Still runnin'

"Our greatest joy-and our greatest pain comes in our relationships with others."

Pic was from 2 weekends ago while in Las Vegas at my buddies bachelor party, good times.

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Finally starting to get fully settled in. Work is slow, but expected. My learning curve will hopefully be steep. Working with kids is great! I am looking forward to it. I was finally credentialed to work in the operating room which is something I really enjoy doing. Looking forward to that as much as anything.

(Kevin Everett crossing the finish line)
Last weekend, I had the opportunity to be a spectator at the Spring Sprint Triathlon, it was out my back door. Interesting format, they swim in the pool on Friday. Then, on Saturday, the bike and run take place. Everyone is lined up in the order of their swim finish time and then they release you into the transition area based on the split differences between each person. For example, swimmer A swam in 4:32 and swimmer B swan in 4:37. On Saturday, he would leave 5 seconds behind swimmer A and so on. So needless to say, made it quite interesting. I tell ya, not sure if I would want to do this format, it is almost more “balls to the wall” than a traditional sprint. Here you have time to rest and there is no holding back, you only have to bike/run. All in all, it was great fun to spectate a triathlon as always. I always tell myself I should be a spectator more often, tons of fun to watch.

I rode the Boise 70.3 bike course the day after the sprint tri. Tell you what, that is a challenging course. The winds are impressive and can really get to your head if you let them. Tons of head winds, but has some fast sections as well.

My training has been steady and consistent. I am definitely feeling much better on the run, but still slow. I have been able to throw in a few longer runs. My avg HR for my first 9 runs was 158bpm. My HR has dropped to an average of 153 over the last 10 runs with the same perceived exertion.
Run//Time//Avg HR//Distance (miles)
10//45:06 //159//4.9
11//45:37//forgot Strap//5.3
12//45:49//166//5.5
13//1:49:24//161//12.6
14//45:03//144//4.22
15//56:16//137//5.1
16//45:08//150//4.9
17//1:15:00//152//7.66
18//38:48//150//5
19//1:22:04//159//9.43
I have really haven’t picked up my swim training yet, just haven’t gotten myself out of bed in the mornings. Have started biking a few times per week. Mostly trainer rides with something longer on the weekends. No plans for racing yet, we’ll just see. I am sure at some point this summer I will be coerced into racing.
Back at it,
J

First 9 Runs in 10 days

("Fist-bump" after a run with Frank Shorter)

"Good things come slow - especially in distance running."

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So here are my first 9 runs. I am 2 runs down on my goal of 60-45 min runs in 60 days. In a couple of weeks, I will add 2-a-days and catch back up. Half of these runs have been on a treadmill, I hate running in cold weather. I would have ran everyday, but this past weekend I headed to Las Vegas for my buddies bachelor party. Needless to say, I didn't run on Saturday AM. I somehow managed a 30min run on Sunday AM before my flight out.

Note: The mileage and average pace are a little goofy. I am using a Garmin watch and sometimes is seems not to recore the proper miles. At this time, HR and time are most important. Distance and pace will come later.

Run//Time//Avg HR//Distance (miles)//Avg pace ===================================

1//45:46//163//4.81//9:30

2//46:13//162//5.13//9:00

3//45:05//163//4.89//9:13

4//45:03//159//4.89//9:13

5//45:12//151//4.89//9:13

6//32:02//157//3.92//8:10

7//45:01//150//4.55//9:53

8//45:05//146//4.89//9:13

9//45:09//170//5.3//8:31

Runnin',

J

Catching Up

“Success is peace of mind, which is a direct result of self- satisfaction in knowing you did your best to become the best that you are capable of becoming.” - John Wooden

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Well, it has been 17 months and 1 week since my last post. A lot has happened since then. I won’t bore you with everything in between (sadly nothing too exciting has happened since then), but just a few things of note. I left my last blog on mission to conquer my running woes and run a few half marathons to see what I could do. I was in the middle of running 31 runs in 31 days and I had planned to continue on for another 30 runs in 30 days. Well, I ran 58 times in 61 days with some great personal results. The 4 days that I didn’t run were 4 days that I took off between my October and November run challenges. I was feeling pretty rocked after October and needed to rest a few days before running everyday again for November.

