St. Patrick's Day is past

And still my Shamrock Run report remains unfinished. I actually started it on Wednesday and have written some during, er, breaks at work. But I haven't had enough time and I'm too tired at night to work on it. But I'm sure I'll finish this weekend.

Running this week has gone on as normal. On Monday, still in Portland, I did 7.25 miles recovery. I'm sure that will come up in the Shamrock Run post.

Wednesday was supposed to be speedwork--but I didn't wanna. Actually hills were on the schedule and I didn't really feel that was necessary so soon after the hills in the 15K and my spontaneous hill run last week. I decided not to substitute in some other kind of speedwork, but instead did eight miles easy. That worked.

Finally, yesterday I moved up my Friday run to Thursday and got up a little extra early to squeeze in ten miles (if I could). Eight of those miles were supposed to be marathon pace...ideally sub-nine but anything below 9:09 would do.

After a 1.5 mile warm-up (shorter than my preference), I endeavored (good word, hmmm?) to kick up my effort to race pace. Well, the effort was there but, for the first couple miles, I was a little lacking in pace. First two miles, 9:25 and 9:13.

It's possible that I would have sped up anyway, but I decided to draw on one of my strategies for boosting a lagging pace. Instead of just trying to run faster, I alternated between running quite hard and running more comfortably from block to block. That helped me hit around nine minutes for the next two miles (9:01, 9:04), on pace!

Then I really did pick up the pace and managed sub-nines the rest of the way...8.51, 8:36 for .37, 8:45, 8:55 for .63, 8:44, and a few more feet at 8:22 pace. Average for 8.05 miles, 8:59!

That left me just a block from home and I should have just stopped and got ready for work. But I really wanted to finish ten total...so I ran twice around the block (10:00 pace) to add the final half mile.

So that's it for weekday running. Sixteen miles on schedule for the weekend...I'm thinking tomorrow will be the day but we shall see.

Have a great weekend! Good luck to the L.A. Marathoners and everyone else racing this weekend!
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Shamrock Run swag

I did the Shamrock Run 15K in Portland this morning. I'll write a race report eventually (I was pretty happy, though not ecstatic, about my result, 1:19:51, which is NOT BAD for a race that's more than 50% uphill).

But now for the important part--free (or discounted) stuff!

I didn't buy anything at the Adidas Company Store yesterday, even with a 50% discount on everything. But this afternoon I'm walking around the Pearl District, planning to cash in on some of the race-related offers. My first stop (where I am now) was Mr. Jolly's Coffee. The offer--a dozen donuts for 25 cents with a beverage. Cool, yes? I ordered a coffee (they do have good coffee!) and while I was adding cream they brought me my very small bag of donuts. Yes, the donuts are mini! You see one in the picture above. All the better, really. I ate that chocolate one and another plain one, and I'll bring the rest back to the hotel.

I'm not sure what other discounts I'll cash in on; I'm pretty sure there are other stores that will attract me even without freebies. My last stop will be Ben & Jerry's, two-for-one ice cream, and I'll have to hustle back to the hotel (where my mom is) before it melts.

A little later we also plan to hit the hotel lobby bar for a free happy hour appetizer. That's from 3-6.

Okay, better get going, I have a lot to accomplish here! :)

Congratulations to all the other Shamrock runners here and elsewhere! Lots of races going this weekend!
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Driving to Portland is like running a marathon...

We drove to Portland this afternoon. We left Everett at noon and got to Portland at 4 p.m.--a solid four hour effort.

The distance from Everett to Portland is 200 miles, so four hours is a respectable time, if not spectacular. Certainly there are many drivers who could shave minutes, even tens of minutes, off that time. Obviously avoiding traffic congestion and bathroom stops helps facilitate a faster time.

I was satisfied with our middle-of-the-pack finish, though. We stopped twice at rest areas to use the bathrooms and stretch our legs. We didn't get bogged down by traffic much at all, only a slight slowing just coming into Portland near the finish. We were slowed a little by bad weather in southern Washington, though--heavy rain, sleet, and hail! At one point we saw four or five cars off the road in the muddy grass median.

