Fartleks, Shalane, and the 5K

Thud,thud,thud,thud,thud,thud,thud,thud,thud,thud,thud,thud,thud,thud,thud,

What is this sound? I keep asking myself while I'm running fartleks with my local group in north Brooklyn. This is the sound of a slow heavy runner, a clydesdale right? That's what they call them in those running magazines I read. Who's doing that?

Surely it's not the runner ahead of me with the perfect stride, gripping the ground with her Lunaglides and pushing away effortlessly. Certainly it can't be the guy closest to me because he's not all that close. Then I realize it's me! I have some how morphed into this clydesdale, like something out of a horror movie. Suddenly these fartleks are beginning to stink.

So how did this happen, how have I become so damn slow? Last year around this time I was getting faster. I finished a rather hilly 5K in 22 minutes (5 minutes faster than the previous year) and my pace for the 4 mile was even better still. Yet here I am with my lingering injuries from before the summer. My piriformis is so tight they had to give it a name (piriformis syndrome) and then there's my partially inflamed foot that hates any kind of speed work.

Well what's a runner to do, I've tried just about everything so now I'm back to running.. slowly, even when I try to pick it up it's still slow ( for me anyway.)

Next week I will return to the 5K I ran last year in 22 minutes and run as well as I can. Let's hope this won't be too crushing for my ego. Until then I will gallop thru the streets of Brooklyn with the speed of one of those horse drawn carriages in Central Park.

And for anyone who thinks a 5K is no big deal because maybe like thousands of other people you run marathons, consider this. Most pro runners consider the 800 meter to be the most challenging. Why? Because unlike marathons and ultra marathons you are giving 100% speed a 100% of the time, and by the time you're finished you want to die, that is if you're doing them right. ;) Here's Shalane Flanagan talking about the 5K.

The Boston Marathon qualifying rant

 On one of my long runs in central park I noticed a girl running in the opposite direction, and though she was not what I would call fat, but she wasn't what I would call exactly fit either and I'm sure no one was mistaking her for a runner in her street clothes.

So why is that annoying? She was doing what I like to call the Boston brag. That's when you wear the famous blue Boston Marathon jacket that brags about your running prowess, maybe you're even sub elite fast. I don't know about you but I know zero men wearing that Boston jacket that don't at least look like they're fast runners. But I've seen one too many female runners qualifying for Boston that don't look all that fit. "But Mark Boston has qualifying times and chubby or not she qualified"

Qualifying times, just what do they mean anyway? The qualifying times are harder for the New York Marathon but no one seems to care about those qualifying times, and who's wearing that jacket? But Boston seems to be the holy grail for runners, a right of passage, as if qualifying for the Boston marathon and wearing that blue jacket makes you a 'real' runner. What's worse is that once runners get a taste of that Boston cred. They want to keep on proving it and showing others year after year "yeah I got into Boston" And my answer to that is, congrats, and so what? Now you're going to show me your medal?

Now don't get me wrong Boston is a fun marathon to do but there are 100's of other fun marathons to do as well and unless you actually live in Boston I see no reason to want to do it year after year considering travel and expenses and so on, why not do something completely different? Oh wait I know, your ego.

Now I'll admit I never officially qualified for Boston but that didn't stop me from running it any way. Every year Boston expects hundreds of people to bandit the race and in 2008 I was one of those bandits "oh no not a bandit, that’s so wrong you must qualify.." let me cut you off before you start screaming at your computer. The head of the BAA ran his first Boston Marathon as a bandit. And like I said they are well equipped for it anyway I only ran the last half to pace my friend Cara and had probably the most fun I had at any race, mainly because there was no pressure and that only happens when you bandit races, so much fun.

A Boston Bandit in 2008

Well that's my Boston marathon and I'm fine if I never do it again even if I do qualify. Question is do I even want to qualify? The answer.. Of course, I want to qualify and then some but only because it'll mean I'm getting faster but I tend to run multiple marathons and sometimes back to back and that’s probably the worst way to try and qualify for Boston.. Unless you're a girl.

