The Pain Report: Seattle Rock-Roll Marathon

In an earlier post I tried to give an objective recounting of the Seattle Rock-N-Roll Marathon. Now its time for some straight up Daddy legs style blogging. Any pretty prose or words of inspiration found hereafter is purely coincidental.

This past January I sat in front my computer, cold rocks in my stomach, staring at the 'click to continue' button pulsing in Apple blue at the bottom of my screen.  Once I hit that button I would be committing myself, and my family, to the biggest physical endeavor of my life.  The seed of the idea took root during the Christmas Holiday in NoDak (North Dakota). I had been talking about maybe running a marathon for charity, but was afraid of picking up the balance of whatever I couldn't raise.  My brother-in-law Andrew was itching to race again and best his finishing time of 3:41 at Grandma's of the past summer.  Then Jen, my sister-in-law, and wife to the eldest Howe boys, Christopher, presented us with the fateful worm on the hook; the Seattle Marathon. The race was sometime in June, which meant fantastic running weather, and we could stay at her and Chris' house. The four of us would run, Jen, the elder Howe boys, Chris and Andrew, and myself.  My fave girls Lisa and Ella would be support crew. To complete the full Howe set, we all pitched in to fly out the youngest member, Anthony, as a graduation gift. Lisa would be with all her brothers, which is rare these days, and we would be rolling into race day with a crew, and thats the best way to roll. So, to rewind, me sitting in front of the computer.  $100 to punish myself.  Cold rocks in my stomach, huge sacrifice for me and my family. Ahh shit! Here we go. Click.  I was going to let 26.2 miles have its way with me.

Before I got deep into training for the Seattle Marathon the farthest I had run was 15 miles. This was the result of getting lost in Brooklyn and trying to find my way back to Astoria, Queens.  It wouldn't be the last time that getting lost somewhere in NYC lead to a long run, but those are stories already told. January and February were to be a base building period but the actual miles logged were inconsequential. So the base building started for reals at the end of February with the kick off of my official training season. I love that I had a training season. I played sports for a brief period a s a young kid but there wasn't a 'training season'. There was football, soccer, and baseball season, with time off in between.  In high school I played tennis for a single season. Again, there was no period of training.  After that one season of tennis in high school I decided to remove the sports from my calendar and focus on the 'off time' found in between.  This respite lasted for almost twenty years. So to make a short story just a little bit longer, I started my first ever Training Season on February 22nd, 2010.

Thanks Hal
For the mileage build up I used as a template one of Hal Higdon's novice marathon training plans. I inserted into this template various workouts I found in Runner's World, which I added in after a six week base building phase.  Look at me dropping the work out lingo. What, What?! My run days were set at four, with weekends off as these are my money making days at the Tea Salon.  Mondays would be the start of each week and the start of every microcycle. Yeah. I just used the term microcycle. My microcycles were always three weeks in duration. The Monday runs were set to always be the lowest mileage of any cycle. Tuesdays gradually increased in mileage, by up to 2X the Monday total late in training, and would always be my medium-long run. Wednesdays were typically one half of the Tuesday run and should have been devoted to speed work. I however, showed no such devotion to speed work and that is my biggest regret of my training. Thursdays were rest days. Fridays were for the long run.  The mileage for the long runs would go up for two Fridays consecutively, then scale back for the third Friday, allowing for rest before a nice jump in miles. It starts with six miles and ends with a 20 mile long run in week 15.  You can take a look at the actual plan as devised by Hal here, (http://www.halhigdon.com/marathon/Mar00novice.htm). This plan is free and even comes with workouts and recommendations for rest days and cross training.

Don't Hate the Orange Circle
As mentioned earlier the one big disappointment in my training was the lack of attention I gave to speed work. The Hellgaters meet at the Astoria Track every Wednesday night for Intervals, which I treated like root-canal surgery, constantly cancelling my appointments, paying the price on race day. I reached my goal of sub-four (sorta) but could have done better with some track work. My mantra going into the next training cycle will be 'Don't Hate the Orange Circle'.

Run Like HELLgate
My favorite runs consistently fell on the Tuesday Switch, and almost always when I combined the Hill workout of Monday nights with the medium-long run of Tuesday morning. The Hill workout consists of running a .33 mile loop sandwiched between the Hell Gate Bridge and the Astoria Pool. By the way, my running club, the Hellgaters took our name from this bridge. The name "Hell Gate" is a corruption of the Dutch phrase Hellegat, which could mean either "hell's gate" or "bright gate/passage", which was originally applied to the entirety of the East River. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hell_Gate) The .33 mile loop is ran 10x, which is about 3.4 miles. The up side of the loop reaches an 11% grade of elevation. It can be a tough workout. On the days I added this into my med-long runs I would do a two mile warm-up right into the Hill loop. After the tenth lap I would head north along Shore Boulevard toward the Con-Ed plant for a short cool down and then into the return leg home. It was during the return leg when I often found my legs to be lighter and quicker, accompanied by a since of floating over the ground. This was my Forrest Gump running from the bullies moment. I was fast, and it didn't feel like it was costing me anything. The few track workouts I've done have actually been at a faster pace, but each stride felt like a deposit of lactic acid. On these precious few runs I simply felt fast, and fast feels sexy.