I'll admit that although our Everett to Portland time was four hours, our actual finish time (arrival at the Benson Hotel) was more like 4:30. Still nothing to be ashamed of.

Though certainly not a PR.
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Heading south

In less than an hour my mom and I are leaving to drive to Portland for the Shamrock Run 15K. (So I need to make this quick, I'm not even dressed yet!) The race is on Sunday, so of course we have to stay at the Benson Hotel Friday through Monday.

I haven't done this race for two years (last year I was in England), but I'm looking forward to it. I've had a great time the other two times I ran it. Even though it's a hard route, I was always happy with my results at the time. I am curious to see how it will go this time...I am sure I am faster now than I was in 2008.

Luckily this is a cutback week on my training schedule, so the race (plus warm-up) will satisfy my 10-mile long run on the plan, as well as a tempo/pace run I would have done on Friday (today) otherwise.

Even though I have the race on Sunday, I have actually done a little more running this week than usual. On Monday I did my usual morning run, 9.10 miles with 4.5 in the middle at 9:09 average pace. The miles before and after that segment averaged 10:02 and 9:37 (even those paces a little quick for a typical Monday morning!).

Tuesday is usually an off day for running, but I had in mind a little hill run I wanted to do as a warm-up for Portland. (The race is uphill about four miles, then rolling hills for a mile or two, then downhill to the end.) This long hill doesn't fit into my usual route, so I added an extra run Tuesday after work.

I promised myself I would do no more than six miles max. My final distance was 5.97. After a warm-up from my house (1.32 miles), I got to the bottom of Everett Avenue, which stretched uphill (with one down dip) for more than a mile. My idea was to go up and back down at about 30 seconds slower than race pace. The rationale was that I would run pretty hard, but probably could go faster in an actual pace. I guessed that I might do 9:30 on the uphill and 8:00 on the down.

At the top of Everett Avenue I turned and ran south on Colby for a bit to make my one-way distance about 1.65 miles. This last part was less uphill (just a bit) and more level. At Pacific Avenue I turned around and retraced my steps back down (again, with the short downhill from the first segment now an uphill).

I think that downhill/uphill aberration skewed my pace a little, in that my first half (up) was a little faster than it would have been otherwise, but the return trip was a little slower. My pace on the uphill was 8:43 (a lot faster than expected!) and the downhill was 8:09. Then I jogged the rest of the way home. Hopefully that gave my legs a taste of what will be needed on Sunday!

Wednesday was speed work and let me tell you, I was suffering trying to run twelve hours after my hill run. My legs were not rested. My warm-up, about 4.5 miles, was slow, as expected. Then I did five half-mile intervals at the track (with a short jog in between). My first three were my "slowest ever," each one a little slower than 8:00 pace. I got my act together somehow for the final two, and they were around 7:45 pace each. Better. Total run distance 8.25 miles.

Finally, my last run of the week before going into pre-race rest was Thursday morning. I really had no expectations, as my legs were still tired from the previous days' runs. I also had a very hard time getting out of bed! After 2.85 miles warm-up on my own (10:13), I met Arjin at the office and warned him I did not want to run fast, and he could go ahead if he wanted. After a couple of miles he did. I just ignored him and ran at my own pace. I was actually surprised that it came out to be 9:37 for the 4.56 miles. This was the opposite of my bad day a couple of weeks ago--I felt super slow and ended up being faster than I had thought. After I left Arjin at the office I ran home, 1.25 miles at 10:10 pace. Total distance was 8.66, a little shorter than typical because of being late and needing to get ready for work and all that stuff.

This morning I did go to the Y for an hour on the elliptical and a few push-ups and yoga stretches. I am thinking of checking out the workout room at the Benson tonight for a little gentle cardio before dinner. But tomorrow I will really rest my legs, no exercise, just walking as needed.

Now, I have to get dressed, scoop the litter boxes, finish packing our lunch, and just be ready to leave. Gotta run! Have a great weekend!

