Week in Review: 26 February - 3 March, and Seneca Greenway 50K Race Report

Miles:

26 February: Club Challenge 10-Mile Run, plus 2 miles warmup, 2 miles warmdown (14 miles, 95 minutes)

27 Feburary: 10-mile lunch run at APG, solo (70 minutes)

28 February: 15 miles (105 minutes) in Allen/Plano, Texas, including trespassing near transformers (the power-converting kind, and not the vehicle-morphing kind . . . that I could tell . . .)

29 February: 5 miles in the morning (35 minutes) in Allen/Plano, Texas, and another 10 miles (70 minutes) in the same darn place in the evening (so bored with strip mall running)

1 March: 15 miles in the evening in Baltimore (105 minutes), stubbornly refusing to wear a shirt in spite of the dropping temperature

2 March: 7 miles at lunch at APG (50 minutes), felt like death :(

3 March: Seneca Greenway 50K, 4 hours, 39 minutes, second place overall, 34-ish miles

Total minutes: 810
Total miles: 110

And now, the important part: The race report.

The Seneca Greenway 50K, along with the National Marathon and the Boston Marathon, have become rites of spring for me. And usually, this race turns out pretty well, even if it hurts like hell (which it usually does). So you can understand my trepidation when, the day before the race, I woke up with a very sick stomach, and bailed out of my intended 10-mile shakeout run at lunch at 7 miles because the stomach pain was no longer bearable. I considered not running this race.

But I also considered the people I would be letting down if I didn't give it the old college try, so I went the other way with this, and made plans with Meg Harnett (who was using the race as part of a 40-mile training run for her first 50-mile race, at my suggestion a few weeks ago) to drive her back from the race, and posted a Facebook status about doing the race, so now I REALLY couldn't back out.

Then I proceeded to have a friend over and "help" (in the loosest sense of the word) her bake vegan cakes for a party the next day, which mostly consisted of me eating chocolate chip cookie dough ice cream straight out of the tub, and occasionally making precision cuts on parchment paper while "Semi-Pro" played in the background. After lots of laughter about nothing, and other similarly whimsical activity, we eventually went to sleep around midnight, which, with a 5 a.m. wakeup time, was maybe pushing it.

But in retrospect, maybe not the worst decision, since I woke up in a good mood as a result of our general mirth-making. I picked up and put on clothes from my neat piles, and, after minimal foot-dragging, I was out the door at around 5:30 a.m., which was kind of a late start for a 6:45 bus from the finish line to the start, but I made it there exactly at 6:45, only to find that they had underestimated demand by one bus, and I would have to wait for one to come back.

So I had plenty of time to sit in my car and think about not running the race (especially since, at this point, it was cold and rainy). But they knew I was here, so I couldn't not do it. Eventually, after about half an hour, the bus showed up, and it was off to the start, which they were delaying for our "short-bus's" arrival.

This worked perfectly, as I got off the bus, handed in my entry form and fee, pinned my bib on, filled my water bottle, and scavenged a Hammer Gel from one of the tables for breakfast (fortunately, it was Montana Huckleberry, one of the better flavors). It had stopped raining, and, also in the category of pleasant surprises, it was not horribly cold, as it usually is at the start of this race.

Meg found me right away, and we walked over to the start together - apparently, her six miles before the race (to bring her to 40 for the day) went well. I saw Mosi just before the race started, and when I mentioned that I hadn't had breakfast, he gave me two Hammer Gels, which was really awesome of him. And then, with absolutely no fanfare whatsoever (a trademark of this race), we were off.

I went out pretty fast, and since I had been hanging out in the back before the start, talking to my friends, that meant that I had to pass a lot of people. Fortunately, the first half-mile or so is a wide paved path, which made passing easy. Normally, I don't go out that way, but after Club Challenge this past Sunday, I decided not to be "slow" in races, ever, whatever that means. (I think it means to be aggressive and push yourself, maybe.) Remarkably, I felt okay, in spite of how I had been feeling for the past 24 hours, and how little I had eaten.

