This weekend was a good one for running, due not only to the cooler weather but also to the results of my Saturday workout and my unexpected good fortune of Sunday afternoon.

For Saturday morning, I had planned an ambitious run, 14-16 total miles broken into segments of 5 miles at marathon pace, 5 at tempo pace, & the necessary warmup & cooldown miles in between. The morning started inauspiciously, as it took a good long while for me to warm up in the 50-degree weather & I had to take a bathroom break after a couple of miles. When I shifted gears into marathon pace at around 3 miles, I was still feeling a bit sluggish, & as a result pushed it just a little too hard, finishing the 5 miles at an average pace of 8:45/Mi., about 5 seconds faster than I should have run. As I cooled down for a mile, I pondered whether to go through with the tempo segment or simply do another 5-6 at MP. It didn't take me long to decide that I should follow the original plan, at least as long as I could stick it out without crossing over into the Realm of Diminishing Returns, a place that I am getting to know intimately.

I never thought that I'd make it the whole 5, but off I went, determined to go as long as my legs would take me without turning to lead. And a strange thing happened: I got tired -- hell, I was tired from the first -- but soon after it would start to hurt a little, the feeling of acute distress would  subside into something manageable & I would find myself cruising along at a pace that truly was "comfortably hard." When I finished, I was more than ready to stop: but I was victorious. I had planned this workout partially as a last-ditch effort before the half to train my legs to run fast when fatigued, & partially as a test to see if they would do just that. With the workout complete, I knew that I had accomplished both. Of course, I paid for it later in the day as my legs slowly turned to dead wood; but from the neck up I was energized, & looking forward to the half next week.

In anticipation thereof, I had made tentative plans to attend a lecture on pacing and race strategy at Furman, hosted by the Furman Institute of Running and Scientific Training (FIRST). Now for me, "tentative plans" usually means "that would be a nice thing to do if I time/initiative/balls to do it." But as I am now making a conscious effort to reach beyond myself & do things that I would not normally do, I gave it a shot. To my surprise, I was the only one who showed up, & as a result found myself with the undivided attention of exercise physiologists Scott Murr & Bill Pierce, who by dint of their recently-published book Run Less, Run Faster are now recognized as among the country's foremost experts on distance running. For nearly an hour, we discussed tapering, mental preparation, race strategy, & pacing, & although I was already familiar with the FIRST philosophy & the works of these two scholars, I came away with an increased knowledge of the science of running & what I need to do to PR in both the half this weekend & the Kiawah Island Marathon in December.

In sum, it was a good weekend for running, & although I worked hard & got too little rest, I'm going into next week feeling good & anticipating good results in whatever I may do.

Posted by MHB at 11:21 PM EDT

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It's been a while. How long, I do not know. The past several weeks have gone by rapidly, distinct in the progression of days but hazy in terms of a clear point of beginning or, more significantly, of ending. But such is the nature of reordering one's life. I've done it before, so I kind of knew what to expect: tests to take, checks to write, budgets & schedules to make, new buildings, new parking lots, new people, new knowledge, new skills, old doubts. Decisions, decisions, decisions ... when to resign ... how much insurance ... how much savings ... plan B ... plan C ... worst case scenario.

All I know is that there's been a lot of that ... and a lot of running, too. I hate to make a catalogue, but that's the way my thought processes seem to be working now, so I'm going to go with it. Thirty-mile weeks 10 out of the last 11 weeks; resumption of speed work, first with extra strides & Fartlek, lately w/ track work -- the standard quarters, but also some mile reps (4 last Wed.) to get ready for the half in 2 wks & the full in Dec; 2 5k races, one strictly for charity due to a large crowd that made running for time impossible, & a small points-series race in which I ran well but was not recorded in the results (I'm still working on straightening that one out); a few weekend long runs, including 18.4 miles yesterday morning; a 4-day running schedule due to my evening class; a gradual decrease in recovery time that I hope signifies an increase in strength & endurance that will translate into better times in longer races.

Posted by MHB at 10:13 PM EDT

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It's high time I took at least a few minutes out of one of my daily tests of physical and mental endurance to write a bit in this blog, lest whatever powers that may inhabit the void into which these words are cast may not be fooled into thinking that my online presence is dormant.

