The long road to the 2009 NYC Marathon

Josh's running blog moved to...

2010-08-15T15:56:00.000-07:00

Given the title of the blog and the fact that we completed the 2009 marathon successfully - and the fact that Brian is doing a lot of things and blogging his jogging isn't one of them - I've decided to start a new blog on my running.

Feel free to follow this one if you'd like, as it will no doubt be updated much, much more frequently:

http://21point8km.blogspot.com/

see you there!

What an accomplishment...

2009-11-01T18:07:00.001-08:00

A long road indeed. Today Josh and I completed what we set out to do nearly 2 years ago. Josh blew it away with his result (I'll leave it to him to share the details). I threw down what I consider a very respectable 4:40 and change.

Time
5 km 00:29:51 - felt good, HR monitor pace was off - kept HR under 160
10 km 01:00:34 - saw the kids around here - still felt good, shed all my extra layers
15 km 01:30:58 - The crowds in Prospect Heights were nuts
20 km 02:02:44 - still nailing consistent 30min 5K pace
13.1 mi 02:09:40 - close to my best 1/2 time in Queens in Sept - starting to ache now
25 km 02:36:13 - knees were getting sore but I didn't slow much over the bridges which I was very pleased with
30 km 03:09:44 - ouch - but still 33min 5K
35 km 03:47:31 - pain. started to walk at every water station for a minute or two
40 km 04:25:40 - it's all mental here and walking was as painful as running now so I kept on pushing it. My HR was actually dropping as my knees and feet were holding me back more than the cardio!
26.2 mi 04:41:37 - Super happy to have finished and well under 5 hrs which was my goal!
Overall pace: 10:45

We'll see how the recovery goes. Though I have done the requirements to qualify for 2010 I'm not sure if I'll run. Plan to do some 1/2 marathons next year and hope to do the triathalon if I can get a training plan together. Might let Susan use my number to run next year if she's interested.

Thanks for following along on this crazy trip....

Last 10 - what a great experience

2009-10-25T19:23:00.000-07:00

Today Brian and I met early for the last ten. Hats off to the Park Slope Track Club for organizing the event. We met under the Queensboro bridge at 59th and 1st. And ran up 1st Avenue and into the last 10.28 (mileage off on watch?) of the race.

What an experience. Not that it's important, but I ran a progressive run.

1 9:40
2 8:01
3 8:01
4 10:22 (water stop)
5 9:06
6 8:15
7 7:59
8 7:58
9 7:24
10 7:28

For an average of just under 8:30 (including the water stop!)

the best part was getting familiar with the intricacies of the last miles of the race. Particularly important was little things like learning the REASON that 5th boxes out around a small square park in Harlem. Also in getting a sense of the topography of the course (it's really flat for these miles, minus the hill late on 5th and the rolling hills in the Park).

I'm very familiar with the Park portion of the race, and that literally flew by. I'm hoping that I'll be just slightly slower and that I'll be in a position to enjoy it. I was also very pleased to learn about the split in the road by the zoo - and the nasty little raised median that would catch you underfoot and might send someone tumbling - less likely to be me after the run.

Speaking of tumbling - one of our brave colleagues started off and within 4 blocks found herself sprawled out on all fours after hitting the plastic remains of the bundling of a news paper - bad news for her. She managed to get up (with Brian's help, took her sunglasses from me, and seemed to get back in the rhythm...I might not have been so game, especially knowing that 10 miles awaited).

All told it's STILL amazing to have the feeling that I 'only' ran 10 miles. Brian and I dropped these miles into our account as easily as we would a fresh twenty from the ATM - it's truly amazing what 6 months of hard training will do to you.

And, what an amazingly beautiful day - let's hope that we feel similar when we next pass these streets and that the calls for rain are in error and we have a day like today!

20 Mile Long Run

2009-10-19T06:49:00.000-07:00

WOW. All I can say. Felt great to get out an log some serious miles on Saturday. Recovery wasn't too bad....feet are a little sore as were the knees, but nothing crippling and I'm up and moving fine today.

Was feeling great in the cooler weather. Basically chose to do about a 3 min walk every 1/2 hour which brought down my total time, but was very please. Did the first 13.1 miles in about 2:06 which was faster than my Queen's Half.

My primary goal is to finish the Marathon on the first - I'm confident in that one.
Secondary goal is to run it in under 5 hours...pretty good for that one...and I'm on track to do about a 4:30 race which would make me ecstatic!

Though I swore I would never run another marathon if I finished this one I'm starting to doubt that conviction a little these last few weeks as the event draws nearer!

"Gree" - no, Dylan, Greece

2009-10-18T20:57:00.000-07:00

I was in Greece this week, so my taper was more 'aggressive' than I'd hoped. Oh well, you only live once, and I'd never been to Greece before. More importantly, this was the first European trip that I've taken in some time where I didn't have the 'wide awake at 2 or 3 a.m.' blues...slept at night and didn't sleep (much) during the days.

Did run last week - once as a recovery and once at the hotel. Thus I added Greece to the list of countries where I've trained for the marathon...

Ran 15 this evening in 2:10 - which is only notable because it was at 151 average bpm - I walked for part...

Splits looked like this:

Mile	Time	Ave BPM	Comment
1	08:19	139
2	08:54	143
3	08:27	147
4	08:13	152
5	08:47	159	Bridge
6	07:57	154
7	08:32	154
8	09:06	149
9	09:07	146
10	08:55	145
11	08:12	153
12	09:03	152
13	08:20	161	Brooklyn Bridge
14	09:04	149	Recovery
15	08:14	158	No Break

As Brian reported via text message today 'I'm ready'

Next week continues the taper (no fast runs!) and I'll run the last 10 next Sunday...good thing too because we have a bat mitzvah on Saturday so I wouldn't have been able to run.

It was cold on this run (44 degrees) so I got a chance to try out my 'secondary' outfit for cold weather. I was pleased and had very little chaffing. I will know where to hit harder with the bodyglide on the big day.

No real interesting developments on this run - was simply a get it done kind of run. Now it was considerably faster than my last two 14 - 15 milers though, so you can see how the heat affects things...

Staten Island Half Marathon – 5 Burroughs completed!

2009-10-11T18:22:00.000-07:00

Today marked the completion of my 7^th total half marathon this year and my 5^th of the 5 Burroughs challenge – last year only 330 or so people completed all 5. This was also my 'last' long ultra-long run, as I begin the taper during the last 3 weeks before the race.

It's not that I am incapable of running 8:15 to 8:30...(if you read yesterday's blog) it's just that I didn't stick to my plan (more lessons learned, better prep for race day). Didn't kill me to day but would have if I'd 'gone for it' on Marathon day...

In order to get the miles in that I needed, I ran 6 miles before the race. I also had to run without my speed-timing footpod, as I dropped it in the kitchen on the way out the door and it managed to bend one of the battery leads beyond repair (well when I was trying to fix it with a key before the race!). Thus I did not have a key tool to gauge my speed. Instead I used my heart rate – rather successfully for the first few miles but then a little worse, and by the end I just ran. All will be revealed soon.

As I ran out on the course I actually ran the first, second, third, eleventh, twelvth, and thirteenth miles twice (or three times if you don't care about which direction was run) – see the chart below.

Mile Absolute (# in race)	Warm up Mile	Warm Pace	Warm hrm Ave	Race Pace	Race hrm Ave	Race Cum M
1	1W	09:09	142	07:52	150	7
2	2W	08:42	146	07:52	158	8
3	3W	08:21	150	08:03	158	9
4				07:55	163	10
5				08:12	162	11
6				07:41	166	12
7				07:55	170	13
8				08:18	167	14
9				07:50	169	15
10				08:01	166	16
11	4W	08:28	151	08:33	171	17
12	5W	08:44	151	08:42	172	18
13	6W	08:30	148	08:14	178	19.1

So all told I completed 19.1 miles in ~ 2:38 – or 8:16 average per mile pace. This was too fast. There's not much more to say. Look at the spike on the heart rate in miles 17 – 19 – way too high. I simply put my head down and ran. Unlike the Brooklyn Half, I didn't slow down to 9 min per mile plus – which is a good sign. I wonder if I'd had to continue running if I'd be able to hold an average of 8:16, doesn't look like it.

So here's what happened – two things really. One, stupidly I started with my corral. I should know by now that unless I'm focusing on running a PR (and maybe even then!) I should not join the red (second after the local elites) corral at the start. A good friend of mine was running just behind me and managed to beat me by 6 places. Why not run with him? I'd just run back from my warm up and simply wasn't thinking when I joined the corral. Everyone passed me in the first few miles – it was painful, sort of. It was also a GREAT learning lesson to run my pace (you see that I did pretty good job of keeping my heart rate down over those first miles. Still that was way too fast).

Second – I was running spot on 8 min miles or just below all the way up until the blow out on 11 – 13. Thus I wanted to push myself to see if I could come in sub 1:45. Now why I wanted to do that, I have absolutely zero idea. I'd run 8.23 miles the day before, and a 6 mile warm up. What made me think that I could run sub 1:45? Anyway, sometimes you think pretty dumb stuff on a long run. I would have been helped considerably to have the footpod feedback.

But the lessons are learned. I do NOT like running ever expanding positive splits – miles 11, 12, and 13 (or really 17 – 19) weren't painful per se, but it's frustrating when I feel that I don't have anything left. Therefore, it will be critical that I really go slow through Brooklyn during the actual race. I can do it and this gave me both the motivation, and to a certain degree the training (as everyone passed me, and I was 'fine' with it).

All told, though, I'm really pleased with the result – my gear works, my hydration & fuel works, I'm mentally there, and I ran 19.1 miles faster than I've ever run it before. I really feel that some day, if I stay in shape, I will be able to hold the 8 min mile pace for the marathon. But that's not this year. And it certainly won't work in anything but perfect conditions...

Still, running 28 good miles in two days and running two great halves in two weekends marks a level of performance that I could only dream about last year. It's funny that I was so head strong about 3:30, and in a way that's GREAT. I'm not going to make it this year, but I will (hopefully) come in with a 3:3X time which will be fine. Even if I'm slower, that will be fine. I want to finish this thing – and that's what I'm going to do.

Official line:

Bib	Place (overall)	Place (men)	Place (Age - Men)	Time	Ave. Mile	Age Grade %
1294	1042	890	188	01:46	08:05	56.50%

A final thought -

I feel great. Better than I used to after the half. I have a bit more low grade throbbing in my feet (balls thereof) but my legs and cardio feels fine. It's amazing what a couple (coughs) of months will do to the old prep & recovery.

Pre-race jaunt

2009-10-10T18:31:00.000-07:00

Ran 8.23 miles today.  I know that you aren't supposed to 'make up' for lost miles.
Still I wanted to go over 40 this week and this run will get me there. 
Plus as you will see it was VERY beneficial.

I ran 8:50, 8:51, 9:09, 8:07, 9:22, 8:25, 8:59, 8:50

Average heart rate 147!

But that includes walking on miles 2,3,5,7,8 - was still low even when running.
Absolutely zero foot pain.

It was a hilly course there and back to Prospect Park.
I took it real easy on the Down hills.

The key point had two faces - MAN running even 8:15 is SLOW!!!!
I got to my times by running marathon pace between walks
(tested my heart rate at marathon pace without stressing me out + providing plenty
of rest). More on this later.
And second I don't think that I can extensively run walk and make my time goal. 
A minute walking is just too long or once per mile is too frequent.

So I resolved to run the first HALF slow, really slow. 
It was very important to learn this and man I believe it.  Heros are not made
out of sprinters in the first 10 miles!

Mentally I can run 8:15 or even 8:20 but I don't know if I can tolerate 8:25 or
even 8:30+ - I will get bored and frustrated.  But I am SURE that can hold the pace,
sure of it.  I was thinking that its the heat of the summer that killed me before
and the run walking that saved me.

That and the practical pacing lesson were very valuable lessons.

Tomorrow might be a bit more painful give the extra miles, but I figure that it
will better replicate the Big Day final miles.

Tomorrow I am going to take it easy.  3 mile warm up at 10 to start and the 9:30,
really easy, mile and a half out and back.  8:30 for the first two.  8:15 - 8:20
miles until the finish.  Then a four mile cool down at any slow pace.  If I feel
great I will run the final at 8:30 (hopefully). If I feel like walking,
I will walk - any time.

Tomorrow is the dress rehearsal - same ferry time.  Will grab a cab to the ferry. 
Same clothes ritual and plan.

Good news from the Start

2009-10-08T20:49:00.000-07:00

Well the news is out regarding the bib number - 20642

First wave, 9:40 start late corral, but in the local competitive runners, what ever that means. My goal will be to suck up to the moderately fast middle 8 milers...and hold the pace through the first half; after all it's the disciple that matters anyway, right?!

http://www.ingnycmarathon.org/entrantinfo/717.htm

Green
First #	Last#	Corral

500	999
3000	3399	A
6000	6599	B
17000	17999	C
18000	18999	D
19000	19999	E
20000	20999	F (I'm here!)
21000	21999	G

No run today - had a board meeting for my coop. Also spent an hour with my daughter. And I'm nursing a bit of inflammation under the ball of my foot. Iced it at work. Will elevate now. Will stop whining. But an unexpected day off this week is welcomed...

Twofer - another two down, closer every day

2009-10-07T18:45:00.001-07:00

Tuesday -

5 miles in 39 flat
or 7:48
with two bridges - the Manhattan citybound and the Brooklyn outbound - which is home bound for me. Hard as heck to keep the pace on this one. Really pushed the pace from the second mile. Tracked the 'miles' because I knew where the splits were as per 'mapmyrun' although I simply don't think they are right - 8:23, 8:15; 6:55?, 7:15, 8 something's not right there.

Wednesday -

6 miles in 47:45
or 7:58
relatively flat course, familiar
no heart rate monitor, no pacing fob
so this was a 'free' run

New Half PR - well just barely!

2009-10-06T14:10:00.000-07:00

It gets so fast and furious toward the end of the marathon training season that you just have to let somethings go, and my blog has been the worse for it. Sorry for anyone missing the postings...

Ran Grete's Great Gallop today and felt pretty good, until I realized that I DID make a personal best, but only by a matter of seconds. It's exactly like you said, I need much more speed training if I want to run faster. Nevertheless, I'm feeling strong and ready for the Big Day. My
diet is much more under control, and allowing for less screw-ups (they didn't have a bib for me, and the subway was running local, which meant that I didn't get any real warm up - I did run from the Subway to the start - you have to understand that I left MORE than an hour to get
there and would have made it there faster running, seriously). Oh well.

Total time (unofficial of course - 1:43.16 which is certainly 2 seconds or so slow. Brooklyn's official time is 1:43.23! And that's with a high 8 and a 9 minute mile on the last two.)

Mile Pace (more or less)
1 8:25
2 8:05
3 - 10 7:45 (with one 7:41 on mile 4)
11 8:05
12 7:44
13 7:44
finish

super consistent - but my sense is that there's no way to run 7:45 during the marathon, it's too fast for me. Never mind that. I read that you take your recent half time and double it and then add 10 to 15 mins to predict your race pace. That would put me right on somewhere
between 3:40 - 3:45 which would be incredible if I could do it, I would be
overwhelmed with excitement.
(one of the reasons I went out so hard today was to test my race pace training - it was something of a long tempo run really).

