Fools and horses Running their courses

My first week as a master is not going at all like I planned.
I turned 40 last week. For my birthday, I did a birthday triathlon that consisted of a run, a trip the Russian Baths, and sushi. I did this last year as well and it's a great time. I get to do things I love with people I love.
One down side this year: Loren got terribly sick and missed the whole thing. And upside: my BFF Tracy surprised me at dinner, which was awesome. She lives in Philly so we don't see each other all that much. The day after my birthday, however, I too got sick. BOOOO.
I missed 4 days of running. Not that big of a deal, but ya know let's be honest. Runners are addicts. At least I am anyway. I don't like to miss my runs.
I was getting back on track this week, running with Loren and the dog a couple of times.
This weekend is the Manhattan Half, the first in a series of halfs in NYC, one in each borough. For a while now I've had plans for this race, plans I've kept in my head until now.
1. have this be my first race as a master
2 run the qualifying time for the NYC marathon, which is sub 1:44.
WEll...
these things may not happen. I'm feeling like crap again. I've run sub 1:44 before though I'm not really in shape for it. Before getting sick, I as prob. right on the edge of that. I was getting my milage up and starting to do speedwork again. Tomorrow's weather at race time is 15 degrees with a windchill of 1. I'm not too worried about that. in 2008, the race had similar conditions and I PRed. My hair also completely froze.
What's making me really think about just sleeping in is we're leaving for Hawaii on monday to climb Mauna Kea . Yes! The high point of Hawaii!!! This trip is more important than a race I'm really not in shape to race the way I want to.
I do, however, have a hard time letting go of races I've signed up for. I don't know why. If I feel like crap in the am but feel better later in the day, I can still go out and get a long run in. I guess I feel like I'm missing the jump start to my Boston training, even though I know there's nothing I can do about getting sick.
I just keep telling myself my first week of training will be done in Hawaii. And will be done in shorts.

You come on like a flame Then you turn a cold shoulder

Really people. Enough with the winter. I'm over it. I think Bea may be over it as well. She went from running all over like a mad woman to ok, I've pooped, I'm going home.
I know how she feels.
I headed out for 11 today and cut it short at 8. It was snowing, which was fine. Around mile 4 it got to be wet snow and was sticking and making the roads in Central Park a mess. Mixed with the horse shit from those terrible carriage in the south end of the park, and well, yuck. Having that muck splash up all over yourself is gross. Plus, the footing was getting bad and Ishii and I could barely go below 10 minute miles. Just not worth it.
It's a good thing I cut it short too and here's why. I came home and I get cold pretty quickly when I stop running in the winter, even though I sweat like mad. So I got in a warm tub and I'm just lying there relaxing and suddenly, it felt like someone stabbed me in the side. I could barely get myself up. I managed to get to the bed with out even drying off and just laid there trying to figure out what to do. I called loren: got voice mail, same with my mom, called Ishii cause we had just run together.
After an annoying conversation with my Dr's office and considering a trip to the ER, the pain went away. There's a chance it was a kidney stone, who knows. I went to urgent care to play it safe. The Dr told me if it was a stone, it passed or I'd still be in pain and probably throwing my guts up. Man, it was BAD!
And here's where all my reading of RWOL has come in handy. He prescribbed Cipro and I had this moment: wait a minute...that's oh wait...Hey Dr, doesn't that have a side effect that can damage tendon? He wasn't sure so he looked it up and said, Huh, well look at that tendon ruptures. I wasn't surprised he didn't know that. How often you think it comes up? I was surprised that I remembered it and remembered reading about someone's bad experience with it. So, he gave me something else. Knowledge is power people!!!!

And now on to something totally different.
After my 16 mile run on Sat, I headed down to my mom's for dinner with her, my grandfather, my bro and his gf. Oh yea, and Loren.
My grandfather is 85 and originally from MA. During dinner he turns to me and says "So I hear you'll be running on Patriot's day this year". Only runners and people from MA knows this means: so you're doing Boston. He then went on to tell stories of watching the race when he was younger. Pretty cool! Just goes to show people who live where storied races like that take place also get a real kick out of it.

