I am adjusting my sense of scale

I may have to quit publishing this blog. I was nearly hit by a car (again) and instead of thinking, "oh shit" or "this is gonna hurt," I was thinking only "well, this'll make an interesting blog post." And this was very close this time. Fancy footwork saved me, but I might not be as lucky next time. I am disturbed that my first thought was about what variety such an accident would lend to these rather boring posts. LOL.

I should at least switch the name and address and continue chronicling my runs, but without the overhead of having readers I know about. I wouldn't be the first person to do so, either out of desire or necessity. Beast had to stop publishing his, NYFlyGirl stopped publishing hers for a while, I think Uptown Girl had to switch hers because people at work were reading it... I just think I'd do a lot better if I weren't playing to an imaginary audience. Not to mention that there's some things I'd like to say that I simply can't, knowing who may be reading. I'll have to think about it.

so. Wednesday's run:




This actually happened on Thursday because I was too exhausted on Wednesday, not to mention the non-stop rain. I helped a client with some photoshop on Thursday and then left about 2 o'clock. After getting home, I changed clothes and was out the door by 3:15. It was just about the perfect time in the afternoon to get the run done. And for some reason, it was a really good run. Very little walking (only two real walking periods that I recall) and I felt powerful. I had a sense that I was pushing my legs through thick air, like wading in water, but that it was easy to do. I was pushing off well with each step, too. My lungs cooperated with only moderate coughing.

I wish I could say traffic cooperated, but...there was construction and the usual yahoos who believe that a stop sign means you are to barely pause well past the crosswalk with your nose in the intersection to ensure that nothing bigger than you is about to hit you, then floor it. I can usually see these guys coming if they're on my side of the street, but it's harder to catch them if they're coming from across the intersection. These guys are even more dangerous, because after barely pausing, they hit the gas, intent on beating not only other traffic, but ME. I've been cut off in this way more often than I can remember. Failing to yield right of way really pisses me off. I want every single one of these assholes to lose their license, whether or not they've ever had prior offenses. They are DANGEROUS DRIVERS and they do nothing to convince me that our current driving laws or licensing practices are severe enough.

I'm not so stupid as to think they all HAVE licenses, either. And if you're driving without a license...it's time to think about jail time and deportation. No, I don't think that's overkill. It won't take too much of that before everybody refreshes their memories on what the driving code actually says and start driving accordingly.

So. The run was pretty good. Certainly should have been, since I didn't run since Monday and that was only about a mile and a half, due to the 11 degrees I was running in. Just too cold to run in without some acclimation. And because it was so good, five miles has become my old three miles. I can do this. Three now seems short. Which is a good thing, because as long as every run seems SO LONG, training isn't much fun at all.

I am reversed

What a trainwreck.

As good as yesterday's run was, today's was it's evil twin, goatee and all. Nothing went right today, morning, noon, or night. Clusterfuck goddamn trainwreck. I haven't had a run this bad in a couple months. Since the Staten Island half in October, actually.

8 miles of misery and pain. Left knee hurt the whole time; couldn't get loose; asthma kept me to a crawl. I walked at least half the distance, I think, clocking about 14 minute miles the whole time. Hills were simply undoable. This whole workout was a seriously f'ed up walk-and-cough-fest. The weather was grey, drizzly, cold, sometimes windy, and dark. The very worst of February.

I'm not even going to download and post the stats. I took my heartrate monitor off after the first mile because I couldn't breathe, but that hardly helped. Absolutely nothing went right in this run. I hope Monday's is better.



--edit 02/17/08--

Portrait of a trainwreck:




I had to take the heart monitor off after I got to the park; I just couldn't breathe.

I am in and out of Joisey

You know, the "Jersey" accent really gets a bad rap. Most people who live there don't sound like that - only people from Hoboken, Jersey City, and other urban spots sound like that. The rest sound like normal people.

I've been in New Jersey a lot these last two weeks, out painting one of my scenic designs. This one was quite ambitious, and I knew it when I designed it, but it will get done on time. At this point, the vast bulk of the painting is done and the rest could be completed by the main painting help they've got - a graphic arts teacher who assists the technical director in lieu of coaching lacrosse. Right now, she's slaving away painting highlights and shadows of 422 square feet of theatrically over-sized (4.5" x 11.5") bricks - approximately 1050 of them. And she's doing it on units that curve up and overhead. I did all the base painting and will finish the brick when I go out to New Jersey next - on Sunday. The show opens Thursday, but I don't think I'll be there. I'm going to help them figure out the scene changes and then split.

