In short, the race was a great experience and a lot was learned, but I have to admit that I ran quite a bit slower than my goal.  I was aiming for a finish of 3:30 and ended up at 4:08.  I based my goal time on my 24 mile run that I completed in 3:08.  Ultimately, I think I have something to learn about hydration levels and salt balances.

We gathered with the other runners just before sunrise for the 7:00AM start of the Marathon, Half-Marathon, and Marathon Relay.  The weather couldn’t have been more cooperative starting out at about 50 degrees.   I finally crossed the start line about 2 minutes after the official start of the race.

I started out very conservatively at around 9:30 mile pace.  Over the next couple of miles I moved up to my 8:00 mile pace.  All was well in my world for the next several miles, but I think this is where my troubles began. I don’t pay much attention while I’m running, and I breezed past a few of the early hydration stations.  But feeling great, I didn’t let it bother me.

I took my first Clif Shot at about 45 minutes and from then on tried to drink at each hydration station.  I felt great up to mile 13.  Miles 13 and 14 were a gradual uphill, so I slowed a bit.  Miles 15 and 16 were flat or down hill, a welcomed relief.  At the end of mile 16 urination was necessary, and it was an awfully dark color (for my urine at least).  At that point I realized I was in trouble.

I drank a cup of gatorade and a cup of water at each station from that point, but I think I was already in too deep of a hole.  The cool temperatures of the morning were giving way to a warm, sunny 70 degrees.  The gradual stiffness in my legs had turned to cramping at mile 18, and I had to stop and walk at each water stop.

Miles 22 – 25 were rough.  Walking had become marginally more comfortable than walking.  I think I managed 10:00 minute miles with a combination of runing and walking.  The last mile was grueling.  My stride had turned to a short choppy waddling effort, but there’s something about that final mile that makes it tollerable.

Four hours and eight minutes after I crossed the starting line, I finished.  Legs cramping and feet aching, all I wanted to do was sit down and eat.

After a bit of reading (thanks Internets) I’m pretty sure I wasn’ t managing my water and electrolyte/salt intake well.  I think I’m going to start experimenting with salt tablets on my long runs.

Here’s  a good post on marathon cramps.

Short list of upcomming races:

• Monster Dash, Minneapolis, MN
• Living History Farms, Urbandale, IA
• Some Thanksgiving day run, TBD

I’m running my first marathon this weekend.  I was duped into running my first mary at altitude by a good friend who casualy suggested that we do a marathon in Denver.

I haven’t run over 12 miles in at least a few years, but I’ve always wanted to do one.  I decided to train in somewhat of a minimalist manner.  I try to stay somewhat fit, but not quite the fitness required for a marathon.  So my plan was pretty much to run a long run every other week and complete 2 or 3 maintenance runs each week.  My long runs started as 8 miles and climed to 10, 12, 14, 18, 20, 24 over a few months.  My maintenance runs were generally in the range of 3 to 5 miles.

The runs were over all pretty good, but I had considerable soreness after the last three long runs.  My muscles were generally fine, but it was my bones and tendons in my feet that really took a beating.

I have found that it is easier on my body to run in lower profile shoes than my normal trainers.  My trainers are typically in the style of the Brooks Adrenaline GTS 8.  I have taken to running my long runs in light weight trainers or road racing shoes.  This is leading me to put more stock in the idea of minimalist running.  Here is a great post on minimaist shoes.

Along with plenty of water, I have been using Clif Shots and Clif Bloks on my long runs.  I have found the Clif Shots with caffeine to be particularly awesome.  Over the course of my 3 hour, 24 miler, I consumed one pack of Clif Bloks and 2 Clif Shots.  I really think I could have used one more Shot, but I made it through.  I have been using them in training and racing events for years and have nothing bad to say about them.

So, wish me luck this weekend; I’m going to need it.  My buddy already convinced me to run in a 50K ultra this February, more on that later.