Beer Goggles
My long runs went pretty well. No run left me so depleted I couldn't resume training after a few days rest. However, the lack of speed work shows up in my log here more than any other workout. I rarely recorded negative splits. I start every run slow, but only because my body demands I do so. Once it allows me to pick up the pace, I do. I would throw in fartleks (Mmm...fartleks) and tempo runs into workouts, but it was informal and lacked focus. Having specific workouts on the schedule helps me to get over mental road blocks.  I can come up with all kinds of reasons not to do a speed workout despite the fact that my best ever mile is 7:00 flat, on the track, doing speed work! I need to find the runner's version of beer goggles to make track work and tempo runs sexy. Mmm...Tempo, Nope! doesn't work. For a while Lisa and I convinced Ella that raisins were bits of chocolate. Perhaps I can find a similar trick for myself.

Snags
I hit only two snags during training. The first was some knee trouble that halted a workout about seven miles into a run. It hit early in the run but I kept going in hopes it was a kink that could be worked out. The kink didn't work itself, but was gone the next day never to show up again. The second snag stole a whole week of training. The first run lost was the long run of peak mileage week. A 20 miler flushed down the toilet, literally. I had caught some kind of bug which sapped my appetite, yet sent me running to the potty chair often. Each trip left me with chapped lips and noticeably dehydrated. At the start of my Taper week I got in one workout, some Hills with the Hellgaters. The workout went great, my legs felt great and I posted a pretty good time.  Afterward I ran into a friend I hadn't seen in a while. We had a nice conversation as we caught up and set up a date to get together for some drinks.  The run home...not so good. It ended with "Chapped Lips" again. This time sans potty chair. Yep! I took three days off and then jumped into the 20 miler that same week. The 20 was too crucial to my training to leave on paper. I felt I needed it both mentally and physically. Also, it had to be run with enough time to recuperate before the marathon.  So I did it. It went...OK. I plodded along at a 9:43 pace. Still I turned in a PR of 3:15 since I had never gone 20 miles before.

Taper Week
Not a fan of Taper week. It left me feeling rusty rather than rested. My first split for the marathon was 9:34. Thats the type of pace I put up after the winter break. After the base building phase I had never posted anything above 9 minutes until this first split of the marathon. OH BOY! Two days off had ruined me. Or, I was entering undiscovered country as the poet said. The start of the marathon was the end of four months anticipation, the nervousness of which slowed my  first mile. It was a feeling similar to what I experience just before going onstage. An hour or so before the lights go up, cold deep breathes stir the butterflies in my stomach into a broiling frenzy just under my skin. I don't think its noticeable from the outside. On the inside however,  I'm filled with no small amount of anxiety as I wonder if I'm about to suck, or be brilliant. Also, I get very gassy. I confided to Lisa a few days before the race that maybe it was a mistake to sign up for 26.2. We both knew Iwas going to run. But still. Was I going to suck? Or be brilliant?

Special Sauce
The day before the race brought a trip to the air port to pick up the final Howe boy, Anthony. We made stops on the way back to collect ingredients for my homemade spaghetti sauce. Which I will now share with you. The following batch served six adults, and two toddlers. One of which has a fantastically voracious appetite.

Daddy Legs Special Sauce
Ingredients  
10-12 on-the-vine tomatoes
1 Red pepper
1 Poblano pepper
1 pkg. sweet peppers
1 lg. yellow onion
as much garlic as you can handle.
Rosemary, Oregano, salt, pepper. to taste.
1 pkg. whole grain pasta.

(You can pick any veggies you want. I always use sweet peppers then add other veggies by season and color. the wackier the better. I didn't had hot peppers because of the race. Otherwise I always put in a Jalapeno)

Optional (but Highly recommended)
1/2 lb. ground pork
1/2 lb. ground lamb (or beef, turkey, whatever you like)
The meat can be combined with some spices and breadcrumbs and rolled into balls, or just browned and thrown into sauce. I actually prefer making a meat sauce, but meatballs make for a better presentation.

The Sauce
First preheat oven to 350 F, then wash an deseed veggies. Cut into small slices and place on a large baking sheet. Drizzle with olive oil and any desired spices. I always go with salt, pepper, and rosemary. Bake for about an hour, I like the veggies to start blackening around the edges. Set aside to cool.

Prepare an ice bath and set aside. Bring a large pot of water to a boil and begin adding tomatoes. Leave for a minute or so, or until skin starts to break, then place in ice bath to cool. Once cooled you need to squeeze the juice and seeds from each tomato. Warning! This can be very messy. I like to squeeze the tomatoes over a strainer and bowl so I can keep the juice as a thinner. The pulp of the tomato should then be liquified in a blender, or food processor. Also liquify 3/4 of the roasted veggies.

In a large pot sauté garlic and onions in olive oil until translucent then add a stick of butter. For a little kick add some red pepper flakes to the sauté.  Once the the butter melts throw in the liquified tomatoes and veggies along with the whole veggies and let simmer for several hours. Throughout the simmer you can add in the tomato juice until the sauce reaches desired consistency. The sauce can simmer for two-four hours. It can be left in a crock pot for up to eight hours on Low. I've done this a few times and don't like it as well as when simmered on the stove. That's it. This is a labor intensive meal, but man is it good. If you try this with some variation I would love to hear about it. Its the type of recipe that could go a thousand different ways.

After the meal we all chillaxed and had a mini fashion show of what we would wear the next day. We were all basically waiting around for the appropriate time to go to be and NOT sleep. I'm a fitful sleeper anyway. On a good night I only get up three or four times to pee. So going five or six times wasn't so bad. All in all it wasn't a bad nights sleep, but I was glad when 4:30 AM finally got off its ass and arrived. Almost four months and eighty days of workouts were about to tested against a full marathon.




Next up: The Race.