In my dreams

About a week ago I had a dream that I ran a half marathon at an eight-minute pace. That translates, by the way, to about 1:45 for the half. Yes, I did math in my sleep!

It could happen. Well, it could. Will it? Not so sure about that. It would require me to run the same pace as I can in a good 10K for more than twice the distance. Possible? I think so. Probable? Maybe not.

And actually, a 1:45 half marathon is not at the top of my goal list. I would be more than pleased with a 1:50 half (sometime), and I can worry about 1:48, 1:47, 1:45 if I ever manage to beat 1:50!

Sometimes it's hard for me to believe that I am able of getting out there and running an eight-minute pace even in a 10K,* considering how much work it is to break even nine-minute miles in my non-race runs. But that's where race day adrenaline comes in, I guess. It's kicked in pretty adequately so far.

Last week was a spectacular combination of slow and moderate runs. On Wednesday I decided to do three one-mile laps at some sort of accelerated pace, turns out it was 10K pace, which is okay for that distance, I think. I started off with slow legs in my warm-up, 4.2 miles at around 10:30 pace. When I got to the track I did the three miles (with .25 mile recovery in between) at 8:05, 7:58, and 7:52. I had really hoped that all the miles would be under eight minutes (and closer to 7:30), but c'est la vie.

Friday had just four miles at marathon pace, but in between my three mile warm-up (10:14 average pace) and my three mile finish (9:58 average pace), I squeezed in 5.15 miles at an 8:53 average; all but the first was legitimately under nine minutes (9:17, 8:56, 8:49, 8:51, 8:39 and .15 at 8:03 pace). This was partly thanks to running with Arjin, who can't bring himself to not try and outrun me. It seriously irritates me most of the time but it makes for speedier runs. And I refuse to let him bully me into running too fast too often...I just let him go on ahead.

I did the week's long run on Saturday morning, at the YMCA Invest in Youth Fund Run at Centennial Trail in Snohomish. The run was "open" from 8 a.m. to 2 p.m. to run as many 5-mile laps as you wanted. It is supposed to be a fundraiser but it seems to have turned into more of a Marathon Maniac get-together. There are usually a number of people running shorter distances (5, 10, 15 miles), but this year I feel like I may be the only one who stopped before getting into at least the 20's! I had 14 miles on my training plan and I ran 15, which was fine, and plenty for me. I made a $75 donation to the fund, which I thought of as $25 for every 5-mile lap. Last year I did 10 miles and donated $50.

Even though this wasn't a speed race, running in a group of people made me a little faster than I would have been on my own, I think. I finished 15.35 miles in 2:24:36, a 9:24 average pace. This is with me stopping my Garmin when I stopped in the bathroom between laps. The "official" timer didn't stop the clocks for bathroom breaks, of course, and my registered time was about 2:30 (closer to 10 minute average pace).

There are a lot of positive aspects to doing a long run in laps (just over 2.5 miles out, and then back, for each lap). It breaks the distance up into small chunks. After all, 2.5 miles is like nothing, right? And even five miles is just a short run. Easy enough to do that three times around.

But it wasn't quite as easy as I had hoped. The running wasn't that hard; I didn't feel like I was pushing myself at all with a sub-9:30 pace. But I never quite got into the zone where the miles fly by. I was quite aware of every single mile I ran. So it seemed a little more drudging than other runs I've done.

On the other hand, I could tell that I was in a much better running place than when I did it last year. I clearly remember how hard it was to run a ten-minute pace in the first mile last year (this year mile one was 9:21, and easy). I only did ten miles total last year (by design), and I know that as I finished up ten miles today I had no real difficulty sailing into the next five (except generally wanting to be done).

During the first two five-mile laps I was running behind a Marathon Maniac named Jessica, who I identified to myself as "Red Shorts." Keeping her in eyeshot—a little closer here, a little further there—was a great way of pacing myself beyond just watching Garmin. I tried valiantly, in fact, to look at the Garmin as little as possible, as I think Garmin-watching sometimes does make the time pass more slowly.

