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I wish I were feeling as confident as Ryan Shay apparently is.
In a Pioneer Press article previewing tomorrow's Twin Cities Marathon, Shay is quoted as saying, "I'm not in the best shape of my life." However, he adds, "I want to compete, and I want to win the race. If winning the race takes the course record, I'm ready for that."
The course record, set by Phil Coppess in 1985, is 2:10:05.
Shay's lifetime best is 2:14:08.
A first for me: I'm writing this entry during a plane flight -- my flight to Minneapolis for marathon weekend. Looks like I won't quite make it to the Elite Athlete Press Conference at 4 p.m., which surely will disappoint the hordes of journalists hoping for an interview with the #12 seed. To be honest, though, I will regret not being there. I thought I could generate some quotable lines from the "wacky ultramarathoner" perspective, such as: "You know, a lot of the guys in this race are really strong over distances of 5K to 20K. My best distance, on the other hand, is 100K, so, to me, this race will be over in the blink of an eye." [Appreciative chuckles all around.] "I'm just hoping that the eye-blink lasts less than two hours and 22 minutes." [More laughter.]
I'm feeling somewhat better now that I've begun the carbo-loading phase of my marathon-week diet. Unlike most people, I follow an "old-school" carbo-loading regimen, popular in the 1970s, that includes a depletion run about a week before the race, a low-carb diet for three days, and then the usual carbo-loading for the last three days. The rationale is that depleting your muscles' glycogen stores during the low-carb phase leads to "supercompensation" during the high-carb phase, with more glycogen getting packed into the muscles than would otherwise occur.
The deplete-then-load strategy is not for everyone, but I've done it about ten times with pretty good results. One of my marathon-week traditions is to make my mom's Quiche Lorraine, which of course is packed with eggs, cream, cheese, and meat -- perfect for carb starvation! This week's menu also included dinners of pork cordon bleu (i.e., pork stuffed with ham and cheese), flank steak, and chicken drumsticks; breakfasts of eggs with cheese; snacks of macadamia nuts, almonds, olives, beef jerky, and more cheese; and desserts of Ben and Jerry's Peanut Butter Cup ice cream (which, of all the B&J flavors, has the lowest percentage of calories from carbs) mixed with peanut butter (to lower that percentage of carb calories even further). Lunches consisted of dinner leftovers.
Come to think of it, these adventures in carb deprivation might have fueled another good quote for the press conference. Something like: "I expect to run well on Sunday because I've been eating a lot of eggs lately. In fact, I've had twelve already this week!"
Ever feel like you're being stalked, intermittently but persistently?
Here's a photo by Glenn Tachiyama from the PNTF cross-country meet on November 6, 2005.
And here's one taken by Chuck Bartlett of Club Northwest at the Sundodger cross-country meet two weekends ago.
The man in orange is Will Dobbie. He's a nice guy as far as I can tell; I just wish he'd give me a bit more breathing room sometimes.
Training for and racing a marathon is often compared to taking a class. It's a decent analogy, especially if one assumes that (A) the class is a traditional lecture course in which grades are determined largely by the final exam and (B) the student is a traditional grade-grubber whose happiness is determined largely by his GPA. All of his work throughout the semester is merely a rehearsal for that moment of reckoning; the only thing that really matters is the number he gets at the end.
Naturally, the analogy breaks down somewhat in the last couple weeks before the big test. Savvy students use this time for cramming, whereas savvy athletes use the time for tapering, which is basically the opposite of cramming. Meanwhile, the insecure among us put the hours previously devoted to running into highly speculative predictions of race performance. That's about where I am right now: looking back over recent "quizzes" and wondering whether they collectively forecast a sub-2:22 at the Twin Cities Marathon next Sunday, which would get me onto the Dean's List of marathoning. (Actually, it's Jim's List, as in Jim Estes of USATF. Whatever.)
So what indicators am I looking at?
(1) Half-marathon performance. My 1:09:29 at Super Jock 'n Jill on September 4th was a major disappointment; I had hoped to break 1:08 and was sure I would at least beat my PR of 1:09:02, set back in March on a hillier course while running alone. To break 2:22, I'll have to run almost as fast for twice as long -- a daunting thought.
(2) Recent workouts. Overall, these have been similar to the ones I ran in the spring (before my 2:23:25 at Vancouver). Example: on April 9th, I did 3 x 2 miles in 10:06/10:07/10:07 with 3-minute jogs in between; on August 16th, I did the same workout in 10:05/10:07/10:07. Similarly, on April 21st, I ran 5.05 miles at 5:15 pace after a 12.4-mile warmup; on August 20th, it was 7.0 miles at 5:19 pace after a 12.0-mile warmup. As I mentioned in my previous post, consistency is nice but improvement would be nicer.
(3) Weight. I'm currently a couple of pounds heavier than I was in the weeks leading up to Vancouver. Perhaps those two extra pounds are pure mitochondria-enriched muscle fibers, but somehow I doubt it.
