The Work of Remembrance

In Memoriam

Good news for runners

I saw a news story on older runners on tv yesterday and I found a link to similar research online today .

Briefly, the point of the research is that it's OK to keep running no matter how old you get as long as you are healthy. Running, in other words, isn't bad for your joints.

The main problem for older runners is need to watch out for is overtraining.

So listen to your body and enjoy the run.

Of course, as I'm trying to get back in shape, I find that overtraining is a danger.

Here are excerpts from the article:

But a study out of Stanford University that looked at healthy aging runners found that running did not damage joints or leave runners less able to exercise. Researchers discovered that if you're healthy and generally free of injury, there are few reasons to put away your running shoes, even into your 70s and 80s.

"Moderate [running], three to five miles at a time, three times a week will actually help your joints to be more resilient and function a little bit better," says Dr. Amadeus Mason at Emory Sports Medicine Center in Atlanta, Georgia. But he stresses that keeping the joints healthy in the first place may be the key to running longevity.That includes not running through pain, and resting if you have an injury...


Beyond the good news about aging joints, the Stanford researchers also discovered some surprising overall health benefits for senior runners when they compared them with non-runners of the same age: Those in the running group were less likely to die from heart trouble, stroke, cancer, neurological diseases or infection.

"The survival rate of the runners was again twice that of the controls," study author Dr. Eliza Chakravarty says. She says the findings were a surprise to the researchers.
Health Library

Additionally, runners enjoyed a better day-to-day quality of life in old age than their more sedentary peers. "Members of the running group, it took them 16 years longer to reach certain levels of disability," says Chakravarty.

Toenails

I seem to have misplaced my toenail clippers.

My longest run so far has been five miles. I'm getting back into the swing of things slowly.

But one thing I've noticed is that I haven't clipped my toenails in a while. But running is forcing off the tips of the big toe toenails in jagged ways. I almost feel like that X-men superhero wolverine. These toenails are sharp now.

Anyhow, my current neighborhood is very hilly so that gives me the opportunity to get a good workout out of even short runs.

Warmest Day of the year

I ran five miles today.

I can't remember the last time I ran that far. And lately I've been struggling through one and two mile runs. I struggled through the five mile run but I made it.

It was a beautiful day. I heard on the news that it was the warmest day of the year. And it would be getting colder soon.

That doesn't surprise me.

It's so good to get out and run because you get to fully participate in the seasons. Although it was warm today, the trees didn't have any leaves on them. I could tell it wasn't quite spring yet.

But things are changing.

Welcome back, BL

It's good to see this blog site returning to life and to read about BL's runs.

Springfield had the perfect running weather this past weekend. Wish you had been here.

Couch Potato to 5K

I've been looking at some different Couch to 5K schedules, and this one looks good. It's only four months long, as opposed to seven months, which seems pretty long... But, one of my friends, specifically the one who got into amazing shape at the end of this last year, uses this website.

This week, my mileage was again two miles--mainly because it was too cold to go outside at the beginning of the week. I did another workout today, this time pairing my mile on a treadmill with some time on an elliptical machine and lifting weights. My knee started to feel funny when I was doing squats, so I stopped them, and other than a few twinges on the bike ride home, it seems to be doing okay. I'll pay attention to it when I run next. Not much news with this workout: last week, I'd added a little weight to most of the things that I do, so this week, I was mainly doing the same weights, but finding it slightly easier.

Movement toward the barely possible

Speaking of:

I've been running about 2 miles per week, ever since an injury sidelined me back in September. Or, rather, I've been running that much since I started running again, in January.

Runner's World advises adding no more than 10% of your weekly mileage each week, to avoid injury.

So, starting this week, I can go 2 miles
Week 2: 2.2
Week 3: 2.42
Week 4: 2.662
Week 5: 2.9
Week 6: 3.22
Week 7: 3.54
Week 8: 3.89
Week 9: 4.29
Week 10: 4.71
Week 11: 5.18
Week 12: 5.7
Week 13: 6.27
Week 14: 6.90
Week 15: 7.59
Week 16: 8.35
Week 17: 9.19
Week 18: 10.1

Now, I don't know that this needs to be adhered to that strictly. For instance, I think I could probably add a half-mile run in sometime this week, and jump to week 3 without doing too much harm, and adding 0.1 miles to each run next week (0.3 total added) would also probably not bring to a breaking point. Mostly, I wanted to type this up to see just how long it really will take to come back from an injury. The hardest part about this set of numbers is, just when I was cheering up, thinking that I could run a 5K in 6 weeks... I realized that the 5K would be my entire week's mileage.

