybe saw 6 people the whole time. 1200 ft climb, 1:56.
AM- Little workout. First time I have had 2 workouts in the same week in years, probably. And first time I have done any workouts other than long tempos in forever. Did 3 warmup, then 3x2 mile with 2 min rest (splits were 5:46, 5:46, 5:42, 5:42, 5:39, 5:34). 12 total in about 80 min.
AM- Met Dan and Jim downtown for a run on the Swamp Rabbit and around Furman area. 21.5 miles on a beautiful morning. Legs felt appropriately fatigued by the end given my mileage this week, but still moving well. Miles 14-20 were all sub-7 pace, with most 6:25-6:45. 21.5 miles in 2:35 (7:14 avg). Good week- 3 more like this as the last of my training, then taper for Umstead.
This is one of the key times of the year when my Greenshortsrunning blog gets tons of hits... from people searching for Green Running Shorts, or St. Patricks Day green shorts, etc. Rather humorous to see where they all come from.
AM- BW. 3 mile warmup, 4 mile tempo, then had to stop to change shoes (looks like my 5 year old Tangents are finished), 6 mile more tempo, 2 mile cooldown. 60:25 10 miles, 1:38 total.
AM- 9 around GE on a gorgeous morning. High today was mid-70's, and low is in the 60's tonight. And I saw bushes flowering. Spring has sprung. Of course, it's supposed to be mid-30's tomorrow night, but still nice this time of year.
I finished my Green Belt certification at work today on the last day it was due (18 months after hiring on). Very glad to have it done- been working a lot of late nights trying to finish it. Now I might actually see my family and sleep.
AM- Long run/Big Workout with Justin. Drove to Croft State park. Beautiful morning- 35 deg at the start, 50 at the finish. We ran an 11-mile loop on the Southside trail as warm up. Then we started a tempo on the flat part of the course- there is a stretch just under 3 miles long that only has 3 very small hills and is otherwise as flat as you'll ever find. It is soft singletrack that is constantly winding- almost no straight stretches. I was immediately working as hard as during my 6:00 road tempos, though my splits were 7:00 to 7:30 (Justin fell behind a bit after a few miles). The last 3 miles were a harder sub-7, with a final mile of 6:25 and some 5:45 stretches on straight portions, including some extra incentive of trying to run down a mountain biker (which I did). Total for the BW portion was 10 miles in about 71 min. Finished with 22.5 miles in 3:11 with about 800 ft climbing. Felt good and got a great workout, though definitely have some sore hips, knees, feet, etc. Now rest for another few big weeks.
PM- Just got in trouble for eating the entire dinner planned for the whole family as an afternoon snack. How was I supposed to know that was for dinner? Actually, I didn't eat the entire pizza- just 5 of the 6 pieces. According to the box, I ate 1600 calories. So I'm still way negative for the day on food. I mean really, if the pizza is small enough that I can eat it myself, should they be advertising it as a family dinner? Should be advertised as a small, post-run snack if you ask me. It's not my fault that standard serving size doesn't account for ultrarunners and 100+ mile week appetites. Right, Jake?
Lunch- Big group of 8 out for the run. Too bad I felt terrible and was absolutely dragging. But I somehow outlasted everyone for an even 10. Even if I was half a mile behind at some points.
PM- 12 at PM with Barry and Justin (first time ever with 3 people). Nice run with lots of talking. Barry is just starting up again but did awesome for the first 90 min, after which we had to slow down. They are putting in some new trail and taking out old, which resulted in some detours and confusion in the dark. Finished with 12 miles in over 2 hrs and 1500 ft climbing.
AM- Aborted medium workout due to fatigue, plus no need to kill myself while feeling down and having a race on Sat. 3 mile warmup, 1.25 MP before pulling the plug, long cooldown with some xt. 13 miles in all.
Lunch- 6 more.
Feb was only my 3rd 400-mile month ever. The other two (Aug 09 before my TOU marathon PR and Aug 11 before UROC) both saw good results the next month. And hitting 400 in the shortest month of the year is extra sweet, though I definitely needed leap day to get there.
Looks like I'll have to work hard to not get chicked this weekend. The 15k is the 2nd race in a series, and Amber Moran (Inov-8 runner) won the first race straight up last week by 7 minutes over 17k. That's awesome. The last time I got chicked at a regular race (other than when I ran sick/injured) was probably Des News 2009, so it's been a while.