I voted for Obama.  I knew he wasn’t Jesus.  I wasn’t expecting the government to be completely rebuilt, but I was hoping for some sort of progress.  I have been seeing and hearing much more fodder from the right/republican/conservative populous with such rhetoric as “how’s that change working out for you?”, “where’s my change”, and other BS.

This empty prodding is normally easily enough ignored, but thinking about it a little bit, I didn’t have a good comeback.  Where is the change?  I still think that Obama was/is the best person for the job, but these sweeping changes we have been hoping for are being castrated in congress and lacking a bit of strong leadership.

Bill Maher has a great piece on this.  New Rule: If America Can’t Get It Together, We Lose the Bald Eagle.

Get your head out of the clouds, you socialist dreamer! “What do we want!? A small improvement! When do we want it!? 2016!”

As has been said before, we don’t get the government we want; we get the government we deserve.  We worked together, organized, and put a “change” candidate if office.  Now the hard part has arrived: backing those words with actions.

We as a people need to ask for more from ourselves and our government: participate.

Because it’s good to be a gangster.

Hat tip to Huffymofo

I’m not sure what’s so different these days.  Maybe I’m getting older.  Perhaps I’m a bit less tolerant than I used to be to some of the issues that come along with running long distances.  One of these issues is chafing.

Chafing only seems to become an issue on my longer runs, probably those over 10 miles, especially when it’s hot out.  The most noticeable chafe was on my inner thighs, so I sought out a pair of compression shorts.

I purchased a pair of Under Armour HeatGear Ventilated Compression Shorts a couple of months ago, and was pleased that they prevented my inner leg chafe.  I wore them for a few 6 – 8 mile runs, just to test them out.  Overall, I was pretty happy with them.  The waistband was a little high for me, and I ended up folding it down to reduce the pressure on my lower abdomen.  It felt like it was slightly restricting my breathing.  Other than that, I thought they were fine and would serve the purpose well.

I ran a couple of longer runs (12, 14 miles) and didn’t have any problems, but halfway through my second leg of Ragnar one of the seams began to light my undercarrage on fire.  The flatlock style seams running through the crotch are a little bulkier than I would expect, and they proved to be irritating.

While not as breathable and cool as a jock or briefs, they weren’t as suffocating as I thought they might be.  The ventilated section in front and under provided great wicking.  However, another 14 miler completed this week showed that these may prevent chafing in one area, but added it in another, arguably worse area.

So, if you are hunting for a pair of compression shorts to ease your friction woes, double check those inner leg and crotch seams for thickness and smoothness.  I’m not sure if I’ll pursue another pair or just lube up the tender parts.  I have a marathon in about a month that I would like to finish without major chafing issues.

I’m guessing any doctor who actually said that wasn’t talking about alcohol, but as Vanilla at Half-Fast points out:

Compared with abstainers, light drinkers exercised 5.7 more minutes per week, moderate drinkers 10.1 more minutes, and heavy drinkers 19.9 more minutes.

You can read the full article on WebMD here.

Lake Calhoun

Well, I know you have been sitting at your computer, waiting for me to update this thing.  The Lady and I have made our move to Minneapolis, and secured ourselves a dwelling in the suburb of St. Louis Park.  We have since survived our first summer in Minneapolis and are looking forward to fall.

It’s been busy, and we’ve traveled around a bit.  One of the outstanding activities of the summer was the Ragnar Great River Relay.

This was one of the best ways a person could spend 24 hours in a van.  It was a 195 mile race run by teams of 12 runners.  Each runner completes 3 legs varying from 3 miles to almost 9.  This served as my motivation to stay in shape this summer and I was able to complete about 20 miles averaging 6:55 minute pace.  That was better than I expected, but close to what I was aiming for.  We finished in 72th place out of 219 teams with a total time of 26 hours 45 minutes.  Not too shabby.

Jarvy has a good post with pics here.

