Run Luau Run

Honey Water

August 25, 2010 by luau

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Lately I’ve been hydrating and recovering with Nuun Water and mix1. Both are great at what they do. I love that the Nuun tablets make them completely portable. I also find that after a tough workout, mix1 definitely feeds me the nutrients I need to be refreshed sooner. Both are great for on-the-go athletes that need to throw something in the bag for a trip to the gym.

Unfortunately (or fortunately, depends on how you see it), the other day I was out of both Nuun tablets and mix1. I was setting out for an easy paced 12 miler so I knew I needed something more than just plain water. As I scoured the kitchen, hoping to find a stray tablet, I recalled what I had read in Born To Run about the Tarahumara drinking chia frescas, a combination of chia seeds, lime juice, honey and water. It was said that this simple concoction kept these runners going for hours and hours. Last summer I tried making chia frescas on my own, but had found that the chia seeds tended to clog the spout in my water bottles. Nothing more frustrating that being 30 – 40 minutes into a run, squeezing your water bottle and getting nothing out of it. My solution? I took out the chia seeds and ended up with a citrus honey drink. By the time Fall came around, I had simplified it even further by taking out the lime. This simple honey water solution powered me to my 7 minute half marathon PR in November (1:33:14).

I’m not sure why I eventually moved away from the honey water. Maybe it was because I ran out of honey one day or because my buddy Mike was recommending Nuun. I don’t remember. Regardless, but late winter I had switched to Nuun almost exclusively.

So the other day I was setting out for a 12 miler, and with no Nuun available, I went back to my old reliable. What a pleasant “re-discovery”. A nice side effect of drinking the honey water instead of the Nuun was that I didn’t need to pack any Gu’s either. Taking a few sips of honey water every 10 – 20 minutes provided me the steady stream of simple carbohydrates I needed to maintain a consistent pace. I also found that I was needing fewer gulps per mile . I’m sure I’ll still mix in the Nuun regularly (you really can’t beat the convenience factor), but I have really enjoyed the honey water over the last four or five workouts. This past Sunday I felt refreshed and able to continue after at 15 mile marathon paced run. I’m still tinkering with the ratios, but a 5 – 10% solution seems to be working best for me.

Now if I could only get to hand out honey water at Smuttynose and New York, I’ll be all set!

Posted in diet, Odd Ball, other, training | Tagged Honey Water, Hydration, running | 7 Comments »

Speak up for those who can’t

August 23, 2010 by luau

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I often talk about the importance of running. How it is a wonder drug, a stress reliever, a life saver. Running is, aside from my family, a prime focus of my life. But sometimes, things happen that make you realize just how trivial something like a quest to qualify for Boston can be.

Recently a friend of my wife’s went through (is going through) the nightmare that every parent fears. Her 9-year-old, pre-verbal, autistic daughter was repeatedly abused physically by her bus driver. This 24 year-old woman would smile at my wife’s friend while driving away saying, “Bye Mom”, simultaneously twisting her daughter’s fingers to the point of spraining them.

The wife does a much better job articulating what we can do here:

http://adiaryofamom.wordpress.com/2010/08/23/stories-for-another-day/

and her friend’s story is on Huff Po here:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/kim-stagliano/post_701_b_685954.html

We all don’t agree on the causes of autism, but I do think that we can all agree that there is no excuse for abusing children. Please take the time to read the wife’s post, but more importantly, take a moment to read Kim’s post and leave a comment. The more comments her post receives, the more likely it will reach the front page of the Huffington Post.

As the wife said:

If enough of us read it (and comment on it!), we’ll get that damned thing to the front page. In so doing, we’ll shine a light on the desperate need to safeguard these vulnerable kids. We’ll make a public statement that we WILL NOT ABIDE by the abuse of our precious babies – whether our babies are two or forty-two. We will declare this atrocity quite simply INTOLERABLE.

Whether it’s my post, the wife’s post, or Kim’s post, please pass this along. Please help speak for those who can’t.

Posted in other | Tagged abuse, autism, Huffington Post, kim stagliano | 5 Comments »

Why do you run?

