It's not the heat...

I'm a Californian. The temperature of my runs is largely dictated by which direction I go from the house--toward the ocean will likely be cooler, inland will be warmer. Humidity is rarely much of an issue either way, unless I happen to be out in the evening when the dew is falling. Normally I check my pace on my wrist GPS about every half mile during a run.

I recently signed up for the Chicago Marathon in October. We all know how that went last year. It's been a long time since I did much running in the midwest.

This past week, I've been staying in Oklahoma, visiting family. The humidity has been dragging me down considerably--my pace hasn't been too far off of normal, but my runs just feel a lot longer and slower. Basically, I've been checking my GPS every third of a mile, and it always feels like it's been a half mile. So the seven mile run I did the day before yesterday was feeling pretty long even before it started raining. This is starting to concern me because I don't want my 26.2 in October to feel like 39.3.

Assuming most of you live in the Midwest somewhere (Missouri, Ohio), how do you deal with the humidity? Does your body just adjust to it at some point, or are there things that I could be doing to feel better?

BEAT JIM IN 08

I've had a good six months of racing. I scored a three year PR in a 5K, a WAVA PR in a half-marathon, and an actual PR in a marathon. My marathon time qualifies me for the 2009 Boston marathon and I have qualified for the 2008 New York half-marathon.

Despite these pleasing race times, every one of you who has toed the line with me has beat me in at least one race. You know who you are.

My birthday is July 12th which falls on the date of the "Y Not Run" five and ten kilometer race at Highland Springs. I hope all of you can join me for a pizza lunch early that afternoon. I have not planned where to meet but I have set aside funds to treat the group. You are also encouraged to bring a significant other.

The Kyrgyz Republic

Today I accepted an invitation to serve the Kyrgyz Republic through the Peace Corps.

This is very exciting. I don't know what sort of internet access I'll have, but I'm looking forward to living a bit more simply and helping people out.

My assignment is to teach English at a university. I'll try to regularly log on to this blog to update you friends and family on how I'm doing.

Right now I need to get everything in order for sending off my forms for a new passport and a visa from the Kyrgyz Republic.

I have a new blog that I'm using to try to sell books and furniture. I'll also try to update that blog semi-regularly before I leave and then whenever I have internet access.

It is abiglove.blogspot.com

Race for a Roof, and the Ultimate Workout

I skipped the 5K I was planning to run last weekend in favor of this morning's "Race for a Roof" 5K sponsored by the Ohio State chapter of Habitat for Humanity. I participated in it, though I wouldn't say I "raced" by any means. After playing 6 hours of Ultimate Frisbee in the May Fiasco Tournament yesterday, I was far too stiff, sore, and physically exhausted to run the 3.1 miles at any kind of reasonable pace. Which was OK, because I had some friends who were just planning to walk the Race course anyway. So I staggered along with them on a nice leisurely stroll through the Ohio State campus.

I'll just shoot for a PR on my next 5K.

Long-distance running has been my one consistent physical activity for the last 7 years or so, and even though I'm in pretty good shape as a result, apparently there are plenty of muscles that I don't use when I simply run for several hours at a consistent pace. However, these other muscles do get used--extensively--in the endless succession of short sprints that are required for Ultimate. On top of that, there is also the throwing, diving, and stretching which worked my upper body. All of this means that I haven't been this sore and tired since at least my last marathon several years back. Even my throat is sore from shouting during the matches, and from cheering on my teammates when I was on the sidelines.

I should definitely do this again sometime...

5k

I ran a 5K this morning! It was a bit of an accident. But for a variety of reasons, I woke up at 5 and I didn't want to go back to sleep. I wanted to go running. (I feel a nap coming on.) But seriously, I was thinking about the times when I used to wake up before the breakfast restaurant in my building was open. I'd wave at the cook who was prepping food for the day. And I'd go running 6 miles before anyone started eating - or at least before anyone paid for food.

It seems like the restaurant may have been less busy then.

Anyhow, I only meant to run a couple of miles but I got a bit carried away. I ran past the start of the Kitchen Fun Run that begins in a little over an hour. Then I ran part of the course for the Chris Sifford 5K.

I may register for the Chris Sifford 5K. It's June 28 and it's my standing 5K PR. 23:20.

That's a goal worthy of aiming at.

OKC Marathon

Ryan and I had a good day.
We both scored PRs. Jim(3:52:58) Ryan(4:36:54)
Neither of us expected a good race. I had been sick (temp 101 on Tues and antibiotics) and Ryan was doing his third marathon in less that 60 days. It was raining at the start and windy. One never knows.

