It's Over!

Summary: 4hours and 25 minutes and 27 seconds later, it's over! Many thanks to everybody. This morning I'm walking very slowly and gingerly.

The stats:
Chip time: 4:25:27
Rank: 354 out of 683 (250th out of 430 men)
Splits: 10K - 56:56 (9:11 min/mile)
1/2M - 1:04:07 (9:18 min/mile)
20 mile - 1:10:04 (10:09 min/mile)
10k - 1:14:17 (11:59 min/mile)

The story:
The folks at Eye-Q put on a really great race. There're lots of water stations, medical stations, bathrooms, volunteers, pace runners and big obvious mile markers (I'm look at you, SLO City to Sea). And the freebies are really good.

Cold cold morning. It was nice to half the half marathoners start 30minutes early - it made my start feel much less crowded. I had been having knee problems and hoped that a week's rest and a few Aleve would be enough to keep that at bay. Unfortunately my knees started feeling twitchy by the first mile marker. That wasn't a good sign.

I found the 4:00 pacer and stuck with that group. It was nice to run in a herd. Even though I didn't talk with anyone, it felt like a little community. Like they weren't going to let me slow down or give up. I was feeling well all through Clovis - the knee pain fluctuated but was never unmanageable.

After mile 13, the 4hr pacer started to pull away from me. I kept trying to catch up and stay with her for one more mile, but it just wasn't happening. As I approached the 17 mile mark I knew that Les, my folks and Rob would be waiting there and I didn't want to dog it in front of them so I pushed on. Rob joined me for the next two miles and kept me moving at a decent pace. I definitely wanted to walk at this point, but he wouldn't let me, so I pushed on.

When I passed the 20 mile marker is when I first walked. Most of the people I could see at this point were walking. Or they were relay runners, which don't count. It was extremely discouraging to still be heading north when I knew the finish line was back south. I found that the longer I walked, the harder (and more painful) it was start start jogging again. At mile 21, the 4:15 pacer passed me - he only had one runner with him. At point I would close my eyes for a few seconds and find that when I opened them, the color didn't come back as quickly as you'd expect. My shoes felt really tight from the swelling and I could feel at least one blister and two toes with a lot of pressure on them. My knees were hurting but more than anything I was just tired. At mile 22 you hit the biggest hill on the course - those bastards. At mile 23 my brother found me and (carrying his baby) ran with me for a few minutes. Near mile 24 I saw my cheer squad again, but by now I wasn't pretending to do well anymore. My dad jogged with my to mile 25. Again I continued to shuffled along as spectators unhelpfully called out that I was "almost there." That's much less encouraging than you might think. At this point, my goals were in terms of 20, 30 , 50 yards at a time. Not quarter miles, not half miles and certainly not in "just a mile to go." With about a third of a mile to finish, a coworker caught up to me (she was doing the relay) and told me that I had to beat her. So I did.

I wouldn't say that I had a good time or that it was fun. It stopped being an exciting challenge at mile 20. If asked today would I do it again, I'd say no (though I would love to be able to get that time down to sub-4:00). Maybe I'll feel differently later. I expect to keep running half marathons and shorter races. Those feel like distances that I can properly train for get better at.

The injury report: I've got two purple toenails - middle toe on each foot. I don't think I'll lose them. One gnarly blister on another toe. My knees and one ankle are really tender. I mean I'm muscle sore kind of all over, but those joint pains are in a whole other class.

The thanks: Thanks to Aleve. Thanks to Rob for running with me when I really needed it. Thanks to my family for being virtually everywhere on the entire course. Thanks to everyone else who showed up to cheer me on. And most of all, thanks to my dear dear wife and daughter for letting me run all those evenings and weekends and being so supportive through this entire stupid stunt.

The Day Before the Day Before the Race

People keep asking me if I'm ready. I tell them "No." And then they laugh and I don't laugh.


I'm don't think I'm ready to run 26.2 miles.


Physically, I'm not ready in that I've never run more than 75% of that distance and haven't had a good pain-free run in like three weeks.


Logistically, I'm not ready because I still need to pick up my packet and buy some vita-chews and organize my music playlist and map out cheering spots for my cheer squad (for whom I'm eternally grateful).


Mentally, I think I'm closer to being ready. I've run almost all of the course, so I can visualize the paths and the hills and turn-arounds. That should be helpful. I know what a good pace feels like and I mostly have a game plan for what to do in the event that my knees fail me.


