DFL>DNF?

What a weekend for American distance running. And not just for everyone at Boston, but for lots of people out west at Mt.Sac. Always a hub for amazing races, I got to watch the last bit of Kristen's steeple, Cassie, Nichole and Wendy's 5k, and Matt and Steve's 10k. Lots of green in the fields that night. Not to mention I got to be at the same hotel as Sara Hall, Jorge (or Eduardo??) Torres, and Molly Huddle! Oh and went to In-and-Out burger. Twice. My 10k was....anti-climactic to say the very least. Let's just say I DFL'ed, got the pity-clap, my glute is killing me, and I have yet to actually look at results. I just don't see a reason to add that much more psyhological agony on top of that. Afterward I spent some time wandering aimlessly around a field in the dark convincing myself that at least it wasn't a DNF. DFL trumps DNF...right? Um yeah....not so much. After that, Matt Levassiur and Steph Bylander (who were ridiculously kind enough to shuttle me to and from the meet since Matt's race was right before mine) and I ate our feelings at In-and-Out and talked about how great the 10k is. Yep. But in all seriousness, quite the letdown. And that's all I have to say about that.

<-Bringing up the rear.

The following day I did no running-related activities whatsoever besides watch a track meet for 10 hours while likely contracting malignant melanoma, and I thought no running-related thoughts. The day after that I went jogging-with-a-soft-j on a really nice golf course on some beautiful grass with beautiful trees in 80 degree weather and got yelled at by a maintenance guy who I'm pretty sure was about 14. So now back in Springs and getting my butt/ham fixed and hopefully will be legitimately race-able by the Sneak.

Since this wasn't a very inspiring or uplifting blog, allow me off-set the doom and gloom for a moment...have I got some inspiration for YOU! Have you ever found yourself wondering, "What would it take to be the best--nay--the GREATEST mid-packer in all the running world?" Well, two brave souls that I have the fortune of being aquainted with are questing to become just that! Check out Springs' runners Matt Copps and Shawn Finley's new blog, Midpack Moments with Matt and Shawn! Follow their trials, tribulations, doubts, frustrations and moments of pure glory! To share in their blood, sweat and tears, click here (and no, this isn't a virus): http://midpackmoments.wordpress.com/

Mt. SAC...and then sick

I headed out to the famed Mt. SAC relays last week despite being sick and deciding not to race. It wasn't in my best interest for recovering, nor would it have been very fun or fast. It hit at just the right time too. Any sooner and I could've recovered before the race. Any later and I wouldn't have realized I was coming down with something, and the race wouldn't have been pretty.

The trip, however, was great as I visited with some high school friends in Santa Monica and got some good rest with an easy week of running. It's a beautiful area, complete with good weather during my stay. We hit up the beach (to run as well as hang out), and I even tried my hand at surfing.

The race was a good opportunity, but I'm not upset about missing it. Up until then, I was really enjoying runs and workouts and was starting to get in shape. I'm feeling better and after getting back into the swing of things, I'll look forward to racing again. Planning on the Cherry Creek Sneak in a couple weeks.

Comeback Conundrum

So, I have this theory which is completely based on antecdotal evidence, and I have no hard proof of which is that when on the comeback trail one must encounter a number of ridiculous setbacks. Now, I don't have any spreadsheets tracking data versus a control group or anything like that. But what I do have is a history of this phenomenon happening to me and my running buddies. Is it a conspiracy or just Murphy's law? Whatever it is is maddening. What else can explain one buddy recovering from a marathon and just when she starts training, she gets hit by a car? Or, any number of perfectly healthy and rested runners get injured within the first few weeks of coming back? For me it's usually some sort of cold or the occasional injury. This last time I swallowed a pill wrong. Yes, you read that correctly - I swallowed a pill wrong! Well it was an antibiotic and it burned my esophagus. I had never heard of such a thing, but it was awful! Swallowing anything except for water was excruciating! Just what a runner on a comeback needs - to not be able to eat for a whole week. By the end of that week, I was so tired I could hardly stand let alone run. But, just when I thought I was going to have to go back on break, I tried some pancakes and with little tiny bites I could eat! Yay! So, from that point on, my esophagus started getting better, and I starting eating and training. I was so happy because who knows what curveball would have come my way if I had to come back from another break? So, I'm happy to say that I pulled through and I should be in the clear now. . . Until the next break.

