Spring Classic Report

In typical Nic fashion I was up and ready to go with plenty of time to spare, but still late out the door as I headed out for Green Bay for the Dick Lytie Spring Classic. To top things off, I set down my water bottle on the passenger seat and didn't realize the top wasn't tightly fastened for about 10 minutes. So much for hydrating on the way to the race!
I then proceeded to get lost on the way into the UW-GB campus where the race starts, resulting in my arrival roughly 3 minutes before the start. Luckily, I've had some experience with this type of chaos on race mornings, so it didn't really matter to me.
Race conditions were 25 degrees with 15 mph winds out of the North. The course starts out on campus, then heads North for the first 7 miles, going up and down some serious hills, before returning to the start. Because of this, I was pretty excited to have the wind coming from the North so I could finish with a decent kick.

I was in shorts, no gloves (forgot them), no hat (forgot it), and a very thin long sleeve shirt--very underdressed to be standing around outside. Luckily, as I mentioned, I didn't have long to wait to get running (sidenote: I'm completely AMAZED I remembered the 405. My last couple runs have inevitably involved me returning home after about a mile because, while I always remember the HR chest bra, I somehow seem to always forget the damn watch! Insert joke here about me always remembering my bra...), and in no time I was off. Despite a technical mishap which didn't start my watch for about 10 seconds, I was simply excited to get running. Early on I kept an eye on my HR and tried to "cruise" as much as possible through the first mile. No such luck. Mile 1: 6:45. I was hoping for 7:15 miles for the first half, then finishing in sub 7 minute miles after that. This spring I haven't run more than 5 sub-7 miles so I didn't have much hope of really blazing out of the gate at this run.
Mile 2 has the course climbing the first of the many hills to leave the campus. I made sure not to go flying up this hill (like most of the runners around me), and my pace dropped off a bit, along with my place, after being passed by about 10 runners. At this point the 3 mile portion of the event seperates from the half-marathoners, so you've got an idea of who you'll be running with most of the time. Mile 2: 7:18.
Mile 3 and 4 take you North (straight into the headwind) and along this way I just remember thinking to myself to stay loose, keep an even pace, and don't work really hard into the wind. I accomplished this by doing my best to not pass anyone and stay some distance behind them...so as not to be accused of "drafting." (sidenote number 2: what exactly IS the etiquitte on that? anyone?) These miles clicked away relatively fast and I was suddenly at the huuuge downhill at mile 5. I love this part of the course, as you descend for a good mile and have a great chance to simply let your stride lengthen and really speed up. I can remember seeing my current pace at 5:15 at one point. I passed about 5 runners on this downhill. After flying by them going down a hill, I knew I couldn't let them pass me again, so the mental game was on. I wasn't through 6 miles yet but was already thinking about my position. Mile 5: 6:21 pace.
In mile 6 I was once again heading straight into the wind and mentally preparing for the 7th mile, in which you head back up the huge hill you got to enjoy in Mile 5. I continued to run smooth, keeping my eye on my HR (always in the 160's) and knowing that I really wanted to push things from mile 8 home, as I'd have the wind at my back for the most part and it would be mainly flat or downhill.
As soon as I turned off of Nicolet Ave of Mile 6 I was working uphill. I kept my pace steady and made my way up the hill. The entire Mile 7 found me drawing two runners ahead of me back in--orange shirt guy and navy everything (hat, shirt, pants) guy. Game on!
Mile 7 saw my pace rise to almost 10 minute miles by the top of the hill (7:06 overall pace) but put a huge smile on my face as I got to the top. Time to get moving! Somewhere between Miles 8 and 9 I passed orange shirt guy and set my sights on Navy Blue Guy. He was about 30 feet ahead of me at this point. I continually pushed harder and harder with each mile, seeing my pace go 7:06, 6:56, 6:33, 6:33. Unfortunately, Navy Blue Guy's pace did the same thing. Ugh. I was flabbergasted I hadn't gained any ground, but that was the case. Mile 11 comes with a big downhill and a run back onto the UWGB campus. I really pushed it down that hill and thought I would finally break this guy. Mile 11 was run at 6:06 (by far the fastest mile I've run in 2009), but I couldn't get closer than 10-15 feet. I continued to push, running 12 and 13 in 6:23 and 6:21, but still never got any closer. As soon as I crossed the finish line, Navy Blue was waiting for me to congratulate me and thank me for pushing him that hard. I returned the thanks, as there was no one visible ahead or behind us, so it was a mutual "push" that brought us home. To run that PR on that hilly of a course (short course, though) was a big boost to what had recently been a kind of crappy spring training season. The McMillan pace calculator has a 1:25 half marathon about equal to a 2:59 full...so there you have it, that's my goal for Grandma's. My AvgHR of 167 is probably a bit high to be sustainable for much more than 15 miles, though.
I'm excited to keep going! My total miles for the week rounded out at 45. This week I'd like to head into Saturday (when I'll be running the Trailbreaker Marathon) with at least 25 miles, so that I'll have over 50 for the week. The marathon will also give me some time on trails for the Chippewa 50K (the middle 6 miles of the course are on the Ice Age Trail, and you have to climb a 40 foot tower and the mid-way point). It'll also provide more info on my HR zones. I can't wait to get down there and run!