So, this is sobering. 18 weeks before running 10 miles in a week. That... wow. Wow.

That is incentive to make sure to add the 0.2 this week, so that I can get to 2.4 the next week. Otherwise, I'll either be stuck doing my 1-mile runs forever, or risk injury.

That said, I'm seriously contemplating training for a triathlon. It's not worth aggravating my injury to try to train for a run too early, but focusing more on cross-training could probably do wonders in terms of keeping my cardiovascular health from slipping any more than it already has in the last few months.

Quote of the Day

Today's quote comes from a column by Eugene Robinson in today's Washington Post headlined Good Time for a Miracle Worker.


Let me interrupt the constant flow of unsettling news about budgets, bailouts and bankruptcies to welcome Tiger Woods back to competition and back into the spotlight. This would be a great time for the most watchable athlete in the world to resume doing what he does best, which is induce such slack-jawed amazement that the humanly impossible suddenly seems within reach.

Quote of the day

"We were built to run. We truly were."

Patti Serrano on Runners Club podcast.

This week I've been downloading lots of podcasts. I downloaded this old one called Runners Club and it was really interesting.

I ran three times this week. I literally can't remember the last time I ran three times in one week.
And I hope to run at least once more this week. Possibly a 5 mile run on Saturday. Maybe tomorrow. We'll see.
Now, these are baby steps.

I ran one mile on Monday. And maybe I ran a little too hard because I was sore on Tuesday. Then I ran about 3 miles on Wednesday and I tried to consciously go slow. (As if I need to think about it.) Today, Thursday, I ran 1 mile again.

It's interesting starting back again right now because on my first two runs of the week, the roads were really snowy and icy. Today there were just isolated icy patches - which was actually not as good a situation as Monday and Tuesday because you don't worry as much about the footing when everything looks clear.

Anyway, exercising religiously again. It feels good.

BBC Big Read

Evidently in 2003, the BBC had a massive publicity stunt to find the most popular novel in Great Britain. There are numerous versions of the list around (particularly on Facebook); this is the version of the top 100 found on the BBC site:

