Milk Run 5k

Tuesday, Aug 31, 2010:

Tuesday morning was warm and humid - what else is new? But we needed to get in a run so we went to the park and ran on the paved trails. 3.9 miles in 34:48, pace 8:51. I felt pretty good, actually, and this is a good pace for me, about the same as the Milk Run 5k a couple of days ago, and that was a race. No pains or problems.

Sunday, Aug 29, 2010, MILK RUN 5k:

The Milk Run 5k is a Minnesota classic race, held at the State Fair every year, always sold out long before race date. This year 1420 runners and walkers finished, slightly more women than men. I finished in 27:08, pace 8:45, number 197 of 628 men and number 10 of 29 men in the 65-69 age group. I had hoped to place better, but there are some pretty good runners in my age group. I’m impressed that there are 29 men that age who want to run a 5k, though. I did finish a minute faster than my last 5k, but the pace was slower than an 8k in March and the same as a 10k in April, so my hopes for increasing speed are not realized yet.

It is a hilly race, though, with a difference of 100 feet between the highest and lowest points, and I did walk quite a bit. I can do better and I will. The best news is: Nothing hurts, including the iffy right ankle.

The race fee also includes a pass to the fair and a “free” milkshake. We enjoyed the fair.

Saturday, Aug 28, 2010:

St Croix Valley Runners. I took a shortened route this morning, just 3.5 miles, because of the ankle injury and because of the Milk Run 5k race tomorrow. No problem with the ankle today - lets hope it stays that way.

Time 33:23, pace 9:32. Hmmm. I wonder if that route is longer than I thought, because it felt like I was going faster than 9:32. Oh well.

Milk Run Shirt:

Five Miles Didn't Happen

I started out with the Woodbury Runners (6:05 pm Thursdays in Colby Lake Park), but my right ankle hurt and seemed to get worse as I ran. Sometimes it hurts a little at the start of a run and gradually gets better - not this time. So I stopped and limped back to the car. I rarely quit a run, but with a marathon on the horizon I didn’t want to risk a disabling injury. I’m hoping that it will be better by Saturday with the SCV Runners.

28 miles for this week, not the planned 33. New week starts Saturday.

Six Runs

Catching up on logging:

Saturday, July 3, 2010:

Only seven of us showed up to run with the St Croix Valley Runners today, with the Fourth of July race in Marine on St Croix scheduled for tomorrow. I ran with Gauss and Dave, all of us rather slow today, chatting easily some of the time and quiet at other times. After the fourth mile I went ahead and finished the last mile at a somewhat faster pace. Total time 49:49, overall pace 9:58.

The right ankle, which has been hurting a bit for several weeks now, did not hurt during the run. I did feel it afterward, just a bit, and I’m wondering if it’s mostly aggravated by lawn mowing across hills, and by leaving my foot in an awkward position while driving. If so, it will get better because: (1) I do have to mow the lawn but the grass will not grow so fast for the rest of the year; and (2) I can watch how I use that foot. Running surely can’t help, but it doesn’t seem to hurt much either. Also, I have some industrial-quality steel-toe boots that may offer some ankle support while mowing. We’ll see.

The right knee still lets me know it’s around once in a while, but mostly it’s quiet these last few days.

Thursday, July 1, 2010:

I ran with Rich again, this time taking a slightly shorter route, about 5.1 miles. Two other guys showed up for the Woodbury Runners tonight, but they left us early, and completed their regular 6.2-mile route before we finished our shorter run. Our pace: 11:28.

Tuesday, June 29, 2010:

We are planning to run a warm marathon, so we have been running in the evening, and did so today. But it was a lovely day, only about 72 degrees or so, and though it was a beautiful 5.2 mile run in the park, it wasn't much help training for heat. I did enjoy running on grass again, and I took it fairly easy, walking up most of the hills. Time 54:46, pace 10:32.

Sunday, June 27, 2010:

We three drove up to the Gateway Trail this evening, to escape the sun. I ran only four miles but in the heat that seemed enough. Splits: 9:18, 10:49, 9:59, 9:44, total 39:50, pace 9:58.

Saturday, June 26, 2010:

St Croix Runners again, Gauss and I finished the five miles in 49:00.