Trey Anastasio is on Austin City Limits tonight, which will be OK for background music to which to type this entry but won't get much more attention than that from me. Sure, the guy can play; but lately cult bands (yeah, I know -- Phish broke up, but I might as well be listening to them all as to be listening to him right now) have simply annoyed me, and besides, this looks less like the intimate setting that is the program's trademark than like a full-blown arena gig, complete with beach ball. A view from the back of the stage reveals that it is indeed an outdoor show, taped at twilight and packed full of scrubbed, fratty-looking youngsters in various stages of music-and-chemical-induced exhileration. Used to be my scene, ain't no more. I'm too cynical now, too analytical. Give me a twisted but insightful take on reality over a pretty escapist dream. These are not the times. People living under a dictatorship cannot afford the luxury of fantasy.

Anyway, I got in a 17-mile long run this morning (nice segue, dipshit), exactly one week after doing a 40-minute long tempo & then coming down with the Head Cold From Hell, which still has me blowing huge globs of ropy, gluelike mucus form my nose (Aren't you glad you kept reading now? You're welcome). It's been a busy week, a busy month, a busy year -- and running has only been part of it. There's a lot going on right now -- marathon training, deadlines, my eventual exit from my job, some new stuff to help me make the transition -- and the next few months promise to be just as busy.

Posted by MHB at 10:50 PM EDT

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It's Thursday night, and I should be working right now. I don't have another deadline until Oct. 5, but I have another 1000 words due a week after that and will have some other obligations taking up several hours a week of my time starting soon and lasting through the end of the year. And yet I am not, because I am exhausted; and the cause is yet another thing that promises to take up a lot of my time for the next few months: training.

To the experienced runner, my training would not look that strenuous. I'm up to 40 mile weeks after a summer of nothing but EZ and tempo; my long tempo runs, done every other week, are now up to 38 minutes, my long-slow-distance runs up to 14 miles. If it hadn't been so damn hot this summer, I would have done better, and perhaps met my goal of 50-mile weeks and a 45-minute long tempo. But I am pleased with where I am, and prepared to get down to some real work getting ready for the races this fall.

My goals are multifold: to be able to run much better in the races I care about (a sub-22 5k, a half in 1:45 or under, a marathon somewhere in the neighborhood of 3:45), to have the fitness to experiment in less important races, and to glide gracefully across the course in races that I run for charity or just for kicks. I had a time trial of sorts in a 2-mile race on a track in July, and a charity 5k (Race for the Cure) on Sep. 29 that will not serve as a time trial due to the traffic jam at the start and the uncertainty of the (new) course, but will give me an idea of how my body will respond to racing this fall.

Jon Stewart is on, so I'm off. More on this topic later.

Posted by MHB at 11:07 PM EDT

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This weekend was one of mild aggavation and too little rest; but it still beats the hell out of going to work. First my garage door opener began behaving bizarrely, moving the door in the right direction for about a second at a time before reversing itself and going back about halfway to where it started. At that point I could have called a repairman; but it is my habit not to spend that kind of money on a repair job unless I am sure that I cannot do it myself, and often the only way to know is to try. At least I should be able to triage the thing and determine whether I am going to need professional help. So I took the housing off the unit, and it doesn't look good. The drive shaft is slipping, so much so that it broke the plastic inner housing that holds the main gear in place. I'm not sure that I can fix the damn thing, but I can unplug it, and as long as I can work on it without fear of getting electrocuted or crushing my fingers in a moving part, I will at least try to fix it myself. It's called self-sufficiency, and many among us have forgotten it or have been conditioned not to risk it for fear of screwing things up worse than they're already screwed. I have found that on balance, I save more money with DIY than I cost myself in during the rare moment of destructive incompetence.

Unfortunately, so far my DIY ethic has not worked on the drain that connects my two bathroom sinks, and which at present is probably the worst-clogged drain that I have ever seen. I've got some chemical drain cleaner in there right now - a last resort, as I have already tried several rounds of snaking and the natural baking soda-vinegar mixture. Yes, snaking was unsuccessful. I've never seen a drain that a snake would not unclog, and thus I fear that it may have been taking a wrong turn in there somewhere.

I am also DIY with my training, which has gone quite well of late. Going into my last week of summer base, I have built my weekly mileage up to a peak of 40.3 last week, and have exceeded 30 miles five of the past six weeks. Yesterday I did a tempo run of 38 minutes at 8:17/mi., which is well on the way to my goal of an hour at half-marathon pace by Kiawah in early Dec. By the end of this week, my long runs will be up to 15 miles -- perfect for starting serious marathon training. In short, running is one of the few areas of my life in which I have no complaints at present -- which is probably why virtually all of my entries of late have been focused upon it.

