Go, Tracy, Go!

Remember when?

2012-01-26T08:06:00.001-05:00

One year ago today, I was in Cairo, wondering why I couldn't access twitter or my gmail. One year ago tomorrow, the internet and local phone service was shut down. From there, all hell broke loose. A few days after that, I watched the Army be welcomed into the streets of Egypt as a liberating force. Every police vehicle, every police station was burned. Most of you know my story by now: how they canceled the trains, so I had no way of getting back to Cairo; how a kind couple I met at a race took me in for a week; how I was eventually evacuated by the State Department. I was lucky, needless to say. My life was never in danger.

Today, I'm whiny because I might not make my (arbitrary) mileage goal for the month. And also I ran out of dark purple fountain pen ink at work and had to fill my pen with dark green yesterday. And I was moved into a new office at work, meaning now there's about an hour mid-day when I have trouble seeing my computer screen because of the glare from the floor-to-ceiling windows. CAN YOU IMAGINE?

First world problems much?

كلنا خالد سعيد
(Translation: "We are all Khaled Said," a rallying cry of many of the protestors.)

Accountability

2012-01-24T07:58:00.000-05:00

Most mornings, I run about 4.5m with Emilie at 6:15. We live two subway stops apart (about a mile or so, but with a big hill in the middle) and so she'll take the train up to me, I'll meet her at the station, we'll head over to Riverside Park, and we'll run. We end at the subway station by her house, where I jump on the train.

I know this sounds convoluted, and it is. It would be easier to meet in the middle, but that would involve us both needing to tackle that hill and me needing to wake up 15 minutes earlier. That's not happening. (Also, the neighborhood between us is a little sketch, and it's dark when we meet.)

Today, I got on the train after my run and stood there, playing Words With Friends like ~~an addict~~ a champ. There was a crazy guy sitting near me, but I wasn't paying any attention. He was really starting to get into it, yelling craziness about how he was going to "pull your skirt down to show you, how could you do this to me, I've done it before you, know, I'll just pull that skirt down, you'll be standing there in your panties, then you'll take him seriously!" This went on for several minutes, complete with skirt pulling down pantomiming.

I very surreptitiously looked around the train - yep, I was the only one wearing a skirt. The crazy guy was talking to me! He was saying all of this in a menacing voice, too.

Eventually he reached out and touched my arm. I jumped, and turned and glared at him, which launched him into a fit of hysterical laughing/yelling. I told him, "Do NOT touch me," to which he replied, "I didn't touch you. God touched you! In your heart. That was god."

Point being: why on earth don't I run the mile home after saying goodbye to Emilie? I can handle a 5-6m run in the morning. Tomorrow and from now on, I'm running home after saying goodbye to her.

MAJOR LIFE ANNOUNCEMENT

2012-01-23T07:54:00.008-05:00

You might notice some changes around here from now on.

Last Saturday, like most people who follow distance running, I sat glued to my computer for a few hours in the morning, following the Olympic Trials. Then, later that afternoon, I had a few friends over and we sat glued to the television, watching the race unfold. Later in the evening, and there is a chance I may have had a glass or four of wine and was possibly egged on by my friends, I declared my intention to compete in the 2016 Olympics, running the marathon.

The good news: MarathonGuide has a history of the women's Olympic Trials. Since 1984 when the women's marathon was introduced, the time needed to qualify hasn't changed as much as you might think - it's mostly been between 2:28 and 2:33. (This year saw an exceptionally strong field and perfect conditions, and the winners came in around 2:25.)

The bad news: my current (and sorely outdated) PR of 4:43 has to fall... like, a lot. In fact, I'll pretty much have to run twice as fast.

Anyone have any training tips for me?

Here is my plan so far:

Lose weight. Probably at least 30lbs - those pros are small. Therefore, I must finish the ice cream in the freezer so I'm no longer tempted by it (DONE).
Train at altitude. No big deal - my neighborhood isn't called Hamilton Heights because I live at sea level, you know (DONE).
Scope out the competition. I went with a friend to the Armory this past weekend to watch some high school track at the New Balance Games. (Actually, we went to watch some elite track, but, ahem, we kind of were late, so we saw a lot of high school relays.) So, high school ladies: in 15 years when you've peaked - I'll be ready for you.
Run. Like, a lot more. Like, maybe even upwards of 40 miles a week. (I fully expect this to increase as I get better. To, like, maybe 50mpw? 60? Surely no elites would ever run more than that, right??)
Get a sponsor. I figure, barring actual sponsorship, I'll just pick a brand and wear a lot of their clothes. Then when I start winning, I can ask for a retroactive sponsorship. Unless Nike finally answers my emails. Can anybody hear me?

The Armory. Picture me out there running, but in shorter shorts and way faster.

Did you know I recently became a vegetarian?

2012-01-19T08:15:00.000-05:00

That's right! I don't eat meat any longer! (Ed: well... sort of. Read on.)

I announced this proudly at the end of December only to be met with derision from my little brother. This one:

That's my brother with some of my healthy vegetarian supplies.

He said, "Why would you have to announce that you're a vegetarian? Why can't you just eat less meat and not be a douche about it, like the majority of the world?"

Well, duh. Because I want to be special. Labels, especially ones you can be self-righteous about, make you special.

Now, never mind the fact that the other day at work, I was craving chicken so badly that I seriously would have hurt someone for a wing. I have a (plastic, butter) knife in my desk and if I'd smelled any chicken, I would have used it. I'm sure this meat thing will stick. I mean meatless thing. Yeah. Besides, all the cool kids are experimenting with meatlessness. Will it make me faster, and thinner, and stronger, and magical? Nah. Will I stick with it? Probably. (Ed: definitely not. Shortly after a draft of this post was written, I fell off the wagon and right into Shake Shack. Je ne regrette rien.)

I said goodbye to my meat days in style, though, with a burger for lunch and combination steak and lobster dinner on New Years Eve. (Ed: goodbye, meat days... see you again in 12 days!) Then, that night to celebrate NYE, hopped up on red meat, I took a 90 minute bikram class.

90 minutes of meat sweats. Ugh.

The weirdest thing about this photo is not that it's blurry, but it's that my sister announced, in earnest, "Oh, you're really going to like this one!" after she took it.

On New Year's Day, she and I ran 11 miles in freezing cold weather with 30mph winds wipping at us while snow fell "down" horizontally. Driving home through the snow, she then took this photo:

She was also quite proud of this photo. Now, I'm no Mapplethorpe, but maybe my sister isn't, either. (Ed: is it weird that I think, "insert name of famous photographer here" and the only name the voice in my head can come up with is "Mapplethorpe"?)

(Final annoying editorial aside: after Shake Shack, there was Manhattan's first Steak 'n Shake. Then there was the Burger Joint at the Parker Meridien. It's been a great week back in the arms of my dear friend red meat!)

What does the future hold?

2012-01-18T08:04:00.000-05:00

Last Monday, I got a very ominous email in my inbox:

This should be exciting, right? Not ominous!

And yet... I'm about 90% certain that I am NOT going to register for the NYCM this year.

That, after running 9 local qualifying races last year. Just not doing it. I've already invested enough time and money into a race that I'm not excited about. (Which is also why I won't be paying to defer my entry, either. Deferral means that you have to pay this year to hold your spot... and also pay next year.)

It's not simply because entry fees have gone up (which they have - it would cost me $227 to register for the race). It's not just because I actually feel okay with the race I ran last year (and I do). It's just... my heart isn't in it. I've done the race two years in a row now, and it's a great race. But it would be a great race to watch, too. And I could instead do another fall marathon or, what sacrilege! not do a fall marathon.

Speaking of not doing marathons, I also made the sad decision that I will not be running RnR New Orleans. Well, the decision kind of made itself when I realized I was only 8 weeks out from the race and haven't done a training run longer than 11m... yet. I really can't justify the cost of traveling to NOLA to run a half, even if I do want to see some friends who are also going to be there. And then I dropped out of Ragnar Cape Cod, ostensibly to run a marathon in Chattanooga - but I'm guessing that won't happen, either.

No motivation. And that's okay.

I do have a few races coming up, though. I'm doing a trail half in a couple of weeks, and then a 10m race shortly after that. And then... who knows? Maybe an early fall marathon abroad? Or maybe nothing.

You can't trust your Garmin

2012-01-17T07:56:00.000-05:00

My friend Renee ran a half marathon last weekend on a track. Yes, you read that right - 68 laps total on a track. Here is her Garmin map from the race:

Let me remind you - she ran this race around a track. The track never changed size. She never veered off the track. She ran decidedly more than 3.09m (10 more miles than that, in fact) and while her time here is correct, her pace isn't.

Can we please drop the whole "but my Garmin said the distance was - " argument now? Finally?

No time to write a real post so read these things instead

2012-01-12T07:40:00.001-05:00

Oh yes, they did: the 10 hottest female contenders at the Olympic Trials this weekend. What, no bikini shots of Jenn Shelton? (For the record, my money is still on Tera Moody for this, too.)

While we're at it, my sister (who sent me that lovely link) also sent me another link: race t-shirt etiquette. I agree with almost all of it - I would argue that family members do not earn the right to wear the shirt.

And more about Ryan Hall and his "desperation for God." Of course, this post would therefore not be complete without a photo of naked Ryan Hall.

Finally, some happy news: Chip Wilson, the CEO of Lululemon, has stepped down. Did you know he's a billionaire? Your $80 yoga pants put him there!

Houston, we have a marathon

2012-01-11T07:59:00.013-05:00

As many of you know, the women's Olympic marathon trials are in Houston this weekend. I guess the men's are, too, but who cares about those? (Okay, fine, some people do, but now that Galen Rupp is out and we don't have the excitement of the Galen Rupp mask, well...)

No blog can ever have too much Rupp Mask.

Anyway, I think the most interesting thing about the trials is that I am a contender! Yes, you read that that right. At least according to Runner's World. So maybe I haven't met the A- (or B-) standard. But, look at this!

Tera Moody is was?* running, and her best is a 2:30 half marathon! I can do that!

Yeah, I get that it's just a typographical error (that they've since fixed). But let's go with it.

In all seriousness, I know it's trendy to be into Desiree Davila because she kind of rocks. But I love me some Tera Moody, and not just because she's a fellow Chicagoan and we have the same initials.

See? Never enough.

*She's injured, but I can't find any suggestion that she's out of the race.

Review: Vega Sport Performance System

2012-01-10T07:42:00.009-05:00

I have a question for you... How do you energize, sustain and recover from your workouts now?

For me, that answer is: badly. In fact, this post has one main point, which is that I do not fuel myself appropriately. In fact, I'm probably the absolute wrong person to offer a review of a fueling system.

First off, background on me and fueling:
Going into marathon season, I dutifully bought a multi-pack special of Gu and Gu Chews off of Active Schwaggle (good lord, how I hate that name). This was to compliment the box of Shot Blocks that I dutifully bought last year in anticipation of marathon season.

Do you know how many of that box I still have? True: I haven't opened any of the Shot Blocks. I've used one pack of Gu Chews. During marathon training, in its entirety, I took two Gus, and both were provided by the Front Runners. I took a Gu and a pack of sport beans during Marine Corps, a Gu during NYCM, and I used up a Gu during the Flying Monkey Marathon (okay, fine, I dropped it in the porta potty and left it for dead, unopened - you would have done the same).

I don't fuel well. Another example? My ideal pre-race/long run breakfast is pretty much anything, and my ideal time to eat it is as I'm beginning my run. Literally as I'm beginning my run. I eat as I'm walking out the door, as I'm waiting for my Garmin to get a signal.

Second off, Vega Sport:
Recently I was contacted by Vega and asked if I'd be willing to try some of their products. Free stuff? Um, yeah. They said that I'd get a 2-3 day supply. With my record, that's more like a 2-3 year supply... if I take up ultrarunning, that is. Otherwise I'll have this stuff through its expiration. And probably beyond. (And then I'll use it after it's expired and wonder why it upsets my stomach.)

They bill themselves as holistic and all-natural and vegan and really really good for you. I'm going to be honest here: given my history with not really using gels, I wasn't too concerned about their all-naturalness. Instead, I had two big concerns: price, and taste. Oh, yeah, and effectiveness.

Here is what I was sent, with an asterisk next to what I tried:-Pre-workout energizer*
-Electrolyte hydrator*
-Endurance gel*
-Endurance bar
-Performance protein
-Recovery accelerator
-Protein bar*

Of the products I used, I will purchase the endurance gel to use in the future. It was delicious. The consistency was less, I don't know, even? than Gu. It felt and tasted more like jam, in a good way. I ate it; it went down easily (without water!), and I perked up immediately.

The protein bar - I did not care for this at all. To be fair, I'm not a big fan of bars in general, and I was eating this one half hungover on the way to a race that I was kind of nervous about. I PR'd the race, running the 15k five minutes faster than last year (and last year's time felt like a reach).

I also tried the pre-workout energizer, which didn't do much for me. The taste was... okay. I couldn't finish the whole bottle, which is normal for me as I don't typically drink before I run. It was a slightly thicker consistency with a neutral flavor. I didn't notice any measurable difference in my run that day. (In fact, I had a pretty miserable run, although I blame it on the fact that I was slogging along with people typically faster than I.) The electrolyte hydrator was much less sweet than Gatorade (EXCELLENT) but had - to me - a slightly odd aftertaste

I should add another caveat to this: I am not someone who takes any sort of supplements. On days that I remember, I might eat a gummy children's vitamin. During harder runs, I might use nuun or gatorade. Other than that, protein powders and any other nutrients that don't come from food are not a part of my diet. My little brother, on the other hand, does take vitamins and supplements and protein powders, so I asked him to try the protein powder. He recoiled when he noticed the relatively steep sodium content - at 520mg, that's 20% of your daily value. (For comparison, the GNC whey that my roommate chugs recreationally has only 160mg.)

Now, finally: price. Frankly, the prices seem steep to me, but I think most nuun-gu-gatorade-clif products are overpriced. It's obvious that a lot of thought went into the creation of these products, and I do love the push toward all natural, plant-based products - isn't that what we should be consuming?

A comparison. Here are the ingredients in a packet of Tri-berry Gu:

Maltodextrin (Glucose Polymers), Filtered Water, Fructose, GU Amino Acid Blend (Leucine, Valine, Isoleucine, Histidine), Natural And Artificial Berry Flavor, Potassium And Sodium Citrate, GU Antioxidant Blend (Natural Vitamin E And Vitamin C), Calcium Carbonate, Fumaric Acid, Sea Salt, Sodium Benzoate, Potassium Sorbate, GU Herbal Blend [Chamomile, Cola Nut (Has Caffeine), Ginger], Citric Acid, Pectin

And here are the ingredients in a raspberry Vega Endurance Gel:

Dates; Filtered Water; Energysource®** (Grape Juice, Natural Rice Dextrins); Sorghum Malt; Electrolyte Blend (Potassium, Magnesium, Calcium Phosphate, Sodium Chloride, Vitamin C, Zinc, Copper, Selenium, Chromium); Coconut Oil; Citric Acid; Natural Raspberry and Strawberry Flavors.

Looking at the ingredient lists, I'm grateful that Vega and their products exist in the market. Which would you rather consume?

2012-01-09T07:33:00.001-05:00

Here is how not to do it:

Two guys in a car. I run past. The driver honks. I turn to look, afraid that I'm in danger. Both men lean over, leering at me. One says something lewd.

I feel creeped out, disgusted.

Here is how to do it:

One guy standing on a street corner. I run past. He says, "Look at you, looking all... healthy! I like it!"

I feel maybe a tiny bit creeped out, but mostly kind of smugly happy. I am healthy!

Here's a better idea:

Don't do it at all.

Running math

2012-01-04T07:41:00.000-05:00

Let's see...

I can have all of this:

For $3.59. 18oz of peanut butter, yum. 20 cents an ounce - that's NYC prices for grocery delivery.

Or I can have this:

8 for $10.80 (or 24 for $32.40, which is the same price), which works out to $1.23 an ounce. Granted you can probably find it somewhat cheaper, but that's the price to buy direct from Gu's website.

What am I missing here? Oh, yeah, the nifty packaging. Which promptly ends up tossed to the side of the road, if New York is anything like the rest of the world.

Things I don't get, 2012 edition

2012-01-03T08:28:00.001-05:00

Here's what I don't get (today):

I love running. I really do. If I could, I would take it behind a middle school and get it pregnant. And then I would even marry it. I love going out and running. I love having an hour or so each day to be alone with my thoughts, or (better) together with friends. I love the feeling of knowing that I did something for myself, both the physical feeling and the smug mental feeling, too.

So why, given that I love running so much, why is it that I procrastinate about it so badly? Why do I have so many, many excuses for why I can't run today... or tomorrow... or right this minute?

It's a race, dammit

2012-01-02T07:53:00.006-05:00

Not a Polyphonic Spree concert.

Me, I'm holding out for the Zombie-color-warrior-mud-chocolate-rock 'n roll-costume party-indoor-relay. Coming in 2013, inevitably. Only $465 to register!

It's a gimmick, people. Here's a better idea: just run the damn race.

(I read about this initially on twitter but then I saw it late last week on Ellen's blog.)

Happy New Year!

2011-12-30T09:00:00.000-05:00

This year, to celebrate, I'm going to a 10:30pm bikram yoga class on New Year's Eve. I will spend midnight in savasana. The next morning, at 11am on new year's day, I will do a long run. I kind of can't wait. Going out on NYE is totally overrated, am I right?

I'm contemplating whether or not to issue a challenge to myself for the new year. One of my friends gives herself a cooking type challenge each year - if you're into meat and want to be impressed, read her posts from last year on doing things like making her own sausage from scratch. Another good friend has set the goal of doing a half marathon each month.

Part of me thinks that giving myself a challenge could give me some focus in the new year. The other part of me thinks that it would just set me up for disappointment when I inevitably abandon the challenge partway through the year. What I do know is that I don't want it to be vague, e.g. "get more fit." That's a recipe for disaster for me. I work much better with specific goals.

Oh! I do have one exciting thing I'll be preparing for throughout 2012. Dawn and I have decided that we're doing the Chattanooga Stage Race in 2013. I'm not sure that preparation involves anything more than "run a lot, often back to back long runs," but I should probably throw as much trail running as is feasible into the mix. If I wasn't so completely over the state of Tennessee (seriously - how many races do I need to run there?), I'd consider this race in May. But the North Face Endurance Challenge Bear Mountain is easier and local, so it will probably get my race registration fee.

If you have any thoughts on the idea of a challenge for the new year, do let me know. Is anyone doing anything like that?

I hope this is the worst thing you see all day

2011-12-29T14:09:00.001-05:00

After a stunningly mediocre run today,* my sister and I stopped off at the running store where she moonlights. While there, I saw the most horrifyingly horrendous sports-related product I have ever seen. Worse than pink body glide. Worse even than those crazy bouncy shoes:

"Handful" - A sports bra designed to flatter, not flatten. It's padded. Like, hugely padded. Like, more so than any of my normal bras. (I tried to photograph the padding. Just trust me on it.)

As Sonja, a Boston Marathon finisher, attests on their website, "I want spectators to focus on my strength and determination-not my nipples!" Or, like they're packaging states, "You're active. You're versatile. Your'e one of a kind. You're a handful."

I don't get it.

Let me just put it out there: I have nipples. Sorry for offending those of you who weren't aware of this, but I in fact do. And yes, on the rare occasion when it's cold enough, there is the chance you will be able to make out a faint outline of a nipple under my thick sportsbra and shirt(s). And if you do, well, I have one thing to say: Stop staring at my chest, you perv.

*with really good company. Nice to meet you, Danna!

2011 in review: a premature look back

2011-12-22T21:25:00.000-05:00

I really shouldn't be blogging right now.

Somewhere, on a scrap of paper in a coat pocket or on a pile on an end table in my apartment, I have a hastily scrawled list of things I should blog about. Things I've meant to blog about. Things I will blog about, once I have a computer again. These are perky things, happy things, funny things. These things are light as air and fluffy as clouds. These are not things that I'm thinking about at 9pm on a Thursday night. After a full day of work, after an evening run, after returning to my office with my mind still on overdrive, the things I'm thinking about are the opposite of fluffy clouds.

No, sitting here in my office, I most definitely should not be reviewing the year that has almost passed in my head. What a year, and not in a good way. Personally and professionally, I've had to answer some serious and hard questions this year. As much as I've made a whole mess of awesome friends this year, I've also had to let go of several people who were very important to me - a break-up, not a death, it could be worse. And I have my health, as do all of my loved ones. For that I'm grateful.