Emotionally, I could use some help. I've really been focused the last week on my knee pain and all of the ways that things could go wrong. Instead of pondering the ways in which I haven't been able to train as long or as well as I would have liked, I need to reimagine this whole endeavor as a test of will. There aren't a lot of opportunities in modern life to stretch for a ridiculous achievement. Not to get all Fight Club or anything, but most of us have got soft lives and "endurance" means having to wait at a really long traffic light. We don't really do rites of passage and in T-ball everybody gets a trophy. So I'm reformulating this run into a feat of endurance, a measure of my mettle, a triumph that will prove ... I don't know ... something. Anyways, that's what I'm going with. That's the psyche up.

Candy Drought 2009!

I am extremely disappointed by the lack of leftover Halloween candy that's been brought into the office this morning. Other friends are reporting similar deficiencies in their offices. Look people, if you're not going to bringing in leftover candy, how am I supposed to recoup the approximately 3 bags worth of chocolate-based named-brand candy that we handed out on Saturday?

Marathon Training update

I dragged my sorry bones 19.25miles for my longest training run. I had hoped to hit 20miles even, but it turns out that running that far is really really hard. In fact, "running" may be overstating what I did. I felt good for the first 15 maybe and then sort of flopped around for a mile and then got into a good rhythm for a mile and half and then imploded and crawled back to the car quietly sobbing. The whole thing took 3:09 which works out to about a 4:20 marathon. Not quite where I wanted to be. I've got some knee pain. I'm gonna need some more drugs.

Third Place = Big Win

Went to the Big Fresno Fair and was pleasantly surprised to see that one of my photos had won third prize (and $20) in the Cityscape category. I'm thrilled. I might as well have won Best in Show. Which I didn't. Because there were some really really really great photos there. I think the key for me is to stick to the unpopular categories. I don't have a prayer in Landscape, Architecture, People, Children, Pets, Animals. But there were only a handful of entries in the Transportation, Insects and Photojournalism categories. So for the next year I'll be keeping an eye out for buses, bumblebees and drug busts.

Edit: This is my winning photo, from the post two spots below.

City to Sea Half Marathon

Sunday's the SLO City to Sea Half Marathon. I'm using it as a trial run for the marathon next month. I'll be paying attention to food and water intake, good form and maintaining a reasonable consistent pace in a race environment.

I've been thinking lately about how I do almost all of my running alone. During the week, I often don't get out of the house until 9PM which is too late for most people. And on the weekends I often run quiet streets or along a kinda-gross canal, neither of which are very popular. Last Saturday I drove up to a park where the marathon finishes and ran there for a change. When I pulled up I saw the park lot was full of runners - finishing up, getting started, stretching, gabbing. It felt like race day. Then on the trail I couldn't help but try to catch and pass other runners (or fight off being passed), which made my overall pace about 30-40seconds faster than I normally train at. I don't know that that's a pace I can sustain for 26 miles.

So that's what this weekend is about. Can I pick a rhythm and stay there so that I have enough juice to finish well? Also I'm thrilled to have my brothers running with me.

UPDATE: I had a 1:50:43 (8:27 pace). Not my slowest, but remember, I wasn't trying to break my PR. Somehow Rob and his spotty ankle still managed to beat me out by 17 seconds. 17 seconds! Every time I surged at the end, he'd push a little harder. It was unreal. Rob, next time, I'm coming for you. That's all there is to it.

Big Times are Back and the Big Fresno Fair!

I entered the following photos into the Big Fresno Fair Photography Exhibit. They were taken from my second trip to Guatemala, in 2004. That's Leslie in the red raincoat in the second shot. They're in the Still Life and Cityscape categories, respectively. Judging was last weekend and supposedly the Fresno Bee will run a list of the winners on Sunday.

I'm not a fan of fairs, but when Les drags me along we do go, I always enjoy the competitive exhibitions (cooking, baking, arts & crafts, etc.). Leslie wanted to enter her Delicious Black and White Chocolate Chip Cookies from Heaven into the cookie-baking contest, but we didn't get the paperwork in on time.

The fair runs from Oct 7th to 18th, if you want to see them on display. Following the fair, they'll be displayed in my house - you can see them there, too.









































Update: No notice in the Bee and no press release from the Fair.