Getting back to Boston

GA/progression run on the TM. Did OK despite not much sleep (helping teenager finish long-put-off assignment for chemistry). Marathon dress rehearsal tomorrow.

Had the marathon dress rehearsal. Put on the whole gear -- cap, headband under it, neon green tech shirt with white singlet over it, tights with RaceReady shorts over it, tucked my car key in the car key pocket, carried a water bottle in Tyler's fanny pack, and headed for the River Trail. Stretched when I got there, but the legs did not want to loosen. Weather was clear and sunny but temps were around 45, I guess. Even after my three-mile warmup run down to the FOP clubhouse, the legs were still tight, and I stretched some more before heading back.Once I headed back, had a little trouble with my pacing; the planned 8-minute miles became 7:39 and 7:42 (that, ladies and germs, is why I need a pace bunny); darn near a tempo run instead of MP. Anyway, once I slowed to the cooldown pace, I jogged back and forth across the Main Street Bridge, and reminded myself once again why I don't like the MSB; that walkway is awfully narrow and that steel railing, combined with my acrophobia, gave me the willies. I could just imagine falling over that rail into the river below, and people who fall into that river tend to be carried out in bodybags. Yikes. Anyway, got back and forth with no incident and finished the run.

I guess the hay really is in the barn now. A couple of short, slow jogs left, maybe some strides on Friday, and then show up at the starting line Saturday morning in Memphis. I guess the good part is, if I had trouble slowing down to an 8:00 pace, the real thing maybe won't feel difficult Saturday. If I actually ran a marathon at 7:40.5 pace, that would be about a 3:21.

Just got an interesting piece of information. It seems active.com has a database which ranks times in races all over the country, so you can look up how your marathon time ranks among 24-year-old females in Utah if that's what you happen to be. Since I happen to be a 47/48 year old male in Arkansas, I looked up the rankings in all five distances I've run this year -- 5K, 10K, 20K, half and full marathon. Turns out I'm in the top 100 in all of them for 45-49 year old men, except for 20K, where they do not have any results at all recorded for Arkansas. My crash-and-burn marathon is 71st. My Gallowalked 5K is 92nd. My Gallowalked 10K is 39th. And my half-marathon time -- gun time, not chip -- is 19th. NINETEENTH. I don't think I've been 19th in the state in anything since my PSAT score in 1977 was third in the state, or so I was told. Nineteenth doesn't get me anything, whereas that PSAT got me a National Merit Scholarship, but it's still surprising and a bit gratifying. And for 47-year-olds only, my time was SIXTH. The first-place time? A guy I went to high school with, who was born the same day I was (the half marathon was the day before our 48th birthdays) and didn't even run track in high school. Of course, he beat my butt by 17 minutes at Conway (and his marathon best beat mine by an hour and a half, although I expect to close that gap considerably on Saturday).

Easy jog at 10:10 pace just to work the kinks out. Starting to carb-load now.

Had a twinge in the middle of my left hamstring; it's been there for several days, dating back to when I was stretching my quads Tuesday morning for my dress rehearsal. But it hasn't gone away. Finally, today, I started to panic, when I realized it was in exactly the same spot as the spasms that shut me down at mile 18 at Little Rock in March. Stretching hasn't worked. Warm baths, ditto. Used electric massager to no effect. So I called John at work and he told me to come in for some treatment. First 10 minutes of ultrasound to the spot, then 20 minutes of iontopheresis. Maybe it's a little bit better; I jogged up to the apartment office a half hour ago to take my rent check in (and test the hammy) and felt no pain, although it still felt tight.

John told me to come in tomorrow for another treatment if I want to. I'll see how it feels in the morning. Maybe I'll get a treatment. Maybe I'll go for a short/slow jog as I had originally planned for Friday. But if it's no worse, I can run with it -- with my fingers crossed that it doesn't do what it did on Lookout Hill in March. Can I run 3:30 with it? That's the unanswerable question until Saturday morning.

Hamstring feels much better today. Maybe it just needed a rest, or maybe John's ultrasound and iontopheresis did the trick. As long as it holds up for 3:30 tomorrow, I'm good with it.

We'll be leaving for Memphis in a couple of hours. Tyler signed out early from school, and Pam's leaving work at noon. We'll hit the expo as soon as we cross the bridge, then go check into our hotel. Tonight, spaghetti with some of the RWOL forum crazies at the Spaghetti Warehouse, then early to bed. I'll be up at 4 Saturday to go find an open IHOP.