I know last year I waxed on about how January 1st was an arbitrary date and resolutions are meaningless. But this year, I'm welcoming the fresh start, even though it's fabricated. I'm looking forward to 2012, but only because it means I can put 2011 very, very far behind me.

Anyway. In between pity parties, I did do some running in 2011.

YEAR IN REVIEW
In January, I started the year with a 4m midnight run in Central Park. Shortly thereafter, I left for Egypt. I ran a 22k (you read that right) in Luxor, Egypt, during the Egyptian revolution and then got evacuated by the State Department.

In February I came back to the states and, out of shape, ran a Valentine's themed 5k.

March saw me developing a bit of a statement on blogging, and also running Coogan's, another 5k in upper Manhattan. It also marked the first time I said "this is my last race for a while" in a blog entry. Hahahahaha.

Yeah, that lasted. Until April, when I ran a trail 10k in the Bronx. And another 5k on a runway at JFK. And then a sort-of 10k to celebrate Easter. I finished off the month with a PW half marathon in Nashville.

In May, I ran the "dirty german" trail 25k (which has gotten my blog no small number of hits by people searching for "Dirty Tracy," "Dirty Germans," or other things unfit for print) in Philly. I closed out May with a difficult 5k in Van Cortlandt Park. June also saw only a few races, including a hilly 10k, a supershort 5k in Montreal, and back-to-back PRs in one weekend at a 5k on Saturday and a 10m race on Sunday.

Also in June? I drank a lot of beer and defended the running skirt.

This seems weird, but I don't think I ran any races in July. How can that be? But I did upset the RWOL forums with a blog entry that I wrote that someone else posted on the site. I certainly wasn't done annoying people at that point, however. In August I wrote about a woman whose blog I read who fabricates her race times. (She got back to me on that, by the way. We exchanged a few messages after that. I think she might be a compulsive liar.)

I ran a mile in 7:37 in September and then I laid low, training for NYCM. (I did try to talk Nike into sponsoring me, but I'm still waiting to hear back.) To prepare for the marathon, I ran a taper-time half that nearly left me dead by the side of the road.

And then! Then! The glorious fall in which I BECAME A STUNT MARATHONER! In other words, I ran 3 marathons in 22 days. It somehow worked, although it involved a lot of massages and rest. But I hope not to do that again. The first was Marine Corps, and then a week later New York City. I gave myself a two week rest before the Flying Monkey.

In December I ran a 10 mile trail race that I haven't blogged about and set a 15k PR.

Happy holidays, y'all. Appreciate what you have. Don't take anything for granted.

This is what it's all about.

2011-12-20T13:20:00.001-05:00

Last week, I was moaning about goals. If you could read between the lines, which you can because both of you readers are very very bright, you could sense that I was - I don't know, not exactly missing motivation so much as kind of floundering about what to do next. I'm goal-less, and while that's okay, I'm also impatient.

I got some excellent advice in the comments, including M's suggestion that I work on... well, on doing nothing. Sweaty Kid also had a suggestion: more trail running. So, I tried that.

On Sunday, I met Illana in a place with a funny name to run on a trail with a burly name. That's how I described it to a friend, and I stand behind my words - we met at the Mamaroneck train station (funny name) to run the Leatherstocking Trail (burly name). And it was awesome.

That photo is about .02 seconds after I stepped in the water accidentally and screamed out loads of profanities. It was cold. Coldcoldcold. This is also my new facebook profile photo, since it's rare that I look anything other than completely strange while in running clothes.

But first, I ran a 15k. And it was great. Saturday morning, only very slightly hungover, I ran the Ted Corbitt 15k in Central Park in 1:29:11, beating my last year's time (and PR) of 1:34:01 by nearly 5 minutes. This made me happy. I set a goal for myself (sub-1:30) and I beat it. And it was hard.

Illana is training for things that are much more hardcore than I am, including a trail 50k this spring. Me, I'm chilling. Although I wanted to throw up more than a little bit at the finish line of Saturday's race, I actually didn't feel that terrible by Saturday afternoon. Sunday was all about easy running, though. Illana let me lead and set the pace, and I set it sloooooow. My Garmin died just as our run began, and hers was recording only the time (not the pace/distance). This was fine by me.

There was an element of Blair Witch to the whole thing - mostly because you can't tell from the photos that we were never more than 500 feet from the suburbs.

Of course, I am like an elephant when it comes to the trails. Well, maybe not quite an elephant, as an elephant would be able to just smash its way through stuff. I'm more like, you know, something clutzy and awkward.

Illana is faking falling, but I'll bet you were fooled, weren't you, you totally couldn't tell that this was staged, can you!

It was only about 90 minutes into our 2+ hour run that she took the lead. Immediately I noticed her style - she jumped gracefully from stone to stone, seeming to float or bounce. "Be nimble!" she told me. "Nimble!" I tried it. It worked. (Relatively speaking. I went from elephant to maybe hippopotamus - which I'm good with.)

What's next for me?

2011-12-14T08:11:00.003-05:00

I don't know what's next. And I need advice on what I should do.

I will hit 1000 miles of running for the year tomorrow morning. Considering that November was a blisteringly tough 80 miles in total for the month (and this was including two marathons! compare it to October at 130 miles), and considering I didn't run more than twice in the entire month of January, I'm okay with that. I'd like it to be higher. Maybe 1500m for next year as a goal? That would be tough, but doable.

My biggest goal for next year, though, is not to race. I'm tired of "racing," as in participating in races that don't get my full attention.

When I was in college, I wrote to the Partnership for a Drug Free America and asked them to send me a video of their commercials. They did. My favorite one was this one:

Anyone who has hung out with me a bunch has probably heard me quote this guy. He gives such an eloquently strung out expression of the way we all pretend like life changes are somehow easy to make. "Come back in one year and I'll be... successful." How many times have I said that?

You come back one year from today and I'll be faster. And running higher mileage. And I'll be thinner. And smarter. I'll make more money. I'll have more friends - ooh, maybe a boyfriend! And my cat won't be an asshole any longer.

Except none of those things will be true. I'll pretty much be the same, knock wood. And that's okay. But no sense in pretending like I'm going to stop my serial racing.

I'm already registered for RnR NOLA, and I've been invited to join a team for Ragnar Cape Cod. In March and May respectively, I'd like to keep those two as my only spring races. In fact, I'm even on the fence about RnR. And then I have guaranteed entry to the NYCM come November.

Do I take a break? If so, how? What do I focus on?

So What it's Hot? Product Review

2011-12-13T11:27:00.000-05:00

A few weeks ago, I got a message from one of my friends asking if I'd seen the "So What it's Hot" water bottle holder. "I think it's like the Snuggie for runners!" she said.

Oh, yes, I'd seen it. Their ads have been doing the twitter/facebook/viral bit, and for good reason. If you haven't already seen it, watch this:

Given that my love of the Snuggie is well known, as is my love of water, I knew immediately that I needed to try the SWIH. Therefore, I did something I've never done before and I shot the company an email asking if they would be willing to send me one to review. A few hours later I had a very nice email saying yes, and less than a week later I had two SWIH, size medium and large, one in pink and one in black. (Customer service: A+.) For reference, the pink is L and the black is M. We didn't really notice a significant difference between the sizes, although the medium was slightly too large to fit comfortably around my neck but fit perfectlyover my head. The velcro may have been aligned slightly differently between the two, as Tara's size L fit around her neck easily. That, or maybe I have a dainty little giraffe neck (<--not true).

I recruited Tara to try the SWIH with me on a weeknight run in Central Park.

The product is simple: it's a stretchy band with a velcro fastening that wraps around your head. An elasticized pouch in the middle of the band holds a water bottle, enabling you to wear it a variety of ways:

Behind your head

Rear shot, behind the head

Over your ears behind your head

Around your neck

Around your waist. NB: we deemed this completely pointless.

Pros:

It's surprisingly easy to get the water in and out. I expected it to be hard and that I would have to remove the SWIH, but I didn't.
Inadvertently encourages good posture. Having the SWIH behind my head meant that I kept my head and torso up straight.
Did not bounce. It actually kept the bottle fairly flush against my head and it didn't really bounce. Now, that said, the water does slosh (see below).
NO ONE GAVE US ANY WEIRD LOOKS. I'm not sure if this is because we live in New York, where doing odd things is de rigueur, or if it's because people expect runners to be different, or if it's because it was dark. But only two people said anything to us, and both comments were curious and encouraging.

Cons:

The sound of the water slushing. For the first two miles, Tara and I were pleasantly surprised by how stable the bottle was. Then we both stopped to drink some water, and when we started up again, it was as though we were running on the beach. Not in a pleasant way, but as though we were carrying the sounds of the ocean right behind our ears. Even talking to each other meant having to speak up over the waves crashing through our heads. Tara tried putting in her headphones. Not only did that not deaden the sound, but she lost an earpiece cover.
Very difficult to drink and run. Although the bottle was easy to remove, we did have to stop to walk to do it.
Definitely puts a weight on your neck. I would not have been able to use this for speedwork/tempo runs, nor long runs. I end up with tired shoulders (ahem, no core strength) after long runs anyway, and adding the weight of a water bottle would be brutal.
No pockets for money, etc. I'm asking too much here, but my handheld bottle gets a plus for also having a small pocket.

Given that it was only about 40 degrees when we ran, I didn't have a chance to test the SWIH with frozen water. I could see that being very pleasant in the summertime, and I will definitely do that for my easy runs next summer.

Overall, I'm mixed on the SWIH. To be entirely honest, I kind of expected the worst and was pleasantly surprised. I'm always looking for an alternative to a handheld bottle, but I'm not sure this will become my go-to. I will use it again; however, I might suggest it for something lower-impact than running. I would use this in a second over a camelbak on a short hike, for instance.


Barely pictured: the surprisingly effective front-of-the-neck approach to wearing it (aka "the St. Bernard")

But you know what? We had fun trying it. Loads of fun. If you're looking for a nice, cheap stocking stuffer or grab bag gift for the runner in your life, why not?

Can anybody hear me?

2011-12-09T15:02:00.000-05:00

I said goodbye to my computer in a very solemn (and private) ceremony on Wednesday. Beers were drunk. Songs were played (from my iPhone, since... well, since...). My 11" MacBook Air may have only been part of my life for 343 short days, but those days were meaningful and that computer's memory (both gigs of it) will live on - at least until I buy a new one in a couple of weeks.

Anyway, I find myself having to do things like talk to people, or use a pen in order to write in a notebook. It's making me twitchy, and it's making me neglect things like my blog. So don't tell anyone, but I'm right now blogging from work. Shhhh!

Something you may not know about Tracy: to pay the bills in grad school, I taught a public speaking course. Now, never mind the "those who can do" adage and let's just pretend for the analogy that I'm basically an expert. One of the things I taught my students was the age-old advice of how to structure a speech: tell them what you're going to say, say it, then tell them what you just said.

So today I'm going to tell you what I'm going to say. And then, next week (maybe? hopefully?) or the week after, I'm going to say it. Slowly, slowly. I might skip the last step.

Things you can look forward to in the next few weeks:

Race reviews! I ran a Thanksgiving Turkey Trot and a trail race in DC. Thank god I did not run the Hot Chocolate 15k. What a clusterfuck that sounds like.
Product reviews!* I have a new running dress. I have a SWIH (oh, yes, I do - and I wore it for 5m and it wasn't as bad as you might expect). And I have some stuff (that's the scientific term: stuff) from Vega.
Um... and other stuff, too? Maybe the list isn't as impressive on paper as it is in my head. That happens.

*Frankly I'm kind of mixed on product reviews. On one hand, if someone sends me something for free, I'm going to take it. And I'm never going to say nice things about something I don't like. On the other hand, I don't like having my blog be a shill for today's crap product du jour. Skip those posts if you don't care. I won't be offended.

Would you believe...

2011-12-05T21:32:00.000-05:00

I accidentally spilled beer on my laptop and am paralyzed until I take it out of the rice bowl in a few days to see whether it is working or not.

I'm a loser.

What do you carry with you when you run?

2011-12-02T08:35:00.000-05:00

Just some quick little begging for advice before the weekend.

What do you carry with you when you run?

This morning, I ran two miles more than I intended to. Emilie and I have a nice morning routine going on: I run about a third of a mile to the subway to meet her, we run for around 4ish miles, and then we part ways at another subway stop near her apartment, where I get on the train and head home.

Today I said goodbye to Emilie and entered the subway. I swiped my card. The turnstile read "insufficient fare;" my card expired last night, evidently. The sum total of what I had on me was: a cell phone, my apartment keys, and an expired metro card.

So I ran home and (obviously) tweeted it. And had someone ask me why I wasn't running with my wallet.

So, I ask: what do you carry when you run? I guess I should have been carrying some cash, but frankly I never do (whether running or not). The few times I've set aside a few dollars specifically for running, I've then gone and spent those few dollars - I'm just not a cash-person. Should I be?

To Garmin, or not to Garmin

2011-11-29T08:05:00.000-05:00

I have loads of interesting things to blog about but not a spare minute in which to record these gems of thoughts. (That's not sarcasm. I actually do have some interesting things to blog about. I'll spare you any sort of tease, but you'll see. Just wait.) Also, I'm exhausted. Completely and totally exhausted. Still.

In the meantime, I'm sure you all heard about this little "event" yesterday called Cyber Monday. (Is it really an "event" if it's just basically a bunch of stuff on sale online? Huh.)

Amongst other things, the Garmin 405 was on sale.

And, funny that, this sale comes up just as my Garmin 305 has decided that it no longer supports my marathon habit - the battery most recently died at around 4 hours. I could get faster... or I could buy a new watch.

I didn't buy it. I think I'm going to try this radical thing where I "don't wear a watch" this winter. You know, sort of like I did for the first 7 or 8 years that I ran? It's retro. But I think it will be okay: I know how far my routes are. I know how to look them up later to map them if I'm not sure. I know how to enjoy a run without feeling saddled by my wrist-computer. And I know how to use a normal Timex for those days when I am curious about time.

Flying Monkey Marathon Race Report

2011-11-28T07:50:00.000-05:00

A day late and a dollar short.

Truth be told, I really was not looking forward to this marathon. Sure, it would be a chance to catch up with some friends. But physically? No way, no how. My body was burnt out from my little two weekends, two marathons MCM/NYCM stunt. My legs felt fine, but I haven't felt refreshed since NYCM. I go to bed early and wake up early, exhausted. I'm just TIRED.

The closer it got to the actual marathon date of last Sunday, my excitement seemed to decrease rather than increase. I was especially bummed because I had a bet riding on this race. Last year, my friend Ian had bet me that I would not be the last finisher of the race (because he would be behind me). When he bailed at the last minute, I ran instead with his brother and we renewed our bet for this year. This year, though, the bet was legit: first one to the finish wins. Loser buys the winner dinner after the race.

Just when I thought it couldn't get any worse, the weather forecast for the weekend stabilized. Low 60s, wind, and rain. I've never run a marathon in the rain.

Thing is, I entered this race much stronger this year than last. I had every intention of running with Ian (not actually racing it against him), and secretly I hoped that I could coerce him into beating his PR of 5:28. By mile 1 of the race, my goals had changed from "lead Ian to a PR" to "finish this damn thing to get to the post-race party."

"I'm cold and wet and want this bitch over NOW!"

This race has a cult following for a reason. It's hard - 7200 feet of elevation change is not for the weak. It's beautiful - fall in Percy Warner Park? Yes, please! And it's friendly - the small size and the devoted fans gives a camaraderie I haven't seen at any other race.

None of that was enough to salvage the race for me. I suffered through nearly 6 hours of cold and rain. I was miserable for almost all of it. By the end I had to cajole myself into continuing using the excuse of beer at the finish. And that was for naught: I had half a beer, realized I was freezing cold, and went back to the hotel to shower. 15 minutes under hot water and three hours under a blanket later, I was barely able to leave the hotel for dinner.

In case you're wondering, I won the race, but by a cheat. The race isn't chip-timed, and although we crossed the start and finish together, I finished three seconds faster. OFFICIAL RESULTS ARE OFFICIAL RESULTS!

Running, and more Lulu-gate

2011-11-16T07:39:00.001-05:00

Here's another Lulu-ism for you.

Click this product link. Begin with the "tempest blue herringbone" color (all the way to the right). One by one, click on all of the colors, moving left through dark slate heathered, plum heathered, and black herringbone, ogling the attractive male model.

Now click on "black" on the far left. Notice any thing different about that model?

(To be fair to Lululemon, I'm sure this was an unfortunate coincidence, and I applaud their use of non-white models. But dude would have rocked the plum heathered and looked way hotter, in my opinion.)

I may be quiet for the next few days. Emilie and I are trying to make a go of meeting to run at 6:15am, and this has so far left me excited to run and completely drained of energy to do other stuff like work (my sleep schedule hasn't yet caught up with the new plan).

UPDATE: Lululemon's founder is still kind of a douche

2011-11-15T08:00:00.001-05:00

One of my most frequently googled posts is something I wrote ages ago about Lululemon. The clothing store has a huge cult following amongst affluent yogis and runners, and for mostly good reasons. They do a lot of community-centered programming out of their stores, and their clothes seem to strike a chord with many by being durable, flattering, and fashionable (albeit expensive).

The store ethics center tightly around their founder, Chip Wilson. Chip Wilson is an advocate of Landmark Education (participating and sponsoring employees' participation), and some have accused Landmark of cult-like tendencies (it may have connections with Scientology).

But then, there's this:

Yes, John Galt. On the side of Lululemon's bags. You know John Galt - the famous character from Ayn "Rhymes with Mine" Rand's novel Atlas Shrugged? The conservative manifesto embraced by Objectivists and Tea Partiers everywhere?

True fact: I loved Ayn Rand in college. I missed two meals in order to finish The Fountainhead, and after I finished it I immediately bought a copy for my brother to read and enjoy. (He hasn't read it yet. It's only been, what, 10 years? I'm sure he'll get around to it soon.) Even though my own personal politics no longer preach rational self-interest as the ideal by any means and I find Ayn Rand's writing to be simplistic to the point of being juvenile, I don't have a problem with the politics of the book per se.

But I do have a problem with stores that try to slip political messages past their customers, especially when Lululemon has tried to play it like this is a motto that empowers women to live life to their fullest rather than a political credo. If "The Virtue of Selfishness" is also your motto, as it was Ayn Rand's, then Lululemon is your store!

Personally, albeit seemingly unconnected to John Galt, I think my friend Sarah summed it up best when she said that Lululemon was now in the Brown's Chicken category (along with Lane Bryant, I'd add). Love the store or hate it, the horrifying murder that happened there overshadows all else.

Post-Marathon Enjoyment

2011-11-14T08:00:00.001-05:00

The weekend in photos:

Running tour leaving from Brooklyn Brewery

It was pretty

Then I had maybe a lot to drink

AND THEN I HELPED EAT A GIANT CUPCAKE

It was awesome.

Multiple marathons and me

2011-11-11T07:36:00.001-05:00

I lied when I said there would be no marathon for me this weekend. I will be participating in a marathon, but I've kept it secret from you. That's because it's a TWILIGHT MARATHON! I'll be watching all the DVDs in preparation for the new movie coming out next weekend.

But now, for reals, regarding multiple marathons - in short: I'm not doing that again. Not because it was hard (it actually wasn't that bad), but more because I don't want my identity to become "stunt marathoner." I want it to become "girl who sets goals, trains for goals, and achieves her goals." The glory of just finishing has faded for me by now.

But, just in case you were wondering how it is that I ran two marathons in 8 days, here are some more details. And then I will not talk about MCM or NYCM 2011 again except in passing.

Why: I don't know? I can tell you some reasons that were not why I did it. I did not do it to join Marathon Maniacs (for those of you keeping score, I became eligible last year and have thus far chosen not to join). I did not do it as some sort of vengeance race - as in, I didn't want to give myself a second chance at a possible PR.

So why did I buy the MCM bib (during the transfer period, totally legit)? A few reasons, I think. One, to see if I could, plain and simple. I seem to recover fairly easily (ahem, largely because I do not put enough effort in).

Also, not to get too personal, but I'm going through something in my life that one might euphemistically call a "rough patch." I wanted to get out of NYC for a weekend, and the thought of seeing friends and running a marathon all by my lonesome seemed cathartic (it was).

And finally, I think that subconsciously I was trying to sabotage myself. Yes, that's right. My training through this whole cycle was actually kind of okay, and I was terrified of not living up to my potential. So how better to counter that than to set up an impossible obstacle that will guarantee that I don't do well?

