Congrats to Barb and Lisa!

RACE REPORT:  Henniker Hot Chocolate 5K

SUMMARY: Overall time (uncertifed course, visual timing):  26:23;  Average pace per mile:  8:30;  Overall place:  24/93;   Age group place (F 40-49): 2/12

SOCIAL:  So I registered for this race mainly because it is in my small New England town, so how could I resist?  I've been trying to change my past M.O. of always going to races alone, so I put out a Facebook invitation to my friends who run to register for the race and then come to my house afterwards for brunch.  I had two takers -- my friend from high school who was on the cross-country team with me (25+years ago!) ("High School Friend") and my work colleague's husband ("Friend's Husband"). My parents also attended as spectators.  High School Friend stayed overnight the night before so it was fun to get up and have coffee and head to the race together.  I got up early to set up all the brunch food (i.e. I put everything out that  I could but covered in tinfoil).

BACKGROUND:   I think I was a bit psyched out, not in a good way, for this race.  Half my problem was mental.  First, I had a super stressful work week so I was still churning inside over work stuff.  Second, after doing a 16 miler on Monday and a 4 miler on Tuesday (for half-marathon training), I hadn't run all week because of work stress, plus my eating habits went down the toilet from Tuesday onward. So I had that yucky, heavy feeling from a few days of stress eating.    Third, I had run the course quite a bit during training and was a little freaked about the steep uphills during the first .5 miles and the hills in the last .5 miles.

RACE:  This was definitely a homespun operation.  The course was not certified and the time was determined by race officials eyeballing it, rather than by chip.  There were 93 runners in all.  During the warm up, I was worried about the 18 degree cold and the fact that my hands just could not seem to warm up.  Despite the Runners World advice (http://www.runnersworld.com/what-to-wear) to wear a long sleeve shirt, and light jacket, I chose to wear a long sleeve shirt and the sweater I use for winter hiking, plus balaclava and heavy winter hat -- BIG MISTAKE as I was way too hot during the race.

MILE ONE:  (8:10 - according to Map My Run)   I was pretty miserable from the beginning of the race to the end.  The steep uphill during the first .5 was HARD even though I was trying not to push it too much. I did recover some during the steep down hill portion for the second .5 and passed a lot of people, as I am a pretty good at picking up speed in a controlled way while not falling during downhills.

MILE TWO (8:09 - acc..  Map My Run)  This mile was completely flat but I was still pretty miserable.  I found that even though this was similar to the pace (according to Map My Run) that I did during my last 5K, I was absolutely gasping for breath and fining it really tough to hold on. There was a turn around ahead, and so I got to see the lead runners passing me the other way.  This was a pick-me-up because I  got to see High School Friend running towards me -- in fifth place overall and in the lead for the women! She looked as if she was running effortlessly -- and I gave her a big WHOOOP.

MILE THREEE (8:47 - acc. Map My Run)  After the turn around, I was still miserable and just trying to hang on, but just couldn't do it.  I know from having run the course before that this section provides some lovely views of the river, but I didn't notice it during the race at all. I wasn't thinking about anything -- not my pace, not my form, not my legs.  All I could think about was getting AIR.  Gasp, gasp, gasp.  It felt as if I was running on my own -- the nearest people were way ahead of me, and I didn't sense anyone close behind me.  I was just hoping not to get passed during the last mile as I felt myself slowing significantly and, fortunately, I did not get passed.  High School Friend gave me a little boost cheering for me at the 3 mile mark, so I mustered some pluck for the last .1.  Was VERY relieved to finish.

