For Whom the Dogs Bark

50F, 85% humidity, wind E 6 mph.  Very nice morning.  Slept like a rock last night, never changed positions and woke up with severe neck pain.  It didn't really affect my run, but I've got leftover stomach problems from my travels last week and that did affect my run.  I warmed up 2 miles, the plan was to go 4 hard at faster than HMP, but I could only go 2, my stomach started to hurt badly and I got nauseous.  So I ran the last 2 as a cooldown.  The fast ones were 6:50 (167) and 7:01 (176).  On a better day I think I could have done 4.  Overall 6.08 miles in 51:30, average pace 8:29 per mile, flat shoes.  Right at the beginning of my fast miles a 2-pound yapper came out to greet me, but he just wanted to run.  He kept up with me for a half mile then got distracted by a tree.  Felt pretty dumb getting outrun by a furball.

67F, 90% humidity, wind SSE 10-18 mph, starting to rain.  Nice cloudy morning out there, a little warm though.  Started out well on the LHR run, but heart rate drift was pretty steep in the heat.  Mile 2 was 9:33, mile 7 was 10:20.  Overall 7.04 miles in 1:10:10, average pace 9:58 per mile, flat shoes.  Had to knock off early to drive a kid to school but that is OK for this week.  I am not in full taper mode for a half marathon, but I don't mind going into the race a little bit rested.  Hopefully I can do some more fast miles tomorrow then nothing hard until Saturday.  Looks like it will be a little warm in Beaumont on Saturday morning, high 50s and low 60s, warm enough to affect pacing, but there is some colder weather scheduled between now and then, so if things get delayed it might still be cool then.  Hoping for the best.

Trying to decide whether to run UVM.  The altitude got me last year, although I had a pretty decent PR anyway.  I am thinking if I do a lot of hill work on my wife's treadmill, up and down, I might be OK.  It would be nice to have something better than a 3:39 (day 5) in my pocket when I am trying to get into Boston this fall.

Once Saturday's race is over, I am thinking of doing 8 weeks of straight LHR training so I can have something to build on for the rest of the year.  I am not improving much on that end of the spectrum by doing it 3 or 4 times a week.

66F, 99% humidity, wind NW 5 mph to start, 56F, 70% humidity, wind N 10-20 mph at end.  Ran right through a front coming in this morning, hope it hangs around until Saturday morning.  Was pretty surprised at how strong the wind was, since the weather report had posted 5 mph at the time I went out -- turns out it was changing on the fly.

The plan was to run 5 fast at 7:00 pace, in hopes that a 7:15 pace on Saturday would seem manageable.  I managed to do that, but given how tired I was I am not sure it will work for Saturday.  Hopefully I didn't wear myself out.  Warmed up for three, accelerating into the fast ones, then 7:02 (169), 6:55 (176), 6:58 (183), 7:09 (188) (really feeling it here) and 6:57 (190).  Was very happy to get that last one under 7, especially since a lot of it was into the wind.  Average pace 7:00 plus 1 second for the whole 5 which I will call a rounding error.  Couldn't believe how high my heart rate readouts were, at some points it was steady 192 and even showing upper 190s but it was spiking at that point and I think it might have been a mechanical malfunction (hopefully not a coronary malfunction).  Nevertheless, the average bpm showing for each split are pretty accurate, I think.  This one was either maximum effort or pretty close, would have been a real battle to run 10K at this speed.  Cool down 2 miles, total 10.04 miles in 1:23:41, average pace 8:19 per mile, flat shoes and definitely not LHR.

41F, 75% humidity, wind WNW 3 mph.  Great running weather today.  Ran 10.25 miles in 1:41:05, average pace 9:52 minutes per mile, low heart rate and flat shoes.  Last mile was 9:49, so nothing under 10 other than the first one, good run.

36F, 93% humidity, calm and clear as a bell.  Pretty much perfect out there this morning.  When I saw the temperature I bundled up, but never noticed the cold.  Still can't believe we are getting these temperatures in mid-March.  Hopefully some of this will hold until tomorrow morning.  60 was predicted yesterday, 53 being predicted this morning.  50 would be about perfect and remove all excuses.  I was going to go 10 this morning but then I remembered something about never going over 8 when you are getting ready for a race so I cut it short.  Hasn't been much of a taper this week but at least I gave it a nod.  Back to China on Monday morning, so I will get almost no running done there unless I can make myself do treadmill.  But first, off to Beaumont tonight for the big race tomorrow.  (Actually a pretty small race but you know what I mean.)