How: All of my training was geared to NYCM, and MCM was an add-on. I did my last 20m run three weeks out from NYCM. In the week between NYCM and MCM I ran a miserable half and then rested most of that week.

The day after MCM, I ran a very very slow 4m. I had a massage on Wednesday. I then took the rest of the week off from running. In the three weeks prior to NYCM, my mileage was 30m, 16, and 30m (the last figure including MCM). As you can see, I took it easy-peasy leading up to the race(s).

Not really winning any mileage awards here.

And then? Honestly, I feel almost completely fine now. I had a very, very painful massage on Monday night (the only time the therapist I like could see me) and I really am not very sore.

MCM v. NYCM

2011-11-10T08:12:00.000-05:00

I swear that next week I'll move on to talking about something else. But not just yet. There will be two more days of recap.

A few days after MCM, I eagerly opened my Marathonfoto email and looked at my race pictures. To my surprise, they were actually quite good. I'm not smiling in many of them, but I'm running in all of them and I even have both my feet off the ground in one.

I'm FLYING!

Every time - every time! - I saw a photographer at NYCM, I was walking. For the record, I took probably 4 short non-water stop walk breaks. I walked up part of the Pulaski, Queensborough, Willis Ave. bridges and I walked up some of a hill in Central Park. And Marathonfoto had photogs at the top of every hill. They even had a photographer set up right after a water station at one point! Are they trying to catch us at our worst?

What's the opposite of flying?

It's not just the photos; it's also the money. I know it's trite to complain about the cost of NYCM (it's significantly more expensive than MCM - $185 + $11 lottery fee for NYCM versus $90 for MCM). NYC is a difficult and expensive city to shut down for a day. And I know that there are logistical difficulties in NYC that aren't there in DC (getting 45,000 people to Staten Island, for instance), and NYCM has appearance fees and awards to factor in to the cost.

But the finish area - the finish area! What a nightmare the NYCM finish area is (still!) A claustrophobic, disastrous, terrible half mile of death-shuffle. I had to push through crowds of people wanting their picture taken in order to have my medal handed to me, and then I had to push again to get a bag with Gatorade and water in it. It took me nearly 30 minutes to get 10 blocks out of the park, while crammed between barricades and UPS trucks with NYRR volunteers with bullhorns watching me from lifeguard chairs.

At MCM, a smiling Marine put my medal around my neck and shook my hand before pointing me to an efficient assembly line of treats (including a boxed lunch!). The photo area was clearly indicated and off to one side, so you could have your photo taken (or not) as you liked. I met my friend less than 10 minutes after I'd finished the race.

Finally, the medals. My cold, cold heart is not warmed by a medal, as you know. I stick them in a box on the floor of the closet when I'm done with the race. But even despite that, NYCM's medal was weak this year. Compare the two (apologies for the green background):

MCM is shiny with a nice, thick ribbon and a part in the middle that spins. NYCM is dull, flat, and colorless.

The (immediate) future of my racing

2011-11-09T08:29:00.000-05:00

As you know, nearly two weeks ago I ran the Marine Corps Marathon.

Then, last Sunday, I ran the New York City Marathon.

And then, my taper for the Flying Monkey Marathon on 20 November officially began.

So what's next?

1. Lose weight. Now that I'm nearly back to where I was speed-wise before I had the blood clots, I need to get back to the weight I was at before them. That's about (gulp) 25lbs that need to go. I'm active enough; I just need to work on improving my eating habits. I'm ready to do this.

2. Develop core strength. My back and shoulders were killing me during the NYCM. This has happened before, and I recognize it as a sign that I have weak core muscles. Luckily this is easy to fix. (If you have any suggestions of core exercises, please let me know.)

3. Run more. I know many of you might disagree with me on this, but in order to do well at the marathon, I need consistent and (relatively) high mileage training. Sure, I can run a marathon with training of 35mpw. But it won't be pretty. I won't finish as fast as I want or as fast as I am capable of. I won't feel good after, physically or psychologically.

I've done marathons that were brutal because I was unprepared. I've done a bunch of those. And I've only done one where I felt confident in my training. Lo and behold, the brutal marathons were all done on 30-40mpw (but I got all of my long runs in!) and the one where I felt confident (and set my PR) was done on 40-60mpw. If I can't get my mileage up higher than it's been lately, I can't ever expect marathons to go smoothly. I'll never fulfill my dream of "racing" a marathon when I'm beginning to struggle by mile 10 or when I'm surprised that I didn't crash. Could "negative splits" ever become a phrase that has meaning to me?

The end goal: Ideally, I'd love to shift my focus to racing a half marathon in the spring. However, taking advantage of Competitor's rare generosity, I signed up for the New Orleans Marathon in March (for $40), and then I have guaranteed entry to NYCM 2012. New Orleans is supposed to be a flat course, so I'm tempted to say that I'd like to go sub-5 hours there (that is definitely my goal at NYCM next year).

I'm not really sure how to focus myself, so if anyone has any suggestions, I'd love to hear them.

NYCM 2011 race report

2011-11-08T07:24:00.003-05:00

Subtitled: Evidently a taper marathon is the way to go for me
Also subtitled: I'm still faster than a Chilean miner (poor Edison Peña dropped out at mile 11 this year)

First, the good:
It was a gorgeous day, and I finished in 5:08:18 (20 minutes faster than last week; 32 minutes faster than last year).

AND I HAD SO MANY SPECTATORS! Yes, after saying that I'd only ever had one spectator, I managed to see Lauren, my brother, TK, and several friends on the course. That rocked. Better yet, my brother saw several other friends of mine. He now thinks that I'm basically the most popular person in NYC, which made me laugh. Outloud. Several times.

Check out the sign on that guy!

My plan for the day was simple: I was going to go out on pace for a 5-hour marathon and just run that pace until I fell off of it. I fully expected to crash, and crash hard, and I fully expected it to happen within the first 10 miles of the race. I was running with Tara and her dad - well, sort of. I was actually kind of a jackass and spent most of the race running about 5 feet ahead of Tara and her dad. (Subconsciously, because I was anticipating a crash, my mind was telling me to stay ahead of them to give me a buffer. Of 5 feet. It was not logical.)

The only photo of me taken during the race. HAHA just kidding.
I would never run topless.

But I never crashed. I just kept running. And it felt good. Even better, I was actually running, not lolligagging. Not quite racing per se, but fast enough that I couldn't really talk. (At one point, true story, Tara and I were going up a hill and I turned to her and made a series of guttural noises. She said, "I know exactly what that means. Yes, we can walk now.")

Sleeping at Fort Wadsworth

Then, the bad:
In some ways, this race was awesome. Aside from water stops (and then, only about half of them) I barely walked. I felt strong all the way through the very end, and my last two miles were faster than my goal pace. I saw almost all of my spectators and felt buoyant.

So why am I not happy about it?

Well.

My second marathon ever, way back in 2002? 2003? (a long time ago) was 5:08:08. That is my third fastest marathon to date (my first race was 4:55 and my third race was 4:43). If I had been 10 seconds faster on Sunday... if I had only tied or beaten my third marathon ever... then I'd feel like I was back to being the runner I was before I got sick, before I had two pulmonary emboli and couldn't run for almost two years.* I want to be that girl again! Never mind that the 5:08:08 was in Chicago and NYCM is a harder course... my mean, critical self-conscience doesn't listen to logic or reason.

I was kind of sad to give this sweat shirt up at the start.
It says: "Born to Hunt, Forced to Work."

So overall, I'm pleased. It was a good day. I felt like I ran solidly and also, I had fun.

What would a race report be without a
half-drunk after photo?

And now... the taper can really begin.

*It's not worth getting into here, but in case you didn't know: I had two pulmonary emboli, about a year apart, and my number one symptom was intense, stabbing chest pain. It took me over a year after the second clot to feel like I was "back to normal" in my lungs.

2011-11-07T07:43:00.001-05:00

Remember last Monday when I was too tired post-race to write up a race report right away, so instead I offered a poll? And remember how one of the choices for "annoying spectators" was Team in Training, and I expected people to go off on me for hating on the charity but instead a few people actually agreed with me in the (totally awesome) comments?

Well, this week, I'm too tired post-race to write up a race report right away, but I do have an observation:

You know that annoying thing that spectators sometimes inadvertently do where they push onto the course, not realizing through their enthusiasm that they're actually creating a bottleneck for the runners? Team in Training was spectating from 1st Avenue somewhere uptown, right around the top of the park. They had a crowd there - it was probably half a block "reserved" for them. They had pushed SO FAR into the course that the blue line (painted on the course to mark the tangents) was at least 5 feet behind them. On a straightaway. The spectators before and after them were all on/near the sidewalk - their group alone was sticking out into the road.

They should have known better.

Also: no marathons next weekend for me.

And the race is Sunday!

2011-11-04T08:02:00.003-04:00

Things I wanted to buy at the NYCM expo, but couldn't find:
-Injinji socks
-Biofreeze

Things I didn't intend to buy at the NYCM expo, but did anyway:
-Asics arm warmers that I tentatively think I love but that are much too big for me so I have to get a new pair
-a super cute purple short-sleeved Brooks t-shirt (NYCM branded)

Not bad. I was in and out of the expo in an hour. Having women's t-shirts as an option for the race shirt was a nice touch this year.

Now, if you don't mind, my brother is in town and we're off to experience all that New York City has to offer.

(See what I did there? That's me and my brother on the right. I added our faces to the audience of the Today Show! I know it's basically seamless and you'd never have guessed this, but the photo is faked!)

NYCM will be my 10th marathon on Sunday. Wish me luck!

Fall Foliage Half Marathon race report

2011-11-03T07:38:00.003-04:00

This story is not pretty. Not at all. It also involves woman-bits, so be warned.

The plan for last Sunday, the 23rd of October, two weeks before NYCM: a tune-up half marathon a couple of hours outside of the city so that we could practice marathon morning stress (getting up at 5 but not running until after 10) and so Tara could "peep some leaves." (Seriously - she must have used that exact phrase at least 1,000 times leading up to the race. Turns out we can add "peep" to the list, along with "moist" and "panties," of words that make me cringe.)

Pretty leaves, no?

The leaves were gorgeous. At several points during the race, I contemplated taking photos of said leaves for the blog. Then I realized: I was running a race, not walking around in the park.

And I was running a good race, at first! Our goal was to stick to marathon pace, or around 11:30s. The first two miles clicked by in 10:0x - and felt easy. The course was hilly - much more so than I expected - but we were going solidly, using the downhills to refresh for the uphills.

Oh, but the hills weren't the only problem with the race.

Here's the thing (and I have to apologize to my brother and any other males who might be reading): I'm one of those lucky women who get cramps each month. Bad bad cramps. The morning of the race, I woke up at 4am (an hour before my alarm) with a very familiar "uh-oh" feeling going on in my torso. I slapped on a sticky heating pad for the drive to the race and tried to ignore it.

By mile 5 of the race, the discomfort of my Woman Times had shifted into pain. Intense pain. Each-step-of-running-stabbing-me pain. I knew, without a doubt, that I needed a bathroom and I needed it fast. Thank goodness this race was stocked with port-a-potties. I saw one in the distance and I jetted toward it.

MY UTERUS IS THE SIZE OF A PEAR. HOW COULD IT DO THIS TO ME? (I didn't wear the heating pad for the race, although I wished I had.)

That bathroom break bought me some time. For a couple of miles, anyway.

Here's the weird thing about this otherwise well-organized race: the mile markers were off. I mean, legitimately off, not just "Waaaah, my Garmin says something different!" off. I know that Garmins aren't as accurate as certified courses. I am never one of those Garmin whiners. The official race time is your time, even if your watch said that you ran 15.2 for a half. It is what it is.

But I didn't know the mile markers were misplaced at first. So when the mile markers were progressively farther than we expected each time, Tara and I trusted the race course; we talked about Garmin inaccuracies and marveled at how badly our Garmins were doing, given the crowdless, open course. Knowing that I was so close to a PR, though, I'll admit that I gave the mile markers a dirty look as I passed by them and secretly wished that my Garmin was right, instead of the course markers.

The course was lovely, but the hills were no joke. Still, they rolled along mile after mile, and so did we. We made some friends with other runners on the course, we looked at the pretty houses, we talked about the marathon, I complained about my cramps as they got worse and worse.

Mile 12, after my second bathroom break, I gave up mentally. (For comparison, in the sum total of my nine marathons, I have used a port-a-potty two times.) There was nothing left. I could not physically run anymore without pain shooting through my abdomen. If you have a uterus, you know the pain I mean. It's a gut-wrenching, terrible pain that made me want to vomit. Either that or curl up on the side of the road in a cow field and just cry myself into painful sleep in the fetal position. Walking relieved it - in fact, walking was pain free.

Have you ever been excited to see one of these?

I told myself not to walk. I told myself I only had 11 minutes left in the race and I needed to just suck it up. I tried to channel every heroic athletic endeavor I could to just HTFU and get through it. I thought of Chrissie Wellington. I thought of Angry Runner. I thought of how good it would feel to know I pushed through. But I couldn't. It hurt too badly. I alternated running and walking and just kind of kept moving.

But what did it matter? I left the port-a-potty at the 12 mile marker, 12.4 by my watch. I had 1.1m left and my PR was now officially out of range. If I could have stopped right there, I probably would have. If this had been the day of the marathon, I wouldn't have finished. I would have DNF'd and walked off the course at mile 12. I was in that much pain.

But here's where the mile markers became an issue. Right about mile 12.5 by their markers, at 13m by my Garmin, a volunteer was standing there yelling, "The finish is right there! Less than .2m to go!" What? The course was an accurate distance. My Garmin had been right all along. If I had known that, maybe... Well, there is no maybe. I didn't push myself harder. I don't know if I could have or not, because I didn't. I finished the race 2 minutes off my PR.

At the finish line, I took my medal and asked if there was a medical area. I was in pain, bad pain, and I needed a heating pad and some painkillers. The man at the finish line freaked out, even as I tried to explain to him through tears that I was fine but having cramps. (Why are we women so often afraid to just say, "I'M BLEEDING FROM MY LADY PARTS AND IT REALLY FREAKING HURTS?" I had menstrual cramps. Dirtier phrases have been said.)

Once the paramedics realized what was going on with me (and that it meant they didn't have to get out of the warm front seat of their ambulance), they told me they had no heating pad and tried to give me directions to a drugstore. In the local vernacular, these directions of "down past the light and a little over the tracks" were too much for me and I collapsed in a chair, crying.

A few minutes, one Aleve*, and one heating pad later, I was fine. Tara and I had lunch and explored scenic Rhinebeck.

I'm being a doofus

Tara enjoys a beer

For what it's worth, my final time was 2:23 - the goal, running this at marathon pace, was 2:30. So I guess it's a victory?

*I'm actually not allowed to take Aleve or any other NSAID, being as I take blood thinners. The pain was so bad that I took my first NSAID in 3.5 years. I was willing to chance internal bleeding to make this pain go away. Don't tell my doctors.

2011-11-02T08:12:00.000-04:00

My love of Frank Shorter has been well documented on this blog.

I love him.

Finally, I've read the Runner's World article about his childhood.

Also, there's a video.

Now, I love him more.

In short, if you don't want to click on it: Frank Shorter's father was a doctor and a beloved community member by day and a sadistic child abuser by night. His abuse of his children was emotional, physical, and sexual (not all of the children would speak to the RW reporter, but all of those who did confirmed the emotional and physical abuse and two of the daughters also shared that they were raped at ages 6 and 13). Frank found a release in distance running. Once his father died and he began to realize how his story could impact - and possibly help - others, he's begun sharing it.

The video is particularly rough to watch. The juxtaposition of the terrible story against the eye and ear candy that is Frank Shorter made my brain spin. So here are some pictures for us to all enjoy.

MCM review

2011-11-01T08:14:00.000-04:00

Marine Corps Marathon. Or, as I like to call it, the People's (Republic of) Marathon.

Point in case. Marine Corps:

People's Republic of China:

Maybe the Marine Corps Marathon is called the People's Marathon because it doesn't offer prize money to elites. Or maybe it's a subtle comparison with China, huh? All I know is that when I pulled out the t-shirt, my friend's husband immediately drew the comparison and started laughing.

If our new communist race directors keep the price as low as it is (registration is less than $100), I'm good with it. I'm not really good with the cotton mock turtleneck, but with my registration savings I bought myself a swank t-shirt of my own choosing.

But don't worry about a risk of any actual communists. This guy at the start line was on the case:

"Only the tea party can save us now."

The short story: I finished the race in 5:28. I was hoping for something much closer to 5 hours, but it didn't happen. I never crashed, I was just slow throughout the whole race.

The long story: I went out too fast, the first third was hillier than I expected, the spectators were fewer and the course was more desolate than I expected, the cold was more miserable than I expected, but overall it was okay.

The good:

I had a spectator! At mile 23! A friend from grad school made a sign and brought me nuun! It was awesome!

The course is shaped like a penis! You see it, too, right?

Marines are awesome. I did not mind having uniformed Marines hand me water, or donuts, or a lunch box at the end of the race.

Do know, though, that the marines do everything at this race, including yelling out the time (in lieu of a clock) at the mile markers. Trying to figure out what "One hundred and thirty two minutes and forty-seven seconds!" meant pace-wise bought me an extra few minutes of distraction.

The bad:

I was lonely. I'd planned to meet up with some of Carla's running group at the start, and I did meet up with Ilana - but then I lost her at a porta-potty at the start (although she was faster than me, anyway!). I can run by myself. But I was expecting either crowd support or company and I had neither.
I was cold. On paper, the weather was perfect. 35 at the start heading up to a high in the mid-40s. Thing is, I haven't run in anything that cold since last winter. I freaked out and bought a long-sleeved shirt during the snowstorm on Saturday, and I planned to wear it along with a skirt. I ditched my throwaway clothes at the start, and my legs were cold for the first 8 miles. And then, they turned immediately from frozen to jello.
I didn't expect the hills. My own stupidity for not researching the course map. I kept to my 5 hour pace through about mile 10 or 11, when I saw the pace group pace me. I tried to keep up, but I couldn't.
The bathroom situation was bleak. (This didn't affect me, fortunately.) Lines for porta-potties were long. Around mile 7, the porta-potties were inexplicably placed essentially on the course (they were on the edge, but the lines extended into and completely blocked the entire course for 50 feet, forcing runners to hop a curb and run through a yard). Lines never got shorter, and during the more accessible parts of the course, lines were 20 deep with spectators waiting.
People are annoying. You probably suspected I was kind of irritated with my fellow runners/spectators from yesterday's post. The spectators were mostly amazing, as always, except I think the cold made them more subdued (compared to my expectations, that is). And the other runners? UGH. I know I was toward the back-of-the-pack, but please. I might be running a 5.5 hour race, but I'm running. Please: don't block the course.

All in all, I would give the race itself an enthusiastic thumbs up. My race, I still need to think about that for a while. On one hand, it's the fastest marathon I've run since my blood clot a few years ago. On the other hand, I felt like I was capable of a 5 hour marathon and I was confident I would be sub-5:15. I need to give some thought to figuring out what happened and why I didn't get there.

And don't bother telling me I was close. Close only counts in horseshoes and hand grenades.

Still, it's a cool medal. The middle part (with the globe) spins around.

Hopefully I'll think about this quickly and come to some resolution, since my next marathon is in - gulp - five days?

POLLS! POLLLS! POLLLLS!

2011-10-31T07:32:00.002-04:00

I tried to set up some fancy blog-embedded polls, but I couldn't. So you'll just have to vote in the comments or something.

Poll #1:

What is the worst thing to happen to marathon spectating in the past few years?

a. the cowbell

b. the vuvuzuela

c. posters reading "WORST PARADE EVER"

d. Team in Training*

*Not hating on TnT... okay, yes, I am. In my experience at big races (Flying Pig, Disney, NYCM, MCM, and Chicago x3), their supporters are the worst at going nuts yelling "GO TEAM! GO PURPLE!" when they see one of their own, only to stare blankly at you if you're not one of them. (I've seen them start to cheer for people who happen to be wearing purple - only to take it back mid-cheer. TAKING IT BACK!)

Poll #2:

What is the most egregious violation of race etiquette?

a. walking in the middle of the course (rather than stepping off to the side), particularly walking several abreast

b. the farmer's blow without checking to make sure no one is behind you

c. non-runners crossing the marathon course perpendicularly, obliviously
d. other (please write-in)

Sad, or inspiring?

