Running through

"When you are beaten by an athlete running through, it means you are owned by him body and soul. The Fixed Order will have been established in a most definitive way, to be altered only by some kind of felonious conduct, possibly involving Claymore mines."- Once A Runner

So I have a race tomorrow, the Woodbury Country Mile half. As its in the middle of a training cycle, I'll be running through, meaning I won't alter my training at all in order to run it. Normally I'd take a day off two days before the race (so the race is Sunday, I would have taken Friday off). Instead, I havent taken a day off since Tuesday the 27th, and since then I've gone 10, 14, 7, and 8 later today. I'm pretty exhausted, but that might be for the better since I always seem to go out too fast and then crash and burn late. If you happen to be running that race, get at me. I'll be wearing a wisco XC kit and my compression socks.

So yesterday I went to pick up packets. I picked up mine as well as my roommates that I'm running with. I got lost. Like actually really lost and I thought I would have to call a taxi or my parents to get home. I took the afternoon off from work and took a bus toward oakdale, which is next to woodbury. Even though I was going to a mall, there was no bus stop there,so I had to walk the mile to get to the shopping center. That took me like 20 minutes because I was going the wrong way for a while. The weird thing is woodbury has no sidewalks, or at least not where I needed them. Google maps had me cross a highway, which was fine because there was an overpass, and then cross another highway which was super scary because not only was there no crosswalk or light that tells you to walk, there was a huge DO NOT WALK sign. I was thinking about turning around, but I didn't, because I didn't know how to get home.

Once I got across the highway, I got on this road that split into an onramp and a one way road to the mall a quarter of a mile in or so. That was kind of traumatizing because cars were just flying, but I made it. After picking up the packet, I had the same traumatizing experience walking out of the mall, but this time I had to go to a different street to take a different bus to get back to St. Paul. I was late, so I had to run the 1.2 miles to the bus stop in (in 7:18). I made it, and from that bus I took another to get home. Bottom line is, I need a car, badly. I left Minneapolis at 3:00p, and got back to my house at 6:30. Ridiculousness.

I bought the IAAF world championship pack for all the days from Universal Sports this morning. Right now I'm watching the marathon on replay, since I don't care about much except that and the womens 10k today. And yes, I already know what happens, and I don't really care. Mens 10k tomorrow though, its going to be an amazing field (start list here). For the record, my pick is Mo Farrah. A lot of people are picking Belke, and I don't know why. I don't think he'll show up at all, I don't think he's raced yet this year. Want to hear something crazy? Trey Hardee us the defending world champion in the Decathalon for America, but he isnt even #1 in his own country, Ashton Eaton is.

Nowhere, Wisconsin

Some might argue that all of Wisconsin outside of Mad Town and maybe Green Bay is nowhere, WI, but I'm talking really nowhere. Like, 8 miles to the nearest town with a population in the double digits nowhere. Anyways, what I was setting up there was my recent trip to my fraternity brother and housemate's cabin in northern Wisconsin. Its like two and a half hours from the cities, though we ended up making it up there in 4 and a bit coming up. We took three cars and one ended up getting lost (it wasn't me) plus we had to stop at a grocery store to get supplies for breakfast and other shenanigans, one too many liquor stores, and a fireworks shop.

We finally got up there and pretty much went to bed right away. That was Friday. Saturday I got up at 7:30 for a 10 miler, except I only went 6. This cabin was so far out of the way it was a good mile or two to a paved road. That, and they had a 3/4 of a mile long unpaved driveway which seemed like it never ended. This kid actually has two cabins, although the one we were staying at was pretty much a shed with a bunch of beds in it. The other one, three miles away or so, was furnished and was where the rest of his family was staying. I woke up at 7:30 Saturday and was pretty sure I was the only person awake within 10 miles or so. It was pretty cool. I could hear a bunch of animals in the distance, thank God. Wolves, bears, that sort of stuff that I'd been warned about because honestly, if a bear got me while I was running I was pretty much a sitting duck.