Then, things got uneventful (albeit muddily uneventful - about 50 percent of the course was slick mud, and required constant care, so as to avoid face-planting). Up to the lake section (where "50K" runners split off and run a loop on the trail around Clopper Lake before returning to follow the "marathon" course), a few people were ahead of me, but only one person, a guy in a red jacket, had passed me. He didn't pass me too hard, and he was in sight most of the time. I couldn't quite catch him, lost contact, and then sort of forgot about him.

Adding to the non-descript confusion, because people who are running both the "marathon" and the "50K" are on the same course, it's hard to tell who's actually ahead of you, except when you get to the lake, which only the 50K runners run. During the lake loop, when I could see across the lake, I could see one person ahead of me, and one person who appeared to be not that far behind me.

I had gone out to race, and so at this point, I started drawing on the training I had been doing this past week, where, in just about every run, I had been throwing in random pick-ups, mostly to convince myself that I could always run faster, probably. (Incidentally, the lingering soreness from this might have contributed to my less-than-ideal physical state on Friday.) As I reached the end of the lake section, I saw the guy who I had seen ahead of me walking - apparently, he had burned himself out. I didn't see the guy behind me anymore, so I must have dropped him.

I continued my "aid station roulette" routine (having no nutrition plan in particular coming in, other than my water bottle and some Endurolytes, I tried to take in about 200 calories at each aid station, mostly in bananas, orange slices, and Nutter Butter cookies, washed down with Coke, Mountain Dew, or Gatorade), and headed down the trail for what is typically the "worst" section of the race. That is, if you're feeling bad as you leave the lake loop (the end of the loop is around the 20-mile mark), this section will make it worse, because the trail descends quite a bit for about half a mile, then immediately climbs just as much in as much distance. I was still feeling strong and pushing, and now I was passing people, but, at this point, there was no telling which race they were in.

Still, passing people is passing people, and since I had no watch to mark progress, this kept me mentally occupied for the remainder of the race. And the remainder of the race was similarly uneventful - I just kept pushing and staying in the moment as much as possible. Before I knew it, I was at the last aid station, and Jon was there, as photographer, and got really excited when he saw me. "What are you doing? You're killing it!" he shouted as he took dozens of photos of me. I would have loved to stay and chat, but I had the nasty little business of the last 3-ish miles of the race, beginning with a creek crossing and a steep climb.


Eyeing up that last hill, while Jon gets trigger-happy on the camera.

It was somewhere on the steep climb, when I could feel everything just clicking, and all the hard work from the past months coming together, that I suddenly felt all of the emotional distress and weight of the past couple of weeks just flood out of me. Yes, that sounds kind of stupid, but pushing my body over that terrain in the way that I was pushing it was perfectly cathartic.

And I wish I could say that I ended the race that way, but as I hit the pavement for the last mile or so, a man walking by said to me "number 5," and that took the wind right out of my sails. It seems as though 5th is my permanent 50K finishing place, and it seemed like for all of the focus and effort I had put into this race today, in spite of the circumstances coming in, 5th wasn't right.

That didn't slow me down, though - I pushed all the way through the appropriately unceremonious finish line, to learn that I was the second 50K finisher - the guy on the road had been counting total runners. The guy in the red jacket had apparently finished just a couple of minutes ahead of me, and was standing behind the finish line picking at the food on the table.

I was happy beyond happy at this point, even though my finishing time was slower than last year's (4 hours, 39 minutes this year, compared to 4 hours, 19 minutes last year). Considering that the course was about three miles longer this year, and the mud had made parts of it less than runnable, I consider this year's effort far stronger.

I went over to red jacket guy to congratulate him on his race. We talked for a bit, and then I realized I hadn't asked him his name, so I did, and he answered "Glen Redpath." Oops. I was immedately really apologetic about it, but he said not to worry, he tends to fly under the radar.