I qualified for Boston!

Boston report, part 2

Thanks to everyone for their comments. By popular demand, I guess I'd be glad to talk a little more about the race.

One thing you don't realize until you've done it is how much is just on a winding two-lane road lined with houses and small towns, completely different from the last couple of miles in the heart of Boston. The start of one of the most famous marathons in the world is literally just a line on the road in front of the Citgo station in Hopkinton. And from there you run through a neighborhood that peters out into a fairly long stretch with nothing but woods on either side of the road. It's a real contrast to the last couple of miles amid the high-rises of downtown Boston.

Wellesley is about halfway. It's an all-girls college. They love the race. They love the racers. 'Nuff said. (I unfortunately missed the one student who was out there holding a sign inviting runners to plant one on her cheek. I heard about this from someone who actually did.)

I overheard a couple of runners chatting near me around mile 10.

Woman: "...yeah, right now we're on a great pace for sub-3-hours."
Man: "Cool. What's your previous best time for a marathon?"
Woman: "3:49."

Unfortunately I didn't get to hear what her training secrets that allowed her to be on pace to shave 50 MINUTES off her PR.

I got the impression from talking to people that Boston must be one of the most running-aware cities in the country, at least as far as the Boston Marathon goes. Even people who would never lace up running shoes unless it was at gunpoint seemed to know a fair amount about the race and its history. The marathon falls on a local public holiday, and there's more than a few families who make it an annual tradition to pack a picnic lunch, drive out to the course, and spend a few hours screaming at runners, even if they have no other connection to the race. It's impressive.

I mean, I saw the evening sportscast on the local Boston news and the reporter, describing Cheruiyot's fourth win, said, "and here's name that's become a household word here in New England the last few years..." and I'm not sure he was being sarcastic.

Anyway, that's just a few random things that came to my head as I was pecking away at the keyboard about Boston. Also, if 45 minutes before the race, you get in a line for the port-a-potties that's 20 people long, at 15 minutes to race time you will still be nowhere near the front and will have a hard, hard decision to make. Especially since the cops are patrolling the nearby woods specifically to foil your plan B.

Watching Boston Marathon

I figure I can offer a different perspective as a spectator at the Boston Marathon, and let me start by saying this: I was totally under-prepared. Actually, I was so under-prepared that I didn't realize it would be a challenge to spot your runner in this race.

At the start, one runner came after another runner. Then came torrents of runners, coming down the street like locusts at the pace for a 3-hour-or-so race. It was impossible to see everyone, forcing me to abandon my plan to take Mark's photo. Instead, I focused on spotting him. I was worried I would miss him because there was hardly enough time for me to scan everybody's face as they came by, racing down the street. Maybe I should have Mark wear a bright-colored top or something that really stands out next time he runs Boston.

Luckily, I got to see him, and he saw me, too. He ran toward me and gave me a big hug before pressing on. I quickly jumped on a train, which was outpaced by the runners. By the time I arrived at the destination train station, I looked up on my watch and knew Mark had already finished.

It took us at least another 20 minutes before we connected. Several times, I stood in the midst of a sea of people, wondering how on earth I would find Mark. I knew then we must develop a strategic meeting plan next time we go to Boston.

More from Boston

Hey Mark, I think I speak for the others here at Poetic Feet when I say that you can post something new about the Boston Marathon every day for the next several months and we won't get tired of it.

Congrats to Mark

Congrats to Mark who finished his first Boston Marathon today in 3:12:37.

It looks like he might have tried to post something earlier so I won't say too much more, except results are up on the web at BostonMarathon.org

Report from Boston

The crappy wireless network here at the hotel has now eaten this post twice, so hopefully the third time will be the charm.

Long story short: I haven't posted around here much because I've been running and running and running. The reason was because that today I joined about 25,000 other people for the 112th Boston Marathon. They say that it's an experience unlike any other marathon. And they're right...from the 8-deep crowds on a hillside at the start in Hopkinton, to the enthusiastic cheering students at Wellesley College near halfway, to the cheering masses in downtown Boston, it's a memorable race. And the fact that it's one of the most celebrated, historic marathons in the world is the gravy on top.

I'd put it out there that I was shooting for a goal of 3 hours, and from the early running things looked good. The day started utterly ideal for marathon running - cloudy/foggy, mid-40s, light winds. The sun burned off the clouds right before the start, but it was still fairly pleasant. I cruised through the first half in just under 1:29 (2:58 marathon pace), and felt great - I was barely even breathing hard.

