November Notes

Here's a post a drafted back in November, but forgot to post:

I've always felt that as long as the snow holds off for November, this month is one of my favorite months to run, similar to a mild February. I have yet to run a single race this year though. As I look back, it seems that several minor injuries, family matters, and a lack of motivation have led to this simple fact.

It's not like I didn't train hard. I ran intervals at a local track for 6 straight weeks, once a week and did some longer runs of up to ten miles too. But I didn't plan to do any specific races and it's the middle of November already.

 

I was able to make some new friends this year. There's a group of older runners that frequent our local rail trail so I have run with them. They call themselves the Running Amigos. Their ages range from about fifty to over seventy. There are some fast runners in this group too. I chased several of them around the Manchester Road Race course a month ago and couldn't quite catch up to them on the 4.75 mile loop. 

My right calf has been causing me some issues so I've had to reduce my ~23 miles/week and suspend speed work for the past several weeks. I think things are turning around now. I ran pain-free the last three runs, but I need to watch it. I ran Friday this week and felt a little sluggish.

Back to Boston

My wife and I were able to get tickets to the American League Divisional Series game on October 5, 2013 between Tampa Bay and Boston. It gets a bit expensive to stay at a hotel in and around Boston so we opted not to stay over night in the city. The game was scheduled to start at 5:30 pm, but we had a family commitment to go to at 1:00 pm, which made the schedule tight. 

 

At around 2:30 pm, we left the family gathering and headed for the Riverside T-station off of Route 95 in MA. We like to leave our car there and take the T-rail to Fenway Park to avoid the traffic.When we reached the station at around 4:15, the parking lot was full so we had to improvise. There's a number of apartment complexes just past the station so we parked the car there, for free. I think we saved ten bucks or one Fenway beer.

The rail system in Boston is heavily used so we didn't get into Fenway Park until 5:25 pm. The weather was good, partly sunny and in the 60s. It was an exciting game. The Red Sox won by a score of  7 to 4.  After the game, we headed over to where the Red Sox players exit Fenway Park to see some of the players and find out what kind of cars they drive. We saw Jarrod Saltalamacchia, Dustin Pedroia, John Lackey, Daniel Nava and Andrew Miller. We also saw Larry Lucchino, the Red Sox CEO and President, with his entourage.

 

We didn't get home until midnight, but it was worth it.   

 

Running in Boston

This past weekend, my wife and I spent some time in Boston and attended the Saturday afternoon Red Sox game versus the Yankees. But before we left for the game, I went out for a 50 minute run around 9:30 am along the Charles River. I can't remember running along with or near as many people other than in a large race. Runners of all shapes, sizes and abilities were coming out of the trees literally.  On Friday, I had watched the scores of runners, bikers, boats, and walkers from our 12th floor hotel room window pass by along the river so I figured that a run would be anything but solitary.

I headed across the Charles River from our hotel and headed south towards Boston University along the east side of the river for 25 minutes or so. I decided to go this way because there's a dirt path that runs along the paved sidewalk, which is much more forgiving on my joints. I passed by B.U. bridge, Harvard Bridge, and Longsfellow Bridge, and turned around near Bunker Hill Community College. I talked to one guy near my turnaround point and asked him how far he intended to run. He politely replied, "18 miles or so," as I turned and waved goodbye.

Just as I started back, I noticed a fairly tall blond-haired woman running slightly ahead of me. It took me about a minute or two, but I was able to catch her when we got stuck at a traffic light with another 13 or so runners. As we headed north along the river, I passed her and said, "This might be a mistake trying to pass you." She laughed and kept on running. We seemed  to be going the same pace so we ended up talking for 5 minutes. It turns out she works in college financial aid. We talked about the Red Sox and running around Boston. I enjoyed our exchange until we parted ways around the B.U. Bridge.

I wasn't able to get in a run on Sunday before we left, but plan to run along the Charles River again if the opportunity presents itself. It was a really enjoyable run and I had great running weather: sunny, a slight wind, 65 degrees F.

By the way, the Red Sox ended up beating the Yankees Friday and Saturday so the weekend was a total success.      

Speedwork revisited

Over the past several years, I've written a number of posts about speedwork. I just started going to the local track once a week again to do repeats, specifically half miles and quarters.  You might remember me comparing actual track speedwork from two different decades, 1997-1999 and 2008 - 2009s in a previous post. There was about a thirty second difference in times, slower more recently.

On July 12, 2013, I did five halves (3:24, 3:30, 3:29, 3:29, and 3:26) and  two quarters (1:36 and 1:34). These times compare quite well with my times from 2007-2009. I ran a rest quarter in between each hard repeat. I also used my lightweight Merrills, which seemed to help me increase my turnover.

On July18, 2013, I did five halves (3:23, 3:27, 3:30, 3:29, and 3:37). It was very hot and humid that morning and I really struggled to do the workout. I brought two bottles of water, but that didn't last long. With the sun beating down on me, I couldn't manage to do the two quarters I had planned to do. I like to think of these workouts as character building, but I was really tired after finishing.

I was unable to get in a track speedwork session last week because of several issues. I still did some pickups on a nearby trail on July 24, 2013 during a 7 mile run. I ran two minutes faster on the return trip from an out and back run.

I'll keep you posted on my times to see how these workouts help my overall speed. Stay tuned.

New Translate Feature Added To My Blog

Hello,

As I mentioned in my previous post, I have a number of lurkers stopping by my blog, but they don't seem to want to comment. Perhaps, they don't understand English. Well, near the top of my opening page on the right of this post, I added the "translate" feature to allow people to convert my blog writings into whatever language a person uses. I hope this helps.

Ken

Running in Florida

Just about every year, we go to Florida on vacation for a week or so. It's a nice break because we don't really care for the cold, snowy conditions in the Northeast each winter. So this April we headed down to Fort Myers Beach for a little R&R. We arrived in Florida via Detroit in the early afternoon of April 16th. The temperature was around 85 degrees and it was sunny. Sounds good, right?

Running in Florida for me has been a bit of a challenge. With the high humidity and temperature, it seems that each mile down there is almost like twice the distance up north. Don't get me wrong. I like going to Florida. But I've found that certain things are important for me to do when running in Florida. First, I put on suntan lotion to prevent overexposure. Then I run earlier in the morning to avoid the hotter conditions. I always drink water before running, but I carry water with me on every run down there. I know some people have difficulties drinking or eating on the run, but my energy gets so zapped if I don't sip some water during these tropical runs. I also don't feel the need to stretch as much before running in Florida because the "fluid" conditions.

One of the best things about running in Florida are the views though. When I run on the beach, it's not unusual to see numerous types of birds.  Pelicans, terns, gulls and sandpipers fly back and forth in the wind. Dolphins sometimes show up and chase schools of fish along the shore. Of course, there are people mulling around the beach too. This April I was particularly impressed with this very old woman who religiously ran by our condo in the early morning on multiple days and returned about 45 minutes later going the other direction, unfazed by the conditions. She wasn't moving fast, in fact, she was barely crawling, but she was doing her thing. It was obvious to me that running played a very important role in her life and I can relate to that. I hope when I get to that age I'm able to do the same.

 

Calling All Lurkers!

I know that my posts on this blog are few and far between, but I'm trying to change things. One of the interesting aspects of maintaining a blog is that you can see where your audience hail from and what method they used to find your blog. I've had a number of visitors from Russia and Sweden, but unfortunately no comments. I get very few comments.

This is an all out appeal. If you stop by, feel free to just say hello or leave a note, even if it's not in English. I really appreciate them! Perhaps we can actually help each other in some small way, whether it's related to running or something else.

Thanks,

Ken