Glen started walking back down the road towards the picnic, and I ran after him (surprisingly, this didn't hurt a bit). We chatted some more, and he made a comment about how not wearing a shirt was a good way to get hypothermia (although I was really enjoying the feel of the sun on my back, and, more importantly, not freezing to death, as I usually am at the end of this race). Then I mentioned that I was waiting for my friend Meg to come in, since I had her change of clothes in the trunk of my car. I said that I would probably hang out with him a bit at the picnic, then go back out to my car and get her clothes . . .

And just as I was saying that, who comes down the road, looking not at all like she's nearing 40 total miles for the day? (Meg, obviously.) So with my water bottle, hat, and shirt in hand, I excused myself, turned around, and ran in with her to the finish, telling her that she was second woman in the 50K, which she apparently already knew, since people were telling her for most of the race that she wasn't far behind the first woman. She even managed a little sprint when the finish line came into sight, which I gladly went along with - a little "second-place finishers" sprint. 4 hours, 58 minutes, AFTER a six-mile "warmup," in a "training run" - as I've said in other media, totally baller.

Then Meg and I hung out at the finish line and waited for the rest of our crew to finish: Mike, in a little over 5 hours, Mosi, mid-5, and Jackie, who may be the only runner in the history of this race to state on the entry form that she would be running the "marathon," then elect to do the "50K" at the split-off (which is why she was "late" to the party). Some rough days, but this course, although fast if run right, tends to wear on you with its relentless ups and downs, and the extra distance and the mud this year added to that effect. (And, for what it's worth, Jackie's perfectly-painted "eye black" stripes made out of mud were totally winning, regardless of anything else.)

We all hung out at the picnic for probably too long afterwards, congratulating other finishers as they came in, and talking and laughing about nothing in particular. Eventually, it was time for me to drive Meg back to her car at the start, and then back home for whatever it is that I do at home (mostly cat-care and write race reports, apparently).

All in all, an awesome day in lots of ways. Not just my performance, but also the way I felt like my friends helped me to do what I did - after all, if I hadn't felt like I was out there for somebody other than myself, I might not have run the race.

And in particular, a special thanks to Meg D, whose performance at the Club Challenge 10-Mile Run last week (1:02 high, a PR for her by over 2 minutes, on a difficult 10-mile course), which I had the opportunity to watch from behind for most of the race, inspired my race. Watching her RACE that hard gave me a new perspective on my running - lately, as I've mentioned in recent posts here, I've felt like I've been "running" more than "racing" in races. Seeing the way she ran helped me to carry her brand of calculated, yet gutsy and fearless, running into my training this past week, and into this race, and if I hadn't run the race that way, it was unlikely that I would have finished as well as I did.

So, once again, I am thankful for all of the great people (race volunteers and staff definitely included) that made this experience possible. Here's to another week of awesome!


A few of the people who dragged me through this, post-race. (Not pictured: Meg Harnett, who, at the risk of TMI, was off TCB in the woods. :P)

Week of 27 February - 5 March, and Seneca Greenway 50K Race Report

Okay, first, the numbers:

27 February - Club Challenge 10-Mile Race (we went over this already), 1:06:38, plus about 35 minutes of warm-up/warm-down, for 15 miles total.

28 February - 35 minutes of random hills on the treadmill, set to "15," whatever that means (grades between 1.5% and 11.5%, I suppose), 4.5 miles

1 March - Exactly 29 minutes of running, for some reason, in the vicinity of Patterson Park, 4 miles

2 March - 40 minutes (about 6 miles) at APG, then another 57 minutes, in part with the Falls Road Wednesday night group (another 8 miles) (incidentally, was called a "bullet in the night" as I snuck up on two women running by the park on Ellwood - this was right after a dude on the passenger side of a car stopped at the intersection of Ellwood and Eastern gave me the middle finger, because the woman driving the car - presumably his wife or girlfriend - was checking me out. Most eventful last quarter-mile of a run in a long time.)

