Just a short entry this week, Gina and I leave tomorrow for SLC for our wedding this Saturday, May 17th. I'll post some pictures of the trip and wedding next week.
One of my long term running goals is to break 3 hours in the marathon. It's not a goal I try for often, I've only ran a single road marathon. This year I decided I run the Andy Payne marathon and go for a sub 3 hour time. I've been kind of half-assed about my training, throwing in some speed workouts and tempo runs but not giving up the trails. Last Saturday I went up to Lake Overholser in Oklahoma City where the race takes place. I was planning a confidence boosting 16 mile run consisting of two laps around the lake at sub 3 hour pace, but instead after going out too fast and having 20 MPH headwind on the back stretch I ended up barely coming in at the right time for the first lap and then had to stop and eat some humble pie.
Running moment of the week: I got some Injinji socks as a door prize at 3 Days of Syllamo and I love them. Since then I've got four more pairs and use them both on the trail and on the road. On Sunday, I discovered one of the unavoidable downfalls of toes socks - if you randomly grab two socks out of your sock drawer, you only have a 50% percent chance of grabbing both a left and a right foot. On Sunday, I was running the trails with two right feet.
5/5 - 5/11
total miles: 53.7
time: 6:53
YTD miles: 1042.8 <- broke a thousands miles!
Showing posts with label goals. Show all posts
Showing posts with label goals. Show all posts
Tuesday, May 13, 2008
Sunday, April 20, 2008
Happy Birthday to me!
I turned 30 this week on Wednesday. Surprisingly, I didn't become an amazing distance runner the next day. That's too bad since now I'm going to get my butt kicked in the 30-39 age group. There's a few races/runs I found online this week I think I'm going to sign up for. First off in June, there's the Greenpeople run up at Lake Hefner in OKC. It's a four hour lap run for fun. I think you're supposed to eat a hot dog every lap you go around or something like that. I'm planning on run there from our house Norman and then running a few laps. In July, there's Cap't Karl's Run outside of Austin, Texas. It is a 12 hour night run on a ~5 mile loop. I ran this last year and put in 50 miles. Somewhere around mile 8 I twisted my ankle and had to stop an hour early when my ankle was the size of a softball. I hope to run at least 60 miles this year. July in Texas, it will be a sizzler!
Running moment of the week: Lying around in bed on Sunday morning watching the Woman's Olympic Marathon Trials on nbc.com. The USA is going to have great distance team in Beijing, it will be fun to watch them go head to head with the world's best. Go USA!
4/14 - 4/20
total miles: 49.9
time: 6:25
YTD miles: 853.0
Monday, March 3, 2008
I'm OK, you're OK, let's all go set a PR at a 50K
Last Sunday I ran the 14th annual A-OK 50K outside of Atoka, Oklahoma. As you can tell from the title of this entry I set a PR and actually achieved my goal of breaking 4 hours in a trail 50K that I set out for myself in an earlier post. My time was 3:53:19. I might be shooting myself in the foot though, I was only supposed to be using this a last long run before "3 Days of Syllamo" and was only shooting for a time of around 4:45. I feel good today though so hopefully I'll recover quickly and go to Arkansas with a new confidence gained from breaking the 4 hour barrier.
At the house...
I woke on Sunday morning at 3:30 AM, the radio playing the overnight BBC news feed. There is something different about waking up really early, for some reason it doesn't feel like you're really getting up and for me it is actually easier than usual to get my butt out of bed. Ask my fiancee, most mornings it's like pulling teeth to get me to give up the covers. The coffee pot was prepped the night before, so I plugged it in, made a small bowl of cereal (mostly because we have Cracklin' OatBran and I didn't want Gina to eat it all without getting my share). My bags were packed the night before, I threw them in the car and left 5 minutes ahead of schedule.
On the road...
I listened to The Slip - Eisenhower, Michael Franti - Everyone Deserves Music and Cake - Prolonging the Magic on the way down. The stereo in our car doesn't work, some sort of computer/electrical malfunction caused by too many rust holes and too much rain so we have a little battery operated speaker that we plug our ipod into. The road was dark, only a small sliver of a moon and there was lots of roadkill but very little traffic. The estimated driving time from Norman to Stringtown I got from Google maps was about 45 minutes longer than what it actually took. Even with the sketchy directions I had from Stringtown to the race start and a wrong turn or two, I still made it to the start about 45 minutes earlier than I anticipated. Plenty of time for a quick snoozer.
Pre-race...
So I didn't really sleep. I can never sleep in a car and have a hard time napping in general, but shutting my mind down, closing my eyes and listening to Paul's Boutique by the Beastie Boys just felt good. I got out of the car at 7:30 AM, a half an hour before the start, pooped and checked in. I wish I was a better writer because the woman who puts on the A-OK (Mary Ann Miller) is one interesting character.