BQ is a big undertaking, I know, but I've worked too hard for the last six months not to take a shot. If I fail, there's always the other goal -- sub-four.

Aw man, this thing ate my RR. Knew I should have saved it. Cliff's Notes version: Below BQ pace for 22 miles, right calf threatening to cramp for last 10 miles, cold, windy, and worst, directly into the wind from about miles 18-25. Pacing not the best in the early miles, but I gave it everything I had, and if I run the same time next year at age 49, it WILL be a BQ for 2011. Finished 337th out of 2213 finishers, at least posted so far, and 51st in male 45-49.

Temp in mid-30s, cloudy and blustery at the start. Early traffic keeps the first mile pace down to 8:13. That's OK. Mile 2, 7:47. Whoa horsie. Slow down there. Mile 3, 7:57. More like it. Mile 4, 7:33. I know we had a little downhill here, but TOO DARN FAST. Mile 5, 8:02. More like it. Average through 5 miles, about 7:54.

Mile 6, 7:50. Back off a touch. Mat at 10K, time 49:36. Mile 7, 7:45, make that two touches. Mile 8: 8:03. That's better. Only physical issues to this point are some twinges in my right plantar fascia. Mile 9: 8:00. Perfect, and two good miles in a row. Mile 10: 7:59. Three good miles in a row. Average through 10 miles: 7:55. I wanted 7:57 or so, but this isn't too bad.

Mile 11: 7:59. FOUR good miles in a row. My online friend Bill from Georgia, who offered to help pace me, drops back at this point, so I'm on my own. I pick out a blonde 20-30 yards ahead of me who seems to be running a consistent pace and lock on to her, just trying to maintain the spacing.

Mile 12: 8:02. Still all good. We're back downtown now. Wind is picking up from what it was at the start.

Mile 13: 8:05. Still OK. Hit the halfway mark in another quarter-mile, so my Garmin is about 0.14 miles ahead of the course measurement at this point. Shouldn't be an issue as long as I can maintain an 8:01 or 8:02 average, and my average at 13.1 is just a smidge over 8:00. Chip time halfway: 1:45:08. Just about right if I can run even split.

Mile 14.1: 8:09. Need to pick it up just a tad. Mile 15.1: 8:02. That'll do. Mile 16.1: 8:07. Giving back a few seconds here and there, but still OK. Mile 17.1: 7:54. Better. But I have a sneaking suspicion when we turn and head west toward downtown again, Old Mr. Wind is gonna slap me upside the head. Plus I have a new physical issue: the right calf keeps twitching like it may go into full spasm at any time, and the quads and glutes are screaming at me (OK, that's two physical issues). Above the waist, I'm fine.

Mile 18.1: 8:05. Yep, I'm running dead into the wind now. Yuck. I bet it's blowing at least 15 mph. Mile 19.1: 8:08. Still giving back a few seconds, but I'm pushing against the almost insurmountable urge to slow down. Mile 20.1 (Garmin): 8:04. Still good, and according to the Garmin, I'm still under BQ pace. I don't feel any pianos dropping on my back, but boy do my legs hurt. Mile 20 (course): There's a mat at the 20-mile mark, so I click the lap button on my Garmin here. According to the Garmin, I've run 20.24. This is now officially the longest I have ever run in my life without walking even a single step. Chip time: 2:42:40. Didn't know it, but I was already well over BQ pace here (8:08 average).

Mile 21: 8:11. I'm still OK. If I can find the energy to maintain this pace for five more miles, I might just get that BQ. I start using my mantra now: "Do you want it? Go get it." Oh, yeah, that blonde chick I picked out 10 miles ago is still up there, although it's more like 150 yards than 20. I think she made a portapotty stop at one point because she passed me and kept on going. I tried to lock on again, uh, no.

Mile 22: 8:20. I get to this point in 2:59:15. Four miles and change left to run in 31:44. I'm not up to that kind of mental math, but I do know it's slipping away. Mile 23: 8:26. It ain't slipping now, it's slipped. I know Boston won't happen this time, but I also know that sub-four IS happening, even if I walk in from here. And I am not going to walk. Mile 24: 8:17. Downtown buildings are in sight now and that gives me a boost. The calf is still twitching and the quads and hip flexors are screaming, but I'm chugging. Blonde is long gone, but one of my 3:30 pace bunnies dropped back and is now in sight. I'm going after him.