Oh no you didn’t! Oh yes I did, Most men I know that qualify for Boston are running about 60 to over 100 miles a week and not just running but training hard and being obsessed with the process, not only because they have to but because they want to PR. Here's a shameful fact. To qualify for Boston, Men 50 to 54 has to have posted a time of 3:35 or better. That time is five minutes faster than the time required for women 18-34. Well if that still seems OK to for you think about this. To make Boston, a 54-year old man has to run faster than the nation’s youngest and fastest women.

Now I'm not sure but I think if I suggested to a female athlete in her early 20's that she's not as fit as a 54 yr old man I might get a punch in the head. But when I mentioned this on facebook it stirred a vicious debate with women fighting for the 3:40 even some that could crush a 3:40 marathon thought it was OK because "women are just slower" What happened to the women’s right movement? I thought women wanted to be equal and didn't want to be treated as the lesser sex? I'm from generation X and we grew up being taught women and men were equal, so when I see this kind stuff it makes me nuts, and to make matters worse there's no proof women are slower!


Cara qualified by running a 3:30 marathon for Steamtown in 2007, she had no training plan, in fact she hardly even trained.

Before Katherine Switzer ran her first Boston Marathon as K. Switzer, why? Because women were didn't run marathons, in fact it was believed that if a woman ran more than 6 miles her uterus would fall out, (wha, wha, waaaat?) maybe you want to read that again because in the 60's it wasn't just here say, it was fact, or at least they thought so.

Now I've heard the stories about women aren't as efficient runners as men because of their hips and so on. But I'll tell you about the fastest runners I know. Both men and women are far from chubby and they train like animals. The goal is always a PR not getting into to Boston by a few seconds. I know a 46 yr old female runner who ran a 3:10 in New York last November her fastest marathon yet. I know a long time runner but first time marathoner, a 25 yr old female who ran a 3:06 she was 2 minutes off her goal of 3:04. These are runners to be admired, not because they are some how born fast, but because they train like most fast runners I know, hard. They know how to train they have their goals and will do anything to get there many I know even hire online coaches. Anyone running a 3:40 marathon in there 20's are just not training hard enough, period.

Here's an article from the Wall Street Journal that backs up what I'm saying

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703673604575550133914934718.html

Honestly who cares if you ran Boston? If you had a jacket from Berlin or London I'd be more impressed. Prove how fast you are by running fast, nine out of ten times you're going to be asked how fast you did your marathon in anyway. Why worry about Boston?

It seems that Boston are raising their qualifying times for 2013 but not just for women for everyone. My guess is everyone will just get faster if they really want to run this race. But it still won't change the fact that BAA thinks a 54 yr old man is more of an athlete than the fastest women more than 1/2 his age.

http://www.baa.org/Races/Boston-Marathon/Participant-Information/Qualifying.aspx

Cara may never know her true potential as a runner because she doesn't like speed work and she's not concerned with a PR, she just wants to have fun. And that's just fine with me.

another NYRR rant?

History is repeating itself. When Fred Lebow bragged about how much money NYRR was making in his book (enough to buy that fancy brownstone they wk out of) the city decided they needed to pay up. With membership increases, races selling out and significant price increases (at the height of the recession no less) NYRR is making more money than ever and the city once again wants their cut.

If they had club revenues of $39. Million in 2008 think about how much more they are making now since price increase for races membership running classes and everything NYRR jumped up in January 2009. For those who don't know all races besides the NY Marathon and the NY half were $11.

The sad fact is that many runners I speak to are fine with this for what ever reason, this means you should expect prices to go up in a big way next year.

This post is a response to the link below from the NY Times.

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/02/10/sports/10running.html?_r=1&emc=eta1

Crowding Out

The crowding out theory says that if you fill your body with healthy, nutrient-dense foods, it is only natural that cravings for unhealthy foods will diminish.

Think about it. It's hard to eat five servings of fruits and vegetables a day and still have room to binge on ice cream later that evening. The body can only consume so much. By eating and drinking nutritious foods earlier in the day, you will naturally leave less room for unhealthy foods later on.

