Too nervous to think of a title.

Sorry for the lack of updates. The last week can be summed up thusly: tapering blows. Seriously, that's about the long and short of it. Okay, it's not ALL bad. I was almost embarrassed by all the free time I had on Saturday, needing to run only a paltry 8 miles. (Sigh…I remember back when that was my long run. Cue the "Wonder Years" theme.) But I find myself using all this free time to get nervous. I was fine until today – I woke up at 4:30 this morning and rather than roll over and go back to sleep in 2.6 seconds as I usually would, it hit me that THIS IS MARATHON WEEK (holy hand basket!). Once that thought was planted, trying to get back to sleep was a Herculean task. I actually resorted to counting sheep for gods sake.

I checked the weather up in Yakima, and at the risk of jinxing myself, I'm going out on a limb and saying I don't think weather will be an issue (cringe…knock on wood…salt over the shoulder). This whole week looks the same: partly sunny, highs in the mid-60s. Perfect! And in order to make that seem even more ideal, I ran my Saturday eight outside in the lovely Portland springtime. Here’s a timeline:
miles 1-3: overcast
mile 4: rain
mile 5: hail
mile 6: sun comes out (still hailing!)
miles 7-8: hail stops, I get uncomfortably warm and give off steam

I'm taking Friday off and driving up to Yakima around noon. I figure that will give me time to go to the expo and pick up my packet, check into the hotel, maybe drive part or all of the course, and find a paper bag to breath in. I strong-armed my friend Tina into coming with me (and that's totally a metaphor – I arm-wrestled her once and she beat me handily. She may be small, but she's stringy.). So I will have a small cheering section. :) I'm hoping to see the Back of the Packer – she is totally inspiring. I want to find whatever it is that supplies her energy and bottle it and sell it. I'd be rich!!

Note to self: I have to remember to ask for late checkout at the hotel. I want to be able to take an ice bath afterward. My feelings toward ice baths are well-documented, but damn it all, they work. Damn it.

Onto that long downward spiral called tapering

I ended up doing an unbelievable 22.34 miles on Saturday. Holy Shit, is all I can say. And then on Sunday I did the Shamrock 5k, meaning I was half a mile away from a marathon over the two days. I have to say, it really REALLY increased my confidence going into the marathon. Not only did I get within 4 miles of the marathon distance on Saturday, but it was NOT an easy run. From the get-go I felt zapped of energy. By the time I turned around somewhere in the wilds of Gresham (more on that below) I felt like a zombie. But around mile 17 I got comfortable with my zombie-ness, and finished easily. I felt much better than I had after my brush with 20 two weeks before. I'm now paying for it, though. I've started to taper so my runs have topped off at 5 mile this week but they have not been easy. I can feel that my legs are empty. They are juice-less lead weights. I'm sure I'll get my energy back after a few more days of eating bread and taking it slow. My long run Saturday is 15 miles and it'll be on an unpaved trail, which sounds like heaven.
So how did I end up doing 22.34 miles? I have the city of Gresham and a faulty bridge to thank for that. First, the bridge. At mile 13.5 on the Springwater one of the footbridges is down. They detour the path onto a nearby road for maybe half a mile, until the road loops around and crosses the trail again past the bridge. I never really bothered to figure out how much distance the detour added because I only ran it once or twice. Turns out, it adds a lot. Plus, once you leave Portland and enter Gresham, the mile markers stop appearing every half mile and start appearing when the city of Gresham feels like paying for one. Turns out, that isn't very often. Basically they put up a marker when the path crosses a major street. Thus the 15.12 mile marker, and the 16.42. Super. I really did not want to go short of my goal again, so I soldiered on even when I was pretty sure I'd hit 10.5 miles. I finally turned around at 242nd Street. On Sunday when I mapped it, I found that I had run 11.17 miles out. Wow.

I still cannot figure this running thing out.

Apparently, this is my recipe for an amazing long run: on Thursday feel ill, complete only 3 of 5 miles, and barely eat anything. Friday, stay out late eating gooey cheese, crackers, and chocolate, and oh yeah, drinking too much wine. Get up at 6 am (grghhmrmr) on Saturday to make it to pool practice by 7:15; afterwards devour three ginormous slices of French toast slathered in butter and syrup. Then change, go running, and finish thirteen miles in 1:58:08, a pace of 9:05. (!) And, except for the French toast jostling around and making its presence known, feel great doing it. WTF?

I have no idea why I felt so good - the only thing I can think of is that it seems like my body finally "got" it. Particularly after I turned at the half-way point, all the mechanics came together. I felt fluid, comfortable. I was leading with my hips and letting them set the pace (apparently the pace they wanted was 'fast'), which led to my feet falling more softly. I walked yesterday and took a yoga class. I feel so good. I hope that when I run tomorrow I'll find that it wasn't just a one-off deal. I hope that I've turned a corner in my running and I can find more peace than struggle moving forward.