1:25:18 (6:30 pace)
7th Overall
One Coffee Mug for placing in my 19-29 age group.

Great Run!

I ran the "half marathon" this morning in 1:25 and change...a PR no matter how you cut it. The course, just like last year, was short, but I'm not sure how short or what my exact time was due to a snafu with the Garmin. More info to share in a bit.

MidWeek RunDown

I just finished my scheduled Thursday Thurteen and it went well! I'm currently rehydrating with Orange Slices, youth soccer style. They're not being chased by Capri Sun, however. In my preparations for the Chippewa 50K, I'm using the race-sponsored post-race refreshment.

My total thus far for the week is 29 miles, all at a good pace, so things are looking up heading into the weekend. Finally, some decent miles...

Up next is the Dick Lytie Spring Classic this Saturday. Last year I ran a 1:28 on a short course due to weather. This year...well, last time I checked, snow was in the forecast. I'm hoping I'll have a running partner up there again, whether it be Roy or Jerry, but we'll see!

Strictly Running-Related Information.

Not even any links to Glaven's site. Oh, never mind. Not even any rips on Glaven (but I did find one for Viper).

Wednesday was 10 at 7:26 pace, AvgHR of 164.

On Thursdays I'm trying to run a bit longer, so I've been aiming for "Thursday Thurteens." This week it was actually almost 15, but the run really sucked. It seemed pretty windy outside (12-15 mph), so I started out running into it. This resulted in my pace slowing, and my body getting a little chilled. Finally, after reaching the turnaround point, I had the wind at my back. Unfortunately, this resulted in my getting really warm, running out of water, and feeling like just walking back home. Yeck. 15 miles, 7:54 pace, AvgHR of 164.

After feeling crappy the rest of Thursday, I took Friday off and got back at it Saturday morning with an hour of yoga with Ellie (I am terribly inflexible in the hips so this was fantastic), and then in the afternoon I ran from our home in Kiel to Ellie's parents' home in Plymouth. Again, I felt crappy most of the run, but actually ran better than I thought I would. 15 miles, 7:29 pace, 154 AvgHR.

Finally, today I took my new bike out for a test ride. I covered 9 miles and definitely need to get it fitted properly. Despite the low seat and odd handlebar position (I was most comfortable in the complete tuck position), I managed a 14 mph ride and really felt it in the legs. Now that I own a bike, I've really been working my mind for a good way to work in a joke about Glaven's recumbent bike, but I'm drawing a blank. Then again, after his afternoon binge, perhaps he could use the break.

Having some work at the office still littering my desk from Friday, I decided to get it done today. There's nothing like walking in to a clean desk on Monday morning. 2 miles to the office in 13:18, 2 miles back in 13:42. I was pleasantly surprised with that pace. Still though, what happened to my speed? Yikes!

Now, it's on to beer. I need to be sure to train properly for the Chippewa Duathlon. First, the run, and then the second half of the Duathlon...the beer drinking.

This week I managed 47 miles and am feeling it in the legs. Next Saturday I'm signed up for a Half-Marathon and would like to go into that run with about 30 miles on my legs. I'm excited to see how I run at it.

In other news, both Marquette and Bucky got eliminated from the Tournament. Louisville and Pitt are still alive, so my Bracket is still relatively intact. And despite Bucky losing, at least they made it further than the Suckeyes.

Spring is Here! (?)

