I blame Vegas and Meb

Weigh-in Wednesday: April 9, 2014 -- 214.2lbs

So this past week wasn't the best. As you may have noticed, I didn't do a full week in review and I gained weight. I was pissy, I wanted to get the hell out of Dodge, and I didn't want fall into a funk. I did start the week well but then I couldn't get past the end of the block while running on Thursday. It wasn't good.

But then we went to Vegas and it was great fun. My lovely wife and I met my parents for a weekend of eating, drinking, and throwing money away. As is tradition we ate copious amounts of food. The only exercise I took part in included doing arm curls with my drink or walking from one eating establishment to another.

Surprisingly this didn't fit into my get back into shape plans...but hey it was part of the getting mentally back into shape. So suck it.

Last night, it got late, we needed dinner fast, and I have been wanting to go to this Eritrean restaurant in our hood. It was great! Assab was everything I wanted and more. Honestly, I figured I would wake up put on my Sketchers and run a one hour half marathon. But I couldn't. I was really full and there was a ton salt in that delicious Eastern African food.

I finished the same race (one year, two hours, 51 minutes later)

So it wasn't the best week. But tomorrow I will talk to the doctor to discuss next steps and have "run" 10 boring miles thus far on an elliptical machine. On ward and upward. Hopefully I will be running by next week and not prepping for surgery.

Week in Review 4-6-14

This week wasn't great. My ankle hurt a bunch. I was on schedule through Thursday, however when I got dressed to hit the road it wasn't happening. There was direct joint pain and some grinding in the ankle cavity and that isn't fun.  So instead of complaining about it (or seeing the doctor) the wife and I went to Las Vegas for the weekend with my parents on a last minute crazy trip.  A much better choice.

Anyway, I did one Pilates mat class, my weekly spin class, and ran six very comfortable miles on Tuesday. I also did some cardio work before and after my Pilates work out.  All in all a pretty good week considering I wasn't able to run more than two hundredths of a mile without limping.

I am calling the doctor tomorrow to see about options and I will report back.

Maybe I will have something to write about with some thought involved.

A Running Commentary

The view down Parkway Calabasas, Mile 2

I was supposed to be running the La Jolla Canyon trail race, but alas it was cancelled. Since I already had my tickets to come to SoCal and I got to hangout with my parents, I came down anyway.

The new training schedule called for 18 miles with 14 at MRP + 10 to 20 seconds.  So I had to find 18 miles to run here in Calabasas.

I started pretty early, hitting the road at 6:41am, according to the watch and ran around the neighborhood to warmup.  It took a while to get the lead out of my legs.  My parents' neighborhood is extremely hilly and the first few miles had a few steep ups and downs, making the warmup not so great on the legs. The second was down an easy hill.

After getting down toward the freeway, I ran north along back roads which most likely have a 10,000 foot elevation change.  After about three miles on Everest the back road I headed West along Las Virgenes Road toward Malibu.  I ran by my middle school which somehow has gotten much smaller over the years and then headed into the beautiful Santa Monica Mountains.

While I was supposed to be running in those hills for a race, it wasn't so bad getting some solo running along a two lane highway...with some of my closets truck friends. 

Miles 6 though about 10

I headed back the way I came and only almost was hit by a car once; mom, that is a really low number of near-death encounters for a long run. I finished my 14 miles at pace just shy of three miles from home and slowed down just a bit to cool off.  I hit 18 miles, walked for about three minutes and then jogged home.

I was wearing shorts. Or was I? I was.

Thanks to an unheated pool in the backyard there was a perfect 58 degree ice bath waiting for me to "enjoy" after a bit a stretching.

I was able to hold on for about 25 minutes in the cold but I don't think it helped much.  I did stretch a bit, however I didn't do it enough. Whatever, I felt pretty good today after a hard 18 miles on a pretty hilly course.