(4) Other statistics. Since my goal is to qualify for the Olympic Marathon Trials, it's interesting (though not necessarily that instructive) to compare myself to 2004 Trials qualifiers, whose traits have been reported in USATF media guides and in a study by Karp and Stager. (Thanks to Mike Salkowski for mentioning the latter in his blog.) So how do I match up?
Age. Average for 2004 male qualifiers: 30. Me: 33.
Body-mass index (BMI). Average for 2004 male qualifiers: 20.1. Me: 21.7. (But thanks to Greg Jimmerson, Ken Pliska, and Ryan Shay for proving that a person of my size can run under 2:22!)
Average weekly mileage. Average for 2004 male qualifiers: 90. Me (July thru September): 55.
Peak weekly mileage. Average for 2004 male qualifiers: 126. Me: 66.
Percentage of miles run at marathon race pace or faster. Average for 2004 male qualifiers: 25%. Me: 18%.
Runs per week. Average for 2004 male qualifiers: 9. Me: 6.75.
Full-time job? 2004 male qualifiers: 62% said yes. Me: yes.
In summary, relative to previous Trials qualifiers, I'm older and fatter, and I run more slowly, less frequently, and not as far. But I do have a full-time job, unlike 38% of them. If I didn't, I'd certainly increase my mileage quite a bit -- maybe even into the 70s....
I'm referring to myself, of course.
Yesterday my wife and I attended a four-year-old's birthday party, which had a superhero theme to which the adults were encouraged to conform. I'm not big on playing dress-up, and my one physical talent of note, long-distance running prowess, ranks quite low on the list of desirable superhero traits -- probably somewhere between good penmanship and parallel parking expertise. Nevertheless, it occurred to me that I've recently been spending a fair bit of time climbing up and down the walls of our house with a belt sander while wearing a costume of sorts (goggles, respirator, earplugs), which seemed like a step in the right direction. If I added a cape and Spandex, I could be ... Sand Man, a superhero with grit!
The photo below (thanks, Mo!) shows the Sand Man chillin' at the party with his superfriend Nacho Libre.
Also present (in varying sizes and developmental stages) were Spiderman, Spiderwoman, a couple of Power Rangers, and a few ambiguously heroic people I didn't recognize. They were generally well-behaved, though they exhibited less self-sufficiency than one would expect from superheroes. (Example: Spiderman sitting about three feet away from the utensils, wailing, "Mama, I need a spoon!")
By the way, one of the unique and just-reconfirmed qualities of Sand Man is that he always completes half-marathon road races in a time of 1:09. (Now true for five of my six attempts; the sixth one was a 1:10.) This is great for those who value consistency, not so great for those who like to see actual improvement.
After over two decades as a fairly serious distance runner, I'm still learning new things about my body. Perhaps this reflects an admirable curiosity and openmindedness, or perhaps I'm just a slow learner. Regardless, last Saturday's 5x1200m workout was a painful yet satisfying reminder of one of my more recent insights.
I can trace this particular insight back to May 9th, 2005, when I went to Husky Stadium hoping to run 3x1600m in 5:00 or faster, with 600m jogs in between. (This normally wouldn't be too challenging, but it came two days after a 6.5-hour hike with Scott Jurek and his ultramarathoning friends.) The first 1600 went fine, but the first 400 of the second one felt horrible and was slow. "Oh well, there goes the workout," I thought disgustedly, wondering how much more I'd slow down in the second lap. When I checked my 800m split, though, I saw that I was somehow back on pace. WEIRD! I began the third lap with renewed optimism, and, to make a long story short, finished that 1600 and the final one in 5:00 apiece.
On that day I realized that, for many years, I had been harboring the assumption that workouts always get harder and harder and harder as they go on (assuming that the interval distance, recovery time between intervals, and goal pace are held constant), with no letup ever. Now I could see that the assumption was not 100% safe; I might struggle early on in a workout (or a race, presumably) and still have a shot at meeting my original goal.
Quite an uplifting realization, and yet there are times when I wish I wasn't aware of it. Take Saturday's 5x1200m workout, for example. The first interval goes OK, but (after a 400m recovery jog) the second one is tough, and I have to kick the last 200m to get down to my goal time of 3:36. I'm tempted to aim for 3:39s in the remaining intervals, BUT I CAN'T BECAUSE I KNOW THAT I STILL MIGHT BE ABLE TO HIT THE ORIGINAL GOAL. I curse my now-heightened self-awareness and labor through the third 1200, again kicking to get to 3:36. Still trying to think of an excuse to ease off a bit; still can't find one that holds water. Damn you, Crowther -- why do you have to stick to Plan A as if it's a test of moral purity? The fourth interval is underway. Another 3:36, barely. All right, one to go. After all this, you better finish strong, you freakin' masochist.... 3:37. Not too bad. Another gut-wrenching interval session is over, and I warm down while pondering my expanding capacity for self-inflicted pain.