Gear worked great. Water stops were fine (I didn't take my final gel pack fuel as I was focused on the finish, and I notice that I slow down about 5 seconds when I eat those, even though I'm still running through).

No walk breaks, nothing unusual, just good solid running today.
Was a bit humid though.

A final thought, because of my bib (later in the pack than usual) I ran with the yahoos at the back - this combined with my actually pretty impressive pace given the traffic meant that I passed everyone - I think that only 10 people passed me the whole time and I past at least one of
them, short guy with a blue shirt and grey shorts, in the end. Maybe more people passed me, but I didn't notice. It is much, much better to be the passer than the passed. Given the way that I feel both physically and emotionally, I wouldn't trade this result with the one from Brooklyn any day. Still that was a very impressive run on basically zero training - amazing. But it's better to be in a position to pass folks rather than feel like they are flying by.

Next weekend is Staten Island and then we're beginning the giant taper.
I will run Staten Island with a fast Frenchman that I know - should end spot on 8 min miles or just a bit higher. Might be a repeat of this race or even faster? Bring it on!

Official Line:

Grete's Great Gallop
October 3, 2009 Parks, Joshua M36 Brooklyn, NY

Distance: 13.1 Time Net 1:43:15
Time Pace/ Mile 7:52
Overall Place 755
Gender Place 601
Age Place 137
Age-Graded % 58.0 %

Weekly Blog - too busy for dailies - Great update worth reading

2009-09-27T20:04:00.000-07:00

Of course they're always worth reading, but rarely do you get three runs from me in the same post.

First - Wednesday - 12 hours after my previous run - didn't have the 'hops' in the legs. 4 miles 37 minutes.

Thursday and Friday were de facto rest days (craziness not worth blogging, including work, go figure).

Saturday - ran the famous NY 5th Avenue Mile.
Posted a 5:51, which pleased me
ran 51 seconds faster than last year - but partially that was the first RUN that I'd taken after Dylan's birth. Mind you, not the first race, but the first run...

Sunday got up early, drove to the rainy start of the Marathon tune up 18 miler. Couldn't find parking, wasted more than 30 mins. Decided to 'call it' - committed to running anyway. Ran 20 and a 20th in 3:11:04. Certainly could have used the folks handing out drinks. Was slowed every time I had to get something to drink. Came home looking forward to the marathon, convinced yet again that I'll finish, but not so sure about the speed. Oh well, first marathon is about finishing, not about being a speed demon.

Times per mile (I walked at LEAST 1 min per mile - my goal was to do a faster second half, as always)

1 9:49
2 9:24
3 9:09
4 8:52
5 9:20 (Williamsburg Bridge)
6 9:23
7 10:42 (bought a drink)
8 9:06
9 10:32 (34th street w/ tons of lights)
10 9:10
11 8:31 (first mile of second half, picked it up)
12 8:28
13 9:27
14 9:19
15 9:18
16 9:51 (Brooklyn Bridge)
17 8:41 (what goes up must come down, Brooklyn side decent)
18 11:30 (bought another drink)
19 9:28
20 10:10 (just wanted to finish)

I did 'striders' at the end of the run to try to get some life back in my legs.

this map is wacky and worth a closer look -

Brooklyn Heights Promenade, Billy'sburg Bridge, Manhattan 20 miler
Find more Runs in Brooklyn, New York

One heck of a recovery run

2009-09-22T20:50:00.000-07:00

Ran 6 miles in 47:10
160 average BPM - no stopping, just good old hard running
very little, if any soreness in the legs from the half.

mile speed in order:
7:52
7:37
7:33
7:41
7:46
8:04

clearly was faster than it's been. Was also cooler than it's been too. Felt nice to get out there and move. Could be a real example of what NOT to do on Marathon day, but felt great to kick off the 6 week count down.

Amazing to see the heart rate stay down for so long at this pace - shows marked improvement!

Queens Cruise

2009-09-20T20:37:00.000-07:00

The Queens Half marathon was by far the worst organized of the Continental Series this year. We were also late, due to a massive post-Turkey GI issue that I had. It wasn't Brian's fault, for sure.

More on the GI issue in a moment - details

Lap	Lap Time	HR Ave	Cadence	Stride Length	Altitude	Grade %
1	10:13.8	137	85	3'0	75	0.3
2	10:19.8	135	86	2'11	49	-0.5
3	10:12.8	135	86	3'0	49	0
4	08:37.4	153	88	3'5	69	0.4
5	08:25.5	155	90	3'6	75	0.1
6	08:32.0	152	89	3'5	75	0
7	08:35.9	154	89	3'5	105	0.6
8	12:35.7	136	89	3'7	66	-0.7
9	07:44.0	158	91	3'10	75	0.2
10	07:47.6	157	90	3'8	49	-0.5
11	07:51.9	159	90	3'9	69	0.4
12	07:40.7	160	90	3'10	49	-0.4
13	07:38.9	164	90	3'10	46	-0.1
1	00:06.5	174	101	3'11	46	0

As can be seen, I applied a, start slow get quicker, progressive running approach. Just short of the 8 mile marker, I had to stop and use the loo. The woman behind me suggested the real gentlemen use a distant tree...thus not holding up the line. Talk was on the 'elites' who just go in their running gear. I politely informed her that I'd been to Turkey earlier in the week and what I had to do would get me arrested if I were to use a tree. The story was better than the reality, but as I emerged from the john, I was a different runner.

note the speed and stride differences for miles 9 through the end. A real progressive run to be sure!

I was very pleased that I ran:
A. Below two hours
B. consistently faster as the race went on
C. without pain and could EASILY have continued

Key stats:
official time (does it matter?): 1:56:22
Average BPM (including the break): 149 bpm

14.5 miles - finishing with 4 mile race in CP

2009-09-12T19:27:00.000-07:00

ran to a race today. Happy with the results 9:44 pace for miles 10-14. I had one slow mile at 11:30 for the 3rd mile of the race which dragged down my pace quite a bit. Felt good overall.

Ran 0.5 miles from home before I realized I forgot my chip and had to go back home...then when I got to the race just at 9:00 on the nose I noticed it wasn't a chipped race, but an RFID tag so I had to go pick up my number. What a pain in the ass.

Loved running with the new HRM - kept up my cadence around 80 - a little slow from what I read online but something I now know I can work on. I'm going to have to get Josh to show me how he posts the cool graphs and uses the software if we ever manage to get together before the marathon.

Overall I basically ran the 13.1 half this week in a little over 2hrs. I'm happy with that and will run the Queens race next weekend. I really see the value in the gels I carry with me as I can feel the difference when I start to run low.

Knees are quite sore tonight so I'll take a couple of days to rest and maybe do one run this week on the treadmill. Need to look carefully at the plan for the next 7 weeks to get the mileage up to the level needed prior to the marathon in Nov.

Treadmill...ugh

2009-09-09T20:19:00.000-07:00

Well, logistics are what they are...today was first day of school so I couldn't bail out this morning for a run...so I went to the gym this evening for 60 min on the treadmill. New HRM came today and I luuuuv it. Sent the old one to Polar for warranty repair as I found rust in it...when it comes back working I'll sell it on eBay!

60 min went quickly, felt great and I caught an episode of TV which is always fun...commercials and all (gross - thank g-d for PVRs).

Forgot to put in the battery for the S3 so I'll have to check that out next run, but overall very happy with the way I feel and that I made it out....only issue is now that it's 11:30 and I have a couple of hours of work to do.

Now for a real long run

2009-09-07T21:26:00.000-07:00

First off, welcome back to Brian - glad to see that he's found time to blog his runs. With 60 days left until the marathon, I'm sure he'll have enough time to train to be ready for the big day. More importantly, it's been lonely here without the other author.

Long Run on Sunday - HRM is busted (see a pattern here?) so there's no heart rate info. Ran much slower than I'd hoped, although the second course was 0.08 longer than 10 miles.

Actually ran in two bits, with a change of shirt, shoes, and socks in between. I also got to put my daughter to bed, well kiss her, so that felt good. It will be important to have friends and family around the course to keep me encouraged.

Times are in the following graph - not that I was walking 1 min per mile and that I caught the light at the Manhattan bridge for a entire minute on mile 19 (thus the sluggishness). This graph really shows the hills - 2, 9, 14, & 19 - well the bridges. So I need to do a better job of being consistent there.

Finally, I'm hopeful that I can get my per min time down well below 9 mins per mile. But if I can't there's always 2010. I'm doing what I can to stay fit and I am hopeful that the next 50 days or so turn out to be fruitful for my training. Regardless, I know that I can finish this race now. I know that my gear works and that I'm strong enough mentally and physically to do it. So now the training is simply and purely for speed - and that's an ego thing anyway. Just finishing the first one will be enough for now.

&amp;lt;a href="http://www.mapmyrun.com/run/united-states/ny/brooklyn/998124743498593423"&amp;gt;Brooklyn Heights Two Bridges Manhattan 10 Miler&amp;lt;/a&amp;gt;&amp;lt;br/&amp;gt;&amp;lt;a href="http://www.mapmyrun.com/find-run/united-states/ny/brooklyn"&amp;gt;Find more Runs in Brooklyn, New York&amp;lt;/a&amp;gt;

&amp;lt;a href="http://www.mapmyrun.com/run/united-states/ny/brooklyn/883125225352650277"&amp;gt;Brooklyn Heights to Manhattan Via Williamsburg 10 miler&amp;lt;/a&amp;gt;&amp;lt;br/&amp;gt;&amp;lt;a href="http://www.mapmyrun.com/find-run/united-states/ny/brooklyn"&amp;gt;Find more Runs in Brooklyn, New York&amp;lt;/a&amp;gt;

I'm baaack

2009-09-07T18:23:00.000-07:00

Ran 5 on Friday....nearly 15 on Sun (http://www.gmap-pedometer.com/?r=3169427
) and hoping for another 60 min in the morning.

My HRM is busted, so I'm going to buy a new one tomorrow either in a store or online depending on the best deal I can find.

Return to NYC Long Run - cool weather a plus

2009-08-30T20:37:00.001-07:00

Our traveling yesterday did not permit me to get out and run. Partially because I was looking after the wee and partially because it was exhausting. Also, I'm trying to get my runs in but not go insane. There was NO WAY that I was going to miss or skimp on today's long run, however.

15 miles from Brooklyn to Billyburg, across that bridge, east village, FDR park (love it), through the financial district, across the Brooklyn, to home. Recalibrated my footpod so the distance should be closer to accurate. Crushed my previous time - 2:03:40 (versus 2:30! yikes).

Nuts and bolts - heart rate monitor is broken, so I didn't have that as a guide - went by 'feel' instead. Interesting to note that I probably let myself run too fast early due to no HRM. Sometimes it's nice to continue to build on the good week that you had and in this case it was definitely the way I felt. Walked ever 2 miles instead of every one. Also walked less at the beginning (something that I will NOT do again, it doesn't help). Felt fine with the 7:35 pace when running early, but definitely couldn't hold on to it. Wasn't well hydrated before the race, so took plenty of fluids and consumed them on the run. All told very pleased. Wanted to feel a bit stronger at the end than I did. Did NOT feel like I could have done another 10 miles, to put it that way, but wasn't as 'crushed' as the last time I went this distance...Also not pleased with the ever inflating per mile times toward the end. That said, that did include the hill leading to the bridge and the Brooklyn bridge, but there are late hills in the marathon too!

Dist	Time	Lap Time	Avg of Lap	From Start
1	0:07:58	07:58.1	7:52	7:52
2	0:15:32	07:34.1	7:33	7:43
3	0:23:43	08:10.6	8:10	7:52
4	0:31:26	07:43.6	7:43	7:49
5	0:40:02	08:35.6	8:36	7:59
6	0:47:39	07:36.9	7:38	7:55
7	0:56:11	08:31.7	8:20	7:59
8	1:04:38	08:27.1	8:11	8:00
9	1:13:02	08:24.1	8:23	8:03
10	1:21:11	08:08.7	8:08	8:03
11	1:29:54	08:43.3	8:35	8:06
12	1:38:20	08:26.0	8:25	8:08
13	1:46:46	08:26.0	8:25	8:13
14	1:55:12	08:28.0	8:29	8:14
15	2:03:40	09:20.9	9:17	8:18

MapMyRun.com - Long Run: 15 miles with 2 running then a walk on 08/30/2009

Alt Brooklyn Heights Manhattan Via Williamsburg Bridge 15 Miler

Twofer in Del Mar yield excellent results

2009-08-25T21:04:00.000-07:00

Ran two days in Del Mar - on different routes, but I can't be bothered to map the second day and will instead use the map from the first day as a stand in. Two interesting features:

First, thanks to my Mom for riding her bike along side my run to keep me company. She kept at it and by the end had me beat. She started out slowly, so I had a nice chance to converse with her - when she wasn't too far behind, which wasn't much of the time. Then she figured out the gearing and was flying at 7 mins per mile pace. Lucky that I've been running negative splits as I punched it into high gear to get it done at the higher interval.

Second, iIn fact, and I'm not sure what happened in the translation to the computer, but the watch was showing that I ran 6:30 per mile for one of the splits. The lap times on the computer are modest at around 7:13 or so, not the 6:40 that I thought I saw. I'll caulk it up to runners' euphoria...but the lower temp and zero humidity equated to a wonderful run. All told I was very, very pleased.

6.5 (from footpod)
&amp;lt;a href="http://www.mapmyrun.com/run/united-states/ca/del-mar/491125169134949427"&amp;gt;Del Mar 6.5 Miler&amp;lt;/a&amp;gt;&amp;lt;br/&amp;gt;

5.2 (from footpod, different course)
MapMyRun.com - Quick Run: Quick San Diego run on 08/26/2009

Hollywood Cool Evening Out and back

2009-08-22T23:28:00.000-07:00

Summary

Name:	Regular Run
Type:	Regular Run
Date:	08/22/2009
Start:	09:00:00
End:	10:42:00
Time Taken:	01:42:00

Workout Weight:	176.0 lbs.
Workout Route:	Hollywood 10 miler Santa Monica Out and Back
Total Distance:	10.38 mi.
Burned:	1,378 (kcal)
Effort:	Normal
Quality:	Good

Workout Notes

Notes	Lots and lots of traffic lights!

Workout Stats

Pace:	09:48 (avg)
Speed:	6.1 (mi/hr) (avg)

&amp;lt;a href="http://www.mapmyrun.com/run/united-states/ca/del-mar/794125169276698138"&amp;gt;Hollywood 10 miler Santa Monica Out and Back&amp;lt;/a&amp;gt;&amp;lt;br/&amp;gt;

Regular early morning 6

2009-08-21T21:27:00.001-07:00

MapMyRun.com - Regular Run: Run on 08/21/2009

MapMyRun.com - Regular Run: Slow jog on 08/19/2009

2009-08-19T20:18:00.001-07:00

Today the run was fine but felt particularly slow. It wasn't hard work, but it felt slow - wasn't particularly slow though :

used the walk run technique...

