Archive for September, 2008

Had a happy 7 w/8 100m strides today.  The weather is gorgeous, really felt like Fall is just around the corner.  I guess technically it’s here already, but until I get a run under 60 degrees, it’s still the end of Summer to me.

A nice thing for frequent commenter and blogger Dogpound and I, we were linked on a cool Scranton City blog yesterday.  It’s an article about Steamtown, check it out.

So I forgot to mention the other day I did something astounding last Saturday…left my Garmin at home.  Yep, I used my Ironman watch for the first time, bought days before the Garmin, but never used.  The thing is more confusing to me than the Garmin but after scouring the directions sheet for too long, I figured out how it works.

What drove me to it was the usual thing of wanting to deal with my Garmin dependency in general, but also, I’ve been annoyed with Garmin’s inaccuracies lately.  I finally noticed that a great part of the path where I run is marked, albeit on the ground and very faint in some areas, but enough that I could check my real time against the Garmin.  What an eye-opener it was on Sunday’s 18-miler.

I wore the Garmin that day, but took it off auto-lap, pressing the lap button whenever I passed a marker.  I went a little crazy with it because I was so intent on finding out what’s really going on, that I ended up with 50 laps!  Obviously, it kept me happily occupied during the run.

What I discovered was, when you use the lap button to mark laps and then look at the resulting pace in Garmin Training Center, the distance multiplied to make a mile (.25 mile x 4) does not equal the Garmin avg. pace listed in the program.  This is a big deal and changes the average totals.  Sometimes it’s faster, sometimes slower, but rarely equivalent to the Pace in TC or on the Garmin itself, while in use.  However, if you do a programmed workout on the Garmin (like 5×600), the multiplication works, it’s just manually entered laps that don’t equate.

What does this mean?  It means it’s better to manually mark laps in a race (as I’ve been doing) and also, in a race, to ignore the pace information completely (beyond instantaneous, even avg. lap pace) which pretty much invalidates the use of the Garmin except for analyzing later.  Now maybe this has something to do with where I live, I know when we were out West (and closer to the sky), it was perfectly accurate, and maybe when the trees lose their leaves that’ll make a difference, but I’m more mistrustful of my Garmin than ever, which ends up being a good thing, as now I will use the park markers more often.

Oh, and you can imagine that upon discovering this, I totally mistrusted my whole training history and had a major freakout, but with a little help from mapmyrun.com, I discovered my intervals and tempos were correct, nothing wildly off there.  Whew! But tomorrow, I’ve got 8 w/3×1600 and I’ll be using the mile markers, so make that 3xmile.  I’m going to go ahead and wear the Garmin for uploading afterwards but tomorrow, it’s just a big fat watch.

I realized my sailor mouth was getting pretty bad on this blog lately, so I’ll try to hold back on the cursing for a little while.

Today was my last LR, I had planned on 17 but changed it to 18 with a couple bells and whistles thrown in.  The bells and whistles were a couple trips up/down most of Smile Hill and somewhere in the second half I added a couple MP miles. Avg pace 9:07.

The run, I should mention, was done in the rain from the start to finish, so my longest rainy run ever.  I wasted quite a bit of time beforehand, hoping the rain would stop, but then finally put on my Wright socks (good for blister protection), a visor and gobs of BodyGlide and got out there.  Funny how the rain kept 95% of the usual running traffic at home, there were so many fewer runners that everyone said Hi and some even spoke in friendly full sentences – it was sweet.

Anyway, I’m glad the last long one’s over and that taper is finally, officially here.  I scared Nick yesterday, told him that after this run my taper would really begin.  He asked what taper was and I replied, “Like PMS for two solid weeks”.  He informed me he’ll be staying with friends for the next 14 days.

Aside from the running stuff, I had a weird moment the other day, watching Dateline.  There was a story about a kid who’s gotten beat up by bullies for most of his school life so his mom is suing the bullies and their parents.  The kid and his mom even went on the Today show and some other national program.

So it was quite freaky when the story began and the camera pans on my old high school, Fayetteville High in Arkansas.  Later, a shot of Woodland Jr. High, the same one I switched to because I was bullied myself so much at the other Jr. High (being fat and having a big nose was a real pain in the ass in Fayetteville, AR).

