Back to 20

After weeks of feeling sorry for myself on account of repeated injuries, I finally made something of myself yesterday with a 20 mile trail. Tried a few new things that might or might not be great ideas for the long haul, but at least I know now:

• Succeed S! Caps
  This was my first pill-popping long run and I must say, they made an entirely noticeable distance. The only nausea/sick-stomach feeling came when I licked my arm to test my electrolytes (salty taste=ok, bland=running low) and forgot that I had about 3 layers of OFF Skintastic dried onto my skin. Mile 17 was spent fighting the urge to duck aside and vomit, but I toughed it out. Popping one every hour worked like a charm. I also downed a Clif Shot Blok every 1/2 hour as a semi-solid intake, so we can thank them for assistance as well.
   
• Green Magma
  I drank this+water rather than the standard Accelerade. Seemed to work OK and provided enough energy, though I wonder if the protein in Accelerade helps ease soreness a bit. I read that some elite ultra runners use Magma during runs, so I thought I’d give it a shot. At $40.00 for a tiny canister though, fat chance I’d be using it regularly unless, like elite ultra runners, I got sponsored by Green Foods (another fat chance).
   
• FiveFingers
  They’ve been seamless for anything under 15 miles, total comfort and great all-around feeling. Beyond that, my feet don’t seem tough enough to handle hours of abuse from jagged rocks and sharp tree-stumps. The bottoms of my feet are mostly bruised, and miles 16-20 were spent coping with agonizing pain in the balls of my feet. I’ll keep trying long runs in them to see how my strength/tolerance builds up. On the bright side, I have no joint pain whatsoever, so they seem to be doing their trick to that end.
   

All-in-all, it was a decent run in a decent, 43 mile week. Some very solid shorter runs with (relatively) respectable times. The 20 took a bit longer than expected, but I just wanted to get the time on my feet and start working on a reasonable hike/run combo. Will try bumping the long-runs up by a mile or two each week, and hopefully be capable of a not-excruciating 30 miler by the end of August. Things seem to be falling into place again. ‘Bout time.

Applicable to Trail Runners

As I prepare myself for the Grand Island Trail Marathon, apparently the only race in Michigan where the race director warns you about bears ahead of time, this comes to mind.

Celebrations, Both Easy and Difficult

It’s only 11am on Saturday and already the weekend has been eventful, to say the least. The good news, first, is that Mae ran and owned her first race – the Flirt With Dirt 5k. Though I was hoping to coerce her into pushing herself through the 10k, she made such a great showing today that I can hardly complain. Maybe as good to run a hard 5k as it would be if she ran a sluggish 10. She’s already signed up for a 10k for next month, too. Trail, of course.

First mile was a 9:10 pace, which, for someone who trains at 12 minute miles, is pretty significant. The last two miles were in the low 11’s and if not for us following some lost runners onto the 10k trail and 1/2 a mile off our course, we probably would have come in at just a touch over the 30 minute mark.

Further on the great side of things, the last two days of rain made for some lovely trail conditions, for most. Some participants tiptoed and sidestepped around the not infrequent muddy puddles, hoping to avoid tarnishing their pearly white cross trainers. We made sure to charge through these at full speed to get them with whatever splash we could. Come on – it’s a trail run!

In all, a great morning. I’ll let the pictures tell the rest of the story.

Aftermath: my trusty FiveFinger KSOs & Mae’s newly christened NB790s.

What Saint Nick does in the off season.

Mae, crossing her first finish line.

Post finish crash.

My three favorite women, all in one place: sister, mother and Mae.

* * * *

On the down side of things, we had to lay our friend Mendel to rest last night. It’s been a rough six weeks combating terminal renal failure, and we all put up a good fight – especially him. He held on as long as he could, but yesterday he affirmed ‘it’s time’. He was surrounded by family, passing away in the arms of loved ones – most people couldn’t ask for better. He will be missed.

See you on the rainbow bridge, buddy.

A Run That I Almost Hated

14.5 miles, 95 degrees and humid with vampire bugs. More detail below if you’re curious.

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Today’s big plans for returning to the 20 mile distance quickly melted due to lack of bearable temperatures.

Lakeshore Park, despite the heat, was still wet from recent storms – making for a slippery first loop. In the FiveFingers, I was able to hit puddles pretty hard and the cold water splashing up helped keep me cool, relatively speaking. I had to lose the shirt by mile 4 and, while much better, this left me open to bug bites and blazing hot sun on my bare skin.

Bugs are evil in this heat. I stopped to pee twice, got gang-raped by mosquitoes both times and had to learn to run and pee to finish it off the second one. Things turned out messy – I will leave it at that.

The first 5 miles were a bit monotonous, but 6 through 8 are beautiful and here’s where the run went its best. I worked at a 25 minute-run (10 minute pace)/5 minute-walk(15 minute pace) combo, and the heat didn’t really catch up to me until mile 9 – which is when I bonked pretty hard. Had to walk most of this, running only when the bugs found me and began their attack. I spent most of this mile trying to talk myself out of the second loop.