This method is most evident when you increase your intake of water. Fill a water bottle or pitcher with clean, filtered water and sip it steadily throughout the day. As the day progresses, you will have less room for coffee, sugary juices, 'vitamin' waters (which is basically Kool Aid) and other soft drinks. It's really that simple!

Forget strict diets, there's no guilt or denial associated with the crowding out method. Start this week by increasing your intake of nutritious foods -- such as dark leafy greens and whole grains -- and you'll begin to notice that your body has less desire for processed, sugary, and nutrient-deficient foods.

NYC Marathon part 2

So here I am the morning of the marathon, alarm goes off I get get a taxi and off meet up with KK and we're off to catch the bus that takes us to the marathon start.

As we get off the bus we are welcomed by high school volunteers who are cheering us and wishing us well for the race, this is always a nice touch because it's so positive you can't helped but feel overwhelmed with gratitude.

My next sight I thought was photo worthy it's a few, men, um watering the grass.

I thought I'd share a couple of pictures here because not many people really get to see the marathon village and it is very different than most other marathons you might run considering the amount of runners (approx. 44,000)

Here is KK at the entrance of the marathon village bundled up for our long wait in the cold.

Most runners have to be here about 3 hrs before the start of the race so you most runners bring blankets and throw away clothes but there were a few out here with just running clothes.

The village is also set up with coffee and tea for the runners and some entertainment that was probably more fun for the out of towners than for me. I didn't really care to here some stale blues band before my run, but hey it added to the atmosphere, so why not?

Mary Wittenberg (below) head of New York Road Runners (http://www.nyrr.org/) being interviewed by NY 1 reporter, I'm guessing she may not be a runner.

Runners from all over the world come to NYC for this massive event which earns more than any other single sporting event in New York.

This group from Peru were smart enough to bring sleeping bags for their wait in the cold.

So I split up from KK and went to to my corral and waited alone for what seemed like forever, with 15 minutes to spare before the race I decided it might be a good idea to go to the porto potty and take care of some last minute, um, stuff. I came out less than a minute later and everyone in my corral had vanished and ran to catch up with them but it was too late they have moved up to the start and I was shut up even before they opened the corrals for the 2nd wave, ugh. Note to self: being in a corral does not mean you will not get shut out of your wave start. Ahh well such is life, whats another 20 minutes or so standing around in the cold.

So as heard Frank Sinatra's voice over the P.A. crooning 'New York, New York' and listened to other runners complain to race officials about missing their start I just stood around quietly frustrated that I was spending extra time on my injured foot but I also vowed to not let this get me down. When it was my turn to start Frank came on the loud speaker once again and I put a smile on my face, after all it's the New York City Marathon and it doesn't get much bigger than this.

As I took the bridge I watched other runners zoom pass me as if they were trying to catch the bus on the way to work, while others posed for pictures on the bridge with their friends, and still others wore costumes to gain some attention from the crowd. It was the start of a spectacle that would last 26.2 miles.

When you get on to 4th avenue you'll hear the non stop cheering the last through the race. When people ask what it's like to run this thing I often like to say that "it's like driving a Toyota Corolla in the Indi. 500" you don't really belong there with these elite athletes and you certainly don't deserve all that fan fare, but there it is and it's pretty amazing at that.

By mile 6 I did a little check in with myself and was surprised I was holding up as well as I was doing, considering last year I was starting to feel achy. It's been said that you'll know how well you'll do in a marathon by mile 6 and so far I find that to be true.

I suppose the real trick for me so far was ignoring the time and how fast I wanted to go and just took in the race one mile at a time, and even more important I made sure I enjoyed it. How? every time I caught myself worrying about my pace or if my injuries were going to act up I focused on my surroundings and thought how lucky I was and added a touch of gratitude and carried on. This wasn't a race for me, I was doing this for the love of running and the marathon and NY in particular. Funny thing how the stress just melts away when you remember why you do these things in the first place.