From mile 16 to 21 is a series of hills that keep Boston from being considered a "fast" course, even if it is a net downhill drop overall. These of course culminate in the infamous Heartbreak Hill near mile 20-21. None of the hills, including Heartbreak, are particularly steep, but they are a grind, coming as they do later in the marathon when you're already getting tired, and some of them are fairly long (Heartbreak Hill drags out for a good half-mile or more).

All around me runners started to slow to a walk or even stop completely and massage tired legs, but I was more than a little happy to find that I had the strength to charge up all of them without slowing down (beyond the normal slowing to climb), including Heartbreak Hill. Just over the top of Heartbreak is a downhill that takes you back down pretty much all the elevation you've climbed, maybe even more. And I put it on cruise control and zoomed down the hill, passing runners right and left. I was still on sub-3-hour pace, and I had maybe 4-5 miles left to go.

The course turned right and leveled off, and it was at about this point that my quads decided to check out for the day, seizing up like a rusty car engine. My quads twitched and spasmed, and it became a battle to move forward at anything faster than a walk. It's no exaggeration to say that miles 22-26.2 were some of the toughest running I've ever done in any race anywhere. In a way, it was a silver lining that this happened in Boston, where I could no sooner begin to falter than the crowd several deep on the sidewalk would urge me to get it back in gear.

My three-hour goal disappeared pretty quickly, but I still considered it a victory of sorts that I was able to gut out a 3:12:37 finish (and had I not somehow managed to actually run 26.45 miles I probably could've gotten the magic 3:10:59 re-qualifying time). And it's hard to be too disappointed at managing to run 22 miles of sub-3-hour-pace marathoning.

I have no doubt that some day I'll cross the 3-hour threshhold, but it wasn't meant to be today. In the meantime, I have a bit of unfinished business with the Boston Marathon. Hopefully I'll be back next year - perhaps sharing a room with rslight or bl?

Peace Corps

Well, my medical tests came back today and they were good.

So I sent off all the paperwork and now i just wait some more.

I'm applying to join the Peace Corps and I'm real excited about it.

I'll write more soon.

Physical exams

This week, I need to see the doctor, the dentist and the optometrist. It's all part of my "job application."

I'm excited but right now with a bunch of medical exams, tests and diagnostics I'm scared and neurotic. Probably more neurotic than scared. What might I have that might prevent me from getting this "job."

I feel fine. I should be fine. All should be well.

But I'm extremely nervous. It's also a "government job" so I'm a little nervous about having all the forms filled out and signed in the right places also.

So, if you're so inclined to pray, say one for me.

Thanks.

I forgot

Today I ran a 21.5 mile run. My fifth marathon is in two weeks. Yesterday I listened to NPR on my way to a 5K race. They were extolling the benefits of vigorous aerobic exercise. Today I hit the wall at about 17 miles and struggled through the “discomfort” to finish my planned run. It was not a pleasant experience - not one I would deliberately repeat. Yesterday I learned from NPR that running improves brain function, especially the ability to do rational thought. After finishing my run today, I went to lunch. While sitting in the cold dinning room, my fingers started becoming numb. It worried me at first until I “rationally” understood that my core temperature had likely dropped significantly after almost three and a half hours of running in 35 degree weather, and that my body’s priority was to supply blood to my core and digestive system thus starving my extremities.
As I was driving home it occurred to me that I needed to share “the rest of the story” regarding the NPR broadcast.

While vigorous exercise may improve rational thought it is obviously destructive to memory. There is no other possible explanation why anyone would be a marathoner. Someone might run one marathon just to prove to prove he/she can. But to run more than one is evidence of clinical psychosis or failure to remember the agony of long runs and marathon races. Since masochism cannot explain the large number of repeat marathoners, the only logical conclusion is that all repeat marathoners suffer from diminished memory capacity. I wouldn’t be surprised to learn that there is a connection between the recent increases between the rising incidents of Alzheimer’s, dementia, and marathon participation.

