I took lots of shots from the finish line banquet, and got nearly all of the male and female elites coming in. As a teaser, here are two of the better pictures. View the whole album here > NYC Marathon 2010 on Picasa.
Edna Kiplagat
Gebre Gebremariam
Filed under: central park, elites | Tagged: edna kiplagat, gebre gebremariam, nyc marathon, nyrr | 3 Comments »
Teodoro Chavez (photo by Stacey Cramp)
I’ll do a writeup on how I spent the earlier part of Marathon Day in New York. But for now, here’s a link to what I did with my afternoon and evening. I spent about two hours with photographer Stacey Cramp, interviewing runners along one of the arteries leading them off of Park Drive and out onto Central Park West.
Almost everyone was willing to spend a minute or two talking with me; just one person was too exhausted, and two others begged off only because they didn’t think their English was going to be good enough.
Stacey’s photos capture how spiritually elated, and how physically humbled, a runner can feel right after completing a marathon. I am grateful for these runners’ generosity and patience yesterday. I hope you get as much inspiration and enjoyment out of meeting them as I did.
Here’s the slideshow: NYC Marathon 2010 Faces at the Finish
Filed under: central park, humor, inspiration, racing, reading | Tagged: nyc marathon 2010, runner's world, stacey cramp | 6 Comments »
I’m scratching the Houston half marathon (which already represented a compromised scratch of the Houston full). At this point I’ll be lucky to get 4-5 weeks of training in for it. So now I’m setting my sights on the Napa full marathon. If I get injured again before then I’m slitting my wrists.
Filed under: injury, racing | 6 Comments »
Last night I had my first ever “bizarre behavior on Ambien” event. I got home from the Runner’s World party at about 10:30. My brain was abuzz with activity. I’m always overstimulated after going to a party of any kind. I knew I wouldn’t be able to switch it off. I also had been drinking club soda all evening (except for one tiny glass of champagne at the entrance). But I hadn’t eaten that much.
So I sat down on the couch with my laptop and shotgunned a full 10mg Zolpidem Tartrate (generic Ambien) and a beer. My Facebook posts from that period were normal.
I got very sleepy, so put down the notebook and went to bed. The next thing I remember is waking up at 4AM and wondering why my iPod was next to the bed and turned on. It was showing “Low Battery.” I switched it off and went back to sleep until 7AM.
As I entered the kitchen to make breakfast, I took note of a few oddities. The freezer door was slightly ajar. There was a destroyed fudgesicle wrapper strewn across the kitchen — bits were on the counter, on the floor and in the trash. Around the base of the trash can was scattered a pile of paper napkins. I did what I always do in such cases: blamed it on Jonathan.
Over breakfast, I did my usual web browsing — Google Reader, blog stats and, of course, the ever-addictive Facebook. But it was with some alarm that I noted that a version of myself had been actively posting around midnight, maybe 90 minutes after I went to sleep.
The original post was done pre-blackout. The follow-up comment, however, shows some cognitive troubles brewing.
There was, in fact, no bling at the RW “shindig.” There was lots of food, which I should have eaten more of.
Was it hiccups that woke me up? Probably. It seems that hiccups are always annoying. Even when you're crocked.
This last one is the best of the three. I don’t even need to highlight it anywhere, as the whole message is highlight-worthy.
At my most mentally disordered.
I like this one the best because it documents my total mental disintegration, punctuated by stream of consciousness thoughts and things I said earlier in the evening, during which the only substances I was high on were club soda and California rolls. There are also hints of things I wrote about as long as a week ago.
“For the record” was something I said when we were leaving. I said that, for the record, I would not take responsibility for Sandra’s knee issue being exacerbated by the fact that she was wearing 3″ Donna Karans and running across the street in them.
“She knows her shit” is a reference to two things: Sandra has a very good knowledge of roadways leading into and out of NYC. I learned about all kinds of shortcuts last night. It’s also a line I used in an email recently, describing Sandra’s coaching to a friend.