The weirdest thing was they interviewed one of the bullies and I’m not kidding, nothing has changed in the near 30 years since I went there.  The jerks are just as stupid with the same vacuous expressions, even the hairstyles are the same.  It was enough to give me the heebie jeebies and remind me why I left for NYC at 17 years old, a mere two weeks after graduation – I couldn’t get out of there fast enough. Thank god for growing up, is all I can say.

…were the first words my ex-husband said to me over the phone, after reading Sunday’s race report.  I laughed so hard, because he’s the sweetest, well-spoken Englishman and I don’t even think he called me that in the midst of our worst fights.  And I have to admit…I am.

Last week, because of the mini-taper for the race, it ended up only being a 38-mile week.  I was due for a cutback anyway, since the previous 4 weeks mileage were 57, 50, 49, 50, it came at a good time.  But since this week is technically my first week of taper, I didn’t want to lose whatever quality work was on the schedule, as well as keeping the scheduled mileage.

So yesterday I ran 8 easy, no pushing, averaged 9:07.  No complaints, felt good.  Today’s schedule (after some creative rearranging)  was 8 w/5×600 (the usual 5K pace, 90 sec rest intervals).

I won’t lie, I wondered how speedwork would feel after a major jolt to the body, especially because my fertile imagination still pondered sudden death, dropping among the army of fat, brown geese waddling along the path – though considering the unprecedented amount of goose shit today, I was more likely to slip and fall than collapse from a workout.

So forget my previous VO2max pacing, I figured today would be fine doing it for effort, but one thing was sure, I was doing ‘em, no question about that.  Started my first one, heard that tuneless beep on my Garmin that says the workout has fallen below my chosen pace.  No surprise, it could beep all it wanted, and it did, incessantly.  Final turtle pace tally: 7:25, 7:29, 7:29, 7:25, 7:34.  Eh, I really can’t complain after the weekend I had.  It did the job, got my legs moving and my heart beating, but that was all I had in me today.

Another observation from Sunday, as I look down as my lightly skinned knees and wonder how that happened (I really haven’t a clue).

Know that if something like major dehydration happens to you, you lose all reasoning, because I remember at one point, during that slow death march to avoid a DNF, I kept wondering if I was dehydrated or had hyponatremia (too much water!).  I knew it was one or the other, but was paralyzed in my thoughts as to what to do about it, so I did nothing.  Crazy stuff.

So tomorrow I have 5 recovery on tap and on Sunday, my last long run (really? already? sigh, can’t believe this is coming to a close) of 17 miles.  My main goal for the 17 is to take my time, my secondary goal is to not want to puke when I take my gels.

They’ll be in the flask, which will help, but some time after I puked from the sports drink on Sunday, I had an idea in the back of my mind that I should take another gel, but the thought was absolutely nauseating.  I’m hoping that was only temporary disgust, unlike when you get drunk in high school on pina coladas and can’t drink them for a decade…if so, this could be problematic.

Let me close by saying I cannot wait for the debates tonight.  I see McCreepy has finally agreed to attend now that he’s done saving the world.  I’m utterly excited to watch Obama be as erudite, logical, level-headed and brilliant as ever.  The Class Act vs. The Lizard…this should be fun.

Doc appointment was fine, EKG is fine, Flo is fine, fine, fine!!  So what did I do the second I got home?  Baked toll-house cookies.  Nah!  Out the door for 5 recovery.

Though I was tempted to wear a ski mask in case anyone recognized me, I stuck to shorts and a top and started moving – a little scared of myself, a bit fragile mentally, but once I got going and stopped imagining my chest walls imploding or death from sudden heart attack, it was just like old times (old times = Saturday).

My strangely dependable legs haven’t a clue that I raced 11 miles on Sunday, they feel great as ever.  Funny, since that was my only fear about doing a Half 3 weeks out from Steamtown, “will my legs be able to recover?”   Ah, the irony.

So medical emergencies aside, let’s look at what I managed to complete during this weekend’s misadventure.  The tracking splits told me I was right on pace at the 10K mark (8:00) and showed a (not surprising) fade at 10-miles (8:06) before I crashed solidly at mile 11.  So I guess I can consider the PDR a non-standard, superlong 10-mile tempo run.  Not at all the race predictor I wanted and needed, but not exactly chopped liver.