Mile 25: 8:55. The good news is, we finally turned south out of the direct headwind. The bad news is, the right calf finally decided to cramp. Fortunately, it let go after 5-10 seconds of jogging and I was able to pick up my pace somewhat. I'm just gonna try to break 3:35 now.

Mile 26: 8:40. My family greets me at about 25.8 miles, at the bottom of the ramp from Danny Thomas Blvd up to downtown street level (who decided to run us UP A RAMP at 25.8 miles?). I'm struggling up the hill, but pace bunny is struggling more, and I passed him. YES! Now the ballpark (=finish) is in sight.

Mile 26.2: Didn't stop my Garmin right at the line, so don't know my final split for that last 385 yards. I know I was going to run as hard as I could get my legs to run into that ballpark, and I did. Then we had to walk UP THE STANDS to get to the concourse. Rode the elevator down to take a shower and change clothes, came back up, still no time posted. Met my family, handed them my clothes bag, headed back in to get food (hot soup after a December marathon is WONDERFUL). By the time I stuffed my face, my time is up: 3:33:42. Missed my BQ by 163 seconds -- less than seven seconds a mile. But it's in range to BQ next year when I'm 49 for 2011. Good for 337th place; I bet I moved up a few dozen spots in the active.com rankings for Arkansas marathoning geezers in 2008 with this one. I'm very pleased with it, but I have no idea when I'm gonna want to put myself through this kind of torture again. It may be a while, because I am in PAIN 10 hours later.

Back home from Memphis. Wife and son wanted to see some of the sights, many of which I ran past yesterday (and some of which I didn't even notice). So we went to the old Lorraine Motel, where MLK was assassinated in 1968 (and which I missed during the race), by Sun Records, where Elvis recorded his early hits (I did notice that during the race; it was very close to the timing mat at 13.1 miles) and a few other downtown landmarks.

My wife liked Memphis and wants to come back sometime when I'm not distracted by a marathon or a football game or something. Works for me.

So we get home, and I veg out watching football and doing laundry and stuff, and then, as the evening goes on, I notice my thighs are hurting more and decide I need a little workout to get the blood flowing. So I go for a very... slow... jog of 2.45 miles in 40:27. You may deduce from the pace that most people would have described what I was doing was walking, and you would be correct. But the legs felt better as I went on, and I was actually able to pick up the pace. The hills around here on the Fairway loop were no issue at all.

Where do I go next? Dunno. A spring marathon? Maybe. Chicago? Could be. Mid-South in November at Wynne? Possibly; I've heard good things about that race, and I could actually drive over there that morning. Just run 5 and 10Ks through the spring and decide later? That's an option too. Maybe San Antonio in November; I hear it's a good flat fast course, ripe for BQ picking. Not ready to decide.

Obviously, that BQ is not way out there in the distance like it's been for the last nine months; it's dangling right in front of me, ready to grab. I just have to decide how best to grab it. I think building my mileage base even further is the way to go, something like Sasha describes. Put in a whole bunch of 50-, 60-, maybe even 70-mile weeks, then do a marathon program from there. I don't have the time to do 90- or 100-mile weeks, I don't think, but I can do multiple 70s. Then again, with what I've put my family through for the last nine months, maybe I need to cut back on the running for a while and spend some more family time. My son will be in college in nine months, and he could use some dad time too. So I have to sort through all that and decide how to proceed. But for now, just kinda enjoy a 72-minute PR and let my legs heal for a couple of weeks.

Once again, two days after the marathon is the day my legs decide to go on strike. I was able to go downstairs forward today (using the handrail as a crutch), but being on my feet long enough to see 28 patients in clinic pounded my quads to a pulp. I did not feel good at all by 5 p.m. Tomorrow may not be much better. I think I will really keep the running to a minimum for a week or so, but the legs may bounce back fairly quickly with semi-complete rest.

Still thinking a lot about what to do next. I think I need to spend some more family time, so I may cut back to maintenance mileage of 30 or so for a while as I decide what race to attack next. Somebody suggested I look at Birmingham. One, Birmingham is in February (too soon), and two, I looked at the course elevation. Looks like a map of west Little Rock. In other words, nope. I'm going to be looking for something I can run faster than Memphis, not a race I need crampons and a rope to run. 

