So…

What have I been doing the last two months?

Getting fat and slow, mostly. When I went to the doc, he said to take at least a month off of running. So, I did.

Then the guy at PT (Who was MAGIC, MAGIC, I say, with the tape and the battery-delivered analgesics) had me keep doing the stretches I was doing, but, more importantly, didn’t mess around and cleared me to start running again, provided I kept stretching and using orthotics.

So, I’m painfully fat (Well north of 180), and painfully slow (Bike’s been averaging less than 16 mph), I’m at least running again.

I’ve also changed jobs, which should end up providing more time in the day. The pool’s a 5 minute walk from my office, and, even better, it’s only 7 miles door-to-door home to office. I’m still sorting out logistics with the job, but I’ve ridden my bike in at least once each week I’ve been working here.

My goals for the summer, as they have been for the last two, are to get well and get thinner. Let’s see how that goes…

Running, cruel mistress

I’m a middle-aged distance runner.

Which is translated as I’m old and slow.

I’m also a Navy Reservist, which means that twice a year I get graded on how fast I can run a mile and a half.

Over most of the last decade, I’ve taken a smug satisfaction in being able to be pretty competitive in running that mile and a half twice a year. It’s not tough to excel at the run – anything better than 12 minutes (8:00/mile) is pretty competitive.

So, two weeks ago, I turned in an 11:04 for the mile and a half. I also ran a mile from the gym to the track before the run, and then did about 3 miles after, ’cause I needed to add mileage as I had been expecting to run the Vermont City Marathon on Memorial Day weekend.

Well, I woke up on 4 April with a stabbing pain in my left heel. F*sck, I said, and blew off my long run that weekend.

I tried cranking out a mile on 6 April, and 3 on 9 April – both times I woke up hurting.

So I took off a WHOLE WEEK, and tonight I tried running again. The first half mile rocked – my legs are fresh, I’ve been riding a bike all week – man, I thought I was good. Woke up with no pain, walked a lot today.

But, about a half mile into the run, I started twinging each step.

And at 3/4 of a mile, something “snapped”, and I limped back home.

My heel’s been throbbing for the last 4 hours, despite a fair amount of barley malt, yeast, and hops as medication. I’m really upset (p!ssed), ’cause the weather in Alabama is phenomenal for running. Man, I want to run.

I rented a bike and have been riding like a madman. I’ll likely do 40 or 50 miles tomorrow morning. But I’m crying because it hurts to run.

Stupid marathons.

50 years

It’s 50 years since Gargarin orbited the planet. In the 20 years after that, we sent men to the moon, started a long-term space station, landed on most of the planets in the inner solar system, and made the first reuseable heavy-lift space vehicle. In the next 30 years…

I don’t think it’s a coincidence that space stalled in the ’80s. Our national psyche changed in the ’70s and ’80s. First we centered on the individual – self worth regardless of the approval of the community. Then we decided that “greed is good”, and made selfishness a virtue. Even religious conservatives have, rather than “denying your father and following Me”, that everything centers on an individual’s family, regardless of the rest of the community.

In the two decades after that, we decided that even a non-binding responsibility of the individual to think of the good of the community was equivalent to Soviet communism. No more pledging “our lives, our fortunes, and our sacred honor” to everyone else in the country – what a bunch of hippies must have written that. I’ll get mine, thank you very much.

We need to get back to thinking that we can do great things as a society for the benefit of all mankind.

Paris-Roubaix next weekend

I dug this article at Velominati (as well as much of the rest of the site). He is, however, breaking a cardinal rule of belgian beer by using a pint glass, but everything else is good.

Red

(Proper glas via Vestio)

I cannot recommend Paris-Roubaix enough. Hugely long race (more than 250 KM) through the North of France, across the fields of Flanders, and with almost 20 sections of cobblestones dating back centuries. Most poignant for me is the stretch through the Ardenne, where vicious battles were fought in both WWI and WWII.

It’s a hugely old race, finishes with three laps on the velodrome at Roubaix, and has been won by most of the legends of the sport. AND, this is the next to last time George Hincapie will toe the line.