Off to Boston

So I will be off to Boston this weekend to help with some coverage of the meet. Unfortunately, I was not able to gain entry into the elite mile out there, but I am hoping to race the 5k, at least. We'll see.

It looks like Delaney will be out there, which will be fun. I am going to cheer vigorously for him.

If anyone else is going to be out there, hit me up and we can share a jog or a shirt visit. Good luck to everyone all over the country racing this weekend. I wish that I could be joining the Western team out at Mt. Sac, but I will be able to go to Stanford with some of the crew in a few weeks.

Good luck to everyone and let's have a great weekend!

SAC is BACK!!!

Am nervous...oh so nervous.

The countdown to Mt.Sac has begun! Actually it began like a week ago, but now that we're four days away the nerves are mounting to an extreme. Track races make me ten times more nervous than roads or cross country (which is saying something if you ask anyone who has had the extreme misfortune of spending any significant amount of time around me in the 72 hours leading up to a big race) I think that this is primarily owing to the fact that whatever time you run on a track is pretty honest. There are no hills or muck or any of that good stuff to make it less of a straight-up foot race and more of a foot-race combined with a feat of strength. So however fast you run on a track, well, that's how fast you are or aren't. At least that's how I see it.

The sole goal of Thursday night: to run a P.R. That's it. Just so that I know that the last couple years of training haven't been totally in vain and that maybe I've actually moved foward even though I don't always feel as though I have. Since it's always seemed to me that I don't run quite as well on the track, I've mulled over reasons as to why that may be, employed some good old-fashioned self-psychoanalysis, and looked at track races where I ran well as well as ones where I didn't, and noticed a huge difference in my approach to both. Mainly, whenever I turn it into an effort where the end result is strictly to hit a given time, you know, a "hit these splits and nothing else and if you start falling off of pace then you suck and nobody loves you anymore" kind of thing, I tend to run relatively poorly. And you can always tell when this occurs because the person who told you they would yell your splits at you suddenly stops telling you what you're hitting and just says useless and inane things like "keep moving foward!" or "great workout!" Seriously? Don't lie to me. Please just turn away and don't watch. Go get a snow-cone or something. I'll be done when you get back.

But anyway, whenever I find a pack to race, stick my nose in it, and actually race for the sake of competing, the time seems to take care of itself. So the plan for Thursday I have decided is to do just that. Get with a pack and race. Mt.Sac is always a strong and deep field so I know if I compete well, a fast time is bound to come with that. Granted, I have a range of splits that I will listen for in the early stages of the race that will give me an idea of what sort of pace we are at so as to prevent going out at some pace that can't be maintained or improved upon throughout the duration of that 25 lap joy-jog. It's easy to get caught up in the initial adrenaline rush of such a big race at a meet the caliber of this one--I learned that my freshman year the hard way.

May it be another magical night at Mt.Sac!!!

t-8 days to Beantown

At last year's Boston Marathon I finished 20th overall in 2:19:17. That was a small miracle considering my training had gone quite poorly. However, as you may know, that left me 17 second shy of the Olympic Trials qualifying standard (which I have yet to achieve before next years race). I have already competed in one Olympic Trials and considered it an experience of a lifetime, so competing in a second would frankly just be icing on the cake. But, this weekend, weather permitting, I'm taking one more real shot at earning a spot on the line in Houston this January. Boston obviously isn't the fastest course in the world, but for a strong, efficient (but admittedly not super fast) runner like me, it is not a bad course either. Plus, it's tough to beat the crowd support and the accommodations provided by adidas and the BAA. This race is a blast. My training, although certainly not perfect, has gone much better than last year. My total mileage is lower than it used to be, I have a chronic foot injury that bothers me as much as ever, and my workouts have been mostly alone because Art and Greg are both training for the 800 meters or something. However, a couple of my key workouts have been as good as ever.

Workout #1:
Three weeks ago, I went to Nelson Laux's house in Arvada to do my standard marathon pace long run on the "Arthur Loop". This a a crazy, car dodging, kamikaze 3M road loop with gentle rolling hills that is perfect preparation for Boston. I started out by running 10M easy on a dirt path in 71 minutes, followed by 3 laps of the Aurther loop (9M total) taking just enough time between laps to choke down a gel and a couple swallows of Gatorade. Averaging just under 15:50 per lap with my last lap being the fastest, I can honestly say is probably my second or third best effort over that course ever. Probably my best solo effort by far. Nelson joined me for an easy cool down of 3M during which I constantly tried to convince him to get in shape a make a come back.

