TEXAS Paul - Out to Pasture - Healing

Boston Marathon

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Location:

Florence,TX,USA

Member Since:

Aug 06, 2006

Gender:

Male

Goal Type:

Boston Qualifier

Running Accomplishments:

ENTRY 1: Age 61 and I'm still alive and running. . . . . . ENTRY 2: Austin, TX, Muddy Buddy Masters, 1st place, 2005, 2006, and 2008 with Karen F. (see picture above - Karen H.; Karen F.; Me; Carey) (Karen H. & Carey did an Ironman in Idaho in June 2007) . . . . ENTRY 3: St. George Marathon 2001 3:18:03; 2002 3:15:56; 2003 3:18:04; 2004 3:19:03; 2005 3:37:21; 2006 & 2007 did not make the lottery. 2008 3:54:04 (tough).  .  .  .  . ENTRY 4: 2007 San Antonio Marathon - 1st place age group 60-64. . . . . ENTRY 5: Eight consecutive Boston Marathons since 2001. Best time so far was 3:35:09 in 2003. Age 55. . . . . . ENTRY 6: Pikes Peak Marathon 5:56:33 in 2005. 3rd place out of 54 runners ( group 55-59) Age 58. . . . . . ENTRY 7: Pikes Peak Marathon - 2008 - 2nd place in my age group (33 registered, 23 finished) running in the snow and ice the last 2 miles of the Ascent at the top . . . . . . ENTRY 8: 3M Half Marathon at a 7:11 pace in 2005, age 57. . . . . . . ENTRY 9: Congress Avenue Mile Austin, TX 5:46 in 2004. Age 57

Short-Term Running Goals:

Entry 1:  Get in a full 6 months of prep for 2009 Boston, no excuses, run a strong Boston. . . . .Entry 2: Use Pilates methods for core strengthening and flexibility improvements.. . . . . . Entry 3: Get completely healed from the muscle disorder that has plagued me since February 2006 (Polymyalgia Rheumatica)

Long-Term Running Goals:

Entry 1. Complete 10 consecutive Boston Marathons - I have done 8 so far. . . . . . . Entry 2. Continue running marathons through my 60's and into my 70's, 80's and 90's.

Personal:

Married, 2 children, 2 grand children. My 9 year old grand-daughter is convinced she is a runner.  My 4 year old grandson loves to wear his Boston Marathon and Pikes Peak Marathon t-shirts.  He wants to run the mountain with grandpa. 

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Miles:This week: 0.00 Month: 0.00 Year: 0.00
Easy MilesMarathon Pace MilesThreshold MilesVO2 Max MilesTotal Distance
60.0037.2013.009.00119.20
Easy MilesMarathon Pace MilesThreshold MilesVO2 Max MilesTotal Distance
2.000.003.000.005.00

Ran at Brushy Creek with the Wednesday night bunch.  Late leaving work so I didn't get in my early miles.  I pulled in just as the group was heading over to do drills.  Did a quick change into running clothes and joined them. 

Bill had us do a hard push workout tonight.  We did the short loop, the the medium loop, then the long loop, then the medium loop, then the short loop which all added up into a 3 mile workout of pushing it really good.  Temps were in the high 70's or low 80's with high humidity as we all had sweat dripping as we ran and afterword as we did stretching.  Got in 2 easy miles and headed home. 

Overall a short night of running but it really was a great workout.  Having a reasonably large group made it fun as well. 

Comments(2)
Easy MilesMarathon Pace MilesThreshold MilesVO2 Max MilesTotal Distance
9.000.000.000.009.00

Got up early and drove down to Wells Branch trail and ran 4 loops and got in 9 miles before going to work.  I ran a steady pace but didn't push it too much.  After doing 26.2 Saturday and pushing it hard on Monday and Wednesday I could feel it some this morning. 