It remains to be seen what I’ll do with this week.  I had easy runs except for some 600s planned for Friday, which I’m on the fence about.  I actually think I’m ok physically to do them, but we’ll see.  It’s supposed to be crappy weather that day so I might just play Recovering Patient and skip them.

I have a 17 planned for Sunday, which I really wanted to be my last 20, but I know I don’t need to push that to the limit either, so I’ll try and be satisfied with the 17.  At least I got four 20-22s this cycle, though I’m not thrilled the last one will have been 4 weeks from the race.  C’est la vie.

And with that, I want to thank you guys again for such great well wishes and comments, you made me feel like I have a huge support team behind me, and I guess I really do – so hugs and kisses and super sweet thoughts going to every single one of you.  I want everyone to have the best running this Fall imaginable, let’s all have some crazy PRs, titillating races, memorable moments (maybe not too memorable) and just some damn fun running all ’round.  High five!!  um, you’ll have to do it to yourself, but I’m there in spirit.

This was a day of firsts:

1. First Did Not Finish
2. First time my body’s ever given out on me
3. First Ambulance Ride
4. First ER stay
5. First intravenous
6. First EKG

Let’s start at the beginning, shall we?

Got to my corral easily, lots of room.  The Star Spangled Banner singer forgot the words which made all 15,000 of us crack up.  Then the race began.

Started off fine, much better racing this year than last, I’ve learned a lot about pacing and not freaking out, so it was steady as she goes from the top.  Started off with a couple 8:03s, the next two were 7:53, 7:54, then 8:01s, feeling pretty good about, too.  At mile 4, I needed a drink, so I got some water at the station, but only managed a sip.

Continuing on to West River Drive, I didn’t take my own advice to get on the sidewalk at the camber because I didn’t want to deal with it and also, I really wanted to run this course the way it’s certified, without any shortcuts or adjustments.  No problem, the camber didn’t even seem bad to me, when it has in the past.

The map showed the next water stop at the 10K mark, so I took my gel too early.  I really missed having a flask, because I had this full mouth of snot (the gel) and had to breathe a few times before I could get it down.  Then the water stop was a bit farther than I’d presumed, so I was getting all anxious about if I’d cramp from the delay.  No cramp, so that was good, but again, I obviously didn’t get enough water in me, though didn’t realize it at the time.  I really hate water stops.

At this point, my pace is starting to lag and I’m thinking I suck, why is this happening, interspersed with positive attempts, like how strong I am and all that jazz.   Well, you can imagine which side was winning.  When we come to the little hill towards Falls Bridge, I push it hard, knowing it’s easier once that bit’s over, but not feeling too good.

I had one more half-assed water stop at mile 11 and that’s when it happened.  I can’t even remember clearly how it started, I think I moved to the side of the road and just basically sat down.  Then this really handsome guy comes over and asks me if I’m OK.  He’s just standing there, I’ve no idea where he came from.  I tell him I don’t feel right, he hands me some Cytomax which I promptly throw up in several heaves.

The medic guys come over on their Segways and ask if I’m ok, I tell them I’m naseous and unsure if I’m alright.  Meanwhile, I ask the handsome guy what his name is, it’s Clarence, which ended up being immensly ironic to me, because if you remember, the angel in It’s A Wonderful Life was named Clarence, and this guy turns into my angel.  He stands there with me and says, I’m sticking with you, you can finish this race, I’ll wait till you’re ready.  I’m like, no, no, my stomach feels awful, you don’t have to wait with me, just go on.  But no, he waits until I say ok, and stand up, so rickety.

And for the next mile, he’s got my hand in his and says, no, this won’t be a DNF, you will finish this race.  Meanwhile, it’s crazy that this total stranger has let me ruin his own!  But it was horrible.  I was walking with this foreign loping uncontrollable gait, feeling like throwing up, telling him that this is all my fault, I was too cocky all this time, I have this popular running blog and I’ve been so sure of what I could do and look at the mess I’m in now.   For some reason, I thought this was my marathon! I was totally out of it.