Workout #2:
2 weeks ago, was my last true fitness test over any distance. I loaded up the family after work and headed to Boulder. While Char took the girls for a walk in the park, I pulled on my road flats, warmed up three miles and did 5 x 2 mile on the Fairview track with a 1 minute rest for gels and Gatorade. Averaging 10:17 while getting progressively faster throughout was a great indicator of my current strength and running economy. And although the last one at 10:13 was hard, I never felt like I really took it too the well and actually felt quite good cooling down after.

Now if only I could start feeling good during my taper, I would be supremely confident going into next weekend. For some reason, I always feel like crap the first week or two of my taper, but usually manage to put it back together by race day. Now, the only thing left is to pray for a tailwind :-)

Racing with the kids in tow

Last weekend the fam and me packed up and headed to Carlsbad for what turned out to be one of the funniest races I have done. For those of you that haven't done Carlsbad 5000 I highly recommend it. While I am not sure I agree with it being called the fastest 5k (to me a race with two 180 turns is not the fastest) it is pretty fast and SO much fun. The streets are lined with people and if you have someone there to watch you it is great. Standing in one spot my family got to see me three times, which turned out to be just what I needed!

First let me explain what it was like to travel to a race for the first time with my kids. It went something like this. Everyone was super happy at the airport riding the bus, taking escalators, eating ChickDonalds (McDonalds to those of you not in my house) and than we had to wait for our flight to take off. This started the first of many meltdowns to come over the next 6 days. Long story short we finally got to our hotel and got our room fixed in time for us to hit the bed at 2am. Not exactly the normal day of relaxing I like to do before a race. The next morning everyone woke up pretty well as they were looking forward to Legoland, but by the time we got to the race they were already wanting to know when we could leave. Once we got everything in order I went for my warm up and left Kevin, my cousin and the boys in charge of my bag and flats with the strict instructions of being back to the meeting point in exactly 24 minutes. I later learned that is pretty stressful when you are trying to lug two kids through a large crowd to Starbucks and back, but he did a great job and got me off to the race in time.

I went into the race knowing I had been hitting my workouts the last week great and could hit 16:35ish on a perfect day but as always the main objective was to better my time from last year and of course win :) At first I was pretty disappointed to not get into the elite race, I felt like getting to run in a pack of runners would definitely pull me to my best time, but I also knew I needed to suck it up and just run.

I got to the starting line and felt pretty ready to go.......the gun went off and immediately I was trapped. What the heck? The women to my right decided that they needed to make a b line to the left side of the road for the turn that was still a quarter mile away. In my typical panic mode I did a little jostling and made my way in front of the ladies as my heal was clipped. The next few seconds felt like slow motion, I thought for sure I was going down. Luckily I caught myself and settled in to my pace. About two seconds later this girl goes FLYING by me. My first thought of course is stick to her stay close. Which I did until the 400 mark when I realized we were going faster than I wanted to be going this early. So I went with plan B keep on my own pace and keep her in your sights. As she crossed mile 1 I saw she was at 5:04 and I came across right on schedule for me 5:11. Hitting my mark calmed me a little and I came to terms with the fact that the girl in front of me looked strong and I was probably going to lose. I'm not saying I gave up its more I came to terms with the fact that if I could just hold my same distance behind her she would pull me to a faster time. Unfortunately when I got to mile two I was the same distance behind her and she was slowing because I hit 5:31. So back to freak out mode! This is where I made a big mistake. There was a high school boy in my race for some reason and at mile 2 he caught up to and passed me. Looking back I should have just latched on to him and gone. I did use his energy and at a little over 2 1/2 miles I caught up to the girl in first place and pushed to the finish for a 8 second win in 16:52. I than had some mixed emotions, my time was so slow but I was able to pull myself together and get the win,it was 15 seconds faster than my time from last year and I defended my win from last year. So I am a two time Carlsbad 5000 champion, even if it is of the old lady 30-39 race :) Than I saw my kids and decided I had to be happy. Chase and Tripp have never gone to a big race with me and they were so pumped up. Chase was so excited he cam running up to the gate saying "Mommy you did so good, I didn't think you were going to win"