The temperature was reasonable in the upper 60's or low 70's.  Humidity was high again so the sweat like a pig routine was in order.  Cleaned up after the run over in the men's restroom and went to work.

 

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Easy MilesMarathon Pace MilesThreshold MilesVO2 Max MilesTotal Distance
12.000.000.003.0015.00

What a great day to run in Austin, TX.  Temps at 6:00 AM about 48 degrees.  Lynn and I drove down to Townlake at the Austin HS tennis court parking lot and met Karen F, Tam, Duke, Steve S, and Rick B.  Karen H has the flu so she took the weekend off, figuring Boston is only 2 weeks away and no reason to tempt fate by running when she was not up to it.  Lynn did her People Bridge walk while the rest of us took off on the 10 mile Longhorn Dam loop. 

After the first 4 miles we ran race pace for 3 miles.  We did this because our Boston training schedule showed us with a 5K race for today, so Karen and I figured a 3 mile race pace in the middle of our 15 mile run would fill that requirement.  I led the group and ran a 7:04 for the first mile, then mile 2 started up and over the Longhorn Dam and up over by the Power Plant.  Those hill sections took a little toll and I finished mile 2 at 7:31, a little disappointed, so I pushed it hard for the 3rd mile that finished just as we went under I-35.  I did the 3rd mile in 6:59 which was much more satisfying.  Then I headed back to meet Karen and Tam as they came in running hard about 2:30 behind me.  Then Duke and Steve came in.  A very satisfying run today which was 4 seconds faster than I did this a few weeks ago.

Then we finished the 10 mile loop, losing Tam and Duke along the way as Tam basically walked the rest of the way.  Karen had run him into the ground on the 3 mile push.  Then Karen F and I did the 5 mile Congress Avenue loop finishing a great morning of running.  Boston, here I come.

Then we went over to Maudie's for breakfast tacos (potatoes, eggs, and cheese).  Karen F brought her god-daughter, Taylor who is visiting for a few days.  As we sat there eating our breakfast, Jessie James (of the motorcycle shows on TV) came in and sat down to breakfast two tables away from us.  We didn't bother him, but Lynn sure thought it was cool, as she likes to see the motorcycle chop shop shows on TV.  Our son, PD, just bought a Buell Lightening sport bike.  A fun day.

Comments(2)
Easy MilesMarathon Pace MilesThreshold MilesVO2 Max MilesTotal Distance
0.000.000.000.000.00

Using the Sunday blog to note other aspects of my fitness program.

1.  Resting HR this morning was 46.  This is a good thing, the best in the past 5 or 6 weeks.   

2.  Polymyalgia Rheumatica muscle disorder status.  It has now officially been over 2 years since I started seeing muscle aching symptoms.  The doctor said this disease normally goes away within 2 years, so I am very hopeful I can soon begin reducing my medication.  
Six weeks ago I reduced my Prednisone medication down to 7 mg a day (4 mg in the morning and 3 mg at night).  Two weeks later I reduced it down to 6 mg a day, 3 mg in the morning and 3 mg in the evening.  Two weeks later I reduced it down to 5 mg a day, but after 5 days (March 21st) due to excess neck and high back muscle pain, I moved it back up to 6 mg a day.  Still at 6 mg a day. 
I visited the rheumatologist this past week and he basically said to hang in there and see where the recovery goes.  He noted that some people actually have to go on long term taking a minimum dosage of prednisone, hmmmmmm, I don't like that.  We will see.   

3.  Hopefully nothing to really mention, but for the past week or two after I run I notice a pain on the top of my right foot and some swelling from the base of the toes that goes half way up the foot.  When I curl the toes or lift the toes "up" it puts a strain through the top of the foot where the swelling is.  Hopefully this nuisance will go away if I ignore it and don't overdo the running. 

4.  Core strength training.  Boy am I missing on this one.  Nothing to report. 
No situps, no crunches, no push-ups, nada.  The lower back is probably to the point in healing that I can get started on the core now. 