After completing the challenge, I had two half marathons lined up in early December. The first half-marathon, the Mistletoe Half Marathon in Winston-Salem was on December 1st, 2007. I had been tracking my MAF test and the last one I did right before Mistletoe was 7:10, 7:18, 7:24. A big improvement from October’s MAF test which was 7:37, 7:56, 7:50. So I had this grand idea that for Mistletoe. I was going to test our MAF theory and stick to a heart rate of 155 for the race and see if I averaged out over 13.1 mile a 7:25/mile pace since that is what my latest MAF result was. I knew my time wouldn’t be fast and I was ok with that, I knew was racing down in Charlotte the following weekend in the Thunder Road half marathon. Well, in theory, it sounded good, but realistically, it was a disaster. Looking back at my splits, the only miles that I actually was under 160bpm for an average was the first two miles, not to even think about 155bpm. My real plan was to run the first 10 miles at 155 and then run hard the last 3 miles descending. Even though I wasn’t on my original plan of holding 155 for the first 10, I thought that I was pretty conservative averaging 163bpm through the first 10 running a 7:10 average mile pace. As expected, my result wasn’t anything great, but I almost successfully completed my goal to descend the last 3 miles. I ran 6:39, 6:22, and 6:28 with a finishing time of 1:32:02, a 7:02 pace.

The following weekend, I headed down Charlotte for the Thunder Road Half-Marathon. With the poor results of the previous weekend, I didn’t really have anything to lose. I had put all this time into running and still didn’t have any results. I decided not to worry about a pace or a HR for that matter, however I was still going to keep track with my garmin. The gun was off and I was rolling. I was pretty amped for this race. It was downtown, tons of people and I ran with my ipod during this race to stay as focused on the task at hand. I ran through the first mile, looked down at my watch and was sure that the race was over...I had just ran a 5:58 mile! Well, as I was thinking to myself what I was going to do next, I figured, “hell, you are here to run , so keep on goin’.” I definitely concentrated on slowing down a bit after the first mile and find a pace that was comfortable to hold for as long as I could. Well, long story short, I somehow held on. As you can see from the picture, I was hurting, but it was all worth it. I stopped the clock that day at 1:24:53, a 6:30/mile average pace.

Well that race last race was December 8, 2007. Not much happened athletically after that. I turned to the newest chapter in my life, my job. I started my new job on January 2, 2008. I took at job at PrimeCare, an urgent care in Winston-Salem. Like most new things, I took this job on full force. I worked every shift that I possibly could have and tried to soak up any piece of knowledge that was given to me. Afterall, I was the new guy, but not only the new guy, a new grad. As I began to take on more and more shifts, I began to work out less and less. Before I knew it, my job had taken over and I wasn’t working out at all. It took me about 5 months to realize it. Looking back, I was amazed how much time went by and how cranky I had become to realize that something essential had left my life, my physical well-being.

My best buddy from PA school, Greg (GP), started challenging me in April of 2008 about a race. As we had spoken weekly on the phone, I think he realized that I had not trained once since early December. I must say this was odd as far back as I could remember since I had moved to Winston-Salem in 2000 that I had taken off completely. It seemed in each phone conversation, we HAD to talk about triathlon. I was denying it at the moment, I was copping out saying I was done with triathlon. He would say, “Man, when are you going to start training again?” His continual prying into my brain about my triathlon days got deeper, “Are you ever going to make it back to the sport, have you just given up?” As I was able to fend him off with my nonchalant excuses, he used a different tactic, challenge. At some point, I think he said something along the lines, “Man, it would be sad if I beat you the Lake Logan Triathlon.” Well, to give you a bit of background about Greg, he is a pretty big dude. Former Tight End at Oregon State, I think he was in the 250's during his prime there. Needless to say, he is a Clydesdale. I think he was down to 220, but still, I was thinking, “is he serious, he was going to beat me.” Well, I finally obliged to the challenge. It was on, August 2nd, Lake Logan Triathlon, an Olympic distance race. I was 8 weeks out and on June 1st, I began my daily training. Once I committed, I made an outlandish bet. I figured if we were gonna race, something was going to be on the line. The bet was, if I beat GP by 18 minutes, he would buy me dinner. If I didn’t, I owed him dinner. Well long story short, I lost. I beat him by 12:35 that day, 5:25 off the winning bet time. For excuse purposes :), I ran a 44 minute 10K, pretty slow considering. Had I ran what I have previously, it would have made it for a close race. In the end, it wasn’t about who won or lost, it was about the journey, the friendship and personal challenge to get back in shape. Even though I wasn’t back to the fitness had been previously been in triathlon, it was a start. It was also learning how to balance work and personal life, not an easy task.

