Marathon Redemption

Two weeks later I look down at the medal they draped around my neck after I crossed the finish line and I still smile.

I'm a marathoner. I've got the bling to prove it.

Two years ago I started a marathon, but did not finish. Believe me, the sting of a DNF after running 19 miles lingers for a long time.

A few injuries and tweaks here and there this time around, but for the most part I kept the wheels on the wagon.

My longest training runs were a couple of 20 milers, the second one was absolutely fantastic. But I still wasn't sure whether I could do 26.2.

When race day for the Kansas City Marathon came on Oct. 18, I was eager. And ready.

My goal was to finish. If the day was going well, under 4 hours would be great. If not, just finish, at least faster than Oprah. Oprah Winfrey is a marathoner, finishing the 1994 Marine Corps Marathon in 4:29:15.

I finished. I whomped Oprah. I broke 4 hours. I still almost can't believe it.

This race was important to me. So very important.

It may be silly, but the pain, mostly emotional, still stings from the Milwaukee marathon a couple years ago. I was injured, sure. But I have been beating myself up for not getting it done. Not finishing what I started.

I started the Kansas City run with a huge monkey on my back. Think gorilla-sized. Maybe even King Kong.

That dude is heavy. It took me 26.2 miles to shake him, but I did it. Left that sucker on the ground.

As for many other areas of my life at the moment, I am not exactly maintaining a steady pace. Work, family and other aspects are filled with way too much drama and uncertainty. I may even be suffering from a bit of burnout. My running has provided much needed solace.

Didn't really mean to declare radio silence on the blog, but that was one item that had to be pushed aside for the moment.

I've strapped on the Mizunos a few times since the marathon and it's been somewhat of a struggle. My knees ached. My legs felt dead.

Went out this morning and felt more life in my legs than I have for quite some time. Maybe my body is starting to bounce back.

You know what that means.

Time to pick another goal and start training for another marathon.

More mind games for marathoners

Something is different this year. 

I blew off a race today. 

The Labor Day 5K in Leawood drew me to the starting line each of the past couple of years. It’s a flat and fast course. Last year I PR’d. 

I have been thinking about the race, and even encouraging others to partake. But this morning, I laced up the Mizunos and headed out. For a semi-long run. 

My work schedule this week is going to play havoc with my running schedule. So I wanted to be sure to get my runs in. The idea of a 5K sprint just wasn’t appealing. 

All of my running focus at the moment is on Oct. 18. The Kansas City Marathon. 

I am obsessed with redeeming myself. Two years ago I attempted a full marathon.  It didn’t work out so well. Looking back, I realize now, I started the summer with an overuse injury. 

Guess what?  Logging lots and lots of miles and running longer than I had ever run before in my life was not a good strategy for healing.  19 miles into the marathon in 2006 I was limping. Big time.  

DNF city. And the demons of self-loathing and self-doubt have been running wild inside my mind ever since. 

This summer, I have been feeling much, much better. I have been logging my miles, focused on the fall. My previous marathon failure, though, has left me toting around a bunch of extra emotional baggage. As strong as I feel at the moment, will I really be able to get it done -- finally -- in October? 

I know I should weave in some speed work. But this morning, I was much more focused on getting in a solid 8 miles with hope of making me stronger for Oct. 18.

A runner's recovery week

What a beautiful morning for a run.

I sure do love cutback weeks. The training schedule seems to have this build-you-up, slap-you-down rhythm to it.

Last week I missed a run – my stomach was churning through the night and I just didn’t hit the streets last Thursday – but still put in a respectable distance. Plus, last Saturday I did 16 miles in the blazing heat.

By Monday I was feeling a bit as if I had been hit by a bus.

Then the training schedule decided I had been slapped down enough.

Monday was a light few miles. Tuesday called for 6. This morning when I went out for 4, I found more pop in my legs than I had all summer.

It was amazing. The 65-degree temperature and the gorgeous sunrise weren’t bad, either.

