5K's Gonna Fall, The Near Miss (Left Ankle Again), and Other Updates

We finally got some dry pavement to run on today at the trail. Sure there was still some snow and ice, but, for the most part, all was clear. We set the timer for 15:00 and started running. We just kept going and going. I half stopped by 1.5 miles thinking we had to be close, but it never went off. We ran over some ice and snow past a few runners that gave up and were walking through that stuff, and still no timer. Finally I just had to ask Jason, and he looked at his watch, and said "we still have another minute." It finally went off, and I'm thinking by now, "you had to have stopped it and hit the button twice accidentally at some point." I was wrong, because the trip back was finished before the 15 minute alarm went off again. So I'm pretty sure the 5K record is going down again, maybe even on the first one of the year (I'm thinking the Corktown St. Patrick's Race).

I know the weather isn't staying this way, but it's nice for now. Any time away from the hazards of snow and ice is welcome. Last Thursday my ankle rolled outward on me at the trail on a slippery patch. I recovered quick, and didn't think I was actually hurt, and finished up the run. It hurt most the rest of the week, but felt fine Sunday, so I ran on it. I probably shouldn't have, because it hurt and I had a couple quick sharp pains on it at the front of the ankle, just above my foot. I kept going through the route, anyway, because I'm an idiot, but I was smart enough to skip Tuesday. Obviously today was all fine and good, so I think I'm okay.

Other than that, I've banned myself from the beer during the week. It had to be done. Jason's quit it completely, and I admire him for it. I just enjoy beer tasting and the whole culture of it so much at this point, I can't give it up completely. Of course there will be special weekdays where there are exemptions. This week's FVD was one of them. I'm sure the calories will add up (or actually subtract down?). Jessi recently joined a gym to kind of join me in healthy endeavors, so I'm sure that will end up being some extra motivation/support for me to lose more weight this year. I'm back on track, and eating healthy. Lent's coming up and I restrict myself so much with my usual no alcohol, no soda, no fast food, no pizza, and it used to be no smoking, but that doesn't apply anymore since I don't anyway. That should help give me a boost, while making me sad I'm missing out on the double filet-o-fish.

Other than that....effin' Girl Scout Cookies, man. My fiancé and I put in the same exact order and we ended up with double the intended amount. Gotta stay away from that.

Winterläufe Weekend

Another first time race is in the bag. I actually think I liked the Winterläufe better that the Volksläufe, but the circumstances for that last year weren't ideal enough to enjoy it fully. There is a lot more fanfare for the Volksläufe with the tents, the bbq, the music, pancake breakfast, the crowd, and everything else. That's for sure, but there are some things that it's missing that are pluses. First off, you don't have a big crowd to wade through. Outside of the first half mile, everyone was spread out enough for me not to be impeded in any way. The other thing is that it's the dead of winter, so the majority of the people there mean business and/or have done a few of these races before. Other than a small group of people that are still hanging on to that New Year's resolution, there won't be any newbie walkers going 5 or 6 wide to go around at the start of the race. To be honest, by the turn-around, there was a huge bubble between the people ahead of me and those behind for me to run in. Maybe it was lucky, or maybe I just smell. Also, the Winterläufe had better shirts. Dark blue and long-sleeved? I love you, Winterläufe.

The race itself was challenging and potentially hazardous at times. The hills were definitely both, and starting out with a few of those early caused a lot of premature runner mortality for some of the participants. It's one of the most predictable things you see as a runner. Every race, a hill or two is going to steal someone's will. If you're just starting out and a race has hills early, it can really beat you up mentally, and you start thinking, "I can't run a full race of this." Then, just like Fozzy Bear, you're a Wakka Wakka Walker and you don't know why. I just pushed through them like usual. I just can't justify stopping anymore unless I actually get hurt. I didn't see too many people out there that looked like they got hurt or had any really bad pulls. That's pretty good for a winter race. I hate seeing that.

There was still a slight glaze of snow and ice in places, but not enough to wear my new snow slippy-on-thingies (official name). The only place they would have been really needed were the bridge and just after it, and possibly some of the hills going down. I made a pretty big point of getting to as much solid ground as possible for the downhill portions and keeping my feet under me. It was pretty reminiscent of the Howell Nature Run, only with snow, slush, and ice instead of loose gravel. I also didn't see anyone fall. I'm sure someone did at some point, but not seeing it happen a few times, at some parts in particular, was pretty miraculous.

Amidst all this, I posted a personal best for my 8K, a 53:24 on the clock and 52:45 chip. I wasn't expecting that to happen, so I'm going to take a shot in the dark and say that maybe I am still improving. I was also fighting off a tight back with a huge knot in the upper left side. It was bad enough to keep me from the first half of work Friday, and it did act up a bit at the end of the race. It was still less of a bother than a side cramp at the bridge on the return trip. I did benefit in part from an mp3 player that knew what to play at what times to push me along, though. Thanks for that extra shot of Andrew WK my little Coby com-padre. Twenty dollars and 3 years ago, and it's been with me through this entire running adventure. It just may be the best $20 I've ever spent. This run was also Jason's first 8K, and of course he beat me, but now he has a good time to work from.



