White Rock Marathon
I know I have not written in quite a while, but I have been quite busy at work, home, and on the roads. This weekend, if all goes to plan, I will be heading out to Dallas to partake in the Dallas White Rock Marathon as a training effort. The plan is to run the first 13.1 miles at Marathon race pace and then drop out. Why am I not running the Half-Marathon instead? Simple, I don't want to be forced to race. I just want to run my pace and get out, much like I did at the Houstonian Lite 30K, where I was instructed to run 20 miles at 5:50 pace and did so without difficulty, even though if I would have crossed the finish line I would have placed 2nd overall.
Anyhow, that will be $130 in two weeks for a training run! Sheesh, this marathoning gets expensive. Also, Dallas is special to my wife and I. I proposed to Perla at the Hyatt Regency Hotel Restaurant (that big, glowing ball in the sky that's always highlighting Dallas) a couple of years ago and she said yes and I believe she didn't expect the proposal, but it was nicely timed with the sunset in the background, hundreds of feet above the earth, rotating through the skyline... Excellent food, mind you, and just an excellent experience. Little Madelyn wasn't even a thought back then. Amazing... Now, Madelyn is getting her teeth and growing and constantly getting us sick. But she is quite a child. She will (is) a handful: extremely intelligent and independent.
Well, training has been progressing well. Three days after my 20 miler in 1:56, I ran my most difficult session: an AM Long Prefontaine (1600-4 mi-1600) in 4:51, 22:21, 5:07 and then repeated the workout in the PM in 4:56-22:27-5:19. That 5:19 felt like an all-out effort. I am paying for it now with achy knees, but otherwise I feel great. My last two mileage weeks have been well above 110 miles/week and still rolling. The mileage will suffer this week due to recovery from the Prefontaines (supposed to feel like you ran a marathon), but I will have an excellent quality run on Sunday.
It has been fun watching Perla progress and try and gain back her fitness. She is constantly battling with fatigue from work and mothering and probably dealing with her tremendous gift of running. I think before the 30K she ran twice that week and still managed an okay effort. Coaching offers such a mix of emotions, as I go through the meteoric rise of someone like a Chris Bittinger who PR's in every run and every workout for the past 6 months, and then to somehow deal with the emotional devastation of a Jake Phillips and multiple stress fractures in his feet.
I take injuries very poorly. I do not know how to handle injuries, on a personal and coaching level. There is so much excitement, anxiety, frustration, lack of patience and understanding that goes on with injuries. They just happen to be a major part of our sport and they are so difficult to deal with and blindside us when things are going well.
Otherwise, I was going to comment on BALCO, on Dear Abby, on a ton of things, but thought otherwise. Perhaps I will get to them one time or another, but I hope all is well in the land of your lives and check back for an update to the weekend...
Anyhow, that will be $130 in two weeks for a training run! Sheesh, this marathoning gets expensive. Also, Dallas is special to my wife and I. I proposed to Perla at the Hyatt Regency Hotel Restaurant (that big, glowing ball in the sky that's always highlighting Dallas) a couple of years ago and she said yes and I believe she didn't expect the proposal, but it was nicely timed with the sunset in the background, hundreds of feet above the earth, rotating through the skyline... Excellent food, mind you, and just an excellent experience. Little Madelyn wasn't even a thought back then. Amazing... Now, Madelyn is getting her teeth and growing and constantly getting us sick. But she is quite a child. She will (is) a handful: extremely intelligent and independent.
Well, training has been progressing well. Three days after my 20 miler in 1:56, I ran my most difficult session: an AM Long Prefontaine (1600-4 mi-1600) in 4:51, 22:21, 5:07 and then repeated the workout in the PM in 4:56-22:27-5:19. That 5:19 felt like an all-out effort. I am paying for it now with achy knees, but otherwise I feel great. My last two mileage weeks have been well above 110 miles/week and still rolling. The mileage will suffer this week due to recovery from the Prefontaines (supposed to feel like you ran a marathon), but I will have an excellent quality run on Sunday.
It has been fun watching Perla progress and try and gain back her fitness. She is constantly battling with fatigue from work and mothering and probably dealing with her tremendous gift of running. I think before the 30K she ran twice that week and still managed an okay effort. Coaching offers such a mix of emotions, as I go through the meteoric rise of someone like a Chris Bittinger who PR's in every run and every workout for the past 6 months, and then to somehow deal with the emotional devastation of a Jake Phillips and multiple stress fractures in his feet.
I take injuries very poorly. I do not know how to handle injuries, on a personal and coaching level. There is so much excitement, anxiety, frustration, lack of patience and understanding that goes on with injuries. They just happen to be a major part of our sport and they are so difficult to deal with and blindside us when things are going well.
Otherwise, I was going to comment on BALCO, on Dear Abby, on a ton of things, but thought otherwise. Perhaps I will get to them one time or another, but I hope all is well in the land of your lives and check back for an update to the weekend...
posted by Gabriel Rodriguez at 4:40 PM
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