New York City Marathon 2010 pt. 1.

What another race report? Booooooring. Well what do expect this is mostly a running blog, remember about my exploits of running and life on the run and so on? Oh what is a runner to do?

So where do start? I know, how about with my last long run leading up to the marathon?

So this is my last 20 miler leading up to the NY marathon and seeing how I'm from NY I might as well make the best of it and run the last 18 and do another 2 in Central Park.

So I get up one day with my special someone, we travel out to my old hood Park Slope to mile 8 and proceed to do a run I've done many a time before except this time yours truly is a bit on the gimpy side.

I've whined about before about an inflamed metatarsal on my right foot which showed up sometime in June as a result of wearing light weight neutral light weight shoes and trying to improve my running form. Now I have pain and symptoms of neuroma that really threw my form out of whack and effected my left I.T. band making running literally a pain in the ass as well as my leg .

So my training has been only 3 days a week with very mild bike riding in between and barely any walking because I learned that to walk is to say ouch.

So I run this last 20 mile thing and quickly notice that this beast of a marathon is all up hill and to make it worse it's like running on the side of a hill (AKA uneven surfaces), which is a popular way to get I.T. band syndrome according to Runners World. But most of this is only noticeable when you are under trained or injured, and in my case I was under trained because of my injury. Hmmm.

So to say the least that last 20 was hell and I kept thinking am I going to finish a whole 26 miles? this last 20 took just about everything out of me.

Well with my lame leg and f'n foot I needed to do something in the way of cross training I chose doing yoga daily, I mean every fracking day for the last for 2 months (that was for any Battlestar Galactica fans out there.)

But was yoga helping any? yes, and to a point, I feel much looser in my leg, which is so tight I can feel my I.T. pulling it as I cross my legs.

It also helped more with my confidence and being OK with the idea of not racing or maybe even bailing out halfway through if need be.

Anyway my next longish run after that is 13 miles, and guess what? 13 miles is still hell.

And what of my next tapered long run of 8 miles? out of breath and no speed. Mmm, not good.

After that I just went with a last minute plan, run this bitch as slow as I can till the pain becomes unbearable then take the cab home.

So my next few runs were not too encouraging either. my last run 3 days before the marathon was 3 miles and after 2 messages, ibuprofen, ice baths, foam roller, and a couple of visits to the foot doctor guess what?? I was still in pain!

3 miles, only 3 miles I'd have to run another 23 on top of that. It would take a miracle for me to finish this thing. I was so mad at myself for trying to fix what wasn't broke in the first place and hurting myself, I didn't even want to run this anymore and I couldn't wait for November 7th to come and go.

So what happens? I get my friend to do a little acupuncture on my foot and head out to the marathon expo to pick up my race number oggle the running merch or as I like to think of it 'porn for runners.' This years theme 'compression.'

It seemed like there was compression gear everywhere, arm warmers and compression socks and more all different colors with funky styles to make you feel like the dorky super hero you always wanted to be.

That aside there are great deals to be had at these expos, I bought a box of 24 power gels for $15., that's half off. HALF OFF!!! How can you not buy it?

The day before my marathon I set up all my stuff. KT tape to tape up my leg (www.kttape.com) my I.T. band strap, my compression gear including a pair of arm warmers I made from a pair of socks (hey why pay for something you can make at home with 2 snips of a scissor?) I also was wearing extra padding for my forefoot, and decided to leave my garmin at home and not worry about my time or splits . After that I set my alarm for 4:30 am. got in bed and began reading Russel Simmons book 'Do You.'

I got to an very interesting part of the book that had to do with 'being in the moment', and it was like a bell went off in my head. Yes be in the moment because when you're in the future you're worried about the outcome of something that may not even happen, when you're in the past you're dwelling on what could have been all the while never being in the moment the right now.

It also helped me to sleep, sleeping the night before a marathon is the worst for me, hell the whole week before sucks. I just have problems sleeping. But that's because I was always focusing on not sleeping and what if I wake up, and if I don't get enough sleep I won't be able to do well. And worse now because I'm injured. But this time I focused on the moment, the breath the quiet around me and soon I was able to remove the chatter from my brain and sleep. And I did it again when I woke up in the middle of the night, instead of thinking OMG it happened again and I'm only getting 2 hrs sleep before the big event I was able to put myself in moment and forget about what would happen if I didn't get sleep and so on.

To some of you this may be no big deal for for me it was huge, I've run many a race and marathon on fumes and let me tell you it's no fun. So waking up at 4:30 and about 5 hrs sleep under my belt I felt great.

I got up and told myself it was going to be a great day and I was going to have fun and that was it, along with finish injury free that was my goal.

So what happens next? aaah, that my friends is to be continued...