This was my first long run with the new training program and it was hard but completely doable.  This run was a check of the fitness levels and I am pretty confident in say I could have hung on for another eight miles at or close to the pace I ran my entire training run.

While I won't be saying that this proves that I have 3:45 in the bag, I am pretty sure I will be able to hold on to 8:35 m/m for 26.2.  This would be five seconds slower per mile than this training run, even with the warmup and cool down miles.  If I could hold the pace for the MRP + 10 (which wasn't really +10) I got 3:35 or pretty damn close to it.

With well over a month to go to get stronger, faster, and thinner, I am feeling good about the Tacoma City Marathon.

Something about Jack Kerouac

On the Road. Get it? It was funny. Ok. Sorry.

This weekend was filled with running goodness.  I was asked to cover the Pace Group Leader Duties as Burton was up in Napa for the aptly named Napa Valley Marathon. I was scheduled for 18 miles this weekend so I got in two before I meet up with the club for 16 more.

For the most part the Pace Group Leadership went pretty well.  I had some technical issues with the watch for the 8:1 run to walk beeps but it worked out alright.  Then we got to the Golden Gate Bridge. 

My running chum Susan from New York is terrified of heights.  So I spoke to her to distract her while we ran across the bridge and completely lost track of the pace. We went a bit fast...but after the pace group we passed on the San Francisco side of the bridge as they were using the rest rooms, had trouble catching up with us, we got the message to slow down.

The views were pretty.

The nine minute pace group taking the Southern Tower

View from the back of the group.

A Fire Hose of Moisture - The Story of CIM 2012

The Weather Channel wasn't wrong.  The Atmospheric River pointed a fire hose of moisture at my face and turned it up to high for about 3:35 on Sunday morning.  Which means that if I had hit my A Goal I would have been running in the rain for the entire time.  But thanks to that fire hose of moisture and approximately 40 mph headwinds A was OUT the window. However, B Goal was achieved with 4 minutes and 55 seconds to spare.

So here is the longer story.

After a quick stop at Trader Joe's for fuel we drove up to hangout with Dan and Karla in Sacramento.  The weather sorta held out. There was some rain but it wasn't so awful and we SAW A DOUBLE RAINBOW.

ACROSS THE SKY!

We went to Shabbat Services which was very nice and we got to see my good friend and college rabbi, had some tea and cookies, and watched some West Wing episodes. Then to bed.

Early on Saturday morning we went to expo, I became a nuun-vert, Abby picked up some insoles for her running shoes, and I got an extremely stylish poncho. We started the carb-fest with a few little things at the expo and some coffee.  We went off to Fox & Goose for brunch and saw Argo. Nice movie.

Then it was time for big carbs at Buca di Beppo with a mess of SFRRC running chums.

Tastes like carbs

To my surprise the food was actually pretty tasty.  While our order was plain, team cow bell (Dan, Karla, and Abby) had a more complex dish with meat and cheese and team cow bell said it was very good. Also it was $16 bucks per person, so that was excellent.  There were a number of first timers and they asked important questions and we all pretended to have the answers (sorry guys, we just made it up). 

First timers Vince, Heather, and Alex

Then it was bed time.  And then it was game time.

Perfect Race Day Conditions

I was scheduled to run the New York City Marathon and then this happened.

Hi Sandy, you bitch.

Then this happened.

Yeah, I know you know.

Now with the California International Marathon scheduled for this weekend, Northern California is bracing for an Atmospheric River to hit and impact Sacramento.  According to The Weather Channel, if it stalls, say when it hits those big ass mountains near the California-Nevada boarder, "significant flooding can be the result."

COME ON MAN!

Here is the kicker:

Most importantly, that plume of moisture [a.k.a. the atmospheric river] won't move appreciably for a couple of days, perhaps through Sunday, aiming its firehose of moisture at northern California and, perhaps, southwest Oregon.  

