Finding Mile 0

Gina and I took the opportunity during a trip last weekend to DC to help Ramiró (Gina's dad) move into a new apartment to check out some of the sights along the GAP and some of the places we will travel through during our trip. It got me really excited about my upcoming run. There is going to be some beautiful scenery, remote passages and lots of lonesome trail.

Our first stop was in Cumberland, Maryland. This is the transition point from the Great Allegheny Passage from Pittsburgh to the C&O Towpath leading to DC. We were able to use the Trail Book to navigate through Cumberland to find the trail at the terminus of the C&O canal.

One direction: Cumberland -> Pittsburgh:


Then turn around: Cumberland -> DC:


This point is 135 miles from Pittsburgh and 184 miles from DC. From there we passed by several of the exits from I-68 and I-70 that Gina will take. After we helped Ramiró and Gloria move, we spent some time searching out "Mile 0" in Georgetown and the beginning on the C&O canal. It was a good thing we had the guide book, for being a national landmark, "Mile 0" is not easy to find. It involves navigating around a large boat house and walking around past a fence. We walked out a bit parallel to the canal. It was really cool to see all of the old locks. I'm excited to experience the history of the canal and the passage on our journey.

I started working on the itinerary of our trip last week during my spring break. I got a good start, but didn't quite finish. I should be able to finish this week and I'll provide a link to the spreadsheet. It's a Google Doc, cool, I'm high tech.

Hill Running

One of the biggest changes in my running since the move from Oklahoma to Pennsylvania is the continual presence of hills. In Norman, I had to hunt out hills. They are possible to find. On the east side of town, many of the country roads are filled with slow rollers as you make your way out to Lake Thunderbird. Additionally, there's Mount Scott by Lawton, but that is a 90 minute drive. In Meadville, it's more of a hunt to find the flat ground. For some visual aids, here are the elevation profiles of my "staple" run in each location.

"Easy Plateau" in Meadville:



"OU7" in Norman:



Be sure to note the scale on each graph, they are not the same! That huge hill around mile 3 of OU7, really is only 35', where as the last 2 mile climb of Easy Plateau goes up over 400'. So how do my times compare? (Both routes are about 7.2 miles)

• Easy Plateau: (21 runs from 11/09 to 3/10) average time: 56:57, pace: 7:55/mile, best time: 53:00
• OU7: (64 runs from 10/07 to 7/09) average time: 53:48, pace: 7:28/mile, best time: 48:00

The reason I'm thinking about this now is due to the training program I got from Runner's World SmartCoach for the upcoming Pittsburgh Marathon. I used my recent 10K time (38:08) and a current workout load of 51-55 miles to get a moderate training program for the marathon, which is 8 weeks away. The program suggests doing easy runs at 7:37 pace and long runs at 7:37 too at the beginning and dropping these down to 7:33 by the end of the program. Initially, I was a bit worried, since 7:37 is faster than my current easy run pace. But then I started analyzing this more throughly (OK, looking for excuses is probably a more accurate description), "This training program is probably written for someone who runs on flat surfaces." So when I went back to my training log, and saw that my times in Norman are about on par with these times, I felt my confidence return. However, there are hills in Pittsburgh...



For those of you wondering about GAP updates, I received the tour books and maps in the mail this week and just started putting together an itinerary for the trip. So hopefully next week I have some more information on this end.

On an aside, with the warmer weather, Gina and I have been firing up the barbie lately. We started using a recipe for pineapple from the current issue of Runner's World. In the magazine it calls for baking slices of pineapple brushed with butter and brown sugar, but we've been grilling it with great results. The first time we capped it off with ice cream, last night we capped it off with some vegan chocolate cake that some friends brought over. Mmm ... tasty.

St. Patrick's Day 10K

On Saturday Gina and I made trip up to Erie to run a local 10K. It was put on by the Erie Runner's Club and hosted at Presque Isle State Park. The race course primarily was an out and back along the thin neck of the peninsula with a short out and back blip at the finish. Warmer temperatures over the last week vanished before the weekend leaving us with rain/fog/mist and temperatures in the 40s. However, the warmer air stayed around long enough to melt the snow so at least we didn't have to fight the ice and slush as we did at the 5 mile race held at the same place on New Years.

There was some confusion at the start. People lined up were previous races start, which turned out to be about 200 feet up course from where the real start was. The race director marched everyone back the 200 feet through the parking lot to the real starting line. The back of the pack stopped at the starting line once they reached it and created a mass of runners lining up between cars. I ended up having to start a few rows back from the start and when the race started had to slip by several folks to get out front. By the time I broke free of the main pack, the lead and chase pack were already a couple of hundred feet ahead and making ground.

I set a solid pace and starting picking off runners. By the half way point, I had moved up to about 10^th place. The wind blew in our faces on the return leg. I turned my hat around (aerodynamic!) and tried to keep the same effort and focusing on picking off more runners. I kept sliding by more runners and moved into 4^th place with about ½ mile remaining. I finished strong, but I don't have a kick. At the end I felt like I still had gas in the tank and should of pushed it harder throughout the race. This time was about 17 seconds off of my PR, but with the weather I still think it was a good effort.

time: 38:09
pace: 6:09/mile
place: 4/257
age group (30-34): 1/11

Gina ran strong too and did get a PR (54:21). I was able to run the last ½ mile with her and enjoyed watching her pass some folks and keep her foot on the gas. No news or information on the GAP, hopefully I'll have something next week. Spring break is the week of March 22 - March 26, the plan is to write a working itinerary that week. I'll post whatever I write.

FULL RESULTS

Run the GAP

So it has been a while, been a long while in fact, almost two years since the last post. As you can probably guess, a lot has changed. Most notably my wife, my dog and I moved from our beloved Oklahoma to Meadville, a small community in northwest Pennsylvania where I began working at Allegheny College last fall. We bought a house, shoveled lots of snow and also bought a car. There have been a few races in there. Most notably the Heartland 100 through vast Flint Hills of southeast Kansas during Fall 2008 and the Oil Creek 100 through Oil Creek State Park, the birthplace of America's oil addiction, right here in northwest Pennsylvania this last fall.

The sun came out a few days ago, broke through after a week of overcast and snow showers. We spotted some new growth on the trees this morning, spring really is right around the corner. With it comes a new opportunity and a new challenge for Gina and myself. The last week of May I am going to run from Pittsburgh, PA to Washington, DC. There is a 330 mile bike trail connecting the downtown area of both cities, 145 on an old railroad bed from Pittsburgh to Cumberland, MD, the remaining 185 on the C & O towpath along the Potomac. Historic, Washington path in reverse. It's called the Great Allegheny Passage. Our plan is to take 6-7 days, that means about 47-55 miles a day.

That's the big impetus for starting the blog again. I plan to blog about my training, itineraries and the actual run after it happens. Here's a few links to check out with info about the trail.

• The Allegheny Trail Alliance


• Linking up


• The Yockatomic Trek