Here's the plus side to New Jersey: the air is clean and the food is good and free (at least where this job is). I like visiting.

The downside is that it rains. A lot. In fact, every single morning I've been out there. And the rest of the time, I'm in the theatre, painting, until I'm so exhausted I can't paint anymore, about midnight.

So I did not feel particularly put out to realize that I'd forgotten to pack my running pants and could not go running (I'm not going to run in my jeans).

So, unfortunately, Wednesday's 5-miler is a dropped run. Today's 3-miler, however, got done just a couple hours ago. I arrived home, changed clothes, and headed back out the door, intent on the regular 3.4-mile hilly out-and-back. Keep in mind I have had to walk parts of this for a long time now.




I guess running with B taught me a little more about how to keep going through coughing fits than I realized. Except for one hard coughing fit (the first one), I didn't have to stop at all. Look at that chart! the blue line is pace. You can clearly see where I walked for just a minute - the rest of the chart is a smooth, almost steady line of running, broken only by two abrupt stops to avoid getting hit by stupid drivers who weren't checking for foot traffic at stop signs.

This was the run I've been wishing for for a long time. It isn't perfect, not yet, but it was surprising in how I was able to summon the effort to keep going through the coughing spells and didn't even stop at Prospect Park for stretching. My legs felt strong and willing.

Tomorrow is a client meeting, then 8 miles in Central Park, then probably top of the day with core exercises and weights at the gym. I have to go back to New Jersey for Sunday and Monday night's tech rehearsals, then I'm home for some time.

(At some point, I need to find a clear week where I'm not interacting with a lot of people - I'm providing some sputum samples for a study and it involves collecting them cumulatively each day, for a week. I'm curious about how much I actually produce per day and this should be very illuminating.)

I am still stressed and now I'm in pain

How's that song go?

"You woke up this morning
The world turned upside down,
Thing's ain't been the same
Since the Blues walked into town."

I felt like hell this morning. I slept poorly last night; just couldn't get fully awake. Took me forever to get going.

I'd gone to the gym yesterday and began the new stage of core exercises, the dynamic ones. They didn't look too hard judging from the article I'm working off of, but sure enough, just towards the end of the prescribed number of reps, I'd feel it. I also did weights on arms and legs and general pushups, situps, and pullups, doing 2 sets w/ fewer reps each, trying to get more general workout done.

Well, that came back to haunt me, as I have spent all of today with fairly tender abs and side muscles, whatever you call 'em.

My run wasn't too spectacular, either. Hard to get motivated under grey and rainy skies. Sleet, actually. Still, I got just over a mile before my first brief walk break and well past the halfway point before really getting tired. It was a slow jog today and far harder than it should have been for an "easy three". Well, maybe Wednesday's five-miler will go better.




And I'm still stressed about the issues noted before. In addition, MR. Anonymous, my comment on the TSA blog was spot on. Transparency, my ass.

Finally, I heard from B. She feels she wants to run faster and farther than I'm capable of - and she's right - so she's going to look for another partner. My search continues.

I am pleased with yesterday's run

Friday's 3-miler did turn out to be on a treadmill, though mostly because it was pouring outside and dark by the time I got time to exercise. I first warmed up with foam rolling, half an hour on the stationary bike, and some stretching, then headed up to the cardio mezzanine for the big treadmills. I chose the "real runners'" treamills this time. :) I like these a lot better. You can set incline to tenths of a degree, instead of whole degrees, and the controls are easier to figure out in general. I had good company, too; runners all.




You can see how nice and even the treadmill makes a run. Aside from some minor monkeying with the mph setting in order to set up a pace I could handle for 30 minutes, the run was extremely even. With the forced pacing, all I really have to do is keep up. Coughing spells were difficult to handle, but by leaning a bit on the handrail, I didn't have to slow down or stop. I DID stop at the halfway point in order to stretch - my left side was all knotted up and tight.