Couldn't stand not running for three days in a row (or five out of six days, since I skipped Thursday and Friday last week), so got back on the TM for three slow miles. No real pain to speak of, but legs definitely felt heavy, especially the left quad. Not a difficult pace (10:00). Probably rest tomorrow, run maybe 4 Thursday, then do 6 on Saturday with the Crackheads. That would give me 15.5 miles this week, counting Sunday night's brisk walk.Wouldn't be enough if I were turning around for maybe a January marathon like Houston, but I'm not gonna do that. May not even be ready (or want to) do one by March or April.

Probably not going to run tonight (although always reserve the right to change my mind), but felt the need to put some thoughts down.

As pleased as I am with a 72:33 PR, I'm frustrated that I got so close to BQ but couldn't close the deal. So I'm reviewing things in my mind that might have made a difference.

* More peak mileage. Yeah, that could have done it. But I already added 20 miles a week to the original plan, and 45 miles a week to the plan I used for Little Rock, and there just wasn't a whole time of time left in the week to add more miles. Yeah, I could have converted 10-mile midweek runs into 12-milers and gotten over 80 that way. But I might also have gotten hurt that way. Ditto adding more miles to my back-off weeks. I definitely feel that there were a couple of times in the last 24 weeks when my body said it had had enough and I was right on the brink of injury, or at least overtraining syndrome, before I backed off. I think that the way I handled the weekend long runs, with six over 18 miles and three of 20 or more, worked well for me, and I would be reluctant to change that.

* More crosstraining. This one makes sense to me. My weak link on Saturday was the quads and hip flexors, more so than the twitching gastroc. If I'd done more lower body weight work, the muscles might have been better able to withstand the strain of 8:00 miles even without more mileage.

* Longer period at high mileage. Instead of two weeks of 70-plus, maybe four or five, without taking the peak up over 75. This is kinda how I read what Sasha suggested I do -- carry a high base. Basically, get my base built up to this level and then maintain more of it for a longer period. And this method would not put any more time pressure on me than what I did this time. To do that optimally, IMO, I'd need to start my program, whether I do an 18-week or whatever, at a higher MPW than I did this time.

* Change my taper? Nah, don't think so. I think I needed three weeks to get ready to perform, and it also gave me time to get the hamstring issue resolved so that it didn't bother me at all on Saturday. I don't think I lost any fitness during the taper for sure.

* Maybe the thing that got me was just a bad break -- that I was dead into the wind at my most vulnerable time of the race. Not sure about that. I'm sure the wind slowed me some, but not 30-plus seconds a mile over the period I was running upwind, which is what I would have needed to hit BQ. Maybe on a calm day I break 3:32, but that's still not BQ.

* One more thing. The one aspect of Pfitz' plan I had the most problem with is his recommended approach to the long runs -- the progression to MP + 10%. I didn't have any trouble carrying MP + 20%, but that late acceleration below 9:00 didn't always happen. Maybe this part is the real key -- teach myself to run at that kind of speed with tired legs. Ditto the Friday-Saturday combo, to start every LR with tired legs, but I feel like doing a better job of getting to MP + 10% might have been what could have pushed me over the edge. I carried my speed for 20-21 miles, but I couldn't carry it for 26.

I'm happy with how I did the speed work, happy with the fact that I got through a very challenging program without getting hurt, and obviously happy with a 72-minute PR. I don't need major changes. I need tweaks. I need three minutes. Seven seconds a mile. That'll get me to Hopkinton.

Back on the TM from a slow 4.5. Picked up the pace just a bit. Still definitely stiff and sore; I have no difficulty remembering what I spent Saturday morning doing. Nothing hugely painful, though, but stiff in some new places, like the ITB is hurting at the left knee where it has not bothered me in the past. Probably will take my time building my mileage back up until I decide where and when to race again.

Out to Two Rivers Park for six miles with the Crackheads this morning. People I don't even know were congratulating me on my Memphis performance. I know Hobbit had put the word out in the weekly Crackhead e-mail, but still, how they knew that was me, I dunno. But it's nice to get props from people outside your circle of friends.

Anyway, a slow, steady 10:00 pace. Just like  in Memphis, the last two miles were dead into the wind, maybe even a stronger wind than last week. No significant problem with the legs. So the first week of recovery went well -- except that I now have to shower, change and go do a Saturday morning clinic. Yuck. Then I can take a nap.

