Way to go Bill!

Good job Bill, on the big 5k! I didn't realize you were doing one so large. It is a very surreal experience being in such a crowd, running along.

I got my steroid shot in the foot last week so I am off running for a week or so. I think my next goal might be a 10k in the spring. I'll have to look one up to see. I ran 5k last week before the shot, and things were still ok. Hopefully my plantar fascia injury goes away now!

The official 5k!

Phew! Tougher than I expected, with a decent range of elevation over long spaces, but I got wrapped up in about 33'. A very lovely ending, with the steepest decline in the entire race, and a curve. You can almost here the Chariots of Fire song.

A lot of interesting dimensions to running with such a big group of people... the sing the Star Spangled Banner, fire the shot, and everyone stands still. The front of the pack pulls out and creates a bit of space, with the fast runners passing up those they can, and the whole pack attenuates over the first few minutes. I think I walked the first block.

Just in general, too, it's pretty remarkable to see the range of people running. Some clearly terribly out of shape, some in amazing shape, old and young, pregnant and pushing strollers. No bananas that I saw, but with something like 7000 people, I might have missed her. When the pack does start to spread, there is the interesting experience of simultaneously passing people up and being passed. I would say, too, that being surrounded by a relatively dense pack was disorienting with respect to pacing myself. I couldn't tell if I was running faster than my normal moderate pace. I guess with roughly 11' miles, I couldn't have been going that fast!

In any case, it was good to have done it!

Drip drop

I so feel like complaining! :) I've had vague but increasingly definite sore throat for a few days, and just in general feeling run down. Blah. Perhaps I'm catching a cold, or one of those 48 hr. tumors. It's funny how the same run can seem better or worse depending on the day, context, and expectations. A couple of days, I ran from our mechanics back to Natalie's office. It was a pretty nice run, even though it's virtually all up hill. The day before, I think, I did my longer old run and didn't find it nearly as challenging as I remember it being. So today, in the rain and with icky cold symptoms, my lower legs both hurt from the hills and my energy level was flatlined.

I think that I won't run tomorrow, and give my body a chance to rest a bit more before Sunday. I'm kind of looking forward to it. What does the chip look like, I wonder. What number will I be? (1729, perhaps... not an interesting number, I think.)

A pretty nice morning

I feel kinda sad that I didn't actually run yesterday, but I made up for this morning with a nice 5.5k, which is actually remarkably like the run that I used to do when I was running a few years ago (pre-child.) Remarkably, at least on this day and in the wee hours of the morn, it doesn't seem nearly so bad as it once did, which I think speaks to some progress over these last few months.
It's been remarkably nice, too, to have this common way of recording progress along with Brian, and to have been making progress is rough parallel! Thanks, Brian, for taking the initiative to set all this up, and for allowing me to come along for the ride! I'm proud of you and your persistence!
I've been listening to the Zencast podcast, which has been fun. One of them finished up in the middle of the run and rather than starting another right away, I put the iPod away for a little while. It really is quite striking how different it is to run! I'm not sure I would say it was any easier, or harder, but the mind goes to different places. I think I appreciated the wonderful houses along parts of my route more today, and certainly the incest fauna. Perhaps, as with all things, a balance is called for?

5k and going strong

Here are some pictures from the race. I came in a bit over 29 minutes by my clock, but I'll find the official time later. There were over 6000 people in this race, which is pretty crazy, but I wasn't last. Also, I beat the guy dressed up as a banana. :)

Big race day!

In 1/2 hr I am going into Providence to race in the 5k. I already went in this morning, around 7, to pick up my tee-shirt, my timing chip, and my number. Already, they were blocking off roads, and it felt a little weird to have all sorts of volunteers wishing me good luck on the race.

Tomorrow is the big day!

So here I am, after 4 months of training, still recovering from my plantar fascia injury, but going strong. 11am tomorrow I will begin the race, with my goal to finish it. :)

Looking back over the blog, I can really appreciate how far I've come. I've had a lot of childhood baggage to overcome, and tomorrow I am going to surmount it in style! I've heard that there are 3000+ people running in tomorrow's 5k, so I imagine that Bill will have a slightly lonelier run than I.