AFTERMATH:  After greeting my parents, I walked back onto the course to cheer for Friend's Husband. All the men looked kind of alike with their hats on, so I wound up cheering for someone who turned out NOT to be Friend's Husband, lol, and realized my mistake only as Friend's Husband was crossing the finish line. Oops.  We all then went into the nearby school gym for hot chocolate and gingerbread cookies.  High School Friend was the overall female winner, and she and I also came in first and second in our age group (women in our 40s), so that was a fun twist.  Of course, in my case that result was a little misleading since there was quite a gap between our times and there were two women in their 50s who finished ahead of me -- but it added to the fun of the event for me that I got to place with my friend, in addition to basking in her glory.  In addition to mugs for finishing, we got medals and jars of local honey for placing.  (Yes, I am a child and I like my medal.)  We had to wait quite a while (like an hour--and-a-half) for the race organizers to pull together times and places, before announcing them -- but almost all the participants waited in the gym because the munches were good.  Afterwards, my friends and family spent the entire day at my house munching on the spread I put out.

LESSONS LEARNED:

1.  Trust Runners World for clothing advice.

2.  I am not going for my shoot-for-the-stars fantasy goal of an 8:30 pace at next month's half-marathon since that average pace almost killed me this time.  Mayyyyybeeee, it would be better if I ran a steady 8:30, but I'm pretty sure that's way too fast for me.

3.  I do not like 5Ks that much these days.  I really prefer longer races where you have time to relax and settle into an appropriate pace.

Sounds like a great race and I have to agreet it sounds like the ill and the overdressing were what got to you.

I unlike most of you like the short races.  I know there is no time to make up any ground, but I find them "relaxing and challenging".  A race makes me push myself more than just a go out and run 3 miles.  I will however never place in my age as the darn winning women keep moving up with me..lol  It always amazes me how fast they run.

Pandora, congrats on the 5k and on placing 1-2 with your friend in your age group. Very nice race report.

HI All - My half was brutal.  I did the New Bedford Half on Sunday (this was my first half 5 years ago) and it was extremely cold and the wind was non-stop espcially on the last 5-6 miles to the finish.  I was feeling pretty strong until about mile 9 when we got on the other side of the water and whomp wind in the face.  It took my breath away.  I was running with my running partner/friend who was struggling to even start it this year (i had this issue last year - and she stayed with me the entier time)  I decided I would not leave her unless she got to fast for me.  My goal was to finish without injury which I did.  Unfortunately it was also a personal worst for time.  I was expecting to be slow due to the new low HR training I am trying, but let's just say I was never where I should have been.We both struggled at times and did more walking than ever,espeically up the hill at mile 12 (I don't know who put that hill there, but I really wish they would move it)  I was really slow suddenly as I felt very naseaus, something I never felt during a race.  I don't think I have seen so many people walking and saying they didn't feel well and it was frigid i that wind.

There was lots of security and they were very strict about no bags and non-runners in the YMCA.  This all came down from homeland security - we met up with a comittee member running the race.

Official time:2717 147/152  F5059 BARBARA MEDEIROS     51 F  1740 2:45:19 12:37   34:42 1:10:55 1:49:10 2:46:55

It has been a tough year for training - I think to many miles inside on the tM is not good for racing outside.  Not sure if I will do this race next year- I hate being so cold, and feeling so sick for a bit after the race.  I am attributing it to a combination of coldness and wind and possibly so dehydration mixed in - the last sip of water I took is what turned my stomach.

Things can only go up from here.

Rondog - You had a great race considering those conditions.  Cngrats on the PR!

Here's my race report for the Rumshaker 5k.

Short Story; skip to the bottom for the summary.

Longer; this is my 2^nd year to run this race, and as long as I am capable, I will continue to run this race. This race will always be special to me because I am a colon cancer survivor, and the proceeds go to colorectal awareness. This is a very preventable and curable type of cancer; IF, it is caught early, so get your colonoscopy.

We had to get up at 4:00 am to make about a 70-80 minute drive down to Birmingham, Alabama. I had some oatmeal and a couple cups of coffee. The coffee done it’s magic, and we were on the road by 5:10 am. I needed to be there to pick up my packet and to meet up with Jimmy and Greg. The plan was for the 3 of us to do about a 1.5-2.5 mile WU, then take off and meet up afterwards. It ended up being Greg and me doing the WU, then Jimmy caught up to us at the start line after he done his own WU.