August 19, 2010 by luau

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Hey Folks,

This is not a typical Run Luau Run blog post where I espouse the wonders of running and try to convince you why you should run. No, today and for the next several weeks (months?) I am asking for your help.

I need YOUR contributions to a project that I’m working on. Interested?

All you need to do is send me a paragraph or two telling me why you run and/ or why you think others should run. E-mail it to me at “runluaurun at gmail dot com” (written out so the bots don’t start sending me spam).

If you can, please include a picture of your favorite running shoes and tell me what kind of shoes they are. Also, please let me know how you would like to be referenced (real name, nickname, pseudonym, etc) just in case this project actually ever sees the light of day.

The more responses I get, the sooner I can put it all together, so please don’t be shy about forwarding this to your running friends and spreading the word.

Thanks!

Luau

Posted in other | Tagged project, Reasons to run, why you run | 45 Comments »

Instant Makeover

August 17, 2010 by luau

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Confidence.

Confidence is sexy, isn’t it? The thing is, none of us necessarily feel confident all of the time. However, there is a simple way to exude confidence, turn up your appeal and do something that is good for your long term health. It’s the simplest thing really. It takes just a moment to do. It’s something you already know how to do, but it may take you some time to get used to doing again.

So what is this one thing that can improve how people (including yourself) see you?

Let me start with a trip to the pool.

Every summer, my family and I have joined a local pool. It’s been great for the kids and is a nice way to end the day after camp. It is also a fun place to people watch. You get to see all kinds. What struck me the other day was what a difference one thing could make in how I perceive a person. Two sisters walked by. They were around my age, maybe a little younger, a had a very similar look. Empirically, I think that they were equally pretty, but one definitely stood out from the other in terms of appeal. I’m not talking solely sex appeal either. It was that one was simply more appealing than the other.

The one difference between the sisters?

Posture.

That’s it. One was slouched over, arms crossed, back bent, hips pushed forward. There was no attempt being made to straighten herself out. The other had her shoulders open and down, her head held high. You could see the confidence beaming from her face.

I was instantly brought back to my childhood when my dad used to harangue me about good posture. He would threaten to send me to military school or tie a stick to my back (jokingly, of course…right, dad? Right?). It wasn’t until he passed along the wisdom of his former kung-fu teacher, Sifu Steve Williams, that I really got it though. My father hadn’t taken kung-fu in 10 years at that point, but this particular nugget had stuck with him. His Sifu (the kung-fu equivalent of Sensei) had told him to think of a very thin, taut, golden thread coming out of the top of his head and extending up to the sky, in the process slightly pulling him up. If he slouched the thread would break. The point was to try to keep the thread in tact throughout the day.

That was it. It’s that easy.

Go ahead. Try it.

You naturally fall into good posture.

Now take a deep breath. Do you feel it? With good posture, your lungs open up and allows your body to take in more oxygen. That extra oxygen can wake you up, sharpen your senses and give you an overall sense of confidence. And with that, we’re back to the beginning. Confidence. Confidence is sexy.

I could go on about the myriad benefits of good posture, from the increased oxygen intake, to the maintenance of good spine health, to better running form, but I’ll leave it at confidence.

If you’re feeling down, or think that maybe you’re not getting the attention you’re due, step outside your skin and take a good, hard look at yourself. Odds are you’re slouching and unwittingly shutting out the world. Think of that golden thread and see if you can go through the day without breaking it. Obviously you have to duck under things or nod your head in certain situations, but try to stick to the spirit of the golden thread. My bet is that you’ll end the day a lot happier than you ended the previous one.

Posted in health, other | Tagged Instant Makeover, posture, running form | 10 Comments »

Where do you prefer to run?

August 11, 2010 by luau

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Posted in other | Tagged outside, poll, running, treadmill | 5 Comments »

Anticipation & Trepidation

August 9, 2010 by luau

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I’ve taken some time off to rest my knee. In fact, when I resume my marathon training schedule on Wednesday with a medium long run (12 miles at a nice and easy pace), it will be my first run in exactly 2 weeks. My original plan was to take 10 days off, but that meant starting yesterday with a 17 miler. Felt a little much, so I decided to give myself one more day before resuming my schedule. Fortunately (or unfortunately as the case may be) the schedule said that today and tomorrow were off days. With 8 weeks to go I have the luck of coming back on a recovery week. Nothing like a well-timed injury.