Hey, amigos!

Wow – missed another month on the blog. Wish it were because I were taking an internet vacation, but I seem to have slipped into consumption mode much more than production mode. There’s something that’s lost there, and I kind of regret it.

Training for the Vermont City Marathon has gotten kind of scattershot – I’ve allowed work to come back to dominate my time, skipping workouts. I think there’s still plenty of time to recover the training plan, but am kind of disturbed that I slipped off so quickly.

I have been pretty regular at getting to spin class, and making about 75% of my runs, including all but one long run, so I don’t think I’m so far off, but I could be doing better.

One Week Down

Man, 2011 is going to be my year. Good stuff the rest of the week, including another spin class on Friday, more bike-fu, and a pretty decent run Thursday.

Good late afternoon run with KC on Saturday. Waited at Gym 109 for him; he didn’t show, so I started without him. Original plan was to run to downtown Newport, but there was a cold wind blowing out of the north. I was feeling marginal to begin with, and didn’t want to run against the wind after I was tired and sweaty. So, I headed north. About a mile and a half in, KC calls.

So, head back, pick up KC, and head down to the pier. Somehow missed Colors, and had to stop at the porta john about a mile before the end. Only drawback to the whole day was forgetting to restart my GPS after the portapot, but other than that, life is good.

But, long run felt great. First week ends as a success.

Next week we start working on weight.

Saturday was an interesting experiment. Completely unanticipated, I ended up with a meatless day. Lunch ended up being a veggie omelet, and supper was a guacamole burrito. Not completely healthy, but no meat. Felt good on Sunday morning. Eating well is good.

2011, Continued!

Hey, Amigios!

Isn’t this great? I’m already meeting my monthly average number of posts, and we’re not even a week into 2011! Frankly, it’s kind of creeping me out, this whole needing to share again, but my writing gear’s a little dusty, and I kind of miss the whole thing.

Man, winter is a drag. I still haven’t motivated myself to head outdoors again after Sunday’s slog in the fog. Sunday’s run was a huge milestone, though. Missy came back in from a “short” six miles or so, and since we didn’t have Sunday School, there was still over an hour before we had to be bundled into the car and trundled on down to the house of worship to get some religion. I felt like crap – there was some alien bug brought forth from Oklahoma over the holidays, and it laid waste to my and my youngest’s intestinal tracts. (In my case too much Clyde’s Cider probably helped)

But, it was pushing 50, and I pulled on the Garmin, pulled on some pants, and laced up the sneakers. The new (that we’ve been in for a WHOLE YEAR) house is at the top of our neighborhood; so I slogged down the hill, and out onto the Gold Star highway. I felt awful, so why not climb? There’s about a 1.5 mile long uphill from the entrance to our neighborhood to the top of the hill at Flanders Road, and I slogged on up

Felt.

Like.

Crap.

But, I did it.

It was a foggy, foggy New England day – cold, still snow-covered ground held back rosy-fingered dawn. Ink-black night had transitioned into unseparated-colors-and-whites pasty grey; the air was wet with condensation. No wind, and the kind of dead silence that’s usually not found unless one’s out to sea. Not many folks up early to practice religion the day after the New Year.

And, sucky though it was, it gave me hope. Made me remember what I love about the road, remember the good things that happen in my head when there’s nothing to think about except for turning circles with the feet, staying light in the knees, and following the white line or crushed
gravel.

At the top of the hill, I turned around and headed back towards the house. Funny thing with running, going down isn’t any easier than going up. But, when I made it back to the ‘hood, I figured I’d head the long way around the block to get home. Legs let out about halfway up the hill, walked for about a quarter of a mile, but ran the last quarter mile, uphill.

As I walked in the door, the hiccups set in, and Missy started laughing. Dunno why, but working hard in the cold always gives me hiccup. With my stomach still in a knot, I also got to re-sample the morning’s kashi (yum) [not], but managed to choke it back down.

