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 I lost control of my first blog in December of 2020 because, well, suddenly I couldn't get into it with my Google username and password.  For years my computer had just brought up my blog and I could just click into it but all of a sudden, no more.   I have no idea what my Google name is much less my  password.  

For awhile I published an adjacent blog that no one could see (except for one sibling) because, well, it was insecure or something. I have no idea.

Anyway, suddenly in a corner of my computer ,I found a link to DC Spinster so I'm back for how long I don't know.  My adjacent blog, with a few dozen posts, seems to have gone off to somewhere from a few months' disuse, maybe I'll find it again also.  So I'm baaack, for now anyway.

I 'm heavy into pickleball now. It's taken me 11 months, since when I first picked up a paddle in Sugust last year till now, to get anywhere near decent. 

The year in review Part 4

Yesterday was a measure of progress in my running during the current year.  Remember, I started my return to running in May after a two-year layoff due to an achilles strain and then more seriously, retina degeneration in my right eye requiring four eye surgeries, two of them emergency operations ("We need to operate today.  Who can you call right now to come pick you up afterwards?").

Fortunately I saved the sight in that eye, although it's diminished.  Once my eye healed from the last procedure in April, I started running again on a drastically reduced schedule, three times a week, starting off with a half mile at a time.  Because I am (or was) a certified running coach, I know that practically all novice (or returning) running plans falter due to running too far and too fast at the outset, thus crashing and burning, so I carefully adhered to a ridiculously low mileage and slow pace blueprint the first few months, even though I couldn't even run two blocks the first day, having to stop and walk it in heaving and gasping, a pathetic performance.

Four months later, on August 27th, I felt the need to gauge my progress by running a measured mile in my neighborhood as fast as I was able to.  I was disappointed to break a ten-minute mile the wrong way with a time of 10:13, but it was an honest effort and indicated some sort of progress.

Yesterday, four months after the last timed-mile run, I repeated the test over the same course.  I was pleased to be under ten minutes this time with a 9:26, an improvement in 120 days of 37 seconds, or about 9 seconds faster per 440 yards (141.5 or 2:22 quarters--slow!),  even though I do no speed work and I have cut back my mileage considerably each week as a gesture to my age being closer to seventy than sixty now, but I was incredibly fagged at the end of the mile.  Still, it is a sign of progress, with room for continuing improvement.

Running some more

Cutting back my mileage seems to have done me some good.  This week I ran 2K (1.2 miles), a mile and a half and yesterday, two miles, my "long" run.  That was the best of all.  It was cold when I started and I wished had brought my running vest.  Instead I bumped up my pace for more warmth from exertion and I found that I enjoyed the faster pace and it didn't knock me back to where my ragged breathing made me wish I could contrive an excuse to end or shorten the run.

As a matter of fact, my breathing didn't increase much when I kicked it up a gear and I found I was running easily.  Heartened, I continued up Broad Street towards the one-mile turnaround in the Metro parking lot, and I noticed I wasn't noticing, as I have been so far in my return to running the last half year, the general uphill inclination of the first half of the route.

At the halfway point, I started back and fell in with a fellow walking way from the station all decked out in Nationals gear and I asked if he was returning from the parade downtown honoring the World Series champions Washington Nationals.  He was, and I walked a block with him as he described how festive the atmosphere was in DC during the festivity and we discussed the chances to repeat were for the team next year since their two biggest stars, the Series MVP and the NL and Series RBI leader, are free agents now.  Waving goodbye to him, I ran towards home, encountering two little girls and their dad on bikes riding ahead of me on the sidewalk and I manufactured the challenge of passing them which I did.

It was a good outing, two  miles run at an elevated pace, more or less, and it didn't wipe me out and my breathing felt finer, finally.  I feel like my running is finally starting to come around a little.

Still Running Some

I've run upon some hard times recently.  Since returning to running in May after a 2 year layoff due to health issues, I bumped my weekly mileage total from zero to 12-13 miles early this month, still running three times a week.  I had a long run of five miles, my longest run yet.

Although I've been very cautious in climbing the ladder of increasing my mileage as my conditioning slowly returned, I think I ramped up the weekly total too quickly, before my joints had settled into the new routine.  Plus I don't think my 5K race this month where I was forced to run fast (it's all relative!) 's My hip especially was giving me trouble, pain actually, whenever I stepped up to climb into the driver's seat of my hi-rise pickup, so I went to my dock, for the second time this year.  Like never look behind you because someone may be gaining on you, don't go to the doctor if you can help it (or stand it) because you might find out things you don't want to know.

