Biting it, moving on.

Had a poor race last Thursday night. 4 miler in the heat, downtown Wilmington. Went out too fast, especially in lieu of the conditions, and the course. Several steeper one to two block in length hills.

Knew it early on too. Glanced at my watch maybe .2 or .3 into the thing and was running a 5:57 pace. Didn't feel that fast, and I tried to kind of down shift a bit out of it, but I think some of the damage had been done. Had been planning on trying to run 6:15 miles. Which coming off an 18 minute 5k last month, and a 4:48 1500m last Saturday, I should have been able to do.

But I knew I had blown it out a mile or so in. Then it becomes a death march, and an exercise in trying not to fall back or lose too many places. Finished in 26:43. Still won my age group, and was still in retrospect not a bad time... but just not a smart or good effort

Though I shook it off quick and like a ball team on a win streak that can use a loss, overall it may have been a good thing. I'm not bullet proof and ten feet tall. I'm fallible again. I think part of what lends to the mistake is being a victim of my own shape. What I mean by that, is similarly 2 years ago I was in real good shape going into the Tri-Span 10k and did the same thing. I did not think I needed to adjust as much to the heat and the hills of the course, because of my perceived conditioning.

Onto training for the Iron Mountain 30 mile race Sept 5, a little under 12 weeks away. Saw Natasha Thurs night at the race which got the both of us amped again for what has become an annual pilgrimage to the mountains of southwestern Virginia.

Plan is for 10 solid weeks of running, then a 2 week taper. Ideally would love to average close to 70 miles a week for 10 weeks; perhaps five weeks on, one down, then four back up? We'll see. The best laid plans of mice and men. Need to also amp the ancillary work back up, ie core and strength.

Love

Sometimes it's as basic as putting on a new pair of cool looking lime green Kinvara 5s and busting out the door for a run. Getting back to the primal joy of why we do this...

Those days when it's not about threshold miles, pacing, bursts, cut down runs, pacing charts, mileage totals. Or how this run fits into the grand scheme of it all training wise.

No, it's the simple sensation of movement and the very act in of itself. The connection felt with the world around us while we trod over and through it. I thought about my buddy Ryan up in Pennsylvania and his calendars. Back in the day he always had one pinned up somewhere with little numbers written in the day's boxes with the miles he had run. There was something so romantically wild and magically invigorating about it... the way he would look at it and talk about it... perhaps describing just how one of those numbers had been achieved.

One day last week I went for a run with my ten dollar wrist watch and glanced at it at about what would be one mile into the run and noted the elapsed time read 8:37. This is why we do this. Because this particular day on this particular run it took me exactly eight minutes and thirty-seven seconds to get from point A to point B. It wasn't fast, it wasn't slow... it just was.

Last Friday and Saturday I was blessed again to help coach the Cape Fear Flyers in a big USATF meet in Myrtle Beach, SC. This meet I took a little time to check out some of the field events like the shot put and javelin back behind the stadium. And the pole vault and hi jump inside the track. You can fall in love again with all of this twenty plus years later...

When the kids PR, or medal, or place. Or just have fun. And come up to you later and tell you about it again. Yeah, yeah. The smiles.

And I got to run too. The 1500m early Saturday evening, after a long, hot day of coaching. Since I was the only open/ masters runner they thankfully thru me with all the high school boys, including three from our team. Standing on that infield, I wasn't sure if I would be able to summon the physical strength to do more than just jog hard a few laps around the track. "Five minutes of hell" laughed Chris.  But I said a short prayer and sucked up some courage and stepped out into lane 8 on the waterfall start in turn two and waited for the gun to go off...

And I ran like hell, and afterwards realized that I loved every precious second of it. I told Chris to duck in front of me heading into turn 3 and said to myself to follow him round and round for as long as I possibly could. I held on thru the first 300m past the finish line, and back through 400m and one lap in. Made it through 800m still sticking a few strides behind him. Looking at nothing but the back of his white Flyers shirt. Hearing cheers and encouragement from coach Joe and Shawn, Elaine and a few of the kids every time we went by the front stretch. Which all kind of fuzzed sound wise into the whirling dervish of the whole thing, but I could hear certain specific voices even though I couldn't fully process all of what it meant in real time ...

Since then life became a task of clipping off a hundred meters at a time. Get to 700m to go, then make it to 600m. Keep taking it. Ok...now make it to 500m to go. If you can take it next is 400m. All that matters then is to make it to 300m left in the race. Nothing more. Make it to 300m. Nothing else matters. Nothing. That is the task at hand. Good. You made it. Now get to 200m. Get there. It's just the back straight away. Nothing more. Nothing less. Keep taking it. Get to 200m. That's all that matters. Yes, yes... now run the turn. Into the turn. Keep digging. Keep taking it. Get to 100m. Get through these big turns and get to 100m to go. Don't lose sight of that shirt. That white shirt is there. You are taking it. You are taking it. Not backing down. You are doing this. 100m to go. It's just the front straight away. Last one. Count it down. Past lane markings. Clip those things off. Past the long jump pit you can see out of the left corner of your eye. Gotta be half way now. Finish it. Finish it. That white shirt is there. Looks to be moving a little faster. Go with it. Keep taking it. It'll be over real soon. You are taking it. You took it. You took it and did it. It's over.