That said, I’m still a little nervous. The knee feels pretty good, but I know that can change with one misstep, one tweak. Maybe I need to face the fact that I’m not 20 anymore and that I can’t push myself as hard as, well, as hard as I wish I had pushed myself when I was younger.

Isn’t it a shame that youth is wasted on the young?

Had I had the determination I have at 40 at the age of 20, who knows what kind of runner I might have become? World-class? Definitely not. But could I have run a marathon with a 2:–:– handle? Maybe…just maybe.

I am in better shape now than I have ever been in my life, save maybe when I was 16 or 17, when I was practicing kung-fu 2-4 hours a day, 6 days a week. But being in the best shape of my life doesn’t change the fact that I’m 40 years old and I don’t bounce back as quickly as my mind and will would like.

Looking ahead at my schedule (I’m following the Pfitz 12/55 program from Advanced Marathoning), there are some interesting weeks coming up. Some lactate threshold runs, some marathon pace runs and some VO2 Max runs – all sessions that produce a little extra pounding on the knee. Running in VFF’s help reduce that pounding, but the fact that I’m still a heel-striker doesn’t help. I’m actually toying with the idea of buying some shoes that may play to my heel-striking tendency – not to convert back to regular shoes, but just to mix it up. My buddy Pete is pretty convinced that he has remained injury free in part because he mixes up what he puts on his feet from run to run. There’s actually some science to that – maybe a topic for another post.

Where am I going with this? I don’t know. The heart and mind are determined, but the body is not as enthusiastic or resilient. Is that enough? Can it be enough? I’ve only been running for 20 months. Do more experienced runners go through this? Or are they simply physically more gifted? How do they adjust?

The next couple of weeks will be telling. I want to be able to complete the plan, knowing that if I do, and am healthy, I’ve got a pretty good shot at 3:20:59 at Smuttynose. I have two friends, Brendan and the aforementioned Pete, who will be running it as well. Brendan is shooting for 3:20 like me. Pete, if all systems are go, may be shooting for a 3:15. Running with those guys will be a big help to all three of us. Like any daunting task, it’s much easier to tackle 26.2 miles with a group as opposed to alone. The thing is, I can’t push myself to complete the plan and go into the Smuttynose hobbling – defeats the whole purpose of training, doesn’t it? I do think I have to finally face the fact that I’m older now, so maybe it’s a little more important to stretch, do the warm up runs, do the cool down jogs and stretch afterward.

So I take my first steps back on Wednesday with a mix of anticipation and trepidation. I’ll have to resist the urge to go all out, but also have to be careful not to run too conservatively.

When did I get old?

What’s your approach to training when coming back from an injury? And for the older runners like me, has your approach changed with time?

Posted in health, rest, training | Tagged anticipation, Healing, Injury, running, training, trepidation | 7 Comments »

Be Selfish

August 2, 2010 by luau

This post was inspired in part by akbutler. (You will run that 5K!)

That’s right.

Be selfish.

I don’t mean cut people off in line or swipe the last food item without asking. I don’t mean hoard all of the ice cream, talk without listening, or think only about yourself.

What I do mean is go out for that long run, go to that gym class, schedule that massage, meet your girlfriend for a manicure and pedicure, book that haircut with your hairdresser, and occasionally, eat your cake too! And don’t feel guilty about it! (Unless you are one of those people who ONLY does those things…then I’m not talking to you.)

I think that people who work very hard taking care of others very often forget to take care of themselves. I see it in the eyes of my wife and others who spend so much time tending to the special needs of their children, siblings or parents.

The focus.

The Go-Go-Go.

The exhaustion!

Even when a particular need is met, there is often still a mountain of needs that are waiting to be taken care of.

No time to rest. Must get to the next task!

But what we all need to remember, that in some cases, being selfish is the most selfless thing you can do. By taking care of yourself, you are better prepared, better able to deal with the challenges that you face. It allows you to be more than just there.

