1 week down

April 7th Day 7: Sometimes you just need to rest. After the 9 mile run on Friday, I needed to just sit on my couch, eat and be lazy. I didn’t even do core. In all honesty, I couldn’t even tell you what I watched on TV. Life is good.

April 8th Day 8: The rest day yesterday was great. However, trying to get up this morning and go for a run was a bit of a chore. Sometimes you just need to force yourself to get up and go for a run. I ran a nice little 4 mile loop this morning and the weather was beautiful. It felt like it was 50 degrees because the sun was shining bright and the wind was non-existent (until I hit a small NW breeze around 2.5 miles).

Around 1.5 miles I started to feel these strange pains in my legs – more specifically in my shins. It wasn’t too painful and they don’t hurt right now, we’ll see tomorrow. About every step for another half mile or so the pain felt like it would jump from one shin to the other. I sucked it up. Nothing really happened to me on the run which is very disappointing. I did however get some weird looks. Apparently I’m a bad person for not going to church on Easter and choosing to go for a run instead. Oh well, I'll live with that.

After one full week of base training I can safely say that I am alive with no pain. I do know that that will change very quickly over the next couple of weeks. Like I have said at the beginning of the training, I just need to take it easy and take care of my body. There is still a lot more miles to run and more beer to be drunk. 

What was I thinking?

April 6th Day 6: The actual route was 9.7ish. What the hell was I thinking? Today I was visiting my Alma Mater and decided I probably should get a run in. I contacted a friend that is still attending Keuka and who happens to have run cross country with me and is currently training for the Buffalo marathon (along with 2 others)! Did we ever go for a run…

The weather was beautiful for a run, just about 50 degrees and sunny with a slight breeze. Keuka Lake is a beautiful place to run but choose your runs wisely as they can turn out to be a bit hilly. I didn’t realize my friend Liz was training for a marathon as well. Too bad she’s been running a lot more than I have! Just before the run Liz asks me how far I was planning on. Let’s just say it was about half of what she wanted to run.

Seriously, if you’ve never been to Keuka Lake you should check it out. Besides the fact that that there really is nothing to do out there except drink and run it is beautiful. However, it is ridiculously hilly which makes you want to hate your life. The first 4.6 miles was great – the sun was beating down and there was a slight breeze. In fact, I thought I was over dressed wearing a long sleeve shirt. The four of us agreed that we would walk up Brown Hill road, good idea. That is approximately a 6.3% grade and .4 miles long. I did not count the .4 miles of the run since we walked it and I stopped the watch. We get to the top and stretch quick and start going again.

I kid you not, once we started running on top of Brown Hill road it seemed that a wind storm decided to come and it felt about 30 degrees. Not fun. The last 4.4 miles was brutally cold and windy. Pretty sure I could have cut diamonds at this point. On the last 4.4 miles we all realized that we are in fact in the middle of no wear. I am also sure that there is a lot of incest and toothless people on the road we were on. Liz told us that the last time she ran this loop a goat chased her for a few minutes – thankfully that goat didn’t show up today. We probably could have died today…

Anyways, I’m assuming it was about 9 total miles of running. My legs hurt and it requires some beer. So far I have had a Corona (choke), a Brooklyn IPA (delicious) and a Smithwick’s (amazingly delicious). I’m going to continue drinking some Smithwick’s because I thoroughly believe I need to intake some calories. 

I hope beers translate into miles

April 5th Day 5: I was supposed to run this morning. That didn’t happen. Seriously, one can never get enough sleep. Luckily, I didn’t have to get to work until 8am this morning so I got some extra sleep.

The weather was looking a bit bleak throughout the day. Around 3pm the sun decided to come out and it warmed up just enough to make the run this evening pleasant. The temperature was almost perfect and there was hardly any wind. However, running is still a chore for me.

I wasn’t too sure where I would run. In fact, I even told one of my drinking buddies I couldn’t go out for beers with him until after the run (we’re heading out in a little bit) – this is a big deal. I finally decided to run the same loop as I ran on Tuesday – a nice 3.18 mile loop (25:43 total time) – but backwards. It turns out the way I ran it today was much easier. I’ll pretend that I’m in decent shape after five days of base training.

It never really ceases to amaze me the lack of attention drivers give runners, pedestrians and cyclists. I really shouldn’t be surprised and I probably should pay better attention as I drag my carcass down streets. On the run today I almost perished twice. Maybe I shouldn’t run by busy businesses’ parking lots. I understand that turning right on red is a great concept, but it also helps to look to the right before actually turning. Good thing I saw this one coming and this chick may have gotten the finger. Too bad I’m invisible when I’m running. The second time was on a side road that has some heavy traffic at times. I had to get up on the sidewalk because there was some traffic coming. I wasn’t on the sidewalk for no more than 2 minutes and some guy decides to back out of his driveway without looking. That was bit close but disaster was averted. He wasn’t too happy because it was clearly my fault that I was running on the sidewalk.

