Crappy Karaoke

Well, it's 15 degrees out right now in Philly. Yeah. Not much more to add to that
statement. I had a solid week of training, with a couple nights of crappy sleep(5 hours
or less). Sometimes the more I train, the less I can sleep. But hopefully a couple naps
this weekend will boost my reserves. I'm not a good napper either. Alas, like a crappy race, when you can't change things push on.

Now that I have enlightened you on current meteorological conditions and my nocturnal habits I shall press on to a more fascinating topic- my training. Last week(ending Sunday), I hit 60 miles for the first time since October. Not a daunting amount of mileage, but a decent baseline to return to. On Sunday, I had another good long run with Elkan. This time we mixed things up and ran in South Jersey. Keeping it real. Or something like that. I got in around 14 miles in 90 minutes, with much of our run being done on small shoulders on the side of the road because of ice and snow on the sidewalks. Averaging 6:30-6:40 pace on most of my runs has become commonplace again, and it's nice to be able to hold a conversation(although the merits of the discourse on our long runs are questionable at best) while running a decent pace. On Monday I ran on the River and put in 9 miles in 60 minutes. I stopped at the turnaround to stretch my left hip out, which had tightened considerably over the first half hour of my run. I blamed it on the endless shoulders we ran on the day before, but who knows.

I am fortunate that I have found a great chiropractor in Westmont, NJ named Molly Phillips who can get me back in alignment in ten minutes time. Monday evening I saw Molly and she identified that I had a forward hip, and after a painless adjustment I walked out of her office without a hitch in my step. I was given homework though which is to squeeze a kickball in between my knees a couple times a day. Sounds funky, but seems to be doing the trick. As a precaution I took Tuesday completely off, and ran an easy 7.5 on Wednesday in anticipation of heading up to NYC Thursday evening to run a 5k with some of my Breakneck teammates at the Armory in Washington Heights. Thursday I got a short shake out run in before work, and that afternoon I drove up to the meet with Elkan and his girl Jenna. After subjecting them to Mumford and Sons and Muse on the way up(they said they liked both), we arrived in NYC in decent time. After a warm up full of dodging preoccupied New Yorkers on Broadway, we were ready to run. I was a bit apprehensive of running on a banked track for the first time in years, but was eager to see where my fitness was at in conditions that were considerably warmer than the sub-freezing temps of recent weeks.

I planned on running 5 min. pace for as long as possible, and to get a solid effort in. After passing 1k in 3:05, I started to feel my left hip and hamstring start to act up a bit and tried to ignore it. But as I approached the mile, I started to think that another 17 laps of the banked track probably wasn't going to be good for my long term plans. And after passing the mile at 5:02, I decided to step off the track. I hate quitting in any race, but with the half marathon coming up down in New Orleans in a couple weeks I am glad I did. I did get to see my teammate Nick run a solid 15:30, and Elkan grind out a 16:11. Marc Pelerin, one of the top post-collegiate runners in the Philly area, had a spirited battle with one of the West Chester TC runners and held on for a very solid 14:49 for second place. Not bad for Jan. 20.

Four of us went out for a 4 mile cool-down through the streets of Washington Hts., and after 20 minutes of running and being pain free I stopped beating myself up for dropping out of the race. We got some awesome views of the GW Bridge at night as we finished up our cool-down. My friend Melissa who coaches at Manhattan College was kind enough to come out for the meet, and we went down to the neighborhood bar Coogans with Jenna and Elkan for a late dinner. For the first time I got to sit in the back room(there was terrible karaoke going on in the front room- seriously bad singing- like Michael Bolton attempting to sing like Beck), and in the back room we were surrounded by hundreds of old Sports Illustrated covers that had various track stars from over the years. A little different from today's coverage by SI, which seems to be some variation of Tom Brady, Tom Brady's model wife, or Tom Brady obscured by a Jet's linebacker waxing him. After a nice dinner we made the drive back to Philly, which was fairly uneventful other than my body attempting to fall into the REM cycle while I was still driving. Nothing loud music and a cold wind whipping into the car couldn't cure. Although I didn't get a full race in, I managed to piece together 11 miles for the day.

Yesterday I pretty much had the River to myself for another 9 miler in the evening. One exception was in the first 10 minutes of my run, when a group of 6 or 7 runners came by in the other direction. For some reason one of the dudes in the group decided that it wasn't necessary to move over at all to let me run by...and he seemed equally confused as to why he was called a variation of the supposedly terrible Ben Stiller and Deniro movie that was out recently. Oh well, just a little courtesy is required. I ended up coming back almost 2minutes faster than I went out and did the 9 in a brisk 59:33. My fingers, despite double bagging with gloves, were unresponsive for a solid half hour after the run. Small price to pay to get the mileage in.

Tomorrow I am planning on a 15 miler with Pelerin and Desantis, and am looking to finish the last 6 miles or so down at 6 min. pace. As it has been the last 6 weeks or so, running with people is making the training infinitely more manageable. Although my friend Josh telling me it was a cloudy 62 degrees in Tel Aviv when he arrived there last week didn't make me feel as thankful. But what doesn't kill us only makes us stronger. Or something equally New Age and corny like that. Until the next time....

Eric