TEXAS Paul - Out to Pasture - Healing

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.   

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.

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.