Posted by MHB at 10:45 PM EDT

Updated: Tuesday, 28 August 2007 10:34 PM EDT

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I don't have time for a long entry, as the season finale of Ice Road Truckers is on (yeah, I know -- but I've been told that we all need guilty pleasures); yet I feel compelled to shout across the deep abyss into which this blog unfolds that I ran a total of 40.3 miles this week, the first 40-mile week that I have ever logged, Monday to Sunday. The most I've logged in a week prior to this was the 38.8 I completed a few weeks before Nashville this Spring. Yeah, I had to do nearly 16 miles on a treadmill, and the last 3+ miles done at the track this morning consisted mainly of stiff-legged recovery jogging, but it's done.

I'm still a couple of weeks away from serious marathon training, and I'm moderately satisfied with how the base training has gone this summer. I had hoped to work my way up to 50-mile weeks by Labor Day; but after 3 straight 35+ weeks, I'm due for a cutback week, and won't get more than 45 the final week in August. But 45 will do. Given the oppressive heat and the other things that I've been forced to wrestle with with this summer -- from intense job stress to having to learn to run on a treadmill (more on this later), I'll take it, for it is more than I've ever had, and a nice little base upon which to build something fun. I would, indeed, be fun to set a few PRs this fall & winter -- maybe a half-marathon in under 1:45, a sub-22 5k, or 26.2 in 3:50 or less. At the very least, I will come back stonger. That I know. How much is the only question.

Posted by MHB at 11:00 PM EDT

Updated: Monday, 27 August 2007 10:20 PM EDT

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Summers are not made for racing -- at least not for me. I'm a big chickenshit when it comes to running fast in the heat, due in part to my own experience and in part to all the scare stories that I've read about young and fit runners who unexpectedly collapsed during runs and either died or damaged themselves to the point that they could no longer run competitively. Running in the heat sucks. It hurts like crap, saps your energy, and turns your urine the color of a school bus. It is an unnatural and uncivil act which as a southerner sometimes leaves me feeling stupid for being out deliberately, sytematically sweating in this fetid muck we call air down here in August, when any sensible person will tell you that in this kind of weather the only acceptable outdoor activity is sitting on the porch and drinking sweet tea.

But it's OK -- as long as you've prepared for it properly, through training and hydration. That's one thing I've been working on this summer while I'm building a base. Much of my easy running has been done in the afternoon heat and humidity, as I find it very difficult to get up early enough to run in cooler weather during the week. I come home from work, change into my running gear, and log 5-6 miles most evenings in the South Carolina air, which sometimes has a consistency similar to that of chicken soup. I do this by necessity; yet I have discovered an unexpected benefit to this practice: the building of mental and physical toughness, which is an area in which I feel I have been lacking in recent years as I learn more and more about running, and thus think too much at times in races instead of simply running hard and giving my all. I also have built more endurance than I expected to build.

I found this out last night during a 2-mile race in an all-comers' track meets held across the street from me at Furman University. The track club holds them on Wednesdays during the summer, and I have meant to attend some of them this year, but have been scared off by the 90-plus temperatures. But the 2-mile at the last meet is one of the club's points series races, and last year I earned myself 50 points for being first in my age group even though I ran a gingerly 15:07. This year it was different, in ways both positive and negative.

The meet itself was fun. I got to see a 6-year-old girl run 400 meters in 1:10, only 11 seconds slower than my high-school PR. I got to see a lot of fast runners, both kids and adults, in some of the other events, including the fast heat of the 2-mile. I waited for the slower heat, just like last year, and had no idea what to expect from my legs and lungs, which had been exposed to no speedwork in nearly three months. My plan was to try to lock into a pace that I could hold, perhaps a 7:15 or 7:20. But even that modest goal was no sure thing.