2011-10-28T07:39:00.000-04:00

I could pose that question about myself and my marathon on Sunday, but actually I'm referring to this article. In short, a 400lb man set out to complete a marathon in order to set the world record for heaviest man to do so (beating last year's sumo wrestler).

Not me.

Let me spoil the ending for you: even though the article opens with "Never underestimate the power of the human spirit," he doesn't qualify to set the record as he took too long. His finish time of 13:45 (which includes an hour rest) was beyond the Guinness Book's 10 hour limit.

Is it an inspiration that he tried, or it is kind of sad that he was going after a record rather than trying to improve his health? (As one friend of mine said, "Why not train for a year and a half and do it at 250 pounds?" But remember: he had to stay above 400lbs to set the record.)

The marathon is not the be-all and end-all. It's okay to start with a 5k and work your way up.

Speaking of which... I'm currently en route to DC for my bad-idea marathon. Catch you on the flip side!

Foot issues: one gross, one not

2011-10-27T07:57:00.009-04:00

I'll start with the non-gross issue so that those of you bothered by feet can opt out of my second foot-related topic.

According to runblogger, Saucony is slowly changing the drop on their 12mm shoes to an 8mm differential. As most of you know, that number refers to the difference in height between the forefoot and the heel of the shoe. Most of us, myself included, do our long runs (or all of our runs) in big, clunky shoes with a 12mm drop. With their elevated heel, these shoes foster a heel strike. However, lately the increase in minimalist footwear has meant that zero-drop shoes (or close to it) are becoming much more mainstream. If you didn't click the link, basically what Saucony's representatives said was that the 12mm figure wasn't based on any scientific evidence but was just one of those "because it's the way we've always done it" sorts of things. Their wear testers seem to like the lower heel.

This could be a game-changing move if other companies follow their lead.

I'll try it. But that won't surprise you since I'll try any fad.

If you tell me you're shocked to see me in my new Brooks Pure Cadence, I will call you a liar.

Next, the gross part. A few days ago, I noticed that the toenail was loosening from the nail bed on the second toe on my left foot. (Turn back now if that sentence made you at all queasy; it will only get worse.) Yeah, yeah, yawn, common occurrence. Soon the cycle of (toenail) life will continue as the toenail falls off and then regrows itself again. I don't even have a left big toenail anymore because it fell off so often that it stopped growing back. So I did what I usually do in this situation, which is to trim off as much of the excess toenail as I can without cutting into anything.

Well. While I was walking around the other day, I noticed the toe was tender. I got home and I took my shoes and socks off and found that the toe was slightly pink. I kind of pressed on it a bit to see where it hurt and puss gushed out. Yep. Ingrown toenail. A few days before a marathon. I swear I didn't cut the nail too short and the skin was never broken (except obviously I must have and it was). I'm soaking it and using tons of neosporin and keeping my fingers crossed.

It's always something, isn't it?

And no, you don't want to see any pictures. It's just a pink toe at this point, anyway. An angry, mean, race-ruining pink toe.

I'm also dying of a cold and I've spent more time thinking about what to wear on Sunday than I have on, you know, like work and stuff. So yeah, it might be taper time.

Tracy's NYCM tips part three

2011-10-26T07:48:00.001-04:00

A few more tips...

Is your bib green? In other words, did you get relegated to the lower level of the bridge? Don't fret! First off, you will not be peed on. It's an urban legend that people pee off the top level and it rains down onto those on the lower level. (Just to be safe, though, stay toward the middle and don't open your mouth.) The bad news: your views will not be as lovely. You'll have the water on one side and the stream of UPS baggage trucks on the other. The good news: you don't go up the crazy hill. The highest elevation point of the marathon is the top of the Verrazano-Narrows Bridge. You will not run to the top of the bridge.

Make sure your bib is easily accessible. You'll have to show it to get into the start area, to get into your particular color-coded start village, and to get into your corral. Don't bury it under 37 layers of clothing like I did last year.

Get in your corral ASAP. All of the instructions advise you that corrals close early, and they mean business. Don't underestimate how long it will take you to walk from the start village to the corrals - it looks like a much shorter walk on the map than it actually is. Last year, Christel and I got to the corrals only a few minutes after they opened, and we were just in time. They closed shortly after we got in, with loads of people shut out. (This is less relevant if you're in the third wave, but if you're in the first or second? They will force you to wait for a later wave.)

Marathon Sunday is also the first day of Daylight Saving Time. Spring ahead, fall back - so set your clocks back an hour right before you go to bed. (Yes! That 4:30am wake up call won't feel as bad once you realize that it's actually 5:30am.)

Endure: A Run Woman Show

2011-10-25T07:24:00.002-04:00

Do yourself a favor: before you read the rest of my review of this performance, click over to the website and buy your tickets before they sell out. Shows are at 3pm on Saturdays and Sundays through at least the first and, weather pending, the second weekend in November.

Got your tickets? Now, let me explain the show to you as best I can.

I had no idea what to expect. I read the website and watched the preview and still wasn't sure what to expect. Complicating things, I read two reviews of the piece, neither of which gave me any clue as to what I would be seeing.

Samantha yawning at the start. Our "tickets"
were mock race bibs. Cute, no?

I'll be frank: I was skeptical. Those who know me well would rightly expect me to roll my eyes if you suggested that I go see anything that could fall into the category of "interpretative, modern dance." But throw running in the mix? I'm game. Skeptical, but game.

I loved it. I even - oh, I'm embarrassed to admit this - I even got choked up in the middle. Yes. Me, who laughed at my brother when he cried during the Joy Luck Club (and a few years later, when Leonardo DiCaprio died during Titanic), I held back tears. Me, who was rooting for Emile Hirsch to just die already in Into the Wild, I felt tears. The piece is emotional.

Checking in to start the show.

So what is the piece, exactly? It is a performance that takes the listener/watcher along on the journey of a metaphorical marathon. At the start, the audience is each given an ipod that's queued to the soundtrack of the show. Music and the spoken words of Melanie Jones, the artist, play continually for the 75 minutes of the show, choreographed to accompany a walking tour through Prospect Park.

Jones leads us through the Park.

The setting at the start of the piece is the start line of a marathon. Over the hour, Jones' character ruminates on what in her life brought her to the start of this marathon, on her training, on her life outside of training, and on her thoughts during the race. Although her story is unique, any runner who has ever trained for a race will recognize not only her anecdotes (about being the token marathoner at a party, for instance) but also the rambling way that one's thoughts propel you through a race or a long run. The story unfolds as Jones' character moves through the imagined race and while Jones moves through Prospect Park. And, fair warning: her story may generate pathos. The kind that makes you very nearly cry, even if you have a heart of ice like me.

Here, Jones is doing a headstand. She is
a very, very talented artist.

It doesn't hurt that it was an absolutely beautiful, crisp November day, the kind of amazing fall day that makes you open to the wonders of the world. The experience would have been different - but also good - had the weather been gloomy.

The credits in chalk on the sidewalk at the end.

Who should see it: runners and those who love them. I think that non-runners would certainly enjoy the piece and would get something out of it, but those who have ever run a marathon (or supported someone through their training) will appreciate it fully.

Logistics: the website stresses the idea of wearing something comfortable, which is important. However, although we covered about 3m like it says, there was never a point during the show where we ran more than maybe 100-300 meters at a time, and the pace we ran was entirely up to the individual (essentially you are chasing the artist). There's a lot of standing around. I wore full on running clothes, but those of the group who were wearing jeans seemed equally comfortable.

In other words, it's appropriate for the day before the NYCM.

Another thing: the music is awesome. So awesome that I went home and immediately bought the artist's album from iTunes. The composer was at our performance, and I kind of wish I'd been a groupie and gotten her signature.

Full disclosure: when she saw me tweeting about it, Melanie (the artist) offered me a free ticket to come and see the show. I then recruited Samantha to come, and she and I split the cost of her ticket. I would have happily paid full price.

Tracy's NYCM tips, day 2: THE BRIDGES

2011-10-24T07:39:00.006-04:00

On Thursday, Samantha asked for advice on the bridges. Specifically, is Queensborough as bad as everyone says?

Ah, the bridges.

Let me answer your question for you, Samantha: no. It's not as bad as everyone says.

Now, since my time on the Queensborough Bridge corresponded with my decision that the race was all "lalala, this is a fun run," I decided to put the question to my sister, too, to see what she thought. She ran her PR of 3:16 at NYCM in 2008, so she'd have the first-wave, competitive perspective on it.

Here's what my sister said: "sure, uhm, which mile was that at? :)"

Then she later clarified:

"By the time you get to the Queensborough Bridge, I think it is mile 15 so by then you are either having a great race or not. When I ran NYC I did have a great race so I didn't think much of this bridge at all. What I most remember about it was while actually running on it the air temperature seemed a little warmer and the atmosphere was stuffier in general. Exiting the bridge was an incredible experience, not only did you get to run down the decline but you are also greeted by thousands of spectators yelling and cheering! It is a great feeling, they make it seem like they are cheering just for you!"

I agree with her. The thing most of us New Yorkers don't realize is that it's a totally different experience running the middle of the bridge (the car lanes, like you see in the photo of me at last year's race) than it is running the pedestrian lane that we rehearse and rehearse. I'm not going to lie and say that the incline is easier in the middle of the bridge, but I didn't feel it as acutely. It was such a different experience to suddenly be somewhere slightly enclosed (although not claustrophobically so).

Let me tell you what did suck, though: the Pulaski Bridge between Brooklyn and Queens. (This from a Chicagoan who will always love Casimir Pulaski for the gift of a day off that he gives Illinois schoolchildren every March.) On the course map this bridge looks tiny. In person, it looms before you like a very ugly ribbon in the sky high above you. You see it from a distance, you approach it slowly, and it climbs up and up and up and it sucks.

Worst of all, you get over the bridge, and you are only halfway done with the race.

So, see? Queensborough is no big deal. Now, in honor of the 59th St. Bridge, let's all sing some Simon and Garfunkel.

Also, a correction: In exchange for bridge advice from a speedster, my sister wanted me to point out that she was a "roving spectator" for me at the Chicago Marathon in 2009. (What she means is that she ran the last 6 miles with me.) This was a feat - she had already finished the marathon herself and turned around and came back to bring me in (at my pace that year? I can't say I was running). I'm not sure that counts as spectating, though...

Tracy's NYCM tips

2011-10-21T07:46:00.008-04:00

Yesterday, I complained about the NYCM "Daily Tips" emails not giving practical advice. So now, in response to your comments/questions, I will try to fill this obvious void and give you useable advice on the marathon.

First off, Aron asked about spectating. Specifically, what are the best places for your spectators to watch for you?

Let me tell you something, Aron (and everyone). I have run eight marathons. Do you know how many times I've had spectators? ONCE.* And here he is:

That's my little brother at last year's NYCM. Most remarkably, he'll be back again this year!

I myself have spectated a time or 12, though. So I do have some tips, both general and specific.

General tips:

Know where to look for your spectator. If you don't know where they'll be, you won't see them. This can be frustrating and can throw off your race - last year, to see my brother, I actually backtracked a few blocks. He (and my friend Renee, who made the awesome sign above) both completely missed me. At the very least, know which side of the road to be on in order to see them.
Online/text/email tracking almost never works. At best, it will send you updates well after your runner has passed. At worst, it won't send you updates at all. Don't rely on it.
Have an easy way to spot them. Signs are great, but you won't see them until it's too late. The best suggestion I can make is a giant helium balloon. It's easy to spot from a distance.

Specific tips to New York:

Understand the course. Yes, this is obvious. There are three main things to look out for:

One, depending on the color of your bib, you will be forced to stay on a specific side of the road for the first 8 miles. It's possible to cross over, but the courses are technically slightly different and so it's considered cheating. There are police. Not worth the risk.
Two, know the subway system. Cross-reference this information against the course map. Be aware - and this is sort of obvious, sort of not - that your spectator will not be able to cross the marathon course. Not even if they walk reallyreallyreally fast and there really aren't that many runners around. Tell them this. What this means is that the side of the street on which they exit the subway is the side of the street they're stuck on. Not all subway stations will let you exit on both sides of the street.
Three, don't tell your spectator to go to any of the areas that are known to have heavy spectating. For instance, First Avenue in Manhattan or Fourth Avenue in Brooklyn - they're jam-packed four deep the whole route. You won't see your spectator.

These are the three areas where I would suggest you might want spectators:

The Bronx. Loads of empty space and easy access to the 4/5/6. Know that they put a giant screen up at 20m, which is entertaining for a block or two.
Harlem. Yes, 1st and 5th Avenues are several people deep with millions of spectators. But the crowds fade out around 95th St. or so. Further uptown is better! (But if your spectator is also in the Bronx, this could be a lot of spectating in only a few miles.)
Williamsburg/Greenpoint/Queens. Slightly less convenient to trains, but not as thick with spectators. Bedford Ave. in particular is fascinating - the Hasidic neighborhoods are amazing.

Watch this course video:

More tips you haven't asked for:

Before the race:

(During the taper:) Read Liz Robins' A Race Like No Other. Reading this book is the single best thing you can do during the taper. Trust me.
(The day of the race:) You can take any ferry you want. It's a public ferry. They load them first-come, first-served. The ferry operators don't have a list of who the NYRR assigned to which ferry. Trust me.
Bring a snuggie. Or sleeping bag, or loads and loads of extra clothes. Even if it's temperate out, you sit around a lot. It gets cold. Trust me.

After the race:

The finish line is a clusterfuck. Pardon my language, but it is. Immediately after crossing the line, (at least last year) they put a medal around your neck and handed you a bag of treats - Gatorade 3, pretzels, a banana. But then... whether you check a bag or not, you have to go through the entire bag claim area - walking more than a quarter mile in a tightly fenced in area past all 60-something baggage claim UPS trucks in a super-tight crowd while your legs cramp up and your frustration rises. Remember this when you tell your spectators where to meet you - you will exit the park further up than you expect and it will take you much longer to get there than you expect. The finish area is tightly cordoned off, so they will not be able to see you cross the line, either. (Last year, I met my brother in front of the Museum of Natural History at 79th St. It took me about half an hour from my finish time to get there, but that was the first place I could exit.)
You can ride the subway free post-race. A little perk for having just run 26.2m!
Don't go to Shake Shack at 79th and Columbus. Because I want to, and I don't want there to be lines when I get there.

What other advice would you give? What did I miss/screw up? What else are you wondering about?

On Monday, I'll address Samantha's question about the Queensborough (I mean 59th Street Ed Koch Queensboro) Bridge.

*Well, 1.5. Another time my roommate came out to watch me run Chicago, but then my dad called him and the two of them left the course to get breakfast, watch the elites, and go back to my parents' house in the suburbs. True story.

Great tips for the New York City Marathon!!!

2011-10-20T11:35:00.000-04:00

Okay, my title is being sarcastic.

About a week ago, I got an email from the organizers of the marathon with the subject "ING New York City Marathon Daily Tip #1. Okay, I thought, nice and helpful! I mean, I did the race last year, so I have some idea of what to expect. But more advice is always great!

But wait... Daily Tip #1 isn't really a tip, now is it? It's just directing me to their website, no? Well, okay, if I'm generous with them, I'll assume that Daily Tip #1 is "check your email and know our website." Okay.

Daily Tip #2. I won't lie: daily tip #2 made me laugh outloud. (I clicked through to the website to show it to you.)

Wait - a race? Now, with less than three weeks until the race? Huh. Um, okay. And I guess while I'm adding races to my calendar, I should also book a hotel? Kind of last minute, but...

The Daily Tips get weirder from there. Tip 3 tells you how to fuel for all the high intensity running you're doing (but we're tapering! the high volume is done!); Tip 4 suggests that you spend money on your friends and family because they're helping you through the race (maybe I'm alone here, but most of my friends and family are either also running or don't even realize that I'm running); Tip 5 tells you to taper - and to do it "correctly"; and today's tip, Tip 6, suggests that you should incorporate pace runs into your training. The training that you've already finished.

I get that they're trying to build up energy before the race, but these emails are kind of amusing to me. Too little, too late! Why not pragmatic information? Why not tell us where the best place for spectators to watch would be, rather than suggesting we buy them shirts? Why not tell us that our bib number represents our corral, and that our corrals correspond with the estimated finish time we provided, and that the different corral numbers correspond to where you start on the bridge at the beginning? Why not give us tips on the long wait in Staten Island before the race?

If you have any questions about the ING NYCM, don't wait for a "daily tip" email to cover them. Shoot me an email, post your questions on twitter, or use the RWOL forums.

Why I haven't been talking much about my running lately

2011-10-19T07:30:00.005-04:00

Because I haven't been doing much of it. Kinda simple that.

Shouldn't this be my strongest month of training now, what with the marathon coming up in just three weeks? Yeah, it should be.

What can I say? Don't take me as a role model. Life gets in the way sometimes. Or, as my mother used to tell me growing up, "The road to hell is paved with good intentions."

Which mile of the marathon is this?

Just finish the distance.

2011-10-18T07:28:00.001-04:00

On Sunday morning, I ran one of my most painful 20m runs ever with the most fun and delightful running club ever. As I was limping back to my apartment, I was chatting on the phone with a friend who had done a halfathon that morning. He was telling me an anecdote, and it went something like this...

The race was a full marathon and a half marathon on the same day. Pretty standard. There was an obvious and well-marked turn off around the 10 mile mark where the two groups separated before the full course added on 13m (so that the last 3m of both courses was the same). So, mile 11 of the half was also mile 24 of the full.

Let's say you were racing the full. Even if you missed the signs and somehow ended up accidentally taking the turn for the half, there's pretty much no way you wouldn't have realized that mile 24 is not the next number after mile 10 - mile 11 does not feel like mile 24.

...which is why it was so odd at the finish when my friend overheard a man yelling at the food table volunteer. "I didn't know about the turn! I never saw any signs! I was running the full, and all of a sudden they gave me a medal for finishing the half! I need to finish a full. Someone needs to take me to a high school with a track, or somewhere, so that I can finish the full." Later he saw this same guy at the finish, yelling that he needed a race official to make this right for him.

Dude: if you were with it? You would have realized early on that you were no longer on the full marathon course.

Here's another example of a similar-but-different thing. Basically, long story short (and you can read the long story here if you're curious), a slowtwitch forum who was at Kona (Ironman) began talking to a participant who obviously from his times must have cut the marathon course. Upon questioning him, he maintained that he'd finished legitimately even though it was clear that he hadn't.

Well, five pages into the thread (fifth post down), who should appear but the cheater himself. He owns it: yes, he cut the course. In pain, he decided to DNF - but then he got caught up in the momentum and crossed the finish line. He was afraid of disappointing his excited family and friends. He's returning the medal and shirt, and he won't go back to Kona even if he qualifies again in the future. Oh, yeah, and he's 22.

Is it cheating? Or is it a dumb-ass kid who made a mistake? Maybe both. The commenters are hilarious, though, including suggesting banning him for life or for at least 10 years (bearing in mind that the Tour de France banned Floyd Landis for two years for doping).

An open letter to the Nike Oregon Project

2011-10-17T07:42:00.014-04:00

To: Alberto Salazar and Nike, Inc.
From: Tracy
Date: 17 October
Re: Recent departure of Kara Goucher and Amy Yoder Begley

Dear Mr. Salazar:

I read, with interest, about Kara Goucher and Amy Yoder Begley both deciding to leave the Nike Oregon Project. The internet is ablaze with rumors about their departures, about how you might be pushing your athletes too hard and encouraging them to run through their injuries. Gossipmongers are calling this a loss for the Nike Oregon Project.

I call this an opportunity.

You might see a disturbing trend (your athletes leaving you, and just before the Olympic Trials, no less!), but I see two open slots in your training roster.

I have a proposal for how you can fill at least one of these open slots: me.

"But, Tracy," you might say. "You're not a professional athlete! I coach world-class athletes!" Well, yes. This is true. I do have a few things going in my favor:

1. Lots of room for improvement. It's hard to take an elite athlete and make her better. But it would be easy to make me better. Lest you think your job is easy, it would be a challenge to make me elite-caliber. Think how satisfying it will be to help me drop an hour - or two? - off my marathon PR.

2. I'm cheap. A high profile athlete like Kara Goucher costs you, what, maybe $500k/year in sponsorship monies? I'd be ecstatic with $100k. Hell, I'll do it for $75k, health insurance, and free shoes. I'll even buy my own running clothes!

3. I bleed red, white, and blue: Obviously that's metaphorical and my blood is red. But I can give you more of an American presence amongst your athletes - that is, of course, why the Nike Oregon Project was founded, right?

3. I already wear a lot of Nike:

Note the jacket.

And the shirt.