Since I almost died twice today, I’d consider it to be my lucky day that I’m alive. Time for a few drinks.  

Catch up of 4 days...

I’m a beer drinker and I have a running problem. That’s not too far from the truth except that I am rediscovering my love of running from almost a year of separation.  

For those of you that don’t know, I used to run all the time. In high school, I skipped classes to go for runs and I couldn’t think about anything else except what my splits should and will be during practice or the next race. I used to day dream of running sub- 5 minute miles like it was my job. I once threatened my high schools girl’s soccer team for cutting in front of us (the cross country team) during one of our workouts – I later had to write an apology note to the soccer team. After high school I went to college and ran. I brought my determination to Keuka College all for about one season and that is where my love for running started to fade.

After junior year in college I left for a semester to do an internship. The summer before senior year, I pretty much stopped running. My alcohol consumption increased (still hasn’t gone down) and I turned into a hobby jogger. I’ve been going on spurts of running for a month or two then stop for three or four months.  This brings me to current day.

About three weeks ago, more specifically St. Patrick’s Day, I ran in a local 5 mile race with a co-worker. After the race I decided I wanted to get back into running. I pondered the idea for awhile and made the commitment of “I’m going all in.” Essentially, that means I am going to train for my first marathon. This blog will keep me honest and keep you laughing.

My training started exactly on April 1, 2012. Being April Fool’s day I was really hoping I was going to fool myself but apparently my mind has caught up. To start training I know that I need to create my base. I will be following an 18 week training plan as the marathon is on September 23rd, 2012 and 18 weeks out will be May 20th, 2012. Until then, it’s all about the miles and getting the legs used to this strange movement again.

April 1st Day 1: A nice 3 mile jaunt around the neighborhood. Running around Greece, NY is fairly easy. However, when one isn’t used to just going out and running 3 miles, you might notice these random little inclines and declines throughout the neighborhoods. I didn’t have a watch for this run so I had no idea at what pace I was running but I’m assuming it was somewhere around 5:30 pace – at least it felt like it. After every run, even back in the glory days, I would go walk down the street for a little cool down. Half way down the street I turned around and ran back to the house – the bathroom was calling my name. Note to everyone: don’t eat about 5 servings of Buffalo chicken wing dip the day before a run.  I actually felt pretty good after the run overall. Nothing gets better than having a nice cold beer after a run. No, it doesn’t defeat the purpose!

April 2nd Day 2: At work I sent a text to a good friend, Matt A. asking if he’d like to join me for a “4ish mile run.” He obviously said sure so I met up with him at his place. We had a great run through Mt. Hope Cemetery. I never realized how damn hilly that place was. Matt hadn’t run for a month (granted, he was recovering from an incredible indoor track season) and he is just a much faster runner than I, he really punished me. As I was trying to suck in oxygen, he was talking away. I gave it the college try to appear that I wasn’t struggling – I think it went alright. During the run, I couldn’t help but realize that we probably ran further than 4 miles but I didn’t dare ask Matt in fear that he would make us go further. We got back to his place and the time was 40 minutes and change…damn we ran 5 miles. I need a beer.

April 3rd Day 3: I’m at work and I send Matt a text: “How are your legs feeling?” Clearly he was in much better shape than I was. The legs were a bit stiff and when I woke up in the morning I was telling myself there was no way, unless Hell froze over, that I would run after work. What happened at 5:30pm? I went out for a nice 3.18 mile run. The start of the run was great. I looked like a stiff zombie as I’m pretty sure I couldn’t bend my knees. About mile 2 I look at my watch and I see 13 minutes and change. Holy crap, I’m going way too fast for base training and marathon training in general. This is the perfect opportunity and a great excuse to slow way down. Now, I’m right in front of Wegmans and there is a lot of traffic so I needed to make this look good. Luckily, everyone else is in a car and they can’t tell if I’m running fast or not. Perfect. Nothing is better for you post run than a couple of cheese burgers. A calorie is a calorie no matter how delicious.

April 4th Day 4: I need a rest. Since I haven’t run consistently in about a year I know what I’m doing. If I am going to do this right, I need to take a break. Today I did a nice little core workout and stretched for a good 30 minutes. Sometimes it’s nice to take a break and get a little focused and recovered. Good thing the night isn’t over so I can get some beer in me! After all, it is Opening Day for baseball so I need to continue with the American tradition. Tomorrow will be a morning run but not sure where or how far yet!