I'm pretty much completely dooming any chances of the wonderful weather the upper midwest is experiencing to continue, but despite that, the winter picture above has been replaced with something more "springy." This weekend was beautiful, and I got a little over excited and tried to put in some solid miles on the trails. While last Thursday the weather was fantastic and the trails were great, the warm weather took away the solid footing and turned it into mud. Any North-facing hills/valleys were still covered by a foot of sno-cone-like slushy snow, and the South-facing hills were mudslides (because they were exposed to the sun, Glaven.) In an hour and a half I covered about 8 miles on Saturday. Sunday I returned to the trails but cut the run short after 45 minutes, when I was completely soaked from the knee down. This morning, after reading that Helen wants to race the Chippewa 50k* , I knew I had to keep the mileage up, so I covered 5 in about 37.
As I mentioned, Ellie's birthday arrives tomorrow, and I've already gotten her a gift! D@mn I'm good! Last summer she took a business trip to San Francisco and visited a cousin of her's while out there. The cousin took her on a 42 mile road bike trip despite the fact she'd never--never--ridden a road bike. She absolutely loved it and has been asking for one since. Happy Birthday to her...and me.
You see, if only she got a road bike, she'd have nobody to ride with. So I needed to get one too. Just another example of me being a great hubsband.
And because she never reads this blog anymore, I can also share with all of you that I'm getting her another gift tomorrow, on her actual birthday. She has no idea it's coming and it's a good one! Fellas, you taking notes out there?

*A great goal for me, when it comes to running, is to finish in front of all the women. I have zero chance of winning anything, but if I can finish ahead of the women, I consider it a good run. It's only happened twice in a distance of 26.2 miles or greater (Madison last year and the Icebreaker this spring). I really don't stand a chance of beating some of the women already entered in the Chippewa 50K, but Helen's decision to "race it" (how selfish of her) really destroys my hopes. How thoughtful of an Irish woman to crush my dreams on St. Pat's Day. Looks like I wore this green tie to work for NOTHING.



Post-Post Edit: Apparently Parsenn has some Irish in him...which isn't surprising considering he's 100% Mutt.

Running on the Moon

What's a guy to do when he's lacking a bit of motivation? Well, after realizing that Glaven's weekly mileage is getting eerily similar to MY weekly mileage...I knew I needed to get running.

Off to the trails I went. Specifically--my favorite trail: The Ice Age Trail.

The Wisco weather that's been dragging me down actually culminated in some perfect trail conditions. After a heavy thaw, then a real wet snowfall, then 40 mph winds, the Ice Age Trail was crusted over but flat and firm...



The North-facing slopes were especially icy, making for a glazed over Krispy Kreme/Surface of the Moon type experience. I loved it.
At one point my hand-held water bottle saved my hand. Trying to get down a slippery slope, I...well...slipped and ended up in a FOOSH.*

Later in the run the same thing happened, only this time the hand-held went flying down the hill. After completing my fall by landing on my Glaven Q Heisenberg, I decided to document my slide down the Krispy Kreme hill:

(if link doesn't work, click this.)

It was fantastic. 14 miles, 2:02. Pretty fast for the terrain!

You'll notice in the video my favorite pair of running shoes...ever. The NB 790's are amazing, and that particular pair will be retired after that particular run. The replacement pair has arrived, and this time I went with a flashier color. I may not be fast, but at least my shoes will look fast!
*Yeah, that's right. A FOOSH. Kudos to any of you out there who know what the acronym stands for...WITHOUT Googling. My money's on SteveQ or The Lam.

In the Meantime

I was bundled up and ready to go yesterday morning, adequately caffeinated and out the door by 5:30...only to find it raining and icy. Back inside for more coffee and some pushups. Ugh. I'm starting to wonder if this winter is ever going to end...but apparently not, at least according to this site at this time last year.



After work I changed out of the shirt and tie and ran home--about 2.5 miles in just over 15 minutes. Felt good to really push it, but I need to get some miles in! I'll try it again tomorrow.



In other news, a commercial featuring Smashing Pumpkins' "Today is the Greatest" came on, and Ellie gave me this odd look, as if the song should have meaning to me. I responded with a confused look of my own. She told me she remembers this song from my 'boombox' (seriously, I had one and the knob went up to 11 on that bad boy). Apparently I woke up to that song every day in high school. I insisted I didn't.



Ellie has a unique approach to situations such as this. She simply insists that she's right, speaks in a much more convincing tone, and ridicules my memory. Occasionally, she'll even act insulted that I wouldn't remember something, as if it's her birthday that was forgotten (March 18...Sh!t it's coming up).