After the run, Jason and I grabbed some sandwiches at T-Dubs. It was pretty decent, and ridiculously filling. It wasn't even that big of a sandwich, I didn't get fries, and only had a small bowl of chili, but that corned beef sandwich knocked out my hunger for the rest of the day.

I wish I could say the same for the Super Bowl. I ate too much, drank too much, and I'll stop myself there before it turns into a Dave Matthews song (btw...am I the only one that thinks he looks like a ventriloquist's dummy?). Anyway, much of the calories were lost in the double vomit tsunami that came after sailing to sea on Barbarossa's ship. Tradition for the big game dictates that we do a drinking game with some questionable, untested, cheap rum, and so far all non-Morgan substitutes have proven to be a very bad voyage for this crew. Still though, I put in a full, very productive day at work, and even got up early. I already need a weekend, though. Admiral Nelson (2010) and Barbarossa (2011) are butt hash.

Snowbunnies

So what if the trail was covered in thick snow and drifts to our knees in spots? We went for it today. That was the most I've pushed my leg muscles since The Crim last year. My thighs were on fire and my calves were ready to explode. I don't care what the distance or the time was today, because we went deep into the snow and went further than anyone dared to tread on the trail before us. The only tracks after a certain point are Jason's and mine, and we did it all running hard with shortness of breath. It was like we did sprints today, and I can't wait for there to be semi-clear roads Saturday. It's going to be a piece of cake.

Today I realized that in some sick way I'm actually starting to like the snow and see it as a welcomed challenge. They always say you'll hate snow when you get older, but despite the run hindering and the shoveling, I still like it. I hope we have more winters of being blasted like this. If we do, I can see a pair of cross-country skis in my future. I used to love doing that, but the lack of snow in recent winters hasn't made buying them worth it. If we're going to have more like this, where it stays cool for long periods of time, I may have to get on that.

The Arms Race Continues

Well, there they are, another weapon for me to win the Cold War. I tried them out this afternoon after work before this "blizzard" we're supposed to get. I pretty much had to, because I also just bought them today. New toys are meant to be played with. They're great on ice and thin snow, but not much of a difference on the thick powder.

This is my first attempt at officially stepping back up to 3 times a week on the running. Today was a solo gig. I pushed pretty hard, and time-wise was pretty solid again. I've been doing some upper body stuff and some other things on the off days. I'm trying to build up a regimen, even if it's nothing too spectacular at the moment. Right now, though, I have to admit that I am dead sore. Also, with the low calories I've done the last few days out of punishment for eating Taco Bell (to be abbreviated TB from now on) and Burger King (BK) back-to-back, I'm kind of wiped out.

I made sure I ate somewhat reasonable today. Dinner was a little on the heavy end, but I don't want to fall off a cliff here. If I string myself out too much, next thing I know I'm lying around eating a 90 count bag of pizza rolls myself, and too full to move, let alone run. I'm trying to keep this thing under control. Besides, I don't have to be too drastic, because, even though the results have been slow, I've dropped about 30 pounds since this all started. That's without making efforts anywhere but out there on the road. I shouldn't have to do too much more to have some big results. I need to step off a little tomorrow, because I'm a walking ache right now. Unfortunately it's looking like there will be a foot of snow to shovel, so a full break is not on the docket tomorrow.

Get out and push...

Yesterday I finally got sick of us slacking off, and pressed pretty hard out on our run. The snow's piled up enough that we had a few good hurdles to jump along the way. The only problem with jumping a snow bank is you better get up on it first. You can't jump without seeing the other side. One blind leap onto a patch of ice on the other side and it's "Sub Zero wins," runner fatality (at least in the sense that you'll be rehabbing a while).

The other thing about jumping and climbing snow banks is that it will steal the wind right out of you. You're doing fine, and suddenly you're trying to catch your breath. It isn't really advisable to be sucking in air too hard when it's this cold, either. We came across the other side of some of the banks with heavy legs, that's for sure.

At least this time, though, we kept pushing hard the entire time. We didn't slow to a crawl to catch our breath or let the legs recover. We just kept dragging our tired selves along kicking and screaming (at least our muscles). We even actually had a nice sprint going for the last 1/4 mile, which we haven't done much of lately. Sure we've sped it up, but flat out sprinting (as much as it can be done on ice/snow) has been out of the question.