I'll be moving my long run to Thurs this week as a mini taper for my trip out to CA. Man, I hope the sleet/ice/crap is off the road for that. I can not wait to go someplace where there's no snow for a few days.

you give me fever

First, here's a picture of loren and I from the Philly Distance Run.
It's actually not bad! I certainly look better then I felt a few minutes before.
I think I found something to help my foot. Pete had been taping the bottom of my foot with kinesio tape. It had been helping. After the race on Sunday my foot was just killing me. When I got home, I saw a free sample of tape in the goodie bag. It also came with a chart showing how to tape every injury you can think of. I tried taping my for PF. It almost instantly felt better. So this will be my new taping course of action. I've run twice since, 2 days in a row, with much less pain after.
So about those runs. Tues I ran up in Van Cortlandt on the cross country trails. It's getting dark so much earlier that the 2nd time around it was pretty much trail running in the dark. That was kinda fun. I've run up there so much I know where every railroad tie is and every little crack, even in the dark. Though I really would not recommend doing this. It was a sorta slowish 5 hilly miles.
I know everyone is boohooing the end of summer and all that, but really, last night as the sun was fading, it was 80 degrees with 75% humidity. SO while I could do without the lack of light, I'd really like it to be a bit cooler!
I had an ok 7 mile run. Until I finished. I felt pretty light headed after. I was walking home and stopped to get some food, thinking maybe it was low blood sugar. As I'm standing in line to pay, the guy in front of me looks at me and says "Audra?". I slowly say yes. He explains to me who he is, a friend of an old girlfriend's. I say ah yes and exchange how are yous and all of that. After he leaves the woman behind the counter says oh it's so funny when that happens. I say yea, I have absolutely no idea who that guy is, he's going back in time a good 12 years.
I couldn't believe anyone would even recognize me since I felt like was about to crowned the prom queen of Hades.
When I got home, I was a bit feverish. I really felt like crap. I figured it was a combo of the weather and some side effects of the yellow fever vaccination I had the day before. I felt crappy for a few hours and by 11pm (though I wish I was asleep by then) was feeling much better.
Now that I think I have a handle on my foot, the rest of my week will look like this:
Thurs: off
Fri: 5-9 miles, I'll have to look at my half assed plan.
Sat: off
Sun 18 mile tune up, plus 2 miles to make 20.
I need to figure out how to run this. Last year it was my last long run before Steamtown so I ran it easy. This year, I think I want to do it as progression, starting easy and finishing close to MP. Rayk we should talk about this!

The hawks alight till morning

As I've mentioned earlier in the week, I have some sorta crud that has invaded my person. Common running advise about running while sick is it's above the neck it's still ok to run. My sorta moves around. I am feeling much better, it's usually the worst in the morning as I wake up hacking up some interesting things. After that, I'm pretty ok. I have a bit of a cough but it doesn't seem too serious. It's just annoying.

I wanted to swap my week around and do my 20 miler today. I changed it back to the planned 12 with the creeping crud. Yesterday I did an easy 6 which was just that, easy and pretty slow. 

Rachel and I headed out this morning, while I was very tempted to do 18 with her, I was feeling good, I played it safe and left the park at 12.

If all goes well, the rest of my week will look like this:

PT tomorrow

20 Friday

5 easy Sat

10 race on Sunday in Brooklyn. I plan on running the first 3 easy and the last 7 at tempo. Its a hilly 3 loop course so this should give me a great workout.

It seems like we were given a tease of nicer weather. Now it looks like we'll have snow and rain tonight. Friday's weather is also calling for flurries. Another long run in the wintery crap.

The bright side of this is I'm still seeing tons of hawks out in the park (in case you haven't noticed, I have a real thing for large birds). Yesterday on the easy run, I saw a HUGE HUGE red tail on the ground sitting on his lunch. It looked like he nabbed himself a squirrel. I was surprised to see him on the ground with it, they usually high tail it into a tree. As the weather changes and the trees get their nice spring coating of leaves, they will be harder to see. They've been great running companions for this horrific winter we've had.

walk behind while you would run

I still dont feel great. Due to not feeling great, I did sleep like the dead last night so that's a good thing. And I am really glad I got my 18 outa the way yesterday. Weird thing, my legs are sore from that. I haven't been sore since the marathon. I didn't push hard and it's not too far for me, I did a 17 2 weeks ago. I think it's just being depleted from having this cold. I changed today from a 7 with striders to an easy 5.5. I just wanted to go out there get things moving and maybe try to sweat this thing out.

It leaves me just short of 50 miles. Oh well. I'll try not to get obsessive about my nice round numbers.

Next week is suppose to be a 54 miles week. Tomorrow I have off, Tues is an easy day. I should be all set to go by Wed.