On Thursday I get my steroid shot for my foot to hopefully put the last of the plantar behind me. Then I have to break for a week from running, and I have to decide what my next goal will be. Perhaps a 10k in the spring, or something else...not sure yet.

Tough Run

I actually did the perfect 5.5k that I was glowing about the other day. Not perfect! It took me 40 minutes since there were so many hills that I had to walk. Yucky general pain in my left leg... kind of demoralizing.

Perhaps after the Great Race, I'll move to cycling!

Oh, and btw

The site that Brian used a little bit ago, gmap-pedometer.com, also has a widget to create real topo maps. It looks like they're linked up with hand drawn but geo-rectified county survey maps. The street names are written in with surveyor handwriting, and there are what look to be pencil drawn lines. A quick look suggests that perhaps I don't live in the hilliest part of the city. :) Is a bit frustrating... I wish all of these map sites would allow you to use a much larger part of your screen. It's sometimes like looking at a Rand-McNally atlas through a small rectangular hole.

Perfect Route?

How wonderful. Just a week or so before the collective 5k's, I think I found the perfect route. http://www.gmap-pedometer.com/?r=2271462
It's about 5.5k and spans only 50 feet, although there are a few steep spots. Oh, wait. That's meters. Damn. Well, about 200 feet of elevation changes. In any case, relatively flat for the area, which is quite nice. It goes along a little park for a bit, and through small residential streets for almost the entirety, giving me some nice time to listen to podcasts. (I'm working my way through the ValuesHacker series, which is sort of the Cartalk guys doing philosophy.)

Well, it's still dark, but everyone in the house should be up soon, which is kind of weird. I guess that winter is coming. I'm starting to think about what to do to stay in shape afterward. Turns out that I've lost very little weight in this process, possibly because I haven't been consistent enough, but that I feel better generally. Perhaps it's one of those things where I picked up some muscle mass in exchange for some weight, possibly. In any case, work has a little weight/training room that I can use for about 15/month ; maybe that would make sense.

Looking forward to this weekend. Natalie's uncle Taras and Clara, a lovely pair, are in town starting tomorrow. Lots of possible activities, but the highlight really is to get them together with Hazel and to expand her circle a bit. :)

A very wet 5 miles

7 days until the 5k!

Today, I did my weekend run, which is the long one, and I ran 5 miles. It was made a bit more challenging because it was pouring rain. Yuck! By the end I felt it was made more challenging by the amount of extra weight, in water, that I was carrying around. :)

Off and On again

I was sick for a bit this past week, so I stopped running for about a week. After the 5-miler, I did 2 runs of 2 miles in the morning (which works well with my schedule), and then did a 2-miler this morning. Tomorrow I plan to do another 2-miler, and then another 5 on Sunday.

10 days until the 5k!

Great Race et al.

Couple of miles... thank god, I've gotten through the anti-procrastination book I was reading. (The Now Habit.) Lots of good ideas but the writing style could kill an elephant. :) Today, I was back to the Alabama 3. I don't think I ever realized that the Sopranos theme is about suicide before today.

So, I went out to find a race on the 21st without much luck in Pittsburgh. Perhaps I
ll do my own little course with Brian on the 21st. On the other hand, the following weekend is the Great Race, which is a big Pittsburgh event every year! I had no idea it was so late. How exciting! In the past, I've just gone out to cheer strangers on, and it might be more fun to run it. Question is whether to do the 5k or 10k. Turns out to be downhill, on average, and just over six miles. Think I probably won't go that way, since it really wasn't the training goal.

5 miles today!

I took a break for a few days to catch up on some sleep, and then this morning ran 5 miles, my longest yet. Pretty tired afterward, but I made it. I even got to see some road I have never been on. At the end of the road that I typically run, it seems to turn into fields and farmland, with stone walls. Pretty neat!

My schedule seems to be about every other day. During the week I am doing 2 miles, but trying to run them quickly. On the weekend I plan to do the longer runs.