My goal for this race was to break 23:30. This is a very flat course with one long overpass that you cross twice. The field showed 1064 that paid for chip timing, and there were at least this many more that didn’t care about the timing. They had a corral system this year, and they were marked, less than 24, 24-29, 30 or greater, and walkers. We all lined up close to the front, maybe 6-8 deep, and off we went. The front of the pack did pretty well and placing themselves in the correct position, as there was not much dodging. I remember hearing 7:27 when we crossed the mile 1 mark (Garmin had 7:37), and I was right with Greg, and I thought Jimmy was right on my tail. As we got into the 2^nd mile, Greg started pulling away from me, and I couldn’t stay with him. Looking back, I say BS! I’ll say more about this later.

There was no timer at mile 2 that I seen or heard, but my Garmin had 7:45. It was pretty uneventful through this mile. As we got into the 3^rd mile, I felt like I was just cruising and not pushing myself. Mile 3 came in at 7:37, and the lat little bit at 5:57. My Garmin had the course at 3.06, as did Jimmy and Greg. It is a certified course though, so I’m calling it 3.1

I have just started getting my feet back under me from dealing with PF all last summer, and running a full in December that I was under trained for. I wanted this to be a test. I am training for an April 5 half, and wanted to push myself. When I crossed the finish line, Greg caught me and we run a 1.5 mile CD. I was not sore in the least little bit, and feel as though I recovered too quickly…..so, push harder stupid! I was happy with my splits though, as I usually fade pretty bad in the 2^nd mile. 7:37, 7:45, 7:37, 5:57.

I have a few pics, a couple that my wife took, one from the official photographer that I will be buying, and one that a nice gentleman took for us. The medal around my neck is something they handed out to all the survivors.

This is a me putting my sign on the Recognition Wall.

Me and Mrs. hog4life

And here's the official race photo that I'll be buying.

There was one thing that made me a little sad about this event. I had made plans for weeks in advance to have lunch with Jimmy, his family and friends, but I had to break our lunch date, and I felt bad about it. Some of you know, and some may not, but my wife has Fibromyalgia. There are days that totally wipe her out, and this was one of them. After getting up so early, and having a busy couple of days prior to race day, she was exhausted and just wanted to be alone. As we were getting in the car, she made the statement to me that she feels very alone while I’m running, and wished she would not have come(not good). We had made a hotel reservation to spend the night, and do some shopping before heading home, so we went to the room and just hung out.

Thanks for reading,

Mitch

Time: PR of 23:14, 7:29 pace

AG: 9/38 (50-54)

OA: 131/1064

Gender: 110/445

Mitch, Great job on your PR, enjoyed the RR.

Here's a double RR from this past weekend.

Grab a beer, coffee, tea, or coke, and some popcorn........

This is one week after my Oak Barrel HM which was my goal race. And since OB was my goal, I thought this weekend of a 32.6 mile challenge would be fun. Well, my Oak Barrel was a bust, so I secretly had some ambition that my training cycle would still give me a strong race, especially for part 2 of this report. This is week 11, after following the Ryan Hall 10 week plan.

Part 1; Heel and Crank Duathlon, 18.5 miles

First, was Heel and Crank Duathlon on Saturday the 12th, which consisted of a 3 mile run/13.5 mile bike ride/3 mile run. This was my first time to do an event like this, and I’ll have to say, that it creates another discipline of training that you should train for (which I didn't do properly). I bought a new bike a couple of months ago, and decided to get a hybrid. This was a good choice for most casual riding with my wife, but not so much for racing on the road; I’ll mention more on this later. I looked up last year’s results and formulated a “goal”, for which I didn’t have a damn clue about, but 1:45 sounded good. I didn’t ride as much as I wanted to, or should have, leading into this because of the Oak Barrel focus. I did a 2.25 mile warm up run prior to the event starting.