Summary

Name:	Slow jog
Type:	Regular Run
Date:	08/19/2009
Start:	21:14:00
End:	22:10:00
Time Taken:	00:58:41

Workout Weight:	176.0 lbs.
Workout Route:	No Route! Map this Workout!
Total Distance:	6.52 mi.
Burned:	791 (kcal)
Effort:	Easy
Quality:	Ok

Workout Stats

Pace:	08:55 (avg)
HR:	140 (bpm) (avg)

MapMyRun.com - Regular Run: Slow jog on 08/19/2009

Relatively easy recovery run - fast few miles, GI slow down

2009-08-18T20:02:00.001-07:00

Felt Strong following the half. Ran hard for a few miles without rest. gi problems hit hard and fast, at furthest from potential help. Continued in the heat. Felt pretty okay, considering.

Summary

Name:	Recovery Run
Type:	Recovery
Date:	08/18/2009
Start:	20:38:00
End:	21:28:00
Time Taken:	00:49:35

Workout Weight:	176.0 lbs.
Workout Route:	04/10/2009 Maintenance Drop & Redhook Loop
Total Distance:	5.57 mi.
Burned:	700 (kcal)
Effort:	Easy
Quality:	Ok

Workout Stats

Pace:	08:54 (avg)
Speed:	6.74 (mi/hr) (avg)
HR:	152 (bpm) (avg) 165 (bpm) (max)

MapMyRun.com - Recovery: Recovery Run on 08/18/2009

The first rule of running in the summer: Don't wear a parka

2009-08-16T20:19:00.000-07:00

The second rule is don't wear black. I was amazed at the large number of folks hearing various articles of black clothing today - I wore white and felt great. The completely opposite of the Brooklyn experience - although much slower, but who cares when you feel this good?

This race was very important to me, since I'd missed it last year (although qualified) due to the birth of my daughter 15 minutes before the start. Steph is a loving wife, but breaking away just then for a 13 mile jog wasn't the right thing to do.

My strategy was to enjoy the run despite the heat and to run faster on the second half than I did on the first. I accomplished both goals.

The start -
I met up with a friend of mine, Vincent, who's a fantastic guy, also father to a daughter and a very fluid runner. We were both excited about the race and I was looking forward to running with Vincent. The start was really congested, although it thinned out nicely after a few miles. The amazing part of the race for me - both at the time and in retrospect - was pushing the pace with Vincent in the park.

The goal was to run 8:10 - 8:15 in the Park with Vincent and then to break away at mile 7 to run by myself through Times Square only to meet up with Mika, my coach, on the West Side Drive. It worked like a charm. The only glitch was that Vincent decided to run a couple of blazing miles in the park, which really pushed it for being able to run faster than that outside the park. If it weren't for the congestion at the start, I would have run two very respectable half races (quarter marathons).

Lap	Lap Time	HR Average	Cadence	Stride Average (Ft)
1	09:11.9	147	88	3 1/3
2	08:37.4	155	90	3 1/2
3	08:44.0	160	88	3 1/2
4	08:04.2	161	90	3 3/4
5	08:13.0	168	89	3 3/4
6	08:32.7	170	88	3 4/7
7	08:14.2	170	88	3 3/4
8	07:50.7	174	87	3 5/6
9	07:50.7	175	88	3 8/9
10	07:50.2	177	89	3 8/9
11	07:51.4	179	88	3 8/9
12	08:02.4	179	87	3 5/6
13	07:58.0	182	87	3 8/9
13.1	00:38.0	188	90	4 3/4

So my hat's off to Vincent (1:53:16 or 8:38/mile pace) for A. pushing the pace, B. running on heck of a race. We've got to do that again!

Just after I left Vincent, I turned out of the park, on to 7th Avenue and ran down to 42nd street. I will do this race, every year, until I can't run any more simply for this experience. As was mentioned in the piece on this on the NYRR.org site -
Another NYC finisher, Michael Anderson, mopped his dripping brow and smiled after his 1:38:53 finish. "It was tough," he said, "but no matter how bad you feel, nothing beats running through Times Square."

After running in the park for an hour, I was faced with entering a canyon of shady tall buildings. The road was packed with fans (although they were really quiet) and every once in a while someone would peel off to kiss a baby, wife, husband, or sig. other. It was great. Just a little taste of what the marathon will feel like. After the race I saw a picture of the men's winner running alone through that stretch and I could imagine what it must have felt like, and it took my breath away. Really a unique experience.

At mile 8 I missed the marker. At mile 9 I took some crappy, nasty tasting hard to chew powerbar - supposed to be endurance boosting candy? Makes me convinced that I should pin Roctane to my marathon shorts and ignore the stuff on the course. (Roctane is that much better, and I will blog about it sometime soon).

Just before Mile 10 I ran into Mika. He was his usual chipper self and it was fantastic to run with him. Here's a guy who's taken the train into the City, stood on the side of the road for who knows how long, just to jump out into the mix when I go running by. Amazing!

He ran the bike trail for plenty and joined when it got really light toward the end. At the end he bailed, which was just as good because I think those around me were probably tired of hearing him tell me how many of them I was passing. I was passed, in total by less than a dozen people - total, all race. Now it helps that I started further back than I typically do, and it was nearly impossible to pass in the early miles. But this is a real difference for me versus the 'go out fast and bonk' strategy that I unfortunately, typically employ.

It was really important to have Mika there, as my pace gradual dropped from 7:45 to 7:50 to 8 flat. The most amazing mile was mile 12. It felt incredibly long. I thought I'd blown my race time. But there it was, completed in 8 flat. Knowing that I only had another mile to go, I knew that I was going to do well this time.

Up until now I haven't mentioned that it was pretty darn hot. I took plenty of Gatorade with me and managed to get a couple of cups of water on the course. And it was hot, but not too humid. Also, I've been running in this lately, so I suppose it doesn't bother me as much as some. The last few miles were on the concrete highway in the sun, so they weren't the most fun.

Just before the finish, Mika peeled out. I slowed and was passed by a spry young woman who said, 'come on man you've been pacing me for miles...you can't give up now.' To which I responded by following her on her tail. We took off in a veritable sprint. We eventually slowed a bit, and she pulled away. Just then I thought, "I can't give up this close to the finish' as I was well with in 400 meters. So using what I had left I managed a pretty recognizable kick to finish off the race. Unfortunately I blew past my motivator, but fortunately she finished very soon after so I had the chance to thank her with a quick handshake.

As is often the case in these longer, more crowded races the finish was chaos. I don't really remember much (got water, a towel, whatever) until I ran into Mika again. Unlike typical, I didn't know what my final time was until well after I'd finished the shoot - and I really didn't care. I KNEW by the gun time that I'd run a negative split and that was my goal.

First half: 54:40
Second half: 52:58
or a difference of 16 seconds per mile in the second half! I am very pleased with the results.

Above you can see the pace run per mile (generally increasing) versus my ever-increasing heart rate. The heart rate reflects the negative split, but also the heat of the day. Below you can see that my cadence was very steady (and for me high, which is good) versus my stride length, which widened on the downhill West Side Highway and really shot up during the sprint finish. I really rarely have anything left for a kick, so this was fantastic.

It's too early to say how I'll recover from this race, but I feel better than ever after a half. Of course this was my nearly my slowest half ever. Previous times were 1:43:23 in Brooklyn (in retrospect amazing!), 1:46:50 in the Bronx (on the most perfect running day of the year), and 1:48:44 in Central Park. But this is the first one that I ran my 9 min miles at the BEGINNING and now the end. Simply put I felt great, despite the weather conditions, and had a wonderful time. I'm sure I couldn't, but I feel like I could run another tomorrow or this week, if I had to.

Tuesday Goal - Negative Splits - Mission Accomplished

2009-08-11T21:03:00.000-07:00

Goal was to run 6 plus miles with negative splits. Mission accomplished. Looked at the neighborhood houses for the first three miles. Walked a bit in Mile 3 - thus the slow split and then brought it home. A bit worried about the spiking heart rate, but we'll worry about all that at the end of the day.

Actually struggled to get the heart rate up into the target zone on the first few miles. Did not stop to walk much (three times).

Averaged 9 min miles for all 6 - ran an extra quarter just to be a good guy.

Tuesday / Wednesday Runs

2009-08-05T20:24:00.000-07:00

Typical report - ran 8.6 miles today and 5 miles on Tuesday. Was slower today than Tuesday. It's been hot and I've been a-walking for my longer runs. It's my way of staying cool and keeping my heart rate down.

http://www.mapmyrun.com/view_workout?w=206124952894322324

MapMyRun.com - Regular Run: Regular Run on 08/04/2009

Recovery: 3.25 miler recovery run on 08/02/2009

2009-08-02T20:45:00.001-07:00

Simply the best week of running to date - finished plenty of miles - enjoyed the recovery run more than I have in weeks. Still looking forward to tomorrow's day off. Really am starting to believe in the walk/run method. Ran today's entire run other than missed lights. Had a funky ankle for 0.4 miles but it cleared up and isn't a problem now.

This is a great map, because it crosses itself a couple of times. Low heart rate at 140 is good for the day after more than 14 miles. I measured my Optimizer using the Polar and it said that I was fully rested, something I think is amazing...

Map:
08/02/2009 Crazy 3.25 mile Loop - Brooklyn Heights
Data:
MapMyRun.com - Recovery: 3.25 miler recovery run on 08/02/2009

To speed up, you have to walk? I do

2009-08-01T20:53:00.001-07:00

I ran for a mile and walked for at least 45 seconds (mostly 1 minute or more) today. I'm very proud of this performance - granted the air was 10 degrees cooler than it's been, so I'm sure that had a lot to do with it, but this is much, much faster than I've been over this distance outside of runs. Please note that these times are INCLUSIVE of those walk breaks.

Speaking of breaking things, I'm not sure that my iPOD shuffle is going to make it after this run. It bit the dust on mile 6 and I put it in my bag - it bounced around for a while and is DOA now that we're back at the house. I'm hoping that a trip to the Apple store will fix that right up.

I feel much better than I ever have after a long run. While I felt that the breaks were too much at the beginning I was sure looking forward to them at the end. Running an average of 8:23 inclusive of the walking breaks is amazing to me. It makes me feel very confident that I'm going to surprise myself on race day. I'd like to call out the Anonymous poster who is betting on 8:50. Wanna put some money on that - I suppose that you'd have to declare your identity too. Easy to take swipes at people from behind that facade (even if you're a much faster runner).

So you see there are motivational aspects of all of this (so thanks to whomever posted that comment).

The walking gave me more time to stay hydrated and to enjoy the run a lot more too. NYC is actually a pretty darn nice place to run. I'm including my route and the link to the stats if you'd like to see more. Heart rate average was of course low, but look at the highs per mile, not bad and much, much better than before when I was running at 174 and above regularly. This is a different workout.

Two last thoughts - the 7:14 on mile 6 was downhill on the Billyburg bridge, but it still counts. The mile that I'm most proud of is the 8:20 on mile 12. That one included a minute twenty of walking and a flat out sprint up the Manhattan Bridge. I was racing a subway track tender up the hill and beat him due to a signal hold on the bridge. But it still felt fantastic to have a bit of a 'kick' after already finishing 12 miles. That is certainly a new experience for me.

Lap	Time	Lap Time	Max	Avg	Min	Cumm.
1. A	08:03.8	08:03.8	157	142	86	1.0
2. A	16:22.4	08:18.6	160	151	120	2.0
3. A	24:13.7	07:51.3	167	153	111	3.0
4. A	32:22.4	08:08.7	166	156	127	4.0
5. A	40:39.9	08:17.5	172	160	129	5.0
6. A	47:54.3	07:14.4	171	164	141	6.0
7. A	57:27.4	09:33.1	169	154	126	7.0
8. A	05:33.1	08:05.7	163	158	151	8.0
9. A	14:49.8	09:16.7	166	154	124	9.0
10. A	23:01.4	08:11.6	165	157	135	10.0
11. A	31:23.8	08:22.4	163	155	128	11.0
12. A	39:44.1	08:20.3	176	162	132	12.0
13. A	48:07.4	08:23.3	170	156	136	13.0
14. A	56:42.3	08:34.9	165	156	129	14.0
15. M	03:36.0	06:53.7	165	157	141	14.8

A = Automatic
M = Manual
Note the difference between the footpod sensor from Polar and the Mapmyrun distance is significant...I think it's simply too hard to put the markers in the right places for the MMR.com site. Then again, the footpod might need calibration...

&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;lt;a href="http://www.mapmyrun.com/run/united-states/ny/brooklyn/757124917166237916"&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;gt;BH to Bedford cross Williamsburg Bridge East River to Brooklyn 14 miler&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;lt;/a&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;gt;&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;lt;br/&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;gt;

MapMyRun.com - Training Log for sandiver

BH to Redhook, return via Smith Street: Slow recovery run on 07/30/2009

2009-07-30T20:06:00.001-07:00

I have been reading about ways to spice up and break up the training and this one was a real winner. Run a mile, walk a minute or a bit longer. Funny thing is, I was actually FASTER than many of my recent recovery style runs. 9:15 average, including walks - so that's not bad. I decided against the mile 5 walk as I'd gotten into a rhythm and just wanted to be done. The average heart rate of 144 is a bit deceiving because of all the breaks. I can't wait to do this on my long run this weekend. A note, due to the weather and a dinner commitment last night, I took an extra rest day this week and distributed the miles to the other workout days.

MapMyRun.com - Recovery: Slow recovery run on 07/30/2009

Tuesday over and back on the bridges

2009-07-28T20:31:00.001-07:00

Pretty simple run really, ran over the Manhattan and back on the Brooklyn. Nice flow to the run, felt better at the end than at the beginning. Was hot and sticky and I still managed to post some negative splits, something that I find challenging.

Miles and their times -

8:48 Mile 1
9:16 Mile 2 Climb
7:02 Mile 3 Downhill all the way / Chinatown
8:54 Mile 4 Climb #2
8:12 Mile 5

Gotta check the course versus the map, 'cause this one seemed really fast and it just wasn't. Then again it was 85 with 85% humidity when I ran. No excuse, just the facts.

MapMyRun.com - Training Log for sandiver

Sunday Sunday Long Run on 07/26/2009

2009-07-26T19:16:00.001-07:00

12.31 miler in 2:02 with walking, scampering (around huge puddles), lightning strikes, pouring rain, and generally $h1te conditions.

MapMyRun.com - Long Run: Sunday Long Run on 07/26/2009

12 mile BH to Billyburg to Manhattan back to BH
Find more Runs in Brooklyn, New York

4.3 mile - Recovery: Relaxed Run around Cadman Plaza on 07/25/2009

2009-07-25T19:45:00.001-07:00

Nice easy run, however I managed to do a 7:35 pace at 155 bpm - so that's showing some improvement. Really needed another run on the soft track and this fit the bill. Scared a bit, long tailed rat nearly to his/her death. Get out of the path, dude!