Overall, a good run, if fairly difficult due to the warmth of the gym and no airflow. It also doesn't help to have no scenery going by, as there's no way to get a sense of accomplishing distance without looking at the distance counter on the treadmill - something which seems to change very slowly and makes every tenth of a mile an achievement in itself.

It is bizarre watching my reflection in the window glass in front of me. I have a pretty good form, even if I do have skinny little legs and my shoulders go up and down too much. Problem is, the other reflections to the left and right of me were running much faster... It is also bizarre finally getting OFF the treadmill. There's a sense of vertigo - my ears have adjusted to the mismatch between non-moving scenery and moving legs - with the result that when I actually walk on real floor and things go past me, the slowest walk looks like a fast run.

Now: SATURDAY'S LONG RUN:




You see that? YOU SEE THAT?? This was a very solidly good run, short of being "great" only by the walk breaks in the first half of the run and lack of temperature control. (Forgive the difficult-to-read graphics - I didn't wear my heart monitor, so without that data - no rainbow background.)

I've been looking around for a running partner and have thus far failed to find one. But B contacted me in response to my NYRR ad and we agreed to meet. I was a few minutes late, but she was very gracious about that. She was surprised to see me with a backpack and intrigued by my method of locking it to a bench. Anything she brings to a run, she carries with her. That impressed me right off the bat. I feel weighed down by winter running clothes as it is, and would find a jacket wrapped around my waist and a fanny pack to be too much. But she's used to it.

When I got myself sorted out, we started off. I planned two repeats of the four-mile loop. Taking the cutoffs at 102nd and 72nd streets caught B off guard. She usually just runs the whole park loop. She seems to like the Harlem hill, but I was glad not to have to do it today. (Next few weeks will be a different story.)

Pacing was the big issue on this run. She's slightly faster than I am and doesn't need the walk breaks I currently do in the first miles. She was a patient partner with a good strategy: while I took a short walking and coughing break, she'd slow her pace, but still keep jogging. When I got going again, my regular 10:15 (or thereabouts pace) got me caught up with her in a minute or two. She offered some good advice after the first two or three of these episodes and without much discussion, took the lead in setting the uphill paces, slowing down there, and then speeding back up for flats and downhills. While it is easy to know this strategy in the head, it's another thing to implement it while running and having B there certainly helped. I do need a lot of recover at the top of a hill and often can't utilize the downhill on the other side as well as I'd like.

BUT the results of this run were, in truth, tremendous. Look at the graph. In the first four miles, you'll see I walked five times (though ONLY five times!) and three of those times had me stopped, bent over, coughing my head off. (That's where the pace spikes downward to zero.) But after that fifth time, which was actually me stopping to put my sweatshirt with my backpack because I was too warm, the next four miles were a great achievement for me.

Look at that! Between markers 4 and 6 there was NO walking. Zero, Zip, Nada. And that two-mile stretch included Cat Hill! I had one bent-over coughing fit shortly after coming out of the 102nd street crossover, and then the rest of the run was pause-free. Having finally gotten my legs warmed up (though my upper half was freezing - I need a heavier shirt or should have kept my gloves on), I was able to keep moving through most coughing fits. It wasn't easy, and I'm sure B could hear my strange breathing, gasps, grunts, etc as I worked to keep up and keep going.

She'd asked me after mile 3 how I was feeling and at that time I'd answered truthfully I was tired - at that point the run was pretty miserable for me. But when she asked again on the 72nd street crossover in our eighth mile, I answered with a thumbs up and joked we could go another loop.

I didn't, of course - my mileage was done for the day and I ended it feeling strong and happy. B, however, has been training for the Bronx half, which is next weekend, and wanted to get a few more miles in, so I thanked her and wished her luck and we parted ways. I wonder if she did another four mile loop?

Anyway, I found B to be a quiet, patient, understanding runner. We talked only a little; mostly comparing notes about what races we've run and our goals for November. Hopefully, we can run together again. A few more runs like that and I should be able to reduce my walk breaks to zero.

One last thing to note: on my last few runs, I'm not ending up with happy, open lungs. Usually, after exercise, my lungs are in a refractory period where I'm free of asthma, but in the last three runs, my lungs have been just as closed as before the run. Hm.