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Easy MilesMarathon Pace MilesThreshold MilesVO2 Max MilesTotal Distance
2.003.000.000.005.00

Ran at McNeil HS with the Monday night bunch.  There were about 50 of us there tonight.  A hot evening with temps in the mid 80's and humidity again.  But a fun run with all the people that showed up.  No way to know all the names any more, just too many.

Duke ran the cool down mile with me after we got through with the workout. 

Sunday I pushed the lawn mower for about 6 hours on our property giving the first mow of the year.  A great aerobic workout and I could even feel it with the upper body work through the shoulders and back.  Good work. 

Comments(2)
Easy MilesMarathon Pace MilesThreshold MilesVO2 Max MilesTotal Distance
4.000.000.004.008.00

Another hot humid evening in Austin, TX.  We ran at Brushy Creek tonight.  3 miles warm-up.  Drills.  4 miles hard.  1 mile cool down.  The 4 hard miles consisted of 5 loops of the medium long loop running each one faster than the one before with a 100 meter recovery between each. 

Tom (Pikes Peak with me this year) ran with me tonight.  I showed him my trail running shoes (Brooks Cascadia).  He is going to RunTex and get some good trail shoes.

All systems felt good tonight.  I think I'm on track to have a decent Boston in 12 days.

Comments(1)
Easy MilesMarathon Pace MilesThreshold MilesVO2 Max MilesTotal Distance
8.000.005.000.0013.00

What a great day in Austin, TX.  Lynn and I drove down to Austin HS track and met Karen F and Karen H at 6:30 AM.  Beautiful morning with very low humidity and temps in the high 40's as we got started with our speed intervals.  A gorgeous sunrise as we were running on the track.  Lynn did her walk of the People Bridge loop on Townlake as we did our speed intervals.

Karen H was just finishing her 2nd week with the flu and is in recovery mode and wondered just what she could do today, but she did great with Karen F helping pace her through the intervals.  My goal was just to beat 7:30 for each interval and run comfortably fast.  My intervals were 7:25; 7:11; 7:17; 7:14; 6:38.  Then we went over on the Townlake trail and did the Congress Avenue Bridge loop with an extra mile up into town to 5th Street due to road closures from the Art festival.  The fragrence from flowers and tree blossoms was strong along the trail and almost gives you a runners high smelling them as you run.  It reminded me of running past the orange groves when I was in San Jose, CA from 1991 to 1998 and would get a runners high from the pungent orange grove fragrence.  Good memories.

Then we went ove to Maudie's for breakfast tacos and they really did a good job on them today.  Just a great start to the weekend.  Karen F and I did some planning talk for our Boston trip next week.  Karen't mother is going to go to her first Boston Marathon so we figured she will be able to spend some time with Lynn while Karen and I run the marathon. 

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Easy MilesMarathon Pace MilesThreshold MilesVO2 Max MilesTotal Distance
4.000.000.002.006.00

Another gorgeous evening in Austin, TX.  Low humidity, temp probably in the mid 70's, just a beautiful evening at McNeil HS track.  Probably 40 of us there.  Donnie announced to the group that there were two of us running Boston next week.  It was fun talking with lots of running friends a week before Boston.

3 warm-up miles, drills, then Donnie had us run 2 each 700M at 5K pace, then 4 each 300M at 1-mile speed pace.  A good workout.  I held back a little being careful not to push it too hard and take a chance of a strain.  Then 1 mile cool down.

Amazing, we have had two of the best weather weeks that we ever see here in Austin.  All systems are still go for Boston. 

Comments(2)
Easy MilesMarathon Pace MilesThreshold MilesVO2 Max MilesTotal Distance
1.000.004.000.005.00

A great evening at Brushy Creek with a little wind and lots of clouds, a storm is approaching.  Temps were in the high 70's or low 80's.  A great evening to run. 