Well, September/October rolled along and I found myself slowly creeping back to working more and training less. This time, I realized it much sooner and decided I was going to ride through the winter. I was on fire with riding until about mid February of this year. I had been at Primecare (PC) for about 15 months and I was getting fairly frustrated with our leadership. I didn’t feel like they had me in their best interest. It seemed the leaders at PC were living along the mantra of “working more, paying less.” My interest to look for a new opportunity became greater. First and foremost, I needed to find a job allowed me to train more, which meant to work less. In 2008, I averaged over 55 hours/week, way too much working! There were a few opportunities out there for me to take, but one in particular seemed to put me “back to the good ole days.” My brother had taken a position in Boise, ID. He had been laying the seed for a few months, “it would be nice to have you out here.” Well, in February of 2009, St. Alphonsus offered me a job in Orthopaedics as the first Ortho PA.

I started work on March 23rd and have finally settled in. I think Boise is going to be a great fit for me, tons of outdoor stuff to do and I look forward to cross country skiing in the winter for a different fitness stimulus.

Just as I left the blog 17 months and 1 week ago, I have begun my run challenge – 60 runs in 60 days. I have no race plans for the year yet, we’ll just see how it goes.

Getting it rollin',
John

MAF Test and THE "Project"

Parental Discretion Advised! The above cartoon has nothing to do with this post and the video for that matter of fact, just had me laughing for a bit, so I thought I would share.

******
This run challenge has been going well so far. I find it nice to track your progress, it is a great motivator to see your numbers drop. I personally track my runs on an excel sheet. It allows me to run the "numbers." Yeah, I am number junkie when I actually record my stuff. It allows me to see what my average mileage is, average heart rate, etc. The challenge for me will come later on when my improvements are far less. So far, I started at 8:30+ miles on my daily runs. Over the past 3 weeks, I am now into the 7:45ish range, not a bad improvement for me. As much as I want to believe that this is fitness gains, the reality is that this is merely a gain of just getting back to baseline. Right now, I have ran 26 runs in 25 days. My unpublished goal (well I guess you can called it published now ;) ) is to run 34 runs in 31 days, we'll see if I get there. My two-a-days are unplanned. If I happen to get an early run in the AM and I have the opportunity or feel the need to get out and exercise, that is usually when I get my second run in. I am only swimming 2 times a week right now and have been lucky to get out on the bike once a week since IM Canada. I told myself that I was giving up the bike in exchange to run, and that was to run often. Over the past few years, I have realized that I have a difficult time trying to do a specific sport focus while maintaining all 3 sports, so that is why I have decided to give one up, cycling for now.

It has taken my 3 years to finally be somewhat motivated to train my run. Quite honestly, I hate running. Talking with my brother 100 millions times about my run in general and trying to assess why I am poor at, I have come to at least one conclusion. So here goes my ramble....if you are sick of listening, I would suggest to scroll to the numbers NOW :)

In the beginning when I started triathlon "seriously" in 2001, my motivation to train was often fueled by positive reinforcement. I was reasonably successful in the North Carolina Triathlon Series (NCTS) in my age-group. For 3 years, I was on the podium probably 90% of the time that I raced. I had a goal by the time I was 25 that I wanted to race in the NCTS elite category and I did. Let me tell ya, that was a tough year for my head. Going from good results to well, uh......Anyways, it was a big jump going from age-group to the elite wave. We have some very competitive elite age-groupers here in NC, which makes it fun to race now, not back then. My motivation to train was much different than the first 3 years....DON'T BE THE LAST ELITE GUY and don't get "chicked." Needless to say, I think I was the last elite a couple of times (well, more than just a couple) and I was "chicked" probably in almost every race. Not cool in the "The Cool Book of Triathlon."

My second year as an elite was a tad better. By this time, I had some minor success in the swim. I wasn't getting smoked from the get go and I was able to get out onto the bike towards the front of the race. During the first few races while towards the front, I wasn't able to stay with some of the uber bikers, so it quickly became motivation to become fast on the bike. My thought was simple, if I can continue to improve on the swim, then get out on the bike in the lead, THAT would be COOL and I could re-establish my "coolness" according to the "The Cool Book of Triathlon." As this was occurring, I wasn't really paying much attention to my run, doing the bare minimum and at times running hardly at all. My motivation solely for the last 2-3 years was to keep getting faster on the swim and bike and just hold on for the run. While this bipolar approach has its ups and downs, its not all that stable for results. I have been lucky enough to do well in a few races because I have had a descent swim/bike combo and held on for the run, but I am over that. I think the reason I hate running so much is that I have poor results as a result of my poor training. If I would just put in par training for the run as I have for the swim and bike, I might feel much differently about running. After all, results are a great motivation for me.