Things that I learned from this event:

• Larger vans are not necessary, but a good idea.  We didn’t expect every full size van in the metro to be rented this weekend, and therefore waiting until a month ahead of time to reserve our vehicles.  We eneded up with two “extended” mini vans.  While it is legal and possible to put seven adults in such a vehicle, more space would be nice for a 24 hour period.
• Four pounds of trail mix is awesome.
• Bring toilet paper.
• Bring warm clothes; it gets cold at night when you’re not running.
• Bring a lot of water.  Gatorade can only be tasty for so long.
• You will experience chafe.  Bring some sort of lubricant: Body Glide, Chamois Butter.  Nipple band-aids aren’t a bad idea either.
• Sleep is less important that you think.
• Beer is good and good for you.

Ragnar puts on several events around the country, so find an event near you, grab 12 friends or strangers, and get running!

Ragnar Website

This may seem like an odd time to go over all of this since we’re moving, but it’s my blog, so I get to do what I like.

We bought this house with full knowledge that we would have to completely remodel the kitchen.  There were nowhere near enough outlets, no space for a dishwasher, the hot water didn’t work, and the layout sucked.  (The fridge opened into the entryway.)

The original beast.

The first thing that we did was add a door to the back yard.  There was only a door from the side of the house, and we got tired of walking the dog to the back yard gate every morning.  So we picked a 25 degree January day to knock out a window and put in a door.

The one on the left is going away

I dropped all of the trim and removed the section of drywall below the window.  Then I busted out the reciprocating saw (one of my favorite tools) and removed the window.

January may not be the best time to take out a window

From there, the recip saw just buzzed down to the floor and cut out the remaining part of the wall.

Don't mind the A/C unit

The siding had to be cut back to allow for the door trim that is a part of the fram.  This was done with a circular saw adjusted for the depth of the siding.

The gap between the siding and door trim wasn’t as pretty as I would have liked it to be, but the door was level and square.  I’ll have to come back and clean it up with some wood filler and caulk.

Once the door was secured with an ample number of 3.5″ screws some flexible spray foam was used to fill in the gaps.  Once dry the excess was trimmed with a razor.  It’s important to note that you shouldn’t use hardening spray foam to fill gaps near windows or doors.  Foams such as the red can of Great Stuff can actually expand and bend the frame of the window or door. 

Next time we’ll talk about tearing up the old kitchen.

It doesn't look that cold.

The call has come.  We are moving north.  I don’t know whether I should be scared or not.  It’s been a while since I’ve had to deal with true winter.  Kansas City has been good to us, but my ladyfriend has a new job in the Twin Cities.  Minneapolis actually looks pretty cool (no pun intended).  December is a great time to head north, right?

I’ve made some good friends down here, and I’m bummed about leaving for that reason.  I’ve really grown to like the Prairie Village area.

One thing that I am most excited about is the biking accomdations up there.  It kills KC on the biking front.  Check out this bikeway map! (large PDF)  KC has something like two trails, and Johnson County (KS) has a few more, but nothing compared to this.  This alone gets me pumped.  (Pumped is awesome.)

surprising forms

I know what you’re thinking, “mmm… granola is tasty.”  We’ll you’re right it is tasty.  Emily over at Barefoot Fitness found an article that echos my sentiments on the yoga/running combo.

Back in college when I was running everyday, and training (mostly) properly, I was fairly strong and flexible.  But in this older, more domesticated life as a desk jockey, my body’s resilience is waning.  My workouts (if you can call them that) are also much more sporadic: short run here, long run there, bike ride whenever…  So basically adulthood is cramping my style.

I’m not a full-on yoga fiend (remember sporadic), but when I do include it as a regular-ish part of my routine, my legs feel less restricted and I’m more injury free.  All of my chronic injuries since college have been soft tissue/flexibility related and yoga seems to keep this beast at bay.  The right instructor and studio/dojo combination can also do wonders for your stress levels.  I can come out of certain sessions feeling as good as I do after an hour massage.

• Full article at Silent Sports