MapMyRun.com - Recovery: Relaxed Run around Cadman Plaza on 07/25/2009

MapMyRun.com - Training Log for sandiver

2009-07-25T16:35:00.001-07:00

MapMyRun.com - Training Log for sandiver

Shared via AddThis

Another late run

2009-07-23T22:25:00.000-07:00

Okay, this is getting a bit silly - I have this blog, the Mapmyrun site, and the NY Times Health page - all to update. My new way to go is to post comments here and then link through to Mapmyruns where you can find the details, should you be interested. I'll always properly blog the long runs as well as any races that I run. This should streamline the blog and save time, and potentially limit my dominance of the board. And, finally, given Brian some airtime, should he wish to blog here too.

http://www.mapmyrun.com/view_workout?w=214124841256152186

5 Miles in 40 mins - felt like I was moving more quickly than that, but I wasn't. Again, I need to increase my work rate to get down to my target pace of 3:30. But I'll be very happy with 3:45...What can you say?

5 Miles at 9 p.m.

2009-07-22T20:28:00.000-07:00

Got up and got dressed this morning, only to find my daughter wide awake. Put my wife to bed and then put my daughter to sleep too - but I fell asleep myself! So:

Summary - Pushed a little bit, felt strong wanted to go faster, but wasn't possible in the heat. Looks like it's going to be very hard to get down below 8 mins for the actual race...but I'm not thinking about that now. I miss the Spring/Fall running temps, for sure.

Name: Late night redhook run
Type: Regular Run
Time Taken: 00:39:25

Workout Route: Brooklyn Heights Redhook 5 mile loop
Total Distance: 5.00 mi.
Burned: 658 (kcal)

Notes hot and sticky

Workout Stats
Pace: 07:52 (avg)
Speed: 7.61 (mi/hr) (avg)
HR: 77 (bpm) (min)
155 (bpm) (avg)
199 (bpm) (max)

Brooklyn Heights to Redhook 5 Mile Loop
Find more Runs in Brooklyn, New York

3 Mile Recovery Run - Cadman Plaza

2009-07-19T18:48:00.000-07:00

Easy evening cool down, recovery run after yesterday's effort.
Actually felt better after the run than before, especially in my legs.

No problems with soreness in my ACL - although my muscles in my right knee were a bit ginger at first. Feel great. Tough to run so slow though. 5 laps of Cadman, and luckily it's exactly the right distance there and back to call it 3 miles.

For more information on the Cadman Plaza track:
http://brooklynruns.blogspot.com/2007/12/markings-on-cadman-plaza-park-path.html

Cadman Plaza Soft Track
Find more Runs in Brooklyn, New York

Date: 07/19/2009
Start: 09:00:00
End: 09:29:00
Time Taken: 00:29:00

Workout Route: Cadman Plaza Soft Track
Total Distance: 0.43 mi.
Burned: 371 (kcal)

Workout Stats
Pace: 10:00 (avg)
Speed: 6 (mi/hr) (avg)
HR: 89 (bpm) (min) 138 (bpm) (avg) 149 (bpm) (max)

Steph's Birthday Long Run

2009-07-18T22:24:00.000-07:00

Was my Wife's birthday so I went out on a long run in the evening - after taking her to an undisclosed location for her birthday celebration. Wonderful day and a nice way to end it.

Ran 14.21 of the goal 15 miles for today. It wasn't my legs, nor my heart that was bad this time, it was the pounding in my knees - ACL to be exact. So I ended a couple of hundred meters early - who cares? Perhaps someone will flame me for that, but I'm a big guy and I figure that the Mapmyrun distance thing is sometimes off. So I'm happy with my run.

9:51 min per mile pace
Note that I walked at 16, 36, 54, 1:19; 1:35; and then again around 2
each for about two mins on the early and 3 mins on the later
Kept my heart rate down on the average, but also noticeably kept it down at pace following the start back up. Was in the 141 - 144 range for much of the West side, 144 - 149 for the Bowery. Ticked up in the dark on the FDR side path and pushed it pretty hard over the Manhattan Bridge (168) but it felt great. Note that the highest rate recorded was 170.

The map may be impressive on this one, particularly if you're not living in NYC.

07/19/2009 Route
Find more Runs in New York, New York

Verizon Corporate Challenge

2009-07-16T20:09:00.000-07:00

Ran a 5k for SP in lieu of doing the 4 miles that I had on my NY Times dance card - the warm up and cool down make it work out.

Hot and sticky, I finished 24:38 last year. Nothing official but I think I did 22:25 or so, which was fine. I ran fast enough to 'count' for the SP team, so that made me happy. Felt good to go fast, although it was definitely a change from my normal runs.

Morristown Verizon Wireless Corporate Challenge 5k
Find more Runs in Morristown, New Jersey

Fast confused 4 miler

2009-07-14T19:19:00.000-07:00

Goal to run the simple 4 mile loop. Wrong turn equaled 4.2 miles run, which was okay. Had a working appointment after the run, so couldn't dawdle.

Was impressed with my relatively low heart rate, considering the heat at 162 average for a well under 8 minute per mile pace (7:37). Only hit 172 on the big hill at the end - doesn't EVERYONE have/put big hills at the end of their training runs? The BH topography gives me no other choice.

Sunday's are long run days - 10 miler

2009-07-12T16:59:00.001-07:00

It was hot so I couldn't call it a long easy run.

10 miles in 1:26.27
wore the fuel belt and bought a Gatorade before the return on the Brooklyn Bridge - crazy to try to run that during the Summer at sunset, stupid really.

Lovely run and miles 6 through 8 benefited from a nice breeze off the water of the east river...

Brooklyn Heights Two Bridges Manhattan 10 Miler
Find more Runs in Brooklyn, New York

Morning dicipline pays off in evening quick run

2009-07-10T19:51:00.000-07:00

Ran a new, flat 5 miler route this evening (after the 5 spot this morning). Had my headphones on which nearly cancel out all sounds - not necessarily a good idea on dark, 9 p.m. roads (but I was careful).

Was moving - at around 7:45 miles per minute - which doesn't sound fast and really isn't fast until I tell you that I was only pumping at 159 BPM - which is much, much lower than I usually do at this speed. Add in that I'd run 5 miles this a.m. and I'm pretty excited about the result!

Final thought - I recovered down to 112 (average 114) bpm 2 mins after the run was complete and the only hill on the course is right before the finish (significantly elevating my heart rate right at the end of the run).

New course:
Brooklyn Heights Redhook 5 mile loop
Find more Runs in Brooklyn, New York

Discipline - Morning workout

2009-07-09T19:47:00.000-07:00

5 mile run today (actually on Friday morning but logged today as it is in lieu of the run that I didn't get in on Thursday)

49+ mins at 145 bpm - the usual route, over and back on the Manhattan and Brooklyn Bridges. Really take a LOT of discipline to run this slowly. If you haven't done it you can't imagine what I mean. If you have done it, then you know.

Beautiful morning - reminded me of SD all year round. Can't imagine a prettier view though...

5 mile tempo run - Manhattan to Brooklyn Bridges

2009-07-08T20:26:00.000-07:00

This week I have four 5 milers to run - thus I'd like to mix it up a little bit. Today's plan was to run a slow first mile and then cook for the following 3 miles. I was hoping to push down into the 7 minute mark, a number that I didn't even come close to.

It took me around 8:15 on the first mile (down hill largely). I ran the next three miles, including the two bridges in 25 minutes. The last mile, which was a relaxing chill out to home (heart rate dropped MORE than 10 bpm) was 7:39. This may reflect the fact that the last 'mile' was short (most likely). It was also very, very flat - something that the other miles were NOT.

Overall a nice run and a good way to start out the week. Feet continue to be a slight bit raw. The rest of me feels fantastic. The long run this weekend is only 10 miles, so I'm looking forward to a relatively relaxed week, all told.

Average speed - 8:13 min/mile
Average Heart rate - 165 bpm (very low for me relative to the exertion that I felt)
perhaps not low relative to my over all speed, if compared to runs/races in Central Park; no climbs like the bridges in Central Park (outside of Harlem Hill).

Brooklyn Heights 5 Miler (Manhattan & Brooklyn Bridges)
Find more Runs in Brooklyn, New York

Very slow recovery run - 3 miler

2009-07-05T20:44:00.000-07:00

As per the NY Times schedule that I'm on (see below), I ran 3 miles today.

32 mins for the 3 miles is certainly slower than I ran earlier in the week - but after 13 miles yesterday I figure that that's fine. I was running to my heart rate - and making every effort to keep it down - the average for this run was 138, extremely low for me. I started walking each time my heart rate got above 140 bpm.

Legs feel great and this was one of those runs when it felt like I could have gone at least 5 miles - nice to want more at the end.

Fourth of July 13 mile blowout

2009-07-04T19:32:00.000-07:00

Slow and steady wins the race and today I managed to do just that - ran slow to begin and managed to keep the pace pretty steady - without too much 9:30 miles in there. Legs don't hurt - averaged 166 bpm, which is excellent considering the heat. Wore my fuel belt with around 36 oz (9 x 4) of water. Consumed 2 gels during the run and one before - just basically took it easy and enjoyed the scenery - which was impressive with all the folks hanging out and partying on the big day. Brooklyn is cool and much more laid back in many ways that Manhattan - or the part that I knew well...

Brooklyn 13 miler - BH Start and end
Find more Runs in Brooklyn, New York

Details:

13 miles
1:51
Pace calculated at 8:31 - which is just fine by me
FYI - tried a new 'lubing' technique which worked much better. Not going to give the details, but I wore my Summer tights without the typical mid-line raffe rubbing that I typically get - this kind of stuff will be a life saver during the actual race. Plus I just put in an order for BodyGlyde after reading about it on Run, Paul, Run's blog - that should work even better.

My feet and legs feel great. Tomorrow I'll try to run a short (~4 mile) recovery run at somewhere in the 135 - 145 range. Man that will feel slow, but luckily I don't have very far to go - let's see if I can get it done in less time than I did the 1/2 today.

All in the best I've felt on a run in a long, long time. And certainly the best I've felt on a long run ever. Ran on the dirt in Prospect Park to take it easy on the joints...but that was only for two miles or so.

4 miles today - 1/2 marathon tomorrow

2009-07-03T19:56:00.000-07:00

Just a quick 4 miles around BH tonight.
Not too slow at just under 8 min miles.
Tomorrow is the big one - a 1/2 marathon jaunt to get the official training started.

Tonight's effort managed to stay at a comfortable 160 average pace - that will mark my top end effort for tomorrow's run. I was going to run down the West Side from the GWB - but that's off as it's 4th and it will be CROWDED with folks. So I'll probably run loops around the old neightborhood just for fun.

I'll wear my fluid belt for the first time, so it probably makes sense to stay close to home and just take it all in...

Too bad Brian's not around, otherwise I'd go over to his, run around the park twice and then come home. a perfect half course, that.

Happy Fourth, one of the best holidays of the year, by far.
Got to be Patriotic, especially this year with Mr. Obama in the White House - and you thought that was a temporary condition...to quote a bit of the OTHER Clinton

Coach inspired 'fast' 3 miler

2009-07-02T18:39:00.000-07:00

After a wonderful lunch with my coach, Mika, I was inspired to really get out there today and make something happen. Then it rained, hard. So between thunderstorms I jumped out for a short, 3 miler. Which I completed in 22:49.

you can follow my NY Times based training here:
http://health.nytimes.com/run-well/users/modCMZzQms5/performance

For the 3 mile course around our place -

MapMyRun.com - Quick Run: Brooklyn Heights Fast 3 miler on 07/02/2009

Map and statistics - including heart rate available via Mapmyrun

Frisco road to beach run

2009-06-25T08:45:00.000-07:00

Another relatively relaxing run - out and back
I worked very hard to keep my heart rate down - average was 155 which is entirely too high for this pace - I ran this in 1:02, which included a ton of walking and beach running.

Afterward I came back to the house and went straight to bed. Either I have a virus in the head or I got too hot on the run...

The Beagle Street to Beach
Find more Runs in Frisco, North Carolina

Frisco nice and easy

2009-06-24T06:00:00.000-07:00

Ran 4 miles with the family - took it nice and easy - enjoyed running in the sand.

The Beagel 2 Mile Run
Find more Runs in Frisco, North Carolina

2009-06-14T18:37:00.001-07:00

Ran with Josh at a 'fast for me, slow for him' conversational pace. I needed to do a long run and surprisingly 6.2 miles just doesn't qualify for that anymore so we met before the race and logged 1.7 miles before the race. Was good to catch up and spend a couple of hours together.

I was planning to do a 3 mile run before the race but Josh had a great idea of a different route cuz he 'knows the park so well' and was concerned - guess not Josh, your route was too short - next time I won't listen!

Never-the-less - I was happy to run with Josh and have the encouragement to run 59:31 at a 9:35 pace - 0:14 better than my 10K. We agreed on a new challenge for us going forward starting tomorrow with 100 situps and 30 pushups twice daily.

NYRR Dash 10K

2009-06-13T18:28:00.000-07:00

Ran with Brian at a very relaxed conversational pace.
Heart rate was still too high at 155, but low enough, I guess. It's a lot of work to go this pace and it felt brutal going down hill - seemed like not enough carry and use of the momentum.

Bib	Overall Place	Gender Place	Age Place	Finish Time	Pace/ Mile	AG Time
468	2909	1876	390	59:32	9:36	57:55

Still I'm happy that I got to run with Brian, and with the two miles that we ran before hand, this wasn't a bad way to spend my morning.

Brooklyn Half an emotionally taxing PR

2009-05-30T20:43:00.000-07:00

There are so many ways that this race report could come together -

...I had a great race and crushed my PR by over 3 minutes...
...from mile 7 on-ward all I thought about was being done, which is unheard of in my training and rare in my race-running...
...I actually managed to maintain a very good pace while watching my heart rate like a hawk...
...it was hot for the first time this running year and that took a toll, despite the fact that I stayed in the shadows of the trees the entire time...
...while running I made an conscious effort to look around and enjoy the run, which I certainly did for the first 6 miles in Prospect Park...

and amazingly all would be true, completely or to some degree. I suppose that distance running is partially/entirely a brain game and I struck out today - and still managed to finish with a decent time. Tomorrow I'll go on my recovery run (3.5 - 4 miles at a snail's pace).

Race Name, Date	Net Time	Pace/ Mile	Overall Place	Gender Place	Age Place	Age- Graded %
Brooklyn Half May 30, 2009	1:43:23	7:53	1638	1368	273	57.9 %

Mile Splits:

#1 7:35
#2 7:49
#3 7:29
#4 7:22
#5 7:50
#6 7:50
#7 7:29
#8 7:38
#9 7:52
#10 8:00
#11 8:05
#12 8:39
#13 8:43
#13.1 0:54

Since I consider it a 'bonk' if I'm running slower than 8 min miles in these distance races (who knows what my marathon pace will be) I wasn't too happy with the last three mile paces. The 7th mile onward are one of on the world's flattest roads (see previous post). Positive was that I could see the mile markers coming a quarter away, but there were more disadvantages.

Average heart rate - 177 bpm (I had to slow it down on the end to keep my heart rate from ticking into the mid 180's. I was religious about 'following my heart' on this race slowing down every time I ticked up. Actually I'm AMAZED that my heart rate on average was that low. Felt much higher during the race and was certainly so on the last few miles...still the average is the average. High was 188.

Who knows where we go from here. Seriously, this race was a wake up call. Either I've got to take my training up a notch or retire from this attempt at this year's Marathon. Only time will tell. I'm not going to give up racing and I really like the half distance. I just can't see myself running another one of those after having run the first half, if you get my drift here.

