The Year in Running and Looking Ahead

It's time for the end of year blog post. The running year was mostly successful. I began it with a very simple goal: run a solid marathon after two regrettable ones in Delaware and Indy. Training in the winter months went well enough, and I ran what I think was a great Flying Pig Marathon in Cincinnati. Over a tough course, I did a 3:11 and stayed solid through most of the race. That gave me confidence to turn my thoughts back to 2:59. I don't know why running under three hours is so important to me. It's an arbitrary number. I've run 3:01 -- what the difference. But then goals are like that. We set out to do something because we can. The many weeks of the Pfitizinger program were the hardest running I've ever done. I never thought I'd do 70-mile weeks. Running truly became second nature to me. As much as I'd grumble sometimes getting up early to run 14 or 15 miles before work, I'd love it. The solitude, the weariness, everything. It left me in great shape, even allowing me to run my best half marathon in 1:24. Of course, I didn't run my sub 3 marathon because of the Achilles injury. This was the disappointment of the year. It's not something I've dwelt on too much. I don't regret anything. The months of hard training were their own reward. Races are just races. The last month or so has been all about recovery.

So what about 2009? Right now, I just want to get my Achilles healthy. My original thought was to run a marathon in Florida this winter. That's not going to happen. I might also skip Boston this spring. I want to diversify my exercise a bit. Still, I'm a runner. I have many running goals that remain unaccomplished. In 2009, I will run a sub 3 marathon. I was in shape to run a 2:55 easily this fall. I learned a lot from my injury. It will be easier to know when to back off in the training. So that's it. I toyed with the idea of running every day before realizing that's a bad move. Ultras still intrigue me, but they can wait.

Recovery

Recovery is hard. Don't get me wrong, it's much better than not running at all. The hardest part is knowing how much to do and how hard to go. My instinct has always been to run harder uphill. That doesn't work sometimes. I decided against seeking a medical opinion of my Achilles. It seems clear to me I have a classic overuse injury that needs time to heal. Total rest wasn't doing it for me, though. I spent most of six weeks not running much at all. Last week, I took a page from Dr. Pribut and started running regularly again. At this point, I'm up to 4.5 miles at a pace around 8 minutes per mile. I ran the last five days, although once was only a mile after I had too many beers and got excited by the Eagles game. Am I going to long or too hard? I don't know. I go by feel, yet hold myself back from going as hard as I'd like. It feels strange to finish runs not very tired. Whereas I missed running before, I now miss feeling spent. As a diversion -- and under, ahem, encouragement -- I'm diversifying into strength training. First up is the very popular 100 pushup challenge. I haven't technically begun the program just yet. I can do 30 pushups in a row, sometimes 35. Yeah, that sucks, but I'm a runner not a lifter. It seems like I can get to 100 pushups in 3-4 weeks. This is a prelude to my big step: joining a gym. I've never belonged to one of those god-forsaken chambers. The frontrunners are Crunch and New York Health and Racquet, both of which offer a corporate discount. Let me know any input. I like NYHRC because it has a pool at the Upper West Side location.

Starting Over

All runners go through the same stuff, from the very fastest to the most plodding. There's a certain kinship because of that. I'm getting in touch with the casual runner set. For the past few weeks, I've started over, running about 3.5 miles a couple times a week. I run slowly, about 8:15-8:30 per mile, often around the Reservoir. My Achilles is better, but it's not fully healed. My fitness has mostly evaporated too. It's hard to believe that a couple months ago I'd run 15 miles before work and did a 1:24 half marathon. That's how it goes, though, and I've grown to appreciate every run. There are times you grow complacent and don't appreciate how incredible it is to have something. I miss running the way I want to run.

Nike Blows Recall

As some might recall, I had major problems with the Nike+ Sportband. It wasn't accurate, then simply stopped working when I wore it in the rain. Turns out I wasn't the only one having problems. Nike last month recalled the Sportband, or as Businessweek's headline calls a "faulty running tool." The problem: moisture gets into the display and busts it. Looks like I can get my $59 back, unlike those who suffered through The Human Race. Here's my problem: let's say I hear about this recall. What would I do? I plugged Nike+ Sportband into Google. I got a link to the Nike site. I expected to find the recall notice and explanation there. Nope. Instead, I'm just directed to a page for another (apparenlty functioning) Nike product, the Inspector Gadget-sounding Nike+iPod WatchRemote. That's kinda crap. I'm searching for one product that's been recalled, and Nike swaps in another product it wants to sell. Nike made a big point of telling BusinessWeek this is a "voluntary recall," yet it's not making it very easy for poeple that got this shitty product to find out Nike knows it's shitty. (It's paying for a Google ad, but it directs to its main e-comerce page, not recall details.) Yet again, we have the image versus reality problem rearing its head.

