Boston Marathon 2016

My feeling of Zen was shattered this week.  It is the Boston Marathon's fault.  2016 is my year to run the Boston Marathon and I want to start training now!  Now, I know that a 51 week training schedule is a bit extreme, but I can't wait.  It was the story of the Rebekah Gregory who was a non-runner and lost a leg in the 2013 bombing and became a runner to finish Boston.   It was Maickel Melamed the gentlemen with Muscular Dystrophy who took 20 hours to complete the race.  It was another year where I watch and track so many others, wishing I was there.  Yes, 2016 is the year I will finally run the Boston Marathon.  How exciting is that!  I just read that they are using the same qualifying standards from last year, so I should be able to get in the first week.

Boston Marathon Fun Fact:  From 1897 to 1923 the Boston Marathon was only 25.5 miles.  The official marathon distance of 26 miles 385 yards was codified by the Olympic committee in 1921 and the start line for Boston was moved from Ashland to Hopkinton in 1924. 

This Saturday I will find out where my fitness is at.  I am racing a 10K and haven't really done too much 10K specific training.  I have run quite a few miles, but those miles have been pieced together, running with my marathon training group, running with my dog, just taking it real easy.  If I do real well, I may just write a book on how to just run a lot, real slow and watch your race times plummet.  I don't expect that to happen; what I expect to happen is a 38:xx effort, probably closer to 39 than 38.  A long ways off from my 2:50 marathon goal, but its a start.  Time to get to work, Twin Cities Marathon is only 23 weeks away!

Good luck to all the Williston runners racing the Lake Minnetonka Half Marathon this Sunday.  You all have put in lots of good training miles and I look forward to some shiny new PR's!

Mileage as Part of my DNA

Last week I wrote about the evolution of my running.  I was thinking about it even more this week, especially in regards to the frequency of my runs and the high mileage.  I no longer think of runs as "workouts."  It is just something I do.  There is not a lot of prep time, because I always seem to have running clothes on or at the ready.  I don't have to think about what kind of run because I almost always run by feel.  I rarely feel wiped out after I run, so I can do it over and over again.  Run with the dog in the morning, then get a call from someone who wants to run again at 11:00?  No problem.  It's like walking to me now.  I go on a long run and get lost, again no problem.  What's a few miles?  I never worry about pace any longer.  I run with folks who run 10:30 pace and also at 7:30 pace.  I will run at 9 minute miles at 5 am and run 10 minute miles at 9 pm or speedier runs in middle of the day.  Sometimes all three in one day!  It's all just running, it's not an event, it's not a workout, it just what I do.  Dare I say I am closer to reaching a Zen state in regards to my running?  Or, could I becoming an Ultra runner?

On the negative side, I do wonder how this new mindset and approach will effect my racing.  I have skipped a few races and even missed a Grand Prix event, which is something I normally wouldn't do.  I still want to race and do well, but the drive just isn't there like it was.  Also, I think I can race just as well with this laid back running approach.  At least that is what I keep telling myself.

Regardless, I will continue to enjoy the progression towards becoming a wise, peaceful and balanced runner. (Not so sure on the wise part!)

My Running Evolution

There were some big changes to my running this week, which got me to thinking about how my running has evolved over the years.  I didn't run in high school or college and really got my start when I was about 21 or 22.  A friend got me started in 1983; I was going through some "stuff" at the time and luckily discovered that running was great therapy.  I didn't train, I just would go out and run; since I had a lot stress, I ran a lot. I was a lonely, reclusive runner who found solace in being alone.  I love running for that.  The Twin Cities Marathon was just getting started, so someone talked me into running it.   With no experience and no running history, I proceeded to run as much as possible. That was my entire training plan.  I think I finished my first Twin Cites Marathon in 3:43.  I pretty much ran the same way for the most of my 20's.  Running a lot in the summer, taking long periods off in the winter and running the occasional marathon. I got married when I was 30 and with marriage and kids, running took a backseat for a short time.  When I did start back up, I had to be more organized and disciplined.  As a single guy, I could run anytime, but with a family, I had to be up early and run before work.  The discipline and focus helped and I was able to get my Marathon time down to well under 3:30.  As the kids got older, I was able to run more and I was able to get faster.  By 1999, a the age of 38, I ran a 3:09 Twin Cities on low miles and the seed for a sub 3-hour marathon had been planted.

