Running to the Sea

I just saw Arcade Fire tonight. Wow. Definitely one of
the best shows I have seen in a couple years. I was
as amazed as when I saw Radiohead or U2 for the first time. See them
if you can.

I ended up doing my tempo on Saturday at the Run for the Hill of
It at Forbidden Drive. I ran 27:49, averaging 5:34 a mile for 9th. One
of the top Penn guys, Luke Grau, won the race in 26:22.
Running a race on cinders and dirt was a nice change from
pounding the pavement. Even with 500 people running
at you on the way back on the path just made things more interesting.
With a about a half mile to go I saw two of the guys ahead of me were coming
back to me a bit, but they still had 50 meters. I decided to get out of the threshold pace I was running at and used a break between two gradual uphills to the finish to go after them. I caught one of the guys with about 100 meters to go, but he responded well and started kicking back past me. For the first time in my running career I was run into the back of an old woman walking on the trail about 50 meter from the finish. The guy was smart, he just ran a tangent to force me to slow down as I came up on the lady. He got me by a second, and I just had to laugh. I have been run into a post at the end of a race(shout out to Jay Wassell) and had to get some stitches, and I have had a finish chute be to narrow to even lean at the tape(the snap decision was get impaled or concede first place-I chose the temporary incovenience of a loss), but I have never been run into the back of a nice old lady. Now if it was the marathon in November and I was kicking for the top 5
my decision may have been tougher...


I ended up having breakfast over Mike Vido's house after the race.
Mike is one of the hardest workers I have seen in the sport,
and in two years at Penn he has gone from being a walk-on
to becoming a legit runner. A steady diet of 90-100 mile weeks have
been his secret... certainly not rocket science. Hard work, consistency,
and self-confidence have been the difference for him. He ended up taking 3rd in the race.
We ended up taking some batting practice off one of
Mike's brothers in their expansive backyard. I made decent contact,
but will not be invited to the Phillies spring training anytime soon. I was most impressed
with how many tennis balls his younger brothers had collected from the woods of their
high school. It was enough to keep Agassi busy as a seven year old hitting countless balls
back at his slavedriver of a dad in Las Vegas(read his autobiography, amazing). Best quote of the book was something along the lines of "I hate tennis, but I can't not play it."

I did my tempo on Saturday instead of tomorrow so I could
have people around to run with. Thus, I moved my long run back
a day, until Monday. I was back out at Forbidden Dr. for 17 miles.
I ran the first 8 controlled, around 6:45 pace. The next
8 ended up being in 49:12, 6:09 pace, with the last 4 miles incorporating an out and back with some decent uphills. My last mile was
easy, and I ran the 17 in 1:51:54. The purpose of pushing
the pace a bit later in a long run is to force the body to
respond when you are starting to feel fatigued. This is similar to the marathon where
it's all about the last 10 miles, after attempting to
stay relaxed for the first two-thirds of the race.

I ended up with 67 miles for the week, with a decent tempo
effort and a solid long run. I have a long way to go to
be ready for the fall, but there is still some time. This coming week
I am scheduled for 70 miles, my highest total in 18 months or so.
In honor of the great show I just saw I will end with
some lyrics from the Arcade Fire song Black Wave/Bad Vibrations:
"We can make it if we run
they won't follow me to the sea
shadows they fear the sun
We'll make it if we run!
Run from the memory."

Eric