Btw, picture me in my cute running skirt, covered in dirt and grass (because I wiped my face with grass after I puked).  Runners keep passing, asking, “does she need a medic?” but Clarence says, “no, she’s ok.”

At one point, I say to Clarence, this total stranger, “oh, god, I shit my pants.” which cracks me up in a sick way, as I remember this guy on the Marathon Forum who always talks about The Bear during races.  Shitting in your pants is The Bear.  I couldn’t believe I’d come face to face with The Bear.  So not only was it humiliating looking so filthy, disheveled and weak, I thought I had a huge shit stain on the back of my skirt.  Clarence is nonplussed and says, “no problem, that’s ok” but I’m sure he wondered why I kept muttering on about a bear.

Finally, I couldn’t take it anymore.  I was so disoriented, that although I run on this route every damn day, I had no clue what mile we were at, but I did know that the end was far away.  So I told Clarence I was totally ok with a DNF, I had to DNF, this was the end of the road for me, and just sat myself on the side of the street.  He got help, which came and asked me a few questions, but once I stood up and was totally dizzy, they got into emergency mode.  All these men appeared, opening things and sticking me with things, putting oxygen on me.

Eventually a car comes with the yellow seat of shame.  I call it that because it’s on the end of the car, so you’re facing all these runners coming towards you.  Let me tell you, it’s one thing to be sitting by the road and having everyone (and I mean everyone) who passes, stare at you, but it’s entirely another to be in the yellow seat of shame with an oxygen mask on, especially once it rounded the museum and not a single person didn’t turn their head for a good look.  Horrible.

But what was more horrible was when the medic guy starts asking me simple questions like, “what’s your birthday?” and I can’t quite remember.  I knew my name and my street, but I had no idea what my zipcode was, total blank.  It was at that point that I got scared.

Finally we pull up to the medic tent, two guys take my feet, another takes my back and they carry me in and put me on a cot.  But not before I look at the yellow seat of shame, relieved that I’d left no stain there.

All these wonderful doctor people are around, soooo incredibly nice, it was touching.  The one woman starts asking me questions, “what year is it?”  I thought and thought and finally said, “8! um…2000?  8?” which still didn’t seem like the right answer.  She asked me something else I didn’t know, but the funny thing was when she asked who the president was, I replied with pure vitriol, “BUSH!” (some things you just don’t forget).

They give me some fluids and she tells me I’ll need to go to the hospital because my blood pressure is 80/60 and I couldn’t answer those questions, so they need to know I didn’t have heat stroke. Before I leave she asks me how old I am for the second time, and when I say again, “47″, she said she thought I’d gotten it wrong the first time, didn’t think I was actually that old.  So I loved that woman dearly.

Then I tell one of the guys about Clarence, who wanted to meet me at the Rocky Statue, to tell him I won’t be able to meet him, but there he is in the tent.  I hugged and kissed him but am so sad I didn’t get his phone number, I feel like I at least owe him $65 for the race.  Though it’s a good thing I didn’t continue walking with him when I did, the doc said if I’d continued, I’d have likely blacked out.

Anyway, I turn to get off the cot and onto the gurney, and I can’t even fucking stand.  I fall back on the cot.  So with some help, I get on the gurney and there’s my first ambulance ride.  woohoo

Again, sweetest people imaginable, the girl in the ambulance gives me more fluid and wraps sheets around me because I’m shivering at this point.  My blood pressure’s still a worry, it’s not rising.  Then we get to the hospital, where yet again, incredibly sweet people, everyone smiling and meaning it, just lovely.  This is my first visit to a hospital, so maybe they’re all like this but I had no idea.

They put me in a little room, I tell the doctor what happened, she says my electrolytes are terribly depleted, they hook me up to more fluids, take blood, and eventually my blood pressure rises a bit, though not as fast as she’d like.  Meanwhile, I tell her I pooped my pants which she says is a natural stress reaction to the dehydration.

They take an EKG and it turns out there’s some borderline thing there, might be genetic, but I need to go to my doctor in the next couple of days and get another to make sure it’s not worse.  I can run as soon as I’ve seen my doctor, so it looks like I won’t be out really, since I’m off tomorrow and Tuesday and Wednesday were going to be 5 milers for recovery anyway.