I registered for UVM yesterday, back to Utah for more high altitude punishment.  I got a hotel room in Midvale but it doesn't look like it is much of an advantage, it appears to be 10 miles from the start line.  When a race starts at 6:00 there are few alternatives to a very early alarm clock.

60F, 90% humidity, wind SE 15 mph.  Really nice running weather today, but I admit it got a little warm by the end.  Wade and I drove to Beaumont last night, got our hotel room, got registered, watched the Jimmer show, went foraging for food at gas stations, then retired early, at midnight, satisfied that the thermometer had dropped to 50F.  Arose in the 5:30 range, noted with alarm that the temperature was back up to 60F, took in a few calories and drove to the start line, about 10 miles away.  This kind of weather always feels cool and refreshing until you try to run in it.

Wade’s brother was running his first marathon and his sister-in-law was running the half as well.  Also, my nephew’s father-in-law, Mike, is a local and he was running in the same age group as me.  I warmed up for a mile and lined up almost at the front, didn’t want to be fighting for running room.  I noticed a guy with Mike on his bib, but didn’t feel like chatting before the race to see if he was the right Mike.  There were several other old guys in the same area, most wearing half-marathon bibs.  I remembered that a 54-year old won this race last year and figured I would have some good age-group competition.  The race counted down and we were off exactly on time at 7:30, was very glad they didn’t wait until 8.

About a hundred yards in I checked my watch and I was running at a 6:35 pace.  It felt plenty smooth but I immediately reeled it in.  It was toucg finding my target 7:15 pace.  First mile was 7:10, second was 7:24.  After that I got into the groove until I started to fade a little bit past the halfway point.

The old guys formed our own group almost immediately, together with the first place woman, and we held together for a while, surging back and forth.  We dropped the first-place woman after about 3 miles, dropped a few younger guys that went out too fast, then gradually started dropping the old, steady guys.  Finally they all fell off except for me and Mike, then at about mile 6 or 7, can’t remember exactly, I put on a last surge and kind of dropped Mike but he never went away.  Then there was nobody.  About then we made the turn back into the wind.  It was hotter and there was some up-hill to the road as well.  Previously we had been twisting and turning through the city but coming back it was a long, lonely straightaway, very tough.  A couple of younger marathoners were ahead of me but they kept increasing their lead and eventually I had the road all to myself, and it stayed that way for the duration.  I found myself asking for directions frequently, but never had trouble getting the right advice about which way the course turned.  Whenever I would pass a group of spectators they would encourage me and then fall silent.  I could tell how far back Mike was by the following shouts of encouragement.  Didn’t seem to me like he was all that far back.

At mile 12 there was a u-turn and sure enough, Mike was within 30 yards but working very hard.  By this time I was struggling to maintain any pace at all and my heart rate was already in the 180s.  I had done a mile earlier this week in the 190s so I did it again.  When I made the next to final turn I had 150 yards on Mike and that was it.  Splits were 7:10, 7:24, 7:15 (172), 7:16 (171), 7:19 (171), 7:15 (175), 7:12 (178), 7:22 (178), 7:27 (180), 7:37 (179), 7:38 (179), 7:47 (184), 7:30 (191), then .11 at 6:55, (188).  Finished in 1:37:04, average pace 7:24 per mile.

After I finished the first thing I did was introduce myself to Mike and sure enough he was the one, 59 years old, a very good runner.  One of the other old guys was 70, and he broke 1:40 and sounded disappointed.  I hope I can do that when I am 70.  (Actually, I probably won’t be doing this when I am 70.)  Turns out Mike and I had met at my nephew’s wedding.  After finishing I immediately tried to find out my overall place but they were coy about it, asking me to “stick around”.  So we did, even though we wanted to get back to the hotel and shower in order to get back for Wade’s brother’s marathon finish.  But we stuck around.  It takes a while to get to my age group.  Wade’s sister-in-law got second out of 37 in her age group and was ecstatic.  Finally they announced us.  Mike was third, so I knew that meant I was second.  The age group winner ran 1:27, way out of my league, so I had no regrets.  Catching somebody like that is going to have to wait for next year.  I worked hard and got a good time considering the conditions.  The overall winner ran 1:11, so thankfully a 1:27 didn’t win it again this year, that would have been embarrassing.  I got 14th overall out of 507 half-marathon finishers, Mike got 15th, and we had a grand time racing through the oil town on a warm Saturday morning. 

After showering, we got back just in time to see Wade’s brother run past the parking lot with 2 miles to go.  He finished his first marathon in about 4:12, running 2:04 and 2:08.  Very steady runner.  He seemed happy when I told him my time for my first marathon.  And my second. And my third.