I ran 10K on the C&O Canal Towpath yesterday in 60:54, jumping in with my friend Ashley while she did 14 miles getting ready for the MCM in October. For the first time in a long time the running came easy, just like in the olden days, abetted by the company of a good friend and the forgiving surface of the towpath.
When I let go of Ashley after five miles to return to my car while she finished her much longer run, I even practiced picking people off the last mile. Team in Training was out there ahead of me and the last quarter mile I ran hard to overtake three runners who were a hundred yards ahead of me. It was fun and I felt good.
Then I went to the Steak 'N Egg Kitchen on Wisconsin Avenue for an artery-clogging breakfast, ordering the Old South Sunday, a meal of biscuits & gravy, 2 eggs, hash browns, bacon and sausage (but I eschewed the extra cheese). While I ate I marveled at the clockwork-like efficiency of the eight persons working in the narrow space behind the counter, three cooking on the grill, three more waiting on the counter diners, and one worker each busing and dish washing. A ninth person handled the outside patio from the other side of the counter and she obviously knew everything that was going on with all the orders.
One patron ordered a T-bone steak with his eggs and seemed disappointed when the steaming meat slab with juices dripping off it was put in front of him. "Is this 16 ounces?" he asked. When assured that it was, he proceeded to eat it with relish. The place was packed and it never closes.
Showing posts with label Ashley. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Ashley. Show all posts
Sunday, August 14, 2011
Thursday, November 5, 2009
Hail Meb too.
You will remember my friend Ashley. She is a running buddy of mine who moved to Nashville a couple of years ago.
In 2006, Ashley paced me the last ten miles to my then-PR at the NYCM. She also enabled me to finish the infamous Chicago 26.2 mile "Fun Run" in 2007 by finding me walking disconsolately at MP 24, barely ahead of the No-More-Running Police who were out on the course, and jogging me the rest of the way in. (I was sick when I ran that marathon, which didn't help with the 90 degree heat that day.) I hated her for the 17 minutes it took us to go the last two miles, but loved her afterwards for finding me and bringing me home.
Overcoming a continuing spate of injuries, and despite a current injury, Ashley ran her first marathon last weekend at the NYCM. She threw down a 4:14 while thoroughly enjoying her run, stopping to take pictures, text, high-five people, etc. She feels she could have gone faster (she was injured) but that's a good ground floor if she continues on in marathoning.
She had a wonderful experience, and who wouldn't at the NYCM? It is my favorite marathon, bar none. But there's more to the story.
Two posts ago I indicated how excited I was to hear that an American had won at New York for the first time since 1982. An American, Meb Keflezighi, who ran shoulder-to-shoulder with the best Kenyan in the world at MP 24 and then vanquished him in Central Park. Meb won convincingly in a PR of 2:09:15.
In my post, I included a picture of me with Meb a few days after he ran a sub-2:10 at this year's London Marathon. Meb is back.
At a post-race party in New York, Ashley met Meb herself. She said it was utterly thrilling. Ashley is the one on the left.
In 2006, Ashley paced me the last ten miles to my then-PR at the NYCM. She also enabled me to finish the infamous Chicago 26.2 mile "Fun Run" in 2007 by finding me walking disconsolately at MP 24, barely ahead of the No-More-Running Police who were out on the course, and jogging me the rest of the way in. (I was sick when I ran that marathon, which didn't help with the 90 degree heat that day.) I hated her for the 17 minutes it took us to go the last two miles, but loved her afterwards for finding me and bringing me home.
Overcoming a continuing spate of injuries, and despite a current injury, Ashley ran her first marathon last weekend at the NYCM. She threw down a 4:14 while thoroughly enjoying her run, stopping to take pictures, text, high-five people, etc. She feels she could have gone faster (she was injured) but that's a good ground floor if she continues on in marathoning.
She had a wonderful experience, and who wouldn't at the NYCM? It is my favorite marathon, bar none. But there's more to the story.
Two posts ago I indicated how excited I was to hear that an American had won at New York for the first time since 1982. An American, Meb Keflezighi, who ran shoulder-to-shoulder with the best Kenyan in the world at MP 24 and then vanquished him in Central Park. Meb won convincingly in a PR of 2:09:15.
In my post, I included a picture of me with Meb a few days after he ran a sub-2:10 at this year's London Marathon. Meb is back.
At a post-race party in New York, Ashley met Meb herself. She said it was utterly thrilling. Ashley is the one on the left.
Thursday, July 9, 2009
The 2009 DeCelle Memorial Lake Tahoe Relay
Last month I ran in the DeCelle Memorial Lake Tahoe Relay for the third straight year, on Bex’s team. The team members joked this year that we’re going to change our name from the Band of Outsiders to the 6:30 Club because every year the team counters some really good performances with some really challenging ones and the result is pretty much always the same, about eleven and a half hours for the 73.2 mile relay around the lake in seven legs. Given the 7 a.m. start, this puts our anchor leg always pulling into the finish at South Lake Tahoe at around 6:30 p.m. every year, Miller Time.
