Praying and Running

Training Details 20 Weeks Total 1453 total miles 3 100 mile weeks 3 full distance training runs (2 at actual marathons) 7 20+ mile runs Race Details Finish Time 2:51:31 77th Overall 72/2412 Men 12/413 Men Age 40-44 First Half 1:23:55 Second Half 1:27:37 The short description of this race would be a solid 23 mile race and a really, really bad 5k. The long painful story follows. First of all, I was very happy to line up healthy this year and finish the race. Last year I pinched a nerve and was unable to run the race after the best training cycle I have ever put together . The heart ache lasted for weeks and the disappointment was nearly unbearable. So, while the rest of this report may sound like a pity party, it's not. It's just an honest review. My goal back at the beginning of this training cycle was to get back to the shape I believe I was in last year. I was pretty sure that a 2:47:00 marathon would have been a walk in the park. I think that if I was feeli...

A couple of years ago my uncle, who lives about 30 minutes from Detroit, invited me to come run the Detroit marathon and stay with them. It wasn't going to work for me that year and it didn't work out the next year. But this year, everything came together and I was able to put it on my schedule as the final long run in a build up to the 2016 Monumental Marathon. Planning started about 8 weeks ago. The marathon begins in Detroit and crosses into Canada for a few miles. That being the case you need official credentials to cross the border. I haven't been out of the country in years and so didn't have any of the various options. We decided to go ahead and just get full passports in case we decided we wanted to fly to France for dinner some evening. While the State department recommends 6 week lead time to get your passport we actually received ours in about 2 weeks. It was a pretty simple process. The race was scheduled for 7:00 AM Sunday, October 16th, 2016. We headed...

I ran the Indianapolis Half Marathon Saturday Oct, 8th, 2016 as a tune-up for the 2016 Monumental Marathon. I had the basic 3 goals for my big tune-up half marathon. The primary goal was to run in the 1:20s while the stretch goal was to run 1:20:00 and the lest I would walk away happy with would be 1:21:30. The goals were not just pulled out of thin air. I wanted to run 1:20:xx because if you plug that number into my personal equation for half-marathon to marathon time that puts me right at my goal of 2:46 for the full marathon. I wanted to run 1:20:00 flat because that would give me hope to break into the 2:45:xx for the full and the 1:21:30 would still give me a personal course record. I was up at about 5:30 AM for a quick shakeout before breakfast. We headed out right on time and made our way to Lawrence, IN which is a little less than an hour away. It was a cool morning with a little wind from the north that would end up having a noticeable effect in mile 7. We arrived and parked...

As you may already be aware I pinched a nerve in my right leg at the end of October. The pinched nerve kept me out of running for a full 8 weeks. During this time I cross trained like a boss with pool running, cycling, arc trainer. That might be good enough for some people to stay in reasonable shape but when I pinched the nerve I was in the best shape of my life. I was a finely tuned machine that was crushing workouts and destroying PRs and it would prove to not be any where close to enough to maintain that level of fitness. I have always used an 18 week training cycle but this time the injury still had me relegated to the aforementioned cross training when the start of the cycle came around. By the time I was back to running I was really out of shape and there was no way I could jump into my usual marathon build up: 7 mile runs were leaving me feeling like I got hit by a truck. I decided to use an abbreviated 12 week cycle and use the 4 or 5 weeks I had until then to just to get my...

Saturday, March 19th, 2016 I ran the Sam Costa half-marathon. This was 1 week after running the 2016 Land Between the Lakes Trail Marathon . My quads were shredded from the descents and the trails and felt bad through Thursday. Also, at some point on Monday I noticed a flare up of my peroneal tendon that resulted in my right foot becoming very painful. I started loading up on Ibuprofen on the Thursday prior. I know this isn't probably the smartest thing in the world but right now it is worth it to me to get some consistent running back in my training. My oldest daughter Kasey was running the quarter marathon so she rode down with me. There is a lot to like about this race and 1 of the best things is a very efficient race morning check in so there is no need for a separate trip to "packet pickup and expo", no need to get there super early either as there is ample close parking in the Northview Church parking lot. Saturday morning came and my foot was a little tender bu...