Recovery

I went two weeks without running. It sucked. I've written before how running has to become like brushing your teeth. The trouble is, can you imagine not brushing your teeth? Hopefully not. Going from 70 miles a week to 0 is not something I'd suggest. The last few weeks were hard. On Friday, I'd had enough. I laced up my shoes, pulled on my cold-weather clothes and set out for Central Park. My first steps were tentative. It was all so familiar, yet at the same time I was tentative. My idea run for a half hour at an easy pace, probably about 8:15 per mile. My route was to Central Park and around the Reservoir. The soft, flat surface of the Reservoir seemed like just what I needed. About 30 minutes later, I was finished. My initial feeling: relief. I missed running. Even going just a few miles at a pace I'd consider excruciating just a month ago was great. The next day, I didn't have much soreness. I went back out for another 3.5 miles today. Now the Achilles is a bit sore. This is probably going to be a bit by bit thing. The key will be running enough to get some blood flowing, but not too much that I just perpetuate the problem. It's crazy when I think back to how hard I was training not that long ago. That's how things go sometimes. Setbacks are inevitable but temporary.

3.5 miles, 30:28

Moving Forward

I've gotten over the disappointment of not running Philly. My main concern now is getting back to running. I miss it. My problem: I don't know what to do. For the past three-plus weeks, I've basically stopped running. This is starting to drive me batty. But I'm trying to listen to my body, something I clearly failed to do initially. My Achilles still hurts. It's not a pain that causes me to limp, but it's a dull ache that's greater in the morning or when I've been sitting for a period of time. Dr. Pribut has always been my main source for injury advice. His take is interesting: he doesn't counsel completely ceasing running and recommends against stretching. At this point, I don't know what to do. Part of me is scared to run. I went out for a run 10 days ago that was OK, nothing terrible. But I don't want to end up running 20 miles a week and never getting better. My impulse is to find some cross-training activity and take a break from running for December. This means getting over my gym-phobia and accepting I'll lose quite a bit of running fitness. The other alternative is to bite the bullet and visit a doctor, another course of action I'm not crazy about.

Limitations

There's a great quote in The Lore of Running about what running taught the author, Timothy Noakes, about life: "It has taught me who I am and, equally important, who I am not." Lots of people focus on the everyone's-a-winner mantra. This is the marketing fiction, where it's nothing but success, awesomeness and glossy photos. Running is both more complicated and more fickle, an endless repetition of a couple steps forward and one back. It's undeniably about achieving goals, but inevitably involves coming up short sometimes. That's what Noakes is getting at: we have our own limitations that running makes abundantly clear. Ultimately there's no hiding. This has happened to me too many times to count, probably most notably my comic collapse 200 yards from the finish of the Delaware Marathon. There's nothing glamorous about getting dragged across the finish line after falling three times, then getting IVs stuck in your arm. And of course, it was my fault. I didn't train enough or respect the heat. I laid in a terrible hospital corridor on a gurney after an ambulance ride that ended up costing me $500 just beside myself. I hate screwing up. The hardest part is not only admitting it but then trying to learn from it and do better. As athletes, we rely on our bodies so much yet sometimes take them for granted. This isn't fair. It's self-absorbed and even arrogant. And the end result is a carelessness that ends up in disappointment. I'm not running the marathon on Sunday. That's OK. There are other races. I will run under three hours soon, I know it. What I need to focus on now is making amends for some mistakes, realizing my limitations, why I ignored them and how I can make 100 percent sure they don't happen again. That's not an overnight thing, it takes work. I'm ready to start. Nothing worthwhile comes easy, right?

Self-Help Edition

This is ostensibly a running blog, not some kind of group therapy. But times are tough. I appreciate the messages of advice and encouragement. I want to do the right thing. Barring any disaster during a run tomorrow, I'm doing the marathon. My guess is I'll be fine, although probably unable to run the way I'd like. I don't feel I'll risk long-term damage. I'm hopeful it will work out. We all hate disappointment, especially when it happens suddenly after a period when training was going great. Life can be that way. Something can go from awesome to oh-shit very quickly. It's probably normal to find it unfair and waste a lot of energy trying to figure out how I screwed up. That's only useful to a degree. I'm a big believer in dealing with things as they are, not as I wish they'd be. The best I can do is accept this as, in many ways, out of my hands, while doing my best to make it turn out as I hope. I'd love to believe I'll wake up tomorrow or the next day with it all better. Part of me thinks that's possible; another part of me knows it doesn't work that way.