Another jacket.

And who could forget the skapri!

(I have more photos. These are just a few.)

And a final note: not that I believe internet rumors or anything, but if there's any truth to the idea that your athletes' successes come from performance enhancing drugs? I'm okay with that. I mean, I'll just do what my coach tells me, wink wink - your tactics are my secrets.

Let me know what you think! I have enough Delta miles banked for a free domestic ticket and I'm happy to relocate as soon as you say the word.

Sincerely, Tracy

2011-10-13T07:42:00.000-04:00

My office has had the heat on all week despite temps in the upper 70s, so my brain is fried.

Here, instead of my usual witty commentary, are some links to things I've read this week:

Running skirts have made the New York Times. Does that mean that I'm ahead of the curve, or does that mean that the trend is over? Eh, who cares. It's capri season now, anyway.

A not-very-well written article sheds no real insight on the specifics of Sammy Wanjiru's death, but it does give some more details surrounding that night. Come on, everyone likes a juicy story. Elite runner comes home with his mistress, is caught by his wife, and then falls to his death out of a balcony? Can I get some movie rights up in here?

I believe the take-home message comes through loud and clear: my make-believe kids will run 10m to school both ways, every day. No excuses, weaklings.

In sad news, the Chilean miner I narrowly beat during last year's NYCM is profiled in the Times. After his brief celebrity faded, he turned to drinking and drugs.

And finally, I snuck something in the comments yesterday, although it won't come as a surprise to anyone. I bought a bib for Marine Corps just before their official transfer period ended two weeks ago. So, in honor of that bit of stupidity, here's more stupidity: an oldie-but-goodie article on Jean's Marines, an organized group of charity runners who were instructed by their coach to cut the course in order to make the race's time cut-offs. But, their argument went, they deserved their medals because of their effort. Um, yeah.

MARATHON SHOES!

2011-10-12T07:57:00.001-04:00

Advice needed.

I have three nearly identical pairs of Saucony ProGrid Omnis.

Their mileages are 130, 146, and 316. All still feel good for long runs - which is intriguing, since I only got 293 miles out of my last pair before retirement. I've been doing all of my long runs in the high-mileage pair lately out of some sort of conservationist instinct to protect the lower mileage pair for races.

So, two questions:
1. Which shoes should I wear for the marathon?
2. Exactly how much am I overthinking this?

I am SO GLAD I did not run the Chicago Marathon Sunday

2011-10-11T07:48:00.000-04:00

Instead, on Saturday, I ran in honor of the Chicago Marathon.

My last year's Chicago Marathon t-shirt and a 312 showerbeer. Yes, it was a mid-day showerbeer. No, I don't have any shame.

For some reason, last week I breezed through 20 miles and felt pretty okay at the end. Saturday, I breezed through 13.2 miles and went home to take a long nap and moan about how sore I was. Not sure how that works.

I was sporting some pretty high fashion post-run wear, though. Let me tell you!

And I may have taken a really, really long nap with my dog. One of us had the sleep of her life. The other one of us thinks that her dog has bad breath. And is heavy.

You know who did run the Chicago Marathon, though? My sister. True story: she was pacing the US Women's Soccer Team. Hope Solo, Abby Wambach, Alex Morgan, and 13 contest-winning fundraisers from the general public all did the marathon as a relay for charity, and my sister was the chosen pacer. (She's the one below with the dark hair who is not wearing the requisite Nike shorts.)

They started right on the start line. With the elite runners. And they finished en masse. In the middle, they tried to ditch my sister. She was the only one going the full distance - each of the charity runners was only going about 2m. Thus, none of them needed water and didn't want to stop to let my sister get water. Finally she broke down and had to stop at a certain point, after which she lost them. So she Rosie Ruiz'd a couple of miles off the course to meet up with them at the end. (I hope she didn't take a medal, marathon cheater.)

That moment when...

2011-10-10T08:00:00.000-04:00

...you come up on a runner out for her Sunday run in the park and you get really excited because you realize you're going to actually pass her and then as you pass her, you realize that your "competitor" only has one leg and is running on a prosthetic.

...you pass a woman running on a prosthetic and think to yourself, "Whatever. She's handicapable. One-legged people can run pretty damn fast these days" and you still feel some victory from passing someone.

...you see a woman run next to you and are instantly grateful to realize that your sports bra fits you, and it fits you well. You then watch that woman bounce away, thinking "ow, ow, ow, ow, ow" in cadence.

...you see a grey-haired woman running lightly and quickly, passing you by. At first you think that she's quite talented for her age. Then she turns around and you realize that she's about 7 or 8 months pregnant. Prematurely grey, or pregnant at an advanced age? Lots of both in NYC.

...you realize that you are chafing, and you are chafing badly. Someone please remind me to put Body Glide under my arms next week before my last 20m?

...you suspect that the New York Times is obviously reading your blog, because otherwise why would they run a story about running coaches being unnecessary just days after you blogged looking for input about running coaches? (Props to the article for head-on tackling Ryan Hall's "God is my coach" thing rather than just glossing over it and giving Hall the credit for self-direction.)

2011-10-07T07:42:00.002-04:00

I am seriously considering a running coach.

I'm of two minds:

-Part of me says, why on earth would I hire someone to do something I basically already know how to do? No, I'm not a coach, nor do I have the expertise that comes along with coaching experience. But I do have some idea of what works for my body, and I know how to construct a basic training plan. What I need is willpower, not another line item in my budget.

-The other part of me says, I pay doctors to tell me what's going on with my body. I even pay someone to make me ridiculous $4 pumpkin spice lattes, because I can't do that on my own. So obviously I'm comfortable paying people who can help me. Some of the best runners I know - in fact, many of the best runners I know - have running coaches.

And just like that, this became one of those blogs.

Plus, I'm in a running rut (yes, again - have I even been out of it?). I need someone to tell me what to do and when to do it, and I figure if that person knows what they're talking about and provides me with accountability, maybe I might actually listen to them. And then maybe I might become a better runner.

Does anyone have any advice or experience or anecdotes or suggestions on running coaches?

News and stuff

2011-10-06T07:44:00.008-04:00

Today, just because I can, I will dust off my iPod nano (an old school red one) and my Nike+ and I will listen to the voice of Paula Radcliffe or Lance Armstrong generically tell me that I'm doing a great job on my run.

And while I'm running, I will pass a moment of silence for Steve Jobs. I'll think about having to type "PR#6" into the old school apples in my 5th grade computer lab. I'll think about technology and about the first time I saw an iPod and knew it was special even though my brother had had an .mp3 player for ages and how I still think the iPad is more for consuming than producing and this makes me annoyed (can our society be any more Wall-E?).

Yes, I'm a fan girl. Well, mostly. I have an iPad, an iPhone, several iPods, a MacBook, and a MacBook Air. But none of them are the latest and greatest because I'm not rich like that (PLEASE DO NOT MUG ME). And yes, I resent the stupid capitalization. Or should I say "iResent the stupid capitalization"?

I thought this was an interesting Apple article (on the Gizmodo iPhone prototype from a few years back).

While we're on the subject of interesting articles, you know it's marathon season when the NYTimes dishes up another of their classic fluff pieces on distance running. The latest is hydration. Drink before you get thirsty, or is it already too late at that point? Avoid hyponatremia, the article says. Also: we slowpokes drink too much because we don't know how to hydrate properly.

My favorite line, though, is the one at the beginning where the author states outright that fall marathon season begins this weekend with Chicago and ends on 6 November with NYCM. Sorry to any of you running Philly; it's evidently not a fall race.

Ryan Hall nude... just like God made him. From ESPN.

And the last bit of exciting news of the day: Kara Goucher is soon to be joining Ryan Hall in being coached by God! Okay, maybe not. But she's not being coached by Alberto Salazar anymore. (A friend of mine grew up in Oregon and said that all of his Oregonian running friends called him "Alberto Saladbar." I challenge you not to think of that from now on. And, if you have any free time, you should really read the New Yorker profile from last year on Saladbar.) No news on who her new coach will be, but Kara? I'm free. Just call. Certifications? Experience? What are those? Come on now. I can help you.

Nothing to see here

2011-10-02T21:04:00.000-04:00

When I sat down to write about my weekend in running, I realized: I'm enjoying not blogging more than I'm enjoying blogging right now. So I'm going to be away for a little longer still, at least until I have something inspired to say. Back before you can miss me!

And then...

2011-09-27T07:38:00.000-04:00

And then...

...I ran 18m on Sunday with Tara and it was okay. I whimpered a bit at the end. I wanted to cry. We finished strong.

...I realized that the odd twingey-bit in my right leg was not going away and was ITB pain so I dusted off my foam roller. (I didn't dust off the ground, though, so it was still pretty nasty and there was dog hair everywhere.) Also, I whimpered a bit at the end. I wanted to cry. I may have cried.

...I registered for a half marathon in a month. There is a Dairy Queen in that town. And a castle nearby. And two more seats in our zipcar if anyone else wants in.

...I'm contemplating buying a bib for Marine Corps. I've actually been contemplating this for weeks, but the transfer period ends Friday and so now we're down to the wire and I have to decide what I'm going to do.

...I realized I have to take the next few days off from blogging so I can, you know, do things like run and work and have non-running fun. I'll be back - Monday?

Any thoughts or advice on any of these points?

Fifth Avenue Mile: Race Report

2011-09-26T07:48:00.005-04:00

I guess I do remember how to run a mile.

On Saturday, I ran the Fifth Avenue Mile and I finished in 7:37, or 16 seconds faster than last year. I'll take it. I really didn't think that I could run anything sub-8, given my lack of speedwork. Now I'm thinking that next year I'll try for a 7:2x. My sister wants me to try for a 6:xx. Hahaha! Dream big. That would make me feel, like, legit.

Just think: if I keep improving by 16 seconds a year, I'll be setting the world record in barely more than a decade!

At the end of the race, I was spent but not so spent that I couldn't turn around and run 18m on Sunday. I didn't even feel like I wanted to throw up when I was done! Now, all I have to do is maintain that mile pace for another 25.2 miles and I can register for Boston - in the second wave of registrants! Hell, if I could only maintain that pace for another 2 miles I'd achieve my goal of going sub-25 on a 5k. But I don't think I could have maintained that pace for another 400m.

In the finish area, I ran into Ms. Duffy. She had the best possible hook-up: she knew where a Belgian waffle truck was parked, near the finish. Of course, I had already started eating my waffle before I thought to take a picture. That's one of the MANY reasons that I'm not a food blogger.

This is a delicious waffle with nutella and banana on it. For the potassium, natch.

Both this year and last, I felt the same way about the Fifth Avenue Mile. I was pleased with myself after the race, I wondered whether or not I could have done better if the weather/my training/the crowds were different, and I am excited to try it again next year. But... here's my curiosity:

Why would you wear a camelbak or a real backpack or a fuel belt or headphones or a fleece jacket (with temps in the 70s) for a 1m race?

That is a serious question. I mean, what would you even put on your 1 mile playlist? I finished mid-pack, and my soundtrack was 7 and a half minutes of my own voice in my head going "RUN FASTER, TRACY, FOR GOD'S SAKE, RUN FASTER" on repeat.

Random stuff

2011-09-23T08:07:00.001-04:00

First off, Ellen's write-up of our run with Lance Armstrong. She did scare me. And the bathrobes the club goers were wearing were odd.

Next, Beth has a follow up on the IAAF's decision to make their new rules regarding world records being set only at women's only marathons retroactive. Paula Radcliffe no longer holds the women's world marathon record. Instead, the record is now held by... Paula Radcliffe.

Here's an awesome take on the IAAF's decision from the Chicago Tribune.

Here's a new one: plastic surgery to correct "runner's face." I will say, years of running without sunscreen can age a person, badly. Dudes can pull it off. Women look older. That said: wear sunscreen, don't get plastic surgery! Oddly enough, the article defines "runner's face" as "looking too thin and gaunt."

I'm not the only one studying the wear patterns on my soles to justify new shoes. New Balance did it in order to create a new shoe.

How do I run a mile?

2011-09-22T08:09:00.000-04:00

Saturday is the Fifth Avenue Mile. I ran this race last year in a blistering 7:53. I would say my fitness last year was roughly comparable to my current fitness, except that this year, I have done no speedwork. A few 10k pace tempo runs and one or two hill workouts are not adequate preparation to race a mile - especially when I'll be competing against the likes of Jenny Barringer Simpson.*

I'm not even sure that my legs remember how to run a mile. The splits are marked at 400m, but I don't know that I have any muscle memory for my 400 pace, either. Last year, my only goal was to break 8 minutes, so I stuck to a 2:00 split for the 400s and came in just ahead of it thanks to a slight downhill at the end (tempered by a slight uphill at the beginning). I remember feeling okay about the race. The first 400 was a touch fast, the middle 800 was just me hanging on, and the last 400 was painful. Good painful.

Now, I know that the stupidest thing in the world would be to go out and do some speedwork in preparation, right? Today is Thursday, a scheduled rest day for me. I was intending to run tomorrow, but easy. Should I throw a couple 800s in there?

What do I do?

This totally happened and is not me copying one photo into another.

*So Jenny Simpson will be in a different heat than me and will finish several minutes faster than me. Next you're going to tell me that I was not competing against Catherine Ndereba when we both ran the 2002 Chicago Marathon.

My weak defense of why I need those Brooks

2011-09-21T08:04:00.002-04:00

Ed (22 Jan 2012): I'm getting quite a few hits to my blog from people googling the Brooks Ravenna 3. What follows is a relatively boring post about how the Ravenna 3 seems to encourage a midfoot strike - for me - as compared to the motion control shoe I wear for longer runs (Saucony Omni). Personally, I love the Ravenna 3. I find it different from the Ravenna 2 (and this is completely non-scientific, and I no longer have the Ravenna 2 to compare side-by-side) in that the Ravenna 3 seems to have a slightly less prominent heel. It also seems quite durable - again, ymmv. I've put ~200m on mine at this point and the shoes feel springy and new still.

Fwiw, I like the PureCadence quite a bit, too.
____________________________________

I have basically talked myself into getting the Brooks PureProject PureCadence. You know, the ones that yesterday I said I was in love with.

Hear me out, hear me out!

I'm a heel striker, I know this. And I've never truly experimented with minimalist shoes/barefoot running (unless you count wearing Nike Frees and Saucony Hattoris for casual wear as experimentation, but I call that "fashion"). When I briefly switched to the Nike LunarGlide, I got shin splints. Those shin splints didn't go away until I got rid of every shoe that was not the Saucony Omni.

Until... I got the Brooks Ravenna 3, and I fell in love with it. They call it a "guidance" shoe. I call it "slightly lighter weight, super squishy, and much more fun to run in."

The other day when I was putting the Ravennas on, I noticed a wear pattern that looked slightly unusual to my eye. Bear with me while I geek out for a few paragraphs here. I compared two shoes: one, the Ravenna 3, and the other, the Saucony Omni. Both shoes have almost exactly 150 miles on them (I usually get around 300 miles on a pair of shoes). Forgive me, as I realized too late that the photos would have been MUCH better had I used a better camera, in better lighting.

I'm used to a predictable wear pattern on my shoes. Specifically, the outer edge of the back of the sole of the shoe wears down noticeably on my shoes, as you can see on the Saucony:

The Brooks, on the other hand, are not worn down like the Saucony:

Here's a side-by-side comparison of the heels of the two shoes:

The heel of the Brooks (above in this photo) is barely worn - in sharp contrast with the Saucony (on the bottom), which shows nearly no wear. Where the Brooks are most obviously worn is in the midfoot:

The Saucony is worn in the midfoot, too but not nearly as badly. The Brooks is really just flattened completely.

What does it all mean? Probably it has more to do with the construction of the shoe and with my mild overpronation than anything else. However, I'm using it as rationale for why it's okay for me to get a minimalist shoe that markets itself as a guidance shoe. (Come to me, PureCadence!).

I have shoe envy

2011-09-20T08:06:00.000-04:00

I want this shoe. I want it bad.

Brooks PureCadence

Logically, it is a bad idea for me to get this shoe. Every time I start messing around with different shoes, I get shin splints. I need to stick to what works.

Plus, I'm not into minimalist shoes. Props to you if they work for you, but they're not my thing.

So why does this shoe appeal to me? Honestly, I have no idea. I haven't even tried it on. I just like it. I like the color (most important criteria in picking a running shoe), I like the look (second most important), and it just speaks to me. I'm listening, PureCadence, I hear you calling!

Run Like Hell

2011-09-19T07:56:00.001-04:00

I didn't run Yonkers. You all gave me great advice (most of which was "run it"), and I wanted to. I really wanted to. But then, I wanted to sleep in Sunday more, and it was glorious. What a perfect, wonderful day after an awesome night of sleep. Yonkers would have meant waking up around 5 to get the train; instead, I woke up hours later and ran 11.5m with Tara. We ran into Ali, and you should totally buy one of her I (heart) Sweat shirts if you haven't already. True: I wore mine today and got three compliments on it. Also true: one of those three was Ali, and only one of those three was potentially creepy (that one was not Ali).

Then, Sunday evening, I ran with Lance Armstrong. Well, sort of. I mean, I was there, Lance was there, and after an amazing and astounding 90 minute wait, we ran.

Is that Lance?

Or maybe that's Lance?

The organizers of the event had some problems, namely that Lance was flying into NYC and his plane was late (or so they told us, but only after the run started). In the meantime, we all just stood around, cold, acting like Lance Armstrong was worth waiting for.

Once Lance arrived with an entourage and loads of fanfare, we had a police escort to the West Side Highway. Sort of. They had told us to expect pace groups from 7 to 12 minute miles. I finished the 3.7m run with solid 10 minute miles and there were only two or three people behind me - and certainly no pacers. I saw the police escort for but a brief few seconds before I was on my own. (Not actually on my own: I had some lovely company in two new friends, Ellen and Juliana.)

These banners lined the course.

I'll admit; I was irritated that Lance made me wait 90 minutes. I haven't waited that long for a brief celebrity sighting since the Spice Girls were in Chicago in 1998 and I stood outside to see them ride past in their bus (do the math and you'll discover that I was much too old to be chasing the Spice Girls in 1998). The organizers probably could have kept us better informed about the situation, but hey: free is free, and you get what you pay for.

Or more than what you pay for, as the case may be. The run ended at a club where we drank fancypants juice drinks while consuming tasty appetizers. They even gave us a shirt - and it was nice! Dri-fit with a cute logo of a running Empire State Building.

Oh, the irony. Listening to Lance Armstrong talk about diabetes prevention while I reach for my third coconut milk drink to wash down a slider, chicken fingers, and fried wontons. Happy birthday, Lance, and thanks for the party!

What should I do?

2011-09-16T07:41:00.001-04:00

One of these days I'm going to get around to reading the Runner's World article on Frank Shorter. I've already checked out the pictures - more than once, actually - but I've been warned that the article is pretty heavy and that I should be prepared for it.

In the meantime, I'm doing the Yonkers Half Marathon on Sunday. Right? Right? I am, aren't I? I mean, I'm registered for it... Well, technically I'm registered for the full, but I shouldn't have any problems downgrading to the half, especially since I would be much slower than the 5hr cut-off and it's a two-loop course (just try to force me to run a second loop).

But here's my question: should I even do the race? I'm feeling overwhelmed with work this week and I'm not excited about this race. At all. I have this feeling like something has got to give to preserve my sanity, and this race might be the easiest obligation to walk away from.

Still, I need to run, and I may as well get a t-shirt for it, right? Or not right?

Not actually me. Just feels like me most days.

Two small things

2011-09-15T07:46:00.002-04:00

When it comes to feminism, I'm more second wave than third wave. But the NYCM begs to differ and has me firmly in the third wave:

Who else is rocking the third wave with me? Anyone?

Next, this Sunday night I will evidently be running 2m with Lance Armstrong. Or running 2m and then going to an event that he will also be attending:

I'm not too fancy-like with my ability to link, but here's the RSVP site if you'd like to join me. (Let me know if you do sign up!)

2011-09-14T08:06:00.001-04:00

I quit my gym two weeks ago, effective 1 October. The gym is nothing special, although it is convenient to my apartment and has branches all around the city (I really can't actually use any of those branches due to draconian policies that charge me for using a gym that's not my primary gym during off-peak hours).

When I gave some thought to my membership, I realized that I had gone to the gym maybe 4 or 5 times all summer. At $65 a month, that means that I paid about $39 per visit. Also, I realized that I absolutely hate the treadmill. TIME TO QUIT!

Of course, ironically I had one of the best treadmill runs of my life last night. Short, hard, sweet.

