Heading into the Fred Lebow Half Marathon on the 25th,
I kept hearing the same thing from the people running it: “I’m not ready.” I was in the same boat. I’d worked out three times since the NYC
Marathon in November. Once was the Rocky
10K, then once at White Plains High School and once at the gym. I prayed for snow but not enough fell at the
right time. If I hadn’t already
completed the distance, there’s more than a decent chance that I would have
skipped it. Instead, I went out and
ran. It wasn’t as cold as I thought it
would be (actually got a pretty good sweat going) and barely cramped while
employing a run walk method.
Initially, I was going run 3 walk 1 but there was a point
towards the middle where I moved to walk 1 run 1. I feel right now like I need to exercise my
toughness more than anything because there were times when my body felt like it
could go but my brain just didn’t want to.
It wasn’t the slowest half I’ve ever finished either which was
surprising. I felt sore for a day or so
before returning more or less to normal.
Returning to normal didn’t get me into the gym though. Still working on that aspect of my
running.
I did get to check off 3 things with the race though. I ran a race in Fred’s honor, I got credit
towards my 9 + 1 and I got credit towards the 4/6 for the Manhattan Half
Marathon in 2016. I also got off my ass
and had to do a work out. That should
probably be the most important part.
Your first race of the year is usually a baseline run where you see what
you need to work on and set a time for you to beat next time. Generally though, you do it with a 5K or 4
miler, not a half. I have shown several
things in my running career and will fit this into unconventional/too dumb for
my own good.
My time was 3:42:12 or 16:58 per mile. That’s the baseline. So for the 4 Mile race yesterday, I set a
goal for myself of 15 minutes per mile.
It was a 2 minute jump but I thought that cutting 9 miles off the
distance would translate to a much quicker per mile time. I also believe that during the half marathon,
I completed the first 4 miles in about 1:05, so I really only needed to shave 5
minutes off that time or about a minute fifteen seconds per mile. Very doable.
Unfortunately, I didn’t stretch/warm up enough prior to the run starting
and struggled through a slow first mile at 17:05. Could I have pushed it? Definitely.
Did I? Nope. I made up some time on mile 2, lost some on
mile 3 and finished right around where I should have been the whole time on
mile 4. Total time of 1:02:03 or 15:31
per mile.
Basically I missed my goal because of my first mile. Where does this leave me? Annoyed.
On the other hand, I’m not totally disappointed because I know that I
could get there with just a little work.
For next time, I need to stretch/warm up. I found such a breakthrough last year by
running a few miles the day before a long run to get my muscles moving. I need to get back to that now, particularly
in the cold weather. If I’m doing a warm
up run the day before, it also implies that I’m working out in between my races
which I have not done yet this year. In
addition to being more limber and having muscles that are ready to respond when
I command them to work, it also develops the mental muscle which I’ve been
lacking. The harder you work between
races makes you less likely to give up or take it easy during races. You’ve worked too damn hard to let that guy
beat you. You know which guy I mean.
So I know have 4 weeks in between today and my next run
which will always be Coogan’s to me although it appears they aren’t sponsoring
it anymore. Tomato, tomahto, it’s still
a 5k on a somewhat hilly course that goes into Fort Tryon Park and up and down
the streets of Washington Heights. This
is one of my favorite races. Part of it
is that it is the first race I did with NYRRs but I also enjoy the
entertainment. It’s called Salsa, Blues
and Shamrocks Run or something like that and that’s what you should be
expecting. You are getting a mariachi
band on one corner, bag piper on the next, electric guitar on the third. Always something to keep you interested.
Goal for Coogan’s? 45
minutes. It won’t be my fastest 5K but
it will be a big improvement for me.
What have I done thus far to achieve said goal? Not a damn thing. Nothing except walking to and from the train
station every day. It’s about a mile and
a half round trip. When people say it’s
“Better than nothing,” this is precisely what they mean. I did however research a new gym membership
at my old gym and am going to rejoin.
Last summer, I got the brilliant idea to cancel my membership to the gym
I really liked and join one of those 10 dollar a month things. My thought was that I needed to save money
because the gym I like is really expensive.
The last thought I had before I signed up was “For 10 bucks a month, how
bad can it be?”
1. 1. Sometimes
you get what you pay for.
So I signed up for the gym while they were running a
special. To get in on time, I signed up
online (huh?) without SEEING the gym (dumbass).
2. 2. Never join a gym without actually walking into
it. If you can go at the time you think
you are most likely to frequent the gym, even better.
On my first time to the gym, I was a little surprised by how
small and cramped it was. I circled the
gym like the dirtiest lurker ever thinking I’d missed something but it turns
out I hadn’t. There was, in fact, no
squat rack. There was nowhere to do
deadlifts. A hang clean most likely
would have gotten me escorted out of the gym because it would knock over half
the machines and most of the people. I
thought to myself “Hey, you are always talking about training Rocky 4
style. Look how ripped he got while
training using only a pile of rocks, his chubby brother-in-law and a beard.”
3.
3. No matter how monosyllabically you express
yourself, you are not Rocky. And
training outdoors emphasizing functional strength is not the same as working
out at a gym where they just don’t have equipment.
I had much stacked against me. I was not motivated by the thoughts of
avenging Apollo’s death. I didn’t have a
beard. Any my brother-in-law is decidedly
unchubby. The lack of equipment in the
gym didn’t inspire me to be creative, it just made me depressed and stay
home. I felt like somebody had bought a
bunch of old weights at a tag sale and decided to open a gym. I remember thinking that if this gym worked
out, one day it could be a real gym.
I don’t want to keep beating up on this gym because clearly
it is too weak to defend itself but it was nowhere near the experience that I
needed it to be to keep my inspired. So
I’m going to pay a bit more (but still not as much as I had been paying) and go
back to my old gym. True, I did almost
sand my knee off there once in 2014 but I also got into pretty good shape a
couple of times there. At least in the
beginning, I’ll be excited for the change of scenery.
I’m excited to incorporate weights, particularly exercises
like squats and deadlift back into the routine.
I’m stuck with the joints, tendons and cartilage (or lack thereof) that
I have. I can’t change or improve that
stuff (if I can, someone let me know) but I can strengthen the muscles around
those areas. By building bigger muscles,
I can take pressure off the knees and hips which will help and makes me
excited.
My next plan is to work out a work out schedule. I need to know what I’m doing to know whether
or not I should be doing it. I can make
an awesome color coded calendar for 2015.
I need the discipline, need to work on the mental muscle. I don’t want a repeat of last year when I was
getting passed in the chute to finish the race and not have the competitive
streak to fight it off. I want to pass
people at the end. And at the beginning
too, if possible.
