3 Weeks to Go: Time to put on my Crazy Pants.

You are probably already familiar with my super duper weird race superstitions, so now I will introduce you to my OCD behavior, known as “Crazy Pants Mode”.  This only happens before a marathon, and quite frankly, I ENJOY it.  (scary!)

Crazy Pants 1:  Diet.  With less than a month to go to my A marathon, this is where things get really spooky and crazy.  I don’t eat gluten, I don’t eat raw or refined sugar, I don’t eat dairy.  I used to quit booze, but I had quit booze in March in preparation for Boston Marathon, and haven’t had a drink since, so I don’t have to quit booze anymore.  I eat leaner protein and I eat much more vegetables.  Without ice cream or cookies, my diet becomes boring. 

Crazy Pants 2:  Piling.  I need to have my specific gear out and ready, so this is the time I start pulling out different gear.  I pick out my compression socks, shorts, T-shirt, panty, everything I would wear on race day and then make another pile of back up stuff for different weather conditions.  Hats, gloves, arm warmers, singlet, long sleeve shirt and pack them in neat piles as well.  Between now and travel day, I will go through at least 2 or 3 combination changes, and pile them and re-pile them in different areas of my home. 

The piling doesn’t end at clothing.  It will continue with number of gels, Imodiums, electrolyte powder, shoes, shoe strings, belts, registration forms, hotel confirmation forms, etc.  Piles will appear all over our house, and will slowly migrate from one corner to the other…

Crazy Pants 3:  “Don’t Try Anything New” – Extreme Version.  I stop crossing the street at red light and will frequently stop at even a blinking red light.  I stop running to catch subways and elevators.  I just stop taking physical risks all together.  Remember the “don’t try anything new” mantra?  I take it a step further.  “don’t take any risks”. 

Crazy Pants 4:  Image Training.  Somewhere during my self-taught marathon training programs, I read in some article that imagining the race course, conditions, people, crowds, etc., will help with your pacing.  Of course, this being Crazy Pants season, I take this to the far extreme.  Co-workers will notice all sorts of non-work related spreadsheets popping up on my dual monitor work station.  Strange colorful elevation maps, Google Earth Maps, marathon course maps and other fun stuff will take space all over the place.  With my my custom made pace planner Excel opened, I try to re-vision my course, my effort level, and past experiences.  I then mark where I would be taking fluids, where I would be popping EFS, and where I plan to kick butt.  I will tweak and re-tweak the pace planner until right before I leave work on my “last day” before marathon.

Crazy Pants 5:  Counting My Lasts.  Now that word “last day” has come up, this is also the time where I start counting my “lasts” before the marathon.  Last long run.  Last speed work.  Last tempo.  Last Marathon Pace mid-distance.  The list goes on.  There will be a series of my lasts, up to my last poop before the race.  Counting my lasts makes me feel like a caged animal, ready to take charge of the race once the gun goes off…which is not a good thing, necessarily, as that results in too fast half and too slow half!

Crazy Pants 6:  Extreme Superstition.  Walk across the street when you see a dude on a ladder.  Don’t open an umbrella indoors.  Donate. Donate. Donate.  Make a sign of the cross when walking across a church (I’m not Catholic, but whateves).  Don’t eat tempura with ice water, Unagi with umeboshi…avoid all Kui-Awase.  …anything that’s ever a saying or a fable, I believe…only during this time tho!

hmmm...I wonder why no one ever wants to go with me to Toronto Waterfront Marathon!

Alert more Media! It’s Rachana’s B-day!

It’s Rachana’s B-day and because there are same mount of A’s and N’s and there’s a “sh” sound, we are celebrating Rosh Hashanah as well.

A few things you may or may not know about Rachana.

·         She’s a Veggie.  That means she’s <-this-> close to becoming a crunchy-granola-yoga-sandal-barefoot runner.  Quelle Horreur!

·         Despite sounding like Rosh Hashanah, she’s not Jewish. 

·         She doesn’t like Border Patrol.  I’m sure she doesn’t like the TV show Border Wars, and probably dislikes Jan Brewer. 