3 March - 28 minutes at APG (about 4 miles) - would have run more, but there just wasn't time.

4 March - 73 minutes, Patterson Park/Fells/Canton (about 10 miles) in the morning.

5 March - 4 hours, 19 minutes, some seconds, about 32 miles, Seneca Greenway Trail 50K, 5th place.

Total Time: 623 minutes
Total Distance: 83.5 miles

And now, the race report:

(But before I begin, 20-second commercial break to shout out my Badwater 2011 sponsor, Natural Vitality. Their Organic Life liquid vitamins, Calm Plus Calcium, and NutraRev! are at least partial contributers to the below-described success.)

When I parked my car on the side of River Road at 6:25 a.m. on race morning, I sat for a minute, and briefly considered not running the race. Historically, Seneca Greenway has been a painful introduction to the spring running season, leaving me broken-down, hobbled, and disappointed with my time. Also, there always seems to be a section of the course that never ends, usually somewhere in the last 10 miles. Having been through this three times already, I had to wonder if it made sense to go out there for a fourth round . . .

On the other hand, just about every race that has gone well for me has started almost exactly this way (i.e. recollection of painful memories, and reluctance to start). And, the purpose of this race was to see what, if anything, the past couple of months of training had done for my running, so if I really wanted to know (instead of just sitting around wondering, hence contributing to the anticipation I was feeling as I sat there in the car), I was going to have to get out there . . .

A little background on the race: The Seneca Greenway 50K is a low-key, $20-to-enter, no-prizes, no-promises, the-course-is-probably-too-long kind of race. Which of course makes it theoretically perfect for an early-season training run . . . except for the fact that most of it is on rolling single-track. To be fair, there are no prolonged steep climbs or descents. At the same time, only about 3 miles of the course is road or road-like flat. The constant winding and up-and-down sneaks up on you and leaves you feeling pretty beaten-up, which is probably why none of the finishing times are all that fast. Given that, my goal for the race was not to run a fast time as much as it was to run a solid, strong race until about 5 miles to go, and then give it whatever I had left.

The bus to the start was noisy with ultrarunners talking ultrarunner-talk, the wait for the start was ball-peen cold (a term I have adopted for the kind of cold that's just slightly too cold to be comfortable shorts and a t-shirt, but not cold enough to complain about the cold without sounding like a whiner - you just stand there and it hits you like a ball-peen hammer), and one of the two bagels that I ate before the start was definitely dyed pink, meaning that it was probably at least two weeks old, but all in all, there have been colder, more uncomfortable starts to this race. Then again, a woman came up to me at the start because she recognized me from my Hellgate failure (apparently she was the woman who drove me back to the starting line), and also from my failure at the Ring, and then she mentioned MMT, which I told her I was doing this year, to which she replied incredulously "why would you go back after all that?" . . . to which I graciously replied that it was a bad day, and that some days will be better than others. (Emotional crisis averted.) As Ed gave us the traditional starting command to "get out of here," I felt nothing, and as far as I could tell, that wasn't a bad thing.

Of course, that quickly changed when the race turned into a track meet from the start. I wasn't entirely expecting this, as the crowd at the start didn't look nearly as fast as last year's field. But the old judging a book by its cover thing was clearly failing me here, as the early pace felt way out of line with what I was trying to accomplish, so I held back and was content to let people pass me on the first 3-mile trail segment. In the meantime, a guy asked me about my cut-up MT100s (so far, in every race, at least one person has marveled at how I could run so far in them), and I would have been less irritated with him if he hadn't said "light as a feather . . . must be nice" and then proceeded to pass me.

Once we hit the first road crossing, though, things began to settle down (i.e., people stopped passing me), and I started finding a better rhythm on the trail (this always seems to take me a few miles). For the next five to seven miles, I wasn't actually closing the gap on anybody, but nobody was running away from me, either. Thinking that I probably didn't have the footspeed to chase anybody, and knowing that going all-out wasn't my plan for the race in the first place, I kept telling myself that if I could just keep up a steady pace, sooner or later, the track stars up front would blow up, and the race would come back to me. I had a feeling that, considering that most people rarely run more than two hours at a time, at about an hour and a half, if I was still feeling okay, the tide would start to turn.