But then, as I was walking home from the gym and getting all melancholy while replaying a reel of "my greatest moments at the gym" in my head (inexplicably, the Dawson's Creek soundtrack was playing), my shin started aching.

No regrets.

For once, I have no opinion!

2011-09-13T07:51:00.000-04:00

I got a very interesting comment the other day on my post about the women's marathon record and the IAAF decision. Looseyfur* asked me what I think about running cruises and camps and vacations and the like.

I was stumped.

I thought about it all weekend. I tried to formulate an opinion. But I couldn't.

To be honest, the only thing I really know about these types of vacations comes from a Runner's World article I read a few months ago. It was kind of a gimmicky embarrassment for a magazine that pretends to cater to a running demographic: silly non-runner goes on a running cruise to Alaska, running a progressive marathon as part of the trip. I'm not sure why Runner's World thinks that it would appeal to, say, me to read that this guy who hadn't run in 12 years trained by "hurrying a couple blocks to grab a couple of slices before [his] neighborhood pizza joint closed."

(Don't get me started on the "progressive marathon," where you total 26.2 with your mileage over a set period of time. What if Pheidippedes had run 3m at at a time? A marathon is an event, not a series of events. Run a 5k or a 10k and bask in the glory of still being better than other people! If someone asks you your marathon time, do you say, "3:04... by which I mean, 3 weeks, 4 days"?)

Let me start by saying: I've never been on one of these trips. I've seen a few different varieties of events advertised that seem to fit this category, though. There are getaways that cater to runners, maybe with a destination race thrown in to cap the experience. There are camps that tailor to runners looking to work with a coach and improve their form. And then there are running vacations - like, trips where running is the main attraction.

And why not? We all struggle with running on vacation - fitting running clothes in our suitcases, waking up early to accommodate sightseeing schedules - why not just make the vacation all about running? I can see the appeal: maybe you're looking to go on a cruise to possibly meet a special someone, but you know you want him/her to be a runner. Here you go, a boat full of runners. I guess I'd have two concerns: one, the price; and two, the fact that I don't always travel alone, and I don't always travel with other runners.

So, then, what do you think about them? Any opinions? Anyone actually ever been on one?

*by the way, you'll be happy to hear that I've learned by reading her blog that that is not her real name!

Weekend wrap-up

2011-09-12T07:46:00.020-04:00

The good: 17 miles done on a beautiful Sunday and, miraculously, I passed the shower test with no chafing! (Almost) fall weather... I love it.

More good: I set out with Tara and Emily to run in Van Cortlandt Park in the Bronx. I'd been looking for a change of scenery, and I tweeted Jonathan to see if he had any ideas for courses.

Wow.

Jonathan sent a detailed description of the course he suggested, including maps and his phone number to call in case we got lost. Even more than that, he offered to meet us at the park, and on top of that he ran us much of the way to mark the course and make sure we made the right turns.

The bad: I slept funny Saturday night and seem to have pinched a nerve in my lower back. In good news, I didn't feel it at all while I was running.

The ugly: That was my second (and last) run for the week. Everything else got in the way this past week, and I let it get in the way. Two runs. That's all. And the other one was something like 5 miles.

I'll be better this week. I will run at least four times this week. Yes. I will.

Confession:

2011-09-08T07:38:00.000-04:00

Not unlike Hilary Duff, ~~I am a pop sensation and actress who is married to a hockey star~~ I have fat arms. Or so I've come to believe: at the same exact moment that I discovered arm warmers, I also discovered the existence of the arm muffin top.

So when I told you a few weeks ago that I had gotten a package from Running Skirts and I mentioned that I would review the arm warmers later, I was bluffing. Yes, it was too warm for the arm warmers. But also, in a size medium, they were too tight on me.* I sent Running Skirts back the arm warmers with a note asking for a size large. In exchange, they sent me compression socks. (I guess they were out of arm warmers? Their communication hasn't been stellar, although I have no complaints about getting free stuff.)

Not even maybe my legs. Their picture.

I'm pretty picky about my compression socks. I like them tight. Very tight. (If I was the crude sort, I would imagine there was a joke in there. But I'm classy.) I can rarely find compression socks tight enough for me to feel like they're doing anything. I was leery about these from the get-go, given that they don't come in sizes. Perhaps needless to say, my fat arms also come along with calves that are, ahem, ample. Muscular, right? Right. Ahem. But if these socks were too small, they'd just be tighter, right?

So how were they? I'm mixed. I didn't really notice anything, to be honest. I put them on after a hard 15m (I didn't run it hard, mind you, it's just that I'm weak). Would the soreness have been worse without the socks? I don't know. I would be afraid that they wouldn't be tight enough for people with thin calves.

I'll wear them. But I prefer my C.E.P. socks.

*I can give you a preliminary review: I'm not sure I like the fabric, as it has next to no give. I definitely do not like what I can only describe as a reverse thumbhole. Instead of having a hole for your thumb, they have a protective casing for your thumb. Not only does this leave your hand exposed to the elements (whereas a thumbhole allows your hand to be mostly covered and thus warm), but it was also snug on me - and I don't have fat thumbs, thankyouverymuch - inhibiting being able to push them up on your arm or take them off easily. So... I'm mixed. If you want to be very twee and have your skirt match your arm warmers, go for it.

Runs like a girl

2011-09-07T07:45:00.006-04:00

Women only marathons: good or bad?

The only women's-only race I've done is the NYRR Mini-10k. It was... aight. Didn't do much for me. I don't really have an opinion on women's only races - too many of them have girly gimmicks (Disney princesses!) that detract for me. (Although I will do the Nike Women's Marathon someday for the Tiffany necklace.)

But this today isn't about me - it's about the IAAF. Specifically, the rule they passed at their last meeting that women's marathon world records can only be achieved in women's only races. If it's applied retroactively, then Joan Benoit Samuelson currently holds the women's world record for the marathon at 2:24, set in 1984. (As the article says, there are "women's world bests," too.)

The reason for this, as you probably know, is the male pacers. Women racing with/behind faster men might be pushed harder than women who are running against other women. It's the same reason why Nike stood behind their decision that Arien O'Connell was not the winner in the 2008 marathon even though she ran the fastest time. They ran different races, Nike said; by not starting with the elites, the elites didn't have her as competition to push them harder. As a letsrun commenter said, the equivalent to women having male pacers is men having pacers on motorcycles.

I'm going to say something here - and I very well might be wrong and you should completely disagree with me if you want in the comments even though I'll just think to myself "whatever, it's MY blog" - but I have to wonder what the demographic composition of the IAAF Congress is. Mainstream running has a history of being not all that eager to embrace women's running - who amongst us who has seen the photos can forget Kathrine Switzer being pulled off the Boston course?

Not just sexist, but also elitist: we all remember the near-controversy when Meb won the NYCM but was not considered American enough for the naysayers, who saw him only as one of those genetically gifted Africans. Distance running recently has become the sport of affluent white men.

Is it possible that members of the Congress felt threatened by the narrowing gap between men's and women's world records? In 1992, an article in Nature predicted that, given the rate at which women's records were progressing against men's, women would surpass men. Soon. Their work has since been refuted, mostly, but the legacy is there.

My weekend was better than yours.

2011-09-06T07:52:00.019-04:00

Or maybe my weekend wasn't better than yours. It's not a contest. But my weekend had some highlights, and here they are.

For this blog post, I did my weekend up legit blogger style with a bajillion pictures that only have meaning to me and are posted to show you how awesome I am and that I will now dump in this blog with as few words as I can. Added bonus: at least one of the WORST PICTURES EVER TAKEN OF ME.

Saturday

15m run with Emily. Finally! A long run longer than 13m!

Mere moments after we laughed about how many running blogs have more photos than miles run, I made her take my picture. For irony, you understand:

But we have no blog photo skills, so the photo was dark. Emily offered to run with her DSLR next time.

Did you know that Manhattan has a monument to the Irish potato famine? They do. And I made Emily take a photo of me standing in it.

A lot of bloggers seem oddly keen on taking photos with their Starbucks. Emily offered to take one of me. I look ridiculous. I'm laughing at the absurdity.

Then we went for brunch. This being NYC, a film crew walked into the diner and started talking to an older couple. We asked the waiter who they were with and he said that the restaurant didn't know - they just came in and did their thing.

Sunday

I'd been looking forward to Sunday for some time - my former training partner Tamara was in town from Canada! Tam is more than a training partner. Imagine spending the first hour of your day talking to someone, nearly every day for two years. When you meet someone and click with them as training partners and friends like we did, it's amazing. It had been far too long, and we had a lot of major life changes to catch up on over 6m.

Aren't we cute?

What you're not seeing above is the first two pictures I took, which looked like this:

The funniest part is that I was subtly trying to sneak out my camera to ask her if I could take a photo when she insisted that we do. She wanted to be on my blog!

Random trivia: she and I actually met on the internet, but way back in the prehistoric early 21st century.

Because this is a vanity post, here's another photo taken after the run/walk (...should have been a run, totally my fault), shamelessly stolen from her facebook page.

Monday

Labor Day.

I did almost nothing. Oh, yes, unless you count kayaking in the East River as nothing!

Maybe it's time to invest in some specialty laundry detergent

2011-09-01T08:00:00.000-04:00

On Monday, Tara and I ran 13m after work. This was a bad idea. Not the run; just the timing. Our run took us into Central Park after dark - and half the street lights were out post-Hurricane Irene.

During the run, Tara kept commenting on how badly her running capris smelled. I didn't notice any scent at all, which I kept telling her. I'll admit: even as I was not smelling anything, in my head I was thinking, "Um, gross! Like, seriously. You say you washed your capris, but if you washed them, they wouldn't smell as badly as you say they do!"

And then... last night. I had grabbed a clean shirt and clean skirt out of my laundry pile, but the second the "clean" shirt got sweaty, it was like the moisture reactivated YEARS of stink. My god. I've never smelled anything like me in that shirt last night. Foul. Truly foul.

This is the shirt in question:

We had to take another photo of the protesters' rat because they've added an ape to the mix! I don't really understand it. But I did take the suggestion of pretending like the drummers were cheering me up the hill instead of annoying the crap out of me, and that mile was my fastest.

Two different people told me they liked my skirt while I was running (one a stranger, the other my friend Jenny whom we ran into on the path - get it? ran into her?).

Also? Not going to lie. I would eat this. You might even say I will eat this:

I know it's disgusting. But it's mac and cheese and a burger. Two delicious things made into one potentially more delicious thing. You can't go wrong. (I would forego the fries.) Anyone up for some Denny's this weekend? My treat. Serious offer.*

*Denny's must be accessible from NYC via public transportation or you must provide a ride for me.

Things I Do Not Like, August edition

2011-08-31T07:45:00.004-04:00

-Daily Mile. I don't get it; I like my social networks social and my running logs data-filled. Stalk my running log if you're bored, but I don't really need 50 of my friends affirming my every run. Not to knock it if it's your thing, but it's not really my thing.

Maybe I should start the anti-Daily Mile, where you can only give demotivation. You can give me a little thumbs-down and a comment like, "You quit at 4m, Tracy? You could have done 6. Lazy ass." In fact, I would encourage you right now to go and review my training log and then mock me mercilessly for the (numerous) holes you'll see. Obvious starting points: no long runs more than 14m in months; two weeks in July with mileage under 20m; highest monthly mileage so far this year in June. If anyone - anyone - tries to tell me that it's okay! and I'm doing great anyway! I will... well, I'll give you a mean look of consternation and beat myself up some more.

-People who throw around the term "fatties" all willy-nilly to disparage others. But we're all runners! So we're all thin! And fat people, well, they just deserve it, amirite? I mean, if I see them eating ice cream, it must mean that they eat ice cream, like, all the time! And that's why they're fat! But, Tracy, it's okay that you like ice cream, because you're a runner!

Listen: be concerned about someone if you know they have a weight problem and it's affecting their health. Be concerned about our society's miserable food habits that are systematically creating an obesity epidemic. But discrimination is discrimination, and that visceral negative reaction you have when you see an overweight person eating (or sitting on the subway, or sweating, or doing anything that loads of people of all weights do) is discrimination. I'm not going to try to convince you that every overweight person has a thyroid condition or has just lost 100 pounds and has another 100 to go, but I am going to try to convince you to not be a dick. And your jokes about "fatties" are dick-ish. Helping to make healthy food choices affordable for everyone will help people lose weight. Mocking overweight people or creating a culture of hostility based on weight won't.

-The obnoxious blister on the outside of my right big toe that hurts like nothing else and won't go away. Any tips?

I'm too tired from a(nother) week night long run to do anything more than regurgitate stuff I've read on the internet for you

2011-08-30T07:35:00.001-04:00

First off, not something I read on the internet but instead something I'm tired of seeing on my runs:

This bad boy has been parked on the main loop of Central Park, on the east side by the Boathouse. I'm not anti-union by any means, but I am anti-really loud drummers and guys yelling at me when I'm just trying to enjoy my run. Read more about the labor dispute here. I do give them props for renting the classy rat-in-a-suit balloon.

Next, if you're an apple geek, you might appreciate this story of a runner who ran the apple logo in homage to Steve Jobs (h/t @jheath). I have an ipad (I'm sorry, iPad) and two MacBooks, but that is way beyond me.

Not beyond me? Beer. I like it, as you know. Studies have shown that non-alcoholic beer helps in recovering after distance running - please let's test the alcoholic beer next, okay?

But don't worry about your beer belly. First off, running can help that gut - better than weights can. But if you just still can't lose that last bit of stomach, just get some new Spanx workout clothes! You can't make this stuff up.

Well, that was that

2011-08-29T07:56:00.004-04:00

Hurricane Irene came and went with fortunately few casualties. Unfortunately, amongst those casualties were both of the races I was registered for this weekend. Mayor Bloomberg rescinded all permits for public events on Saturday and Sunday, so I sat on my couch like a lump in lieu of racing. Or running. Or doing anything that wasn't "eating junk food and pretending like the impending natural disaster made it okay."

But now for some controversy. Well, sort of. Because, you see, the NYRR's policy is to not offer refunds in case of race cancellations.

This is a standard policy with races, as most of us know. Many of the costs are sunk, including the permit, the t-shirts, the bibs, the Gatorade, the labor, etc. But that didn't stop many people on the NYRR facebook page from complaining about the profiteering NYRR and their greed for race fees.

I get the policy. I read the small print before I checked the "I agree to these terms" box and I wasn't one of the complainers. But... it would be nice if they acknowledged it somehow. I was registered for two races that were canceled in one weekend, and both of these race registration fees were expensive (by NYRR standards). Instead, their acknowledgment of the cancellation came via email:

As you see, the email is three sentences: 1) race is cancelled, 2) YOU GET NO MONEY BACK SO DON'T EVEN ASK YOU GREEDY GREEDY PERSON, 3) be safe! I might have liked an apology thrown in there. With a refund, you see, I could have bought more, better junk food for the weekend.

My weekend is ruined. RUINED!

2011-08-26T08:05:00.003-04:00

Original plan: 5k Saturday morning, half marathon Sunday.

New plan: 5k Saturday morning (hopefully), stay inside and batten down the hatches through Monday morning, long run Monday evening.

Source

The mayor preemptively canceled all permits for any event being held Sunday, city-wide, in order to clear the roads in case of an evacuation - thus the half is not happening.

I'll admit: I was secretly more than a little relieved to hear that. I'm no wuss and I would have run in the hard rain and heavy winds, but I would have hated every minute of it. And when you're shooting for something in the 2:15-2:30 range for a half finish, that's a hella lot of minutes to hate (nearly 150, to be precise).

YAY! ANOTHER MIDWEEK LONG RUN NEXT WEEK! AWESOME!!!!

What is an athlete?

2011-08-25T07:55:00.000-04:00

The other day when I was modeling my running skirt, I looked at the photos and said, "Great photos! I almost look like a runner!" The friend who'd taken the photos gave me a puzzled look and said, "Um... you are a runner." My meaning was not to disparage myself, though. Yes, I am a runner. I say that unequivocally. However, if I were walking down the street next to Shalane Flanagan, you would say, "She looks like a runner!" and we would both know you were talking about Shalane.

Not me.

Then yesterday, while I was thinking about this, I got an email from another friend. He mentioned that twice this past week, people have said to him, "Obviously you're an athlete." Both times he thought they were being rudely sarcastic. Both times they weren't - they were impressed by him.

Now, he's a dear friend so I hope he won't be offended when I say that he doesn't exactly look like Frank Shorter. (Yep, another excuse to google "Frank Shorter shirtless".)

Frank Shorter

I know that athletes and runners come in all shapes and sizes, I do. But isn't perspective a funny thing? In the company of runners, I feel out of place and - yes, I'm going to say it - chubby. But in a non-running community, I'm basically a gazelle.

I'm reminded of a conversation I had once, years ago. I mentioned to a classmate that I was dismayed because my weekly mileage had fallen to about 20mpw, and I wanted to be up closer to 30mpw. This classmate was a casual runner, and he was impressed with my 20mpw. I said, "Yes, but in my circle of friends, 20mpw is not a lot!" His reply? "Sounds like you need to get a new circle of friends."

I felt the earth move under my feet

2011-08-24T07:58:00.002-04:00

To be fair, I felt the floor of my apartment, and the four floors below it, move under my feet. The earth was down there somewhere. It moved. My apartment just kind of wobbled.

But yes, you read that right: I SURVIVED EAST COAST QUAKE 2011.

Of course, my number one thought was not: "Am I okay? Are my pets okay? Is the city okay?" Nor was it even, "Has this shown up on twitter yet?" My number one thought was: "How will this affect my long run?" and its corollary, "Does this mean I don't have to do my long run today? Is it even safe?"

Yeah, of course it was safe. So I did my long run.

It was a gorgeous day and a good, solid run. I ran about 8m down the West Side Highway to meet up with Tara near her office, and then she and I ran back up to the Upper West Side.

But... the run wasn't long enough. That's been the story of this marathon training cycle. My past four or five long runs have all been around 13m, and this weekend will be the same (I'm running a half on Sunday). I wanted to do 15m, but between leaving late (I got an important phone call right as I was walking out the door - why are those always bad news?) and not having a good sense of how long things take me, by the time Tara and I parted ways it was already dark out. I don't like running in the dark, so I got on the subway.

The marathon will be fine - as long as I get my act together and up my long runs. I'm not training for a half, after all.

I only got very nearly hit by two bikes during the run, so I consider it a success. That, and it was also oddly fast (for me). I have found that I'm fastest in the late afternoon/early evening.

I'm not usually an "OMG here's my playlist!" girl. You can choose your own music or, better yet, go without music. But when I walked out of the apartment, iphone in pocket, I decided I wanted to listen to music. I found a mix on my phone labeled "marathon" and I started it up. Can I tell you how much it rocked? Yes, or I can show you.

The best part? This isn't all of it! There's more music left on the playlist for another run! I stand behind it all as awesome, even the two versions of "Boys of Summer." Especially those, in fact - it's the perfect time of year for that song. I will admit to feeling kind of old when Blink-182 started, remembering that my brother and sister played me that song on my 23rd birthday... a decade ago. But! The Cheat is Not Dead (you either get it or you don't).

And I can't be the only one here who's seen Coed Prison Sluts? Like, a bunch of times? And owns the soundtrack? And thinks it's awesome music to run to? (Attn: potentially NSFW. I can't say for sure as nothing fazes me anymore.)

Running Skirts Redux: A REVIEW

2011-08-23T08:09:00.007-04:00

Friday afternoon, one of the most exciting things that's ever happened to me took place (that is not hyperbole, sadly): I went down to check the mail, and I discovered a package from RunningSkirts.

I was confused - I couldn't remember ordering anything. But it was plausible that I would have; I do love me a running skirt. Had I been sleep-shopping? ...again?

I opened the package and, much to my delight, there was an adorable skirt and a pair of arm warmers,* compliments of RunningSkirts, with a nice note inviting me to review the skirt. Don't mind if I do!

Their description of the skirt reads: "Red and mini white polka dot print skirt in lightweight performance fabric. 2 Roomy Velcro closure pockets at the hips. Attached compression shorts with no chafe flat seams have a longer inseam for thigh protection and a fit that does not ride up. Inseam length 6-8".

Let's start with the important details: I think the polka dots are really more pink than white.

I was excited to see how generous the compression shorts were in length (pardon the slippers), so I put the skirt on to test it out.

Pardon the messy house. And - just so we're clear - the foam roller is obviously a prop. Literally: I propped it up for the photo so I'd look like someone who uses a foam roller.