Another thing - I am going to crush this time in the Nike 1/2 in August. It is just going to happen, must happen. I've got to get a hold of those last two miles - sure I was 30 seconds faster than I was in the Bronx a couple of months ago, but that was a hilly course that I didn't know before I ran it.

In the 'yada yada' department - it's been brutal around my house for sleeping lately. Mostly because of our little one's 'sleep training'. I don't believe in excuses, but this is a fact. let's hope that we're in a better spot in a few months time for the Nike Half (which will be hellishly hot, pray for a cold snap).

Final thought - this is by far the best my legs have felt after a long run/race - so that's a real glimmer of hope here. I've got to get out there on the streets more often and cut down on the excuses!

Shoulda been simple - Brooklyn 1/2 Prep run

2009-05-23T23:13:00.000-07:00

This one should have been straight forward - go to Prospect Park, run to the corner, find Ocean Parkway, run to Coney Island to prep for the race. The only problem is that I left out of the WRONG exit and one can't just run down Ocean Parkway without a car...disaster ensued, but only a small disaster.

Definitely didn't do it in the time I'd hoped. But then again, I didn't run the 6.1 or so miles I'd planned either. The upside is that the part outside the Park next weekend is going to be pancake flat!

If I'd run another 1/4 turn around the Park all would have been so much better, you see...

8.9 miles in 1:22 or so, not my fastest performance. Oh yeah, Ocean Parkway simply never ends...but I'm glad to know that now (improving the mental game, huh?)...

&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;lt;a href="http://www.mapmyrun.com/run/united-states/ny/brooklyn/923124312893562526"&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;gt;Pre-Brooklyn Half training run&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;lt;/a&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;gt;&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;lt;br/&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;gt;&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;lt;a href="http://www.mapmyrun.com/find-run/united-states/ny/brooklyn"&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;gt;Find more Runs in Brooklyn, New York&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;lt;/a&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;gt;

Getting into the rhythm thanks to Jay

2009-05-20T09:15:00.000-07:00

So I've found a new running partner. Jay met Susan through acting and he's a morning person looking to get fit, so he's happy to hop the train over to PS in the morning and hit the park loop for 40min. This is great motivation for me to get up and I always like running with someone rather than alone.

We ran yesterday, today and plan another run tomorrow. On the weekend we'll do our own long runs then back to the routine during the week together. I'm running just under 10min pace, which is fine for my mid-week runs right now. The plan is to stretch it out to 5 miles next week, then use interval training and some sprint work to get our speed up to about 8:30 over the course of the next few weeks.

My plan for this Sat is a nice 8 mile run at ~10 min pace, then some more biking for x-training on Sunday. Feeling good these days and the early sunrise is helping that for sure.

Downtown NY 3 miler

2009-05-19T20:50:00.000-07:00

A funny thing happened on the way to this race - I actually decided to race it, which, in retro-retrospect was stupid. The entire idea was to enjoy running through the financial district - a race that I missed last year due to a business trip.

So without enough recovery from my long run, I managed to race through this literally and was focused completely on running and did very little sighseeing. Now maybe that begs the question of whether you can sightsee with 4,600 other people anyway.

Sex/ Age	Bib	Team	Overall Place	Gender Place	Age Place	Finish Time	Pace/ Mile
M36	1533	BRRC	495	445	93	21:25	7:08

For some reason I thought this race was a 5 k...

But I did manage to keep the pace and I did manage to get in front of the horde so that the start/race wasn't a total waste (key without corrals). So I planned my work and worked my plan, an important development as I sometimes 'lose focus' during the race and slow down (never stop, though!).

Pretty neat, but I think that next year I'll buy a $5 suit and run with a briefcase or something.

Heart rate was high - in the 175 zone on average, but with a nice maintenance pace of 172 at sub 7 miles for the first mile plus, so that felt good.

Tomorrow's a rest day - and I might just rest on Thursday too, too much City street pounding in too short of a time for me.

Nice active weekend

2009-05-18T18:11:00.000-07:00

Ran the Healthy Kidney 10K on Saturday too. Felt strong and ran a 9:49 pace. This is much better than the last time I ran a long distance (10:09 pace for the 9.3 mile race in March).

The Nike+ sensor logged me a little too fast and a little too far but it mostly got the time and slow period correct:

I made it out for a ride on the bike with kids in tow for ~10 mile ride on Sunday and I'm heading out in the morning for a quick 4 mile loop of the park. Generally feeling positive about the weather getting better and logging more miles over the next few weeks to start building out the distance.

Healthy Kidney Long Run

2009-05-16T17:26:00.000-07:00

I'm just not keen on the subway! Ran to the race - using the old link - although the route this time was up Broadway. Click here for last route.

Last time I did this I was sluggish on the run there and felt horrid on the run at the park. This time, I felt okay on the run there and great on the run in the park.

Overall Place	Gender Place	Age Place	Finish Time	Split Time	Pace/ Mile	AG Time	AG Gender Place	AG %
1353	1140	213	47:45	0:23:40	7:42	46:27	1377	57.7 %

Remember, that I'd run over 6.5 miles before the race even started - in around 49 minutes this time...so these were miles 7-13

Race Mile :
1: 7:30
2: 7:30
3: 8:07 (hill)
4: 7:47
5: 7:37
6: (didn't catch)

my Finish of 47:45 was only 2:30 slower than my last 10k (which was fresh)
It was almost 40 seconds faster than my 2008 Scotland run, which was run with pacing from my unofficial coach (although we got super jammed at the start and ran a 9:30+ first mile). It was 30 seconds faster than the same course run in December, when I was just coming back from being off with Dylan's birth. And it was more than 30 seconds faster PER MILE than the last time I ran 10k before a 10k for a warm up.

A wonderful moment in the race: 10 mins into the race the very light rain picked up and it POURED. Just long enough for me to get through two of the three significant uphills. For some reason - must be the difference between good days running and bad days running - I welcomed the rain and took it literally in stride. It must have been good for everybody as the guy who won the race broke the course record too.

One more thought, while I didn't run a negative split in this race, I didn't really fade either. This is interesting especially when you realize the high miles that the second half of this race represented since I'd left my house. So I'm very pleased with that!

Thus I'm really looking forward to the Brooklyn Half at the end of the month. I hope to shatter my PR for the 1/2. Let's see

Additionally, my legs don't hurt as much as they have, and I'm hoping at least part of that is having the right shoes...

Brian and Diane also ran very good races, but I'll let them tell their tales.

JP

Three runs in one entry - Mom's day = new 4 miler PR!

2009-05-10T16:07:00.001-07:00

In reverse chronological order -

Today's race – Mother's day 4 miler

My goal was to run the entire race in under 28 mins, at least matching my time from a couple of weeks ago.

Comps:
Last year's Mom's day – May 11th – 28:17 (which seemed unbelievably fast at the time and for a long time thereafter – my fastest per mile race by far up until that point)

Run for the Parks – April 11th 2009 – 27:48

Today's race – 27:32
Splits – Mile 1 6:49
Mile 2 6:41
Mile 3 7:10
Mile 4 6:49

The stupid hill on Mile 3 always kills me (but I can't complain when mile #4 is straight down hill). Overall I am very pleased both for breaking my PR and for maintaining my tradition of 'doing it for Mom' (including this year Steph!) and running my fastest on Mom's day.

Now let's hope that unlike last year I continue to peak all the way through the Summer.

A final thought – this was a taxing race. My AVERAGE heart rate was 181. I'll have to check the pace and heart rate against the Run for the Parks...but I think that this shows that I'm a bit further out of shape that I was in April. Time to hit the streets a bit harder. But the new shoes (got racing shoes as my old racers were spent) helped out a ton.

Friday's run

A little 2.22 miler out and back. First with my brand new, proper, shoes. I went out fast and tried to beat my time coming back, which I did easily. In retrospect, I wonder if I used a bit of energy on Friday and this caused my elevated heart rate in today's race?

Out (downhill) 16:23 HRM Ave 158 Pace: 7:23
Return (slight uphill) 15:46 HRM Ave 171 Pace: 7:03

note the difference in heart rate – which includes starting from basically scratch both times (long wait, like 10 mins between runs).

Sunday Night Run

5.92miles
53:43
Perhaps interestingly, I had to stop – for the first time basically ever as my forefoot (right and to a lesser degree my left) throbbed with pain. When I got home I realized that I was a. wearing the wrong shoes (I have high arches and these shoes are for normal footed folks) and b. I flex my foot really hard when sitting at this and my work computer. Since then I've been working to address both factors. The sitting was easy – just mentally break the habit. I also ordered some new shoes (which are working like a charm, as you can see above).

Vienna Scenic Route - Travel

2009-05-01T19:15:00.000-07:00

Week long trip to Vienna didnt' stop the running (although I only got one run in).

1:30 with a low - 138 average bpm ran over 9 miles - so that's good.

Scenic Vienna Route
Find more Runs in Vienna, Austria

Back at it after a week off

2009-04-25T20:36:00.000-07:00

My last run wasn't the most fun, and it knocked some of the MoJo out of me, so I took the week off. Not something I can do in a month or so, but nothing that I'm too worried about now. Plus I have a big meeting (oh yeah!) this week so I was putting in a bit more time at work than typical.

Today's run was supposed to be nice and slow, but I didn't really have that discipline and ended up going out reasonably fast (for me).

Run: 10.27 miles (I don't care anymore what MapMyRuns says, it's always too short).
Time: 1:31 with a couple of stops - for water, to tie shoes, for traffic, blah, blah it was a training run

Felt great and it was nice to be in the double digits again.

Next stop Vienna - I hope to run there on Monday afternoon local time, with an immediate blog to get on my MapMyRun globe to the right here.

&amp;lt;a href="http://www.mapmyrun.com/run/united-states/ny/brooklyn/191124071611945084"&amp;gt;04/25/2009 14th Street East Side Long Run&amp;lt;/a&amp;gt;&amp;lt;br/&amp;gt;&amp;lt;a href="http://www.mapmyrun.com/find-run/united-states/ny/brooklyn"&amp;gt;Find more Runs in Brooklyn, New York&amp;lt;/a&amp;gt;

Finally a run during the week....

2009-04-22T08:43:00.000-07:00

Wow....been a long time. After my sore knees got better (only a week or so) and my broken toe healed (it's been 6 or 7 weeks now) I finally committed to get back out there even if it means giving up some sleep time.

I ran the Colon Challenge cuz I signed up, but the 15k after not running for a month was brutal on me and my toe was complaining most of the way. Despite that I was pleased with my time and ran a consistent 10min/mile pace. You can see from the photos that I was suffering though...

Yesterday morning I was up at 6:30 and hit the pavement. Here are the stats:

you can see that I did have to walk a couple of times - I went out a little too hard at first, and had to do the first walk, then the second one...just lazy I guess....the third walk, I manage to power up a major hill without walking which pushed my HR over 180 so I had to walk that one off before jogging the long hill back down to home.

Grabbed a quick shower, saw the kids, talked to Susan then zoom out the door to make it through the 60+min commute to the office in time for 9am. Today I took a day off. My legs are a little sore but my knees and toe both feel fine and I'm in better spirits in general. Will hit the pavement again tomorrow for another run.

Here's the map of my route:
http://www.gmap-pedometer.com/?r=2753532 apparently my nike+ is off a bit as it logged me in at less mileage than the map reads. My footpod on my HR was a little more accurate tracking me at 3.95miles and a 9:55 pace. In the end, I ran, didn't die and am psyched to get up and go again tomorrow so I'm not going to worry about the small mileage and pace differentials!

More Tomorrow!

Who needs the subway? Ran to the race and then ran the race.

2009-04-19T08:59:00.000-07:00

While preparing for today's race last night I learned that it's about the same amount of time to run to Central Park as it is to take the subway. This is particularly true with weekend service delays.

So before running in the official race I jogged up to the start - which left me relatively tired and without a number (didn't have enough time before the start). So I comfortably snugged in with the back of the pack and awaited the start.

&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;lt;a href="http://www.mapmyrun.com/run/united-states/ny/brooklyn/154124015523869109"&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;gt;04/19/2009 Run to 68th Start Route&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;lt;/a&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;gt;&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;lt;br/&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;gt;&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;lt;a href="http://www.mapmyrun.com/find-run/united-states/ny/brooklyn"&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;gt;Find more Runs in Brooklyn, New York&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;lt;/a&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;gt;
4 miles and a little over 31 minutes later I was done. Of course this is much, much slower than my recent PR. But I was proud to finish (these were miles 6.6 through 10.6 run today - so from that perspective not bad). Also, my last 1/2 was run at above an 8 min per mile pace, so compared to that I was moving...

Last Name	Overall Place	Gender Place	Age Place	Finish Time	Pace/ Mile	AG %
PARKS	1662	1369	275	31:21	7:50	55.2 %

Still I never felt in the groove today and fighting all the people (even though I passed a pretty good number of folks, which felt good) took its toll.

Next week will be better and I'll run more than this week. Also, I'm looking forward to running in Vienna at the end of the month!

I think I can get my per mile down to somewhere in the mid-7's (7:35) for these longer runs. But even the progression from 8:05 to 7:50 is okay considering how I felt.

Needless to say, I took the subway home! The $2 was well spent and so was I.

Slow recovery run

2009-04-12T19:15:00.001-07:00

Simply put I've been taking the concept of 'rest days' way too seriously. Who knows when the next time I'll get to run. Clearly not tomorrow night as my father in law is coming to dinner (thankfully!). So in the last hour of sunlight I threw on the shoes and hit the streets.

My goal was to keep my heart rate below 155 bpm at all costs. So I ended up walking whenever I hit 155 and showed a considerable amount of discipline to keep an average rate of 148 throughout the run. Needless to say I absolutely adore my Heart Rate Monitor. One simply cannot run this way without the instant feedback. Perhaps I am overly technical but that's the way I am, so this is the way I train. The result is that I ran 9.13 miles (by both MapMyRun and the GPS, so that's a first!) and I felt very, very strongly that I could have continued.

However, I'd already run 20 + miles in 3 days and also had run for 1:24.09 - so I'd probably had enough...still I didn't feel tired or 'done'. Instead I felt great. This is the huge advantage to running aerobically.

At this pace I can enjoy the scenery - something that I noticed today that I 'zone out' on my typical run.

Another funny one - as I was crossing the Manhattan Bridge I really had to slow it down (but NOT walk) to keep my heart rate down. It wasn't until a couple of miles later that I realized that I was running straight into a 12 - 25 mile an hour wind. When I turned off of the protected West Side Drive, on to the causeway in Battery City Park, I was hit straight in the face with the river-level cold breeze - 'that explained my slow cross of the Manhattan Bridge' I thought. That way I ran back, I only got the wind at my back for the Brooklyn Bridge crossing.

Still 9:15 average at 148 isn't horrid. And this race was designed to clear out anything from the 10k and to continue to build the base.

04/12/2009 Manhattan Bridge to Battery City N Moore St Brooklyn Return Route
Find more Runs in Brooklyn, New York

10k Scotland Run results in another PR

2009-04-11T20:08:00.000-07:00

As the announcer said, 'the Scots managed to bring their weather with them' and he wasn't joking.
Distance: 6.2 Miles, 10.0 Kilometers
Date/Time: April 11, 2009, 10:00 am
Location: Central Park, NYC
Weather: 48 degrees, 93% humidity, rain.