Taking care of yourself could be getting some sleep, getting a run in, or maybe even something simply cosmetic like getting your hair done. It’s important. It’s important because if you don’t do it, you’re gonna crash and be useless. Who can take better care of the ones you love better than you? No one, except a rested you.

There’s a problem of course. There are only 24 hours in a day. Those hours can come and go very quickly.

When, Luau, when am I supposed to be able to do these things for myself? I hear ya. I really do. Let me pose it a little differently with an unrelated short story:

Many years ago, the wife and I were struggling with a recommendation from a doctor regarding little Brooke. I won’t get into specifics, but suffice it to say that it was a very difficult decision that took a lot of soul searching. We kept asking ourselves, what happens if we do this? What are the possible negatives going forward? In the end, and I can’t remember whether it was the wife or I who came up with it, but we flipped it and asked ourselves, “what is the price if we don’t?” Once we approached it from this perspective, our path was clear.

So I ask you this. What is the consequence if you don’t somehow find the time to take care of yourself, both short-term and long-term? And if you ultimately break down, who will be there to take care of those you have been working so hard to take care of?

I am selfish about my running. 4 – 6 hours a week. Those 4 -6 hour are mine and no one else’s. Sometimes it’s 90 minutes at 4:30 in the morning, sometimes it’s 2 hours starting at 11:00 at night. If I’m lucky, I get a lunchtime run in. It keeps me up even when the world conspires to bring me down, but it also contributes to hopefully keeping me around for at least another 50 – 60 years. If I can be relatively sharp-minded and able-bodied until I’m 90, Brooke will have me around until she’s almost 60. Hopefully by then she won’t need me the way she needs me now. That is why I am selfish.

What do you need to be selfish about?

Posted in health, motivation, other, rest | Tagged autism, mental health, physical health, running, Selfish | 8 Comments »

Ignoring Pain

July 30, 2010 by luau

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This post is written somewhat stream-of- consciousness style. I have had two streams in my life running parallel to each other the past few weeks. I’m not sure what one has to do with the other, but they somehow feel connected…at least to me.

***

So a few weeks ago I tweaked my right knee again. I’ve been trying to ignore it, thinking that if I run more slowly, if I run more lightly, if I stretch more regularly, the pain will eventually go away. I’ve been following a training schedule for the upcoming October 3rd Smuttynose Marathon, and my rest days have helped, but honestly, after every run lately, I battle with varying levels of soreness.

***

Over the past several weeks, autism has raised its open hand on several occasions and slapped me pretty hard in the face. Every time it did, as much as I tried to put on a brave, happy face, it hurt. A lot.

I have, for the most part, long been the happy-go-lucky member of my family. As a kid growing up, I just kind of rolled with the punches. Now, with a family of my own, I still am the one who stresses the silver lining in any situation. I am the one who emphasizes the positives and ignores the negatives, almost to a fault. It’s not always easy, but I work hard to remain positive in just about any situation.

Even when autism slaps me in the face, I will often turn the other cheek and smile. Even when my Brooke goes to hide in the bathroom for 25 minutes, shredding a plastic bag meant for her wet bathing suit, because both the visual and auditory stimuli from a camp activity is overwhelming, I say, “well, at least she’s using her tools to remove herself from the situation instead of having crying fits like many of her typical peers.”

Even when she goes to a birthday party for one of her classmates and just can’t seem to appropriately break into the social interaction of several of her friends, awkwardly trying to insert herself and ultimately failing, I say, “She’s socially motivated! She’s not shying away!”

See? Silver lining – quite possibly augmented with a dose of mild denial. Though denial may be the wrong word. I am not in denial of the fact that my baby girl has autism. Shoot! I’ll tell anybody who will listen about it. But maybe I’m in denial about some of the aspects of her autism that affect her life.

I have never been one to dwell on the negatives. At least, not on the outside.

But I’m tired. I try not to show it. I try to re-frame it. And very often, I convince myself everything is going to be all right – even when things look bleak. But those slaps get harder and stronger. As she gets older, the gaps become bigger and more noticable. My attempts at smiling have become less genuine. The tears that I shed in private when no one is looking have become more common.

I wonder and worry about the future (both immediate and more frighteningly, distant) of my little Brooke.