The weekend, March 12, 2016 I ran the Land Between the Lakes Trail Marathon. This marathon is run along with options for 50 miles, 60k, and 24k (a little over a half marathon) at the Land Between the Lakes National Recreation Area in Kentucky which is a little over a 5 hour drive from my house. I ran, and won, this marathon last year but due to heavy snow and rain in the weeks proceeding it last year it was moved to the roads. So, while I ran it last year, this year was truly my first "trail' marathon and I had no idea what I was in for. As with last year, the purpose of this race was "marathon-as-a-training-run" for Carmel Marathon in April. The goal was to finish the distance and need as little recovery as possible after. Meaning I wasn't planning on going into this and trying to win. I knew I wanted to run slow enough to keep the damage to a minimum. So my plan was maybe 7:30 for the first half and 7:15 for the second if I felt good. That is a minute sl...

The marathon is cruel. Training for it will beat you up and it will wear you down. It holds out to you the hope of glory but with that hope comes the risk of heart break. While I have been blessed and usually win the glory, I experienced this heartbreak first hand Saturday 11/7/2015 at the 2015 Indianapolis Monumental Marathon. I have gone back and forth about writing this and after a few people have inquired I decided to go ahead and put it out there in case anyone else was wondering. As you all are probably aware, I have been training for the Indianapolis Monumental Marathon for the last 18 weeks. I had a rough time starting out and mentally and physically committing fully to another marathon training cycle but got that put behind me after several weeks and I dove in. The goal was to run the 2015 Indianapolis Monumental in under 2 hours and 48 minutes. My previous PR was 2 hours 49 minutes and 46 seconds. This was the same goal I had and missed for the 2015 Carmel Marathon back...

This was my big tune-up race for the Indianapolis Monumental Marathon. I always run a half-marathon at this point in the build up to the Monumental to get a final big fitness boost, a reality check on where I am at fitness-wise and, if all goes well, probably the most important aspect is the confidence boost that I get. I got one heck of a confidence boost yesterday, 10/25/2015, at the Valpohalf Half-marathon in Valparaiso IN. Valparaiso is about 2 hours from home which is kind of right there on the line of driving on race morning or staying in a hotel the night before. This time we decided to get up and drive. Valparaiso is on central time which puts it an hour behind us. Meaning the 8:30 AM start was really a 9:30 AM start for me.  Making the decision to drive that much easier. I have been dealing with some issues on the top of my right foot, which is probably extensor tendinitis, for the last couple of weeks. I saw my soft-tissue guy last Friday. He worked on it some and got...

Last Saturday, 10/17/2015, I ran the Indianapolis Marathon as a training run in my build to the Indianapolis Monumental Marathon. I have run the half marathon at this race for the last several years and have used it as a tune-up race and final fitness gauge for what has always been my "A" marathon, the Monumental. This year, the calendar proved a little challenging. This race is usually at the end of my first week of taper. So, I can use it to gauge where I truly am and I am rested enough to run a PR effort which usually results in an actual PR. The way it worked out this year though it was at the end of my biggest block of training both in quality and quantity. Leaving it a full 3 Saturday's out from the Monumental. I have come to rely on my wife as a manager/coach and when I pointed this out to her she had a solution as usual. She suggested I run the full marathon as a final strength workout and find a half-marathon the next week to run as a tune-up race. 21 days is...

I really just finished week 5 according to the plan with the week late start mentioned in the previous training update. About that plan, it went pretty much by the way side over the last couple of weeks due in large part to running Blister in the Sun Marathon on Sunday the 8/2/2015. More on that when I get to it. As I eluded to in my last post, I have really been struggling with getting going in this cycle and I think a lot of it had to do with the vacation to California and then rushing and trying to cram workouts in to get caught up. In the future I think I would simply trust my fitness enough to know that I could have sacrificed that first week and maybe even the second week in order to not start out the cycle stressed and tired. Enough with the psychology and on to the training. Week 4 only had 1 real workout which was a 20 mile long run and 2 other "kinda" workouts with 14 and 12 mile medium long runs. No tempo or race pace workouts scheduled but I skipped the race...

It's marathon training season again. I went back and forth over the off season trying to decide on which training plan I would use this time around. I have always used the plans in Advanced Marathoning by Pete Pfizinger. Because I get bored easily, I was tempted this time to go with Jack Daniel's "Final 12 Week" program found in "Daniel's Running Formula vol. 3." In the end I came back to Pete; "stick with what you know" Since it was by far my best marathon ever, I will be trying to replicate my build up from the last Monumental with the paces just a little quicker to help propel me to a new PR. I got a late start with this cycle because we were on vacation in California the week I should have started. So I basically I planned to run the workouts from week 1 and 3 for the first 2 weeks. I faltered a bit because I had a hard time getting into the groove and getting my mind into the right place. It takes a lot of physical AND mental effort to t...