24 Weeks To Marathon Part Deux

It’s official. I’m registered for my second marathon, the Ogden Marathon, coming up on May 15th 2010. The most awesome thing is that runners of the half-marathon will include my old lady Melanie (sorry, that sounded derogatory, albeit funny. For the record, I have never called my wife “my old lady”. Even though it does sound funny.) And…….my sister Hollie, her husband Kelly, and my brother Kenny. I am really excited that they have joined the life of pleasure and pain that is running. This is very cool.

The big muscle at the top of my right leg is still acting testy. I’d smack it around and throw it in the dumpster if it wasn’t connected to me. I didn’t run for a few weeks which drove me nutz. I got antsy.

Finally on November 20th I went out for a 6 miler. My leg was a bit sore but I felt like a jungle lion that was just let out of a cage.

Tuesday, November 24th 2009: 7 miles in 1 hour & 14 minutes. I left while it was still dark outside. The temperature said 29 degrees outside. Granted, I had to fight my eyelids from freezing together. But I LOVED running in the cold. My body didn’t get tired nearly as quickly.

Thursday, November 26th 2009: 6 miles in 1 hour & 11 minutes. Mel and I went out on our own little turkey trot Thanksgiving morning. It was warmer on this morning: 33 degrees. I’d take running in that instead the 90+ degree days of southern Utah summer any day.

My leg is still sore, but back to about 70% of where it was pre-injury. I’m keeping my pace slower and not doing a ton of miles so hopefully it will continue to improve. I’m giving my leg a few more days before insisting that it stop this little temper tantrum.

Butch Cassidy 10k 2009

I ran the Butch Cassidy 10k race on Saturday with the mountains of Zion National Park on the horizon. The course started in Springdale and ended at Grafton ghost town. You could not ask for a more beautiful place to run. The leaves were changing and all the trees were glowing yellow.

I started the race running with my friends Shane and Melanie. We reached a big muther hill around mile three and I was so tired that I wanted to cry like a school girl. My friend Tom helped coordinate the race (and did a fine job by the way). I sent him a message after the race letting him know that the devil called and wanted that hill at mile 3 back.

Melanie Cowden has been a good running buddy for me in the two races we have done together. We finished in 56 minutes. At the end I gorged on bagels, a banana, and lots of cookies. I strained my right hamstring a few weeks ago, so by the end of the race my leg was really hurting.

But somehow cookies seem to ease the pain.

Dear cookies: I love you. I don't care what race you are. Chocolate chip, peanut butter, snickerdoodle - I love you all. You make me happy. You make the shooting pain in my leg go away. I love you.

Losing A Toe Nail

I think my arrogant bragging about never losing a toe nail has finally caught up to me. I knew I might be in for trouble about three hours after the marathon.

I'll spare you a picture since, generally speaking, toes are pretty gross to look at. But use your imagination and envision this: Long Toe. Left Foot. Getting Black. Darker By The Day. I don't know what to expect but I'm thinking one of these days it's going to just pop off.

In other running news:

Monday, October 19th 2009: 3 miles in 28 minutes. My legs still feel rusty.

Tuesday, October 20th 2009: 30 glorious minutes on the exercise bike.

Wednesday, October 21st 2009: Snicker's Bar.

Thursday, October 22nd 2009: 4 miles in 34 minutes. This was a golden run. Very, VERY rarely I have an effortless, painless run. It felt amazing. My legs felt like feathers. I averaged an 8:47 per minute pace which is fast for me.

These rare outings are the reason running becomes an addiction. It's like gambling. You lose money on 29 pulls of the slot machine. Then on the 30th pull, you win some money. You are happy. So you keep dumping your paycheck into the machine hoping for another jackpot. One time when the gamble pays off and you're hooked. Elusive runs like this keep me going.

Friday, October 23rd 2009: Nothing.

Saturday, October 24th 2009: 10 miles in 1 hour and 40 minutes. The first two miles were great. During the last eight miles, I felt like I'd just been hit by a station wagon (and wished I would just get hit by a station wagon). I was completely exhausted. My body was out of gas. My legs were lead. While I was running, I tried to figure out why I was so miserable. Was it...

• The 44 ounce Diet Mountain Dew I drank yesterday?
• Not getting enough sleep the night before?
• Not having enough fuel in me (I had a bowl of cereal in the morning then nothing else until I ran 7 hours later)?
• Running in the afternoon when it was warmer outside?
• Too soon after the marathon?

I definitely think all of those things played a part in the train wreck. But I think there's another, more simple reason the run was so hard: 10 miles is just a really far distance to run no matter how you look at it.

I was discouraged considering that I had run 26 miles four weeks earlier. 10 miles should be nothing. But 10 miles was something. Hard.

Want To Come??

There are a few races we have on the running calendar:

Butch Cassidy 10k: November 7, 2009. Our friend and Boston runner Tom is involved in planning this race in Springdale near Zion National Park. I'm really excited for this one.

Painter's Half-Marathon: January 23, 2010. I haven't done this race before, but I hear it's a beautiful course on the trails along the river in St. George.

Hurricane Half-Marathon: April 24, 2010. Rumor has it they may be changing the course this year. Hmmm.

OGDEN MARATHON: May 15, 2010! I'm itching to do another marathon to try and get a better time. This seemed like a perfect race between now and next year's St. George Marathon. They have a full and half marathon. If all goes as planned, I'll shoot for the 26.2.

What I'm most excited about with this run is who will be joining me. Mel will be running the half-marathon along with my sister Hollie and brother-in-law Kelly!

Kelly and Hollie are just beginning the insanity that is running. There is nothing like the excitement of your first big race. Here is a training calendar I made for them. Feel free to make use of it if you're just starting. I am very far from being an expert, but this gradual build-up seemed to work for me in preparing for my first marathon. (Click picture to expand.)

I think it would be a blast to have a big group of friends, family, rookie runners, and running pros all get together for this one.

Want to come????

Our Daily Marathons

You know, running 26.2 miles in a marathon was really, really hard. The pain was excruciating.

But lately I've been thinking about how sometimes life can be really, really hard too. Sometimes the pain is excruciating. I think many people are in the midst of running their own personal marathon.

Over the last few days I've looked into the eyes of people who are fighting their way through a marathon:

• The little girl at school who gets teased by the boys and doesn't have any friends.
• The dad who isn't able to sleep at night because he lost his job and doesn't know how he is going to put food on the table for his family.
• The mom who feels like she is being swallowed by depression and can't seem to break free.
• The man who has failing health and is tormented by constant pain.

Seeing these struggles makes my heart hurt. I think our own daily marathons are much more difficult than running 26.2 miles.

In a real marathon, crowds line the street and cheer you on. When you feel like you can't put one foot in front of the other, the cheering gives you strength. But most of the challenges in life are quiet, inward, personal battles. We don't have screaming crowds to get us through.

In an actual marathon, you know where the finish line is. But in our life challenges, often we don't know how much farther until the finish line. Sometimes we're not even sure there is a finish line.

While I was running the race, I could feel the love and support from my family. It helped keep me going. I have to think that God is watching from the sidelines, loving and supporting us too. When life gets hard, I have to believe that God will give us the strength we need to get us to the finish line. He knows us and will be with us as we run our daily marathons.