Back in the Saddle

Hey everybody, sorry I’ve been away for such a long time. I’m sure my half-dozens of readers were absolutely heartbroken since I haven’t posted since last May. A lot has happened since then.

I’ve moved from Jacksonville to Orlando, where I grew up. It’s given me the chance to reconnect with a bunch of my old friends get acquainted with some new friends as well.

Race Update: I ran a couple more 5ks in Jacksonville, posting a PR of 17:59 at The Run for the Pies. I recently ran the Disney Marathon with mixed results, finishing in 4:41. Yeah, that’s gonna change here in 2010.

Now, almost 8 months later, I’m back in my groove in Orlando and ready to wow you all with speedy stories and motivational musings. I’ll post to my twitter feed and to dailymile each time I update. Til then, keep moving.

Mike

Long Run Haiku

It’s 5am, I’m packing to meet my fellow runners from El Guapo and Jo from Jacksonville Running Company for a long run. I’m delirious at best. So, of course, this was the perfect time for my mind to start thinking in haiku. Here goes:

Woke in dead of night
Running fourteen half conscious
Take big nap later

RITA CASH 5K Race Report

Great race in Jacksonville Saturday morning. Weather was cool but very balmy at about 75 degrees. This 5K was for a great cause: The RITA (Reasearch Is The Answer) Foundation. The Foundation is a Jacksonville, FL based non-profit organization whose goal is to raise awareness regarding all cancers, especially breast cancer.

For more info on The RITA Foundation, you can visit their website here.

It was absolutely awesome to see so many teams of mothers, daughters, and sisters running the course this morning. This is the first of two races that RITA holds in Jacksonville each year and both are very fun runs along nice, flat courses. Today’s event was held in the Freedom Commerce Complex off of Baymeadows Road.

Was really excited about wearing my new singlet today that I got from Jacksonville Running Company. This was definitely one of the most comfortable tech tops I’ve ever worn in my life. Big kudos to Mizuno for this one.

The race shot off right at 8am with the lead pack holding around a 5:15-5:20 pace. I think this was to let our good friend Mike “Taco Verona” Cummings make good on his promise to lead for the first half mile. His name officially got changed to “Taco Rabbit” after this race. The course was very flat and fast with a couple U-Turns thrown in (we were in an office park, after all). The overall winner was Sam Morse from Vermont (why he was in FL, no clue) with an impressive 15:15 finish time, followed by Josh Myers (Jax Running Co) in 15:30, and Owen Shott (Jax Running Co) in 16:19.

Yours truly took 1st in the 25-29 age group and got some sweet schwag for my efforts. I really only got this because Sam, Josh, and Owen (all in my age group) took the overall awards. Won’t complain though.

The full results can be found here.

Looking forward to the next RITA Run, which will be on October 10th at the St. Johns Town Center! More info about Jacksonville area races, including the famous Gate River Run, can be found here.

Here are some of my race pics: #1 #2 #3 #4 #5

Happy running everyone!

Muddy Buddy Orlando

May 9, 2009 – Race time conditions: 80 degrees, humid, clear

Woke up bright and early at 4am for the 10th Annual Muddy Buddy Orlando. My muddy buddy Leigh and I drove into Disney’s Wide World of Sports Complex well in advance of our anticipated start time of 6:30 along with my best friends Dennis and Jon along with their respective significant others, Priscilla and Chenoa, to get our race packets and get all set-up for the race.

We all have absolutely no idea what to expect from this race. All we know is that it’s about a 6 mile race that involves us alternating between running and biking legs and that there’s a pretty gnarly looking mud pit at the very end that the teams have to finish TOGETHER. Here’s the course:

 

The sun was barely peeking above the trees once our wave started around 7:00. The Buddies on bikes went out first followed by the runners about a minute afterwards to avoid people being run over.

Leg 1 (Run) – After Leigh went out on the bike, I began with the rest of the runners about a minute after. It absolutely felt like I was toeing the line of a 5K and had the race anxiety to match. Once the runner’s horn sounded, I shot out of the start at solid 6:00/mi pace and quickly opened up a gap on all the other runners in the wave. The pace slowed slightly as the terrain varied, just to protect the feet and ankles. Got to the first transition and completed the first Muddy Buddy obstacle which was a climb over a 7 foot wall. It was really easy to lose a few places in your wave if you couldn’t find your bike easily. Another team had done one of these before since I saw a bike with a Spongebob helium balloon attached. Silly, but effective. 