No running today as I recover from 26.2 eight days ago and 6.14 one day ago. But I've pretty much decided where to make my BQ try. I started a where-to-go-for-BQ thread on RWOL, and got a lot of good suggestions, including Newport, OR. So I look at the Newport race website and see the 2008 race winner is a fellow FRB blogger. So, because Newport works for me on several levels, I'm pretty sure at this point that's where I'm gonna go for BQ next:

* Scheduling. My son graduates from high school May 19 and has been wanting to take a graduation trip. He wanted to go to Canada, but that's gonna be hard to do, in part because none of us have passports right now. But he's OK with Oregon. And a May 30 date fits in well with his graduation.

* Course. Fast, and flat. Sean confirmed that to me; so did the guy who suggested it.

* Weather. As much as I hate running in the heat, that's a worry for a late May race, but if there's anywhere I can depend on for cool weather at that time of year, it's the Pacific Northwest.

* Accommodations. My wife's cousin owns a cottage or condo or something on the Oregon coast, about 70 miles from Newport, that will make a great base for a week of tapering/vacation before we move down to Newport for the race. And I've already found a great flight deal on Orbitz for that week (thank goodness that the price of jet fuel keeps going down).

If for some reason Newport doesn't work out (maybe we can't get the cottage), option #2 is Traverse City, MI. Northern Michigan is beautiful, the course at Traverse meets my criteria for terrain and weather, and it's not too far from the Canadian border so my son could get his Canadian trip. Either one would be OK with me.

Finally, a good night's sleep thanks to a nice batch of NyQuil. Maybe too good. The stuff didn't wear off until after lunch, so it was a groggy morning.

While the meds were fading away, the weather was getting nasty. Yesterday it was in the 60s. Tonight, it's in the 20s, freezing rain, the grass is crunchy. Just the kind of night for which treadmills were invented. And I put it to its intended use. Five recovery miles while I watched the football game. No discomfort at all with the legs.

Tyler just learned (it's 10 p.m.) that he doesn't have to go to school tomorrow; freezing rain will do that around here, since chains are unknown and salting the streets almost unknown around here. But the temps are not supposed to warm up much at all (subfreezing all day), NLR is very hilly and I'd rather not my son have to drive that decrepit old van on slick, inclined streets (I saw a high school kid have an accident this morning near NLRHS when I went to drop off some Prilosec for his heartburn). Then again, the decrepit van is still in the parking lot at school; Pam went to pick him up after school because his windshield was iced over and she didn't want him driving anyway.

Heard from my friend Michelle, who ran her first sub-five-hour marathon yesterday in Dallas. It was very warm and humid, and many of the runners (including her) paid for it. She reports being dizzy after about 21 miles, and when she finished, she went to the medical tent where her BP was like 80/40. She recovered before too long without an IV or anything. Classic dehydration; hypovolemia from sweating too much produces hypotension which results in dizziness. Very proud of her running a PR despite adverse conditions; I told her my speed must be rubbing off on her. She feels that her late friend Anne Pressly, the murdered TV anchor, was cheering her on. Wouldn't doubt it.

Six easy miles on the treadmill. It's still icy outside and the forecast is for freezing fog tonight, so tomorrow may be no picnic on the streets and highways either. Six of my 19 patients today actually showed up; only a couple of the others actually bothered to call and cancel. Perhaps they thought we would be closed like most of the doctors' offices in town.

 I've now run 27 miles in 10 days since the 26.2 in one day. It's still hard for me to think of myself as not only a multiple marathoner, but a successful (relatively speaking), goal-achieving marathoner. My athletic career, such as it was, tended to consist of bumping up very quickly against limits I could not overcome. Too small and not strong enough for football, too short and not quick enough for basketball, inadequate hand-eye coordination for baseball and golf, not enough training to do the job in track.One problem I think I had is that I didn't know what it took to succeed as an athlete. I didn't have the concept of hard work as a vital component; why my dad, who was an all-America high school football player and a Division I recruit, didn't try to impart that to me, I still don't know. I didn't lift enough weights and do enough drills to overcome my small size in football, I didn't develop other skills like ballhandling to compensate in basketball, and I didn't build my base enough to become more than a mediocre middle-distance runner in track.

I probably would have done the same as a marathon-wannabe if I hadn't found good resources like Pfitz' book, and this blog, and the RWOL forums. There, I found out what other people who were succeeding did, and not only that, I got encouragement that I never got from my coaches as a kid. I never showed enough natural talent for them to really bother coaching me, and they spent their time coaching the kids who had the talent. 