It was over. It was done. I staggered about the track. Congrats from and to Chris. I think James too. Not sure, but probably. And Thomas too. I wasn't too far behind them either. Time?  Wow, nice. 4:48?  Yes on the score board it read 4:48.80 behind my name. I was pleased. I was high. I heard some congrats now.  Thanks, Thank you. I smiled.

I felt blessed. I feel blessed.

Because I love this. From every race to every easy run. And everything in between. Run on my friends.

More runs and miles

Signed up to a run a 1500m on the track in Myrtle Beach next Saturday. Part of a meet that I will be coaching at. Decided this morning I need some "get down speed" to quote the fictional character Quenton Cassaday in Born to Run. Ran 10 x 200m at about 35 seconds but legs were just too fatigued to do more, and the mind was half checked out. Ran again at noon 5+ miles and got in 6 x 150 In/ Out sprints.

Going to cut the mileage going into next week. Also have a 4 mile race the night of June 11th in downtown Wilmington. Been running a harder average pace on most of my runs the past few weeks, while also accumulating a solid chunk of miles. Might be some kind of coping with grief mechanism... just seems more natural to go harder. Bash and bash some more. Throwing the rule back out a little.

Though there are days where I swear my legs respond to being in motion. Like they are returning to some primitive, natural state. Where it all just seems to flow. And I can get semi-fatigued but never too tired.

Up in Pennsylvania two weeks ago to say goodbye again to my Mom. And of course I ran. Got in as much as I could. 10 + miles that Saturday morning, weather in the upper 50s and raining. In fact pouring at times. Wailing on up and down the hills. Running with ghosts of the past. Floating around familiar bends on country roads. Flying down alley ways in my old hometown. Yesterdays long forgotten spring to life for a few fleeting moments... if I reached out I  swear I could touch them.

Ran into (almost quite literally) and old friend from high school. She was out on a 13 miler. Had run the Pittsburgh marathon a few weeks ago. We chatted amicably in the rain. I forgot that my hands were getting a bit numb.

Then 7 miles hard on the Towpath that evening. Out onto the single track trail that winds thru the valley up to Jim Thorpe. Was sunny, muggy and hot then. I pushed the pace and enjoyed it. Beautiful scenery. Like being cut off from the World. Came upon a bunch of people out walking, kind of looked like some sort of Outsiders. Couple, adults, kids. They all said hi, friendly. A girl asked if I was sweaty. Kinship I think because at heart I'm an Outsider too.

9 more miles Sunday morning. Hills. More hills. Up and down. Then back on the road, in my car.

On and On

The humidity suffocated me a few times last week. Trying to run threshold miles on my lunch break when its 85 degrees out with an even a higher heat index. Like I told my Dad tonight, I don't care how good of shape you are in, it will chew you up and spit you out onto the asphalt.

But later last Thursday afternoon a quick storm blew thru the island and in its aftermath we were left with rain cooled temps and a drastic cut in humidity. Met my old friend Burt that evening as the sun came back out. We headed back into the Carolina Beach State Park and put down close to eight miles. Showed him my little hill circuit, and he showed me a way to cut from the end of a pier by the Cape Fear River back onto Sugar Loaf Trail. (included 2 'long jumps' to clear water that flowed up in between small sand bars and into the reeds.)

Talked about the good 'ol days and our epic trail runs all the way down the back side of the narrow island to behind the Armory. Out and back runs that took 3 hours or more. Changes in terrain, vegetation, into the woods, out of the woods, running by the river, around water towers and drainage ponds where gators live. Exploring the brick and cement ruins of the Dow Chemical Plant. Passing on tales of what they did there (made gas to unleash on the Germans in WWII ?).

Friday...lunch time run...and what a difference in weather from the past few days. I am able to get three miles in at threshold pace, negative splitting them in 6:23, 6:19, 6:09. Working hard, but cruising at times too. That empowering feeling of being in control of it. Dictating pace. Even dialing it back if need be.

Saturday and an early morning trek to Durham to coach with the Cape Fear Flyers. Rode up with my buddy and fellow coach Shawn. Russell slept in the back. 17 year old beast of a shot putter and discus thrower.  It was a sea of humanity at the stadium, white, black, young, old. And everything in between. I cheer, coach, record splits, finish times. Advise, counsel, fellowship. The kids are alright.

Two straight 70 mile weeks. Pain in my right foot ebbs and flows, and sometimes it tweaks my knee, but I run on and through it. I run, run, and run. Sometimes I don't think it matters why. Its something to ponder another day. Probably while I'm running.

Loose Thoughts

I like to think about pushing things to the extreme. Living on the edge running and training wise. Maybe it's wired into my DNA. For years I lived on the edge with the booze and the drugs. Maybe I don't know any other way. Or I feel more alive and like I have more of a purpose, a reason to be... when I am chasing IT into never never land.