This year was no different as we finished at 6:39 p.m., slightly slower than last year’s 6:30 p.m. finish, which was slightly faster than the prior year’s 6:32 p.m. finish. Running through two states and past some incredible scenery, this race is a must-do. We’re always far off the winner’s time, which was under seven hours this year, but we have fun.
Eric ran the first leg in 1:20:18 (8:22), 9.6 miles of rolling hills in the cool of the morning past the casinos at State Line where the race leaves California and enters Nevada. He came within a minute of the team’s PR on this relatively easy leg. Remember, this is a race with hills at altitude (starting at 6200 feet), so even this “easy” leg is a difficult run for us flatlanders.
Eric handed off to me and I ran the shortest leg, 8.2 miles, in 1:18:01 (9:31). It was practically a mystical experience for me because this is the highest, hardest and hilliest leg, a killer. It literally made me sick. Maybe I'll tell you more about it in a future post.
Next up was K, who had a tough run. Her scenic 10.3 miles was mostly downhill, which aggravated a hip condition she had. She handed off to Bex after being out for 2:02:20 (11:53). (K on the left is done, Ashley still has a five and a half hour wait before her leg starts.)
Bex motored off on the longest leg, 12.3 miles which included a big uphill part. After re-entering California, she brought the baton home to J, an avid mountain biker, in 1:58:00 (9:36).
J was picking runners off right and left on his 10.6 mile run until about halfway through, where he discovered that being in condition for hard biking doesn’t necessarily correlate to running long and he was hobbled by knee problems. He gave back all of his passed runners and more before handing off to Ke in 1:54:57 (10:51).
Ke was new to the team, a runner we picked up the day before. A high school track coach, he had come to vacation in Lake Tahoe and could think of no more relaxing start to his time off than to run a very hard relay leg up in the mountains. We gave him the other hardest leg, comparable to my leg, a 10.5 mile run over large rolling hills that culminates in a steep, relentless mile and a half climb up a mountain pass. Pleased to make your acquaintance, Ke. I did this tough leg in 1:37:44 (9:18) last year and injured myself doing it (my hamstring seized up into a clenched, fiery ball 200 meters from the end). Ke was handling it very well until the last hill knocked down his time, but he still finished in a very nice time of 1:35:54 (9:03), setting the team's PR for the leg.
Ashley took it from there. Coming back from injuries, she returned to racing after a year of recovery with a time of 1:28:12 (8:24) on her 10.5 mile run back to the starting point, also setting a new team PR. Her scenic leg included a narrow shelf road portion with no shoulder where the roadway fell away steeply on both sides, and I was going to assist her along here by running with her as a spotter, but I couldn’t keep up with her quick pace and abandoned the effort. She picked off nine runners enroute to the finish so we finished 94th overall out of 150 teams.
This year was no different as we finished at 6:39 p.m., slightly slower than last year’s 6:30 p.m. finish, which was slightly faster than the prior year’s 6:32 p.m. finish. Running through two states and past some incredible scenery, this race is a must-do. We’re always far off the winner’s time, which was under seven hours this year, but we have fun.
Eric ran the first leg in 1:20:18 (8:22), 9.6 miles of rolling hills in the cool of the morning past the casinos at State Line where the race leaves California and enters Nevada. He came within a minute of the team’s PR on this relatively easy leg. Remember, this is a race with hills at altitude (starting at 6200 feet), so even this “easy” leg is a difficult run for us flatlanders.
Eric handed off to me and I ran the shortest leg, 8.2 miles, in 1:18:01 (9:31). It was practically a mystical experience for me because this is the highest, hardest and hilliest leg, a killer. It literally made me sick. Maybe I'll tell you more about it in a future post.
Next up was K, who had a tough run. Her scenic 10.3 miles was mostly downhill, which aggravated a hip condition she had. She handed off to Bex after being out for 2:02:20 (11:53). (K on the left is done, Ashley still has a five and a half hour wait before her leg starts.)
Bex motored off on the longest leg, 12.3 miles which included a big uphill part. After re-entering California, she brought the baton home to J, an avid mountain biker, in 1:58:00 (9:36).
J was picking runners off right and left on his 10.6 mile run until about halfway through, where he discovered that being in condition for hard biking doesn’t necessarily correlate to running long and he was hobbled by knee problems. He gave back all of his passed runners and more before handing off to Ke in 1:54:57 (10:51).