The race takes place on her private land and the check-in takes place in a large metal shed. I got number 1119, which might make you think that the runners numbered in the thousands, however this is far from the actual number of 13 runners in 50K (including earlier starters) and about twice that again in the 25K. After receiving my number I was instructed by the race director to grab any of the "freebies". These "freebies" consisted of hats, socks, water bottles, t-shirts and something still in its cardboard box. I scored a hat. Go on and say it, you're way jealous.
I changed into my running attire, lubing up the necessary areas as needed. Even with the cloud cover and wind it was warm enough for a tank top. Roughly speaking, the race is "T" shaped, starting from the bottom then out and back along the cross bar and back to bottom of the "T". One lap is 25K, the 50K runs two. I took another poop (damn buffalo meat) and made sure my bottles were full and set some Gu out on the car seat so I could reload in between laps. At 7:55 AM, Mary Ann called everyone over to the start, gave some last minute instructions and seeming mid sentence broke into "Ready,
GO!
A tweet on her whistle and we were off. The race starts on a single track trail around a small pond on Mary Ann's property. The trail is outlined by some logs and looks very soft until you take a closer look and see all of the ankle twisting rocks buried under the leaves. After a small stream crossing, a push up and over a steep little hill and another stream crossing, the race leaves the single track and turns right up a fire road. The fire road is pretty rocky too, but wide enough so that you can navigate a mostly dirt/sand path. After about three-quarters of mile on the fire road, the trail crosses a turnip (radish?) field. This, as is the rest of the course, is extremely well-marked with yellow flagging. A little further along after a little more uphill and you get to AID 1 at the center point of the "T". By this point I was all by myself, as I would be the remainder of the race, although with the trail doubling back on itself so many times, I saw the other runners often.
From AID 1, the race goes left and this meant straight into the wind. Did I mention it was windy? This is Oklahoma people, it's always windy. And Oklahoma wind seems to come at you from every direction. After leaving the aid station the trail becomes very smooth, runnable and slightly downhill. About two and a half miles of this and I arrived at AID 2. The second aid station is unmanned and there is a sheet of paper to sign and initial. All of the aid stations were well-stocked with water, Gatorade, cookies and other typical ultrafare. It was at this aid station that I first ran into the woman runner with the large backpack (see Running moment down below).
Turning back toward AID 1 from AID 2 is slightly uphill but mostly the wind was at my back. Back at the center point of the "T" at AID 1 the race continues straight along the cross bar out toward AID 3. For some reason, the stretch from AID 1 to AID 3 and back felt slightly uphill both ways, which probably means it was pretty flat. The condition of the trail here is similar to the stretch from AID 1 to AID 2. Once back at AID 1 for the third time, it was a quick downhill trot along the rocky fire road back the starting line. I finished the first lap around 1:49.
I slammed a V8 (the best mid-race drink), grabbed some more Gu and headed out for lap 2. Somewhere around half way into the second lap I started feeling tired. I took a couple of walk breaks in the second half of this lap. It was already looking like I was going to set a PR and maybe break 4 hours. I kept looking at my watch calculating how much time I had left versus how quickly I ran a particular section in the first lap. Leaving AID 1 for the last time I dropped the hammer and pushed it to the finish.
Post-race...
I changed my shirt, put my Crocs on, got a bowl of chili (made by Mary Ann) and a can of Busch, the best post-race drink. There were only two other runners that that finished around the same time, one was the woman with large backpack who ran the 25K and the other was woman who was an early starter for the 50K. We all chatted a bit, made some congratulatory comments and were happy to be done. I picked up a jar of honey and my first-place prize - a bottle of Oklahoma wine. Mary Ann: "I don't know how good it is, I just bought it because I liked the label." Isn't that how everyone buys wine?
On the road...
Back in the car, I finished listening to the Beastie Boys. I stopped at a gas station by a casino to fill up and call Gina. Other music too, but I don't remember. More traffic now than before. I had to stop for batteries for the speakers.
At the house...
Shower. Beer. Napoleon Dynamite. Zzzz...
Running moment of the week: It doesn't matter how hardcore you might think you are, there is always some else out there pushing the envelope further. During the race I passed a woman carrying a very large backpack, the kind you might use to go on an extended backpacking trip. I spoke with her after the race and discovered she is training for a race called the Bataan Memorial Death March. Check out their website for the complete details, but very quickly the race is a marathon by White Sands National Monument in New Mexico. The race is a memorial to a group of World War II POWs in the Philippines that were forced to march across the island, many to their death. There are two primary divisions in the race, lightweight and heavyweight. To be in the heavyweight category you must carry a 35 pound pack throughout the entire race. Hardcore, but nothing in comparison to what the POWs must have experienced.
2/25 - 3/2
total miles: 55.6
time: 7:13
February miles: 246.7
YTD miles: 497.3
At the house...