After ten miles, I ate a Gu; not because I was particularly hungry but just to help teach myself to fuel (some) on long runs. And I figured, a shot of sugar and caffeine wouldn't hurt, and might help make the last five miles go more smoothly!

After that second lap I think I beat Red Shorts Jessica out of the bathroom, because she wasn't ahead of me this time. Later I saw her just a bit behind me, which gave me a different incentive—don't let her pass me! So while the first few miles in my last five were a little slower (than the beginning miles), the final couple miles were speedy!

In the last few miles, I did decide to try to push it a little, just to get done and make a decent showing for myself. So the last mile, and especially the last .12 mile at finish, were quite impressive (to me)!

Here are my splits for each run, by mile. In between the full miles which occurred in five-mile segments, there is a .12 overage which I am not including in these splits. (Except the one at the end.)

Miles 1-5: 9:21, 9:30, 9:25, 9:20, 9:18.
Miles 6-10: 9:28, 9:37, 9:29, 9:19, 9:17.
Miles 11-15: 9:37, 9:35, 9:38, 9:18, 9:02. Plus .12 at 8:23 pace.

I was not tempted to go on and run another five miles! :)

My next task for the day was to pick up a "Triple Chocolate Ganache Cake" to bring to the Bar Association Legal Services benefit auction on Saturday night. (The cake was part of the dessert auction.) I had "purchased" a certificate for the cake at the Juvenile Court VOA fundraiser auction last year, then redeemed it (from the probation counselor who was making it) to re-donate to the Bar Auction. Lisa, the cake baker, lives in Snohomish only a few miles from my run site. Perfect.

I actually finished the run earlier than I had projected, so I sat in my car for a while before heading over to Lisa's house. I still arrived before she was quite ready, so I watched as she decorated the top of the cake with flowers. What she did (this is a clever trick) was fold drinking straws in half and secure them with cellophane tape, then use the straws to hold a little water to keep the flowers fresh while they were stuck in the cake for the rest of the day. It worked well!

I brought the cake home and had myself a low-key afternoon before getting dressed for the auction. (We were leaving at 4:00, so I only had a few hours on my hands.) I ate lunch, of course. Otherwise I would have been ravenous and crazy (more so than usual) by dinner time at the auction!

As it was, I was still anxious for dinner to be served—I think it was around 6:30 or 7:00. Being my usual hungry self, I quickly downed my teeny tiny starter salad (a hollowed out chunk of cucumber stuffed with a few lettuce leaves—artsy but very minimalist) and finished all the food on my dinner plate (salmon and filet of beef, mash potatoes in some kind of fancy shape, and two or three tiny token vegetables). Yes, others tastefully left behind some meat, or fish, or potatoes...I think it is admirable that I restrained myself from grabbing their leftovers! Oh yes, I also ate a small roll with butter. I think it is so stingy that they didn't bring around another bread basket!

Keep in mind, I may have eaten back five or so of my miles during the afternoon, but there were still a lot more miles begging to be fed! And although I had eaten a perfectly reasonable dinner, by anyone's account, I still felt undernourished.

Luckily, it was time for the dessert auction! Also luckily, Ann is very interested in chocolate desserts and decided we should have one, no wait, two, for our two tables. She took over the bidding and we ended up (after a slight bidding war with a judge) with Lisa's Triple Chocolate Ganache Cake and another Chocolate Ganache Cake which was actually rather similar, but robed in chocolate "lace" and topped with raspberries.

After all the desserts were distributed to the table, hotel staff took them away to cut and serve them (luckily they brought them back eventually too). We all got very tasteful and appropriate pieces of our table's cakes. Here's Ann and her boyfriend Pete with a cake, before the cutting.
The other cake went to our other table and I didn't get a "before" shot, but here it is "after"!

Once the cakes were returned to our tables, several of us had seconds. I chose a piece of the Triple Chocolate Ganache Cake (at the other table) for my second serving. After eating that, I can honestly say (and did in fact say, to Rod), that now I felt like my fifteen miles were worthwhile. (I also no longer felt the craving for more fuel!)