Still convinced I was right despite her best efforts, I racked my brain trying to figure out the song that I would wake up to. I was pretty sure it was similar to the Punkins but could. not. think. of. it. Considering I have ZERO musical talent/dancing rhythm/an ear that can decipher "pitchy" or "flat" or "oversung" or any other jargon found on Idol, I decided to use the Intertubes to prove Ellie wrong. Finally, after a lot of soul searching Googling, it came to me.



Spacehog. In the meantime.



I still love it, too. And I don't care what any of you think of the song. My highly-refined musical ear sez: It rocks.



When confronted with the news she was wrong, Ellie simply responded with a shrug of the shoulders and a "get me some wine" raise of her empty glass.



My favorite part (besides the killer beginning and oooh oooh oooh part) of the song happens to be the chorus:

We love the all the all of you

Where lands are green and skies are blue

Skies are blue, eh? Not in Wisco. Not for a while now.

And there you have it: The post has come full circle, back to the white stuff that continues to fall. 35 mph winds started late last night and continued this morning. Once again, more coffee. Once again, I'm aiming for an after-work run. If I run straight home, it'll be with the wind.

On the last episode of "Nic's Life..."

Yikes! This site has taken a bit of a hit recenlty in posting frequency! For the 7 of you still reading (and I count Glaven's 3 comments-per-post as 3 distinct people), it's time for some random bullets to be fired off to get you updated:

• I haven't been running much at all. I haven't lost a lot of fitness, but I don't see myself gaining any training time throughout the spring, and because of this have reluctantly had to look at my upcoming races with much, much lower expectations. I had high hopes to be able to run Chippewa fast (well, for me, anyway) and then use that effort as a great springboard into Grandma's, where I really wanted to run sub-3 hours. I'm really not sure that's possible. Nothing seems to be going my way in terms of training, but there will be additional bullets fired relating to that.
• I plan on training straight through the Trailbreaker, then doing a 1.5 week taper for Chippewa, then training straight through Journeys in early May and doing heavy speed work in the last couple weeks before Grandma's.
• Work has been fantastic! The practice continues to grow, and I'm more and more humbled with the problems that my patient base has trusted me with. I'm continuing to make connections in the community and am excited to keep getting busier.
• This past weekend I traveled down to Chicago to take an Active Release Technique re-certification seminar. If you haven't experienced A.R.T. from a doc trained in it, you're missing out. The stuff is really dynamite. One of the best parts about that seminar is the fact you get tested by the guy that invented the technique, Mike Leahy. A former Air Force fighter pilot, aerospace engineer, chiropractor, and multi-time Ironman finisher, the guy's interesting to talk to and a great teacher. Where else do you get to test your skills against the guy that created the skill itself? He's worked on a lot of athletes whose names you may recognize, Lance Armstrong being the most known. I'm pretty sure he's helped out some guy named Anton Krupicka with some overuse injuries, too.
• Every lunch hour I ran from our hotel to the Chicago lakefront for lunch. On Friday it was 7- out and absolutely beautiful. The last time I was downtown Chicago was at the '07 marathon, when it was 95 in early October. This time it was 70 in early March.
• Ellie is officially signed up for Grandma's Marathon, and her younger brother ("The Doug") is also signed up, along with his girlfriend, for the Half. I'm helping them with the training program and excited for them to experience such an amazing event!
• Parsenn has not tried to kill me, despite some intertubes rumors. He has, however, really shown me that he doesn't care much for running. Give him a tennis ball or a racquet ball, and he goes NUTS, but a run around town? Not so much.
• Did I mention it was 70 in Chicago on Friday? Today, back in Wisconsin, we're in the middle of a "Thunder-snow." Seriously. It's crazy out right now--several inches of really wet snow, 25 mph winds, and thunder and lightning. WTF is going on? Is spring ever going to friggen show up?
• My car died. Yes, the Bonneville--my aid station on so many of my training runs--rumbled its last couple miles last week. Ellie and I have a new (to us) car now, and I'm right now drinking a "Pacifico Clara" in its honor. In our garage sits an '04 Chrysler Pacifica, which I am still weary is going to turn into a mini van at any moment. It's very close to one now.
• I finished the 100 pushup challenge! I was following the training very well until a couple weeks ago, at which point, much like my running, I pretty much quit. Then, last week, for some reason I decided to pop off some pushups. I got to 50 and felt pretty fresh, so I kept going...finally breaking down at 103. Not bad!
• That's all, but be sure to check back, as random stray bullets may be fired off again at any time.