April 2019 Monthly Running Challenge

Date :::: Miles :::: Cumulative
04/01/19 :::: 3.8 :::: 3.8
04/02/19 :::: 2.7 :::: 6.5
04/03/19 :::: 1.6 :::: 8.1
04/04/19 :::: 0.0 :::: 8.1
04/05/19 :::: 0.0 :::: 8.1
04/06/19 :::: 5.7 :::: 13.8
04/07/19 :::: 5.0 :::: 18.8
04/08/19 :::: 0.0 :::: 18.8
04/09/19 :::: 3.4 :::: 22.2
04/10/19 :::: 3.3 :::: 25.5
04/11/19 :::: 4.1 :::: 29.6
04/12/19 :::: 3.6 :::: 33.2
04/13/19 :::: 5.5 :::: 38.6
04/14/19 :::: 5.3 :::: 44.0/ 100 mile goal

As predicted, I spent most of the day reclined on the couch or in bed and it was great. I kept debating going for a run before it rained, but I was way too lazy and the rain came. So I gave up that effort for a while. I finally felt like I should do something with myself, so headed to the gym and ran and then did some assisted pull-ups, dips, and pushups.

For the first time, I watched a movie while running on the treadmill and it worked pretty well to keep me going. I watched Free Solo on the plane yesterday and got really into it, so I watched The Dawn Wall today while running and it was also really good. I'm inspired to do some more rock climbing after all of that. I mean, nothing remotely crazy, but regular people rock climbing.

Wishing the best for all the Boston marathon runners, including our @lporter229!

4-1 rest
4-2 7k easy
4-3 7k easy
4-4 rest
4-5 7k easy/threshold
4-6 11k easy
4-7 7k recovery
4-8 rest
4-9 7k easy/threshold
4-10 4k slow
4-11 rest
4-12 4k easy
4-13 5k (Shine the Light)
4-14 7k recovery
4-15 rest


April Total: 66k
April Goal: 150k

January Total: 131k
February Total: 159.5k
March Total: 183k

Next year when you pop in here claiming your December 2019 mileage, what accomplishments will you have made?
Run at least 4 5k races.
Get under 30:00 and a PR for 5k.
Average at least 135k per month, which would put me over 1,000 miles for the year.

Run the Year Team: Five for Nineteen

Scheduled rest day today. Just as well, because it's 35 degrees F, windy, with mixed rain and snow. Today was supposed to be the first day of golf league -- I'll run in the snow, but there's no way I'll golf in the snow, even though I have before. With age comes wisdom (sometimes).

@lporter229 Have a great race!!!


2019 Races:

4-13 Shine the Light 5K -- 31:12 chip time; First Place 65 and older
6-1 Freedom 5K (Will be off the schedule due to another commitment)
6-30 Strides for Starfish 5K

Yesterday I walked my 5k race, due to my Achilles’ tendon injury, while my husband ran the 10k we originally signed up for.

This race was a little bit cursed - we signed up for it because it had a nice shirt, a medal, and promised free beer and bbq with live music, plus it’s on the same trails where we usually do our hill practice. It seemed like the ideal first 10k race. But then the weather decided that of all the beautiful days in April this one day would be cold, torrential rain, with a wind warning for gusts up to 40 mph. So it became an exercise in determination. We will have fun whatever life throws at us!

At least the shirt was even better than expected, due to manufacturer shortages they upgraded our shirts for free, so it’s a high end tech fabric half zip with thumb holes. I expect to wear the shirt next fall after the weather cools back off (it has instantly gotten pleasant again, as soon as race day was over.) And I like the medal, which is a bbq grill.

My husband ended up with TWO medals, placing third in AG out of I think eleven.

We normally run together and had been curious how he would do running separately. He’s physically faster than I am but has asthma, and in practice I tend to outlast him over anything longer than 10k. Since we had done a tempo run on the exact mapped course before I was injured, I had a good idea of what I could have run had I not been injured. But then, as usual, the course wasn’t what was on the map. I have literally never run a race in Memphis where the map was accurate, with the exception of the big St Jude races. In this case, instead of starting on the paved trail, the races started and ended smack in the middle of a soggy field and then the runners ran towards the officially marked paved bit, with about an extra tenth of a mile tacked on to the start and end as a result. No idea why they did this, since there’s plenty of room to set up where the map says to set up, but the same crew handled the Turkey Trot and they did it then too. Yesterday the ground was absolutely saturated and squelchy. My husband was saying we should be arrested for abuse of road shoes! Our poor shoes looked like we ran a trail race in them! Anyway our practice run came in at 6.21, and his tracker had 6.37 for the official race. Based purely on pace, he ran the race about 15 seconds a mile slower than we did together. But then, conditions yesterday were horrifying.