***

On Tuesday night I attended the Kick-Off for the Autism Speaks Boston Walk. Don’t worry. I’m not here soliciting donations (that’s the topic of another post). The Kick-Off is meant to pump up the walkers as they get ready to shift their fund-raising into high gear, usually done with inspirational speeches from parents and politicians. I think they did a good job of that, but for me, it was Autism Speaks’ President Mark Roithmayr’s speech that struck a chord with me. He talked of the scientific research Autism Speaks funds and the recent findings that are helping to unlock and solve this puzzle we call the Autism Spectrum. There may never be a “cure” so to speak for autism, but the more scientifically based knowledge we have, the greater we will understand this disorder. The greater our understanding, the better equipped we will be to help our autistic sons, daughters, siblings and friends. It gave me renewed hope.

That hope was buoyed by news of the passage of an Autism Insurance Bill in both the State House and Senate (unanimously I might add) and a video-taped promise by our governor that he would pass the bill if it made it to his desk. Awareness is making a difference!

***

Yesterday I had the great pleasure of meeting a scientist who has been working in the field of autism research for over 35 years. She was delving into solving this puzzle long before most people had even heard of autism. Dr. Helen Tager-Flusberg spoke to a small group of us who have been touched in some way by autism. We had been invited to see firsthand where the dollars go and how they are used. She spoke of her ongoing research, concurrently studying the receptive language of non-verbal children and the infant siblings of children with autism. Her enthusiasm, even after 35 years in the field, is infectious. She is still eager to learn, to discover. I could feel myself get excited for the research she was doing, thinking, “gee, I wish I were 22 years old again so I could apply to graduate school and come work with her!” But the most joyful part of my experience of meeting Dr. Tager-Flusberg and touring her lab, was seeing the fire and energy of those that worked for her. These young women are the future of autism research, they are excited by what they are doing and they quite obviously knew their stuff.

It was somewhat bitter-sweet to see this because much of what they do will more directly help those that come after me and my little Brooke, but there are bound to be some things that come out of their research that will help all people on the spectrum, whether it is directly or indirectly.

I walked out of the meeting with renewed strength. Autism will continue to takes its swipes at me, of that I have no doubt. The private tears will continue to be shed, but my resolve to help has been hardened. I can feel that resolve bleeding into other aspects of my life as well.

***

I have long compared our family’s personal journey with autism as a marathon, not a sprint. This was long before I started running regularly. A year after Brooke started receiving therapies to help her cope and communicate better with the world, I said that we were no longer crawling a marathon, we were walking. We still have a very long way to go, but we are walking. Her progress has been phenomenal, but it has had its up and downs. We will often take 3 steps forward, 4 steps backward and then 2 step forward again. A painful but ultimately positive path.

***

What does this have to do with running? with my preparation for Smuttynose? With my troublesome knee?

2 days ago, I sat looking at my knee. I’m pretty sure it’s not a joint issue per se. I pulled, possibly ripped, something over a year ago in my hamstring. Something actually popped behind my knee. The doctors never found anything, but it’s never been quite the same. 3 marathons, 4 half-marathon and several shorter races later, I am faster and stronger overall, but my knee hurts. 2 days ago, I wondered how I was going to deal with this. 2 days ago, emotionally hammered by the recent trials of autism, I wondered what I was doing. Why was I running? Smuttynose is 10 weeks away. New York, 15.

After the event of the last two days and speaking to Mark and seeing his enthusiasm about my running for Autism Speaks this November, the purpose became clearer. I need to do what’s right to be ready to run in October and November. Maybe these last few days were about not having to be in denial to have hope? Maybe one doesn’t need to be Pollyanna to be positive? I don’t know.

What I can tell you is that after the Kick-Off and after my tour of Dr. Tager-Flusberg’s laboratory, the pain I have been ignoring (both autism and the knee), have my full attention again. The focus is back. I’m going to take a week and really let the knee heal through real rest, massage and stretching. How else this is going to manifest itself over the next 3 months, I am not sure, but I want to thank Mark Roithmayr, Erica Giunta, Kelley Borer, Christine Pecorella, Dr. Tager-Flusberg and the rest of the Autism Speaks team for helping me regain my footing.