“I am driving with Sandra” was not accurate. I was, in fact, sitting somewhere in my home. We don’t know where, since there is evidence that I made my way around several rooms of the house last night. This may have been posted from the guest room. It’s worth pointing out that in order to post these messages, I had to first unearth my iPod from the bowels of my gym bag, which was in the entrance hall. Upon closer examination, it appears all Facebook updates were sent from my laptop (iPod messages are labeled as such). So I went from sitting on the couch thinking, “I feel really sleepy” to instantly being in a state of altered conscious. The brain is an amazing contraption.
“It’s a fun, exhilarating ride. No near deaths. Just thrills.” What I find most amazing about this copy is that I still managed to spell the word “exhilarating” correctly. I must have been marshalling all my mental capacities and working so hard to accomplish that. Sandra’s driving reminds me a little of Diane Keaton’s driving in Annie Hall. Although instead of half a sandwich on the floor, she has water bottles rolling around.
She told me that her daughter says she’s a terrible driver. I told her that I felt she was merely an assertive driver and, further, she drives like she conducts the rest of her life: making decisions with confidence and taking advantage of new opportunities as they present themselves. She’s also not afraid of 18 wheelers.
Filed under: everyday life | Tagged: ambien, facebook | 8 Comments »
My days are packed with running-related journo stuff, cross-training sessions, medical appointments and the work I have to do in order to pay the bills, of which there is a lot these days. But it’s bad timing.
Here’s the rundown for anyone following along at home:
Injury: Yesterday I got my diagnosis: osteitis pubis (inflammed adductor tendon) and sacral stress fracture (break in my lower pelvis). The latter is healing on its own. The former needs some help. I didn’t want to ask when I can start running again. I didn’t want to hear the answer. I’ll ask next week. I was initially glad to get the news — at least it’s not a tear that requires surgery — but plunged into a few hours of despair later on. I’m better now. But I’m not thinking about it too much. I just plow through my gym workouts and ignore the big picture.
Partay: Tonight I go to the Runner’s World party in mid-town. I’m not a party person, but I would like to meet some people I only know by name, byline or email. My date is Coach Sandra, who is generously chauffering us both there in her leaf-green Volkswagon bug.
Mi Familia: Tonight my sister also blows into town, but I’ll miss her. But tomorrow I meet up with her, my dad and my stepmother for some good old-fashioned steakhouse fun in the Meatpacking District. Then we all head downtown (way downtown) and hotel it overnight.
Gawk and Talk: On Sunday I arise at 5:30AM 8:00AM and, if anyone in my family is actually awake, bid them adieu. Then I train it back uptown and spend the morning watching the elites run the marathon. That’s the gawk part — comfy tables to sit at with appropiate eating utensils so they can gawk at the onscreen access’ on three giant television screens with a bunch of other losers. We’ll be getting real-time splits and probably all kinds of other statistics. Then around 1:30 I will wander out to the Post-Finish area, meet up with RW photog. Stacey Cramp and force myself to be extroverted and loud for around an hour and half. I feel bad accosting people right after they’ve raced 26.2 miles (I know I often want to kill anyone who tries to talk to me during that time), but I’ll try to look for people who don’t look homicidal or suicidal.
Impose and Collapse: Then I go to a friend’s place nearby to borrow her office in order to transcribe, edit and send off my interviews later in the afternoon. The rest of the day is unscheduled. What’s left of it.
Healing is Expensive and Tedious: On Monday at 9:15 I go to the office of an orthopedist whose services I can’t afford. But I’m paying for them anyway. He’ll give me a Platelet Rich Plasma (PRP) injection in my adductor tendon to jump start its healing. I also hope to get hold of a bone stimulator machine (no giggling) from the first doc. Another friend recommended Bone Up (again, stop giggling) supplements, which are speeding their way to me via Amazon.com right now.
