42point195
By marathonerAnother year
If 2011 had been a ski run, I would have traversed across the slope to make a big, wide turn to end up traversing in the opposite direction again. Not much ground gained in the direction of the fall line.
This year end, I tumbled down and picked myself up over and over again, amidst fatigue and frustration.
2012, I want my turns to be short and rapid, with swift executions right down to the base of the hill.
Turning a page
I have moved to France two and a half weeks ago, after living for close to 5 years in Atlanta. In other words, I ran in Atlanta for close to 5 years.
I ran along the stretch of Peachtree Road at Buckhead that has been widened for both pedestrian and vehicular traffic. I saw the construction area at my “no man’s land” in Brookhaven morph into a new residential district. I witnessed a Starbucks store go into business near Lenox Mall, only to close its doors shortly after. I watched the blue-green-and-white signs at what used to be Wachovia Bank outlets being replaced by the red-and-gold Wells Fargo logo. I got all excited over a “Clearance sale” poster at a Borders store on one of its last days of business only to find that all the good stuff were gone by the time I returned after washing up from my run.
I have stopped counting the number of races that I have participated in. It is true that after running in the same place for some time, a race feels like “just another race” and the routine business takes away the excitement in running.
To my relief, this is changing.
As I settle into a new city, trying to re-establish my running routine signifies the attempt to seek some regularity in my everyday life. While doing that, there are new things that I need to learn and experiment. I have to relearn to count in kilometres instead of miles. I have to find new running routes and calibrate them. I have to think of a hydration solution for my long runs. I have to test new fuel. I want to tune in to the local running calendar and I want to check out the running stores where I can get all my supplies.
I am doing this all over again. A new city is bringing a fresh breath of life to my runs.
High note
This post should have been written a lot earlier. The Georgia Half Marathon took place in March. Then, there was work to wrap up. After that, there were South America, followed by Singapore, and now Paris.
Almost five months have passed, but I really want to write this post to summarise the things I did differently for my race preparation because what I ran for the Georgia Half Marathon this year was about the best I can do. I was close to my limit.
After running the same races for a few times, it was easy to treat the next race as just another race. Since this would have been the last time I would run the Georgia Half Marathon, I wanted it to be something different.
I resumed my Sunday long runs in January. Due to travel plans for work, I could not do much more in January and only started to properly train from February onwards. My longest run was 14 miles and I worked in three speed training sessions.
During the training period, I continued practicing pilates once a week, something which probably helped me avoid back pains during the race. Besides that, I went to see my massage therapist once a month. I do not know if the sessions by themselves were helpful, but they were definitely painful. The pain made me feel that the therapist was doing her job and I love the sense of satisfaction after subjecting myself to the pain. The “feel-good” effect of the massage sessions made me feel that they were already worth the while.
This time, I also added lunges to my programme. Exercises like this can be time consuming. To save time, I covered part of my walk home from the gym by doing lunges, sometimes with a bag of groceries in each hand if I do grocery shopping after gym. I usually ended up doing around 70 lunges in one session, something that left my gluts sore the following day, without fail. Again, I do not know if the lunges by themselves were effective. I record them as one of the ingredients of a regime that resulted in a successful race.
The weather was nice on race day – cool, but not too cold. I ran the race in tank and shorts, with the Supernova Sequence 3 that were 345 miles old. I did a proper warm up, which I think was very important in preparing my body to start the race in a proper condition. I started the race at the end of the field and I do not remember anything remarkable happened during the race. I just kept running, running and running and I caught up with the 2:30 pace team at the last mile.
Unlike during some past races, my lower back did not hurt during the last mile. I was probably a little tired by then, but I could still run. There was an improvement of more than 4 minutes over my previous best timing when I finished. This was my fifth time running the Georgia Half Marathon since its inauguration in 2007. For yet another time, this race was where my effort paid off where it concerned personal bests. I had my runner’s happy ending before saying goodbye to Atlanta.
Postcard from the Galápagos – delivered
When I was at the Post Office Bay at the Galápagos, I picked up two postcards to hand-deliver them when I was in Singapore back in June. The delivery brought me to some residential areas on the island where I have never ventured before. One was off Bukit Timah Road, close to King Albert’s Park and the other one was on the hill behind Margaret Drive. When I went to the second place, I was pleasantly surprised that it is possible to find such an authentic property at such a relatively secluded place to live in and yet still be so close to town.
I, too, left a postcard at Post Office Bay for delivery. A few days ago, I learned that it had arrived at its destination. It has this lovely picture of two albatrosses. It took about three months for it to arrive at the mailbox of its recipient since I left it in the barrel of Post Office Bay, not as long as I had imagined it would take. It is so interesting to see people taking part in this “game” in different space and time.