The dress I wore to the auction was a little knit dress (by Tribal) that I had bought in Blue Hill, Maine, when I went to Maine for the Half Marathon in September 2008. This was the first time I'd worn it. I wore it with very high-heeled, pointy toe pumps, which surprisingly didn't bother me at all despite all the running over two days (more than a marathon distance, put together). Rod is wearing the camel-hair blazer I gave him for Christmas (which I searched high and low for, to find the only camel-hair blazer in the greater Seattle area). And yes, we are wearing our dorky name tags.

On Sunday we went skiing and this time I did feel the running in my legs. Mostly it was in my right calf, which I think was tired because my achilles tendon and ankle were a little roughed up from the running. In the morning we did a couple of black diamond runs, in somewhat soft snow, which put a lot of stress on my legs. In fact, riding up on one of the longer chair rides, I could barely stand the dangling of my leg; it just seemed to ache. Later on, though, we switched back to some runs that seemed easier in comparison, and I didn't hurt anymore. We skiied through the morning, had lunch, then headed home.

A good weekend!


*My sub-eight pace was in my 10K PR, back in November. My average pace was slower in the Smelt Run recently, but I am considering it an eight-minute pace effort, with slower miles due to the wind. This is only for purposes of assessing my capabilities, not giving myself extra credit!

Smelt Run 2010

Saturday morning I picked up my parents and drove up to LaConner for my first 10K in 2010, the Skagit Symphony Smelt Run. This is the fourth time I have run this 10K. Last year I managed to achieve my personal worst time in a 10K ever (go, me!) and this year my time (while not a PR*), was about nine minutes faster. My time was about 50:36 (that's what my watch shows). Actual time may be about one second faster (official results not yet posted).

As is not uncommon at this time of year, the weather was pretty crappy. It was raining on the drive up, and sporadically once we arrived. However, the rain stopped before the actual run began! I have almost never had to do a race actually in the rain.

I started out with my warm-up wearing a jacket, but after I ran a mile or two I was plenty warm enough (it was quite balmy) and I left the jacket at the car before the race began. I had been jogging around town hoping to get at least 1.8 miles warm-up, maybe two miles. At 1.89, just minutes before the start, I decided I wanted another bathroom stop before the run. I dashed into the school building and luckily found an open restroom quickly. I was the last person in there, and I literally ran down the hallway to get to the starting area. It seemed like a very close call, but in the end there were still several minutes of announcements before the start.

Here I am in the first block of the race, wearing my photo-friendly orange top! I love it. This may be the first time my mother has ever quickly spotted me in a crowd. In the picture, I have just tossed my gloves to my parents on the sidewalk.

The race started by running into and through LaConner. At the end of Morris Street the 5K runners turned right and the 10K group went left. We ran down First Street and veered around the outskirts of town, going up and down a couple of short but steep hills along the way. My first mile was good, 7:55.

When we re-connected with Morris Street we turned right out of town and onto the flats. Very quickly we encountered the famous Skagit wind. Well, it's famous to me and anyone who has run this 10K. Despite a pretty hard effort on my part, the wind was slowing me down. Mile 2 - 8:14, Mile 3 - 8:23.

We turned around and started tracing our way back around 3.75 miles. Now the wind was sort of at our backs (though not especially pushing us along), and I was able to pick up the pace. I also immediately felt a lot hotter, as the wind was no longer cooling me! Mile 4 - 8:17. I vowed to try to get the remaining miles under eight minutes each.

I used my old trick of running with a hard effort from mailbox to mailbox (they're not very close up in the farmlands). Mile 5 - 7:56. In the last mile I ran out of mailboxes, but I picked other landmarks to shoot for. Mile 6 - 7:58.