So what the hell does all this "ramble jamble" have to do with my running....well here I am today, 26 runs in 25 days later, 6 years after I have started triathlon, attempting to give myself a chance. I have spent much of my triathlon race days always looking behind me, waiting for the inevitable, THE PASS in hopes that my S/B combo was enough to hold them off. I have done 6 IM's, never breaking 4 hours in the marathon. How could I ever expect anything better than a 4 hour marathon when I have never come close to putting in the time that it would require to run less than 4 hours, I surely have catered to my swim and bike and I have seen results. Hopefully this season my site will stay in front of me, no more looking over the shoulder.

So I will go ahead and create that public expectation of myself, something that I think many of us fear. We fear because we are worried that we may not deliver what we say. My plan is to finish this month of 31 runs in 31 days and continue on into November with the same challenge. Jeff has challenged the TriCoWS in the month of November to be a swimming month. 30 swims in 30 days. Each swim must be at least 2K to count. My run challenge in October defined a run as 45 minutes. The November 30 runs in 30 days run will be defined as at least 60 minutes. In October, I have been training around 10-11 hour a week, mostly running. Next month, I hope to see 14-15 hours of training per week spread between swimming and running.

Here are the last few runs since my last post and my MAF results. Comparing my MAF test which was right before I left for Canada, I ran 7:51, 8:02, 8:05 at the same HR of 155 for miles 1, 2, and 3 respectively.


Run//Time//Avg HR//Distance (miles)//Avg pace
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18//40:16//158//5.4//7:27
19//51:05//149//6.44//7:56
20//44:42//163//6//7:27
21//50:33//159//6.44//7:51
22//1:04:55//150//7.82//8:18
23//57:39//154//7.58//7:36
24//50:00//155//6//7:48
25//50:00//154//6//8:14
26//49:01//151//6.1//8:00
******
MAF Test - Run 24
LAP // TIME // AVG HR
==================
1 // 7:37 // 155
2 // 7:56 // 155
3 // 7:50 // 155

Until next time my friends,
J

IM Hawai'i and "THE" project

Well first off, congratulations to all that raced at Hawai'i this past weekend. It was a blast to watch you guys. Great job Dennis, BDC, Kate, Teresa, Dave, Marky V, and Billy. Here's a quick recap:

- Dennis had a killer day going 9:16, freakin blazing!!

- BDC has been waiting for this moment. He went to Vineman in shape to win and had a flat that put him out of contention. Recovers, trains hard and finally gets a well deserved result, 9:26 with a 3:16 run.


- Kate had a steller performance for her pro debut in Kona taking 24th and a killer run split of 3:17

- Our favorite local, Dave, kept his vibe alive finishing another IM, I think he is close to 15 or 20, a great example for us young triathletes.

- Teresa took 2nd in the 45-49 women

- Marky V had the fastest swim split of the day and led all amateurs through mile 10 of the run... Impressive bro

- Billy has had a spectacular year as a pro and finished in Kona with a great result running 3:10.

******

The running is still going. I am officially half way through the month and I have ran 17 runs in 17 days. Quads don't feel bad, but my calves are feeling it quite a bit. I tend to get calve tighness and soreness with high volume/frequent running. I have always complained of this when I ramp up my run frequency/mileage. It has never (knock on wood) caused me to stop running, it is just uncomfortable at times. This is the time that I usually start strectching quite a bit and it usually alleviteates the achilles/gastroc tightness/soreness. So here are the updates of the runs since my last entry.

Run//Time//Avg HR//Distance (miles)//Avg pace
1//46:37//158//5.4//8:38
2//48:08//155//5.4//8:55
3//45:53//160//5.5//8:20
4//48:49//161//6//8:08
5//46:14//171//6//7:42
6//1:00:09//147//7.25//8:18
7//48:13//162//6//8:02
8//43:10 + 1:55//156//5.4//7:59
9//42:35:00//150//5.4//7:53
10//46:05//155//6//7:41
11//1:32:15//155//11.25//8:12
12//47:25//150//5.5//8:37
13//48:48//159//6.55//7:27
14//58:32//158//7.6//7:42
15//41:00//156//5.4//7:36
16//47:46//139//5.5//8:41
17//45:41//156//6//7:37
******


On a side note and as much as I am afraid to admit it, I went to "So you think you could dance" tour with Jeff and Erin's two girls, Kenzie and Laney. We had a blast, talk about people knowing how to dance....maybe in my next life.

Massaging the calves,
J

Project 26.2 update.....

"See no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil"...I think that is how it goes. Here is a pic of TGG's 3 monkeys. BOCO, GOOD TIMES!! Just a glimpse into our schinanigans over the summer. This is Denny's "bad boy" with Chris, Mat and JD at our farewell party.

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Here is my run summary so far for my 31 run in 31 days of October. I have ran 11 times in 12 days. Later in the month I will do a few more "two-a-days" and will catch that up. Not feeling too bad yet. We'll see though, ran my first long run today after a run this morning.