A quick rest in the car and a banana later, and I’m back out for loop 2. This time I left the FiveFingers and went all natural. As awful and dehydrated as I felt, I realized I wasn’t going to make it another 10 miles, but I wanted to get what I could out of the day. Running the last 4.5 miles barefoot gave me a greater sense of accomplishment, helping me cope with not hitting my mileage mark. I also earned some quizzical looks from the few mountain bikes who dared to make it out for the hottest part of the day. I didn’t hold to any run/walk combo – I just listened to my body and ran when I could and walked when needed. This was so much more enjoyable and comfortable. By the time I got back to the car I felt like I could heap on a few more miles. I’m glad I didn’t, though. A few hours later and I feel horrible – the kind of dehydration that entails headache, diarrhea and a completely pissed-off stomach.

As hard and somewhat disappointing as today’s run was, I felt I got a lot out of it. Obviously not in terms of raw mileage, but discovering some things that need serious work (namely my fluid/electrolyte intake) and getting a few good barefoot miles in to toughen up my soles. Also on the bright side, my joints and muscles feel great. This shoe-less thing is working out well.

One Rainy Wish

Ok – back on track with the 50 schedule I had. I think if I pace myself properly I can get up to 18 this weekend (mid 40’s for the week), as the schedule calls for. Decided to go to Heritage Park for today’s 6.5 miler since 1) I didn’t want to run on the street in the pouring rain, running under trees would be safer with storm clouds overhead and 2) who can pass up a muddy trail in a downpour?

Loved every second of it. Wore the NorthFace (semi-waterproof) but probably didn’t need it. Got too hot – more sweat coming out than there was rain moisture getting in. Oh well, will know better next time.

FiveFingers are perfect in the rain. Like wearing aqua sox, you can charge through deep puddles and it’s not like running with wet towels wrapped around your feet. Only downside is they have no traction, and thus get really slippery on muddy inclines. Learned to take these slow, though, and it was fine. I needed to, anyways, since I wanted to avoid hip soreness.

Clocked low 7’s pace for the last mile home. Didn’t take anything to drink or eat – hoping to burn fat and train my body not to depend on those things. Worked out well – a little hunger at beginning and end, but running fresh throughout. No walking breaks, except for aforementioned hills. Less than 5 minutes of walking total.

Runs keep getting better, but a touch of hip pain in the other leg now. Going to swim tomorrow night and take a day off my feet. Only 3 miles of speedwork are scheduled for Wed, so I don’t think I’m missing out any significant distance.

Can’t wait until my joint health catches up to my ambitions.

Love Hurts

Finally getting back on track. A handful of 10+ milers last week and some fairly strong shorter runs and I’m feeling pretty alright, bruises aside.

The image to the right is the result of a completely barefoot (sans FFs, even) 4 mile trail run and apparently invisible jagged rocks. I’m all into purity and all, but that might be enough to keep me away from that notion for the foreseeable future.

Not much happened over the last few days on account of insane sleeping schedules and working on new magazine templates (I was working until 8am, Saturday night to Sunday morning), but I got my payback today in the form of the best 10 miles I’ve run to-date. My first double-digits run in the FiveFingers and honest to God the most enjoyable miles I’ve ever run. It didn’t hurt that Lakeshore Park is hands down the most curvaceous trail I’ve seen, and the terrain is technical-ish without being too steep. Basically 10 miles of gorgeous single track, surprisingly located just down the street from Twelve Oaks. On account of the thick tree cover, you can faintly hear traffic, and only here-and-there. The only other noises are the wildlife and every now and then the gear-changing of passing bikers.



The completely lightweight FiveFingers kept me reasonably fresh well into the final mile, which I churned out at an 8 minute pace. There are still some coping issues in the form of toe-stubbing and blisters on the ball of my foot, but my joints and muscles feel amazing. I could have easily thrown on a few more miles – will bump it up to 15 next week and see if I feel as good. Hoping to be back up into the 20’s by the end of June – and feeling as great.

I’m really digging the FiveFingers and it’s getting harder for me to imagine wearing regular shoes again – at least on trails. The extra padding of conventional shoes helps a lot on pavement, even when I’m running with (what I believe to be) good form. We’ll see. Ongoing process, but as an update these things continue to amaze me.

TenFingers

Attempting my first 10 miler (or more) in the FiveFingers in about 1/2 an hour. Great timing that I happened upon this article just now. Excerpt below.

“Everyone who wears shoes walks wrong,” he says, echoing the headline of his recent article, “You Walk Wrong.”

Sternbergh calls the ubiquity of footwear a “conspiracy of idiocy.” He points out the probability that at no point did any shoemaker say, “Let’s design something that works with your foot.” In the Middle Ages, for example, people began wearing shoes with higher heels to avoid stepping in other people’s excrement. Today, high heels are considered sexy. Whatever their reasons for wearing the shoes they wear, people don’t usually consider whether a shoe actually works with their foot, he says.

The human foot works pretty well on its own, Sternbergh says, and it doesn’t need a lifetime of help from shoes. He explains the basic illogic of footwear by comparing the concept to a perpetual cast. “Imagine if someone put a cast on your arm when you were 3 years old and you never took it off,” he says. “Your arm would stop working. That’s kind of what’s happened with our feet.”