Like I said before, what a beautiful morning for a run.

Of course I'm a little crazy. I'm a runner

Hi everybody. I’m Oz Runner.

“Hello, Oz,” they reply.

I’m a Garmin-o-holic.

“That’s OK. We know what you are going through. We are here for you. Admitting you have a problem is the first step.”

Um, it’s not really a problem. As long as my Garmin works.

Today, my little buddy behaved like the good Garmin Forerunner I have known and loved for the past year and a half. 6 miles run. 6 miles recorded. 6 miles downloaded to the computer.

I love this guy, in a manly, recognizing it is – mostly – an inanimate object sort of way. It just seems like he really gets me.

Before my Garmin came into my life, I never was very diligent about keeping a running log. Sure, it is kind of fun to relive your training run while moving the computer mouse around the course on something like mapmyrun.com to figure out how far I went.

Or you can always drive along a running route before or after a run to check your mileage. Oh boy, that sure is a blast.

Not anymore do I have to do such things. No sir. I’ve got my Garmin.

On a whim, not really planning what route I need to run, I can get a quick glance at the training schedule, head out the door and create a route on the fly to hit just the distance I need that day.

OK, I recognize I can get a bit obsessive about this thing at times. On my weekly group runs, for example, sometimes according to my personal Garmin, I will come up short by a tenth, or maybe two-tenths of a mile from the 10, 12 or 14 miles or whatever I was supposed to run that day. Maybe my GPS was a bit off from the Garmin of the guy who plotted the course, maybe I cut some corners or maybe I just got off track by turning my Garmin off when coming in for a water stop, then walking a bit and then restarting it.

Sure, I try to be casual at the end of the run and all as I stop, sip a cup of Gatorade and chat with my fellow runners for a bit. And yes, then I have been known to run in the parking lot to get my full tenth or two-tenths of a mile in. Once I even drove home, then ran in front of my house for one-tenth of a mile.

It’s just so magical when my little buddy beeps and displays the completion of another full mile. Yes, it’s silly. I’m probably a little crazy. But I am a runner. Aren’t we all at least a little bit crazy?

My Garmin ate my homework, er, training run

I haven’t trotted out the-dog-ate-my-homework excuse since, oh, about the fifth grade.

While it didn’t work so well with Ms. Chase – she sure was a great teacher, but she didn’t put up with any nonsense – I am forced to try again. You gotta believe me. I did the work, but it just disappeared.

This time the culprit isn’t my once-beloved St. Bernard – you can’t imagine the size of the goobers that dog could produce, but I digress – but my Garmin.

Yes, yesterday I put in my miles. Seven of them. Really.

But then as I went through my morning routine – sitting around waiting for the sweat to stop dripping off my body so I could take a shower, brewing a pot of coffee, checking in on the Tour de France (Go Garmin!) – I plugged in my Forerunner 205 into my PC.

Got the electronic beep that said it was downloading the latest running history. But when I clicked into the chart……it wasn’t there!!!

What the heck?! It was like my seven miles in 1 hour and 6 minutes on a hot, steamy summer morning – July 22 to be exact – never happened. The sweat definitely was dripping off my nose so I know I ran. The hallucinations don’t usually cause me any problems until I am about 16 miles into a training run on a 90-degree morning in August. But the computerized chart wasn’t there.

Guess I am not the only one struggling to get out of no running vacation mode. Do you think the Forerunner is pouting because I only took him on one run while out in Colorado?

I had another dog once who hated to be left behind at home when I went out for a run. Even as Jesse aged and started dealing with a little arthritis that slowed his pace considerably, the dog went crazy if I put on my running shoes and didn’t grab the leash to take him along. Sometimes I would have to take him out for a warm-up mile, drop him off back at home and then finish my long run.