Some would argue it's just a coping mechanism. Coping from what I would ask. Life, they'd answer. Or an escape. I think I like an escape better. Seems more proactive.

"The road of excess leads to the palace of wisdom" wrote William Blake. Maybe he was a runner at heart.

Think of the word too, runner. We run. We cover ground. We are simultaneously moving away from things while moving towards something else. Our first coaches if we've run competitively tells us "don't look behind you".  But like Don Henley in The Boys of Summer video most of us have looked back.

So I think about what's next. It's wide open. Full of possibilities. I am bound only by the limits of my imagination. Free to dream. Free to dare. Free to explore.

I've been reminded of late how quickly all of that can change. A fellow coach and running buddy has a big electronic machine strapped to him at all times to monitor his heart. I saw him at mile 24 of a marathon he finished back in March. I thought about him and thought about how lucky and fortunate and how it cool it truly all is that I could get up and go out and race a 5K that Saturday morning. And I prayed that he'll be better soon. And I ran like hell.

And it clicked. The race Gods were with me. Like I said to Ron today when we were running down a trail in the state park... we can do everything right as runners going into a race and it can still go to shit less than half way in.

I closed a 5K in a 5:42 3rd mile Saturday. I may never do that again. Nobody knows. But I dam sure enjoyed it. And am damn grateful for all of this. Every step, every mile, every heart break, every triumph, every dream, every crazy thought.... every moment being involved with something that I love.

Post HS 5K PR

Ran the Teacher Trot 5K at Ashley HS (Wilmington, NC) in 18:00.5. Which broke my post high school 5K PR set back in 2010.  ((( and one of my former HS teammates back in the early 90s said "great job... but 17 something would've looked even better!"  ))).  A sense of humor in this sport is indispensable.

Training for the most part has been going well. Lesser mileage in April but more intensity. Adding in threshold runs and speed work on a weekly basis. Plus trying to stay diligent with the ancillary work on my core, and upper body strength. Resistance exercises such as sit-ups, planks, push ups, along some free weight exercises like arm curls.

Coaching kids in track 2, 3 times a week. Mix of runs with them. Had the pleasure today of racing with two them, and got to witness both of them set PRs. Owen in 19:36, and Paxton in 21:34 (which were awesome times for a 12 year old and 12 year old girl... plus they love the sport and are having a lot of fun).

Got to also race with my Dad today. Not too shabby himself, winning the 70+ male division with a time of 26:34. It was the first run together we've had since my Mom and his wife passed away earlier in April. The fact that my Mom started her career as a teacher made this race all the more sweeter. The awards included apples on top.

Happy running all. I cannot fully articulate how much this little sport of ours has meant to me the past few weeks. Onward we go.

Running Thru it.

Last Saturday morning it was 10 x 400m in about 1:22 on a :75 rest cycle. Didn't sleep that much, woke up real early. Was dreary, dismal, grey... and raining.  But I went anyway. I couldn't not go. Because if I didn't, I wouldn't have known what else to do with myself.  Time was standing still. Or moving very, very slow. I knew I couldn't make it go backwards. Back beyond when my Dad called to tell me the doctors asked if he wanted to put my Mom on life support. Back beyond seeing my Mom laying there with tubes in her cold body. Back beyond when she would open her eyes and stare lifeless at us, unable to respond.  Back beyond when I was told she had passed.

No, I knew that was impossible. So I ran. I ran hard. I lined up each time and took it. I took them like only us runners who have been battle scarred throughout a lifetime of competitive running can take them.

And then it was over. Then the thoughts come back some more. And over the hours and days that would follow I learned about grieving and pain and loss and sorrow. But I kept running. Because I had to.

I went to track practice last Monday and Wednesday night and ran with kids. We ran hard some of the time. We played games and goofed off too. Running is fun, its important the next generation knows that. Heart ache, grief, sorrow... hopefully those things can wait a good while for them. But nobody knows. So we do the best we can, while we can.

Last Thursday before the memorial service I ran 3.33 miles at threshold pace. At one point I looked at the white painted line by the road's edge and told myself just follow it and don't think about nothing else. Just go. It's like God. It's there. Just follow it. Don't think about it. Keep taking the next step. Whap whap whap whap whap my shoes hit the macadam.

Then Saturday it was 16 x 200m in about :37-:38. 200m jog/ rest. One after the other. It's rhythmic. It's soothing in a somewhat painful way. Three deer scattered as I ran hard. They regrouped later up the dirt road by the wood's edge. Then scattered again as I ran hard. When I finished I looked up the road and there they all stood perfectly still...watching me. I waved. Told them I was done. Said thanks and that I was going home. And was leaving theirs.

Sunday and I ran a 5K with some of the kids. I ended up with Holly and El. They are both seven. We ran and chatted. El said people shouldn't litter cups after the water stops. Holly kept asking me how far we have left to go. I kept fudging the answers a bit. Her knees hurt and she wanted to walk. But she didn't. She finished strong. 28 minutes. I was happy for her.

This week I'll do a lot of it again. I don't know any other way.