50MPH Runner

Cyanide & Happiness @ Explosm.net

Feels Good

After 4 months of avoiding physical activity, I have started my running build-up. No, I am not starting to get up to 70 miles a week. Not even 7 miles a week. But, I have been increasing things 30 seconds here and there, and I just broke the elusive 5 minute barrier tonight. It was not an effortless 5 minutes, but comparing to 5 months and 3 months ago, I will take it as a happy midpoint for now. So, hopefully things are the upswing and I will be able to start doing runs that might actually show up on a GPS.
Now that summer is coming to a close (well, I still have another month) and most of you are back into training, hopefully we can get this blog going again. I'm curious to hear about the workouts you all are doing. Have people started thinking about races for the fall? Also, I feel like most of the posts on this blog have been just 3 people or so...so maybe we could try to get more people on here, and that would make it more exciting.

If I'm Free...

I'm applying to grad school. They asked me for a "travel anecdote." I wrote about running...

The summer I spent in Wyoming was full of the kind of freedom that can only be afforded by flight. I had quit an internship and taken a job as a camping assistant for an active travel company. After my campsite duties in the morning the Grand Tetons were mine to explore. As a runner, I could cover a lot of ground.

The only problem was that Wyoming has famously unpredictable weather. I’ve heard it has something to do with the valleys—the same thing that makes national parks so beautiful to look at also makes them downright inhospitable at times. A peaceful mid-morning breeze can give way to a hailstorm without warning, and that’s exactly what happened on the day I drove myself out to the Elephant Back Loop for a run.

I had been later than usual breaking down tents at the campsite that morning, and I was anxious to get on the trail. I tied my shoes and started up the gradual incline, pleased to see that the trail’s name matched its terrain. As I bounded along, everything was wildflowers and fresh mountain air. I was in such high spirits that when the cold breeze turned to a gush, and the air carried the scent of rain, I didn't worry. Running has a way of engendering magical thinking, and I ran on, higher and higher up the elephant's back, two, three, four miles away from the road and my car.

Then the storm hit: it was a spectacular show of thunder and lightning that would have been fun to watch from the safety of a car with the heat turned up, but I was in a singlet and shorts, utterly exposed and starting to panic. How far along the loop was I? Did it make more sense to keep going, or should I turn back the way I'd come? The dirt had turned swampy in the rain, and I knew the trail would be slow going in either direction. I decided to cut through the trees and try to make it down to the road, where I would at least be on level ground.

I scurried down through sharp bushes and fallen branches, and made it to the road sooner than I'd expected. But now the rain had turned to hail, and there was no protection from the wind—so strong that it was a struggle to suck in air. But I pressed on in single-minded determination to move forward. My eyes stung and my cheeks burned. Can't be more than three miles from the car. My fingers were turning white. Keep going. I had no other options.

A pickup sped by me, slowed to a stop, and when I caught up with it, a young man called out to me through the window.

"You look like you need a lift."

"No, that's all right, thanks anyway." I watched his taillights disappear into the gray, not quite believing that I'd let him go. But when I finally made it to my car, shivering in cold and exhilaration, I felt an exquisite autonomy. Call me stupid or call me crazy, but in the words of Jimi Hendrix, "If I'm free, it's because I'm always running."

Second Thoughts...

This is one talented high schooler—what he lacks in running talent he makes up for in writing. Loved it so much I had to cross-post it...

By Oliver Davies of The Viking

The clock reads 4:24. Four minutes, 24 seconds into the most painful run of my life. 36 seconds left. 36 seconds to break five minutes in the mile.

If all the sub-five minute milers in America were to come together to promote breaking this difficult milestone, I have a feeling I might just be the spokesman for their campaign. I can almost see it now, big billboards and posters put up all over cities, buses and sports arenas with a picture of me, with a big caption underneath reading, "If he can do it, anyone can!"