Posted in motivation, New York City Marathon, other, rest | Tagged autism, Autism Speaks, Healing, knee, marathon, pain, running | 29 Comments »

It’s all relative…

July 27, 2010 by luau

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…when it comes to speed. What is fast for some is slow for others and visa-versa. Still, the one standard you can compare yourself to is, well, yourself. Part of the reason many of us enter footraces is to see just how fast we are. Once we have finished one, we use each subsequent race to measure how our speed has waxed or waned. Much of our change in speed can be attributed to diet, hydration, training, weather and quality of sleep & recovery.

But what about Mars Blackmon’s eternal question, “Is it the shoes?”

Can what you wear on your feet make a significant impact on how you perform on the streets? Nike, along with Blackmon (Spike Lee) and Michael Jordan, tried to sell us on that idea way back in the early 1990’s. “It’s gotta be the shoes” was everywhere.

Runners today have a myriad of shoes to choose from when they enter a running store. Every shoe has it’s selling point, whether it’s support or cushioning, firmness or flexibility. And of course, we all have different feet, so the range of choice is a good thing, right? But what if you are simply looking to increase your speed. You feel you are close to whatever goal it is you have set for yourself, but you have fallen just a little bit short. Is there a shoe for that?

People are constantly asking me, “Can you run fast in those, uh, things?” They point at my Vibram Bikilas or Treks, not sure what to make of them.

Commercial hype and celebrity endorsements aside (Joe Montana – it is so sad to see you pitching those Skechers Shape Ups), let’s do a simple thought experiment. Let’s pit twin brothers against each other in a long distance race. Each has had the exact same training, eaten the exact same foods, and received the exact same amount of sleep. They are wearing the exact same outfits and weigh exactly the same. They also both incorporate the same running style. Which one would you bet on to win this race? You can’t, because any bet you make would be a complete guess.

Now, let’s take one of the twins out of his traditional shoes and put him in a pair that weigh half as much (12oz to 6oz each). This is now the only difference between the twins. One is literally carrying 3/4 of a pound less than the other. Now you may wonder, what difference can 3/4lb make in a footrace? Well, based on certain calculators out there on the internet, for a 175lb man like me, it can mean 9 seconds in a 10K, 22 seconds in a half-marathon and as much as 45 seconds in a full marathon. For a 150lb runner, the time difference is even greater. What’s 9 seconds? Well, it can mean the difference between placing in your age group or not (I’ve missed placing in my age group twice 5 seconds or less). It can also mean the difference between qualifying for Boston or not. I still have over 9 minutes to make up, but if I ran in traditional shoes and clocked a 3:21:40, I’d be pretty ticked off!

So what am I getting at? Vibram Fivefingers are my racing shoe. They literally are half the weight of my old Brooks trainers and I am convinced that they have helped me reached times that I wouldn’t have had otherwise. Between the forcing me to run in a more efficient manner and allowing me to carry less weight, my speed has picked up. At the age 40 and with only a little over a year of consistent running under my belt, I was able to record a sub-40 in just my second 10K. I was not a runner before November 2008. Was it solely because of the shoes? No way! But I don’t doubt that they had a huge part in my race that day (of course, I still missed the podium by a few seconds).

If you are a dyed-in-the-wool heel striker with no desire to change your stride, then the minimalist shoe is probably not for you. But if you are naturally a mid- to fore-foot striker, or are like me, a partially reformed heel-striker, and you are looking for ways to cut down your times, the Vibrams, and more specifically the Bikilas or Treks, may be the shoe for you. I’ve heard people say that as heel-strikers they cannot possibly run in the Vibrams. I would have to disagree. I have always been a heel-striker and although I’ve tried to alter my mechanics, using a cross between chi-running and barefoot techniques, I will still land just ever so slightly on my heel.

Providence Marathon

Boston 13.1

Boston Run To Remember

That said, my heels have been fine. I am a faster, stronger and more efficient runner than I ever was.

Taken to extremes, you may ask, well why not toss out the shoes altogether? Go barefoot! That’s another 45 seconds right there! The problem with that for me is I don’t have natural tread on the bottom of my feet. Both the Treks and the Bikilas have enough tread so you can run hard and still maintain traction with the ground. If I tried that barefoot, I think I’d rip the skin right off the bottoms of my feet.