Run//Time//Avg HR//Distance (miles)//Avg mile pace
1//46:37:00//158//5.4//8:38
2//48:08:00//155//5.4//8:55
3//45:53:00//160//5.5//8:20
4//48:49//161//6//8:08
5//46:14//171//6//7:42
6//1:00:09//147//7.25//8:18
7//48:13//162//6//8:02
8//43:10 + 1:55//156//5.4//7:59
9//42:35:00//150//5.4//7:53
10//46:05//155//6//7:41
11//1:32:15//155//11.25//8:12
******
On a side note, I just passed my medical boards to practice which is quite exciting. Been a pretty big internal stress in my life lately, so it is nice to get that gorilla off my back. Now its off to the races and hope to get my state license soon. Still interviewing at quite a few places and looking pretty much anywhere, so if you know of a great Orthopedic office that is looking for a PA, let me know.

Will check back soon,
J

Attempting Balance.....

It been a while, so I thought I would update what I have been doing over the past month. But first I want to say good luck to the TGG's in Hawaii. BDC, Dennis and Billy are racing as well as Kate, Marky V and Teresa. JD is racing in Florida as well. Good luck to you all, will definitely be keeping an eye on you on Iromanlive.

Training has definitely been put on the back burner as I have been preparing/interviewing for jobs and studying quite a bit. I was however able to fit in a couple of races since IM Canada, all for fun. The trip back from Canada was pretty uneventful, but long. I think it took my brother and I about 6 days to drive from Penticton to Winston-Salem. We stopped over in Kansas City for day to spend time with family. It was definitely nice to see my middle brother and his family. I don’t get to see them much and Kellan and Jaden are growing so fast.

Once I got back, I did a local sprint triathlon here in W-S called the Angel’s Triathlon. It is directed by one of our TRICOW club members Mick Gunter. He puts on a great race for a great cause. This year was special because it also kicked off a great foundation called the AJ Linville Foundation. The AJ foundation was started by another one of the TRICOW club members Aubrey Linville. They started Team AJ which was created to help spread the word about the AJ Foundation and also promote a healthy lifestyle by having them compete in their first triathlon. I think something like 50 people from Team AJ were doing their first triathlon. Lastly it was my birthday, can’t ask for too much more than being able to race for fun.

I hadn’t really done much training since it was 3 weeks post IM Canada, so I was out there to have some fun and see everyone that I hadn’t really seen all summer. I had started running a little about 2 weeks post Canada which was earlier than I have ever done, but it truly was at a snail pace, just to get my legs moving again. As for biking and swimming, I think I had ridden about 2-3 times since and swam about 4-5 times since the big day. So I was ready for a rude awakening, or at least my lungs and heart were. I hadn’t raced much hard stuff this summer, well none at all to be exact, so it was going to be fun to see what would happen. Well, nothing to exciting other than it hurt like hell and for the first time in a while, I asked myself “why did I like sprints?” Finished and hung out with all my “amigos.”

A week later, a buddy of mine Curtis asked me if I wanted to join him on a team with his wife, Paige (I went to PA school with her), and another classmate of mine Ann to do this event called the Marine Corps Ultimate Challenge Run.>
The Ultimate Challenge Mudrun consists of 4 person teams. The 4.2 mile course is an all-terrain race conducted on dirt roads, improved and unimproved trails through the training area. This trail includes mud holes, walls, trenches and other obstacles that require swimming, crawling, climbing and jumping. It was down in Columbia, SC so it was a bit of drive, but I was like what the heck.

Let me tell you, it was one of the most fun things I have ever done. I would definitely recommend this to anyone, it was just a total blast. We were a coed team and we actually did really well. I think we took like 73rd out of over 600 teams. It was pretty sweet. Depending on where I end up taking a job, I am definitely in for doing this again next year.

On the training frontier, I have begun to think about a running program. Project 26.2 needs to get started. Jeff posted a challenge to all the TRICOWS for the month of October to do 31 runs in 31 days. I thought this would be a good start to my running program. So far, I am 6 days into it, have done a minimum of 45 minute runs. I missed two days in a row while I was at an interview and the rule is supposed to be you can’t miss 2 days in a row, but I will make them up by doing a couple of two a days later in the month. I think I am going to stay off my bike for the winter for the most part and concentrate on running while maintaining a swim. All in all at this point, my main focus is getting the J-O-B. Here are my runs for the past few days:

Run//Time//Miles
1//46:37//5.4
2//48:08//5.4
3//45:53//??
4//48:49//6
5//46:14//6

Will be in touch,
J