CHRISTOPHER MCDOUGALL is at it again

Chris McDougall has a blog in the NY Times which is well worth a read but I need to correct him here. He goes on about barefoot running and now is considered some kind of spokes person for the latest running craze. So before you throw out your running shoes you might want to read my post.

"Hang on — if running is bad for humans, why isn’t it bad for every animal?” Dogs run on sidewalks, elephants trot for miles across baked African savannas, reindeer bound across solid ice on rock-hard hoofs, yet they don’t get shinsplints and Achilles tendinitis. How come every other creature gets along just fine on its own limbs except us?"

Quoted from his blog http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/11/04/born-to-run-the-marathon/

Well think about this. When was the last time you saw a dog run 26.2 miles? are these elephants doing speed work around the track bi-weekly? and just how many legs do reindeer run on? Or better yet any monkeys or apes running 26.2 miles? Thats what I thought.

Kenyans run barefoot right? until they get free shoes donated to them and they jump right into them.
What about the story of animal hunters wearing down other animals? Are they running on a track doing? doing tempo runs? or racing every weekend? chances are they are more likely to do stop and go running and something they were raised doing. And lets not forget there lives are filled with physical hard work and heavy lifting, when was the last time you dragged a dead carcase back home from where you killed it?

And what of the tribe in Mexico? they are running sandals that are one inch thick, hardly barefoot. If we're getting injured a lot it's because we're over doing it. Do you treat track work and tempo runs like a race? are you pushing yourself too hard too soon? are you getting enough rest? do you run on an injury?

I'm just dropping this here because many of us (including myself ) are injured runners. Looking for a quick and easy answer isn't the way to go.

And by the way Mr. Mcdougall says he weighed about 240 Lbs. That is roughly 100 more Lbs than I am. Anyone carrying that much weight around is sure to have problems running.

He could have easily had the same results by stronger and losing weight with lifting.

I'm not saying barefoot running is not good for short runs to get your feet stronger but running races barefoot is smartest thing to do. And by the way many of those barefoot runners I do see at road races are the slower runners.
you want to be a faster and better runner? follow Mebs or Paulas training plan not some guy who's selling his book.

30 Day yoga challenge?

So I gave myself a challenge, you know the one I’m talking about? It's the one all the cool kids on the Internet are doing. One of those fun 30 day challenges.
Well in all honesty this was not really my idea it came from one of my yoga instructors from Greenhouse Holistic. Her practice is called Jivamukti and part of this practice is to set an intention with every practice or as this one went once a month. So for the month of September the intention was, yep you guessed it 30 days of yoga. Far be it from me to ignore a physical challenge, this is right up my alley and well since I’m paying for this by the month I might as well.
Anyway I can be like the ‘Enlighten Up’ dude, well not really because like I said before I’ve been practicing yoga longer than I’ve been running. But this was different and I wanted to see if there were going to be any changes in me, plus I’ve been dealing with IT band and other running injury issues since before the summer and I could use all the help I can before November 7^th and the 2010 New York City Marathon.

And Speaking of running I’m down to 3 whole days a week with biking on off days, and of course resistance training as well as 7 days a week of yoga. Some might say I exercise a lot but to be honest I cut down a bit .

Back to yoga, and as I said my main place I like to practice is Greenhouse Holistic (http://www.greenhouseholistic.com/index.html). And even though I’ll go and try another studio every now and then I always come back to here. Greenhouse has 3 locations, a sauna, massage, and of course top notch instructors which I’ll review in a later post as well as review my favorite yoga DVDs.

My 30 day challenge may be up but that doesn’t mean I’m stopping here. I figured I’d keep going right up until November 7^th so lets call this a 60 day challenge and I’ll keep you posted on what happens from here. In future blog post I’ll tell you how practicing yoga has or hasn’t helped with running,the practice itself and how I’m improving with the asanas and just how I feel about life in general. Till then namaste.

Bronx 1/2 Marathon

So here it is another Sunday another 1/2 marathon, another day to get up at 5am. BLEH! Lord knows why I run these things, not that I don't love the run itself but everything else that goes along with it. 5 am to run 13 miles at 7 am on a Sunday? that even sounds crazy to me, but even at that god forsaken time my significant other and myself managed to get to the race late thanks to the NYC Subway. Yes folks the train arrived nearly a half hr late and then decided to kick a train packed full of runners out the said train just 3 stops before our destination in order to go express. Why? to make up for lost time of course. I had to wonder if the train would even be a 1/3 as crowded the rest of the day as is was at that moment.

So along with maybe a couple of hundred tired and annoyed runners I arrived at the Bronx half just as the horn went off and started at the end of the corrals which meant lots of weaving to get through the speed walkers and the other 3 hr finishers.

I ran the race quite well considering my injuries the first sign of my endurance slowly returning, I finished in 1:52 not my best but not my worst. That award goes to the recent Queens half in which I hobbled in the near 100 degree weather in 2:16.

