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December 13, 2004

What's up with THAT?

Have you ever seen the episode of Cheers where Cliff tries to be a stand-up comic, but his whole schtick is just making a statement of obvious fact and then following it up with "What's up with that?" Something like "The ducks on the pond in Boston Common. What's up with that?" And Lilith thinks he's hysterical and can't control herself laughing?

I couldn't help think of that earlier today when I got an email from a coach/ runner guy in Phoenix whose group I've run with before while I was there, telling me that the 30K that we're running on Saturday is on the dirt path next to the canals. What's up with THAT? I finally get a chance to run outside of Austin and away from its hilly race courses and I get a DIRT TRAIL? Boo. Honestly ... I wouldn't be complaining except that I'm supposed to do marathon goal pace out there. Seriously. I've done enough whining for one week. But I'm really kinda stumped as far as what to do on Saturday. Trying to run MGP, especially an MGP that's already in the realm of unrealistic, on that trail (I've run it before) would be considerably harder than on the road, and it might just be a frustrating endeavor. I might be better off to just run it as hard as I can and just be happy with the result.

Speaking of running marathon goal pace on a dirt trail, I tried to do 6:50 pace for 7 miles on Town Lake trail this morning and couldn't quite get it done. How embarrassing. I opened with a 7:03 and then followed with 6:54, 6:53, 7:00, 6:54, 7:03, and 6:58 for a 6:58 average. Yay. (*sigh*)

Posted by jenandmats at December 13, 2004 7:26 PM

Comments

If it helps - and it probably won't, but just in case - remember that some of us would really enjoy your failures :-) Don't forget that with the changing surfaces, holding a specific pace can be difficult down on the trail... at least, I've always found it to be so.

Posted by: Richard at December 14, 2004 11:14 AM

hey there! i would NOT worry about the MP run. right before i ran a 1:28 half, i could NOT do a half marathon pace run faster than 8:30 - that is WAY off - and you are NOT way off! hang in there; some days are better and dead on than other days. just relax, smile, and lose yourself with every footstep - the seconds will slip off.

Posted by: bridget at December 14, 2004 10:56 PM

Thanks, guys. It's always nice to know that other people struggle with these things, too. It's one of the reasons we keep reading and writing these things!

Posted by: jenandmats at December 15, 2004 9:19 PM

i hope that your marathon pace run went well today. i find that any time there's any kind of variation i just have to set up a range of goals...based on the conditions... it is hard on trails and hills, etc...but if you do have a good day and still get you time...that's a great feeling...and then on the other hand... if you base your evaluation on effort that's also a good assessment! good luck!! :)

Posted by: liz at December 18, 2004 9:09 PM