But with all the help I got, nobody ran a single step for me. I had to push myself out the door six times a week, and put in the miles whether I felt good or not, do the LT runs and the MP runs and the VO2-max semisprints and run the hills, and make the effort to read the books and the forums and apply what I read there to my own situation. Much of it helped, some of it didn't, and I had to decide what applied to me and what didn't. 

So now I'm in uncharted territory for me. I've achieved two major athletic goals -- running a marathon, and breaking four hours. I'm now a better-than-average marathoner (in 2007, the average male finisher in an American marathon ran a 4:29:52, according to marathonguide.com, and only 15% broke 3:30; I'm a lot closer to 3:30 than 4:30 now. The average for my age group was 4:24:40). But now I've got to press on and see what else is in there. BQ, 3:15, 3:00 -- what is my limit at age 48-plus, and how can I get there? I ran a 5:05 mile and 11:02 two-mile in high school; how much of that speed is still there? Can I learn to run 26.2 at 7:24 pace? How about 6:51? Right now I haven't even run a 5K at 6:51, although I think I could do that now much better than I could last July. Is BQ going to be enough for me? Is 3:15 enough? Will my wife let me find out?

Back to the icy weather: my TV-reporter friend Michelle, fresh off her first sub-five marathon,  was doing a live remote tonight standing near an ice-clogged stretch of freeway. She was wearing a blue Brooks jacket and earmuffs. I cracked up when I saw her; I've seen those exact earmuffs and jacket at 6 a.m. on a Crackhead run. But her hair and makeup were a lot nicer than they are at 6 a.m. :) (I know you sometimes read the blog, Michelle; that's why I'm picking on you).

XT today, trying to target the quads and hip flexors -- those muscles that fatigued first at Memphis and pushed me above BQ time. Half-hour on the recumbent bike with the resistance turned up, trying to maintain 90 RPM cadence (= 180 steps per minute running cadence, which is what I want). Pretty successful on both counts. Maintained a high-80s cadence average, and the hip flexors and upper quads are the muscle groups that were burning when I finished. Then capped it off with a couple of sets of upper body work; there were some twinges in my infraspinatus muscles during the marathon, although I had no trouble properly carrying/using my arms for 3:33.

Back on the TM for five. Legs did not want to go. Neither did the rest of the body. Then I realized it was the old pattern -- I wanted to run faster. Turned up the TM decently, and I felt stronger and finished the run with some energy. I would still classify it as a recovery run, just a little more intense.

At some point I have to get over this cold or whatever it is I have. My sinuses have been draining for two solid weeks. Yes, I'm aware a marathon batters the immune system, but somewhere I have to get back to normal. Sheesh. And taking stuff for symptomatic relief has just left me feeling dopey.

You'd think I'd learn by now, but I keep doing it: Setting my alarm clock 12 hours LATE. Wanted to get up at 4:45 a.m. to go run with the Crackheads, set it for 4:45 p.m. Then woke up at 5:45. I was supposed to meet Sparky30 from RWOL this morning. Got to the Capitol at 6:06, just as Tom sent the Crackheads out on their run. Tom said no one had been asking for me, so maybe Sparky didn't show. So, with no stretching or warmup whatsoever, I headed out on the run. And just passed people left and right, first walkers, then joggers, then runners. Finally looked at my watch and I was cruising at 9:00 pace. And just kept cruising. Couldn't read my directions properly in the predawn light and went too far before turning around and heading back, so my planned 8-miler wound up as almost 9. Maintained a near-9:00 pace, then put the hammer down the last half-mile or so and ran it at about MP.

 Off to Fayetteville this morning to see Spamalot this afternoon and a basketball game tonight. Then spending the night, waiting for the latest Canadian cold front to arrive. It's supposed to be about 20 tomorrow morning up there, 17 tomorrow night down here when the front makes it to central Arkansas. It's 44 now and the temperature is already falling. 

Back on the TM tonight as Minnesota visits Arkansas for a few days -- temps around 25 and wind chill in the teens. Started out planning a recovery run, but again it felt right to crank up the pace as the run went on. Ended up at 8:34 pace for the last two miles, which would be interim-GMP plus 10% until I decide finally what GMP is going to be. For now, I'm going to work toward a 7:45 pace. I know I could hold 7:45 for 13 miles two months ago, the trick will be to double that in five months. My shoot for the moon goal is probably a 3:15 (7:24 pace); my fallback goal is just a BQ. Wow -- BQ as a fallback goal.