The fit of the skirt is ideal. I love the length of both the skirt and the compression shorts. Their fabric is stretchy with a generous waistband made of the same fabric (no muffin top), which means you can wear it lower on your hips or higher toward your waist as you like. Once I'd adjusted mine, it stayed put. I don't really have a waist, per se, so I can't address how well the waistband would work on those with a more hourglass figure or who typically like a drawstring waist.

As a general note, I've owned two RunningSkirts in the past, and the sizing was slightly inconsistent between the two. One of the skirts I owned was quite large, so I sized down when I bought the next one - and found it to be, um, figure-skimming (aka tight). Given the stretchy fabric, the smaller size still fit easily. But it looked tight. I just noticed after wearing it to run that this skirt is one size larger than my typical pants size, but it fit well.

What I see as this skirt's biggest drawback is the pockets. Specifically, there are two, one on either side at the hips. They are generous and square with a small piece of velcro to close them.

I'm picky about pockets. I like them, I like a lot of them, and I like them to be secure and tight. I could easily see throwing a gel or two into these pockets, but my keys jangled (because the pocket wasn't quite tight enough) and my iphone fit, but awkwardly. Note that their website calls these "closures" instead of pockets, which I think is apt.

The iphone pocket bulge doesn't look as awkward in this photo as it actually is in real life. The iphone can only fit sideways, which made it difficult to plug my headphones in. Once I started running I didn't really notice anything, though. I even got used to the keys jangling after a few steps. They weren't bouncing but simply making noise.

Also note that the compression shorts are compression in name only - they're not overly tight by any means.

The verdict? After 4 miles, I like this skirt and I will wear it regularly. It's comfortable and the compression shorts didn't ride up, nor did they chafe. In essence, it did exactly what I like my running clothes to do, which is perform well and not give me any reason to think about them. No pulling, no adjusting, no nothing but me and one of the best runs I've had in weeks. And, if you're into that sort of thing, the skirt is also kind of cute. The $68 price tag is steep, but it's not out of line with what running skirts often go for and RunningSkirts does offer sales periodically.

I'm happy to consider myself a Skirthusiast.

But don't take my word for it on this skirt's comfort. If you go over to my friend SillyGirl's blog, you'll see countless photos of her in different versions of this same skirt - a true testament to its wearability. And its versatility! She's about 6' tall and lithe, and I am... not. Yet we both look good in the skirt, if I do say so myself.

(And yes. The green shirt with the red skirt was a little bit "Christmas in August.")

Edited: Carla had a very different experience with RunningSkirts (and with the company) than I did, so be sure to read her review for a different perspective. I haven't worn this skirt for more than 4m, so I can't say whether the shorts would ride up after a longer run (or whether they'll be different after I wash them). If my review changes, I'll update this page.

*Even though the weather today was nice and cool, 75 degrees is still a little warm for arm warmers, so review part two will have to wait.

Now, on this week's agenda...

2011-08-22T07:58:00.000-04:00

Long run Tuesday!! YAY!!! I CAN'T WAIT!!!

That's the special holiday you get to celebrate if you:
a) bail on your Sunday long run
b) are pretending this is a good thing while secretly kind of dreading it
c) are anxious about not having had a solid run longer than ~13m in ages
d) are me
e) all of the above

Yep, I bailed on yesterday's long run. I met Tara and Jenny, intending to do three loops of Central Park. I made it one loop - barely. The weather was bad (hot and humid), but mostly it was that I was bad. I try to use the "what would you do if it was race day?" barometer to convince myself to suck it up on days like this, but yesterday one of the rare days where the answer was "you'd consider DNF'ing and probably just end up walking like 25 miles of the race." I was beat. I went home and took a nap while they ran.

I also skipped my run on Friday, though. I'd planned to go out in the evening, and I was in my running clothes dressed to leave when the sky darkened with a severe thunderstorm warning. I had just read an article about severe thunderstorm warnings, and I just got this sickening sense that running in the rain was okay, but running in a severe thunderstorm was stupid. I asked my brother what to do, and he told me that if I went running, he'd play "If I Die Young" at my funeral (I told you The Band Perry was stuck in my head lately!).

So, tomorrow. Long Run Tuesday. More celebratory photos to pretend I'm cool with it.

Love (of running) is a battlefield

2011-08-19T08:08:00.000-04:00

Why I deserve a medal: After about 5 hours of sleep Wednesday night, a long day at work yesterday, a large meeting I was very stressed out about, and a mandatory two-hour after-work meeting at a place I volunteer, I dragged home about 9pm, exhausted.

But what did I do? I put on my running clothes and went to the gym. I was on the treadmill by 10pm. Because that's what you do when you're training for a marathon.

Why I am actually the weakest link: I spent the entire run watching Jersey Shore, sending emails (you know you're not running fast enough if you can type), and bargaining with myself. The final deal I struck with me: stay on the treadmill for 4m and walk really really fast home and you can count the mile back-and-forth to the gym, calling it a 5m run. I'm on the fence about whether that's cheating or not.

Why it's probably a draw: When I got home, I discovered not one but TWO small blood blisters, one on either foot on my second-smallest toes. The treadmill changes my gait. Yet another reason it's lousy.

So I did the logical thing: I threw my dirty clothes on my roommate's chair and sat down on the couch with a beer. And a Gatorade, for balance.

But, more importantly, can anyone explain to me what my hero Frank Shorter is wearing here? (I can tell you what he's NOT wearing - a wedding ring).

Why lie?

2011-08-18T07:28:00.025-04:00

We're runners. Let's face it; our race times matter.

Usually they are intensely personal and don't matter at all to anyone else but else, but they matter to us.

Personally, I don't lie about my times. One of my life-mottos is WYSIWYG: what you see is what you get. Sometimes I'm not proud of my times, other times I'm ecstatic. Most of you when you see my times probably think that I should go back to playing shuffleboard or whatever else it is that slow people like me do to keep us occupied. I get out of running what I put into it. If I was more dedicated and pushed harder I would see more results. But I'm happy, I'm (mostly) healthy, and I absolutely love running.

Do you compare yourself to others when you run? I don't mean in the pseudo-competitive, "I'm going to pick that person off next" way, but in a serious way? Or are you competing with yourself and your expectations?

To stop beating around the bush: what would drive someone to lie about their race times?

If you're going to do something public like tweeting about your running and racing or blogging about it, you owe your readers some honesty. Misrepresenting yourself on your blog is disingenuous and dishonest. As is moderating your comments to such an extent that the only comments published are unanimously positive. This creates the (intentionally) false impression that you are a faster runner than you are. And get this (watch out; this is bold) - no one but you actually cares.

One particular blogger I follow has this problem. And it's bad. She blogs anonymously, so the sky is the limit in terms of her hyperbole. Finishing Chicago in 6:48 hasn't kept her from publicly stating that she finished in "around 5:30" or even "about four and a half hours." A half marathon that she finished last year in 2:34? This became "I was on track to run 1:45 until mile 11." Honey - unless those last two miles took you more than half an hour each, no you weren't.

I don't want to attract her attention by linking to her, so I won't call her out publicly. But I just don't get it. Most of the time she openly buys her bibs on craigslist, which I kind of think is less poor planning and more a ploy to avoid being listed in the race results. A recent race that she did - which she reported as a PR (piecing together her blogs and tweets, you would expect that to be around 2 hours) - was this:

I edited out her name. Please note that the results do include a 17-minute rest room break that she says shouldn't count toward her finishing time. So... I guess it was actually a 2:49? Another race a week later she said was a 2:14, and not a PR. But...

What's wrong with just being you? What's wrong with celebrating the achievement of running a marathon or a half marathon?* Why must you be ashamed and - worse - lie about it?

Let me pass on to you a piece of advice my dad has given me before every marathon I've ever run: "Tracy," he says, "You're not going to win." And you know what? Every race, he's been right. So why lie?

I'm not judging you based on your time. However, I am judging you based on how you report your race. Own your performance. It's yours.**

And now, because they crawled into my brain almost a week ago and won't leave, I present to you the Band Perry:

*And if you know me, you know I'm conflicted on this myself. While I am most absolutely certainly NOT in the "there are real runners and then there are casual runners camp," and while I myself am slow, I do get a little frustrated sometimes by the whole OMG YOU DID IT YOU ARE A HALFATHONER DOESN'T MATTER IF IT TOOK YOU FOUR HOURS!!! attitude.
**I've actually had this post sitting in my drafts for over six months, debating whether or not to post it. I can be a bitchy person sometimes, but it's not really in my nature to publicly direct it at a single target. I feel a little uncomfortable about it, but I actually truly do want to understand the motivation that causes someone to exaggerate their own performances. AND YES I KNOW THE ANSWER IS JUST FOR ME TO STOP READING BLOGS THAT MAKE ME ANNOYED.

Zombies and ultras and two questions for you

2011-08-17T07:29:00.003-04:00

The other day I got a tweet from a former student:

Zombies! I gather this is the latest in the mud run/warrior dash/spartan race fad. An expensive fad. Occasionally a deadly one.

Truth be told, the event kind of sounds like fun. I probably won't do it, partly because of logistics (it's outside of Baltimore and I'm in NYC - although my smug urbanity forces me to pretend like my car-free status is not a hindrance but instead something that makes me better than all of you oil dependents) and partly because of the price: $67 for a 5k? With "obstacles," so I won't even PR? It's for fun, right. Fun.

But if I understand correctly, it's not really a race per se. If you want to know how I feel about racing for "fun," read this post of Sarah's and my comments on it (I'm the first commenter).

So, question 1: what do you think of these "adventure" races - would you do one or have you done one (and was it fun)?

Zombies aside, you know what I might do? An ultra. I mean, I will do one at some point, but I'm starting to creep out of the dreaming stage and into the planning stage. Also on twitter, I was bantering with two friends about upcoming races, and this came up:

Obviously I'd have to start with a 50k like the Swamp Stomper, and the best thing to do would be to piggy-back it off of marathon training... like this fall's marathon training. I feel like I keep waiting to do things like this for a time when I'm much, much faster than I am at present.

Clue phone, it's for Tracy: you're never going to be that much faster. Plus, ultras have really good food at the aid stations.

So, question 2: Have you ever done an ultra, and (whether or not you have) should I do it?

Blah humbug

2011-08-16T07:40:00.000-04:00

I wanted to update both of you readers on my running, but... My runs have just been kind of there lately, my life outside of running and the blog is also just sort of there, and I find myself in the very very unusual position of not really having anything to say about myself. (That won't stop me from filling several paragraphs of blog with meandering nothingness, mind you.)

But at least I have been running, mostly. I'm still taking antibiotics to cure the sore throat from hell - nearly three weeks ago! My long runs have seemed to stagnate in the 12-13m range for the past few weeks, and running has felt very hard. It's not getting easier, anyway. Still, I've been doing it. I need to kick it into gear, though. And by "it" I mean "myself." I need to kick myself into gear. I need to kick myself, period. Snap out of it, Tracy!

Now, I'm sure it's totally unrelated that I'm writing this from the couch with a chocolate chip cookie in hand. And it's not the first time lately I've been in this position, either. Not even the first time today. They're double chocolate chip, actually. Remember: correlation ≠ causation.

This weekend, though, I got some good running in. On Friday I ran to Trader Joe's, where the cashier made me feel like a badass when he was impressed with my 4m jog. "You ran here? From Harlem? Damn!"

Quit giving me that haughty look, you skinny freak

On Saturday I did a long run with my friend Renee down Summer Streets and onto the West Side Highway. I'd love to gush about how the weather was perfect and Summer Streets was amazing and it was one of those runs that just glowed, but truthfully? The company was great but the run itself was hard.

Now her haughty look seems more disdainful as Renee cozies with her life partner.

On Sunday, I met Mz. Duffy for a loop of Central Park. Good company, good conversation, and steady rain made for an amazing run. This one I actually could gush about, but just use your imagination.

After the rain run, on Sunday afternoon, I had a massage. On Sunday night I slept nine hours. Huh. Guess I was tired?

2011-08-12T08:38:00.002-04:00

Um, so, um, yeah, I think I may have gotten a saddle sore riding my bike on Monday. I'm just going to leave it without any further elaboration lest the conversation turns any more indelicate than it already is. But I may go down as the first person to ever get a saddle sore from riding her bike for less than an hour. Please recommend your favorite powders/gels/lubes to help a girl out. (Clearance bike shorts from REI are already en route.)

Other than that, I'm putting together a list of my dream races. A comment yesterday pointing out this race (8 Tuff Miles) got me thinking about it... Late winter vacation?

Definitely on my dream race list:

Pikes Peak (the Ascent)
now the Pikes Peak Road Ascent, too
the Mt. Lemmon Marathon
okay, fine, the Nike Women's Marathon is on there
the NYRR Knickerbocker 60k
since this is a dream list, I may as well throw Comrades on there (but the down course. I'm not a total martyr!)

Incidentally, something that Comrades does (per their Wikipedia page) is pretty interesting: you get a different medal depending on your finish time. Honestly? Even though all of my medals would be made of tin, or plastic, or whatever other crappy alloy they gave to slowpokes, I like that. Why not make the medals actually have some meaning?

It's weird how attracted I am to hill races, when I don't particularly like running hills. Any dream races you'd include that I haven't?

Updated: Majo points out in the comments that I left out the Swiss Alpine Ultramarathon. Yeah, I did, because I'm not crazy. But I do know someone who is, so do check out Christel's report of the race. (Actually, maybe it should be on my dream list - it does seems gorgeous, and she makes it sound easy!)

Sometimes New York is cool

2011-08-11T07:50:00.003-04:00

Ever since I saw someone who was either Alec Baldwin or a crazy man (or... both?) on a bike on my normal running path a few weeks ago, I've been on hyper-alert for celebrity sightings. And lo and behold! Yesterday evening, running around the reservoir with Tara, I saw one!

Chris Noth! At first I wasn't sure it was really him - Tara had just told me on Sunday that she had seen him recently, so I was afraid he was on my mind and the guy I saw was just a random older dark haired dude. I got a good look at him and immediately turned to Tara to say something intelligent like, "OMG wasithim didyouseethat?" Another girl ran up behind us, saw my mini freakout, and said, "It was totally him."

And if your google autofills "Chris Noth sweaty" from now on, you can know that I had something to do with that. Apologies. The best I could do was a beach picture - and he looks waaaaaay older than that in real life. And he was wearing a shirt.

If you're looking for more memes, this time about healthy living bloggers, head over to Angry Runner's page and look at the ones I'm proud to say I helped her come up with. And then, while you're at it, head over to Bridget's blog and tell her what you think about money-making races that turn themselves into parties, breeding undertrained people who are "experiencing" the event rather than "racing" it: yay or nay? (I hope I don't have to tell you what I think.) And then, while you're clicking, head over to Geek Girl's blog and give her some support - she's going through one of those messed up situations that really helps to put your life in perspective.

I wish I'd known about this sooner!

2011-08-10T08:26:00.000-04:00

And also I wish I was better at running hills, and didn't have a job that precludes heading to Colorado that weekend. While I'm at it I wish I was 20 pounds lighter and maybe blonder, too. You know what? While I'm daydreaming, make me a millionaire, too.

I will do this race - and the "real" Pikes Peak Ascent - someday, mark my words. More info about the race here.

Who am I?

2011-08-09T07:50:00.000-04:00

I learned a very, very valuable lesson yesterday:
Bike shorts exist for a reason.

Yes, I went for a bike ride yesterday. A real bike ride - not on a spin bike in a studio, and not because I was on my way somewhere. And yes, it was awesome. I finally know what it's like to pass people (even if those people were runners while I was on my bike).

Why on earth did I do that?

Well... I'm maybe, maybe contemplating a multi-sport event. A duathlon. I mean, I love guns and I've cross-country skied a bunch, so... (that joke never gets old, does it!)(what? it's old already? huh.) A 2m run, 12m bike, and 2m run? I can probably do that, right? I haven't registered yet, but what's tipping me over the edge is their "fat tire" division, which accommodates slowpokes like me on their commuter bikes.

A little pep email from Ms. Duffy (she was right - gaining speed on the downhills does make the uphills not as bad) and I headed to Central Park for a loop. I was kind of nervous about it; not only was I afraid I'd have to walk my bike up Harlem Hill (stop laughing! it didn't happen), but there's been some tension between the police and cyclists in the park lately. Cops have been issuing $270 tickets for cyclists who don't stop at red lights in the park - even during the park's car free hours and when there are no pedestrians around.

I didn't get a ticket.

But I did get some insight into one of the bigger problems in the park: tourists are assholes. They ride their rented bikes the wrong way in the running lane. They cross the street whenever they want in groups of 10-20. They think that making eye contact with me as I fly down a hill means I'll stop for them. And worst: they ignore the stoplights completely. Hey, cops, here's an idea! Ticket the tourists.

Their jerkiness made me into a right asshole. As I rode through green lights in the park, narrowly missing tourists, I started yelling, "You have a red light" at them. Most of them looked confused, having not even seen the lights. One guy yelled back, "I know - I ignore them!" Ein Stuhl in der Hölle for you, tourist.

Should I do the duathlon? I can't decide. If I do, however, I make you a promise that these are things you will not see on this blog:

No gratuitous pictures of me in spandex. Actually, no pictures of me in spandex, period.
For that matter, no panda shots. I don't care how cute your adorable skirt and cowboy boots look, if you are on a bike, safety is a priority. PUT THE CAMERA DOWN.
No gushing, loving posts talking about how amazing biking is (except this one). I have a hybrid commuter bike and it's okay, but it's not great. I will never be a great cyclist on it.

2011-08-08T08:43:00.001-04:00

Some of you may have already seen this, but it's quite interesting so I'm happily reposting it. Over the weekend, on the New York Road Runners facebook page, someone posted two links to information about being a bandit catcher for the NYCM.

There was an article in the New York Times three years ago, and in 2006 someone posted on a listserv a detailed description of what it was like to do this.

Interesting reading.

People see banditing as a victimless crime, and to some extent it is. But then again, it's not. Course limits are there for a reason, for one thing, and then for another thing: participation in a race is a privilege we pay for. I agree in particular with the facebook comment that likens banditing to stealing.

As much as I might complain about how hard it is to get into the race, or how expensive it is to get into the race, banditing is not okay. When I ran the last 6 miles of the Chicago Marathon with my sister (for her first!), they offered me a medal at the end - which I declined. Personally, and you might disagree, I see a difference between a friend jumping in to run part of the course with you (as long as they are respectful and don't take aid) and someone deliberately trying to run a race they haven't registered for.

Step one in training for a race is figuring out how to register for it, and doing that. There's no glory in finishing a race you're banditing, even if they do give you a medal at the end. You've taken aid that was intended for those of us who paid, you've congested an already busy course further, and you've cheated, plain and simple.

One of my favorite things to read around marathon time is this blog, where Jonathan Cane tracks down people who have cheated the NYCM. It's kind of shocking to me how many people cut the course.

Now, personally, I think more races should have a legal bib transfer system to help prevent banditing - but that's another complaint for another day! Speaking of which, anyone have an MCM bib they want to (legally) sell me?

I know it's a disappointment, but...

2011-08-05T07:54:00.000-04:00

I will not be participating in the Jamaica Underwear Run tonight.

I know, I know: most of you will probably be devastated that you won't be able to tune in on Monday to see pictures of me in my underwear,* but I screwed up the dates and I have my monthly book club meeting tonight. I'm also so inundated with work that I probably won't be able to go to my book club, either.

So if anyone wants to run it, pretend you're me and collect my registration packet. I think you get free boxers at the end! The Naked Cowboy will be there!

*This is basically what I would have looked like. Totally, right? I even own that outfit! (Okay, maybe not. But I have some twine, pink underwears, and a piercing facial expression.)

Things I thought while running in the rain last night

2011-08-04T07:58:00.001-04:00

Miles 1-2
Yay! Running in the rain! This is fun! It's like you're a kid again! You must know some songs about rain, Tracy! What are they? Oh, right:

Look - another runner! Oh, she's unfriendly. Listen. You and I are the only runners around for miles. You can smile back at me, lady.

OMG, there are no runners around for miles. Could I be appearing on a "ripped from the headlines" episode of Law & Order: SVU next season? Okay, better be more aware of your surroundings... there are a lot of bushes here. Lots of places for bad guys to hang out.

Mile 3
Okay, phew, a cyclist. I'm not alone. Wait - is he wearing white bike shorts? Really? In the rain? White? You go on with your bad self, I guess.

The West Side Highway under the George Washington Bridge smells a lot like wet dog tonight. If that wet dog were vomiting and defecating at the same time.