The weather and the turnout helped. There were so many runners -- especially kids -- that many of the events had multiple heats; thus the first 2-mile heat did not begin until after 8:00. By then, the sun had gone behind the clouds and a slight breeze stirred to cool the mild air, already under 80 degrees, a little more.  By the time my heat started, I had ditched my shades and was ready to test my physical limits. I'm not quite sure that I did so fully, but I did run at a pace that was quite hard compared to my recent efforts: slightly under 7 minutes for most of the race. Unfortunately, there were so many people in the heat that I had a hard time remaining in the inside lane, and thus added an additional 100 meters or so (according to my GPS) to my race distance. Yet I was pleasantly surprised by my performance, which included the wholly unexpected addition of a kick at the end. Yes, as I entered the bell lap, I found that despite the fact that I had begun hurting in earnest with around 1000 meters to go, I had something left, and began to open it up a bit. I turned it on a bit more in the backstretch, and as I came into the homestretch, I found an extra gear that I had not had possesed for some time. It was nice, and even though my time was a still-modest 14:28, I proved to myself that my base training is going reasonably well, and that the tempo runs that I have began mixing in with the easy miles have paid off in a modest way, and need to be continued. Plus, I had fun running a different race on a track upon which I have done many productive workouts, and upon which I saw Alan Webb break a four-minute mile earlier this year.

Posted by MHB at 11:13 PM EDT

Updated: Sunday, 19 August 2007 11:15 PM EDT

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Life is too short to allow the things that we fear to hold us back.

Those who wish to destroy good things can do so, if they have the means. But they cannot destroy the concept of good, nor your will to impose it.

Good leaders are rare, because the process of attaining leadership usually destroys the good in people.

Nine out of ten times that you try something new, you are likely to fail.

There are always lessons in failure. Sometimes the only lesson is that you are an idiot.

We are all idiots sometimes.

Posted by MHB at 10:41 PM EDT

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When I began this blog, I told myself that I would not get too introspective or self-revealing on it, as personally I feel that such ramblings are a waste of space at best, and embarrassing at worst. There are few people I know who have blogs that can pull that off, and I know for certain that I am not one of those people.

Yet when I look back at my recent entries, I see that I have been a bit forthcoming with my personal difficulties; and while I'm not convinced that I crossed the boundaries that I have established for myself, it does make me a little squeamish. but then again, blogs -- if done properly -- are all about subjective journalism, and if I have been a bit more open than I intended at times I did it in that spirit, and in the interest of the pursuit of truth. What the hell could be wrong with that?

I had to run in the rain again today, this time for the entire 5.3 miles. At times it was heavy, with thunder and lightning looming in the distance, although it never got closer to me than 5 miles away (believe me, I count when I'm out there in it). As usual, there was something peaceful about it -- at least when it wasn't thundering -- and I finished with a healthy sense of accomplishment and defiance. My shirt was so soaked I had to leave it on the porch. The base continues to build: another story, and another 5.3 miles in the log for the week. I'll take it.

Posted by MHB at 10:57 PM EDT

Updated: Saturday, 15 September 2007 11:52 PM EDT

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Not much in this world feels better than digging your way out of a hole. That is the task that has occupied a large chunk of my waking hours for the past couple of months, and it appears to be paying off. My house is home to a lot less clutter than it was a few months ago, and although I still have a long way to go, it is nice to be able to walk into my office without tripping over mounds of haphazardly-placed crap, or to look into my master bathroom and see evidence of demolition where there used to be shiny-white but hopelessly leaky tile. And it is equally nice to know that I can now go to my crappy, moribund job each day with the knowledge that I now have the freedom to leave, anytime I want, and make it until I can secure full-time employment again. As a result of these developments, my stress level has decreased substantially, and my running continues to progress.

This weekend began with another Saturday-morning run in downtown Greenville, which has become kind of a ritual for my wife and me since we started it a few weeks ago. I did 10.6 miles of long slow distance last Saturday, so this time I decided to do a long tempo on the rubberized "marshmallow trail." I had done 30 minutes on the soft surface at 8:19 splits over the 4th with no difficulty, and this time planned to do 32 at a similar pace. I went out too hard, at around 8:05 by the halfway point, but as the weather was overcast and the temps just under 70, I decided to hold it for the full 32, and did OK with it, finishing with 8:06 splits and feeling reasonably fine. The rest of the morning was relaxing as usual, fueled by coffee and capped off by my wife treating me to a belated birthday lunch at a Chinese restaurant. But later that afternoon, the hard workout began to catch up with me, and I dozed off hard. Later I dozed off again, and was out for good by 11:00.

I probably needed the rest anyway. I've got more building to do, more miles to pack on before the Summer is over. I want to be up to 50 per week by Labor Day, when I will start serious marathon training, and hopefully lay the groundwork for a new beginning during the Winter and Spring racing season.

Posted by MHB at 11:03 PM EDT

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