Leg 2 (Bike) – After getting on the bike, I quickly ran into some issues as the back tire became misaligned and made the treads rub up against the bike frame. The bike was still rideable but made, hands down, the most annoying sound as I rode it. I’m pretty sure everyone on the course knew where I was during this leg. I was still able to go pretty fast on the bike and get to the next obstacle. Didn’t want Leigh to have any trouble finding the bike so I stood it upside down to make it easy to spot! It’s no Spongebob balloon, but it worked. The obstacle was a 15 foot cargo net followed by a fun slide at the end!!

Leg 3 (Run) – This part of the race was nice and relatively flat going through some trails behind DWWS and along the surrounding roads. Did my best to keep around a 6:30 pace at the very least. Leigh had to be losing her damn mind listening to the bike. For faster runners, this leg is where you start to overtake the waves that started in front of you. So maintaining pace and weaving in and out of people/bikes on the trail was the biggest challenge. The obstacle at the end of this leg was a balance beam. Wasn’t much of a problem. Found the bike and decided to figure out what was wrong with it. Just had to loosen the back tire and realign it. Took all of 15 seconds. Why didn’t I do this earlier!!! 

Leg 4 (Bike) – This leg of the race had a ton of terrain changes that went from hard packed gravel to super-loose sand. The trail seemed to narrow as well as the leg went on as well. It’s really easy to get stuck in traffic on this part. No clue what the speed was like on this one. Obstacle was a crawl under a cargo net and over a turf carpet that does a pretty good job of scraping up your knees. Not a pleasant sensation but the race goes on.

Leg 5 (Run) – Time to finish strong. Trail went to grass on the roadside and had an embankment for about 200 yds on the side of the road that was uncomfortable. Turned to a loose sand access road into the back of DWWS which would be complete hell for anyone on two wheels! Luckily after about a quarter mile of that, the trail turns back onto the nice paved trails of the DWWS grounds and gives a reassuring surge as you’re almost to the finish! The hope is short lived as you get to a set of stairs that you have to climb. Running, its not such a big deal. What was crazy was watching the bikers have to carry their bikes up about 40 steps! Mountain bikes are significantly heavier than road bikes so this has gotta be a huge chore. The light (or mud in this case) at the end of the tunnel is in sight as throngs of cheering fans are intently watching all the finishing Muddy Buddy teams get down and dirty in the Pit at the end. 

The Pit – This is the final transition area where the teams meet up after the last leg to finish in a gigantic muddy mess. This mud pit is huge. There is nothing clean about it. I mean, you have a little dirt on you from running on trails but other than that you’re relatively clean. This mud pit basically tells you that you’re gonna need a fire hose to clean yourself off after its done with you (A day later, my tri shorts STILL are not clean).  Down on hands and knees, the teams crawl through the 60 or so feet of mud pit and on to the finish line.

This was an amazing race with a great post race party with 2 free beers for all participants. I highly recommend signing up! The Muddy Buddy is held in about 13 cities nationwide. You can find more info at http://www.muddybuddy.com

Leigh and I ended up getting 3rd place in our age group (Coed – Combined age 46 – 55). Heres the schwag we brought home:

 

Muddy Buddy Medal

The gang post-race:

VDOT Results look promising!

I was talking to my coach (Paul) over the past couple sessions we’ve had and I asked him about what type of paces I should be running and how fast I should expect to finish the marathon I’ve been training for (Chicago). Both him and Owen (part owner of Jacksonville Running Company – www.jaxrun.com) turned me on to the method used by legendary running coach Jack Daniels. He uses the VDOT method of estimating race finishing times based on previous race performances so I figured I’d take a look and see what I SHOULD finish at for the marathon. This was using my latest 10k race performance and PR of 39:27. My goal for my first marathon is to qualify for the Boston Marathon in 2010, which for me is a 3:10:59. Here goes…

 

 

VDOT 52.8 – Predicted Finish Times
Distance	Time	min/km	min/mile
1500 m	5:08.4	3:25.6	5:30.9
1 mile	5:33.3	3:27.1	5:33.3
3000 m	11:00.5	3:40.2	5:54.3
2 miles	11:52.9	3:41.5	5:56.4
5K	19:01.8	3:48.4	6:07.5
8K	31:11.8	3:54.0	6:16.5
10K	39:27.0	3:56.7	6:20.9
10 miles	1:05:21.8	4:03.7	6:32.2
20K	1:22:27.1	4:07.4	6:38.1
Half marathon	1:27:18.3	4:08.3	6:39.6
30K	2:07:06.4	4:14.2	6:49.1
Marathon	3:02:05.7	4:18.9	6:56.7

 

 

So basically…life is lookin’ good for October

Running in Tempe

I’ve been in Tempe, AZ for about 3 days now working on a branch audit for my company that will conclude on Saturday. The trip over was pretty uneventful other than a generous helping of disgruntled passengers who were late for all their connections. The result of this was the Phoenix passengers having to wait in their seats until all the connecting folks emptied the plane. Needless to say, it was easy to sit back and snicker on the inside watching people completely lose their collective shit over their connecting planes that had already left and that they can’t do anything about.