Running Experiment

My physical therapist decided to try a little experiment today. Since I severely overpronate (i've been told I have feet like Calvin), she taped my feet after our session today, and then asked me to go for a run later. I think the idea was to make my arches "arch" a bit more, but I'm really not sure. I just finished 7 miles, and the main things I notice were that the extra "snugness" was quite comfortable to start, but eventually (around mile 3) the outside edges of my feet started to hurt where they were constricted by the tape. I've never tried running with my feet "bound" before, but I don't think it helped all that much (my knees were still aching a bit after the run, which is the main problem I'm trying to take care of with PT). I guess maybe it's a good thing that I didn't quite know what the therapist was trying to accomplish; that way I couldn't psych myself into thinking it was working or it wasn't.

On an unrelated note, has anybody else noticed how fast Sanoodi has become for route mapping? Since I got my Garmin last year, I haven't needed to use Sanoodi much. But it ended up coming to the rescue today when my Garmin battery died during my run. On previous occasions, it has taken longer for me to map my run than to actually run it! But this time it was blazing, even with the continuous elevation update turned on. They must've upgraded their hardware/software/ISP significantly. Good for them.

Hogeye Marathon

Can you believe it? -- Moby, The Stars

I (rslight) completed my third marathon Sunday at the Hogeye Marathon, which starts near the University of Arkansas in Fayetteville.
Hogeye has been called one of the top 10 most difficult marathons in the United States because of its numerous steep hills. It was fun.
It's a small event. There were 67 men and 31 women in the marathon (considerably more in the half-marathon and 5K). The course ventures through very beautiful countryside, passing a golf course, parks, affluent homes and boats on a waterway. Weather was sunny and warm, but not crazy hot.
I suppose this is what they call "no frills" ... no spectators, music, chip timing or costumed characters. But volunteers were caring and encouraging. Roads weren't closed off for this, and a couple of times we were dangerously close to traffic (just a few orange cones sort of separating us from cars).

My legs were extremely sore at the end, and a volunteer had to catch me from falling down at the finish line.
But I got a PR of 4:39:04. (That's more than eight minutes faster.)

Some of you deserve a piece of this cartoonish hog medal I received for your advice after Little Rock. I really tried to pace myself better.
Here's how it broke down. You probably still think I started too fast.
Mile 1: 9:11, Mile 2: 9:55, Mile 3: 9:08, Mile 4: 9:30, Mile 5: 9:34, Mile 6: 9:26, Mile 7: 9:44, Mile 8: 9:44, Mile 9: 10:23, Mile 10: 9:55, Mile 11: 9:54, Mile 12: 9:49, Mile 13: 10:03, Mile 14: 10:01, Mile 15: 10:05, Mile 16: 10:07, Mile 17: 10:20, Mile 18: 10:47, Mile 19: 11:01, Mile 20: 11:52, Mile 21: 11:11, Mile 22: 11:41, Mile 23: 11:24, Mile 24: 11:30, Mile 25: 12:24, Mile 26: 12:19, 0.67 remainder: 8:26.

Running Hogeye was part of my secret plan. Late last year I signed up to run three marathons in two months to qualify for Marathon Maniacs. I didn't tell anyone before now simply because I didn't want to horrify people, but it has been a lot of fun.

Now just one race separates me from maniac status: April 27 Oklahoma City Memorial Marathon.
I've looked forward to that one for months, and it's almost here.

Potentially interesting side note: I'm also glad to have a new 5K PR of 22:38 after running Saturday's Oklahoma State University Osteopathic Scrub Run 5K in Tulsa, Oklahoma. A race featuring college student volunteers in scrubs!

Overhwelmed by the support

Well, as most of the readers of this blog know, I'm in between jobs right now. Things seem to be going well right now. Here's the top of an interesting story I read with resonated a little with me at this point in my job search/interview process... More to come.

SALEM — Jennifer Jordan was looking for a way to educate her Salem State colleagues about the Peace Corps and the sub-Saharan African country of Botswana, where she'll be living the next two years as part of a public health mission.

So she asked people to join her in a symbolic "Trek to Botswana," by either running, biking or swimming the distance from Salem to Botswana — 7,694 miles — by her departure date on April 16. To her amazement, 30 faculty and staff members got on board.

"I'm overwhelmed by the support you get from people when you go forward with something you really want to do," said Jordan, who works at the college's Wellness Center.....

The efforts of the Trek to Botswana team will culminate at the 12th annual North Shore Wellness Fair and Road Race on Sunday, April 13, at 9 a.m, at the O'Keefe Center on Canal Street.

For more information and registration, visit www.salemstate.edu/wellness.

Back in the Saddle

You may recall that I injured my knee during my LA Marathon training...various tendons became inflamed and extremely painful anytime I tried running while wearing my knee braces. And I needed those because of my earlier ilio-tibial band injury, which precluded long runs (mroe than 5 miles) without the braces.