1. The Lord of the Rings, JRR Tolkien X
2. Pride and Prejudice, Jane Austen X
3. His Dark Materials, Philip Pullman X (1/3)
4. The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, Douglas Adams
5. Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, JK Rowling X
6. To Kill a Mockingbird, Harper Lee X
7. Winnie the Pooh, AA Milne
8. Nineteen Eighty-Four, George Orwell X
9. The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, CS Lewis X
10. Jane Eyre, Charlotte Brontë X
11. Catch-22, Joseph Heller X
12. Wuthering Heights, Emily Brontë X
13. Birdsong, Sebastian Faulks
14. Rebecca, Daphne du Maurier
15. The Catcher in the Rye, JD Salinger X
16. The Wind in the Willows, Kenneth Grahame X
17. Great Expectations, Charles Dickens X
18. Little Women, Louisa May Alcott X
19. Captain Corelli's Mandolin, Louis de Bernieres
20. War and Peace, Leo Tolstoy X
21. Gone with the Wind, Margaret Mitchell X
22. Harry Potter And The Philosopher's Stone, JK Rowling X
23. Harry Potter And The Chamber Of Secrets, JK Rowling X
24. Harry Potter And The Prisoner Of Azkaban, JK Rowling X
25. The Hobbit, JRR Tolkien X
26. Tess Of The D'Urbervilles, Thomas Hardy
27. Middlemarch, George Eliot X
28. A Prayer For Owen Meany, John Irving
29. The Grapes Of Wrath, John Steinbeck X
30. Alice's Adventures In Wonderland, Lewis Carroll
31. The Story Of Tracy Beaker, Jacqueline Wilson
32. One Hundred Years Of Solitude, Gabriel García Márquez X
33. The Pillars Of The Earth, Ken Follett
34. David Copperfield, Charles Dickens
35. Charlie And The Chocolate Factory, Roald Dahl X
36. Treasure Island, Robert Louis Stevenson X
37. A Town Like Alice, Nevil Shute
38. Persuasion, Jane Austen X
39. Dune, Frank Herbert
40. Emma, Jane Austen X
41. Anne Of Green Gables, LM Montgomery X
42. Watership Down, Richard Adams
43. The Great Gatsby, F Scott Fitzgerald X
44. The Count Of Monte Cristo, Alexandre Dumas X
45. Brideshead Revisited, Evelyn Waugh
46. Animal Farm, George Orwell X
47. A Christmas Carol, Charles Dickens X
48. Far From The Madding Crowd, Thomas Hardy
49. Goodnight Mister Tom, Michelle Magorian
50. The Shell Seekers, Rosamunde Pilcher
51. The Secret Garden, Frances Hodgson Burnett X
52. Of Mice And Men, John Steinbeck X
53. The Stand, Stephen King
54. Anna Karenina, Leo Tolstoy X
55. A Suitable Boy, Vikram Seth
56. The BFG, Roald Dahl
57. Swallows And Amazons, Arthur Ransome
58. Black Beauty, Anna Sewell X
59. Artemis Fowl, Eoin Colfer
60. Crime And Punishment, Fyodor Dostoyevsky X
61. Noughts And Crosses, Malorie Blackman
62. Memoirs Of A Geisha, Arthur Golden X
63. A Tale Of Two Cities, Charles Dickens X
64. The Thorn Birds, Colleen McCollough
65. Mort, Terry Pratchett
66. The Magic Faraway Tree, Enid Blyton
67. The Magus, John Fowles
68. Good Omens, Terry Pratchett and Neil Gaiman
69. Guards! Guards!, Terry Pratchett
70. Lord Of The Flies, William Golding X
71. Perfume, Patrick Süskind
72. The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists, Robert Tressell
73. Night Watch, Terry Pratchett
74. Matilda, Roald Dahl
75. Bridget Jones's Diary, Helen Fielding
76. The Secret History, Donna Tartt
77. The Woman In White, Wilkie Collins
78. Ulysses, James Joyce
79. Bleak House, Charles Dickens X
80. Double Act, Jacqueline Wilson
81. The Twits, Roald Dahl
82. I Capture The Castle, Dodie Smith
83. Holes, Louis Sachar
84. Gormenghast, Mervyn Peake
85. The God Of Small Things, Arundhati Roy
86. Vicky Angel, Jacqueline Wilson
87. Brave New World, Aldous Huxley X
88. Cold Comfort Farm, Stella Gibbons
89. Magician, Raymond E Feist
90. On The Road, Jack Kerouac X
91. The Godfather, Mario Puzo
92. The Clan Of The Cave Bear, Jean M Auel X
93. The Colour Of Magic, Terry Pratchett
94. The Alchemist, Paulo Coelho
95. Katherine, Anya Seton
96. Kane And Abel, Jeffrey Archer
97. Love In The Time Of Cholera, Gabriel García Márquez
98. Girls In Love, Jacqueline Wilson
99. The Princess Diaries, Meg Cabot
100. Midnight's Children, Salman Rushdie

Australia's ABC did something similar, of which I have read more. Modern Library has two lists, the editor's picks and the audience's.

SF WTF?

I'll have more to say about the Columbus Marathon (and my performance in it) once Marathonfoto comes through with the pictures. But I thought this warranted posting first...

At Women's Marathon, Fastest Time Didn't Win
C.W. Nevius

There were over 20,000 competitors in Sunday's Nike Women's Marathon in San Francisco. And 24-year-old Arien O'Connell, a fifth-grade teacher from New York City, ran the fastest time of any of the women.

But she didn't win.

It doesn't get much simpler than a footrace. All it takes is a starting line, a finish line and a clock. You fire the gun and the first person to the end of the course is the winner.

However, as the marathon officials said to O'Connell - not so fast.

While O'Connell had the greatest run of her life and covered the course faster than any woman, she was told she couldn't be declared the winner because she didn't run with the "elite" group who were given a 20-minute head start.

So what could have been a lovely Cinderella story about a young woman rising above her expectations in a race that bills itself as all about empowering women turned into a strict the-rules-are-the-rules edict. That's not the image we're trying to promote here.

San Francisco has become one of those destination locations for the new breed of distance runner. Between the San Francisco Marathon in July and the Nike race - billed as the largest women's marathon in the world - over 40,000 runners will visit this year.

It is great that these events are held here, but they are also representing the city. What we are hoping is that they leave town talking about the terrific location, the great restaurants and the perfectly organized event. Instead, we look like we don't know how to operate a stopwatch.