Obviously, I’m not writing about work or the damned audit. Sorry to disappoint.

Anyways, upon settling into my hotel room I immediately started to dwell on the potential running spots that would be both long enough and convenient enough for me to try out in the mornings. This is where Google Maps works wonders. I found a quaint park, or should I say collection of parks, about 1.5 mi from my hotel that surround a river-turned-lake called Town Lake (formerly Rio Salado). Distance is long enough for me to get decent mileage if I’m doing loops and it seems a safe enough area as its right next to Arizona State University. Not to mention the potential for eye candy that might be out there. This is highly doubtful at 5:30am when I’ll be running, but a boy can dream.

Tuesday 3/24/09:

I get to the parking lot around 5:30am or so and quickly realize that there are not a lot of early risers around here. My rental car sits by its lonesome in the parking lot almost to the point where I’m afraid of someone breaking into it while I’m out. Why someone would break into a Pontiac Vibe is beyond me, but stranger things have happened.

I’m slated for 9 easy miles today, or “run like you feel” miles as my coach Paul says. Well I felt excited today, which in my case means that I run faster than what I’m supposed to. Easy pace for me is about 8:00/mi. Again, I got excited about  my new running locale and decided to average 7:20/mi for the distance instead, like a dumbass. Didn’t hurt that the ASU crew team was settin up for practice and there were a few choice ladies in the bunch. Needless to say, I was running faster!

Overall, the 9 miles went well, no pain, just a little tired from the quick pace that I had no business running this morning.

Wednesday 3/25/09:

Same deal as yesterday. Only car in the lot. Ugh. 6-8 miles easy hills today. The trail around the lake is hilly enough to suffice but its got nothing on the Acosta Bridge back in Jacksonville.  Made a conscious effort to go easy today and averaged about 7:50/mi for the duration of the run. I was able to take in a lot more on the course this time. I’m used to squirrels running across the trail back in Florida, which is kinda the same deal here, except the squirrels are replaced with jack rabbits. I was just waiting for that one big as F desert snake to make its way out on to the course and ruin my day. Alas, it never happened, thankfully.

Fun thing about running in the morning is that you get to witness amazing things like this:

Sunrise @ Rio Salado Park

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Needless to say, I stuck around for a bit after I was done.

Thursday 3/26/09:

I really can’t get enough of this park. Waking up early doesn’t seem like such a bad prospect when I’m being met with a great place to run like this. Today was an easy 8 mile run which felt really smooth and consistent for me. My splits on any given mile were around the 7:50/mi area. Felt completely relaxed and content with this run. It’s a shame that I won’t be able to spend more time out here. A race in this beautiful scenery would be outright amazing.

Friday 3/27/09:

Today was my day off. Good thing too because work required my full attention for about 14 hours. Sometimes I think long days at work are more strenuous than doing long runs!!! Unfortunately I partook in a lot of stress-related eating that included no less than a large Quizno’s sub, a huge cookie, and 7 slices of pizza.

Saturday 3/28/09:

Read above. This run flat out sucked. 8 miles of clunky, sluggish, running torture. Couldn’t get into a rhythm for the life of me. Feet felt like rocks so much that I could hear my foot strikes over my blaring iPod. Even my beloved Town Lake park betrayed me by having a section of the trail unlit during which I was truly watching my surroundings for anything out of the ordinary. This was definitely one of those “get it done and get home” runs. 

After shoring up some things at work, I’m on my way back to the east coast, humid air, trees, beaches, and my friends. The ‘Zona was beautiful and running here is sublime (at least in the mornings). I think I’ll go look up some races now!

Thanks for reading everyone, more to come later.

Time to switch gears.

Ok, so I bombed fantasy football last year both as a fantasy manager and as a blog writer. I’m gonna switch gears to something I actually do on a daily basis which is running/triathlon training. Run reports, race reports, miscellany, I’ll write about it. Stay tuned kiddies.