After passing my old neighborhood (Park Slope) we passed another marathon staple the High School band the plays the theme from Rocky non stop through out the race. It may seem like a silly thing but it's really a great moment and feels really random when you first hear it.

By this point I always run into a fellow runner on the course and friend Lynn Bradley, Lynn and I met while taking speed classes at NYRR. In the speed classes I always managed to be a pace group ahead of her and I often was faster than her in the short distance races in the NY marathon I would see her on a regular basis and we'd run together for a couple of miles or close enough that we'd keep seeing each other. At some point I would burn out (mile 20 or so) and Lynn would keep going and has run a 3:33-3:35 marathon consistently and I would kick myself at the end for not training for this properly and falling short of that by 10 minutes or worse.

More importantly ,the thing I notice about Lynn during these marathons is that she never seems stressed she's always smiling and is actually enjoying the whole process of running. I remember seeing her 2 yrs ago at mile 18 or 20 pulling over to the side to hug some friends and I thought she was crazy wasting valuable PR time but she didn't because she came though the same as always. The point is she doesn't take this too seriously, sure she trains hard but instead of dreading it she keeps embraces it and instead of worrying about her time she enjoys the race and always seemed to be in the moment. I didn't see Lynn this year (probably because of the wave start mix up) but I did think of her often and every time I worried not finishing I remembered Lynn and I remembered to be in the moment and just enjoy myself.

By mile 11 I was close to home in Willamsburg where I knew to expect some familiar faces, or at least some people with NBR t-shirts on cheering on their team. I saw a few members at the hydration stations (NBR volunteers at mile 12 for the past 2 years to support the team and local runners) Sure enough by mile 12 I was able to get a few high fives and one of the runners even ran after me to offer me bananas, which I gladly took.

Here are a couple of friends waiting on me on to show up on Manhattan Ave. (in Greenpoint) but they didn't see me, probably because they were busy posing for these pictures.

Before I knew it I was at the halfway point remembering the previous year and where my I.T. band started to give out. Today though I was strangely o.k.
In Queens I saw friends holding up signs for KK (they didn't see her again fro the 3rd year in a row) I ran over to them and gave them a hug and ran off.

The dreaded Queensboro bridge, many runner have a hard time with this or start to feel achy at this point as I checked in with myself I knew that if I could run the bridge without taking a break I would finish the whole marathon. My goal as I said in the previous post was to have fun but really I would have been o.k. just making over the bridge and then dropping out if I had to.

So what happened? I made it over the bridge onto the roaring crowd of first avenue (my favorite part) I saw KK's parents gave her mom a hug and went off, and unlike last year I felt great it was almost too good to be true, with 10 miles to go I knew I was going to finish this thing.

At mile 20 in the Bronx I ran into Fernando from NBR and we ran for a little as he took off he encouraged me to pick it up and at that point I looked at my watch and realized if I did pick up the pace even just a little I would easily break four hrs. But I remembered I wasn't in this to do any certain time and if I break four hrs or not is no big deal anyway and more important if I start to pick it up and race I would risk my foot, so I just waved him on and was kind of proud of myself for keeping my ego in check.

Then there's this guy, who obviously doesn't care about his time, he's dressed as a snail and he ran beside me almost the entire race.

At mile 24 I was greeted by Cara, Dave, and Michael so I stopped for a few to say hello and take a picture.

I think KK (in Blue) was a little less enthusiastic about running at this point than I was.


Oddly enough I didn't feel any pain till after mile 25 when I started to limp because my foot had swelled up and the injury I was dreading was finally kicking in. I realize now it probably happened because I stopped to say hello and started to run again. at this point all I could do was loosen my shoe laces and just tough it out. Luckily that was the worst of it. I crossed the finish in 4:11 and change (chip time) as the clock read 4:38 and I was just happy to finish and not have to use any of that cab money I brought with me that I thought I'd be using.





So yes, much to my surprise I did actually finish this year. The lesson of the day? 'be in the moment and enjoy every bit of it'

This may not have been my fastest but it was the most fun, and isn't that really the point? I guess it only took 16 or so marathons to figure that out. :)