Diagnosis: Arthritis in both hips.  The subtle but persistent pain in my hip coupled with the diagnosis made me consider abandoning running for awhile.  But I had worked too hard the last half year to do that so for the last two weeks I have cut my mileage total to the bone but kept at it, running my mandatory three times a week.  It's a discipline thing, getting out there and lurching into motion for a mile run even.

I've enjoyed my short runs, easily loping along for a dozen minutes or so but still breaking into a sweat the last half of the shuffle.  I still mark down 3 entries per week in my running log (I note only distances now, not times anymore), with a long run of only a couple of miles, and it keeps me from giving up running entirely again.  My conditioning is deteriorating slowly from my current level I am sure, but it hasn't dropped off a cliff, and I am still in the game as my hip pain subsides for the most part, and I plan to bump the mileage up the scale even more slowly soon.

The race in retrospect

More thoughts about Saturday's 5K race.  It felt good to be back in the saddle again, even though it was my slowest 5K race ever at 32:39.  Only once before did I run a 5K race in more than thirty minutes, a July 4th race several years ago on a hot, humid afternoon in the heat of the day run on the blacktop surface of the parking lots out at RFK Stadium which felt like running through a steel factory between two rows of blast furnaces.  I had to walk twice that day in the sapping, cloying heat and finished finally in about 31 minutes.

Sunday I didn't walk but it was a long slow grind on an out and back run on the W&OD Trail with one significant hill in the second mile that had to be tackled twice, going out and coming back.  Going out to the midway turnaround the runners sorted themselves out in staking out their positions in the race.  The hill didn't bother me in either direction, it was short (about 80 yards) although relatively sharp, because I've been working hills around here on my runs and they're knocking me back less and less.  Hills are good (training) for you, it's where you can take down a runner in a race who's close by and get or keep in front of him or her for good.

I got by two or three runners on the downhill section of the hill the second time and then had the last mile and a quarter to myself mostly as the runners were separated into their spots pretty much.  I was glad I had worn my ball cap as the sun was shining directly into my eyes on the return leg and the bill pulled down helped my vision considerably.  My eye woes last year has affected my vision while running noticeably, unfortunately, and I have trouble seeing the surface ahead of me in low light or bright light situations.

My breathing cadence settled from gasping to regular though heavy during the last mile.  A woman came up fast behind me then and disappeared slowly in front of me as she was finishing strong, the only runner who hauled me down in the second half of the run.  I watched her pass two more runners further ahead of me upon whom I had had no designs on catching, but her passing them motivated me to run a little bit faster (turnover! I thought) and I started eyeballing the runner 30 yards ahead as I slowly, very slowly, ran up on him.

I decided, from the back, that he might be in my age group and I passed the few minutes I used it took to catch him that thinking how disappointed in myself I would be if I took the easy way out and just kept my place and he was third in my AG thus putting me at fourth.  It ultimately was moot because the race didn't award AG places plus he clearly wasn't as old as me when I looked at his face, but still I caught and passed him, in the last quarter mile and one other runner 10 yards in front of him.  I spent the last 400 yards glancing behind me anxiously to see if either of them, or anyone else, was coming up on me near the finish line, the perils of being in front of likewise runners but nobody made a push those last hundred yards and I finished in the aforesaid 32.39, a time I was very happy with given that it was my first challenging run after spending 5 months coming back from a two-year complete layoff.

The race wiped me out and I'm a day behind in my training for the week, although I intend to make up the day.  I did run 4.2 miles on Monday in 47 minutes, with a long hill near the middle point, and contemplated as I tackled the hill both ways that although my pace hasn't really improved yet in the last several months, my ability to take on hills without wilting has definitely improved.  I am encouraged, I just wish I had someone to run with sometimes because I always enjoyed running with my running buddies, all of whom have moved away or moved on from running, at least with me.

Four miles

I got out early this morning, before dawn, to do my "long" run for the week of four miles, choosing to do the hilly route I did on Saturday which proved to be beyond my current conditioning because I had to do two walking water breaks then when I reached the summit of the two long sharp hills on the route where the trail rises to an overpass over I-66.  Today I kept it slow and steady, with my eyes screwed into the ground as I ascended each hill, and completed the run without walking in about 51 minutes.