After nearly a month of virtually no running, and another several weeks of physical therapy, I went on my first run with my knee braces. I'm happy to report that I ran almost five and a half miles with no inflammation of the tendons in my knee, and thus no pain whatsoever. I'm continuing physical therapy to see if I can strengthen my knees enough so that I can ditch the braces altogether, but at the very least I'm back to where I was before my injury. I do still have occasional pains while running, but it's really no worse than I've always had; at this point I've just ceased to be paranoid about it. If nothing else, this signifies for me a mental shift from "recovering" to being "in training" again.

So, any suggestions for a summer/fall marathon I should run?

22-minute land

Run away! Run children! Run for your life! -- Gnarls Barkley, Run

I (rslight) escaped from 23-minute 5K purgatory at Saturday's Northeast Greene County Relay for Life in Strafford. My new 5K PR is 22:51, trumping my previous best of 23:04 in November. Having a super easy, flat course really helped.
I received a Relay for Life water bottle for getting third in my age group. (Don't be jealous.)

Getting a PR like that puts you in a good mood. You read business news online and laugh and say, "Wow, stocks are going down just like my 5K time."

Ronald Rafferty, a runner who finished just before me, asked me what my goal was for the year. I paused at the question because I already reached my goal of going under 23:00. The next logical goal is to try and do it again, and see if I can become a permanent resident of 22-minute land.

Good luck to MS and Jim Evans as their April marathons approach. And good luck to anyone preparing for something I don't know about. (That should cover everybody.)

Love/Hate

I saw a pretty cool running shoe commercial last night while watching the NCAA tournament. I'm not sure that this is it, but this is from the same advertising campaign.

The Runner's High

I saw an interesting story in the New York Times today about research into the mythical runner's high.

I'll post some excerpts:

The runner’s-high hypothesis proposed that there were real biochemical effects of exercise on the brain. Chemicals were released that could change an athlete’s mood, and those chemicals were endorphins, the brain’s naturally occurring opiates. Running was not the only way to get the feeling; it could also occur with most intense or endurance exercise.

The problem with the hypothesis was that it was not feasible to do a spinal tap before and after someone exercised to look for a flood of endorphins in the brain. Researchers could detect endorphins in people’s blood after a run, but those endorphins were part of the body’s stress response and could not travel from the blood to the brain. They were not responsible for elevating one’s mood. So for more than 30 years, the runner’s high remained an unproved hypothesis.

But now medical technology has caught up with exercise lore. Researchers in Germany, using advances in neuroscience, report in the current issue of the journal Cerebral Cortex that the folk belief is true: Running does elicit a flood of endorphins in the brain. The endorphins are associated with mood changes, and the more endorphins a runner’s body pumps out, the greater the effect.....

For athletes and nonathletes alike, the results are opening a new chapter in exercise science. They show that it is possible to define and measure the runner’s high and that it should be possible to figure out what brings it on. They even offer hope for those who do not enjoy exercise but do it anyway. These exercisers might learn techniques to elicit a feeling that makes working out positively addictive.

The lead researcher for the new study, Dr. Henning Boecker of the University of Bonn, said he got the idea of testing the endorphin hypothesis when he realized that methods he and others were using to study pain were directly applicable.

The idea was to use PET scans combined with recently available chemicals that reveal endorphins in the brain, to compare runners’ brains before and after a long run. If the scans showed that endorphins were being produced and were attaching themselves to areas of the brain involved with mood, that would be direct evidence for the endorphin hypothesis. And if the runners, who were not told what the study was looking for, also reported mood changes whose intensity correlated with the amount of endorphins produced, that would be another clincher for the argument.

Dr. Boecker and colleagues recruited 10 distance runners and told them they were studying opioid receptors in the brain. But the runners did not realize that the investigators were studying the release of endorphins and the runner’s high. The athletes had a PET scan before and after a two-hour run. They also took a standard psychological test that indicated their mood before and after running.

The data showed that, indeed, endorphins were produced during running and were attaching themselves to areas of the brain associated with emotions, in particular the limbic and prefrontal areas.

The limbic and prefrontal areas, Dr. Boecker said, are activated when people are involved in romantic love affairs or, he said, “when you hear music that gives you a chill of euphoria, like Rachmaninoff’s Piano Concerto No. 3.” The greater the euphoria the runners reported, the more endorphins in their brain.