Nick is freaked out when I call from the hospital, and he rushes to my side, waiting with me over 3 hours, bringing a change of clothes, because of course, I told him too that I’d pooped myself.

So how lovely when I’m strong enough to walk to the bathroom to take a piss, I find out I’d never even shat myself! And here I’d announced it to a full assortment of total strangers.  Oh well.

My lessons learned from this surreal adventure are:

1. I am taking my handheld with me for long races from here on in, no question about it.  I don’t care to become a better water stop drinker, I train with the bottle and it gives me confidence to have it on me, so why tempt fate?  Sure, I’ll have to stop at water stations still, but so many fewer and I’m already used to unscrewing the cap as I approach fountains, so what’s the diff if it’s a spigot, fountain, or a few cups from a water station.  Plus, it makes taking gels infinitely easier.

2. Take S-caps for long races if it’s above 45 degrees.  I didn’t bother taking them today, thinking it wasn’t that hot out and besides, I would be taking 2 gels, so my electrolytes should have been covered, but I got fucked up with electrolytes before I even got to my second gel.  If I’d have taken an S-cap, which has about 6 times the electrolytes of gels, I probably would have avoided going down so badly.

3. I’m adjusting my goal marathon time to 3:45.  I know what it feels like to hurt and I don’t like it.   3:45 is only 5 minutes different, but it’s enough to feel I’m still running to potential.  My pace only suffered after I got sick, so I still believe my training has been strong to support a great time in Steamtown, though you can imagine I thought I’d need to bag it entirely when I was in my half-brained state.  I even thought of ending this blog, getting off the forums and quitting running completely.  I was really kooky there for a while.

And now for some silver-linings:

1. It wasn’t a full marathon as I’d imagined it was at one point, so the DNF is only half bad.
2. By experiencing this miserableness in a Half, I’m all the more richer for Steamtown.
3. For the lack of electrolytes, my body never once cramped, if we don’t count my brain.
4. I didn’t shit myself.

Yep, it’s getting down to it, the Philadelphia Distance Run is tomorrow and I’m nervous!  Because it was the first Half I ever did, it’s a goal race for me, but also, it’s an important indicator for my Steamtown goal pace.  So I have a lot riding on this one.

I’ve had an easy last three days running-wise, yesterday was off completely and today was 4 w/6 strides.  There were so many runners in the park this morning plus assorted folks putting up tents and barricades, the mass of porta-pottys are already up and there’s a general feeling of excitement in the air.

Now I’m back home and the task for the afternoon is meatballs.  I had to back out of a forum FE tonight because Nick’s coming back from Portland late this afternoon, so I’m making spaghetti and meatballs for a romantic, carb-loaded homecoming.  He won’t be at the race tomorrow, instead going with our friends Jeff and Lara on a big cycling event, so we’ll both be in athletic heaven for the day.

Besides missing the forum dinner, I’m also electing not to meet up with anyone before the race starts (I’m sorry Matt!!).  After last year, when I waited in the porta-potty line for about 25 minutes, then the gun went off while I was waiting there, barely getting myself into the corral in time, I’d rather stay at home as long as I can (I live very close to the start of the race) and pee in my own bathroom, then just slide into the corral and go.  “Focus” is the name of the game for me tomorrow.

The weather looks fine – sunny and 56-59 at the start, around 67-68ish when I’m done.  I’m wearing a pace band with two sets of numbers on it, just in case.  As far as other accessories, I’m carrying two gel packets instead of a flask because I want to wear my skirt and the waistband isn’t strong enough to hold a flask up.  I’ll also be wearing my chosen marathon shoes instead of the speedier Elixirs.  I’m trading the couple ounces I’d lose for fresher cushioning, the better for after-race recovery, since Steamtown remains the most important consideration here.

My two aims for the race (besides getting a good time) are to deal with gels and waterstops in a calm manner, and also, if there’s a clog of people in front of me, not to panic, but to realize that by slowing down, I’m harboring energy to speed up when I need to.  I remember my silly self from last year, because of those “eek, I can’t get through” moments, I stupidly ended up running all over the place (tangents? what are they??).  Live and learn.

So that’s it from Pre-Race Day Central.  I’ll be back here afterwards and give you all the dirty details.  Wish me the best, please.  Over and out.