And sure enough, it did. I passed the second aid station, a couple of bottles of water, three chocolate wafers, and two generic, suspiciously-yellow Chips Ahoy-style cookies later, finding myself finally gaining ground on the three people who were in sight in front of me (including MT100-marveler). On the trail up to Mile 15, I concentrated on gradually closing the gap. The timing couldn't have been better, as I was coming in for the kill right at the aid station . . .

And then all three of them turned off onto the marathon course, leaving me alone to chew on a rock-hard ginger snap as I began the lake loop. This was a bit unnerving, since I had been keying my effort off of their gradual exhaustion, and now I was left to guess on my own how much I might have left in the tank. I didn't see anybody in front of me, and I didn't want to think about what was behind me. So I shut off my brain to the extent possible (except for the part of me that couldn't stop thinking about how I fell on two bridges running around the lake section last year), and kept my effort under control on the lake loop. It felt as though it was routed longer than last year, but maybe I just blocked a lot of last year's lake loop out.

In any case, I came out of the loop and back to the marathon split-off aid station unscathed, but, as far as I could tell, no nearer to whoever might have been in front of me in the 50K (and now, with the marathon runners on the trail ahead of me, there was no way to tell who was really ahead). Still, being in the position to pick off runners (even if they weren't in my race) was confidence-boosting, so I kept the pace steady, kept passing people, and miraculously, kept two more fake yellow Chips Ahoy cookies from being thrown up (although I could taste the chocolate-flavored bile in my throat).

It was at about this point in the race (somewhere a little past 20 miles) that it occurred to me that this was the furthest I had ever gone in this race without (1) stopping due to nature's call or (2) walking because the trail had burned me out. I attribute the former to spot-on nutrition - not too much food the night before the race, or right before the race, or during the race, but just enough to keep me going (and since my usual diet is fairly low-carb now, it doesn't take too much sugar to keep me going anymore, which is great news for my slow digestive system). I attribute the latter to all the time I've spent running on uneven ground in my cut-up MT100s, and the time I've been spending in the weight room. As I meditated on this, of course, I had my obligatory stumble of the race, on a root, uphill. Being an old pro at these now, I instinctively rolled, rose to my feet, and after about four walking steps to make sure that nothing was knocked loose, continued running the hill.

As I reached the final aid station, I looked at my watch, which didn't actually have the race time on it, since I had accidentally both stopped and reset the timer vaulting a wooden guardrail earlier in the race. By my estimates, the stopped watch incident happened around an hour and a half in, and my watch was now showing about 2:20, so with 7-ish miles to go, I was (relying on admittedly flawed memory here) about 10 minutes faster than my fastest split at this aid station, the only split I ever pay attention to, because usually by this point in the race, I am ready for it to end at any minute. But surprise! I felt strong, and people were telling me that I looked strong, and they weren't lying about it, so now I thought might be a good time to start stepping on the gas and seeing what was left in the tank.

And lo and behold, a target appeared, in the form of a big tall guy in a tri kit, taking his sweet time getting out of the aid station. I passed him as he was adjusting some trivial part of his getup, and he began to chase. Hard. Hard enough that his heart rate monitor was beeping at him every time we would climb or weave through some particularly difficult obstacle, begging for him to stop. Silently, I was begging for him to stop, while at the same time grateful that somebody was forcing me to push the pace. At the first short, steep hill, I took the opportunity to walk, and he thanked me for the nice "cadence," which is when I knew that I would pass him eventually. Over the next section, we passed a few more people, but knowing that I still had a very long 4.5 miles to go, I let off the gas a bit, and he passed me, but this was fine. I kept him within sight until the last aid station, and as we cruised in, I passed him, shoved a bunch of candy hearts in my mouth, and hurried towards that last cruel climb. Passed. (And, according to the photographer at the aid station, looking like I hadn't just run 30 miles.)