Crunch Time!

That is what we're getting down to. Running and my social life are in a no-holds-barred six-week cage fight to the death. So far its been something of a draw. Last week I did my first planned two-part run. I had a party to go to on Wednesday after work, so first I ran my midweek long run (8 miles) on Tuesday. On Wednesday I ran three miles at lunch, then two more after I got back from the party around 7:30. Thursday was five miles at the gym, then pizza and canasta with my friend who is (tragically) moving to Milwaukee.
Plus, as I mentioned, I went to the coast last weekend. There was not the remotest chance in hell that I would skip a long run, so I went to bed early (right when things were warming up…siiiiiiiiiiiigh) and ran 19 miles along the Siletz River south of Lincoln City, OR. (Digression: Oh man!! If every long run could be like this long run, I would run 8 more marathons this year. It was, seriously, just about perfect: I was dressed perfectly for the weather, which was ideal; the scenery was beautiful; there were mile markers on the road, so I didn't have to guess; I had just enough Gatorade and ShotBloks [secondary digression: I'm now devoted to ShotBloks]; it was not easy but I never stopped and only once around mile 17 did I even truly desire to walk; there were some nice hills to give my legs a change of pace; I did my ice bath in the ocean; and I left for the run early enough that despite having to take an ocean bath and then shower [I had sand in…everything], I was still ready to roll at the same time as everyone else. Marvelous.) This week is more of the same – I'm taking Friday off and heading to Sunriver with some friends. I can't do my long run on Saturday because a) Sunriver is covered in snow and b) I agreed to go snowshoeing. Luckily the run is only 13 miles, which is (knock on wood) practically easy at this point. My plan is to run 10 miles today, 6 miles tomorrow, and the 13 miles on Thursday. That gives me 29 miles for the week, which is only two below my scheduled distance. If I have time on Sunday after I get home I'll knock out a quick 2-3 miler to reach my goal. I'm hoping that I don't feel terrible clumping all my mileage together like this, but it's really the only option that allows me to pretend like I still have a life.
I was thinking about it, and I shouldn’t really complain because this was my decision, yada yada, but this blog would be like two paragraphs if I never complained, so here goes. Last week was actually my peak mileage week at 37; I have a few more 35 miles weeks coming up. My pace is (a little bit) faster than 10 min/mile, but when you factor in changing, warm-up, stretching, cool-down, ice-bath, etc., running 35 miles a week is like having a part-time job. I seriously cannot fathom how normal people who have a job and a family churn out 50-mile weeks (aside from running much faster than I do). More than anything, it's the time commitment that makes me hesitant to commit to another marathon. Particularly now that summer is on its way, with all the hiking, and the barbecues, the weekend camping trips and the dragon-boating. Practice for DB starts March 1…eek. I'm thankful there is just a month of overlap between racing and running. I think I'm tired now…

Pictures from this weekend. It was SO gorgeous...

Alas, ShotBloks

Hmmm…yeah. Well, first things first, I did twelve miles on Saturday and it was great. For the first time EVER, I ran the SC and was not precipitated on, not even a little. That right there would have made it noteworthy. I was also well-rested because I moved a short run from Thursday to Sunday (Thursday was my B-day), so I had two days' rest going into it. That gave me the confidence to really work on my pace, and I finished the 12 miles in 1:47:06, for a pace of 8:55! Holy crap! It went by in a flash. I don't think I need to tell you how much this boosts my confidence.

The questionable part was that I tried Shot Bloks for the first time. I sort of wondered how you were supposed to ingest them on the run, and then I read a suggestion that you sort of tuck a square into your cheek and let it dissolve. That's nice in theory, but in practice having my cheek puffed out messed with my breathing, and made me feel like a chipmunk. They took forever to dissolve (I ended up chewing them a little because I needed to take another square while the old one was still hanging around). Plus, my tummy (which normally doesn't bother me at all) seemed a little uneasy about the Bloks. It just gurgled and felt vaguely out of sorts. On the other hand – I kept up a 8:55 pace on a relatively long run, and that may be because I pretty much constantly had a Blok in my mouth. On my 19-miler this weekend I think I'll try them again – that is a true long run, and I'll be on one day's rest.

I’m not really nervous about nineteen – now that whatever was bugging me in January is gone I feel great about running. I am a bit anxious about the route, however. At the last minute I was invited to the beach this weekend (and I will never turn down a free beach weekend), so I'm trying to find a route nearby that seems safe. I emailed the local runner's club, hopefully they'll have some suggestions. And for the ice bath – into the ocean!! Can't wait.