I am a runner, but by no stretch of the imagination do I consider myself elite. I haven't been blessed with a body like Usain Bolt or Steve Prefontaine, but I've ran cross-country for the last four years, and have made do with my God-given talent (or lack thereof.) As this year's season came to a close, I decided I would aim to do what I never thought possible, and judging by the gaping expression on the faces of my peers, what they never thought possible either: breaking five minutes in the mile.

With a team of seniors, (plus one cocky junior Varun Kohli,) I warmed up that fateful Wednesday, aware that whether or not I broke five minutes, I'd either fail embarrassingly, or pass out on the track, unable to revel in my glory.

Conditions were perfect. The temperature was around 60 degrees, no wind. The fans packed the stands to cheer us on. In retrospect, they might have been there for the soccer game: it's still unclear. As runners lined up on the track, the silence was unbearable.

Before I knew it, the watch had started, and there we were, 200 meters into the most painful 1600 meters of my life. If everything went according to plan, adrenaline would take me a lap into the race, while the last three would be dependent on guts and pain tolerance. So why was it hurting already thirty seconds in?

Panic hit me like an egg on Freshman Friday. Thoughts like "Should I just get it over with and drop out now?" and "This could be a bigger fail than Michigan's football season," went racing through my head. Considering I had organized the race, I now had a pack of angry runners going after not only the five-minute mile, but me as well.

Like a bad dream that wouldn't end, I found myself at the end of the first lap, 3/4 of a mile left. My quadriceps were ripping apart as I strained through the first lap. The pack pushed on. I focused on sticking with proper mechanics and kept telling myself that in less than four minutes, I would be home free.

Jeff Billing, Paly's former boys' cross-country coach, used to repeat one thing throughout his infamous motivational speeches: your body can handle so much more than your mind believes. Herein lays the motivation of running, of stressing the body far past the peak of exhaustion: to see whether you can break the body-mind disconnect.

Two laps in, I honestly thought I could.

Pain moved past my legs and engulfed my entire body. The pack was falling apart, but I didn't dare turn around fearing what lay behind may only discourage my efforts to move forwards. Regardless, I pushed on.

In miler's folklore, the third lap serves to destroy every personal record, every shot at glory, and provide an immeasurable amount of pain before the final adrenaline rush kicks in at the finish. I strove to push on the third lap, but found myself helplessly slipping away from the steady pacer, cross-country coach John Welsh, as I closed in on the last 600 meters, one and a half laps left.

I had all but given up on my hopes of breaking five as the fourth and final lap came around. I knew it would take a miracle. 300 meters left and my legs were numb. Then, as I passed the halfway point, with half a lap left, my coach screamed "36 seconds left!" 36 seconds. Just like that, the dream was once again alive.

In those 200 meters, I don't think I've ever tried harder. With 100 meters left, the race became an all out sprint. Desperately trying to catch the lead man, I've almost got him.

Five seconds. Four seconds. This is my last shot. I sprint, no, I tumble, I collapse, through the finish line.

Lying on the ground, with my heart pounding like it might just give up and stop altogether, the timer reads the final time from his watch:

5:01.

Cruisin' for a Bruisin'

So let's see if we can keep the negative posts rolling for a little while longer.

Last Friday night I was riding my bike down near Ashby BART around 11 pm when I took my hand off the handlebar for enough time to hit a pothole and ruin my day (and back wheel).

I still have a reasonably clear memory of immediately after my front wheel contacted the pothole. The wheel lifted off the pavement and rotated to an angle not conducive to going in a straight line, I had time to think something along the lines of "guess I'm fucked", then just waited for it to be over. I wound up on my back resting my head on the pavement, going through the internal checks to see how serious it was. I felt pressure in my head, but maybe that's just the adrenaline. OK, I can move my arms....legs too. I checked my head below the helmet line for blood and tender spots. Nothing, just a really mild headache. Maybe the helmet hit the ground and I'm just feeling that. I laid there for a little longer making sure I could remember peoples' names and then decided to risk it, took off my helmet, and stood up to walk over to the sidewalk.