Anyway, run went well. Had a weird twinge in the left glutes as the run began which I have not felt before, but it went away in the first 400 and did not return. Those last two miles at 8:34 felt quite comfortable. I did not turn on the fan in the fitness center because I wasn't sure I needed it, as cold as it was outside. Turned out I worked up quite a sweat without it. That's OK too; my race is in May, when it will definitely NOT be in the 20s, so I might as well maintain some degree of acclimation to "heat" so that I'm not caught unprepared when it warms up in the spring. 

New complication in the training routine. Boss wants me to work two Saturdays per month. He is convinced, probably correctly, that our nurse practitioner has no intention of returning from her maternity leave, now at three months and counting, and he does not want to have his weekday clinics loaded with followup visits. So we see followups on Saturday morning so he has more times to do the procedures that really pay the bills. He says he will pay me extra for the Saturdays, in addition to the raise I just got, but don't know what that will mean. And Saturday is, of course, my long run day. I suppose I can do my LR after the clinic, especially in the winter, or start my clinic after the LR (less likely, especially as the LR starts to creep back into the high teens, which it will), or do my LR on Sunday (I like that option least of all, but it may become necessary). Saturday clinic starts 1/3/09. Stay tuned.

Anyway, back to tonight's run. Easy 6 on the TM (it's still raining and barely above freezing, not that I was likely to run outside). Wore the HRM for the first time in a long time. Average HR was 139, creeping up to 151. Last HRR figures I had, 139 was about 70% of my HRR. But then I really have no idea what my resting heart rate is now; haven't tried to check it in months, because rolling over to, say, grab a watch or turn the light on puts the heart in high gear. Is it in the high 50s like it was a few months back? Dunno, but kinda doubt it.

Going to Camden tomorrow for Christmas. I'm supposed to do an 8 mile GA with strides tomorrow, but this may get in the way. Nana has a treadmill; I may do an easy 5 on the TM tomorrow night and do my strides when I get back Thursday night. Or do them Friday morning; that would work too.

New complication in the TM issue. Went to the mom-in-law's for Christmas Eve. Mom-in-law has a TM she never uses, so voila, there's my run rather than trot around after dark in a town I don't know all that well. TM works fine. The overhead fan and the HVAC vent in that room don't. So I got zero circulation for an hour on the TM. Felt like I was running in a sauna. Otherwise, the legs did fine on a routine recovery run.

I think I'll wait until I get home tomorrow night for another run, or maybe a crosstraining session and run Friday morning. No more TM runs at the in-laws...

Ordered my copy of Pfitz' new book, or the second edition rather, this morning. Also ordered Noakes at the same time, so I'll have all sorts of new info to peruse on cold winter nights.

No training today; spent today occupied with Christmas, and a good long nap after Christmas dinner that was much needed, then driving two hours home from the in-laws.

As is typical with our long drives, my wife and son both dozed off and I had a lot of time to think. One of the things I thought about is that run in Memphis, and its timing. If I were seven months older, it would have been a BQ run -- I would be 50 before the 2010 Boston Marathon, and my time was a BQ time for the 50-54 bracket. But because I was born in October and not in March, I'm not yet BQd.

Some people would probably send in their app  for 2010, fudge the birth date by seven months, and get in. The BAA doesn't know. And I still would have been 48 at the time I ran in Memphis. It's tempting, I have to admit. But I'm not gonna do it. I'll do my spring attempt, probably at Newport, and if that doesn't do it, I'll do a fall race, maybe Chicago or Memphis again or Mid-South. A 3:30 in either one gets me in for 2010. A 3:35 in the fall gets me in for 2011, when I will be 50. I can get those 163 seconds for Newport, or I can run another 3:33 in the fall, and get in the right way. And if I can't get in the right way, it's my own darn fault.

So now, having taken today off and with no work tomorrow, I can do a morning workout tomorrow, then take my son shopping for his college computer purchase, then go buy my wife's last Christmas present, then go open presents tomorrow night at my parents'. Then hit the road with the Crackheads on Saturday at Oucho's, in the West Little Rock Himalayas, and do a Friday-Saturday combo for the first time in a long time. When (not if) I am finally training for Boston, Oucho's will have a prominent role, because it's got killer uphills and killer downhills. 