I knew to break 3 hours would need a significant time commitment, but with a 5 and 6 year old, it didn't seem wise.  It wasn't until 2006 or 2007 that I trained for the specific goal of sub 3 hours.  I spent 3 years following low mileage plans and failing miserably.  It wasn't until I adopted the high mileage, slow running strategy that I saw results.   I ran a 3:17 at Minneapolis in 2010, a 3:07 at Twin Cities, followed by 3:02 in 2011.  It wasn't until 2012 at Des Moines that I broke through.  Since then I have ran 2:56, 2:54, 2:54 and 2:53.  In that 5 year span, I have run over 3,000 miles per year and PR'd at every distance.  The last 5 years have definitely been my competitive time.

But, I have realized that you can only keep up running that hard and long for so long.  In recent years, I have evolved into a social runner, running with clubs, with friends, with my daughter.  Races are social events as well as competitive events.

This week, I attended a Chi Running clinic.  Now I have been following Chi Running techniques for many years, but this is the first time I have attended a clinic.  It is definitely a technique designed around endurance and longevity over speed and short term gain.  I got a lot out of it, but see this a turning point in my running.  From competing and pushing, and putting my body through the ringer, to looking ahead and finding out how long I can do this running thing and still get some joy from it.

Lastly, I got a dog.  A dog that I can run with.  It wasn't enough that I had people to run with on most of my runs, I needed a companion on my lonely 5 am runs, or those difficult 4 or 5 mile recovery runs in the middle of the week.  I feel like I have evolved from that lonely, recluse, hermit runner of my 20's into a more well-balanced runner and person. I still enjoy my solo runs, but they have become less therapy and more of a meditation, if that makes any sense. I still have some racing ahead of me, and maybe a marathon PR or two, but I also can see that this sort of effort can't go on forever. Soon I will be that 60, 70 and 80 year old runner, running for the sheer joy of getting outdoors and moving, which certainly beats the alternative. Looking forward to how my running will change and how it will change me.

Yeah, I'm one of Those Guys.

I am a 50-year old runner.  Yeah, I'm one of "those guys."  The guy who still thinks he looks okay in half inch inseam running shorts and a singlet.  Still lines up at the front of a competitive 5k race, only to finish a half a mile behind the winners.

Our kids are grown and we don't play golf, so we run.  60, 70, 80 and sometimes 90 to 100 miles per week.  When people ask us how many miles we ran, we shrug it off with a nonchalant, "eh, only about 85 this week."

Our dresser drawers are full of race t-shirts, some of them much older than the guys who win the aforementioned 5k's.  We've got a couple of boxes in the closet full of bibs, medals and even awards for some age-group win in a small, local race.

During the day, we wear blue shirts, with navy ties and beige slacks.  But on the weekends we can be found wearing high vis yellow jackets, bright orange singlets and electric green shoes.

You will find us congregated  most Saturday or Sunday mornings, milling about the starting line of a race.  Maybe running warm-ups, doing strides, preparing for the race like our lives depend upon it.  We chat a little bit about how many miles we logged that week, about nagging injuries that will keep us from doing our best that day and usually way underestimate our finishing time that we share, then feign surprise at the finish when we were a minute faster than predicted.

We have all our PR's since turning 50 memorized down to the hundredth of a second, and we really like passing young runners in the final miles of a race, no seriously, it's really fun.

When we were 20, we most certainly would have laughed at this 50-year old version of ourselves, but who cares.  We are having fun and pushing ourselves beyond limits we couldn't have imagined.  We see the 70 and even 80-year old racers out there and we don't laugh.  There is nothing but respect.