My hands felt frozen in the warm-up and in the corral waiting for the start of the race. There was really nothing I could do to get warm - and the first mile's heart rate shows it - it was a real bear to get started - and I had to slow myself down about the 3/4 mile point not to speed through. I was very happy to have heart rate feedback, as I slowed dramatically (in the first mile and again on the big hill in Mile 4 to keep from blowing out).

Splits:
Mile 1: 7:13
Mile 2: 7:09
Mile 3: 7:09
Mile 4: 7:40 (huge hill)
Mile 5: 7:10 (regained focus)
Mile 6: 7:23 (lost focus? Or just couldn't keep the pace...)
Rest: 1:32

Last Name	First Name	Sex/ Age	Bib	Overall Place	Gender Place	Age Place
PARKS	JOSHUA	M36	1503	1041	917	191

Finish Time	Pace/ Mile	AG Time	AG Gender Place	AG %
45:17	7:18	44:03	1102	60.9 %

Overall I'm overjoyed. I beat my goal time of 46 minutes by a mile. I almost made my long ago stretch goal of completing a 10k in 45 minutes (but that will have to wait until another time).

Looking back, there is only really one thing that I'm not happy with - my 'kick' or lack thereof. I tend to go out too fast and then hold on until the end. This year and last year I ran the last 0.2 miles in the same amount of time (90 seconds in 08 and 91 seconds this year). I'd like finish stronger. Still taking 30 seconds per mile off my time feels pretty great. And too think that it felt like moving last time!

Comparison of my per mile times in 2008 (pink) and 2009 (blue) - you can see that the slow first mile cost me last year and I never really recovered. Still the 40 second per mile faster pace through the first few miles increased that lead (hard to see here).

Heart Rate (upper) and Altitude (lower) '08 vs. '09

Here you can see how hard I had to work over the first mile this year to get started. Nice to see though that I was moving more quickly and spending less effort to do it - that's text book better training. And to think that I'm 'only' running a couple of days per week. Let's see how this Summer's training goes.

Over all a very good result. I'm happy, especially that I didn't let the rain interfere with getting the work done.

Scotland Run warmup - Maintenance Drop

2009-04-10T19:43:00.000-07:00

Ran to drop off the monthly maintenance and just kept running. Stayed in the 145 - 155 bpm band - using my new hrm band.

04/10/2009 Maintenance Drop & Redhook Loop
Find more Runs in Brooklyn, New York

Time taken - 44 mins

Generally pretty uneventful, save the fact that I'm nearly two minutes faster at this relatively sane bpm band relative to when I started slowing down to go faster. It is amazing how long it takes to improve and then how quickly the results build up.

Tomorrow's the Scotland 10k - last year I did it in 48:24. I can safely say that I will crush this PR tomorrow. Last year I ran with my good friend Mika. We ran that race like this:

Mile 1: 9:25 (huge crowds to manage at the start)
Mile 2: 8:00
Mile 3: 8:05
Mile 4: 7:35
Mile 5: 7:25
Mile 6: 7:20
Last: 1:30 (I hope that works out)

Average pace 7:48 - My PR is 7:47 from December 7th.

I don't want to put too much pressure on, but I do expect to perform considerably better in this race tomorrow. Let's see where the splits come in. I am going to go out on a limb and predict a finish of around 46 minutes or thereabouts. My personal goal from a long, long time ago was to run a 45 minute 10k. I've clearly never done that, but tomorrow I might just go out and try.

Sub 28 minute 4 miler sets new PR! By almost 30 seconds...

2009-04-05T16:36:00.000-07:00

My goal for today's race was to at least beat my time from last year's race of 28:53 or 7:13. I was thinking that, more likely, I would run between my most recent 5k pace of 7:09 and my PR pace for 4 miles of 7:04 (last Mother's Day). As a stretch goal, I hoped to break 28 minutes, maybe. Instead I got a great start and ended up blowing all my expectations away.

Distance: 4 miles (with a 1 mile warm up and cool down)
Breakdown:
1 - 7:05 (crowded and hilly)
2 - 6:48 (thinned out, downhill)
3 - 7:09 (slightly uphill)
Put me spot on 21 minutes at the 3 mile turn - I said to myself 'I've got to finish this strong and beat the 28 minute mark!'
4- 6:45 (downhill)

Last Name	First Name	Sex/ Age	Bib	Team	Overall Place	Gender Place
PARKS	JOSHUA	M36	1458	BRRC	439	411

Age Place	Finish Time	Pace/ Mile	AG Time	AG Gender Place	AG %
100	27:48	6:57	27:02	558	62.3 %

Needless to say I was elated at the finish and very pleased with my performance. This the first time that I've gotten out of the 60% AG and into the 62%s.

For more information on the results of all the races I've run with NYRR click here.

Times Square to Home (nearly)

2009-04-02T19:48:00.000-07:00

Tonight I ran from just West of Times Square to home, cutting across Chambers and then back across the Brooklyn Bridge.

GPS suggested that the route was 6.6 miles. Mapmyrun says 6.3 - oh well.

I tend to think that the 6.6 was right as I was MOVING and my watch suggested that I averaged 7:45 over the distance - that feels about right. Not necessarily pushing it but definitely focused and concentrated. Felt fantastic and would have gone longer but want to run hills tomorrow (perhaps) and have a race on Sunday (short, but still want to have some legs left). Imagined that I could have done another 3 or even 4 miles no problem at that pace...

04/02/2009 Time Square to Brooklyn Heights Route
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Back in the Brooklyn/NYC Saddle Again!

2009-03-29T18:28:00.000-07:00

It's good to be home. Went out for my typical training run and ended up competing a good one. Misty, threatening rain the entire time...but I made it and did a pretty good job.

03/29/2009 Houston with City Hall Loop
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Details -

Distance: 9.33 miles
Time: 1:14:30
Pace: 8 min per mile (spot on)

Only real comment is that I'd thought that my original version of this included a trip around City Hall, so I ran around City Hall after coming out of the South Street Seaport. Turns out that loop is new and different from before. Compare this result to my run on March 11th - there I ran 8.71 miles in 1:13. Here I did 9.33 in a minute longer. Again I didn't 'push it' at all, just nice and steady and easy. Felt great. Excellent to be back at it. Perhaps those hills that I ran in Belgium paid dividends on this run? I felt a slightly better push off during my stride and definitely maintained a better cadence than before.

A final thought - I signed up for the 100 miles in 31 days Challenge at MapMyRun.com. So I have 31 days from today to get the 100 miles in. I'm at 9.33 - so I have 90.67 miles to go. I figure that I can average 3.3 miles per day for this next month...why not? It's a good challenge at least.

Stockholm Syndrome

2009-03-26T20:03:00.000-07:00

Meeting went on and on. Needed to get out and run despite my hacking cough and occasional shooting pain down my right thigh (from coughing too hard and potentially from a wee bit of lactic acid in there from the hills of Genval, see below).

Ran for 1:06 and got in 7.5 miles and got lost. So in the end I probably ran another 1.5 miles trying to find the hotel - which I did but not in time for dinner.

Missing dinner was actually a good thing as I had a glass of wine with the team (for my heart and to be social) and felt as though I didn't miss anything. These meetings sometimes feel like feeding frenzies.

Miss my heart rate monitor - need to replace that bad boy soon. 03/28/2009 Stockholm Route
Find more Runs in Stockholm, Sweden

And by the way it was pitch black, great for seeing the City lights but horrid for being in a 100 acre park that you've never visited in the day!

The hills of Genval

2009-03-21T17:13:00.000-07:00

Ran twice around the Lake (Lac) with Dom(e) Hein aka Pierre. After the warm up, headed to the long hill that my hosts used to live on. Then, in around 4 minutes per go I ran up hill 0.4 miles on average each time. After each run I walked back to the lowest point and started again. The best news was that I ran the last loop as quickly as any of the others.

Today my bum hurts, so perhaps I made some progress, perhaps. I'll throw these kinds of runs into my weekly pursuit of completing the 2009 Marathon as I hear that it's important to push the lower body's muscle groups vis-a-vis hill runs like this.

Given all the walking the time frame of the workout isn't really relevant. Although I did beat my time from the day before on the laps of the lake!

Early evening Genval Run

2009-03-20T17:41:00.000-07:00

Visiting Dom and Mlo I couldn't help but to run around their lake.

22:40 for two laps wasn't bad.

03/21/2009 Genval Lake Loop
Find more Runs in Rixensart, Belgium

Grandfather's 90th celebratory run

2009-03-14T08:24:00.000-07:00

Got up early and jumped out for a long, slow run. Was cold and rainy - 38 degrees f

took around 1 hour 8 minutes to complete the loop. Felt great to be in the old neighborhood of my grandparents. Sure miss the Pacific weather.

03/21/2009 Bellevue, Medina, Clyde Hill
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Since islands are surrounded by water

2009-03-11T20:16:00.001-07:00

one can jog around both sides - my typical run goes straight across Manhattan (from Brooklyn of course) and then around the southern most part of Manhattan. Now I have discovered another route - this time on the East River.

Run: basic fitness run
Route: my watch said 8.71 miles

03/11/2009 Route
Find more Runs in Brooklyn, New York

Time needed : 1:13
This suggests that I would have been on course to match my best 15k time of 1:14 or thereabouts - which is amazing since the only time I pushed it was on the way back across the Brooklyn Bridge.

Lesson learned: taking time off to rest the bones and muscles is important!

Long holiday from running & travel as well

2009-03-08T18:58:00.000-07:00

I've been quiet on the streets and quiet on the blog for some time.

First of all, I've managed to come back from my UK, France, UK trip with a cold. Second, I suppose that it's good to take some time off on the knees every now and again.

First the surf trip

Went on a short jog around Tooting Bec with Dr. Thom of Dr. Thom's Clinic. We jogged for about 3 miles and called it a day.

Later that Friday, we flew to France and surfed south of where we were staying in Biarritz. Since I didn't catch any waves there, I won't tell you where I was.

Saturday was different. Following our resident LK (Local Knowledge) we went on this trip:
Surfed for two sessions of a total of 4 hours (2.5 plus 1.5)
Caught too many waves and they were long ones. Can conclude that running does zero for one's upper body - at least not mine. So I struggled. But the cold water didn't help either.

Had a blast, came back sick - what can you do? Wanted to run today (first day that I felt up to it) but didn't/couldn't find the time with my Mom leaving town (thanks Mom!) and a trip to our cousin's to get some baby clothes.

Shots of the surf trip - here

Event Registration: The ING NYC Marathon Nov 1, 2009

2009-02-24T13:52:00.000-08:00

Something 'clicked' when I saw this on the screen - a very surreal feeling!

Confirmation:

You have a confirmed spot in the ING New York City Marathon 2009.

Entry #344XXX
Please use this number for any correspondence relating to your marathon entry

Joshua Parks
United States
The following fees have been charged to your account ending: XXXX.
Processing Fee: $11.00
Entry Fee: $138.00
Total: $149.00

Welcome to the 2009 race. This year you will be part of an extra special event as we celebrate our 40th running. Before you step onto the starting line, you might enjoy reading New York Times writer Liz Robbins’ book “A Race Like No Other”, and watching Judd Erlich’s documentary “Run For Your Life” ( Click Here). Thank you for joining us.

Nearly Soloing the Brooklyn Bridge & City Hall out and back

2009-02-22T20:21:00.000-08:00

After a long day of sitting around and doing shopping, I was literally hoping around at dinner. I suggested a run and Steph said, 'sounds great, but it's late.' Undaunted, I strapped on my running shoes and jumped out to start my run at 9:42.

Finishing 34 minutes later I'd put another 4.3 miles in the bag. That and I'd run both the Brooklyn Bridge and the loop around City hall. For comparison, I ran this same course (minus City Hall) in late 2007 - but in 32 minutes. Thus I effectively ran around City Hall in 2 minutes (which is impossible).

Details:

4.3 miles
34 Degrees (22 degrees w/ windchill)
Pace: 7:47 average
(pace was 7:24 on the return part of the Bridge when I pushed the tempo)

Average Heart Rate: 164 (which is high for a recovery run, but this was more of a 'I had a light but fast weekend' run, which means all bets were off)
Pumped it up to 183 on the uphill before shutting it down and cruising on the downhill side of the bridge.

General overall feeling: amazing. I've been feeling down lately during my running as the reality that I'm not going to run a 7 minute pace for the Marathon sets in - that's a longer time on the road. But this pace (7:40's) felt pretty great, even though this was admittedly very short. My stated goal for the Marathon will be 8 mins flat. But my stretch goal will be in the 7:45 area. And I think I can reach it.

Mostly I just enjoyed pushing the tempo on the vertical seeming uphill of the way out of Manhattan - there's something about pumping that hill that just feels great. That and the fact that the V. Narrows bridge is there, out over the right shoulder, gleaming green in the distance.

I love my new slower paced system, but sometimes you just have to burn a little rubber.

Recovery:

2 mins: solid 100/99 bpm
5 min: 93 bpm

Pretty Happy with the Results

2009-02-22T16:03:00.001-08:00

What can I say - Josh threw down the gauntlet when he insisted that my time should be below 9:00. I slacked off training this week and my diet on the road wasn't great as I was stressed out about some logistics at work and really wasn't focused like I should have been. I'm hoping to be more focused this week - particularly if I want to run 9 miles as planned for Sat this week.

Results from NYRR from the race said that I finished the 5K in 26:59, or 8:42 per mile. Since running the 1-mile race in September last year I've been getting steadily faster in my times and this was a big improvement. In October I ran 5M at 9:58, Nov I did 4M in 9:43 and my first race of this year was 9:24 for a 5M. Today's distance was only 3 miles but I did a nice 2M warm up to get a little loose after a week of sitting on my computer without running.

My heart was pounding hard for this one. Compared to my training runs where I'm trying to keep it under 165 I was way out there at 175 for most of this run but didn't feel too bad.

Overall very happy and planning to work hard to make this a solid week of training.

New PR - Al Gordon Snowflake 5K

2009-02-21T18:53:00.000-08:00

Today I ran the Al Gordon, who's still alive at 107, 5k in Prospect Park.

Race Results:
Overall place - 499
Gender place - 444
Age place - 89
Net time - 22:11
Ave. per mile - 7:09 (which is the number of the house in which I grew up!)

Notes on the race:
There was a huge disturbance in the force as I picked up my blue race bib - which meant that I could line up with the elites for the first time in my NYRR career. Hoping to live up to the billing of my 360 bib number, I jumped in the coral after a nice warm up with Brian. The first mile was basically straight up hill.

Per mile times:
#1: 6:58
#2: 7:09
#3: 7:19
rest: 47 seconds

I stopped to tie my shoe (which was initially tied in the corral before the race) - it looks from this like I 'lost' 10 seconds during the re-tie exercise - bummer! You can see the V in my heart rate, right by the dotted vertical line.

This race reminded me how hard it is too improve, as I ended up beating my personal best by nearly a minute, and yet, didn't run my fastest per mile race ever for NYRR - that would be the 4 mile 7:04 per mile burner that I completed last Mother's Day (thanks MOM!). Even with those ten seconds back I was not as fast as last May. But I'm certainly 100% faster than I was last February.

