Wednesday@Valhalla (01/28/09)

2009 Boston Marathon FULL!!!

If you were planning on sending in your application for Boston, or even trying to qualify by running the upcoming Austin or Mardi Gras Marathons, you are out of luck. The 2009 Boston Marathon is full as of 1-26-2009. This may be the earliest that it has reached capacity.

Houston Marathon Recap + Pictures

I believe this is a great format to everyone to post their experiences and comments about the Chevron Houston Marathon. So I guess I will start.

I was a bit disappointed in my time this year. Maybe being sick at Christmas slowed me down. Some of you saw me at my worst at the John Phillips LOOONG Run, but I felt pretty good the two weeks before the marathon.

I know that many people would love to run the marathon in my time of 3:43, but everything is relative. This was one of the strangest marathons I have run. I started out great; I felt great. I was running easy and comfortably for the first five miles. I was confident I would have a good race.

Then at Mile 6 as we were running up some hills, I started to have trouble breathing. Since I needed a bathroom break anyway, I stopped and thought that would aid in recovering my breathing. I ran easily for about a mile and still had trouble. I really was beginning to worry about finishing. I stopped 4 times between Miles 6 and 9 and finally felt better and ran very comfortably up to Mile 21 where I started to hit "the Wall" with cramps and slowed down. At that point I ran from water stop to water stop. With about a mile and a half to go, I saw Linda cheering the runners. She asked me if I needed anything and I told her, "I need to be at the finish line".

Two minutes after the race, I was relieved to have finished. Two hours after the race, I began to wonder if maybe I should scale back on running marathons and now two days after the race, I'm thinking about how I will do better at my next marathon, probably sometime this fall!!

That's my story. I want to hear your story by adding your comments.
BOB

I am including a slideshow of some pictures I took before the start of race and after finish. Enjoy, :-)
Neeraj

Marathon Weather History

It does look like we are going to have good weather for the marathon. This will be my tenth consecutive marathon and we have had a variety of weather. I did some research on a website called Weather Underground which records temperature, humidity, and other weather data from several points inside the loop of Houston. The table above shows the temperature, dew point, humidity, and wind and wind speed approximately 2 1/2 to 3 hours after the start of the marathon. I think you can see the temperatures are fairly consistent, usually between 50-55°F, but there have been some fairly warm days as well. I will never forget the death march of 2000 and upon looking at the conditions in 2006, I now understand why I ended up walking some of the course with Allison Nadolski (now Abbott).

Marathon Weather Watch

With less than a week to the Houston Marathon, now is the time to start obsessing in earnest about things that are entirely out of our control - MOST IMPORTANTLY THE WEATHER.

It would appear that we will have cool weather, but will it be raining or windy? Humid or really humid? You can monitor every conceivable parameter ad nauseum at the National Weather Service Forecast Website.

Knock yourselves out!

The Dreaded "Tweak"

Websters defines "tweak" as: "to pinch and pull with a sudden jerk and twist" and that is what I felt this morning in the back of my leg running strides at Eleanor Tinsley Park today around 6AM. I think the injury is minor and I hope to run a long run on Saturday after 72 hours of rest, but this does put me in a lousy mood.

And it started out great. I got up this morning to join the Will's Hills group at 5:30. Will scheduled one of his more intense workouts which included after an initial warm-up run, the following workout: 1) a half mile warm up run, 2) a hard one mile run, 3) a slow jog to Eleanor Tinsley Park, 4) 10 strides/sprints of approximately 100 meters, 5) 12 minutes of fairly steep hills, then 5) another hard one mile and a 6) cool down back to home base. Try it sometime, especially in the middle of August!

Today, however, was dark and damp and cold. After an initial sluggishness during the first mile, I started to feel pretty good. But it was during the eighth stride that I felt the dreaded tweak. Instead of trying to finish the work-out, I slowly jogged back to home base. Maybe I'm getting a little smarter in my old age!

Mentally, I am trying to figure out why this happened: was it the run late last night being too close to the morning workout? was it lack of a proper warm up on a cold morning? did I just come down wrong on a dark uneven surface while trying to sprint? Why does this have to happen when I've become happy with my running for the first time in months?

Also, mentally, I am thinking about when I can run again. I have had injuries that were alot worse. The pain is isolated and does not spread when I walk or go up and down stairs.

I'm optimistic that the recovery will be short, but for now the dreaded 'tweak' has ruined my day!!

Let It Snow

Real runners don't let a little snow get in the way of our Ritual Wednesday BCRR Club Run! (Photos: E. Rodriguez)

Hey you wimps out there who were too wuss to come out to play in the cold (you know who you are)!! We had a blast running in the snow without you!! Truly a unique experience in Houston... We had fun warming up at Valhalla after thanks to the generousity of Jay Byers, who funded the tab. Thanks Jay.

K. Mahon