Bill had us run over across the dam where we did the drills.  Then he had us do 4 miles of the dam hill loop.  Veronica stayed with me and we had a really nice run.  On the first loop on our way back up the hill trail we passed 4 para-military guys.  I led the way and as I passed the lead guy he looked over at the grey bearded old man and couldn't handle it.  He picked up the pace to stay even with me and then we started up the steep concrete part of the trail up to the top of the dam, and he could hardly keep up when one of the guys yelled at him to join the group and he backed off.  Veronica said it looked like he was real happy to rejoin the group, fun. 

Then we all ran back over to the other side of the dam and did our stretch drills.  A nice workout.  As far as Boston goes all looks well.  We leave Friday morning and arrive in Boston about 1:30 PM.  We'll head for Copley Square and do our packet pickup.  Sunday we will watch the olympic trials where 4 ladies from here in Austin will be running.  Karen H. and I will bring Texas flags and wave to them for encouragement.  Should be a great time.

Comments(3)
Race: Boston Marathon (26.2 Miles) 04:03:23
Easy MilesMarathon Pace MilesThreshold MilesVO2 Max MilesTotal Distance
0.0026.200.000.0026.20

What a beautiful day in Boston.  The clouds parted just as the race started and we were on our way.  I was confident to run between 3:45 and 3:55 and hoping for better, but by the 14th and 15th mile I could feel it in the legs and knew from the past two years that the pace was going to slow down every mile from here.  The first half of the race I steadily passed other runners.  By mile 14 and 15 I was running even with the other runners, and from mile 16 on it was a mix of staying with the other runners and recognizing that about 2/3 of them were slowly steadily passing me, which was a little frustrating, but what a great day and a great race.  I have to remember that I have lots of running friends back in Austin that wish they were qualified for Boston and could be here, as it is a privilege and an honor. 

I'm convinced that this muscle disorder, Polymyalgia Rheumatica, is the root of my challenges the past two years.  I'm still on 6mg of prednisone medication per day and hoping to get off the medication soon.  However, I saw too many other runners with real handicaps so I have no complaints.

How fast some things can change.  Only 5 years ago I was running 4 marathons between 3:15:56 and 3:19:03.  Then the PMR hit 2 years ago.  Lesson:  enjoy all your running, do your best under the conditions, and as long as you know you trained well and ran well, that is all you can do. 

The crowd was the best I have seen in 8 years here at Boston, and it is great every year, but this one was special.  The good news is that even though I could feel the legs beginning to suffer I was able to keep up the running and not get into a bunch of recovery walks, other than when I would drink the Gatorade at the aid stations.  On Heartbreak Hill it was satisfying to be passing some runners who had begun to walk.  I had dedicated mile 21 to Kory and thought of him as I pushed it up Heartbreak.  Mile 13 was dedicated to Benn and as I passed all the screaming girls at Wellesley College I thought of Benn and how he will enjoy these girls.  I resisted doing any kissing with the girls holding "Kiss Me" signs. 

My running partner Karen H had a similar experience as I did, as she had been recovering from the flu for the past several weeks.  Still, a great race that we loved to run.

Sunday we went down and watched the American women do their olympic trials.  What a great experience that was.  We got to see them 6 times during their 26.2 mile run (including the start and finish) because they did a loop course that brought them back through town.  These are fast women with the winner, Deena Kastor, running a 2:29:35.  By the time the women finished at 2:45 they were looking real slow which makes no sense at all because they had just run a awesome race.  And the women who were finishing just under 3 hours were looking extremely slow by the end of the race, but again, finishing under 3 hours is an awesome run.  Goodness, what fun this was.

I'm guaranteed to be in St. George this fall so I'll hope for more recovery from the PMR and be ready to run a decent time, hopefully. 

Right now it is time to prepare for the Pikes Peak Marathon in August.  The training focuses primarily on strength training and strength endurance.  The training starts today.   