The 5k started ten minutes before the 10k and ran the same course with the exception of a loop around the lake. As I lined up, the announcer made the usual announcement about slow runners and walkers starting in the back, and I realized this race was going to be a little different from my usual experience - instead of everyone jostling to the front, no one was willing to go near the starting gate. Every single person was hanging back a hundred feet from the start, looking around to see if any “fast runners” would materialize and step in front. The announcer eventually asked people to please move up! I realized, looking around, that the field was made up almost entirely of people who couldn’t run the 10k or half marathon for some reason. One fit young guy kept coughing into his sleeve. Several people had visible braces or bandages. Some were visibly unfit for reasons of age, infirmity, or obesity. And then there were my favorite people, who attend races all over the Midsouth area, the dancing crew. It’s usually a man and woman, but yesterday they had a friend with them. They wear matching shirts saying, “No walk, no run. We dance!” and they do - they dance the entire distance of the race, usually shorter distances but I’ve seen them at a half. I told them my troubles and that seeing them brightened what was set to be a disappointing race, and planned to hang with them as long as I could keep up - they dance faster than I can walk.

As we started, a woman walking near me commented, “The weather didn’t turn out to be so bad after all! It’s not as cold as they said it would be, and it’s not raining!” And that was true for the first mile, through the piney woods. Then we turned the corner into the open area by the lake.

You could hear it before you could see it - the howling wind and the supports for the flag over the visitor’s center clanking. Then, coming out of the woods, you could see the people who had emerged in front of you suddenly put on a burst of speed. The joggers were running, and the walkers started to jog. And then you emerged yourself, and the horizontal blasts of rain hit you in the face.

I wasn’t running because of my injury, so breaking into a run was not an option. I put my head down, held onto my hood, and walked very, very swiftly.

My husband, running the 10k, had two and a half miles of this, the first one into the teeth of the wind. He ran an eight minute mile, which is about 45 seconds faster than our usual 5k pace. Says he had no idea what speed he was running, he was just trying to stay upright. You know that video of the ducklings getting blown around? That was us. Found out later the wind was 25 mph with gusts to 60 mph.

For those of us walking the 5k, we only had a few hundred feet of unbroken wind, then back into the woods which provided some shelter. I decided that since my ankle didn’t seem troubled by a very fast walk, I would try to walk the rest as fast as possible, for the exercise and also because not running when surrounded by runners was SO HARD, Y’ALL! We passed some buffalo, who seemed untroubled by the weather. The wind put an end to any camaraderie among walkers, since no one could hear anyone, everyone strode briskly in silence. It was strangely beautiful - one of the blessings of being a runner is being out when sane people stay indoors.

I did burst into a run on the finish line. Couldn’t stop myself. It seems not to have hurt anything - in fact my ankle felt better after the race than before.

By the time I made it back - 45:17, average pace 14:15 according to my gps since the course was long - the temperature had dropped twenty degrees. A windswept cover band cranked out “Don’t stop believin.” I pulled up find my phone and located my husband, about three miles in. Soon the first 10kers came into view, a pair of young men wearing nothing but shorts and flying along, generating more than enough heat to stay warm. I positioned myself where I could cheer for my husband and snap photos as he arrived on the pavement and then after he turned onto the soggy run to the finish. He did 59:28, so under an hour, which was our goal. Assuming I had been running with him, I would have been second in my AG, and if I had run it at our practice pace, would have won the AG. But that’s why they have races, it doesn’t count unless you show up and do it! As it was, my brisk walk was 8th of 12. Yay not last!

We grabbed some bbq but it was a measly amount, instantly cold, and our fingers were freezing. So we went to the car to tailgate, then decided the heck with it and went to our favorite bbq joint, which was fortuitously open at 10 am on Palm Sunday Morning, even though we were the only people there. I found out later from the Facebook page that they ran out of bbq before the half marathoners got in, and the promised “beer” was a cup of half a beer. People were not pleased. All in all not a well run race, but it was their first time so hopefully next year will be better.

Still not regretting getting out there despite injury. In some ways this was harder than my half marathon. Not running is hard!

4/1 15.3 miles
4/2 20.14 miles
4/3 20.26 miles
4/4 20.21 miles
4/5 28.52 miles, 340 days on the run
4/6 32.41 miles
4/7 15.16 miles
4/8 15.28 miles
4/9 20.64 miles
4/10 20.3 miles, 345 days on the run
4/11 20.36 miles
4/12 20.25 miles
4/13 40.29 miles
4/14 21.6 miles
4/15 20.32 miles, 350 days on the run