With a little over 2 miles to go, I knew that a solid finish was in the bag. Something between 4 hours and 4 hours and 20 minutes seemed like what was going to happen, although I couldn't do the math right then and there. All I knew for sure was that the race was nearly over, I didn't feel nearly as bad as I thought I would, and the candy hearts were still in my mouth, stuffed under my gums because chewing and swallowing them was too distracting at this point. So, time to drop the hammer, and as soon as I hit the road, I dumped my water bottle to lighten the load, and gave it whatever I had left, and, just to make the last mile a little more exciting, started closing in on another runner who was dying. Unfortunately, I wasn't quiet enough, because he heard me coming, looked back, and started picking it up a bit. There just wasn't enough course left for anything short of a Usain Bolt-style sprint to be good enough to catch him. As it turned out, he was in the 50K, and finished 4th, some seconds ahead of me. I finished fifth, in 4 hours, 19 minutes, and some seconds, with a huge smile on my face, tossing my water bottle into the air in celebration, and spitting out the now-useless candy hearts. (Attractive.)

As it turned out, either the course conditions were amazing (they were pretty good, but there have been better years), or the field was stacked at the top, because in the five times that they've done this, my time would have won the race twice, been two minutes short of the winner's time twice, and lost outright only the year that the course record (4:06) was set. (Who knows, a new course record might have been set this year - I didn't stick around to see the results, and they aren't posted yet . . .) I managed the mile-long deathmarch back to the car more comfortably than usual this year, my plate of barbecue not being entirely appealing, but my legs not being completely wrecked either. And, as luck would have it, as I was putting my track suit on by the car, Hellgate woman came running past, asked me how I did, and reacted even more incredulously when I told her my finishing place and time. (So there.) And thus, all business of relevance being finished, I departed. (Wearing the track suit, windows up, heat on full blast . . . never too early to start training for Badwater.)

Overall, this was a very satisfying race, since I accomplished every goal I set out to accomplish: run steady, finish strong, live to run the next day. I had an appropriate pre-race quasi-taper, an appropriate nutrition strategy, appropriate preparation for the course itself, and exerted an appropriate effort level. Could I have run faster? Probably, considering how much I had left at the end. With a less conservative start, a finish of about 10 minutes faster seems plausible; beyond that, who knows. My downhill running has also improved, although not quite to the level that I'd like. So there is definitely more work ahead of me, but this race served as reassurance that I'm on the right track, and that I have a solid base to build on. The future looks pretty bright (even if it is peppered with various foods of questionable nutritional value).

20-26 February: Week in Review, and Club Challenge 10-Mile Report

Okay, dates, times, distances:

20 February: 10 miles (74 minutes), Canton/Fells/etc.
21 February: 4 miles (29 minutes), Canton/Fells/etc.
22 February: 6 miles (42 minutes), including a "tempo" Patterson Park loop
23 February: 3 miles (25 minutes), APG
24 February: 8 miles (56 minutes), Canton/Fells/etc.
25 February: 2.5 miles, Campus Hills speed loop, 3.5 miles, treadmill hill program (51 minutes total)
26 February: 6 miles in the morning (40 minutes), 5 miles in the afternoon (35 minutes), all Canton/Fells

Total Time: 352 minutes
Total Distance: 48 miles

Definitely a decrease in mileage from the past couple of weeks, but considering that I didn't have a 30-ish mile run thrown in there, still decent volume, and overall, an appropriate draw-down, considering that the runs on the 24th through the 26th felt awful.

And speaking of which, Club Challenge . . .

The Club Challenge 10-Mile Race, hosted by the Howard County Striders, is a race that I've made a point of doing for the past few years, since it's the major Falls Road Running team race of the year. That's the fun part. Everything else about the race - the brutally hilly course, the end-of-February-when-nobody-is-totally-in-shape-yet, the distance (which is too long to be run outright "fast," but too short to just rely on endurance) - is, well, challenging. Every year, I wind up questioning my sanity around Mile 4 of this race, and every year I wind up finishing anyway, and totally forgetting how bad I felt the next day. That said, this post will not fully convey how bad it felt, since I've already partially forgotten that, but rest assured, it was worse than however this sounds.

