Last Chance!
I'm sure you're tired of reading about it, but this really is the last day to enter the First and Last Annual Earn Your Donuts Bad Race Photo Contest (Brought to You by Road ID). I thought I'd give it one more mention since I usually get more page views during the week than on weekends.
If your bad race photo is voted the winner (by commenters or poll voters, not me) you get a $35 Road ID gift card. 2nd prize is a $10 Dunkin Donuts gift card. You can either leave a link to the picture in the comments of this post or the original (below), you can e-mail it to me at earnyourdonuts@gmail.com. I won't post your full name on my blog or spam you or anything.
Go here for all the details:
http://earnyourdonuts.blogspot.com/2012/02/first-annual-earn-your-donuts-bad-race.htmlI'd like to get the entries up for voting later this week, but this is kind of a crazy week. I don't think it would be fair to both of our contest entrants to extend the deadline, though!
First Impressions
Ok, with administrative matters aside...as far as actual running, last week was kind of a washout. After Monday's three, I didn't run again till Saturday because I was sick on Wednesday and Thursday, and by the time I felt better on Friday afternoon, why bother? Saturday is a regular running day anyway. I ran four miles again, which was my plan all along. I was a little slower than last week, and felt the most out of breath since starting to run again, which I think was just the remains of my cold or allergies.
I'll go for three miles tonight, most likely. It is supposed to be in the 60s today, which is great, I suppose, except 1) I can't stay healthy the crazy fluctuating weather we've had this winter -- I have never been sick this much in one winter; 2) I actually like running when it's in the 30s and 40s; and 3) I suspect this is going to come back to haunt us in a really hot summer. If this week goes well, I'll try for five this weekend.
I did my leg program for the first time yesterday (finally getting to the "First Impressions" mentioned in the title). It included leg press, leg curls, leg extensions, hip abductors, hip adductors, calf raise machine, and I did abs, too. The fact that I'm largely pain-free today probably means I need to add a lot more weight if this going to actually do any good.
One Year Ago
This is a week of anniversaries. One year ago today my wife ran her first half marathon, the 2011 Disney Princess Half Marathon. She did great, but she wasn't sure at the time whether she'd run that distance again. We know how that turned out...in less than a month from now she'll be running her third half! Congratulations again, Princess Chris!
It's race week and I'm trying to take it easy.
I ran 3 miles on Monday night and 3 miles on Wednesday morning. Neither one was good. On Monday, my calves hurt, my feet hurt, and my stomach hurt. On Wednesday, I had less pain in my legs but just felt like I wasn't getting enough air and didn't have enough energy. I don't feel like I could have run 5 miles, let alone 26.2. I'm undertrained by marathon standards, but not THAT undertrained.
I suspected that I had or was getting a cold, and also that I have just burned myself out too much with work stress and long hours over the past two weeks.
So, part 1 of the remedy is three inhalers, Singulair, loratidine (the active ingredient in Claritin), multi-vitamins, and Airborne, which probably doesn't actually do anything.
I've also been eating a ton of protein in an attempt to give myself some energy, and I'm trying to make sure I get adequate sleep leading up to the marathon. That's been a challenge. I worked Sunday, Monday, and Tuesday nights, staying up until the wee hours of the morning. I can usually subsist with little sleep, but between being a little sick and stressed out, and oh yeah, since I have a marathon on Sunday, this wasn't going to work.
My brain just stopped working completely at around 9:00pm on Wednesday night, and I vegged in front of the TV and was in bed by 11:30. I woke up not quite refreshed, but feeling much improved. I have to make sure I do a better job resting, or Sunday will be a disaster.
I know you're getting tired of hearing this, but I had the best of intentions this week. I knew this was probably my last chance to pound the midweek miles and still have a chance to taper properly. I ran a tough 4-mile hill workout on Monday, and was fired-up to get out again on Tuesday night. The crisis of willpower that's haunted me over the last month was over.
But then, I started coughing. By the end of the day my throat was swollen and hurting quite badly, and I knew a run was out of the question. On Wednesday afternoon, my doctor hooked me up with a ProAir inhaler and prednisone, both of them steroids, and they made a huge difference almost immediately. Though I felt much better, I still felt like I had too much tightness in my chest, so I put my run off until this morning.
Since a winter storm (in October!) is barreling toward us as we speak, scheduled to drop 6-10 inches of snow tomorrow, I decided to make this my long run, which was scheduled to be 12 miles. I ran 12 miles in 2 hours. Not bad, in and of itself.
For a variety of reasons, most of which have been under my control, I clearly haven't done what I've needed to do to be ready for this marathon. For most of October, nailed my long runs but managed only one or at most two midweek runs.
As I prepped for Shamrock, my level of focus was just so much better. I've trained for both marathons during two of the busiest times of work I've ever had, but while I used work stress as motivation and looked forward to my nightly runs in January and February, in October it became a reason not to run. In hindsight, I think my IT band injury was the best thing that happened to me. I was running very good 16 or 17 milers, right on schedule, and then WHAM!, I could barely even do 5 right after the injury. It made me work really, really hard to get back. I didn't get all the way there, but under the circumstances, I think I did the best I could.
This time? I did a great job staying ahead of schedule all summer and had some great long runs in September and October, and maybe I rested on my non-existent laurels a bit too much during the week and I definitely feel a little burned out on this running thing right now. I certainly took advantage of every possible excuse. I guess it helped that I hurt my knee in late January, a month and a half before the race. This fall, I ignored the warning signs till it was almost certainly too late.
I have to run 26 on November 20th. I ran just 16 this week. And even with my 20-mile long run last week, I still got only 26 miles total last week. If I were a wiser man, I would probably switch to the half marathon. I'm just going to do the best I can on race day, even though it won't be very good even by my Shamrock Marathon standards. With a little bit of walking, I made it through 20 miles just one week ago. As long as I don't let my endurance decrease any further, I think I can finish this race in the approximation of one piece.
My plan? Officially I should be tapering, but I'm going to try to have a last tough week of midweek runs, and then get a last good long run of 18-20 miles. I'll try to follow that with another good week of shorter midweek runs, and then my last long run is scheduled for 8 miles. To make up for the abbreviated taper, I'll do probably do two 2-mile runs and a walk during the last week instead of the two 3-mile runs.
Wow, that was a downer. In summary: Cats...playing football!