The end result wasn't all that favorable time-wise, but it was about 3 minutes down from the last few times. I was exhausted after, and I'm still sore today, so I know it was a good run this time. We need more like this. I think the new goal is to push to get down to our warm weather times in this stuff. We'll have to take another 2-3 minutes off for that, but I think it can be done. Obviously the snow's not going anywhere, and we're supposedly getting another foot here tomorrow night (should make Wednesday's run interesting), so we should have plenty of opportunities to conquer it.

I should probably get Jason's phone back to him before Wednesday, though. It was on our recliner, so it must have fell out of his pocket. Hopefully he'll be home when I try to run it out to him today. I'm not sure if he knows where it is at all, but hopefully if I miss him at his place, he'll come to ours looking for it.

I'm back!

Well, the blog is back. Here's the temporary one from "Run Fatbrent Run 2":

Well, my old blog seems to be on hiatus, so for the time being I will start a replacement until google can get it back for me. Don't expect me to spruce it up too much, but for now it's home. It's been over a week since my original had its issue and fell off the map, and I've had at least 3 itches to write entries. At this point, it just can't wait any longer.

First of all, the secret weapon shoes I had bought for running in the snow; they and I had a few issues. The first thing was, despite feeling better at the upper size, they were slipping all over. So back to 13's I went after one snow run. Shhh, don't tell the store I wore them. The 13's are a little tight, but (as I had previously forgotten) so were my Kanadia tr 2's when I started. Anyway, I think we're good now. I don't think they are built for road races, though. They slip too much on wet pavement, but we'll see if that changes with a little wear. I still would like to get something to go over the shoes for snow, even though the Adidas are pretty good in the powder.

The weather is still a major factor in the runs. In three runs since the old blog went AWOL we've had some interesting conditions. One run (on the trail) with deep snow over uneven slush that froze to ice, which tested the ankles pretty good. We had one in my neighborhood with an ice pond from a water main break. In that case, trying to go across was a bad move. My feet went through the ice down to pavement covered in another thin ice layer with flowing water over it. After 2 failed attempts to go through, we just gingerly walked around it. Apparently fixing the break shut down 2 lanes of traffic on Monday. Yesterday, the trail was with about 3 inches of snow, and we didn't get but a mile down before the timer went off.

The frustrating part about the weather is that we have absolutely no idea where we are, shape-wise. There's nothing to guage where we're at, or where we'd be at on dry land, because every time we go out, it's something different. The snow doesn't just create a layer to slow us down, it creates a layer of doubt and a haze of uncertainty making us wonder whether we're even doing ourselves any good right now. Sure there is something in just going out there, but is the snow making us stronger in our legs, or are we using it as an excuse to half-ass it out there? I really don't know at this point.

I can say right here and now that, yesterday, I didn't push at all. Jason was struggling (which is still faster than I want to go) so I took it easy (or easier than usual). At the same time, I haven't made good on my word to be healthy this week. I saw some weight loss last week, and I got too happy with myself (also, because, despite my insistence I haven't lost hardly any weight, I am down 28lbs since July '09). I hadn't had any fast food yet this year until this week, and I didn't keep that streak going. Wednesday, I decided to try Burger King's Jalepeno Cheddar XT, and after a quick coupon check, found out I had a buy one get one coupon. So there I went eating two of those, back-to-back, without batting a lash. Yesterday, just 2 hours before our run, mind you, I had a large Quiznos Chipotle Prime Rib sub. I then proceeded to wash that sub down with...no, not a large soda, that'd be bad enough...but a footlong Subway Meatball sub.

You see though, I do things like that, and publicly calling myself out from now on might be a good thing. You see, I'm a sucker for fast food promotions, and right now that Beefy Crunch Burrito at the Taco Bell is beckoning. The revelation that Taco Bell has only 35% beef in its meat just has no ill effect on the appetite. At least yesterday, I cut myself off after lunch, and ate no more the rest of the night. Still though, I'm sure I was way beyond my daily caloric intake anyway. Sadly, I was still completely starving until I went to bed, and almost caved into making some microwave nachos. I swear my appetite is its own animal. If it could take form, it would be exactly like that "me want honeycomb" monster, but with more varied taste buds, and the resolve of the Ranch Tooth.

Wonder what a hybrid of them would look like...maybe it's a project for photoshop when I get home...







I'm going to try to have a caloric make-up day today, burrito or no. So far I've only had 500 cals (at least according to Tim Horton's website).

More later...happy to be back.

Lock and Load

Meet my new secret weapon



This should give me a little more traction until the roads are clear, and should be pretty great for the trail runs. Admittedly, I still don't do a lot of research on shoes or dump a lot of money on them. So, because I loved the last pair of Kanadias, and they got me through my first 10 mile, I'm going to stick to what I know. I may decide I need something else, maybe something lighter for the road races. For now,though, I'm happy for my new foot tires.

Also, I redesigned the blog a bit. No big whoop.