Beach to Beacon 10k: recap

I had hoped to PR this race.  I came nowhere close to PRing this race.  If there is an anti-PR, I almost did that (it was almost as slow as my very first 10k ever!  Maybe slower.  For real).  However, I had also not anticipated that it would be in the 70s with 80% humidity and 2 miles in the bright Maine sun to start.

I began too fast.  Probably I should have slowed down.  However, running at what I was hoping would be my race pace was so easy at first.  It felt kind of like when I PRed on the half-marathon.  So I suspect that I had it in me to make my goal, except that the situation made it impossible.

Here is where you end:

Even better, you don't need to run up the hill at the end!


The course was great (a little hilly, but not horrible).  The support was great.  There were tons of water stops and even ample portapotties at various points.  The t-shirt is great (real wicking fabric!).  Even the running expo was great (2 shirts and 2 bottoms for $33 total).  The people along the route were great, particularly whoever was playing 'I like to move it' around mile 3.  The only complain was the weather, and obviously no one could do anything about that!

I was asked by two EMTs if I was okay.  That is always my acid test for whether I did my best on hot and humid days.

My one piece of advice: if you are doing this run, park at the South Portland locations if that is viable.  They had by far the shortest line for the shuttle bus and it was really easy to get back on 77.  Definitely the best choice I made all day!

It has been forever, I know

Some stuff that happened over the past month:

1) A lot of bad runs as the temperature went up/humidity increased.
2) One very bad half-marathon, during which I felt sick around mile 4 and never got better.
3) One really good 6-mile run on a night where the humidity was low.  That was fun!  So it isn't all hopeless, apparently.
4) An 11-mile run on the treadmill, which seemed endless.
5) I BOUGHT A TREADMILL!!!!!!!  Not the same one as the 11-mile run.  But my very own.  So I can run on it and watch the Red Sox.

Stuff that is happening in the future:

1) I am going to Australia.  It's winter there.  I hope that this bodes well for running.
2) I'm doing a 5k in Australia.  Because hey, why not?
3)  Then I get to do the Beach to Beacon 10k.  I am hoping to set a new PR here.  My goal is under 11:00 mile splits.  Doesn't have to be much under them.  Could be 10:59.  But that would still be a PR.  My current PR is 11:15 and I have spent years trying to break that one.
4) All that's left after that is a marathon.  No biggie.

I am trying to stay positive in the face of much negative with running.  Still working off the stomach bug that hit me during the half-marathon and running has not been going so well since then.  Still trying to remember that it is only one glitch and sometimes glitches happen.  Not doing great with all of these sentiments.

I'm sad that the half-marathon didn't go better for a number of reasons.  The conditions were really good for running (in the 50s!).  The course was really good for running: only one real uphill and very scenic besides.  My stepmother would have done very well if we could have just run the course.  So I was very annoyed at the outcome.  At the same time, it's really hard to run when you're sick and there is a bug going around.  I am not the only one to suffer through it.

Two incomplete runs, blech

I decided that this week was the week to stop with the walk/run and just go with running.  I think I have to retract that decision.  Today was better than yesterday, but both were not very good.  Blech.  It's frustrating to think that a month ago in Germany, I felt like I was running pretty well and now I feel like a failure.

Yesterday, I had things to do in the morning, so I waited until the evening to run.  I knew that this would be challenging because it would be hot and I expected to hit my two-mile wall, which occurs after running 2 miles before I heat adapt when I simply need to walk.  The weather last night was 89.6F with humidity of 62% when I went and the dew point was 75F.  That is not a nice dew point.  Also, the temperature and humidity definitely put that near the threshold of ick (when humidity + temperature > 160).  But I didn't even get to two miles.  After one mile, I had to start walking.  I think that I started too fast considering the conditions, which didn't help, but I was still frustrated by the result.

On to today.  Admittedly, I did get started a bit later than I would have liked, but I thought that the reduced humidity would make up for my tardiness (around 9am instead of 8am).  The dew point, according to Accuweather, was 77F, the temperature was 81F and the humidity was 86%.  Okay, so that's nasty.  But I'm still annoyed at myself for having to walk and not making it through my four miles.  I feel like I used to be able to get through these things but this year I have no capacity or stamina or something.  It's probably just no adaptation to the heat since I was gone for a while.  I'm still irritated about it.

So it will be treadmill later today to finish off the 2 miles that I didn't get done this morning.  And I've accepted that I will have to walk on Sunday during parts of the long run or I won't make it.  But it is really bugging me.

I mean, I guess the good news is that I got further today than yesterday before having to walk?  That's not really consolation.

Who knew I would go running today?

There were so many factors that were against me to go running today:

1) There were storms.  Big storms.  And do you know what else they brought?  Humidity.
2) I had a long day at the office.  Like, about twice as long as I anticipated.
3) I slept terribly.
4) I can still feel the dregs of the flu.

And yet, somehow I went anyway.  The new running plan started today, this time for a 5k race.  It's nice, because you don't have to start thinking of your 5M runs as 'the short ones.'  For most of the day, I was pretty much convinced that I would do some form of cross-training instead of the designated run for the day.  Then for some weird reason, as I was driving home, I suddenly wanted to run.  Now.  And so I did -- well, okay, once I got out of the car of course and changed.

Mind you, today's actual run was not exactly the toughest I have ever done.  It was two 10-minute intervals that were supposed to be at my half-marathon pace, with a 2:30 jog break in between.  I do have to say that I think I went faster than my half-marathon pace (I left the new and awesome toy at home...long story short, I am dogsitting again and figured I wouldn't need it, what with the flu recovery and all) and parts of this run were not great.  For instance, I was stiff because I decided to paint my bedroom on Saturday and for some reason this tightened some of my hamstring muscles.  I did a warm-up to start (no idea how long by time or distance), then plunged into my intervals.  Voila, run complete.

Some days I remind myself that it's easy to find a myriad of reasons not to run and that you really just need to find your one reason to go.  I'm glad that today worked out in the end, even if it was much to my surprise.