I’ve put well over 1000 miles in VFF’s over the last 12 month, with close to 400 in either Treks or Bikilas, interspersed with some runs in my traditional Brooks. I know my comfortable pace in my VFF’s is about 20 seconds faster than my Brooks.

Based on my personal experience therefore, I have to agree with Mars. “It’s gotta be the shoes!”

Posted in racing, training, Vibram Five Fingers | Tagged Bikilas, Fivefingers, running, shoes, Speed, Vibram Bikila, Vibram Treks | 11 Comments »

The 35th Annual Marathon Sports 5 Miler

July 23, 2010 by luau

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Last night night I ran the Marathon Sports 5 Miler. It was, to say the least, a very new experience for me. I had never raced anything shorter than a 10K, so I wasn’t sure how I was going to approach this. I was running on two teams last night. One was the RaceMenu/mix1 team that I have been running with since April, the other was an informal coming together of friends to form a coed foursome to compete in the team competition of the race. We had no actual chance of winning the competition outright, but we did have a friendly wager with some friends who had formed a team of their own. It was Team We Run This Shizzle (with Doug, Jamie, Nina and myself) versus Team Runners Through The Jungle (with Hugh, Michael, Alett and Lizette). The winning team was to buy the losing team a beer.

When Jamie and I arrived at the high school where the race was starting, I looked around and knew placing high was going to be tough. I have never seen so many high school and just out of high school runners at a race since, well, high school. And these kids looked serious. There are some races that bring out the more hard core runners, and I think that the Marathon Sports 5 Miler is one of them. We finally managed to find both Team Shizzle and Team Jungle, and the smack talk began. At one point I asked Hugh what the strategy was for running a 5 Miler, and he looked at me deadpan and said, “run faster than a 10K.”

Soon we were called to the start. The race started at a local high school on one of its fields. As the Marathon Sports website describes the course:

The course is a moderately difficult certified 5-mile combination of hilly roads, grass, and trails, starts like a shoulder-to-shoulder cross country classic, and finishes with a flourish on the High School track.

RaceMenu leader, Alain, called me up to the starting line.

“How fast you running this,” he asked.

“I’m hoping around 32:30”

“Ok, I’m running with you. Stay up here.”

I put my toe on the line and looked around. I remember thinking to myself, “I do NOT belong with these guys.” All around me were “real” runners. Next to me were a pack of BAA (Boston Athletic Association) runners. It was intimidating. I looked back to wave at Teams Shizzle and Jungle but couldn’t find them in the sea of runners. As I scanned the crowd I realized more and more that this was a serious crowd of hard core runners. More doubt began to creep in.

The starter raised the bullhorn…

Now, this was the first race since the Manchester Marathon in November that I ran naked. No, for you non-runners, that doesn’t mean without my clothes. No, naked means running without music or your GPS enabled phone or watch. I did cheat a little by wearing my stopwatch, but running without music and more importantly Runkeeper, meant that I wasn’t going to have my normal half-mile splits to tell me just how fast I was going.

…and we were off!

Alain and I took off like jackrabbits across the large field. As we made the first turn off the hill, the course dipped drastically and it was all I could do not to slide down the grass. Within 90 seconds were back on road and looking around I knew I was in trouble. I was huffing and puffing already while getting passed by scores of high school runners. I thought to myself, “man, it sucks to be old!”

3 minutes in I asked Alain if his garmin said how far we were. He looked but couldn’t tell. I was hoping to hear we were on a 6:00 – 6:15 pace. A couple of minutes later I saw the 1st mile marker. From a distance I could make out the first number. A “5”. Crap! Alain and I passed the marker at 5:35 – way too fast for me! Alain tried to pull me along, but I had to ease up and recover. I waved him on and watched him slowly pull away.

Mentally I was in crisis mode. I realized that I had truly screwed up my race plan by going out so fast. To be nearly 45 seconds faster than my planned pace was too much. Part of me wanted to stop, but I knew I couldn’t let Team Shizzle down. As I approached the 2nd mile marker I heard Hugh yell from behind me.