That dog was high maintenance. I sure hope my Garmin buddy gets back to his grab-and-go self by the morning. We’ve got to log 6 miles, according to the schedule. It’s time to get serious about training and, like Ms. Chase so many years ago, I’m not inclined to put up with this nonsense.

“The Garmin ate your training run?” I can hear her say, the scowl forming on her face. “Yeah right.”

High-altitude cross training

So there I was, 10,000 feet up, and staring at my running shoes. My running shoes stared back.

And I didn’t go running.

It was vacation, after all. I didn’t mean to take a vacation from running. It just sort of worked out that way.

Last week I flew to Denver with a mob of family members. Between aunts, uncles, cousins, a grandmother and a very good family friend, we just about had enough people for our own traveling circus.

On the first day, I did strap on my Mizunos and go for a run around Denver. I cruised by Coors Field, the Lower Downtown area and then back up the state capitol.

Felt pretty good considering that I was a mile above sea level. It also was fun to get the runner’s view-vantage point to see how much my hometown has changed over the years.

But then we piled into a couple of vans and headed for the high country. Stayed in a cabin that was at least 9,000 feet high with a few dirt roads and a bunch of rocky trails nearby.

Between all of the horseback riding, river rafting and hiking – I did do a bunch of mondo hikes – I just didn’t make the time for a morning run. Best hike of the week: A steep, winding three-mile trail that takes you from the rim of the Black Canyon of the Gunnison down to a beautiful secluded reservoir. Then, of course, after visiting the site known as Hermit’s Rest, my son and I had to drag ourselves back up. The 7-year-old Ozling and his love of hiking in the mountains and fierce determination left his Daddy proud.

I drank more beer in the past week than I have in the past six months. Maybe as many as three or four for the week. I didn’t end up paying too big a price. Only came back with a couple more pounds than I left with.

My training schedule was waiting for me upon my return. It’s only a piece of paper, but I think it was glaring at me.

I realize I can’t get this week of training back. It’s important, I realize. Just before I left, I did take the plunge and sign up for one of those lengthy fall races.

Definitely time to get back to work.

Can we just call this past week a bout of high-altitude cross training?

An oasis for runners

I figured something out this morning.

You’ll probably think it’s silly that I haven’t noticed before now.

But here it is: I’m not a camel.

No, really. I just checked. I looked in the mirror – it was kind of hard to turn my head around to the back, but I did it – and found that I didn’t have any humps. Not even one.

So, I must ask myself, why have I been wandering in the desert without any water?

Well, in this case the desert consists of the streets in my neighborhood that I use to piece together routes of a few miles during the weeks. But on these steamy summer mornings, I might as well be running in a desert.

Hydration is important under those conditions. But I never liked to carry water. The sloshing in the bottles drove me nuts. Trying to stash bottles along my route didn’t really work all that well either.

I saw those runner’s fuel belts, but they always looked uncomfortable. I know how bad it feels when my shirt rubs in the wrong places. Can’t imagine what my hips would look life after five miles of chafing against a fuel belt.

But then I saw one of those Amphipod belts. I got a small one a while back to stash my cell phone in on longer runs. My ankle had a nasty run in with a pot hole a few years back and I made the not-wise decision to walk back home, more than a mile. I decided that if I ever have another problem like that again, I want to be able to get on the cell phone and call the Mrs. Oz taxi to come pick me up. But I digress.

The point is, the Amphipod belt worked great. No chafing. It made me start wondering, hmmmm….look at that other Amphipod belt that comes with a form-fitting water bottle tilted to the side. Bet that wouldn’t slosh too crazily.

I picked it up, admiring it, each time I went into the local running store over the past month. Price seemed a bit steep, but I finally brought one home.

It was amazing this morning as I took it along and was able to take a few gulps of water at two miles, then again at four. I didn’t feel nearly as run down at the end of the run.

So, to review, here are the big lessons: 1. I am not a camel. 2. Runner’s need water.

Give me time. I just might start to figure out some of this running stuff. Eventually.