I woke on Sunday morning at 3:30 AM, the radio playing the overnight BBC news feed. There is something different about waking up really early, for some reason it doesn't feel like you're really getting up and for me it is actually easier than usual to get my butt out of bed. Ask my fiancee, most mornings it's like pulling teeth to get me to give up the covers. The coffee pot was prepped the night before, so I plugged it in, made a small bowl of cereal (mostly because we have Cracklin' OatBran and I didn't want Gina to eat it all without getting my share). My bags were packed the night before, I threw them in the car and left 5 minutes ahead of schedule.
On the road...
I listened to The Slip - Eisenhower, Michael Franti - Everyone Deserves Music and Cake - Prolonging the Magic on the way down. The stereo in our car doesn't work, some sort of computer/electrical malfunction caused by too many rust holes and too much rain so we have a little battery operated speaker that we plug our ipod into. The road was dark, only a small sliver of a moon and there was lots of roadkill but very little traffic. The estimated driving time from Norman to Stringtown I got from Google maps was about 45 minutes longer than what it actually took. Even with the sketchy directions I had from Stringtown to the race start and a wrong turn or two, I still made it to the start about 45 minutes earlier than I anticipated. Plenty of time for a quick snoozer.
Pre-race...
So I didn't really sleep. I can never sleep in a car and have a hard time napping in general, but shutting my mind down, closing my eyes and listening to Paul's Boutique by the Beastie Boys just felt good. I got out of the car at 7:30 AM, a half an hour before the start, pooped and checked in. I wish I was a better writer because the woman who puts on the A-OK (Mary Ann Miller) is one interesting character.
The race takes place on her private land and the check-in takes place in a large metal shed. I got number 1119, which might make you think that the runners numbered in the thousands, however this is far from the actual number of 13 runners in 50K (including earlier starters) and about twice that again in the 25K. After receiving my number I was instructed by the race director to grab any of the "freebies". These "freebies" consisted of hats, socks, water bottles, t-shirts and something still in its cardboard box. I scored a hat. Go on and say it, you're way jealous.I changed into my running attire, lubing up the necessary areas as needed. Even with the cloud cover and wind it was warm enough for a tank top. Roughly speaking, the race is "T" shaped, starting from the bottom then out and back along the cross bar and back to bottom of the "T". One lap is 25K, the 50K runs two. I took another poop (damn buffalo meat) and made sure my bottles were full and set some Gu out on the car seat so I could reload in between laps. At 7:55 AM, Mary Ann called everyone over to the start, gave some last minute instructions and seeming mid sentence broke into "Ready,
GO!
A tweet on her whistle and we were off. The race starts on a single track trail around a small pond on Mary Ann's property. The trail is outlined by some logs and looks very soft until you take a closer look and see all of the ankle twisting rocks buried under the leaves. After a small stream crossing, a push up and over a steep little hill and another stream crossing, the race leaves the single track and turns right up a fire road. The fire road is pretty rocky too, but wide enough so that you can navigate a mostly dirt/sand path. After about three-quarters of mile on the fire road, the trail crosses a turnip (radish?) field. This, as is the rest of the course, is extremely well-marked with yellow flagging. A little further along after a little more uphill and you get to AID 1 at the center point of the "T". By this point I was all by myself, as I would be the remainder of the race, although with the trail doubling back on itself so many times, I saw the other runners often.
From AID 1, the race goes left and this meant straight into the wind. Did I mention it was windy? This is Oklahoma people, it's always windy. And Oklahoma wind seems to come at you from every direction. After leaving the aid station the trail becomes very smooth, runnable and slightly downhill. About two and a half miles of this and I arrived at AID 2. The second aid station is unmanned and there is a sheet of paper to sign and initial. All of the aid stations were well-stocked with water, Gatorade, cookies and other typical ultrafare. It was at this aid station that I first ran into the woman runner with the large backpack (see Running moment down below).
Turning back toward AID 1 from AID 2 is slightly uphill but mostly the wind was at my back. Back at the center point of the "T" at AID 1 the race continues straight along the cross bar out toward AID 3. For some reason, the stretch from AID 1 to AID 3 and back felt slightly uphill both ways, which probably means it was pretty flat. The condition of the trail here is similar to the stretch from AID 1 to AID 2. Once back at AID 1 for the third time, it was a quick downhill trot along the rocky fire road back the starting line. I finished the first lap around 1:49.
I slammed a V8 (the best mid-race drink), grabbed some more Gu and headed out for lap 2. Somewhere around half way into the second lap I started feeling tired. I took a couple of walk breaks in the second half of this lap. It was already looking like I was going to set a PR and maybe break 4 hours. I kept looking at my watch calculating how much time I had left versus how quickly I ran a particular section in the first lap. Leaving AID 1 for the last time I dropped the hammer and pushed it to the finish.
