Day Ninety Two - Personal Best

As you all know by now, Saturday is our weekly long run. This week we met at Bathesda Terrace in Central Park and I have to admit I was a little suprised at how sparsely attended the practice was. We found out that our head coach Ramon finished the NYC Marathon in 2:49 and change, which, as he would say, is pretty freaking fast. We also found out that one of our other coaches is pregnant, so congratulations Christine. After those announcements was our mission moment, this week given by one of our honored team mates. I'm horrible with names, but this is the guy that was diagnosed with Non Hodgkins Lymphoma (I believe) 3 years ago and is now training for a marathon (after competing in an Iron Man last year). He mentioned that the 5 year survival rate for his particular cancer is 50% at the 5 year mark. That's pretty sobering. And that's much better than it was just a few years ago. Another reminder of why we get out of bed at 7AM on Saturday to go and run. After all of these preceedings Ramon told us what we were scheduled to run that day. There are 3 different marathons being represented at our training sessions - Honolulu, DisneyWorld and Phoenix. Jen and I are, of course, training for Phoenix, which happens to be the last marathon of the three. So while the other folks have to be ready before we do, we'll be putting in miles in the cold weather longer than they have to. Honolulu, as a matter of fact, is coming up in just a couple weeks (Dec. 9th or so), so those guys are sort of coming into the home stretch. They were instructed to run 17 - 20 miles. How d'you like them apples? For people running Phoenix and Disney we were told to take it easy. Just a 12 mile run...provided that we have been keeping up with the training and that we had previously run 16 miles.

Drat.

My long at this point was 14.7. Just 1.3 measly miles from a nice leisurely jaunt around the park. But no worries. It was a beautiful day, with weather perfect for running, and I had come expecting a good long one anyway, so screw it, I'd run the 16.

I decided on 2 long loops (6 miles a pop) and one middle loop from Bathesda at 72nd Street to the 102nd St. Transverse. My course would be the two long loops in succession with the shorter loop last. To change things up a bit (because that 6 mile loop in the park is starting to get a tad boring) I decided to run in the OPPOSITE DIRECTION then what I am used to. I know. I'm a crazy person. Now, while there are no strict "rules" as to which way one should run in Central Park, I was definitely going against the grain, or at least, the bulk of the grain. As instructed I tried really hard to keep myself restrained for the first 3rd of my run. Ramon mentioned this morning that the goal should be to hold back on the first third, find your groove on the second and on the final third finish stronger than you started. I'm paraphrasing of course, but that's what I took from it anyway. I tend to try to keep the same pace throughout the run which has left me totally gassed at the end on a couple of occassions.

Doing what I could to keep things slow, I ran the first loop in the opposite direction, which was actually a little unsettling after so many times around the other way. I finished at a little over an hour, so somewhere between 10 and 11 minutes a mile. I turned around to run the second loop in the "right" direction and challenged myself to finish in under an hour. I learned a couple things during the second loop. The second six miles is definitely easier if you hold back on the first six. I also learned that I crap out around the 9th mile. Not that I have to stop or anything, but I stop feeling like I am in the zone and just start feeling like I am running. I kept my pace and finished in about 55 minutes, but I was feeling every step.

At this point I stopped for my second Goo and met up with some fellow Team In Training members. We got to talking and all headed off in the same direction and dammit, I forgot to set my stopwatch to start again. I wanted to time the last 4 miles - c'est la vie. I actually slowed down and stayed with them for the first mile and a half or so and it was nice to pace myself with them and actually have someone to talk to for a while. We ran the 102nd St. Transverse West to East and then I said goodbye and got back up to my pace to finish the run. I got back to Bathesda about 2 hours and 45 minutes after starting and talked to one of the coaches and another runner for a few minutes then said my goodbyes and started what I thought would be a very painful trip home. And while my knees did get a little sore, and my shins and feet were feeling the mileage too, I have to say that my body never felt quite as bad as I expected it to, which I took as a good sign.

There you have it. My longest run to date. 16 miles. Although Steve, the coach I was talking to after the run, said we'll be aiming for 18 on the "trails" of Central Park next Saturday, so that record won't last long, apparently. As long a run as that sounds, I'm actually happy to be learning a new course and some new mileage next week. So now we're past the 200 mile mark and headed straight for 300. Stick with me and we'll get there.

Thanks to The Lost Bee Gee, Brian Girard for his generosity in the world of fundraising. That much closer to my goal thanks to you.

Hope you all had a good weekend. More later...

DAY 92
TODAY'S MILEAGE - 16
TOTAL MILEAGE - 207.93