Comments(6)
Easy MilesMarathon Pace MilesThreshold MilesVO2 Max MilesTotal Distance
4.000.000.000.004.00

The recovery from Boston is going really well so I brought my running clothes to work and went to Brushy Creek and joined the group with a mile warm-up and then we did drills.  After drills Bill had us run over to the boat dock parking and we ran a loop on the trail, then recovery up the road to the dam.  Then a mile loop across the dam and back where most of us saw a rattle snake on the path about 100 meters from the start.  Then recovery down the hill to the boat dock.  Then a mile loop on the trail.  Then we did stretches to finish up.  A nice workout that was easier than I thought it would be only 2 days since Boston. 

I talked with Tom and told him that our Pikes Peak training starts today.  We are going to have fun.

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Easy MilesMarathon Pace MilesThreshold MilesVO2 Max MilesTotal Distance
10.000.000.000.0010.00

7:00 AM, temp in mid 60's, met Karen H and Tom H at Austin HS tennis court parking lot.  Ran the 10 mile Longhorn Dam loop of Townlake.  Beautiful morning after thunderstorms went through central Texas last night.  Only 5 days since Karen and I did Boston and this 10 mile run felt really good, but by the last few miles we could tell we were working. 

Went over to Maudie's for breakfast tacos.  After that Lynn and I drove up to Georgetown and went out to Lake Georgetown to scope out the possiblity of some running trails that Tom and I could use for part of our Pikes Peak Marathon training.  They have a 26 mile trail that runs all the way around Lake Georgetown and part of it goes down to the bottom of the dam and then back up the other side.  Looks like a possibility for PPM training.  We will have to check it out.

Anyway, good news is there are no injuries or strains from running Boston, so all systems should be go to move on into the PPM training with a focus on strength endurance more than speed.  Tom is excited as this will be his first PPM. 

Comments(2)
Easy MilesMarathon Pace MilesThreshold MilesVO2 Max MilesTotal Distance
4.000.001.000.005.00

A beautiful warm evening in Austin, TX, with temps in the 80's but fresh air after the rain storms we had this weekend.  2 miles warm-up, then drills with Donnie and the group.  We had about 30 or more of us here tonight.  A lot of folks were doing congrats for me and Aaron doing Boston last Monday, good friends.

Then Donnie had us do "circuits".  Run hard 100 meters then do 10 push-ups, run hard 100 meters then do 10 lunges, run 100 meters hard then do 10 ab-crunches, run hard 100 meters then do 10 jumps.  Repeat this routine for all 4 laps of one mile.  Karen F and I ran this one together.

Then we ran 2 miles cool-down after a lap walking recovery.  A fun evening.  Only one week since Boston but it felt really good to give it a push. 

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Easy MilesMarathon Pace MilesThreshold MilesVO2 Max MilesTotal Distance
0.000.000.000.000.00

Cross training tonight on the weights.  35 minutes of leg extensions, leg curls, ab-crunches, push-ups.  I increased the weight each round.  Legs felt shaky after the workout, felt good. 

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Easy MilesMarathon Pace MilesThreshold MilesVO2 Max MilesTotal Distance
0.008.000.000.008.00

A nice warm evening in Georgetown, TX.  I met Tom at 5:00 PM at the parking lot near the Lake Georgetown dam.  Tom had to be back by 1 hr 30 min, so we went on a discovery trail run along the northeast side of the lake.  A nice challenging trail with rocks and roots and tree branches and all with enough up and down running to make this a good challenging run. 

We pushed the pace at 10 minute segments and then took a 1 minute recovery walk, and repeated this for the entire run.  By the time we finished I could really feel it in the upper legs.  A great workout.  We will probably do this kind of running on most Wednesday's as part of the Pikes Peak Marathon training. 

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Easy MilesMarathon Pace MilesThreshold MilesVO2 Max MilesTotal Distance
60.0037.2013.009.00119.20
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