"That's pretty weak," said Jon Hendershott, associate editor of the authoritative Track and Field News magazine, based in Mountain View. "Think of the PR they could have had with this girl coming out of nowhere. It sounds like they got caught totally off guard."

O'Connell, who describes herself as "a pretty good runner," had never managed to break three hours in five previous marathons. But as soon as she started at 7 a.m. Sunday, she knew it was her day. In fact, when she crossed the finish line 26.2 miles later, her time of 2:55:11 was so unexpectedly fast that she burst into tears.

"I ran my best time by like 12 minutes, which is insane," she said.

At the awards ceremony, the O'Connell clan looked on as the top times were announced and the "elite" female runners stepped forward to accept their trophies.

"They called out the third-place time and I thought, 'I was faster than that,' " she said. "Then they called out the second-place time and I was faster than that. And then they called out the first-place time (3:06), and I said, 'Heck, I'm faster than her first-place time, too.' "

Just to make sure, O'Connell strolled over to a results station and asked a race official to call up her time on the computer. There it was, some 11 minutes faster than the official winner.

"They were just flabbergasted," O'Connell said. "I don't think it ever crossed their minds."

No one seemed exactly sure what to do. The trophies had already been handed out and the official results announced. Now organizers seem to be hoping it will all go away.

"At this point," Nike media relations manager Tanya Lopez said Monday, "we've declared our winner."

O'Connell said some race officials actually implied she'd messed up the seeding by not declaring herself an "elite" runner.

"If you're feeling like you're going to be a leader," race producer Dan Hirsch said Monday, "you should be in the elite pack."

So this is her fault? O'Connell was just being modest.

"I'm a good, solid runner," she said. "I never considered myself elite."

Jim Estes, associate director of the long-distance running program for USA Track and Field, did his best to explain the ruling. He's had some practice with the issue. The Sunday before last, at the Chicago Marathon, a Kenyan named Wesley Korir pulled off a similar surprise, finishing fourth even though he wasn't in the elite group and started five minutes after the top runners.

In that situation, and in this one, Estes made the same ruling: It didn't count. O'Connell wasn't declared the winner and Korir didn't collect fourth-place prize money.

"The theory is that, because they had separate starts, they weren't in the same race," Estes said. "The woman who is winning the elite field doesn't have the opportunity to know she was racing someone else."

Estes admits that giving the elite runners a sizable head start may not be the best policy.

"These are things this race and other races need to look at," Estes said. "It comes down to what a race is, and who is racing who."

Nonsense, said Track and Field News' Hendershott. He said O'Connell took her best shot, ran the fastest and should have won.

"What's she supposed to do, lay back because she's not an elite runner?" he asked. "If the elites are going to lay back, that's their fault."

As for O'Connell, she's not bitter. After all, she got her best time ever, had a nice weekend in San Francisco and comes home with a story.

But she didn't win. Maybe the best way to explain that is to say it is just another case of the elites in San Francisco giving the city a bad name.

On Motivation

Since I injured my knee back in January, I've had a tough time staying consistently motivated to run. I recently looked back over my running log, and during the February-June period, I think I averaged only about six or seven miles a week. So it has been slow going.

Fortunately, the upcoming Columbus Marathon is changing that. For a while, I was waiting to commit to the race before starting my serious training. But at the same time, when I wasn't seriously training, it was hard to feel like I was in good enough shape to actually complete the race. Several shorter races this summer (from 5Ks to a half-marathon) helped me to get over the Catch-22 situation that I had gotten myself into. Also, one really good long run (15 miles) last weekend finally convinced me that I could actually be ready for the marathon in October. It wasn't at the pace that I hope to eventually achieve, but I have to be where I am before I get where I'm going. Mostly, the fact that I didn't feel like complete crap for several hours after the run felt like an accomplishment in and of itself. I decided that I must be making progress towards being race-ready, after all.

It also helped considerably that the Women's Olympic Marathon was last weekend too. Seeing others run marathons, and run them well, does wonders for my motivation. Watching Constantina Tomescu build up such a dominating lead over the likes of Catherine Ndereba and the rest of the elite field was quite exciting--the aerial shots with the long, slow pans from the leader over to the chase pack something like a quarter mile back were quite amazing. I actually did the registering for the Columbus Marathon about a half an hour after Paula Radcliffe grittily limped her way to the finish (still finishing with an average pace around 5:40). Seeing that reminded me why I'm a marathoner.

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.