“Some people have these really extreme experiences with very long or intensive training,” said Dr. Boecker, a casual runner and cyclist, who said he feels completely relaxed and his head is clearer after a run.

That was also what happened to the study subjects, he said: “You could really see the difference after two hours of running. You could see it in their faces.”

In a follow-up study, Dr. Boecker is investigating if running affects pain perception. “There are studies that showed enhanced pain tolerance in runners,” he said. “You have to give higher pain stimuli before they say, ‘O.K., this hurts.’ ”

And, he said, there are stories of runners who had stress fractures, even heart attacks, and kept on running.

Three days

How out of shape am I? It's hard to say.
I'm not as burned out as I was though.

For the first time since January, I've gone running three days in a row. It's only a total of eight miles, but still I feel good. I'm making progress and getting back in the saddle so to speak.

Now, I've just go to keep building on this new foundation.

Quote of the day - on having everything

“If I drank a lot of beer, I would have everything.” - Barnard Lagat, who lives in a gated community and barbecues four times a week.

From a story about Lagat's American Olympic dreams in today's New York Times.

And a bit about his training:

He did not train like many other distance runners. He worked out once a day, not twice. He ran 65 or 70 miles a week — maybe 80 at altitude in Flagstaff, Ariz. — not 120 or 130. He stressed quality over quantity, no running just for the sake of running, everything crisp and hard: tempo runs at slightly less than a five-minute pace, longer runs at just under six-minute pace, 13 miles in 70 minutes. He did hill repeats, from 300 meters to a mile, and on the track he ran 8x300 meters in 42 or 43 seconds with 45 seconds of rest in between. Or a brutal 500-meter repeat drill, in which he ran 300 meters in 42 seconds, jogged 100 meters in 30 seconds, then sprinted 200 meters in 28 seconds.

Frisco congrats

I'm your daytime waitress at the Taco Tiki Hut. I'm your daytime waitress, here's your stupid 7-Up -- The B-52s, Funplex

No groan or moan for me (rslight) this week.
Saturday's Frisco Highline Half Marathon in Springfield (and, I suppose, Willard) was a great experience, and I finished with a nice PR of 1:49:34 (beating my previous 1:52:57).
Having a flat course and pleasant weather helped. I tried to maintain an 8 minute per mile pace through the whole thing. There was a moment around mile 10 when I was tempted to speed up to overtake Bob Dewar, who was a little ahead of me, but I kept cool. It worked out.

Congrats to Jim Evans for taking first place and dominating his age group in the 5K.
Congrats to MS for dominating ... well, most everyone in the half marathon.
Congrats to Tangerine for her spirited participation in the 5K.

Gratuitous side note: The musical quotation above has nothing to do with running. I'm just glad the B-52s actually have a new album out.
When I first drove on an interstate highway in Texas as a teenager, I had the song "Roam" turned up loudly on something called a cassette player. Hopefully the new stuff on Funplex will be at least half as good. The song "Funplex" suggests it will.

lemme at em...

23

Bad Pitter Pat Karma

Instant Karma's gonna get you -- John Lennon, Instant Karma

When I (rslight) was a teenager, I really misheard the words to that John Lennon song.
I thought his opening lyrics were: Think some cop is gonna get you.
It makes sense.
Think some cop is gonna get you. Gonna knock you right on the head.
I thought the song was called "Shine On." Sometimes I would hear people mention Lennon's "Instant Karma" and wonder how that song went (before I bought the John Lennon Collection in college).

The Pitter Pat 5K in Springfield has left me in similar bewilderment for two years now. The local Junior League does a commendable job of organizing it, but it's just not a rslight-friendly course. I'm not sure I can articulate why.

Saturday's race wound through a western section of city and seemed to have ample corners and subtle elevation changes. With an apology to homeowners, the neighborhood lacked charming scenery, although the rainy sky may have made it appear more drab.

Last year I made the mistake of eating a large breakfast before the Pitter Pat and suffered stomach cramps before an uninspiring 26:27 finish.
This year I felt strong and fast, but only managed a 23:26, which is sadly way short of my 23:04 PR. I hit the 3-mile mark around 22:30 or so, but the last little bit seemed to go in slow motion. I suspect the course was slightly long.

Trying to beat my current 5K PR is a significant challenge. Last week I ran the Tiger Streak 5K in Ozark in 23:09, just 5 seconds off. Fortunately Saturday is the Frisco Highline Half Marathon. The half marathon will get my mind off of my 5K failures for a while.