The first 3 mile run was an out and back on a wildlife refuge dirt road with maybe 4 blocks of pavement at the start, and then again at the finish. It was mostly clean and hard packed dirt, but had a few spots of gravel, some twigs, some camber, a few mud holes, and a few pot holes. There was plenty of shade, and one aid station at the turnaround. When we first hit the dirt road, it was a little tricky; you couldn’t get too close to the person in front of you, because you might step in a hole, or even land on a small rock. I finished this first leg in 23:16 for a 7:46 pace. Here is a pic of the trail; I’m in the green shirt.

I grabbed a cup of water as I entered the transition area, my time here for T1 was 1:48. I wore a pair of compression shorts, with running shorts over the top. At my bike, I had a gear bag, I yanked my running shorts off, put on a pair of padded biking shorts, fastened my helmet, put the sunglasses on. Then I walked my bike out of the transition area to the “mount” line.

My 13.5 mile bike ride was finished in 52:22 for a 15.5 mph average. For comparison purposes, the overall winner’s bike ride was 34 minutes for 23 mph! This was a beautiful ride out on country roads with little to no traffic and had a few rollers. I had a water bottle on my bike and drank almost all of the 20 oz. during the ride. There must have been 30 or more people that passed me while on the bike; I passed a few that were riding these “fat tire” bikes. There was a special class for this too, claims that it matches Huffy against Huffy. I say BS! It was kind of funny, I was pedaling my little ass off, and these folks were passing me like I was sitting still, and they were doing it with very little effort. I was almost to mile 4, and the leaders were heading back at their mile 11. I had a good ride, enjoyed the views, pushed a little and was trying to save some energy for the next day’s HM. Got a couple of nice pics as I was coming back into the transition area.

My time for transition 2(T2) was 1:34. I’m not sure how I was able to do this 14 seconds quicker than the 1^st time, but I did just the opposite of T1. I removed the helmet, removed my biking shorts, put on running shorts, racked my bike, and headed out for run #2. I grabbed a cup of Gatorade on the way out of the transition area. This was the exact same out and back course as run #1.

My legs felt like effing soupy mashed potatoes that were 10 times as big, and a million times heavier than they were just about 70 minutes earlier. I could barely keep them turning over. I managed to keep trudging along, thinking, damn this sucks, and tomorrow’s HM will be worse than the previous week’s Oak Barrel. I finished this run in 28:41 for a 9:34 pace. Here is a pic of me crossing the finish line, and , boy ole boy, was I glad to be done! See the Team TJ bracelet?

Summary, my overall time was 1:47:39. I finished 143/183 in all males, and 7/9 in the “fat tire” class. I will probably make this a yearly event, but will either buy, borrow, or rent a road bike for next year. My ass was really sore later that night and into the next morning. It was a deep pain; kind of felt like the bone was bruised. These tri guys and gals are great people, just like straight runners are. They were all shouting out to me, “good job” as they passed me, and that made me feel good on my bike that was outclassed. The best and most amazing part about this event, was the post race party and awards ceremony. They had pancakes with strawberries, bananas, blueberries, whipped crème, and BEER!

There was a big group of people that asked me to take their picture with a couple of their phones, look what the real camera guy did, lol!

Part 2; Bridge Street Centre Half Marathon, 13.1 miles

Remember the Oak Barrel RR from last week? A time of 2:20, numb foot, cramping, lots of walking, yet had a quick recovery. I am hoping that I have some good legs, since I didn’t trash them. The only thing is now I wonder what the 18.5 miles of Heel and Crank did to me. I had some loose goals going into this half. I definitely wanted to better the Oak Barrel time, but I also wanted to get less than 2 hours. They had pacers with various times, but for me, I focused on three of them.

This was the first year for the event, and I’ll have to say, that the owners of our Fleet Feet store, that were the race directors, done an awesome job. The race started and finished in a fast growing shopping district, in an outdoor type “mall”. We run a big loop away from the stores and there was a short section or two that were run twice as part of the route back. The course was mostly flat with a few rollers, but nothing major. Temp was 57 degrees at the 7:00 am start time, and 70 degrees predicted at 9:00 am.