Ke was new to the team, a runner we picked up the day before. A high school track coach, he had come to vacation in Lake Tahoe and could think of no more relaxing start to his time off than to run a very hard relay leg up in the mountains. We gave him the other hardest leg, comparable to my leg, a 10.5 mile run over large rolling hills that culminates in a steep, relentless mile and a half climb up a mountain pass. Pleased to make your acquaintance, Ke. I did this tough leg in 1:37:44 (9:18) last year and injured myself doing it (my hamstring seized up into a clenched, fiery ball 200 meters from the end). Ke was handling it very well until the last hill knocked down his time, but he still finished in a very nice time of 1:35:54 (9:03), setting the team's PR for the leg.
Ashley took it from there. Coming back from injuries, she returned to racing after a year of recovery with a time of 1:28:12 (8:24) on her 10.5 mile run back to the starting point, also setting a new team PR. Her scenic leg included a narrow shelf road portion with no shoulder where the roadway fell away steeply on both sides, and I was going to assist her along here by running with her as a spotter, but I couldn’t keep up with her quick pace and abandoned the effort. She picked off nine runners enroute to the finish so we finished 94th overall out of 150 teams.
Friday, September 7, 2007
Charmed Twenty
Charm City 20-Miler. On Sunday I finally got my twenty-mile training run in at this race, a point-to-point run down a four-foot wide dirt Rails to Trails path through a forest which provided a canopy of foliage overhead to keep the runners in perpetual shade. Sound nice? Early in the morning a bus dropped us off near Maryland Line, MD and our cars were 20 miles away. There was no way to get back except to hoof it. No turning back on my obligatory twenty-miler before my marathon now.
Here are my splits with total time and average pace as the race progressed in five-mile increments in parentheses.
Mile One 11:19 (uh, 3-minute equipment stop) Two 8:11 Three 8:23 Four 8:28 Five 8:52 (45:14-9:03 pace)
Mile Six 7:54 Seven 8:49 Eight 8:38 Nine 8:58 Ten 8:54 (1:28:30-8:51 pace)
Mile Eleven 8:49 Twelve 9:31 (walking water break) Thirteen 8:41 Fourteen 8:46 Fifteen 8:57 (2:13:16-8:53 pace)
Mile Sixteen 9:00 Seventeen 8:56 Eighteen 9:32 (walking water break) Nineteen 9:20 Twenty 9:03 (2:59:10-8:57.5 final pace).
Result. I got my twenty in. I PRed. I broke 3 hours. I took second in my age group. It was a good run.
Race notes. The last mile is uphill on a country highway. I knew it was coming and I started thinking about it as early as MP 15. I was able to handle it by running steadily up it. My worst mile was nineteen when I was getting really tired. But I revived the last mile by being motivated to break three hours. The local running club has quite a resource in this trail and they stage wonderful races on it.
Thanks! I want to thank my friend Ashley for her generous contribution to the charitable cause I am running Chicago for. She also is getting ready to run a fall marathon for charity. Go help her out, she's a terrific person and a good runner.
Thursday, May 31, 2007
A Running Start Foundation
Please help: It's up and official! Both A and myself have our charity-running websites up as we each raise money for A Running Start when we run Chicago on October 7th.
A Running Start has a mission of addressing the impoverishment of the East African part of our world through sports, by enabling youngsters in that running-rich region to attend U.S. schools on running scholarships (as Rich once joked to me, we need to encourage the Kenyans to keep beating us so badly in marathons, right?), encouraging students to stay in school and using sports to promote development and education. (Left: A on the bridge.)
A explains it better than I do. She's also far ahead of me, already, in her training for the marathon and she's going to kick my butt in it. She's leading the whole Chicago-group in fundraising. Go to her site and help her out.
Or go to my site and help me out. It's a good cause, and God willing, I know we're both gonna do our best on October 7th. (Right: 2006 NYCM, 15 minutes away from Tavern on the Green.)
Running update: I ran 50.5 miles in May. On Tuesday morning I ran a mile around my house to limber up in 7:31. Leading a running group of four at work yesterday at noon, I ran about 4.3 miles on the Mall in about 43 minutes.
A Running Start has a mission of addressing the impoverishment of the East African part of our world through sports, by enabling youngsters in that running-rich region to attend U.S. schools on running scholarships (as Rich once joked to me, we need to encourage the Kenyans to keep beating us so badly in marathons, right?), encouraging students to stay in school and using sports to promote development and education. (Left: A on the bridge.)
A explains it better than I do. She's also far ahead of me, already, in her training for the marathon and she's going to kick my butt in it. She's leading the whole Chicago-group in fundraising. Go to her site and help her out.
Or go to my site and help me out. It's a good cause, and God willing, I know we're both gonna do our best on October 7th. (Right: 2006 NYCM, 15 minutes away from Tavern on the Green.)
Running update: I ran 50.5 miles in May. On Tuesday morning I ran a mile around my house to limber up in 7:31. Leading a running group of four at work yesterday at noon, I ran about 4.3 miles on the Mall in about 43 minutes.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