·         She doesn’t like caffeine.  I’m sure she doesn’t like Starbucks or Red Bull. 

·         She’s running two marathons back-to-back this fall, and is aiming to out PR each other.  3:00 for NYC, and 2:50 for Philly. 

·         She’s an Brightroom vigilante.  If you are wearing a wrong race bib, she will come and assassinate you. 

·         At one point, she too, had fallen to the Curse of Maharaja.  We hear it was a nasty shin splints.

Now that we talked about Rachana, here are a few things about Rosh Hashanah. 

·         It’s a Jewish Holiday, celebrating the beginning of a new Jewish year. 

·         You need to eat apple and honey during Rosh Hashanah.  It symbolizes “sweet new year”. 

·         Contrary to western interpretation of the Genesis’ “apple” being an evil fruit, Jewish scholars believe that it was actually a pomegranate that made the first man fall.  (Hey, what's wrong with a pomegranate.  I love POM-Wonderful.)

·         During Rosh Hashanah, they blow a horn.  This prompts the Rabbi to start running mid-service.  Not a good move for a Rabbi.

And now the big reveal:  CURSE OF MAHARAJA

It’s not as blingy like the Curse of Koh-i-Noor, unfortunately.  But here goes:

Since our Maharaja is such a strong, fast runner, anyone that runs or trains with him will sustain at least one injury.  Really!  While not a detrimental, career ending injury, it’s enough to take you out of training for a couple of weeks.  And…since you can not train, you won’t get any faster.  Thereby securely securing Maharaja’s spot as the fastest male runner of our team!  If you don't want to fall to the curse, simply accept defeat:  you will never be as fast as the Maharaja.

Alert the Media! It's Xena's B-day!

Wishing you the happiest, fastest, most fabulous 21st B-day!
You can finally drink champagne! 

So.  Now that you are 21 years old, here are somethings you may want to be careful of:

1)  Don't Drink and Drive.  Actually, in your case, "Don't Drink and Run".  At your speed drunk running and subsequent crash can seriously injure people.

2)  Booze ain't Performance Enhancers.  I know some old timers may have done a shot or two to warm themselves up pre-marathon, but science has proven that alcohol and running don't mix well.  If you need a shot, stick to EFS Liquid Shots.

3)  Beer is a Recovery Drink. No really.  Drink away post race or a hard training.

Now that you have reached full adulthood with legal drinking, we here at AGONY suggest that you approach drinking just like you would a marathon.  Start conservatively then finish aggressively and strong.  It's OK to end up a hot mess as long as you have fun doing so.

So enjoy that cold pint after your PHILLY HALF.

NYRR Bronx 10 Mile Race Report

Coach Terry:  Do you want to race Bronx?

Me:  No.  I don’t have to race it.

Coach Terry:  OK.

So with 4 weeks to go to Toronto Waterfront Marathon, the weekend long run was scheduled as 18M long run, broken in to 3 parts.  6Ms at 8:30, 10Ms at 8:00 and 2Ms at 8:30 as recovery for Saturday.  Sunday was a Recovery Run of 4M.  hmmm? 

Turns out, I thought “race” meant “go all out, sprint the hell out of it and PR like no other”, while Terry thought “race” meant what it’s supposed to be:  A road race.

Now I don’t mind doing a 18M then a 10M race, but being that I’m susceptible to injuries these days, I had to get Terry’s permission.  Last time I didn’t listen to him I ended up with Shin Splints Round 2.  Well, the answer was an obvious “um.  No.  Can’t do 18M then a 10M.” 

After a bit of back and forth, we settled on 12M on Saturday at 8:30, then 10M on Sunday.  Having no pace direction on Sunday’s race, and Saturday’s 12M being one of the most humid runs ever (I ran before the down pour) I decided that marathon pace of 7:45 will be a good pace for Sunday.

Rabbi, Bobby and Jenny from the Block was at the race.  G-Man was supposed to run, but he had fallen to the Curse of Maharaja.  The weather was almost perfect.  It could’ve been colder, but the 63F weather was a big relief compared to the 90F weathers we’ve been subjected to.

I wished my team mates good race and entered my corral. 