After finishing this one up and limping home I decided I needed to see a proper doctor about my foot. Actually I was advised by the doctor in the med tent. She had said that if I had neroma that a doctor could give me a shot of cortisone and it might clear it up. Woo Hoo!! That was enough for me to forget acupuncture for the moment, not that it wasn't working but every time I went for a run it acted up again (though a little less each time.) And to be honest I had something else irritating the side of my foot and I just wanted an xray to be sure I was OK.

Turns out my neroma successfully went away with acupuncture but I did have some serious inflammation. So the Doc jabbed me with a needle between the joints of my toes (where the pain was) and told me this may hurt a little. After letting out a wail that I 'm sure they heard in Kansas the doctor joked and said "hey it didn't hurt me a bit" (it was painfully funny) So after what seemed like an eternity if having having my foot speared with this instrument of torture he advised me to use arnica tabs ( http://www.arnica.com/?cat=50 for more info) The other problem on the side concerned him more. As I maybe mentioned before I over pronate so I wear special running shoes for this more than common dilemma. The dilemma within the dilemma is that the part of the shoe that keeps me from over pronating is irritating a bone one the inside of my foot and could cause tendinitis. Greeeeat. What to do? Get new shoes. "But I just bought these shoes less than a month ago and used them maybe 5 times" I cried out in

despair. Who said running was a cheap sport? What's good about this? I have an excuse to get new running shoes. Awesome.

On a side note I did have a discussion about the infamous 5 fingers with him. He was obviously a fan because he was wearing them around the office and said he walks (WALKS) everywhere with them. He did say it made his feet and legs stronger, he also agreed they are not for everyone, especially when it comes to running. Why? well there's a little thing called concrete here in NYC, also it takes some time so build up the strength to wear them. He's had people in his office with running related injuries as a result of wearing these 5 fingers (Ahhh sweet validation.) We also talked about this other shoe craze as in shape ups. He said they were good for ankle strength and balance. Well now off to plan C of my marathon training,which is less than 12 weeks away. Seems like no training is the new training.

" When it is obvious that the goals cannot be reached, don't adjust the goals; adjust the action steps."

Life is a Beach ( written August 14th)

As I lay here on the beach listening to bits of 90s brit pop (in the form of Supergrass) I ponder on my various new found running injuries. These injuries seem to like me. They linger and sort of go away but they return like an old friend when you least expect them.

Just who and what are these injuries ad why do they like me so much?

Injury #1: Left leg.

Yes this one really seems to be making up for lost time, over a dozen marathons and ultra marathons and not one single boo boo, in fact not even a break between running or speed work or anything. But that all ended when I overloaded my training schedule with too many projects and replaced yoga with biking. Which turned into a terrible mistake, but hey I was training for a triathlon. This led to last November me walking the last ten miles of the NYC marathon.

I never did recover from that even though I ran an ultra 3 weeks after, plus a spring marathon and a hand full of half marathons.

Injury #2:Neroma.

This one stopped me from running for a month and I blame switching to light weight trainers. They felt great just over time my weak imbalanced right foot and over pronating gave way to a pain that had me limping while walking . Of course being the trooper I am one month later I returned to running and my 2nd run after a tough 3 miles? a half marathon in mid 90s temperature (hurray for summer) Of course this led me to my worst half ever ( 2:16 ) and a visit to the med tent for ice (which worked miracles)

So what have I done aside of rest? Acupuncture! I started treating my right foot with great results the swelling went down and I was able to run a good 7 miles of that half before I began to really fade (due to the heat) being on my feat that long only aggrivated my foot and brought the pain back but it was still manageable compared to how I felt pre acupuncture.

I write all this knowing I'm not in the greatest shape to run yet another half marathon tomorrow in the Bronx, but you know I signed up for it and thats enough to make a runner risk it all. At least its a healthy addiction.

Anyway I have realized during my time off that being a fast runner doesn't really matter all that much to me, yeah I know there's Boston and all but I already ran it and yes it was fun but mostly because I ran it as a bandit and there was no pressure to 'PR'.

No what really matters is that we are able to enjoy the process of training and running the marathon rather than worrying about satisfying our egos.

I also learned that being injured has made me a better swimmer, from a lap and being out of breath to nearly a mile.

Next year I'll do another sprint triathlon or a few for fun. I've had ambitions for an Ironman but I'll let that happen on its own, why kill myself? Besides I'm never putting yoga on the back burner again it's always going to be an important part of my training. It kept me injury free for nearly 10 years and the moment I stopped taking care of myself I got injured.

Besides, don't we just do this for fun anyway? Speaking of which I'm going to return to the beach and my lovely lady. Adios'

"I don't think anything is unrealistic if you believe you can do it"