The last portion was back in town, and of course this is where you want to go all out to try to finish as fast as possible. I had two goals—finish under 50 minutes if possible (I could tell from my watch that it was possible), and catch up with the woman in the 2010 Seattle Marathon shirt (which, obviously, I recognized), who was just ahead of me and had been for much of the race. (There had been another woman who was running neck and neck with me for part of the last couple miles, but somewhere in mile 6 she pulled ahead and was never seen again.)

The Seattle Marathon lady looked like she was running so easy, not even trying too hard, and I thought surely with a strong effort I could catch her. In the last few blocks, on the street with the finish in it, I poured it on as hard as I could. I saw my parents as I passed by. Here I am in that last stretch—maybe I don't look like I'm running too hard, but I was!

After I passed by my folks, there was only a short distance left to go. But then I felt myself getting dizzy and nauseous. I put my hand to my mouth as if it would prevent me from puking if I really needed to! I could also see the clock had turned to 50 minutes. I let up on my pace just a little bit till the lightheadedness passed. I may have been hyperventilating from breathing so hard! Obviously, any chance of passing Seattle Marathon woman was lost. (In this picture, I thought it was funny that the old guy was wearing a jacket the same color as my shirt. We also matched the reflective vests of the course volunteers, and one other guy that was running. Luckily he was quite a ways behind me, so he didn't show up in the pictures by mistake. That has happened in the past!)
I crossed the finish line at approximately 50:35 (I noted the clock time but now I can't remember exactly) and punched my Garmin at 50:36.** I ran ahead to congratulate Seattle Marathon woman. When she turned around she was quite red and sweaty, so apparently hadn't been running so effortlessly after all! Thank goodness. We chatted about pace and times and age groups for a few seconds. She asked me if I was in the 50+ group (yikes, did I look that bad?) and I thoughtless replied, "no, thank goodness!" (Well, she deserved it for that!) She's in her late fifties (and yes, she beat me), and lamented how it is harder to be in the upper end of the age group with all the "younger" ones coming in. Yeah, I get that! My position in the 40+ group has been seriously compromised by all the 39-year-old fasties turning 40!

My dad came and met me after the finish.

We walked back to meet my mother.

We were going to have brunch/lunch at the Calico Cupboard in LaConner, but the street was so crowded (there was a Smelt Derby in addition to the race) that we couldn't park near the restaurant. I decided we should go to the Calico Cupboard in Anacortes instead.

So that's what we did. I ordered us a giant cinnamon roll to share, and I had fish (salmon) tacos. Yum.

In case you are wondering, I am not really disappointed that I didn't beat my PR time. For one thing, I don't see how I (or anyone) could expect to PR in every race. I am quite happy that I was in the 50-minute range, which is more than two minutes faster than any other 10K I've done (except for my PR). I would like to get another 10K PR sometime, of course. I kind of have my sights set on the July 4 Yankee Doodle Dash. That is if I'm not too beat up from the Newport Marathon and Seattle Rock & Roll Half Marathon beforehand. I have a time goal in mind... but I think I'll save it for now.

*My 10K PR of 49:20, from the 2009 Fowl Fun Run, is exactly ten minutes faster than my "personal worst" time of 59:20!

**My pace for the last .24 mile was about 7:40. Not fast enough to make me sick—don't know what was going on there!

I must go to London, immediately!

The U.S. - U.K. exchange rate dipped below $1.50 (to £1) for the first time since I was over there a year ago. At that time it was down in the $1.40's (yeah!) but over the winter it's been hovering at $1.60 and above. Today, £1 = $1.499, and it has been a steady drop through the $1.50's in the last few weeks.*

All this is making me wish I had thrown my name into the lottery last summer for the London Marathon on April 25. My plan is to try to get in for 2012 (planning on Boston in 2011), but that's a long way off and who knows what the exchange rate will be then! (Not to mention, there's no guarantee I'll get in anyway.)

So if anyone knows of an extra entry to the London Marathon going a-wanting, let me know!

Yeah, I'm 90% kidding.... (but if you can hook me up, pass it on, 'kay?)


*Yes, I do monitor the exchange rate daily. Doesn't everyone?