Thursday, June 24, 2010:

Rich and I ran the 5.2-mile Woodbury Runners’ route, the only runners to show up today. Nice recovery run, my first run since Grandma’s. Time about 59:00, pace 11:21.

Summer in the park:

Coeur d'Alene Idaho Marathon

Coeur d’Alene Idaho has a marathon with a 33-year tradition. It’s a good marathon - I recommend it. My own race could have been better, but only six minutes slower than Abilene in April and I’m not unhappy with it. 43rd marathon, 27th state, second of two in my age group. I don’t like finishing last, but the other guy beat me fair and square.

The weather in Coeur d’Alene was almost perfect for a race, with cloudy skies and temperatures rising slowly from 50 to 57. A little less wind would have made it even better, and in fact I wore a singlet under a throwaway shirt which I never threw away because it felt good in that wind.

My right foot hurt. The outside of the foot seems slightly injured at the ankle, probably from running trails so much. I guess I can no longer brag that the Brooks Launch shoes have kept me injury-free, though I probably should use shoes with more ankle support for trail running. The middle toe on the right foot really raised a ruckus too - not uncommon but more painful than usual - made me yelp a couple of times. I had no other pains during the run. Afterward both calves cramped severely, each just once, one at a time, and I could do little but wait for the pain to subside. I had taken five salt packets during the race - maybe I needed more? For sure I should have done more stretching immediately after the race to try to prevent that post-race cramping.

The Coeur d’Alene Marathon route seems rather helter-skelter - we never did find a map good enough to guide us through it before the race, though the volunteers made navigation easy on race morning. A good part of the course is on roads and trails right along the shore of Lake Coeur d’Alene, affording a spectacular view, with mountains looming behind the enormous blue lake. It’s a bit hilly, not the best for a PR or a Boston qualifier, but certainly not the hilliest course I’ve run, not even as hilly as the trails that I run regularly near home. It was 100% paved, the road shared with cars (coned off) in a few places, but that was never a problem.

It seemed that the marathon was a little short on aid stations. I took either a Clif Shot gel or a salt packet at every aid station except the first one, and ended up using only five of each. The busses for the race course tour, the day before the race, were hopelessly oversubscribed. And the web site was out of date, displaying last year’s location for the packet pickup. Otherwise the race seemed to be organized well. The course is open for 7 1/2 hours, enough for all but the slowest runners. 403 souls ran the full marathon, 1228 the half, and 52 the early-start marathon (5:30 start versus 7:00 am).

My splits: 9:41, 9:43, 9:23, 9:49, 9:06, 10:18, 21:07 (2 mi), 10:03, 10:10, 10:46, 12:49 (uphill), 9:28 (back down), 25:03 (2 mi & potty stop), 13:02, 10:28, 24:16 (2 mi), 11:26, 11:15, 11:21, 12:16, 11:59, 11:54, 13:39 (1.22 mi), total 4:50:02, pace 11:04.

We drove to this marathon, from Minnesota to Idaho and back, especially enjoying the drive back. In a single day on I-90 and I-94 we saw:

• Antelope, bison, mule deer, magpies, and many other creatures that we don’t see in Minnesota;
  
• Snow-capped Montana mountains on one side of the highway, or both sides, for hundreds of miles, hour after hour, constantly changing and always fresh;
  
• A full rainbow directly ahead of us, though we never drove in much rain that day;
  
• The North Dakota badlands in the Theodore Roosevelt National Park (Medora, ND), including
  • Scenery more colorful than the South Dakota badlands,
    
  • A prairie-dog village right at the edge of the road, and
    
  • The North Dakota Painted Canyon;
• A spectacular, unforgettable after-dark light show which we watched for 100 miles, as a thunderstorm crossed our path ahead of us in Minnesota; and finally
  
• The three-quarter moon rising like a huge, orange, lopsided welcome sign right in front of us as we approached the Twin Cities at midnight.

It was a magical day. And to our surprise, traffic on I-90 and I-94 was light this Memorial Day weekend. I’m so glad we didn’t fly this time.

Ankle Twister

My friend Jim doesn’t like running on my favorite trail - the road alongside the railroad tracks. I think this is because of the hazard presented by the one- and two-inch rocks that have fallen down from the raised track bed to litter the trail. And he’s right, of course. Yesterday I had a close call, stepping on one of those rocks, twisting the right ankle outward. My unthinking reaction was to drop down, to take most of the weight off that foot for the remainder of the step. Then I walked for a while, and was able to finish the run normally. Happily, there is no lasting damage.