I planned to start with the 2:00 pace group, and pick it up if I felt okay near the half way point, but when we all bunched together right before the start, I found myself closer to the 1:55 pacers. I did a 1 mile warm up, and thought what the heck, my legs had loosened up from the day before, and so I would just stay with them for a couple miles to see how I developed. I also wanted to make sure my numb foot thing didn’t bite me again. The first five miles splits went like this, 8:45, 8:43, 8:42, 8:35, and 8:38. Did I mention it was hot? I was already dreading the rest of the run but felt rather good for this pic. I grabbed some water at the first aid station.

The next 4 miles were strong too, but near the end of mile 9, my legs started feeling like the soupy mashed potatoes again. The splits were 8:36, 8:44, 9:14, and 9:22. I took some Gatorade at the next aid station, then a GU and water at the third one. It’s still hot, and getting hotter, lots of the men were running with their shirt off. Gotta have a GU pic with the end in your mouth.

As I approached the 9.5-9.75 mark, I noticed one of my lady friends walking along side of a man and she was holding his arm. When she recognized me, she told me he was about to pass out and wasn’t going to make it. I am a First Responder at work, and my training kind of kicked in. I already was fading from the 28 or so miles that I’ve done in the last 24 hours, so I pulled up and took his other arm. We walked him about ¼ miles to the next corner where there were police and volunteers. He said his quads were seized up with cramps; he was walking very stiff legged. I asked a lot of questions about his hydration and fueling prior to the race. Did I mention it was hot? I was mostly trying to keep his mind distracted, he wanted to sit down, but I knew that would be a bad choice, so we kept him walking. When we reached the police, they immediately called for an ambulance, and we went on our way. The split for mile 10 was 11:14. I don’t know this guy, nor did my lady friend, so I don’t know the turnout, but I really suspect he was severely dehydrated and suffering from heat exhaustion. Hopefully it was nothing more than some IV fluids and then they released him. In my 5-6 years of running and racing, this makes the third person that I have witnessed in trouble. All 3 times were because of the heat.

This next pic is a thumbs down around 10.5 or so

Let’s get back to the race. I had lost the 1:55 pace group, and the 2:00 group had gained on me. I was hoping I could just hold with them to the finish, but the soupy mashed potatoes said no. There was one more water stop, I think just past 10, right where we handed off the guy having problems. I took 2 cups of Gatorade and 2 cups of water. I drank both Gatorades and one of the waters; the other water went on my head. I for sure didn’t want let the 2:15 pacer come past me. So I just kept my little walk/run going to the finish line. It was so freaking hot these last couple of miles, and there were no more aid stations. They had 4, and should have had at least 2 more if not 3. The final splits were 10:44, 10:40, 10:28, and the final point one was 9:23. As we turned the last 2 corners coming back into the shopping square, there were people everywhere cheering. Here's a pic of me coming into the finish line.

My finish time was 2:04:36. This was good for O/A place of 299/964, and an AG place of 21/52.

My next half is planned for Sept 20; I will have a few races scattered through the summer as I continue to build and maintain my base. I would like to point out, that during this cycle, I had a lot of good MLR’s during the week of 7-9 miles, and my highest weekly average of 34.5 prior to any of the 8 halves I’ve done. I will use the Ryan Hall 10 week plan again in Sept, try not to do 18.5 miles the day before, and hope for a good strong race from start to finish. I am ready for Alabama winter to return, and although it was temporarily here this morning, I would like it to stay longer. It was 40 degrees, raining, sleeting, and a few places were having some light snow. I am definitely a cold weather runner. I will not try to over analyze these past 2 weeks, but some of the numbers I keep up with, pointed to a strong race for the second HM….maybe next time.

I almost think if it weren’t for the 18.5 miles the previous day, I would have been able to hold the 8:40 pace for 5 more miles. The outcome of this weekend was a quite memorable one, so I have no regrets about anything. I got a really cool beer mug for completing the 32.6 mile challenge, and gained some bragging rights. My foot didn’t go nummy ass did, lol), and I didn’t have stomach cramps, so that’s a win.

Thanks for reading,

Mitch