Since this is a "relatively" short race, a relatively short summary is in order: I started out at just over 6 minutes for the first mile, hit the second mile in around 12:20, the third mile in around 19:20, and after that, the hills started coming and really did me in. The first couple were okay, but after that, I have never felt such blinding, excruciating pain in my quads when climbing a hill. The pain gradually disappeared on the flats and downhills, but of course, after a few miles on that course, there is never enough of either to regain any sort of rhythm. I ended up finishing in 1:06:37, which is 12 seconds faster than what I ran last year, but 1:48 slower than my fastest time at that race (although I think that may have been run the year that the course was 0.15 miles short).

So, in a way, not really much different from last year, which leaves me wondering how to feel about my performance. It was a strange race, because the limiting factor was not my aerobic fitness, but the fact that past the third mile, my quads felt like they might explode at any second. Other than my quads, I felt fairly strong, so it may just be that insufficient recovery from my weight room sessions was the culprit. By comparison, last year, I had done a 20-mile run the day before the race, and was incubating some kind of cold, hence my mediocre performance. That said, last year, I think that I performed closer to my theoretical capacity at that point. Even if I had been less sick and tired on race day last year, I don't think I could have gone that much faster. This year, had I not come in on a "bad" day, I think I would have had a faster time in me.

All water under the bridge at this point, but it does point to increased volume and sharper, more aggressive speedwork as the way to build from here (surprise, surprise). The diet and core exercises and all that seem to be working at the moment, so no need to mess with any of them. Hopefully, a better test of where I am will come this Saturday, at the Seneca Greenway Trail 50K.

January 2010 - A Month in Review

It's been a while since I posted here, and that's not for lack of running, but lack of time to write about running. Here are some reasons why I've lacked time to write:

1. I closed out 2009 with a 100-mile week, and started 2010 with 150 miles in 2 weeks. (Since then, I've backed off a little, hitting roughly 50 miles a week). These weeks were on the strength of at least one 25-mile run in each week.

2. I've been on the ultra-healthy "Ultra-Metabolism" diet of nuts, fruits, vegetables, and limited meat and fish. (That's the gist of it - to learn more, read the UltraMetabolism book.) Somehow, I've lost about 5 pounds, and I feel more energetic and healthy than I did before. As a side effect of the diet, I've also learned to be very efficient at cooking and cleaning dishes, all while going to school and holding down a full-time job. Life expert right here. :P

3. I was in a minor car accident that totaled my 2001 Honda Civic. (Incidentally, this didn't stop me from running 25 miles that same day, to make 100 miles for the week.) It's in the process of being resurrected as a "salvage" vehicle right now, because, with only 120,000 miles on it, it still has a lot of life left in it. In the meantime, I've been driving around a Jeep Liberty (fun) and a Hyundai Accent (not so fun).

4. I've been shuffled through three positions now at work in the last month, and I'm taking classes two nights a week (Tuesday and Thursday), until 10 p.m.

So yes, a lot going on. And running is definitely in the mix, and I'm looking forward to a number of races this spring, including (but not limited to): Club Challenge 10-mile, Seneca Greenway 50K, National Marathon (pacing 3:00), Boston Marathon (hoping to run 2:5x, faster than 2:57:13 that I ran last year), Frederick Marathon (pacing 3:10), Bull Run 50-mile (if I get in), Massanutten Mountain Trail 100 (if I get in), Old Dominion 100 (probably, for the heck of it - I loved that race), Western States (the real goal race in all of this), Badwater (if by some random stroke of luck I get in), and, well, who knows from there, but that's a pretty busy schedule already . . .

But whatever, bring it. I like a challenge.