Along those lines I wanted to illustrate how the 'new' training method was playing out. Remember that the concept is to run longer, slower and build cardiac capacity. As you can see from the graphic above - my heart rate average per exercise is clearly coming down (with a couple of exceptions like the recent races), and my pace is staying the same (not pictured) or even going up, especially for long runs.

Another nice thing to pick up from this chart is that my miles are going up very quickly - back to a higher per week level than before Dylan was born (in July 2008 - note the dramatic fall off as well as the quiet period just before 2008 close). I thought that this was hands down the chart of the day.

I'll try to keep integrating interesting graphics, especially when they are this 'telling' or illustrative.

As seems to be a common theme for me lately, this race was a win on many fronts, but left me with a feeling of what could be, rather than of complete accomplishment. It felt a lot harder than I'd expected. So I've got to get out more frequently, push the pace, run some hills, and leave the excuses (and old times!) behind.

I am very proud of Brian and will comment on his blog when he posts - I also expect that he'll share the pedometer of our run today - I don't want to upstage him.

Bethesda MD: 21+ mile weekend

2009-02-15T20:47:00.000-08:00

Saturday
Ran Rock Creek Park with my sister in law Diane

Map: http://www.gmap-pedometer.com/?r=2563684

Distance: 9.14 miles
Time: 1:26.28
Heart Rate Average: 148
Comments: It's great to run with Diane. We chat and catch up and she tends to push me harder than I'd like for my recovery runs - I won't admit it to her but maybe she'll read the blog. This was an immensely beautiful run, and one that I will certainly add to my 'usuals' when I'm in Bethesda. We parked just outside the limits (you can see the parking lot in the zoomed in Satellite view right by the start...

Started out nice and easy and then increased the pace on the return (uphill). Diane really killed it over the last mile and it was all I could do to keep up.

Sunday
Capital Crescent Trail Solo
Map: http://www.gmap-pedometer.com/?r=2563682

Distance: 12.18 (going by the map ped because my footpod wasn't working)
Time: 1:40.56
Heart Rate Average: 153
Comments: The distance is likely a bit high because I was having footpod problems at the beginning and started and stopped a couple of times. City street run to the trail, which is paved. Ran on the side of the trail for much of the run in an attempt to soften the footfalls and decrease the pounding. Ran almost all the way down to Georgetown, and had I know how close I was I would have continued. Felt great on the uphill, although I was running in the 9 min per mile pace. All the downhill at the beginning and a nice 'kick' back up into the neighborhood completed an enjoyable and impressive training run. Note that the heart rate is staying down and the speed is slowly but surely ticking up.

Final comment - my legs feel surprisingly fresh for a 20+ mile weekend with only slight tenderness in my knees. My ankles on the other hand feel a bit battered from the uneven ground (I always run on asphalt). And I'm a little tired, but in general it's amazing how my 'typical' run is now ticking up into the 8 plus mile mark without really even noticing it. A 'long' run of less than 10 miles feels like a bit of a ripoff, with something missing.

I'm still somewhat frustrated by the relatively modest improvement in my per mile times - but I know that it's too soon to see major improvements and that I'm carrying some lactic acid from run to run. It takes a couple of days to clear and I'm not necessarily giving myself enough time. Still it will feel pretty great to tick off 5 spot on 7 minute miles again. But now is the time for patience to let this training regimen take its course. Remember the marathon is still 9 months away...

DID IT

2009-02-14T07:25:00.000-08:00

In Boston today but made it out for my 7 mile run in the cold.

http://www.gmap-pedometer.com/?r=2559610

More later

Bittersweet second 1/2 in three weeks

2009-02-08T15:22:00.000-08:00

The Bronx Half Marathon is now in the bag. And it is with mixed emotions that I compose the blog. First off I ran a great first 3/4 of the race. Unfortunately because I was so fast on the first portion I had nothing in the tank to finish. I'm disappointed by my really weak 'kick' that lasted for the last three miles.

To give you a sense of how fast I went out:

Last March 2nd I ran a 23:06 5k - today's first 3 miles took 22:43 more or less equaling that pace. My best ever 10k is 48:16 - and I ran the first 6 miles today in 46:15 which ~ 47:45! Clearly, WAY TOO FAST for a 1/2 marathon for me at this point, but it felt good. Lesson learned.

Official results:

OverallPlace	GenderPlace	Age Place	Finish Time	Pace/ Mile
1074/ 3668	891	178	01:46:50	08:09

Mile	Time	Ave. Heart Rt.	Mile	Time	Ave. Heart Rt.	Mile	Time	Ave. Heart Rt.
1	07:41	164	7	08:02	176	13	09:15	175
2	07:32	169	8	08:01	176	0.1	00:51	183
3	07:30	171	9	08:01	177
4	07:45	172	10	08:37	175
5	07:45	176	11	08:33	176
6	08:02	176	12	08:41	175

Heart Rate was just too high the entire race - and the complete breakdown after mile 10 marks a real opportunity for improvement. However I did manage to improve my per mile time by 9 mins per mile and my overall time by 1 minute and 46 seconds - not bad for two weeks of training! I just wish I would have left a bit more energy for the rolling hills of the Grand Concourse - those were real killers! Next year!

A special thank you to Steph and Dylan who were there - in the bitter wind - to see me run and give me a hug at the finish. It was great to see them and I really needed their support to pull through that last mile and 1/10th! Perhaps we'll have some fun video to post later in the week from Steph...

Finally a good week

2009-02-07T13:48:00.000-08:00

Very solid run today. My Nike+ said it was 5.5M but my gmaps measurement said 6M. I'm not that worried - spent 60min at ~10min/mile pace so it is what I needed to do for today to keep inline with my training plan. Tomorrow I'm out with Liam all day doing a lot of walking but I might try to make it to the gym for some cross training as scheduled.

Was planning to drive to Boston on Tues which will mess up my training but I think we're moving our meeting up to Mon afternoon so I'll be driving on my Mon rest day and will be able to do my run on Tues as planned in the morning. I felt a lot better doing my run today after having done the 3 runs during the week. This is what I need to do to get the ball rolling on the training and I'm feeling positive and energized about the plan ahead of me though I'd like to pick up the pace somehow - maybe when my cardio is better in a month or two.

Vote of no confidence

2009-02-04T08:34:00.001-08:00

Bummer....just noticed someone voted that I won't finish the marathon....I need to work hard to instill some confidence out there. Here is a gadget with my last 5 runs (click on arrow to move through them). Clear to see the consistency of the treadmill runs.

Two days and counting

2009-02-04T06:07:00.000-08:00

It was really hard, but I dragged my sorry ass out of bed this morning and hit the treadmill for another 3 mile jog today. I am trying out my new pace ~8:30 mixing it up with my regular pace of around 9:30-10:00. Felt good this morning and I was able to keep my HR under 165 which is the level at which I start to feel fatigue accumulate quickly.

I'm going to be vigilant in my training using the Higdon plan - which means another 3 miles tomorrow morning then I'll hit the pavement Sat for a nice 6 mile jog (which should fit okay into the calendar/schedule this week).

Finally - I'm pathetic...gotta make Feb a turnaround month

2009-02-03T10:33:00.000-08:00

I'm having a really hard time making the time and mustering the motivation to get out and log the miles. I'm on the road in Boston every week working til after dark and commuting in the morning out to the client which requires gettin up really early to exercise.

My second part of the challenge is managing my diet on the road (and at home, but to a lesser extent). I'm eating well today. Cup of fresh fruit for breakfast, salad (veggie only, no dressing) and a pear for lunch with some water. I have an apple for later this afternoon. Will have a crappy hotel salad for dinner as the other options are all heavy butter laden fare (i.e., wings, burgers, potatoes...you get the idea).

At least I got up and ran this morning. Logged 3 miles on the treadmill and they did some upper body weights to improve my strength (which is miserable).

Here is my plan starting with my 3miles this morning from HalHigdon.com

Cadman Plaza Early Morning Run (note Parkes middle name)

2009-02-03T07:54:00.000-08:00

On my run today I was thinking 'this next 1/2 is a real opportunity to blaze a new trail and crack my speed record' - but my legs remindedme that I'm still carrying a ton of lactose in my legs from the first1/2!Run: 4.83 miles over a packed 'track' artificial surface. I ran the first two miles slow, then cranked out two miles in 16 minutes (well 1.98 so it was an 8:04 per mile pace - plenty fast for me - and my 'race' pace for the 1/2 certainly). Absolutely no pressing or difficulty. However my heart rate did creep up - it was snowing - to around 160 toward the end. So tomorrow I'll run a slow four miler.

Notes: I really appreciated the softness of the track surface (it's not a track but a circular path about three feet wide around one of the parks in downtown Brooklyn). Running this track will become one of my weekly runs as I do love the soft feel and am very, very keen to reduce the pounding on my legs. Also, it's 1/3rd of a mile, which is better than the 1/4 mile tracks I've run on before. There are some transitions to tile, but generally it is very soft.

Conditions: near freezing with a light wind and drifting slight snow.

For more information & pictures of Cadman Plaza -

http://www.nycgovparks.org/sub_your_park/historical_signs/hs_historical_sign.php?id=11811

'Long' Sunday training run

2009-02-01T10:07:00.000-08:00

Description: Slow and easy training run.
Route: Out through Dumbo, then out to Redhook and back

Pace: 9:34 min/mile = Painfully slow, thus although I ran for an hour and fourteen mintues, (my 15k time), I only managed 7.74 miles
Heart rate average: 150 bpm (I finally got a new battery, so that's probably right). Ran in the zone of 144 to 155 but snuck up to 160 a couple of times. Never 'pushed it' - just nice and slow and easy.

Notes: I stopped a couple of times either to wait for a car, or to just enjoy the view. Also, instead of pushing through I stopped briefly to injest my gel at 38 minutes - which ended up right in the middle of my run.

I should get a water belt for these long runs or take money to buy some water at a bodega.

Health: my legs got heavy and a bit tight toward the end...this was a big week for me at 19.9 miles. Niggly little things in my right knee (very slight) and left anterior ankle (needs stretching).

New Shoes = Nice Run

2009-01-30T16:59:00.000-08:00

Received my new pair of Asics Gel Kayano(R) 15's yesterday and literally couldn't wait to get out and run in them. Had been wearing Saucony Hurricane 9's for the last 3 pairs of shoes and wanted to try something else. Man what a difference. The Asics are much 'stiffer' and not just because they're brand new. They're just less pillowy and felt much better especially in the ankle. Most importantly, as I increase my miles per week it's important to have shoes to switch into to decrease the compression on any one pair. So far I'm impressed with these Kayanos. Mile 5.9 down hopefully a couple hundred more to go before trashing these!

Run: http://www.gmap-pedometer.com/?r=2526876
Moderate pace with a push in the middle and at the end. Swing out to Atlantic, down the harbor to the Manhattan Bridge, Race pace across the bridge, and then an easy out and back through Manhattan. Back across the Brooklyn Bridge at a very moderate pace, back across the promenade at just fast enough to practice my kick.

Details:
Distance: 5.9
Time: 52 minutes
Heart Rate: 156 Average (though I think I need a new battery as the start was super slow - I'm not that fit!)

Manhattan Bridge:
Average pace: 7:23
Distance: 1.2 miles
Stride length: 4 feet (versus 3 ft 9 in for the average of the entire run)
Just felt great and pushed it hard up and down the bridge. Running the Manhattan is great because there's nobody on it. It's dark, it's cold, it's got trains running right next to me, and it's hard core. But all that, put together is fun. The views aren't nearly as good as the Brooklyn (but I'm not exactly sight seeing anyway).

General thoughts on the run:
All was well in the world (Steph putting Dylan to sleep) and TGIF!

Recovery:
after 2 minutes: 103 bpm average for 1 minute (down from 111 at the start of that minute)
after 5 minutes: 98 bpm average for 2 minutes (down to 89 beats at the end of two minutes - but I was eating because at this point I was hungry.

Slippy Icy Rainy Mess - Redhook out and back

2009-01-28T16:05:00.000-08:00

Slow recovery run today - nothing special save the fact that it was nearly freezing, raining, with inches of snow and ice on the ground and the streets were running with nearly freezing water. Other than that it was just cake.

Pretty simple run = flat Redhook out and back

Distance: 5.74 miles
Time: 57 mins
HRM Ave: 143 bpm

General feelings and thoughts were that my legs felt fantastic given that I'd run a half on Sunday and this was Wednesday. I was worried that if it froze up overnight that I wouldn't get a run in before Friday, which would be bad. Now I can run on Friday and then make it happen over the weekend.

Manhattan Half Marathon

2009-01-25T18:56:00.000-08:00

Today I completed my first official half marathon. There's a bit of a story about how that's the case - here it is. I was planning on running the Brooklyn Half marathon last year in May. Unfortunately a slight knee injury kept me out of that one. Then, on July 27th, 2008 I was scheduled to run the Nike New York half - this race is great, starting in Central Park and ending, via Times Square, at Battery Park. Since Dylan was born 15 minutes before the start, I didn't get the chance to run that one either. So I was really looking forward to completing this race.

The train was delayed, leaving me at the Road Runner's office to pick up my number spot on 7:30. The start was at 65th street meaning that #582 (24th overall finisher - and a great guy. Very modest and interesting - go #582!) and I ran from NYRR to the start - leaving off our stuff at the baggage drop 5 minutes before the start. I wanted to put on my shades and double tie my shoes, so after jumping in the corral (a slow one) I bent over to get it done. No sooner had I gone over, it seemed, but the guy behind me (the sighted member of a blind running team) said, 'we're moving' either to me or to his ward. So I very quickly tied and we were off - to move about 10 feet only to stop again. So I got the shades on and the shoes tied.

Distance: 13.1 Miles, 21.1 Kilometers
Date/Time: Jan. 25, 2009, 8:00 am
Location: Central Park, NYC
Weather: 14 deg., 52% humidity, wind 6 mph

Results:

Last Name	First Name	Bib	OverallPlace	GenderPlace	Age Place	Finish Time	Pace/ Mile
PARKS	JOSHUA	1517	1521	1224	251	01:48:44	08:18

Data:

Mile	Time	Ave. Heart Rt.	Mile	Time	Ave. Heart Rt.	Mile	Time	Ave. Heart Rt.
1	08:21	158	7	08:16	165	13	08:21	172
2	08:18	163	8	08:16	167	0.1	00:51	175
3	07:51	163	9	07:57	170
4	08:28	165	10	08:44	169
5	08:22	166	11	08:35	170
6	07:55	163	12	08:23	167
							Time	Ave. Heart Rt.
							01:48.44	163

Thoughts:

This race was a test of both endurance (duh!) and patience since I ran it entirely at around 88% of my peak rate (save the last mile, where I 'kicked' a pathetic showing as you'll see). The first miles I really did a good job of moving without burning up on cardio. By the second loop my pace was slowing a bit - although I was amazingly consistent throughout. The miles are presented so that the times/heart rates can be compared easily.