So I run to this guy's other cabin, only about two or three miles being on paved roads and didn't see a soul. It was the most relaxing thing ever. I had thought I could do the whole thing in road running shoes- my synchrofuels- but was sorely mistaken. After 8 miles my feet were bleeding and felt like bricks. In fact, the all- yellow upper of the shoes is now all brownish with dried blood. But its all good because when I got back to our cabin I jumped in the Chippewa River (which was freezing) and then threw a couple fireworks in the cabin to wake everyone up. After yet another trip to the liquor store in Winter, we went rafting down the river.

We stopped midway down (actually more like a half hour into our float) to this dumpy old place called the Wannegan in Ojibwa for some pizza. I'm pretty sure- no, I'm certain- that it was just frozen pizza thrown in a pizza oven, but at that point I wasn't complaining. After the pit stop we all left, beer coolers in tow for Dave's other cabin (I said his name, he's probably going to be pissed), which was a good hour and a half down the river more. Nobody passed out, no casualties, although we had a ton of beer left over, which was okay since we were going to have a beer pong tournament that night. I'd resolved not to drink until I got done with my running, and because I've had a grand total of 1 beer before that weekend. So once we beached our crafts we went in to warm up (it had started raining before we got to our destination).

Dave's mom, grandma, and two brothers were at that cabin, and man, I haven't had that kind of hospitality in a while. She cooked us hamburgers, beer brats, and corn on the cob fresh from the co- op in Winter, and it was delicious. I was in a food coma. After a good three hours of playing cards and helping out around the cabin, we headed back to our cabin in "the truck" which was an ancient pick up truck with monster truck tires. Most of us climbed in the pick- up part of the truck and almost died a few times. Dave's a really bad driver. Most everyone went to sleep right away, which was kind of a bummer. I didn't, and stayed up talking by the fire until midnight or so, then set my alarm for Sunday's run.

Sunday was supposed to be 10 miles, but I decided to loop around Winter for a 16 mile loop. Luckily I brought my Cascadia 6's with me so I threw those on, as well as a Wisco XC singlet I got at the Griak invite last year. It was a pretty cool run. The town wasn't all that hard to find from the cabin, and I was able to take fire roads all the way into town. When I got there it was pretty cool. It goes without saying, everyone loved the singlet and it seemed like the whole town yelled something to me- they love their bucky up there. I was thinking the whole time about Once A Runner. You know how Quenton Cassidy goes to train at Bruce Denton's cabin for a couple months? thats exactly what I felt like. I should do that, just go up to that cabin and just run and run and run some more. That would be awesome. After I got back, I chilled in the river for a while, and then packed up my stuff feeling much more of a runner.

On the way back our car stopped by the leinenkugel's brewery in Chippewa Falls. Pretty cool stuff actually, plus we got 4 free 8 ounce glasses of whatever we wanted. We each had two glasses before the tour and two after and we were set, or at least I was. I'm actually surprised I was able to handle that much beer. I know I'm a lightweight, but I don't know how light, and I don't really want to find out. But whatever, that was good stuff.

Okay, well its getting close to 2:00 A.M. and I have to get up for work at 8, so I should probably stop writing.

Or we could blaze!

That's a quote from Once A Runner, if you didn't know. Most of my post titles are from OAR. I would have put the full paragraph up there, but it wouldn't fit, so here ya go:

It is simply that we can all be good boys and wear our letter sweaters around and get our little degrees and find some nice girl to settle, you know, down with...Or we can blaze! Become legends in our own time, strike fear in the heart of mediocre talent everywhere! We can scald dogs, put records out of reach! Make the stands gasp as we blow into an unearthly kick from three hundred yards out! We can become God's own messengers delivering the dreaded scrolls! We can race dark Satan himself till he wheezes fiery cinders down the back straightaway....They'll speak our names in hushed tones, 'those guys are animals' they'll say! We can lay it on the line, bust a gut, show them a clean pair of heels. We can sprint the turn on a spring breeze and feel the winter leave our feet! We can, by God, let our demons loose and just wail on!