The Way Ahead

I haven't updated the blog much lately, mostly because it's about running and I haven't been running. To be precise, my last run was on the morning of Election Day. That night, I came around to the realization my Achilles is injured. Ever since then, I've missed running. I hate it when I can't run. But I know I need to heal. Everything I read about Achilles injuries is scary. After 12 days of not running, I needed to know what was up. I can't say that I don't have pain after all that time off. I do. So today, along the Bay Trail in San Mateo, I set out on a 5.5 mile run. The first half mile was not good. I felt like my gait was different. Every step hurt. I felt like I was trying to find a way to land my foot that was comfortable. Eventually, I warmed up and completed the run without much drama. It wasn't the best run I've done by far, and I do feel some lost fitness from all the time off, but it wasn't excruciating. My verdict is mixed. I know my Achilles won't be right by Sunday. That's impossible. The question is whether I risk damaging it more by running a marathon or just skip the race. My head says the the latter choice is best, maybe split the difference and find a marathon somewhere in early January. But I don't want to do that. I have a good sense of what's wrong for my body. I think I can run the marathon without doing any long-term damage. Will I break three hours? I honestly don't think so. I'm simply not running confidently. My goal is to accept the race as it is on that day and try to do the best possible under the circumstances.

5.5 miles, 44:37

Seeing The Big Picture

This is the post I've put off writing. After 10 days of denial, I finally admitted that I'm injured. That hard long run at the end of the 70-mile week? It was a mistake. My Achilles hurt for the next week, but I just cut back my mileage a bit and gobbled Advil. The thinking is similar to Kubler-Ross's stages of grieving: denial, anger, bargaining, depression, acceptance. Finally on Tuesday, I reached acceptance: I'm hurt. I feel discomfort when I walk. I run compensating for it, and slowly at that. This is difficult. I've worked pretty hard the last several months to run a great marathon. Now, two weeks out, I'm faced with the prospect of losing that chance. Still, I'm hopeful. I'm using rest, anti-inflamatories, ice and stretching. I'm using The Stick. I haven't run for three straight days, the longest layoff since I ran the Flying Pig Marathon in the spring. I'll try my best to get the Achilles in as good of shape as possible and see what happens. Oddly enough, while this is trying, I don't feel overwhelmingly disappointed. As much as possible, I try to keep things in perspective. Life, just like running, is full of ups and downs. In the big picture, the marathon is just a day, a race that in effect celebrates and validates a whole lot of effort over many months, even years. Yes, I'd like to run 2:58 or 2:55 on Nov. 23, but if I don't, that's OK. It wouldn't take away what I learned through months of training. I'll try my best and see what happens. If this is meant to be, it will happen.

Finding Inspiration

Marathons are inspiring. Many people go to them, see the people of all ages and shapes out there doing it, and determine to run one. I can understand that. I remember watching my first marathon as a new runner in 1999, wondering whether I could do that. The process of discovery began soon thereafter. Today, nine years and 13 marathons later, I went up to Harlem to watch the New York City Marathon. It is great spot because the crowds are thinner and mile 22 is where I think the real stuff starts. George Sheehan once wrote about this point of the race as where "the miles beyond will challenge everything he holds dear, his value system, his lifestyle. They will ask nothing less than his view of the universe." This is where I go, after the elites have long since passed, to appreciate how awesome it is to see people doing something individually extraordinary. I clap and look at the faces, twisted in determination (and sometimes resignationan), knowing they have their own stories. And it is inspiring. It makes me ready to set out on my own in three weeks to see what I have, where I can go and what will come of it.

5.75 miles, 43:53

Nike Chooses Image Over Reality

One of my favorite running quotes comes from "Once a Runner," the John Parker novel about Quenton Cassidy. It's admittedly a bit corny.

Running to him was real, the way he did it the realest thing he knew. It was all joy and woe, hard as diamond; it made him weary beyond comprehension. But it also made him free.

It's true because running is pretty stark. At the end of the day, you can't fake it. Natural ability will only help so much. The more you pour into it, the more you get out. There are no style points. That's refreshing because in our modern world, the reverse is too frequently true. Often image is more important than reality. I was reminded of this when I got a Google link to The Nike Human Race book to commemorate the 10k the company held in August. What's clear from my original post about The Human Race is Nike screwed up and put its marketing goals ahead of runners. Now it's looking to upsell those same runners with a 256-page glossy book, "The Day the World Stopped to Run." (That'll run over $50 when you're done with customized cover and shipping.) Ana and I IMd about this today. She has written about this already when it comes to brands. Her idea is that often brands try to communicate an abstract image while people's perceptions are increasingly formed by their real-world interactions. All too often images have the upper hand. The reality of the Nike Human Race was a poorly planned race -- really more marketing event -- that frustrated many participants. What Nike wants people to see is a glossy image of "inspiring" photos and little stories about runners overcoming adversity. This is all surface, the typical reliance on images. People run for so many real reasons -- to lose weight, to do something extraordinary, to find out more about themselves -- and that should be celebrated. The way to celebrate that is by doing right by runners in reality, through great products and services, not treating them as props for the marketing machine.