PDS (pretty damn slow) but I got 'er done.  I started at 5:55 am and was on my way back before the sun came up, and I was treated to a spectacular view from the top of the last hill of the ascending sun as it started to rise above the horizon.  I had to wait another twenty minutes till I got home to fetch my my camera to record it and by then the sky had lost its multihued coloring but it was still pretty even so.

I plan to do three miles on my next run so that will give me ten miles for this week.  My ankle hurts and my legs are  sore but I'm starting to feel fitter.  It's been three and a half months since I started coming back and I get more motivated to keep at it each week.

I'm going to stay at my current level for a couple of weeks to try to "lock in" my current, slightly improved conditioning and hopefully lose another couple of pounds to slowly make my running more nimble and less ponderous.  Better times will come.

3 miles done

Today I got out running as soon as the dawn lightened enough to see the roadway, in the cool of the early morning before the sun came out and made everything hot again.  After my 90 bicep curls with my l'il ol' dumbbell (3 sets of 15 reps at 25 pounds, each arm before and after each run), my recently added routine of a few push-ups, and stretching, I burned off a neighborhood mile while I considered my two-mile segment because I was undecided about that part.  (Whew, glad that's done.)

 

I had done 4 miles with a long, tough hill two days before and I didn't want to do that hill again because my legs felt used up, but I know hills are good for runners and speed their progression to improved fitness and ability.  I had already chickened out on doing Saturday's tough hill by the route of my neighborhood mile, taking me away from that hill, but it led me towards a half-mile hill in town not far from my house which I had been staying away from after failing to fully surmount it weeks ago when my conditioning was even less than my current pathetic state.  (My weight training station.)

Alright, I thought, let's go.  It was a long slow plod up that hill (longer but not quite so steep as Saturday's hill) but I made it and turned around a mile out and had the benefit of going down the same long hill on my return.  (My push-up platform.)

I was happy to get my exercise for the day done by about 7:15 am, with the whole rest of the day stretching out ahead of me, just like in the old days.  Coming back is a slow process, but it seems to be coming.  (My gym.)

It was hard, but boring for readers

I waited all day for it, to run my third time for the week to finish out my weekly running.  Four miles to top out the week at nine miles.  I went out at 4 pm when the sky was overcast and the breeze was up, hoping that would enable me to put in a sterling run.

I went out WB on the W&OD Trail where there are tough hills after the first mile surmounting the overpass bridge over I-66 (both directions).  No bicyclist whizzing by me, wandering in my 4-foot WB lane, ever announced their presence as they silently passed me, I hate that, at 25 MPH you could kill me if in my fog of fatigued flushed running, I lurched leftward two feet.  Going out the breeze was up and the sun was behind clouds and I reached the two-mile turnaround point feeling like I was coming back.

On the return trip the sky cleared and the sun beat down mercilessly upon this particular stretch of the 40-mile asphalt ribbon that is the W&OD Trail snaking through Northern Virginia because Asian invasive vines have killed every tree along its first 20 miles. These non-indigenous plants will kill all the shade along the trail's entire length in the next 10 years, a backward return for the Columbian Exchange.  It makes running on the W&OD in the summertime a real slog.

I surmounted the brisk hill coming back without reducing my slow shuffle to a walk, but then I partook in two 60 meter walking water breaks to quell my racing heart, and stopped for a minute to watch a taped-off crime scene just off the trail where the dozen Fairfax County police units I observed on my run, parked at vantage points along the way or cruising slowly through the area were obviously looking for someone in a vehicle.  I was exhausted coming back to my driveway after my "long run" of four miles, but felt that despite the glacial 13-minute per mile pace, I had proceeded apace in my comeback to running.  And I lost a pound overall.

...So good

I was bad yesterday, it was my every other day to run and I didn't.  I took the day off, after worrying about not running all day as the day slipped away.  I finally decided that I had done a Ti Chi class the evening before so that qualified as an exercise day and I could take the next day off.

I got up early today and hit the trail for 3.1 miles.  It felt great, though I'm still plagued by The Slows and the first mile takes an awfully long time to fall away.  But I fell in for a very brief interlude with the local high school's cross country team on a summertime training run, said hello to everyone I ran by and received a reply every single time, and even kept ahead of a faster runner who was 100 yards back when I hit the W&OD Trail for a quarter mile (he had reduced the gap to 10 yards by the time I turned off).