New music! What other songs do you know about rain? Well, there's Prince:

No, I don't know any of the words to that song besides the chorus. But there's always - oh, no, oh no -

Mile 4
Must. Get. That. Song. Out. Of. My. Head. Replacement:

Okay, it's not about rain. But it's got a good cadence, I know all the words, and if you sing the chorus as "rain, rain" instead of "dance, dance," it works.

They're from Chicago! My brother's friends have partied with them! I wonder if it's true what my brother told me, that the lead singer always wears a hat because he's bald? While I'm on it, I wonder what really broke up Pete Wentz and Ashley Simpson? And I wonder if Pete Wentz was really upset that his penis pictures leaked, or if he's secretly another Anthony Weiner? [ed. note: it would be embarrassing to admit how much time I spent on this topic.]

Mile 5
The leggies are feeling very fresh tonight! No, you did not just say "leggies," not even when you were having a conversation with yourself, did you really now?

Home - home - home - almost there.

Blah blah blah, something about regretting the runs you don't do and not the runs you do, blah blah, rain is refreshing, blah blah blah.

A race, or a rock concert?

2011-08-03T07:49:00.000-04:00

When I was in junior high and high school, if we wanted to go see a big concert we had to get tickets the day they went on sale. This meant a trip to the mall (where the Ticketmaster outlet was) first thing on a Saturday morning, where we could stand in line to get a bracelet that gave us the ability to go back at 9am, when the tickets went on sale, to buy the tickets.

Okay, so maybe the shows I went to in high school didn't always sell out.

By college, the process had shifted to the computer. Now, you had to be online right at 9am, clicking furiously through and entering the right codes before the scalpers did. It was always a gamble - how popular would the concert be? How many tickets were available? Could you still get them at 9:15, 10am, the next day? And of course if you missed the window and the tickets sold out, you could always buy them at a mark-up from a scalper.

I really liked the Judybats.

On Sunday, I mentioned that race registration for the Flying Monkey Marathon would open Monday morning at 9am. And at 9am, it opened. Then, at 9:04, registration for the race promptly closed. (Actually, it closed at 9:03 and 58 seconds.) Last year, the race sold out in 32 minutes.

What gives? It's a small race, limited to about 250 participants. And the race director allows early registration for last year's finishers (myself included, this year), which accounts for a few entries. But mostly it was just demand, plain and simple. It's a great race that's had some well-deserved good publicity. People were ready at 9am.

This isn't an isolated problem, though. Demand for race entries in general is high. We saw this with Boston. Also, RnR/Competitor keeps buying and adding races and then jacking the fees (and worse, we pay them). What's the solution? (Please, please don't say "increase race fees." Yes, I did take econ in college, but no, I do not want to be priced out of any more races!)

This week in long runs

2011-08-02T07:42:00.002-04:00

Have you seen Disney's Cinderella? I dreamt about having a great long run, and this Sunday, I got my wish.

That was exactly my long run this weekend. The birds were chirping, the sky was wide-open and blue, the sun was shining down on us, kissing our shoulders with warm and cozy happiness. 13 miles of blissful magic with Tara. Exactly what running is supposed to be.

I'm not kidding! It was even the damndest thing - if I hadn't seen it myself, I wouldn't have believed it: a gaggle of river rats (possibly a rat king?) led us down the running path to a drinking fountain and even held down the button for us to fill our water bottles! It was kind of weird and gross at first, but hey, the rats were trying to be nice. I got the impression they liked my skirt. They were curious about Tara's waist-water bottle, too.

Okay, obviously I'm lying. The skirt bit was too much, huh?

It was a good run, though. Even without magic.

Don't feed the trolls

2011-08-01T08:06:00.023-04:00

Last week, I wrote what I thought was an innocuous post entitled "I'm calling you out." It was geared toward a preponderance of blogs I'd seen lately, full of (relative) beginning runners telling their (even less experienced) readers exactly what they should be doing.

I thought it was pretty obvious that this post was written with a hefty dose of tongue-in-cheek. I mean, for goodness' sake, I write a running blog. I read running blogs. I participate in running forums. I read running books. I go to running classes. When I'm not working or sleeping, I spend probably 75% of my awake time either running or thinking about running. I love getting running advice. Some I take, some I don't. Some I take and then later discard. Some I don't take and then later wish I had.

So, on Friday, someone posted a link to this post on the Runner's World online forums. I'm flattered that she wanted to share my post. But the response! Here are a couple of highlights:

Ah, the internet. Gotta love the trolls. (To be fair, both of these runners later admitted they were being harsh.)

It's generated five pages (and counting) of discussion. I love that something I wrote has caused a lengthy discussion. But... much of the discussion has nothing to do with my blog post at all, and even the people who try to take me to task for what I wrote aren't always basing their critiques off my words. I weighed in twice, against my better judgment, and a few people do take my side (thank you, Aron!!).

My point in the original blog post was that many blog readers consider bloggers to be experts regardless of their experience - and I think this came across to the handful of you who are regular readers of my blog. Unlike what some on RWOL inferred, I don't think that credentials or a paycheck are a guarantee of expertise. However, simply having a blog does not guarantee expertise.

For the record, here is my running advice to you. Write this down, it's good: There's a lot of advice out there. The best thing to do is to figure out - through trial and error - what works for you. What works for you will be different from what works for me. That's it.

Now, if you don't mind, I'm going to tell myself that "any press is good press" and return to doing what I do well, which is running - slowly. Back tomorrow with a lighthearted and inane post that is decidedly not full of advice.

DO IT!

2011-07-31T18:06:00.000-04:00

Register for the Flying Monkey Marathon with me.

The race is on 20 November in Nashville, TN.

Registration opens tomorrow (Monday) morning at 8am CST. Last year, registration was only open for 32 minutes. You will have fun. I will be doing it. You should do it, too.

Yeah, my sister is still here

2011-07-29T07:33:00.003-04:00

But I'm less excited about it.*

See, I arranged yesterday morning for her to run with a group of women around her speed. She's much faster than me, and I knew I'd be holding her back if we ran together the whole time.

We were meeting them at 6:15 at Engineer's Gate. That's on the east side of Central Park and I live on the west side of the city, so the easiest way to get there was to run. No problem! It's a touch over 3m. Oh, wait... that meant waking up at, you know, 5:15. Let me clarify - 5:15 in the morning.

I got my sister up, though, and we sort of shuffled/ran into the park when disaster struck!

[Redacted: my sister made me take out an anecdote here that was very relevant, trust me. She said, "How is that important to anyone?" JUST CLICK THE LINK, OKAY, AND YOU'LL UNDERSTAND.]

Finally at the meeting point a few minutes late, I left my sister with the group. It was originally my plan to shuffle around while they got their run in, but when I got there I promptly decided I needed to go back to bed instead. I went to Starbucks and got a trenta of iced tea and then headed home. (I actually got a large. Trenta is redonk).

When I got home an hour later, my sister was sitting, soaking wet, in the stairwell outside of my apartment.

I asked her how it went, and she was kind of demure. "Oh, I was really dehydrated," she said, sheepishly. What? "I was kind of out of it. Um, I think that they might have thought I was kind of rude," she added. Errr?

I asked her, "Did you get to talk to Maria? She's nice and she's funny, and I think her training plan is a lot like yours!" She said, "Um, not really. Um, no."

I asked her, "Did you compare notes with Susan on your marathons? I think her PR is only about a minute off from yours!" Her, "Um... um, no?"

Me: "Did Megan tell you that she lives in my neighborhood (for now)?" Her: "No, no, um, that didn't come up."

Me: "Did you talk to Kelly? She's a really good friend of mine!" Her: "I'm not really sure which one she was? They all just kind of talked. I didn't really say much."

ARE YOU SERIOUS? In other words, my sister is that girl of the running group. The one that stays apart from everyone else and just kind of lurks.

What the hell, Mandy, what the hell!

*(Just kidding. I mean, my sister is weird, obviously. But my annoyance is meant in good fun.)

My sister's here!

2011-07-28T08:02:00.000-04:00

Nothing to say today because I'm out running with my sister, who's in town from Chicago to visit me (and run in Central Park). Yay!

Christmas 2010. I guess I gave her a colander?

I'm calling you out.

2011-07-27T08:02:00.003-04:00

I'm calling you out.
Well, some of you.
Well, actually probably not any of you who read this.
And I'm not calling you out by name, anyway.

Who am I calling out, then?
I'm calling out bloggers who give training advice.

I'm calling out people who are all "This is what I do, and it worked for me that one time, so this is what you should do, too. Eat this, run that, buy all of this... Trust me."

STOP IT.

I can't tell you what to do. I wouldn't tell you what to do. DO NOT TRUST ME. Sure, if you want advice on something I'm actually professionally qualified to speak on, I'll give it (but first you have to tell me what it is that I'm professionally qualified to speak on) (Hint: nothing).

What I can do is give you anecdotes about me, about my training, about what works for me, about what I like. More often than not this falls into the category of "anti-advice." Cautionary tales.

See, if you've read this blog for more than a day, you know a not-very-well-kept secret: I'm not a very good runner. I have enthusiasm and some modicum of perseverance and absolutely no natural talent. Why on earth would you listen to me if I gave advice, anyway? And I'm not alone! Sure, there are blogs out there by talented runners. But even more of them are by crappy runners, like me. (No links there. You know who you are.)

But that's the rub: a BlogHer study has shown that 88% of blog readers trust the advice they read in blogs. Now, let me tell you a little secret: not only am I not qualified to give you running advice, but neither are most other bloggers. And yet they give advice... by the droves.

And this bothers me.

Clue phone, it's for all of you blog readers: even professional athletes have coaches. Even professional runners (well, minus Ryan Hall) don't profess to have all the running answers but instead listen to someone else's advice.

Or, as Running is Funny said in response to why he doesn't give running advice, "1) Everybody gives running tips; and 2) they are mostly full of crap."

So stop giving advice you're not qualified to give. You're mostly full of crap.

And, for the love of god, NO MORE FOOD PICTURES.

From here.

Mind games

2011-07-25T07:55:00.001-04:00

Saturday: I ran 11m. It was tough. And then it was done.

Oh, did you want more?

Okay, then. There's also this: my mind played games on me during this weekend's long run. Wicked games.

(Maybe not wicked like that.)

Granted, it was in the 80s when we started our long run at 7am. And granted that I had a miserable cold and didn't get enough sleep. And granted... as sad as I am to admit this... I just kind of wasn't feeling it. I haven't been, for a while now.

But this weekend! On one hand, I'm happy that I got an 11m run in. On the other hand, it was hard. When I would stop to walk, my body would instantly yell at me. Dizziness, chills, all of the symptoms of heat exhaustion would hit me. But they were psychosomatic. (I'm pretty in touch with when heat is bad for me and when it's okay, and I wasn't at risk for heat exhaustion. My head just wanted me to think I was so I'd stop.)

It should have been a great run. Kim was in town from Chicago and we met up at the start. The course for the run was multiple loops of Central Park. Around mile 5, I had convinced myself to stop. Not even Kim's company was pushing me through (I felt terrible and Kim was - literally - running circles around me to avoid taking walk breaks). Not even my plans to meet Samantha for brunch after were convincing me to keep running. Just then, I heard someone say, "Are you Tracy?" It was Tara! Meeting her ~~helped me~~ was one of the only things that got me through a second loop of the park. We gossiped,* we walked, we drank a lot of water, we finished 11m. On one of the hottest days in New York history.

So, 11m done. Ugly. But done.

*It's amazing to me that the NYC running community can be so big and so small at the same time. Here we were, two women who knew each other only from the internet, and yet we were able to immediately start talking about other runners we knew (also from the internet). Maybe the NYC running community is big but the NYC internet running community is small?

A few things...

2011-07-22T07:53:00.000-04:00

First off, The Brooklyn Marathon.

Eight laps of Prospect Park.

A much needed marathon in the city's most populated borough, or a crazy, crazy exercise in running in circles? I would kind of lean toward the latter.

The deets: 20 November, in Brooklyn. Only 250 spots, and it was 25% full yesterday. ~~Why anyone would ever want leave Manhattan for a race, I don't know.~~ I'd be there, but I'm going to be running another race in Nashville that day, hopefully. Of course, the super hardcore will be doing 9 laps of Central Park that weekend for the NYRR's lone ultra, the Knickerbocker 60k (last year's link). I will do that race some day. Mark my words.

Secondly, Foot Locker/Runner's World is having their Run Club again this year. Those of you with creepy good memories might remember that I did this program last year and liked it. I'm definitely doing it again this year. (I actually got really squealy and excited when I read their email about it.) If you're curious about my thoughts from last year, you can read them here.

I'm not cool enough to know how to make it that you can click on the picture for a link, so click HERE instead

The deets: every Monday and Wednesday from 25 July (that's three days from now, heads' up) through 14 September. Meets at Columbus Circle at 6:30pm. I'll be there. So will my friend Kate. What more do you need to know?

In case anyone is curious, next week I'll share some of my thoughts on the Jack Rabbit program I've been doing for the past eight weeks and how it compared to this program. If I make it through the weekend, that is.

Thirdly, the NYRR long training run that I'll be doing tomorrow has been scaled back. Originally it was to be a 20m run with paces up through 11 minute miles, meaning that the slowest group would be out running for nearly 4 hours. They're asking the pace groups to back off by 30 seconds per mile and closing the run off at 3 hours, which thanks to the logistics of the run (it's a multi-loop course) could be as little as 11 miles.

I'm cool with that. As I write this, it's 11:30pm and the temperature is 90 with a heat index of 100. I'm no hero. I'll scale back.

But I have a question and I need advice: I have a miserable, miserable cold (I know; nothing more fun than a summer cold!). Any tips on running with a cold? On knowing when it's okay and not okay?

it would be remiss of me not to talk about the weather

2011-07-21T07:52:00.004-04:00

On occasion you'll hear me blustering about how I used to live in Egypt, and how because of this, hot weather doesn't phase me.

Bullshit. I hate the heat more than anything in the world. Take me out of air conditioning for more than maybe three minutes at a time and I turn into a sweaty, sweltering, cranky hot mess. And making me run in it? Yeah. Most days I start sweating even before I start running. That's hot, right?

Still, the heat is responsible for one of my favorite memories from growing up: the Heat Wave of 1995.

No, the heat wave itself is not a pleasant memory. In fact, I still shudder (literally) thinking about it. I was about to leave Illinois for college, and we didn't have central air in our house. It was miserable. My mom, my brother, and I sweated through it, mostly by yelling at each other and by running the heck out of a window unit, taking a lot of showers, and praying for no brownouts to affect our power.

Nearly 1000 people died that summer because of the heat. It was a massive public health crisis. One of my brother's good friends at the time participated in a benefit event, with her youth choir singing to raise money for the cause.

That's where the humor comes in. My brother and I promptly put together a list of songs we suggested to her that she sing. Not only did she not think it was funny, but she was really, really angry about it. The angrier she got, the funnier we found it to be. It got such that either of us humming one of these songs instantly sparked a fit of giggles.

What can I say? We're terrible people with a dark sense of humor that tends to make us laugh when uncomfortable.

Here are our suggestions:
-Summer in the City, the Lovin' Spoonful
-Hot hot hot, Buster Poindexter
-The Heat is On, Glenn Frey
-Heat Wave, Martha and the Vandellas
-Cruel Summer, Bananarama
-Hot Child in the City, Nick Gilder
-This wasn't around in 1995, but I think I'd have to add Hot in Herre, Nelly. (I cleared it with my brother. He laughed.) My brother also added Sex on Fire, Kings of Leon and Burnin' Up, the Jonas Brothers, but I'm rejecting those two as I don't like Kings of Leon and I'm embarrassed that a grown man knows a Jonas Brothers song.

Now, whenever there's a miserable heat wave like the one we're under,* I think to myself, "You're not dead," and then I think, "Remember those songs." And I laugh. I LAUGH IN THE FACE OF A TRIPLE DIGIT HEAT INDEX. It never gets old.

What songs am I missing? What would you add to the list?

Also, thank you for all your thoughtful comments yesterday. I did go out and run yesterday evening and again this morning. They were good runs with good company, but they only confirmed that I need to run more and more and more.

*I know corn futures are tied to the economy and all, but I'm just going to put it out there and say I really don't care about the crop yield when 22 people are already dead and predictions say this heat wave could be as bad as 1995. I may laugh when I hear songs about heat, but the heat wave itself was no joke. There were morgue trucks. The morgues couldn't hold all of the bodies, so they set up refrigerated trucks in the parking lots. Yeah. Makes me really, really not care if I don't have corn on my plate this August.

Why was I crying on a park bench the other day?

2011-07-20T08:49:00.001-04:00

Why? Beats me. But, I'll tell you how I got there.

My plan for the weekend was this: Saturday morning, try out the Nike Marathon Training Group (out of Niketown) and see if that could be my long run; Sunday morning, run with the NYRC Marathon Training Group - for my long run if need be, or just for a recovery run otherwise.

I'd heard that the Nike runners were a large group and that they were more friendly to slower runners. They also have a policy of not leaving the last runner behind, which I like. So, I was excited.

I'd run with them once before, and it was an odd experience, enough so that I never returned. I think it may have been before I started this blog. It was the middle of winter, cold and dark, and we were running an out-and-back 4m. A little before the turn around, I noticed the last Nike pacer was kind of circling around near the woman who had to have been the very last runner. The woman was struggling. I stopped to walk, more to see if this woman needed company than for myself. And she did! (When I say the pacer was circling around near here, that's literal - she'd run ahead, run back, stop and stretch, run back.)

It turns out this woman had never run before in her life, but some coworkers had told her to try the Nike group since they're encouraging of all abilities. She was wearing a cotton sweatshirt, yoga pants, and older shoes. We walked together for a bit - just long enough for the pacer to think we were friends and to wander farther afield.

Now, I was stuck. Frankly, I didn't want to walk the 2m back to the store with this woman. But, I didn't see how I could abandon her. I tried everything: "We'll feel warmer if we run!" or, trying to get the pacer's attention and point out to her that I didn't know this woman. Finally, the pacer came over by us and started small talking.

She mentioned something about a race she'd done recently, and I murmured the polite, "oh, that's so impressive," that was called for. And here's what the pacer said: "Oh, you'll get there. Coming out today is a great start. Soon you'll be able to run the full 4m, and then someday a 10k, and if you keep trying, maybe even a marathon eventually! You don't have to run fast to get to the finish, you know."

Yeah, I know. Trust me, I know.

I wasn't offended by her comment so much as by the fact that she didn't even listen to us enough to catch on that a) we weren't friends, and b) I actually was a runner capable of running 4 (or more!) miles. I don't hold it against Nike or against that particular pacer. But it was annoying.

So, Saturday. They do have a large group, and the plan was to run 10m around Central Park. My typical pace for long runs (and I wanted to add a few miles on post-Nike) has been around 11 minute pace, and with the hills of Central Park I was thinking I'd scale that back to 11:15 or 11:30, even (it was hot). When they divided us up into groups for pacing, the last group was planning to run a 10 minute mile pace.

Whoa, there. I can't do that. My fastest pace for Central Park during a 4m race is 9:52. My 10m race PR is 10:30.

I told the pacer that I'd be the last, and she said she'd keep an eye out for me. She meant that literally - every little bit she'd glance over her shoulder and make sure I was still there.

So there I was, during a hot part of the day (they don't start until 9, which was actually more like 9:15 or 9:30), running a course I hate, all by myself.

I tried to pull it together and salvage the run. I knew it wouldn't be my long run, but could it at least be a decent tempo run? The first mile, with the stupid Cat Hill, was 10:08 by my watch - and I was a ways behind the group. By mile 2 (slowed to 10:20 on my watch), I couldn't even see the group anymore. I was done and I decided to run home. The pacer had turned around to run back to me, so I told her that the group was too fast for me and that my run was over and I'd be leaving Central Park. She looked confused; I could tell she didn't know how to handle the situation and I felt kind of bad about it, but I couldn't keep up.

So I left Central Park at 100th St., sat down on a park bench in the middle of the intersection of Amsterdam and 100th, and felt the tears. Tears that I'm a crappy runner, tears that I couldn't keep up with that group, tears that my long run was bagged, tears that I ran TWO TIMES last week because of this stupid funk.

I got it together after a few minutes (okay, actually after I was kicked off the bench by some guy watering flowers) and I ran home - the second half of the run was actually pretty great.

But that's where I'm at. I'm determined that this week will be better and I'll get myself together. Starting... tonight after work. When I run. Hold me to it.