Now.  People.  Please be considerate of other runners and wear deodorant.  If you don’t believe in chemicals and if you are crunchy granola “born-to-run” yoga vegan sandal runner, you can still wear the all-natural rock deodorant.  As soon I enter the corral, pungent smell hits my nose.  And it’s not even a hot day.  Ugh.  I can’t wait for the horn to go off, so that Mr. Sweatypits can leave me in peace.  The race finally starts after some opera-fied rendition of the national anthem that is way too scary for a Sunday morning.  Between the soperano voice and the tart, eye stinging smell, I am in censory overload - and not in a good way! 

When the race starts bunch of people pass me and I try to practice being Zen.  I have to keep my marathon pace so I tell myself it’s all part of marathon training.  “Your time will come…ohmmm”.  Stay clam, Pace yourself, Stay calm, Pace yourself.  I repeat like a mantra.  I’m Japanese, the people that invented Zen.  This Zen crap should come to me like second nature. 

But I suppose years of living in NYC has ruined me.  I’m all Zen’ed out by mile 4.  Something clicks inside my head.   “ZOMG!!! WTF!!!  I’m all FXXKING TIRED OF PEOPLE PASSING ME!!  SCREW ZEN!!!!!”  I’m like that GEICO commercial’s Angry Cyclist on the Brooklyn Bridge.  “YO YO WATCHOUT WATCHOUT!”

I take a hit of performance enhancing substance and decide I’m going to negative split this b!tch.  I catch up to Mr. Sweatypits so I pass him.  He’s more pungent than he was 5 miles ago!  YUM YUM!  I zoom down some hill and zoom back up the stupid hill.  I see the stupid ginger hair dude that pushed me at mile 2, so I push him out of my way on the hill.  I pass some chicks in skorts and cute hair bands.   A nice volunteer at a water station shouts, “YOU GO 1570!!!”  I give him a salute for some reason as I pass more dudes.  And before I know it, I’ve finished the race.   Heh.  I felt like I could do another round after getting my medal, so I guess that’s good sign. 

Strangely, I didn’t see any Frontrunner Queens near me.  Maybe Bronx aint their style?  Although post race, one sat down next to me and watched me stretch badly.  He looked like he wanted to ask questions, maybe he had proper stretching suggestions...?

Overall, I had a good run with decent numbers even though I didn’t try all that hard. 

Coming This Weekend:  20M. 

Coming Next Weekend:  23M. 

AND…more on Curse of Maharaja next week!

Hey Kids. It's Crunch Time.

As the fall marathon season begins, us Agony Runners all have our training plans to execute.  Some of us may have a personal coach, some of us may be taking tips from other runners, and some of us may be doing a training off a book or a website.  Either way, the training regimen becomes increasingly rigid, more strenuous and definitely longer than ever.

What I have noticed this season is that, I’ve been less generous with my time.  Before, if someone wanted me to do a race with them or do a random length run (short or long), I was like “sure, why not?”.  This season, I’m much less generous…or rather, selfish about my workouts.  OK, a better word would be more disciplined than ever before.

As an older runner, I have a very limited window where I can run at the level I am running now.  In about 2 years, I’ll start to decline.  My PRs will be far and few.  My time will fall.  I will get slower and slower.  Hey, it’s just the way it is.  I think this is why I’m more serious than ever before to get the good times while I can.  I need to work harder than ever before because I need to PR one last time.   A friend of mine once said, “you have to be a little bit selfish to achieve your goals”.  I fully understand now. 

I know it’s not very “team like” for me to not run a Team Points race or not spend time with my team mates.  I’m really sorry.  I just can’t afford it right now.  My “A” race is just 5 weeks away, and the summer heat and humidity has done nothing to build confidence.  I need the time to train harder.  But I promise.  Come December, I will be more team-like! 

Oh, and BY THE WAY…NYRR is reconsidering the Baggage Check Shi!t Show.  We may not be able to wear the fashionable Ponchos afterall!  Too bad, because I was actually warming up to the Little "Stinky" Orange Riding Hood look.  I thought it'll look awesome if I pinned my bib # on the hood part post race.