It sort of felt like old times, when running was enjoyable to me before my injuries and subsequent weight gain.  I sweated off three pounds on the run.  I had exercised and showered and was ready for the rest of the day by mid-morning, a great feeling I had practically every weekend morning when I worked and ran long on weekends.

Not that three miles is running long.  But I feel like I'm getting there, and I'll get there if I have patience and stick to the plan.

So far...

After my health woes of the last 12 months, once I was fully healed by May, I started on the long and arduous road back to running.  I don't run with anyone anymore as all my former running buddies have moved away or in one instance, she doesn't return my calls. Life moves on, friends fall away.

I created a plan--run 3 times a week, paying close attention to distance (low mileage) and pace (plodding). Most running plans fail because of unrealistic goals, and I am closer to 70 than 60.

I started with a 1/2 mile per jog for two weeks, then kicked it up to 3/4 miles per run for two weeks with a "long" run of a mile. By June I had pushed past the I'm-going-to-die feeling each run and although my pace remained a mere plod, I found a "2d wind" late in runs, and I was up to a mile each run.  Most importantly I was still at it. 

I added a little weight lifting before and after and I stretched prior and subsequent to each run, a significant factor that I believe has kept me injury free so far. 

July brought further progress, 3 miles per run with a long run of 4 miles. I recently hit a weekly total of 10 miles. 

Unfortunately I developed a mystery calf injury last week and although I I felt like a sloth, I took the full week off and it healed. Monday I plodded two miles and I intend to do 3 miles my next run. So far so good.

I'm coming back

What a year. A year ago I developed a hole in the vision in my right eye and I had emergency surgery the next day for a torn retina, the first of four surgeries in the past year that saved my sight in that eye. 

The worst was when the first surgery failed and the surgeon filled my eye with silicon the next week (surgery # 2) and for 5 months I went about with a foreign substance in a major organ (my eye) and don't think my body didn't know every minute of every day that there was something foreign in it that it couldn't expel. But surgery # 3 took the oil out, except for floating residual particles (that I call my asteroid belt) that lazily cross my vision in a flurry and I wonder if a lifetime of this will eventually drive me nuts. In other words, it seems as if often there are flies buzzing about on the periphery of my vision, except that they aren't there, unless it's that one in a thousand that actually is there. 

This caused me not to run till my eye was fully healed, which I determined to be a month after my fourth and last eye operation in April. Meanwhile I put on dozens of pounds in my lethargy. (Any workout can strain the eye, in my feeling. And my vision had (has) flaws in it from the damage, especially in depth perception.)  

In May I started coming back, running three times a week beginning with runs of 1/2 mile at a time that first week. I couldn't make the entire two laps around the track that first time out without having to walk. Last week I suffered a slight setback in my routine, but I have come back from that. More to come later.

Call the Zombie Patrol for a Pickup

Like a zombie lurching through a heat-stifled town, as if apocalyptic fires were burning everywhere adding to the heat, I plodded four miles this morning as the heat of the day built up rapidly.  The hottest June on record last month, and July is headed for another heat record.  With high temperature and excessive humidity, it's slated to feel like 110 degrees later today here in DC.

I went 3.2 miles early on Wednesday, another scorching day where it felt like 100 degrees when the heat built up.  I finished my run then totally drenched and feeling lightheaded and slightly sick, just like today, and I spent the rest of that day in my house recovering from the enervating effort.  I feel better today, so maybe I'm becoming acclimated to the sapping heat.

I feel good about my running right now.  I was out of running for the last two years while I recovered from an achilles strain and then was felled by a retina tear which required four surgeries to heal and nearly took my sight in that eye.  My last surgery was in early April and on May 1st I started running as I was fully healed.  Coming back was (is) slow and hard; my first day I targeted running a mere half a mile, slowly, and I had to walk the second half of that "run."

But I have been keeping at it, running three times a week, stretching my calfs and achilles before and after each run assiduously, which I never used to do, and slowly building up the mileage, first a half mile, then three quarters of a mile, then a mile, now I'm up to three-mile runs each time, albeit very slow and plodding, with today's long run for the week of four miles.  Whoot, I cracked double digits after two and a half months with ten miles for the week.  It's paltry progress but I'm keeping at it, taking it slow and steady, and I no longer feel like I'm going to die each run.