My goal was to finish in less than 2 hours - which I did. However I left the race disappointed simply because of the way I felt on miles 9 through the end. The hills of Central Park are very unforgiving and although I did a great job of running them on the first go, I didn't feel as though I ran them well on the second. I was very, very grateful that I didn't run my usual crazy fast splits, as this would have left me unable to finish.

All told though this race was a huge success. I ran more or less the race I wanted (I had planned to run between 150 and 160/165 throughout - this broke down on the second lap but partly because I felt good and didn't feel it necessary to keep it down for the second lap). That always feels good. I didn't know how consistently I'd run and felt as though my legs were stiff as boards on the last three miles. I had to 'gut through' a couple of ones at the end - something that I'm not used to. But I've posted a starting point for longer runs.

Conclusion:

I really need to run more frequently both to build the base but also to enable faster miles. This is simply the way it is. I am planning on working with Steph to figure out how I can carve out some time to make it happen. I look to decrease my times here and hope that I can improve on this time significantly by the end of the year. I can't imagine doing the marathon at this pace - but it's nice to feel like I'm building a base from this place.

Finally - getting in more than 1 run per week

2009-01-24T07:39:00.000-08:00

Made it out yesterday for a second run of the week. Around Prospect Park again, this time there was no snow and it was much warmer. Wore my HRM this time and tried to keep it under 165 for the full run which helped me keep a consistent pace (though I did stop to stretch twice as my calf was sore from last Monday's run). Here's the Nike Plus record:

Snowy run around Prospect Park

2009-01-19T16:14:00.000-08:00

I made a bit of a social observation on my run today. On the West side of Prospect Park the sidewalk was salted and cleared - that's where all the nice houses are...as I ran around the South end of the Park there was a bit of snow accumulation. When I hit the east side where it's a little more economically 'diverse' there was too much snow to run safely on the sidewalk and I had to move to the road inside the Park (see map here....http://www.gmap-pedometer.com/?r=2502616)

I ran a lot faster as I was actually kicking my heels up a bit for a change. I think this is the key to me picking up a bit of speed. Unfortunately it burned me out and I ended up walking a little bit as my HR was way out of zone.

Still need to get in more than a run a week - managed to get on the treadmill once this week in Boston. Hoping this week will be a bit easier on lifestyle, committing to not watch TV and get up early for the runs.

Slow down to speed up? Aerobic training run

2009-01-19T15:48:00.000-08:00

Run:
Brooklyn Bridge to Battery City Park to Brooklyn Bridge

Description:
Aerobic conditioning

Conditions:
30 degrees F, Snowing, ½ to 1 inch compressed snow on the ground

Details:
After reading my last post, Mika, my unofficial coach, suggested that I learn about aerobic conditioning. Thus I read a couple of webpages and decided that my zone for healthy aerobic conditioning was 144 to 155 bpm. Thus, this run whenever I got my heart rate up too high, I slowed down. When I got too low, I sped up. Notice the difference between the Heart Rate readings on his run versus the one from 6 days ago:
19 January 2009: Zone Aerobic Run

13 January 19, 2009: Typical Training Run

With the ‘new’ type of running – very ‘slow’ with a strong constant pace and aerobic conditions – it feels/appears that I can run forever. That’s the idea of these types of conditioning runs. I’m not convinced of what to do next as I’ve read conflicting things about when one can add speed work to the mix. My sense is that I will keep running in this zone for the bulk of my running with a fast workout thrown in.

I hope that this enables me to take up the speed of my regular running as I was struggling to increase my pace and always seemed to get zapped out – experiencing slowly decreasing per mile times in later miles of the run.

All of this is fairly obvious to the exercise physiologists of the world, but I just hadn’t realized the extent to which I’d succumbed to my couch potato lifestyle!

Note how the times of my later miles do not decrease as they typically do on longer runs – this is how I know that I’m in my aerobic zone:
Mile Speed Dist from Start
1. A 10:58 1.0
2. A 8:56 2.0
3. A 8:32 3.0
4. A 9:11 4.0
5. A 9:57 5.0
6. A 9:01 6.0
7. A 9:45 7.0
1 13:47 7.1
Finally I picked a great time to start this type of training as running for speed on a slick, snow and ice covered roadway isn’t a good idea. As it turned out, this was a wonderful way to spend the last two hours of light on a Monday afternoon!

Redhook Recovery Run

2009-01-13T16:49:00.000-08:00

Summary: 4.5 miles in 37:12

8:16 average pace
164 beats per minute average
Temp 38 degrees very low wind
Felt generally excellent throughout
Map - http://www.gmap-pedometer.com/?r=2489599

Comments:

This is a very familiar run for me, and one that I haven't done for some time. It's refreshing to travel a known course that I haven't run since before Dylan was born. First mile was amazing – flew through it even though it felt like a recovery run (heart rate average was 150!). Huge advantage to run a downhill and/or flat course after the bridges and Central Park hills that I typically handle.

Miles over time

7:35 (150 bpm ave)
8:04 (166 bpm ave)
8:28 (164 bpm ave)
8:14 (176 bpm ave)
4:50 (180 bpm ave) – ran straight up hill fartleg style to finish, cooled off (not timed)

Recovery intervals:

@ 2 mins (for 1 min)

Max 131

Min 122

Average 126

5 mins (for 5 mins)

Start of 5 mins – 121

Average over five mins – 112

Final heart rate – 103

Existential thoughts:

This run takes me out of my neighborhood down through Redhook to the end of this part of Brooklyn. At the furthest from our apartment, I see the Verazanno Bridge on my left and the Lady Liberty on my right. This is when I come around the Fairway market, our favorite place to shop, which has been built into an old red brick warehouse. From there, it's along a walking path that used to be a high gauge train line of some kind. As if to prove that trains actually ran on this track, a couple of rusted old cars sit, right outside of Fairway's eating patio.

From there it's a left turn in a different world...from comfortable NY Borough jogging straight into something out of Raymond Chandler. Except I used to live in SD and almost nowhere in that city still has the feeling of those great novels. This sure does – shapeless 19^th century warehouses on the left, an unused in winter dock on the right. Which contrasts in the mind with the lively houseboat lifestyle lived by some there in the Summer as I can tell you. Straight ahead on this particular night was two potentially moving shapeless posts marking the end of the drive. It turned out that when I past them they were two drunk 'artists' headed home in heavy coats, speaking in low tones.

Another right, and down the street to the seemingly Daliesq Ikea – where did that come from? Folks on the street with the patented blue plastic bags, heaping with purchases.

From there another left turn, as a right turn would end me up in the freezing Atlantic – down the street there is some sort of slow motion drug deal happening between gentlemen in an Ateam van and a 1986 Chevy Impala, extended edition.

It's just about then that I realize that running is more like being in a car than being on foot. You don't actually want to be any of the places that you are at that time. Well sometimes you do – when I run through Times Square or across the Brooklyn Bridge, I enjoy being there. I'm happy to be there. But other times I want to be through my work out; I want to be somewhere else, done, not there, and I'm simply there because it's between where I was and where I'm going.

Fred Lebow 5M

2009-01-11T18:47:00.000-08:00

Okay - so I finally got out for my first run and my first qualification of the new year. I'm figuring on running my 9 races again this year to qualify for the 2010 NY marathon just in case.

I'm pretty happy with results. Here is what my Nike +iPod measured - the time was accurate, but the distance a little off...you can't see very well in this graphic, but in the larger one I noticed how my pace picked up as the crowd thinned after two miles - my first mile took nearly 11:45 to run!!!

Roadrunner results (official)
Time - 47:01
Pace - 9:24

I was hoping to get out for a long run today but the icy conditions were just too risky - I'm on the road again this week in Boston but going to make a real effort to get some miles logged.

Chargers Gear Powers Parks through Fred Lebow Classic

2009-01-10T11:20:00.000-08:00

The Fred Lebow classic marked a positive result from my perspective as I beat my goal of 38 minutes. I also wore a Chargers T and skull cap to support my team tomorrow!

Mile	Time	Comment
1	07:38	Crowded
2	07:11	Thinned out, downhill
3	07:27
4	07:59	Dreaded hill, better than before
5	07:20	Brought it home

Last Name	First Name	Sex/ Age	Bib	Overall Place
PARKS	JOSHUA	M36	1271	612
Gender Place	Age Place	Finish Time	Pace/ Mile	AG %
516	111	37:39	7:31	58.2 %

Significantly slower than my PR of 36:52 run early the morning of June 4^th of last year – this race marked the 50^th anniversary of NYRR's founding. But it does mark and improvement over the 39:45 that I ran over 8000 meters (4.9 miles) in March of this year – since we are going to be away that precise date this year, this will stand in on my goal to run each race faster than I ran it last year. It also suggests that I'm fitter this January than I was last March, another good sign.

The only other data point that I have is 38:20 – which I managed on the SECOND lap in preparation for the NY Half Marathon last Summer. Thus, you can see how far I have to go to get back in the shape that I was just before Dylan was born – sets a nice goal!

Details:

Heart Rate – 177 average (I pushed hard this race and the crowded, slow start didn't help)

General overall – felt very strong and focused

Niggly injury update – none to report

Manhattan Bridge to the Southern Tip Out and Back

2008-12-28T15:36:00.000-08:00

Following a successful run at the opposite end of Long Island I returned to face the western tip today with a bit of the southern tip of Manhattan thrown in.

Total distance (gmap-pedometer, as my footpod was inactive for some reason this run): 9.7 miles

Total time (including waiting for lights, e.g. wind breaks!): 1:14 flat

Route:

http://www.gmap-pedometer.com/?r=2457243

Manhattan Bridge out and back across to West Broadway, down to the southern tip, around and back via Manhattan Bridge. I typically don't run back across the Manhattan but the weather was great so I figured everyone (and their dogs) would be on the Brooklyn Bridge so I steered clear.

Details:

Heart Rate – was very low for me, especially at this speed (7:40 or so) – around 165 bpm average

Thoughts – felt great, but then again running in a long sleeve with tights (no hat, no gloves, no jacket) will do that to you. Missed my new, on order, clear glasses for training – too dark for shades and too windy not to have something. I refuse to run in my regular glasses, but need some eye protection.

China town looks great this time of year, go check it out if you haven't!

Niggly report – all well on that front. Believe that my new insoles are the culprit, and will replace them and test those old shoes...the left arch feels great and the quad is better too. Small blister, but it was a long run.

Boxing Day - Sag Harbor Run with Diane

2008-12-26T23:41:00.000-08:00

Traveling and running are always simultaneously challenging and incredibly rewarding. This staycation we went to Sag Harbor to visit Steph's sister, and fellow NYRR runner, Diane. Today Diane and I went out (and back) for a 7.84 miler. Pedometer link can be found here -

http://www.gmap-pedometer.com/?r=245435

Showing that I am, in general, willing to run anywhere – here we're on the exact opposite tip of Long Island from our house. Special thanks to Steph (and Dylan) for staying home and keeping the home fire burning, literally!, while we ran.

Details:

Pace – “Recovery” – averaged 8:41 min per mile

Heart Rate – 155 average (much, much slower than race pace, which is good)

General overall – felt strong, could most certainly have gotten up into double digits at that pace without trouble

Niggly injury update – the outside of my left arch has been bugging me, especially on longer runs, but it didn't bother me at all. I also have a very slight strain on my right quad, which again didn't bother me during this run – save the end when it reappeared in a much less naggy way – will stretch and hope for the best here

The Battle Begins

2008-12-23T05:40:00.000-08:00

I see two major battle fronts for the next year.

The first is getting out and logging mileage on my weary legs. It's hard to find time when I'm on the road and it's easy to just sit and hang with the family after a long day rather than head out for a run in the evening. I'm not a morning person so getting up early for a run before the day starts is also very hard.

The second battle is the food consumption. I'm living on the road a lot lately so I'm constantly eating in restaurants and it's hard to resist the temptation for good food that is rich and not particularly healthy. I'm planning to return to my previous vegetarian ways to reduce my consumption fatty meats. I'm also going to try and blog my food consumption - thereby embarrassing myself if I continue to overeat.

Last night I made it to the gym. Ran for 5 miles and did a little bit of weights after. Won't make it there today as I have to do some shopping then Susan and her sister are leaving me with the kids while they go to a show - tomorrow the gym is closed but I will try to make it outside for a run in the cold!

Ted Corbitt Frozen 15k

2008-12-20T18:15:00.000-08:00

As with many races today was something of a major success and, at the same time, a little bit of failure. When I got to the race this morning, I found that the race was no longer and instead it would be a fun run. Thus no link to my official results...undaunted I still ran the 'fun run' and did pretty well given the conditions – Officially from the national weather service the temperature was 23 degrees with 7-10 MPH winds.

NYRR Ted Corbitt 15K

The NYRR Ted Corbitt 15K took place on Saturday, December 20, as an unscored fun run in Central Park, due to icy road conditions. (from the NY Road Runner's Web page).

For pictures of the race – click here

For pictures of me running the race - click here

Regarding my run – as per usual I went out too fast, that said it felt GREAT. And when I say great I mean I was running great splits (for me) all the way into the 8^th mile – as you can see here:

Mile	Time
1	08:13
2	07:22
3	07:25
4	08:13
5	07:41
6	08:05
7	07:51
8	08:24
9	08:12
0.3	02:48

Total time by the watch – 1:14:18 (could have been slightly less given the gloves factor) but it was a fun run so nobody cares, right?

Comments are that mile 1 was crowded and hilly. Miles 2 and 3 felt great. Mile 4 was hilly. Mile 5 through 7 were around the turn coming for home (but the bottom of the loop). Mile 8 – now that's the problem, but I think the wheels feel off a little bit there. Nice to see that I pulled some time back on the 9^th mile though, shaving 12 seconds off the previous mile. The finish was a bit slick and thus the 8:30 time on the last 0.3 mile.

One interesting tid bit, perhaps very interesting (please comment) for the more experienced runners; I had two gels with me, one which I ate before the start. And the second that I wanted to eat at 45 minutes. But I was so far ahead of my planned pace that I didn't eat it on the straight away (it was only 35 mins in) and instead thought about it at 45 mins (which was on a huge hill - so I didn't do it) and instead finished the race without. Saturday afternoon quarterback I think that I might not have struggled so badly on mile 8 and 9 if I'd taken the gel. Food for thought - pun intended...!

For more information on the course:

http://www.nyrr.org/races/2008/pdf/map_corbitt_08.pdf

Most importantly I stayed warm and finished the race – even though I'd hoped (especially during the 47 minute completion of the 6^th mile) to beat my personal best time of:

Distance (miles) Net Time Pace/Mile Overall Place Gender Place Age Place Age-Graded %

Colon Cancer Challenge 15K
March 9, 2008 Parks, Joshua M35 Brooklyn, 9.3 1:13:53 7:56 894 716 281 56.4 %

A final thought – I managed to accomplish a huge goal – always a goal really, but important when the miles get high of running faster than 8 minutes a mile on average. The Central Park course is particularly hilly, yada, yada, but it's always important to run faster than my goal (at this point) time for the NY Martahon in the Fall. Let's see how training goes, it's a long, long time away, (perhaps those 7:30 miles will start adding up?) but it's nice to see that I can sustain the goal pace and manage to finish the race with something left.

All in I'm proud of myself for making the effort. Seemed like many others just stayed in bed, and I certainly wanted to do so too!