“Hey Luau!

“Yeah?”

“When I told you to run faster than your 10K pace, I didn’t mean twice as fast!”

I tried to laugh but I was still recovering. My whole body was aching, but I was determined to just get to mile 3. As long as I could get to mile 3 I knew I could finish. Hugh paused for a beat and then moved on.

I hit mile 2 at 12:26 (a 6:51 second mile). At this point I knew I was on my own for the rest of the race. I had originally hoped to run with either Alain or Hugh, but had burned through too much fuel in the first mile. I was just going to have to hang on for dear life. At the next water stop I grabbed one cup and downed it and then a second cup and poured it over my head. As I left the water stop I heard a little boy say, “Dad? Why did that man pour it on his head?” I laughed.

Mile 3 came quickly in 6:02, though I wonder if that mile marker was misplaced. 18:28 through 3 miles. Despite having killed myself in that first mile, I still had a shot at a 32-handle if I could just maintain a 7:00 minute pace. Normally, that’s a pace I can manage, but man, I was hurting. I focused on just staying steady, keeping the feet moving.

Mile 4 arrived in 7:04. I was fading and fading fast. At 25:32, I knew I just needed to maintain to reach my goal time, but it was a struggle. I was getting passed and I wasn’t passing anyone; psychologically that can be a game crusher. But with about 3/4 of a mile to go, something happened. Up ahead I could see I was actually gaining on some people. I wasn’t the only one struggling this late in the game. I found new energy and kicked it up just a bit. I wasn’t going to try to catch them in one fell swoop. I knew I had a little bit of time to reel them in.

My engine was sputtering but I was determined. My legs and lungs were yelling, screaming at me, but I mentally plugged my ears and yelled “lalalalalalalala!” as loud as I could in my head. A young blond girl passed my on my right. I latched on and stayed with her. With a half mile to go, the course returned to grass for a little over a quarter mile before finishing on the local high school’s track. The girl started to pull away (I’d find out later that she is a nationally ranked high school miler) as we hit the track.

The moment my feet hit the track, a flood of memories came back. I had not run competitively on a track in over 22 years, but it all came back. The crowds, the pain, the adrenaline.

The adrenaline!!! Thank God for adrenaline. As we rounded the turn to head for the final straightaway, I heard Alain cheer me on. It was time for the kick, and man did I kick! I passed the girl and three other runners as I stretched out my stride and just went. The last guy in my sights got away by 2 seconds. I patted him on the back and we shook hands.

You want to know what those 2 seconds cost me? A top 100 finish overall and a top 20 finish in my age group. I finished with a 32:14 (16 seconds faster than my goal), 101st of 915 overall and 21st of 156 in my age group. By far not my best finish, but to accomplish that in this field felt pretty good. I found both Alain and Hugh. In the end they had each finished about a minute ahead of me, so I didn’t feel too bad.

I went back out on to the field to cheer on the rest of the runner. In came Mike, then Jamie, Doug, Alett, Lizette and Nina. Team Shizzle initially thought we had lost, but when I checked the scoreboard later that evening, Surprise!, we had actually beaten Team Jungle by 98 seconds.

After taking a few photo-op shots with the RaceMenu/mix1 team and O-Water, Teams Jungle and Shizzle made their way to my car where we cracked open a few beers to celebrate the competition.

Jamie, Doug, Me, Nina, Alett, Hugh and Lizette

Despite having run for RaceMenu for several months now, this was my first race where I was running in a team competition. I absolutely loved the extra motivation it gave me to run hard. Before the race, Jamie was telling me that she was concerned about how she was going to run and that she didn’t want to let her teammates down. This despite the fact that she was a last minute addition and didn’t actually know the runners. It is great motivation to run your best, and she did! She ran a 36:20, coming in over a minute faster than what she was hoping for. I know that when I wanted to give up at mile 2, knowing that I’d be letting the team down was a huge motivator to keep going.

So now it’s back to training for the Smuttynose Marathon, but I already have my eye on next year’s Marathon Sports 5 Miler, and I’m hoping we can have the same friendly bet again, because next time Hugh, I’m taking you down…I’m taking you down to Chinatown. Let the smack talk begin!