Yeah, good stuff. I think I'm going to get that book out of the library today and never finish reading it. Kind of like that book on Haile Gebreselassie that I never finished reading? that one sucked though. Its not like I can't sit down and write all of OAR either, because I probably can, but there's something about reading that book every summer that gets me geared up for running.

So, actual running has gone great lately. Apart from the lax bros taking my beloved track from me. Like this lax bro, who is also my roommate (see photo). So my track work is scheduled on Tuesday, and because of my work schedule, I can't run until 8. Well, lax camp has both the field and track from 8-10 everyday, and since the only other day I could do a track workout in the morning is Friday (which would make me have two easy days in a row, but a speed workout and a marathon pace long run back to back, which would suck a lot. So I've been going to the High School track 5 miles or so from me (so 10 round trip). I'll just run there and run back. Its kinda brutal so sometimes I'll just wait until the brosciety meeting is over and run track at like 11, but that sucks too.

The Last 2 runs I've done in my new flats- my New Balance MR1400's. I think I figured out why I like them so much- they fit exactly like the Brooks Racer ST4's (which are my favorite shoes of all time), whereas the ST5's run a tad wider than the 4's... but I'll get to that in a later post. The two runs were an 11 mile tempo (2 mile warm up, 7 mile @ tempo pace, 2 mile cool down) on Thursday, and a 7 mile recovery on Friday. I'm probably going to wear my trainers for this weekend's runs, but I'd like to get up to the point where I can do an entire half marathon on flats and feel good about it.

Thats another thing, I signed up for another half marathon next month, so I'll be doing 2 within like 17 days of each other. Even better, they coincide with my long runs, so what up?

So last night was a rough one. I thought I was going to go to bed early like I usually do, get up for work at like 6, work from 8-noon, and then run home from work (which is 7 miles, I have 8 to do today). Not happening. I ended up pulling an all nighter for no reason, and it looks like I'm gonna grill when I get home, then nap, then take a night run since its supposed to get real hot real quick.

It looks like I might finally get my 21 papers sometime soon. I got an email from the New York Times (they email me headlines) saying that the Senate had reached a deal on the MN budget, which would potentially end 16 days of shutdown. However, when I clicked on the link to the article, it didn't exist, so I don't know what that means but I think we're still in lockdown mode over here. I tried to get my license renewed through the county service center last Thursday, but doors were locked and no one was home at 11 in the morning, so I don't know what's happening right now. It could be worse, at least we're not Detroit.

I'm thinking of getting into the steeplechase. Like really into it. Last year I did a couple club races and didn't do too badly (I only came in last twice) and only ate **** off the water jump once or twice. But I think it would be kind of cool to have that in my back pocket. Heck, Steve Slattery is still steeplechasing and he's like 50, so how hard can it be?

Also, one of my friends just turned 21, and she's engaged already. Either the kids aren't alright (thats an Offspring reference for all you hipsters) or I've got some work in front of me as far as dating goes

The loneliness of the long distance runner

No, I'm not referring to the book because that book sucked. Seriously, don't read it, it made me want to jump off a bridge. Book was super depressing. Anyways, I think I named a post the same thing two years ago, but deal with it. This one will probably be better anyways.

I'm almost done with Once A Runner, I've got 30 minutes (~1 chapter) left. I'm at the part where he's just about to compete in the Southeastern Relays against John Walton in the mile as his Finnish alter ego. I'm going to finish up the book tonight, even though I promised myself I would only listen to the book while running. I'm pretty amped to get home and listen to it, even though I could probably write the last few chapters of OAR from memory. I've read it five times already. Once A Runner is like the Bible- you pick up something new each time you read it.

Anyways, it was freezing cold today. It was the type of cold where I wish it would have snowed just because that would have raised the temperature a few degrees. It did snow at the tail end of my run, which made me want to go longer except I couldn't because I had to go to work. I love running in the snow, except the part where snow accumulates on the sidewalks- that part sucks. It seems to be an epidemic around me, and I'm guilty of it too. It snows, you tell yourself "I'll shovel that tomorrow," the snow melts and freezes overnight, you decide it takes too much time to shovel that, and it snows again and the cycle repeats itself. What results is piss poor footing and an uphill battle to stay upright and move forward at the same time.