Post-race...
I changed my shirt, put my Crocs on, got a bowl of chili (made by Mary Ann) and a can of Busch, the best post-race drink. There were only two other runners that that finished around the same time, one was the woman with large backpack who ran the 25K and the other was woman who was an early starter for the 50K. We all chatted a bit, made some congratulatory comments and were happy to be done. I picked up a jar of honey and my first-place prize - a bottle of Oklahoma wine. Mary Ann: "I don't know how good it is, I just bought it because I liked the label." Isn't that how everyone buys wine?
On the road...
Back in the car, I finished listening to the Beastie Boys. I stopped at a gas station by a casino to fill up and call Gina. Other music too, but I don't remember. More traffic now than before. I had to stop for batteries for the speakers.
At the house...
Shower. Beer. Napoleon Dynamite. Zzzz...
Running moment of the week: It doesn't matter how hardcore you might think you are, there is always some else out there pushing the envelope further. During the race I passed a woman carrying a very large backpack, the kind you might use to go on an extended backpacking trip. I spoke with her after the race and discovered she is training for a race called the Bataan Memorial Death March. Check out their website for the complete details, but very quickly the race is a marathon by White Sands National Monument in New Mexico. The race is a memorial to a group of World War II POWs in the Philippines that were forced to march across the island, many to their death. There are two primary divisions in the race, lightweight and heavyweight. To be in the heavyweight category you must carry a 35 pound pack throughout the entire race. Hardcore, but nothing in comparison to what the POWs must have experienced.
2/25 - 3/2
total miles: 55.6
time: 7:13
February miles: 246.7
YTD miles: 497.3
Sunday, January 13, 2008
Running goals for 2008
It's a good time to write down my running goals for 2008. Putting these in writing should help me stay on task to realize them.
1. 2500 total miles for the year - Originally I thought running 3000 miles the year I turn 30 would be pretty cool, but then I did the math and realized that this would mean 250 miles a month. That seems a bit much. 2500 miles for the year still averages out to slightly over 200 miles a month, which is more than I ran the last three months of 2007. Seeing as I have never kept a running log for an entire year, a side goal is to just keep track of all of these miles.
2. Feel strong throughout a 100 - In all three of the hundreds I have run, somewhere around 10:00-11:00 PM I start to lose it and end up walking a lot of the rest. I don't think I'll be able to run an entire hundred, but feeling strong in the dark like I did last weekend in Bandera is possible. I haven't entered into a hundred yet but I'm considering running the Heartland 100.
3. Time goals - I don't have any time goals for specific races and since trail runs vary so much in difficulty a time goal is always secondary to feeling strong throughout the race. But two overall time barriers I would like to break are 3 hours in a road marathon and 4 hours in a trail 50K. Potential races: Andy Payne Memorial Marathon and El Scorcho 25K/50K.
4. 7 days / 7 50Ks - This might not happen this year as I already have a lot going on this summer (i.e. getting married) but I would like to push myself on a solo multiday long run sometime before we leave Oklahoma.
Running moment of the week: Trying to navigate the muddy jeep road around Lake Stanely-Draper without getting my shoes full of mud while tied to two dogs who could care less if their paws get muddy.
1/07 - 1/13
total miles: 23.6
time 3:15
YTD total miles: 95.6
1. 2500 total miles for the year - Originally I thought running 3000 miles the year I turn 30 would be pretty cool, but then I did the math and realized that this would mean 250 miles a month. That seems a bit much. 2500 miles for the year still averages out to slightly over 200 miles a month, which is more than I ran the last three months of 2007. Seeing as I have never kept a running log for an entire year, a side goal is to just keep track of all of these miles.
2. Feel strong throughout a 100 - In all three of the hundreds I have run, somewhere around 10:00-11:00 PM I start to lose it and end up walking a lot of the rest. I don't think I'll be able to run an entire hundred, but feeling strong in the dark like I did last weekend in Bandera is possible. I haven't entered into a hundred yet but I'm considering running the Heartland 100.
3. Time goals - I don't have any time goals for specific races and since trail runs vary so much in difficulty a time goal is always secondary to feeling strong throughout the race. But two overall time barriers I would like to break are 3 hours in a road marathon and 4 hours in a trail 50K. Potential races: Andy Payne Memorial Marathon and El Scorcho 25K/50K.
4. 7 days / 7 50Ks - This might not happen this year as I already have a lot going on this summer (i.e. getting married) but I would like to push myself on a solo multiday long run sometime before we leave Oklahoma.
Running moment of the week: Trying to navigate the muddy jeep road around Lake Stanely-Draper without getting my shoes full of mud while tied to two dogs who could care less if their paws get muddy.
1/07 - 1/13
total miles: 23.6
time 3:15
YTD total miles: 95.6
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