Six miles of the long run route
For the past four and a half years of running and training in Atlanta, I have always used the same route for my long runs. It is a 10-mile route from where I live and runs along Peachtree Road (except for the half a mile at the start to get to Peachtree Road and Peachtree Industrial Boulevard towards the 10-mile end). I would run out along this route and head back when I have covered half the distance I wanted to run on that day. For example, if I plan to run 14 miles, I would run along the route until I reach mile 7 and head back in the opposite direction.
I wrote about this route two years ago here and I have another post on how I handle my hydration needs during my long runs here.
Part of this route is also almost the entire course of the annual Peachtree Road Race in Atlanta. This year, I ran the Peachtree for my fifth and last time, along what is the first six miles of my long run route. I decided to pictorially record the key landmarks at the mile-markers of my miles 1 to 6 (which can also be miles 14 to 20, depending on whether I am running out or running back and on the distance covered for the day).
For simplicity, I label the place where I start my runs mile 0 and count the miles up to 10, going north along Peachtree Road. Coming back, my mile-marker numbers simply denote the number of miles left for me to run. The Peachtree Road Race starts at mile 6 and head south. In other words, the race is run in the same direction as if I were heading home.
Mile 6
In fact, the race does not start exactly at my Mile 6. This place, almost at Mile 6, is the holding area for runners on race day. Mile 6 is a little further up north (to the right), just round the corner from Phipps Plaza, at the junction of Peachtree Road and Wieuca Road. Mile 6 is an important hydration point for my runs of 14 miles and above. I would always stop here to refill my bottle before heading further out.
Mile 5
Mile 5 is at the junction of Peachtree Road and Piedmont Road. To the left, there are Wells Fargo (it was still Wachovia when I started running in Atlanta) and The Container Store (not in the picture). It takes me about an hour to get to this point so this is where I would normally squeeze a pack of GU Gel into my mouth before continuing with my run. A CVS Pharmacy opened here in the past couple of years and I started patronising them regularly on the way back from my longer runs.
Mile 4
At Mile 4, there is a Publix on one side of the road and a Walgreen Pharmacy on the other side. I have used Publix for a toilet break before, big business. Speaking of that, there were a couple of occasions when I sneaked into Intercontinental Hotel between Miles 5 and 6 to use their restroom. I said “sneaked in” because it felt rather awkward to be all dripping in sweat while walking in the lobby of such a classy hotel. Nonetheless, the toilet experience was first-class (obviously, race-day port-a-loos are nowhere close) and I was there early enough in the day to not have curious guests staring at my body oozing with sweat as I washed my hands.
Mile 3
Mile 3 is at Peachtree Battle Promenade. This has never been a hydration point for me. It is around here that the route reaches its lowest elevation in the area. What it means to me is that when I am heading out, this is the beginning of an uphill climb. It gets easier when I am heading back home when the same stretch becomes downhill. However, when I reach Mile 3 when heading back, it was also time to change gear for another steep climb.
Mile 2
This part of the route is a hill, an uphill climb when I am heading back home. This is where Piedmont Hospital is and the hill is given the name “Cardiac Hill” by the Peachtree runners. In the early days of the race, runners were joking that running up the hill was so tough that they could just drop to the ground and be hospitalised at Piedmont Hospital once the get to the top. I also remember reading in some running magazine that this hill is among one of the steepest to be featured in a race route in the US, so this is serious stuff.
There is another CVS Pharmacy at the top of this hill. When I am really tired and thirsty on a hot morning, this CVS is the motivation I give myself to get to the top. That is where I can get a cold drink and a snack.
Mile 1
The Equifax building marks Mile 1. This point is of psychological importance. Running out, it means that I had overcome the first mile. Running back, it means that I had only one more mile to go.
Mile 0
Nearing the end of a long run, I would decide at this point if I were to make a right turn on 17th Street and keep running home. In that case, I would end up at Mile 0, which is close to my place.
On the longer runs, I always feel tempted to continue straight along Peachtree Road and end my run on 14th Street at Piedmont Park instead. The distance covered is about the same, but this would allow me to slowly stroll back along 14th Street and stop by at the Starbucks at Colony Square for breakfast. (What? After all the energy bars, GU Gels, chocolates, Gatorade and with a couple of hours more to go before lunch, I still wanted breakfast?) Almost all the time, I would end up giving myself a treat for having woken up so early and for being bothered to be running on the road for some 3 to 4 hours or more. Just bagel and mocha, nothing much, but they always taste so good.