Lassoing the To Do List: I won’t be able to exercise Mon, Tue, Wed of next week, which is good because I’m slammed with work again. My “real” work and my “fun” work. The real work is under control, but the fun work is so far behind I can’t stand it. I’ve lost all momentum with Houston Hopefuls and need to pick that work up again soon. I have two major interviews with Big Running Names on the horizon that I need to prepare for, along with numerous other little projects. One of the interviews is of a backward-looking nature, the other forward-looking. That’s all I’ll say for now. But I think they’ll both be good if I don’t screw them up.
Busman’s Holiday: No trip to the Dominican Republic later this month to report on a 10K there. They didn’t want to foot the bill. I’m disappointed, but a little relieved too as the travel would be a new source of stress and interruption in training. We’ll be working through Thanksgiving to hit other project deadlines, and that’s fine because preparing a huge Thanksgiving dinner for two people is kind of pointless. Especially when one of them’s a Brit.
Filed under: billat, elites, everyday life, injury, racing | 6 Comments »
Filed under: central park, racing | Tagged: nyc marathon, nyrr | 4 Comments »
Little Jaymee Marty of Sacramento, California! Jaymee was among three astute readers who guessed my injury correctly — a stress fracture of the pelvis. A random drawing among the three (talk about good odds) revealed Jaymee as my contest‘s winner. The prize? A whopping $25 in BarnesandNoble.com loot! Your codes are on the way…
Filed under: injury | 8 Comments »
Naturally, now that I’ve found a doctor who I need to pay upwards of $200 per visit to…and I’ve had an MRI…my injury has receded rapidly. Once the ass and hip pain subsided in mid-to-late September, it was replaced with chronic adductor pain. That was enough to keep me from running (along with fear of a stress fracture) up until now.
I ran for 20 minutes around a baseball/soccer field on Sunday. I had bad adductor pain all morning and while walking there. But I figured it had been 12 weeks. Even if I did or do have a stress fracture, I’d served my requisite time off. And if it wasn’t — meaning it was a strain or a tear — I probably couldn’t do much more damage by trying. The typical idiot runner logic.
The pain did not get worse during or after the run. And, aside from a lot of leg soreness yesterday (much of which I attribute to a very hard pool run on Friday and heavy duty weight work on Saturday), there was no obvious fallout from that run. In fact, the adductor felt almost good today. I overnighted my MRI images to new Dr. to read today. I go see him for a diagnosis on Thursday morning. I’ll tell him that I ran and see what he says.
I will say that running felt very weird. It’s been 12 weeks. I haven’t taken more than a week off (before this, obviously) since 2006. I was aerobically fit and wanted to run faster. But it was difficult from a muscular standpoint. It was like starting all over again in that regard. I was not ready for that sensation and it was kind of a blow mentally. I won’t be able to just go out and run 10 miles again immediately. I’ll need to build up. I also know that every twinge will make me nervous.
But, hey, at least I ran for 20 minutes (18:34, actually). I haven’t lost sight of that. It makes me happy to know I can get back to it soon. I should add that Jonathan ran with me and had no pain in his foot. I think he’s going to be training hard before I am.
I ran about 90 seconds less than he did because at one point I ran up a hill. I wanted to try running down it to see if the glute pain would return. Walking downhill was excruciating right after my injury occurred, so I thought a run downhill would be the real test. While I was at the top, I met a friendly black cat. It was Hallowe’en. The cat crossed my path, but then came back to say hello. Nice kitty. The run downhill that followed was fine. Thanks, kitty.
I will be switching my Houston registration in January to the half marathon. I don’t want to try to run a marathon on 8-10 weeks training. But that is enough time to get ready for a good half marathon. I’ve got the plane tickets and the room reserved, and we got work through the end of the year that I wasn’t expecting, so we’ll enjoy it and not think about the fact that we’re spending a shit-tonne of money to fly to Texas to run 13.1 miles.
Assuming I am training again without injury soon, the plan is to train properly for a good race at the Napa Marathon in early March. Houston is five weeks before that. It’s not ideal timing, but after the last three months, I’m not looking for “ideal” anymore.