At Carlsbad they do the awards ceremony for each race about ten minutes after the top three cross. Chase and Tripp asked me if they could come up with me to get my award and of course I said yes. It was the cutest thing EVER. They immediately took the award from me and Tripp wouldn't put it down or get out of the picture. The photographer wasn't too happy about it but they were so cute! I wasn't about to tell them they couldn't be there. As any parent that is a runner knows, your kids and spouse have to sacrifice a lot of time with you for you to follow your dream. If being in the pictures at the awards ceremony was what they wanted I would let them have all the glory, they deserve it WAY more than I do.

Little did I know making it through the race was nothing. The next four days I spent quality time with my family in Legoland and Seaworld. And let me tell you that was way more taxing on my body than racing :)

CU 3k this weekend

So I have had a good week of training last week with a couple of good workouts. The wind is kind of getting to me! After every workout i have to say well that was a really good workout considering the wind...

I did a 9 mile threshold last week and avg. 5.30s into the wind for 8 of the 9 miles, my 9th mile was 5.28 and it was a pretty easy mile for my last mile of 9.

Then friday need some repeats at race pace so when i went to the track it was 15 mph winds again. so I put together a 3x 1k, 3-400, 2-200m. I felt very strong, very easy workout, and i was hitting 69 to 67 pace on all the reps. which is very encouraging being at 6000 ft and wind... again!

This weekend i'm racing the 3k at cu and i'm all signed up to race the 10k at Penn Relays!!!

Thanks for keeping it real with me and keep it really with our boy Banana Hands too!

Tommy OUT!

Mt. Sac--Here we come!

I've been meaning to post for awhile now but I haven't had much to say.  Since my last post in which I claimed that I was feeling better (I was in the hospital two days later) I been trying to get back to normal (pneumonia sucks!).

Though I still went to Jacksonville, I merely went in the capacity of a spectator.  It was exciting to hang with the large BRC contingent and watch you guys race so well but it was also very surreal to spectate rather than participate (although I didn't mind partaking in the post-race festivities).  It is always motivational to see a group of athletes with full-time jobs, compete with and beat a number purely full-time athletes.  I definitely had a bit more pep in my step when I got to Alamosa.

Now it's on to Mt. Sac.  I began this year with the goal of proving to myself that my fastest days aren't behind me.  Although spending a stretch in the hospital probably didn't improve my prospects, I've been feeling sharper and stronger than I have in years.  With less than a week to go, I'm fresh off of 120 miles of spring break training.  I don't know if I'll be able to PR, but I've at least proven to myself that I'm physically capable of running the workouts that I ran when I did PR.  I guess that's something, right?

For those of you who read this post who are of my ilk (about 30 with a car seat(s) and/or a mortgage) I guess we should all take heart in the fact that in many ways we cheating the system.  How many of you actually believed that you would still be "competing"in any athletic endeavor at this point of your life when you were in high school or college?  I know I certainly didn't.

Good luck to those of you running Mt. Sac.        

My last few weeks recap

Two weeks ago:

- I went to Tempe with Scott and Jesse.

- I ran an opener 3:50 1500 and the hardest and ugliest 800 I've ever run (1:55).

- We ate at Yogurtland in Tempe. It was so great. I got like 7 different kinds of yogurt.

- We ate pizza at a gas station and I farted a lot on the ride home because of it.

- We averaged 20.2 miles to the gallon on the trip

- We ate authentic El Salvadorian fare. (Pupusas. They were delicious.)

- Jesse and Scott slept in bunk beds.

- I smashed a Cadbury Egg with my bare hand.

- I listened to E-40 before my race.

- Other stuff I'm forgetting.

Last week:

- I went to Austin, Texas

- I went to the Whole Foods world headquarters and ate tacos.

- I ate pizza on 6th street and it was so much fun.

- I heard a lot of country music and it was not much fun.

- I ran at 5:30 one morning and saw probably around 100 runners out. It was wild!

- I missed my flight and had to stay in the Austin airport all day, causing me to eat horribly.

- Other stuff too.

I will be out at the Boston Marathon next weekend. If any of you are going to be out there, let me know and we can try and meet up and share a high-five.

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