Nice six-mile run otherwise though. No train came by, but the trail was bordered throughout with lovely late-summer flowers, and two deer watched intently as I trotted by 50 feet from them. I ran without walking for the first three miles, then changed to run two minutes, walk one minute for the remaining three.

Splits: 9:04, 9:08, 8:57, 10:00, 10:38, 10:14, total 58:01, pace overall 9:40. I’ll take it. Tapering now, fall marathons coming up ...


It's so hard to beat a ripe, juicy nectarine.

Caffeine works!

On the way out to a 16-mile run I grabbed a couple of packages of Clif Shot Gels, one cran-razz and one orange. I ate the cran-razz first, at miles 4 and 8. Then at mile 12, I had half of the package of orange.

By that time I was getting a bit tired - walk breaks were more frequent and maybe a little longer. But around mile 14 my energy picked up again. Walk breaks nearly disappeared. This doesn’t just happen, so I checked the package of orange Clif Shot Gels and saw that it says "with caffeine." I had completely forgotten that any of the gels contained caffeine, and wasn’t expecting the pickup, so it was definitely physical and not psychological. I’ve felt this pickup from caffeine before, especially in marathons, but never quite so dramatically. Just 50 measly milligrams of caffeine from green tea extract, according to the package. The benefit lasted for at least two miles, perhaps more but my run was over.

Today the idea was to take it easy - long, slow distance. That’s just what happened. No pains worth mentioning, just tired muscles, which feels pretty good actually. Because of recent ankle issues, I ran in my last pair of Brooks Burns rather than the Summons that I have been using for training. That might have helped.

A beautiful 64-degree day, lots of people on bikes, a few on skates, and plenty of moms & dads pushing babies in strollers. Egrets and herons, with lots of noisy frogs for them to lunch on. Precious few runners, but it was nice to cross paths with my sweeties on the way back from the northeast turnaround.

Water at the even-numbered miles, gels every four miles. So far, barring any still-quiet injury, this run was an unqualified success. It’s a masterpiece.

Splits: 9:10, 9:47, 10:41, 8:54, 9:41, 9:37, 10:14, 10:10, 10:30, 10:24, 10:28, 9:05, 11:21 (phone calls), 9:31, 9:46, 9:10, total 2:38:28, pace 9:54.



Recent dinner: Bison garam masala with peas, spinach, onions, and tomatoes, and chopped cucumbers with yogurt.

Night Cramp - Ouch!

Yikes! In the middle of the night after Sunday’s 10-mile run I was awakened by an excruciating cramp in the right calf. Normally the best way to relieve a cramp is to go into a stretch, but I was in bed and that didn’t seem like an option. I just moaned and waited the minute or two required for the cramp to pass. Then I could get up and do the stretch, although by then the muscle had injured itself a bit and it hurt to stretch. It still hurt Monday morning and all that day.

I’ve never had a night cramp before, and hope I don’t again. Why did it happen? Two possibilities that I can think of: (1) I ran ten miles the previous day without taking any water during the run. Normally I do take water for a run longer than eight miles; and (2) This was DEX day - the day that the dexamethasone has its maximum effect, and in fact I had taken the DEX just a few hours earlier. Can it have this kind of effect? Never heard that before, but there aren’t that many runners taking DEX so it could be an unreported side effect.

Tuesday, though, I had a nice four-mile run on the Gateway trail. NO pain in that calf during the run, although I could still feel where it injured itself. I did have a slight pain in the outside of the left ankle, new and strange, that did not entirely go away. I think it will though. Doesn’t feel like a serious thing. I hope.

I was doing well enough, but stopped to help a little turtle across the trail and out of bike danger, and then I walked for a while with another runner as we chatted. So the overall pace is glacial, but the run served its purpose. Hoping for a long run Thursday if the ankle will cooperate.

Splits: 9:07, 21:02 (2 mi), 9:18, total 39:27, pace 9:52.



This morning's breakfast: Gluten-free oatmeal with dried cranberries, organic strawberries, organic walnuts, frozen blueberries, kiwi, a dark chocolate wafer, and organic fat-free milk.