So, the streak’s still alive. Monday, I snuck into spin class at the Y. 45 minutes of lungs searing on no breakfast may make Billy a slightly skinnier boy.

Streak continues today.
After a crummy adventure with the car in which I fell victim to terrible service and wrongly questioned someone who I’d usually known to do good work, came home to a great supper with Missy and the kids. Put everyone to bed, then TO THE LAIR! 45 minutes on the rollers, 26 minutes on the treadmill, shower, write, and to bed.

With an actual paper book that no-one but me’s requiring me to read.

All hail Discordia

2011 kickoff

Ah, blogosphere, if there’s any left.

The end of 2010’s been rough, running-wise for me. I completely failed at Fat Cyclist’s lose 10 pounds by Christmas challenge. The start was good; but the finish left a whole lot to be desired. For a variety of reasons, primarily work-related, I fell off the wagon and finished off on Christmas Eve right where I’d started.

Which I suppose is a large part of the story of 2010.

I didn’t really make any real resolutions for 2010, so there’s no real way to sum up the year. I suppose I could chunk my dailymile.com feed (Love, love, love that site) to figure out how this year compared to last year, but, frankly, I’m afraid it’d depress me.

I ran the Vermont City Marathon in May, and then pretty much sat up in the saddle for the rest of the year. Vermont City was a great race, but, as usual, my training was sub-par, and I faded hard at the end of the run. What was different, though, was that I felt completely compelled to finish the race when I cramped at 16 miles.

Melissa ran New Haven this year instead of me, which was completely fair, and about which I have no regrets other than pure jealousy. But I think that without that as an end of summer goal, I kind of wandered…

My alternate goal was to lose 20 lbs between Memorial day and the end of summer – absolutely no progress there.

Overall, though, I’m cool with it – this was a tough year at work, and I’ve pulled through with general success. My fitness hasn’t lost anything since this time last year; my relationship with Melissa has probably never been better, and my oldest kid isn’t getting notes sent home from his teacher on a regular basis, and actually got a smokin’ good report card this last marking period.

There are prospects at work that look promising both professionally and in terms of work-life balance, and I’ve been selectively de-committing from some of the non-work stressors that I have.

So, I’m upbeat but realistic about 2011.

Enough so that I think I’ll set some goals:

1. Run Vermont City again. Loved the race, and Melissa wants to run Flying Pig. Which means if I want another family weekend in Burlington over Memorial Day, I need to suck it up and run. Oh, the sacrifices I make.
2. Finish FatCyclist’s 10 lbs plan by the end of January. Frankly, it was working while I was able to reschedule priorities. January looks to be somewhat less chaotic than December was, and it’d be nice to roll into training for Vermont City at 175 instead of 185.
3. Tri, tri again. I really regret not doing an olympic tri last summer. I especially regret not doing one with my buddy Dave W, who is no longer working at the same place with the part-time job. So, hopefully, I can do a win-win here and keep in touch with someone who’s been a good friend (something I’ve been notoriously bad at in the past), AND work out my tri demons. I’m also good for the NAVSTA Newport tri in August – it’s a sprint, and I’d love to see what I can do with some good training and 20 lbs less baggage.
4. Not get onto Jon’s list of dead blogs. I really miss posting as much as I had in the past. I also need some inspiration – who’s writing well?

Here’s hoping to get back to you all in 364 days with a great 2011 wrap-up.

10# in December; Careful riding in the basement

Fat Cyclist, who never ceases to be an inspiration to me, posted a quick framework for losing 10 pounds by Christmas. Basically, it boils down to:

  • Eat Sensibly
  • Exercise

So, naturally, I’m all over it, despite having lost and regained the same 5 pounds for all of 2010. Haven’t seen south of 175, which is where I’ll be if I can do this, since, early 2009? Maybe. Something like that.

Anyway, I’m in. And characteristically, I managed to get a flat while riding my bike on rollers last night. I’ll let that sink in –

I got a flat in my basement.

It’s probably got something to do with riding off the rollers and pinch-flatting. I haven’t yet looked. But, it’s not the most auspicious start.