This one fits in the category of boy-yo-mama-taught-you-better-than-that. Despite fighting this cold or bronchitis or whatever the heck upper respiratory garbage I've had for the past week or so, I got up this morning and headed to Oucho's. Warm, muggy, raining intermittently. But at least there was a breeze so I didn't get overheated. Headed out on the hike of the mountains of west Little Rock. Became obvious very quickly that my body has not recovered from this whatever. Lot of walking. Lot of thinking I should be walking when I wasn't. Somehow managed to finish 10.1 miles and get back to Oucho's in less than two hours. And managed to run most of the big hills -- Rahling, coming and going, and Pebble Beach. I wondered where the Sherpas and the oxygen masks were, but I ran the hills.

 Then I went home and took a really long nap. I feel a little better -- emphasis on little -- but I'm still definitely not over this junk. Better now than in the middle of training for Newport, I guess.

Had planned to do 6 on the TM tonight, but got up there and the fitness center was locked up tight. No TM for me. I was about to give up on the run, it being 7 p.m., dark and pretty cold already, but I remembered that I had mapped out a 4.75-mile loop about a year ago on the USATF website that I had never actually run. So I came back, looked it up, noticed a couple of places I could tack on some extra mileage, and set out.

First, I remembered pretty quick why I'd never actually run this route. It is nothing but HILLS. Actually, the uphills proved not too much of a problem, but the downhills were pounding my thighs pretty hard, especially after 10 miles of Oucho yesterday. Even with that, I felt pretty good, and I threw in another little detour later in the run to add some extra distance.

Wasn't sure how far I had run (my Garmin was out of juice, not having been recharged after yesterday's run). So I got in the car and measured it, both with the odometer and the partially charged Garmin. The result: 7.31. Didn't sleep too well last night due to coughing, but I've felt better today. Hopefully the crud is finally subsiding, but I did get some Mucinex at the store this afternoon to help push it along.

 If the real problem with my BQ near-miss at Memphis was a lack of quad strength due to lack of hills, running this sucker a few times will help fix that. 

After pummeling my quads with 17.4 miles of hills this weekend, decided to take it easy on them tonight. Fortunately, my landlord cooperated by reopening the fitness room tonight, so to the treadmill I went. Standard progression run finishing at slightly sub-9:00 pace, getting faster every mile. Quads were really hurting early in the run, less so as I got warmed up. Discovered afterward that the glutes were kinda sore.

Plan right now is to run 7 tomorrow and 5 on Wednesday to finish the year at an even 1900 miles. That would be equal to running from my apartment to the outskirts of San Jose, CA. Or 450 miles more than running from here to Provo, for you Utahn bloggers (is that really what Utah people call themselves? Utahns? I remember seeing that in some stories datelined Salt Lake City back in my previous life as a journalist.). Or 437 miles more than running from my place to downtown Boston, to get to the real point of this blog.

I know that's chicken feed compared to the mileage Sasha and some of the other FRB bloggers put in, but compared to where I was two years ago, that's incomprehensible to me. And, barring injury, it's gonna pale in comparison to the mileage I plan to rack up in 2009.

Great night. Strong 7-miler with strides on the TM -- and got to watch my Razorbacks beat the fajitas out of Oklahoma at BWA. Of course, if I lived close enough to Fayetteville, I would have been there instead of running, but that's OK too. Watched all of it while running, screaming at the refs, etc. So much for our being picked last in the SEC West. We'll be in the top 25 next week, unless we lay an egg Saturday against UNT.

Five miles tomorrow to cap off the year at exactly 1900 miles. Then go celebrate my dad's 70th birthday with him on Thursday. Except for having to work Saturday morning, this is becoming a very good week. 

Probably shouldn't have run today (or any time in the past week), but I'm OCD, I admit it. I wanted that round number, and I got it. A nice, slow, agonizing 5.01 on the TM put me at 1900.01 for the year (so I could say I went OVER 1900). My sinuses are killing me, I'm producing all sorts of green stuff, I'm not sleeping, and I'm exhausted. Got my nurse to call in a Z-pak for the sinusitis, which I am now taking. So I'm going to call it a year -- literally. I'm going to bed as soon as I finish updating my log. My copy of Lore of Running arrived today and I'll read myself to sleep.

Probably should not run a step until I'm completely over this (or at least until I get some sleep). But I bet I do anyway. Not tomorrow, though. Tomorrow's my dad's 70th birthday, and it's for him.