Filed under: injury, racing, strength training, training | 5 Comments »
Tune in for tonight’s NY Running podcast at 8PM ET, for a 360˚ view of the NYC Marathon. My co-hosts include:
We’ll talk about things you might want to keep in mind if you’re running the race this weekend, lend some facts to the faces you’ll see at the font of the pack in the elite fields, and cover some general stuff about the current NYC-area running scene.
Here’s more info on TalkShoe. Remember that if you want to submit questions in the chat room, you’ll need to register ahead of time.
Edited: You can listen to the my auditory debacle here: NY Running podcasts
Filed under: central park, elites, podcast, racing | Leave a comment »
Longtime readers know that I have had an extended battle with the scale, my pants and race photographers over the issue of my weight. Or, more specifically, how much fat I carry and how it affects my ability to run fast. Here, for example, is a post from nearly two years ago in which, after a couple of years of calorie counting and restriction, and obsessive-compulsive tracking of my weight (Tanita) and body fat (Omron) readings, I had made no progress and decided it was pointless to keep caring. A check of my thyroid showed nothing unusual there, so my failure to lose (as it were) was obviously my fault somehow; or that of my ancestors. But according to at least one nutritionist runner, I shouldn’t concern myself with it.
That message stuck for awhile, but in the spring of this year, aware of my lack of progress in pushing my paces and race times downward, I looked for answers in the gravitational realm once again. Out came the evil twins, Tanita and her moronic brother, Omron, as well as my demented spreadsheets (which included colorful charts of my total lack of progress). Also, over the summer I acquired an Apple iTouch and among the universe of “apps” found something called Tap and Track, which would enable me to record every moment of energy expenditure and every morsel that passed my lips.
I dutifully tracked everything. I made adjustments over weeks, increasing calories slightly, or decreasing them slightly to drastically. I teetotaled for weeks. Or drank with wild abandon. Nothing happened. I began wondering if I might be the first person in the history of eating disorders to experience no change in weight.
During this time I’d started training with Sandra and, while the workouts were hard, the mileage was about what I’d been doing since January, or around 50 mpw, with very little cross-training. Then I got injured in August and could do nothing but limp and complain for about three weeks. I was not exercising at all, so I lightened up on what I was eating to compensate. I ate lots of cabbage and non-fat yogurt. I gained just over three pounds in those three weeks.
In early September I started cross-training and over a few weeks built up to what is now a steady weekly helping of hard work, with a day off about every 8-10 days or so. I kept up my compulsive taking and recording of readings. My weight did not change. My pants even got tighter for the first few weeks, which was quite discouraging indeed. In disgust, I sent Omron back to his dungeon under the bathroom sink and stopped stepping on Tanita every morning. I ate when I was hungry (about every 2 hours), stuck with reasonable foods (I haven’t eaten junk in years) and kept alcohol intake to a minimum most nights. But I stopped keeping score on the iTouch.
Then I started to notice things. Glimpses of shoulder muscles rippling beneath the fat. My arms had a nice, inward curve where triceps meet lats. I could see the adductor muscle that is giving me so much trouble. And veins. I had veins. My blouses were getting tighter, yet, paradoxically, I had obviously lost back fat. One day, getting dressed, I flexed my back and shoulder muscles for Jonathan and asked if he noticed a difference that would explain the shirt problem. “Do that again,” he said, a little stunned. Yeah, I had muscles alright. I think the weight training and spinning have helped my lower body, while I mostly credit the pool running for my upper body development.
Finally, my pants are loosening up, despite my emerging Incredible Bulk physique. But I think I will need new shirts. I still won’t weigh myself. But for shits and giggles I did some Omron readings over the past few days and they were consistently about 2% below the ones I got earlier in the summer.
I will probably always carry considerably more fat than your typical skinny bitch marathoner. But at least I’m learning it’s possible for me to lose some of it. Best of all, I’m saving so much time now that I’ve deinstalled Tap and Track.
Filed under: drinking, eating, physiology | 4 Comments »
Races Like a Girl 