And so is born my current crisis. I fell and ripped my running tights the other day, which is a problem when I only have one pair. So the last few runs have been chilly, and I have my Brooks wind briefs to thank that I still have the, um... ability to have children, shall we say? So, I'll have to hit up Run 'n' Fun on Sunday... oh shoot.

Other than that, today's run was pretty awesome. I ran to the U, but this time crossed over to the West Bank for some variety. It was peaceful. I named this post the loneliness of the long distance runner because we all are solitary creatures, and crave that time when we're alone with our minds, with an expanse of road in front of us. Some of us don't need that, but I know I do. I live in our fraternity house and someone is having a good time there almost every night. I'm not a party guy per say, since I don't drink and the measure of a man seems to be how many beers he can drink. So, its nice to get away from that mess and... I don't know... reground yourself?

That also concludes my first full week of consistent training since late July. Only 20 miles, but at a 7:54 average pace, which is halfway respectable, all things considered. I still have one workout left to add to my flotrack workout log that is written on a pizza box on my bed. That just oozes class. I ran 4 days, which I think I could up one more day without, you know, the knee flaring up. Its finding the time that's the issue.

John L. Parker is not William Shakespeare

Theres a raging debate on Track Talk (okay, not a raging debate, but its there) about Once A Runner and its literary merit. Not only that, but I've heard "Once A Runner sucks" from quite a few people. It might be coincidence but the majority are fat kids who haven't ran a mile in their lives. Anyways, the question was brought up "would a non- runner even want to read OAR?" I don't really care, but I don't think so. From a non runner's perspective, I think I would find OAR quite boring. A whole chapter on 400 repeats? pages and pages describing unremarkable training runs in detail? really? I love OAR, but its no To Kill A Mockingbird or Catcher in The Rye. That said, I'd rather read OAR than both those books because OAR is about runners, and runners are a rare breed . Not all of us obsess over shoes or 400 repeats, or Sammy Wanjiru's high school cross country times. Maybe not all runners do, but all runners run, and so a book about running naturally appeals to them all. So I guess in that sense is a cult classic. In the world of running books though, its got to be at or near the top.

As far as running goes, I did it, I went back to back. I shouldn't have, but it happened. I'll probably end up going three days in a row too since I have a three hour break between class and work tomorrow. I only went 45 minutes. Only 45. Why do I say only 45? Well, I'm going slow for one, I'm just trying to build up a long slow milage base so I can get a few good months of training under me and then figure out what I'm going to do with my life. I'm on chapter 11 of OAR as well. Book gets better each time you read it

If you can fill the unforgiving minute with sixty seconds worth of distance run

And so it begins. That's part of a quote by Rudyard Kipling, but I hope you know that already. I actually know that quote by heart- every year we have a packet of readings each day for our pledge process for Sigma Chi. That quote is from one of the packets we had to read during our pledge period, and we had to chose one reading from each packet to discuss in front of the actives each night. I chose "if" (that poem) and talked about OAR and Quenton Cassidy and Bruce Denton and all that. Of course, no one knew what I was talking about.

The moral of the story is that I started reading Once A Runner again for the third time. Actually, I downloaded it on audiobook from the library and loaded it on my iPod. It works pretty nicely, although I do have a complaint. OAR was only available in Windows Media Player format, and it wasn't playable on a mac since you needed a certain codec not available on mac to play it. No problem right? I started up my virtual machine and downloaded the book. After installing the apple usb drivers on my virtual machine, I was ready to roll. I plugged in my iPod, but had to reformat my ipod for windows, which erased all my songs. That was kind of a headache, but whatever. Im already on chapter 7.

On to the actual meat of the post, right? Well, I ran a little over 7 miles in about an hour. Slow, but peaceful. It was nice to go out there in the light snow and just slog through a couple miles. granted, it was a little difficult footing, but its all good. Night runs are awesome, and snow running is awesome, so put both together is really awesome. My knee felt really good too. I could feel it a little bit in the last mile or two coming home, but not a problem.