I actually came out of the accident relatively unharmed considering how violent the crash seemed. Even some bad scrapes on my left knee, right hip, and both palms are well on their way to being healed less than 4 days after. I'm not even sure I hit my head. My neck muscles on the left side were really sore two days afterward so maybe I somehow managed to keep my head off the ground. It certainly feels like the bulk of the impact was on my right hip. There weren't any clear marks on the helmet, so the persistent headache was probably psychological and sleep deprivation from that night.

It could have been a lot more unpleasant. I was fortunate to be biking with a friend, Joe, who watched over me as I collected myself. Lindsay and Christina came back in a car to come get me and Lindsay took me to the emergency room to get checked out, waiting with me in the worst emergency room ever for 5 hours until 4 in the morning. David was there to talk to me on the phone and assuage my worries of a slowly developing head injury.

So now my left knee is slightly bruised and it hurts to run and I have to delay my comeback for another week. Mostly I just wanted to get the crash out of my system and thank all my friends who were there to help.

Paid Information

So after spending $200 to find out that I don't have a stress reaction on Monday, I just spent $65 this morning to find out in 30 minutes that I most likely do not have an overuse injury, sports hernia, or hip flexor problem. Apparently I have an unstable pelvis, which is a problem due to having very tight everythings. I'm not sure if I agree with this diagnosis; it's true I have not stretched in two months, but that happened after the injury.
The physical therapist's plan for me is to do core work and stretching until hopefully I am healed, which could be a couple months. While this is not really that helpful, it's better than not being able to do anything. I can even do some aquajogging and a couple miles of running, if it doesn't hurt (which it does). I am going to try to take Lindsay's advice and make sure to do all the exercises as seriously and focused as possible, so I can forget about how I think that this is the wrong diagnosis. The good thing is that even if this doesn't work, when I start running again, whenever that is, I'll be really flexible and have a strong core, which will be really helpful.
I'll give a more positive post in a few weeks when I start seeing results.
The moral is: do your stretching and corework and it will save you money.

Listen to Your Body?

Today was a beautiful day in San Francisco. I walked to the ferry building, and did a few 50 meter spurts of running on the way there. They were some of the sweetest, most glorious moments of running I have ever experienced—and definitely the highlight of my day, the rest of which I spent moping, and poking at my leg so much that I gave myself a bruise over the stress fracture site. With injury, some days are better than others, and today was a hard one.

When I got back, I read an article by Gina Kolata, the science journalist for the New York Times who really gets runners. She wrote about the old dictum to "listen to your body"—and how maybe it's a load of crap:

“I never listened to my body,” he said. “Maybe I should have. So let’s get that clear right off: I think it’s an impossible task.”

When he was training, Mr. Fleming said, he couldn’t train less or make himself go more slowly. And, he added, if you really listen to your body, you will not achieve what you are capable of.

Athletes need someone else, a coach if possible, he said, to tell them when to rest, when to take an easy day and when to work hard.

It's a hard lesson to learn, but I think probably a true one. There's so much anecdotal advice floating around the running community about how to avoid injuries, a lot of it coming from incredibly talented, accomplished, and seasoned runners. But it doesn't seem like any of us is capable of taking our own advice—elites get injured plenty.

Being injured makes me think about running even more than I do when I'm not injured, and over the past six weeks (my longest break ever), I've been thinking a lot about what I could have done differently to avoid such a long layoff. I could have taken more time off at the first sign of injury. I could have walked at the end of that one run where my leg was really bugging me. I could have cross-trained less vigorously during my time off.

But I did none of these things. Why? Because the thing that makes us good runners—that slightly obsessive drive that separates us from the non-running population—is the same thing that makes us so injury prone. We don't know how to stop.

Strangely, there's something comforting about those words as I write them. An injured runner is in a state of existential torment. Ok, that might be a little hyperbolic, but running is a huge part of our identities, and when we haven't run in weeks, we start to question who we are—or at least I do.

But if the quality that plants me so firmly in the running community is the same one that sidelines me, then I can rest assured that even when injured, my runner-identity is intact. A small measure of relief, but I'll take what I can get, and if that means 20-second spurts of running for now, so be it.