Therefore, some locations, particularly in the coastal ranges of northwest California and the Sierra foothills, will likely pick up over 10 inches of total rainfall through this weekend, leading to flash flooding, river flooding and, in recent burn areas, debris flows. (emphasis mine) 

If they cancel this race due to a little sky stream coming to town, I am going to lose my shit.

But as with most weather events, the use of phrases like "aiming its firehose of moisture" give me some pause and reassure me that the bored California-based meteorologists want a big storm to play with...but then again, I thought that was the same thing with Sandy.

I am confident that the race will go on...and perhaps the snow will support the extremely low water levels in Tahoe.  That part is good news. It isn't like I haven't run in the rain and it isn't like it makes much of a difference.  A marathon hurts no matter what and I am going to be running one, rain or shine.

When the gun goes off, rain and all, here are the goals:

• A Goal: 3:35 - 3:45
  Revised based on weather and hi-po for painful chaffing.
• B Goal: Sub-4
  This is the same as NYC.
• C Goal: Don't Die
  This is the same as always.  

Here we go. 

These little town blues

This past weekend included 15 eating and drinking establishments, at least seven different kinds of beer, a lot of Mexican food of varying degrees of authenticity, and that piece of New York Pizza.  It also included a two month-old, old friends, a set of parental units, paint cans, a flee market, 16 miles in Central Park, and mid-town lunch specials. The only place something like that could take place in what amounted to three-and-half day vacation is in the best city in the world: New York City.

Some background:

1. The wife and I have not been on a non-wedding/non-visiting hometown vacation since our honeymoon.  This is not to say that these other trips weren't fun or we couldn't relax during them, but there is something to be said about this luxury of a "real" vacation.
2. San Francisco is a nice town.  There is good food and the people are nice, but it is not a city and it is very slow. Stuff closes too early, it isn't easy to get around, and there are no good bagels. This isn't to say we don't like it here, but we should be honest, it pales in comparison to New York.  Anyone who says otherwise either has not lived in New York or couldn't cut it in New York.
3. Going on vacation to your old home is strange. But at least you don't have to pretend you are getting the inside scoop on the local spots by asking the bellmen where they eat. Right, because those guys aren't told where to tell you to go by the same people providing information (and tips) to the concierge.

Now that I got that out of the way, here is what went down.

My First Music Festival - Outside Lands, a review

This weekend I went to the three day musical bonanza that is Outside Lands, and thanks to very generous connections, the wife, the sister, and I all were VIPs for the weekend.  This afforded us two very important things: seating for the main stage and access to clean bathrooms.  While the seating was nice, the bathrooms made the event.

Music - In the Park

The music was good too.

Sometimes you just want pizza

There has been a lot going on since I last wrote a blog post.

The Olympics and the craptastic coverage NBC has provided, especially here on the West Coast.  A CEO of a chicken restaurant started a family values revolution, boycott, and counter-boycott.  A number of my chums ran and PR'ed the San Francisco Marathon.  All of these things are things I would often write about and try to find some real useful, perhaps even insightful, thing to say about them.

But sometimes you just want pizza and that is the only thing you can think about.

Sometimes the weekend lives up the hype

Over the past four months I have either traveled or recovered from traveling on my weekends here in San Francisco.

This past weekend did not follow that trend.

Needless to say, people like me don't often have weekends like the one I will recount in all its glory for your reading pleasure. It was rare for me to have such a weekend even in the best city in the world.  So I can now say, without any doubt, that after a weekend of epic proportions, San Francisco has a lot to do. Perhaps, it has more to do than New York. Or at least it is easier to do it here.

But now, for my epic weekend of epic-ness. It all started as the sun was breaking the horizon and other overly-dramatic descriptions of Saturday morning.

Perspective

The wife and I went out to see some very big trees today.

Cute, no?
During our trip to Muir Woods, driving the somewhat death-defying roads and taking in the forest that has been standing since long before they started fighting in the Middle East, it was easy to get all philosophical.

It has been two solid months of living apart now and we are into the final two and half months until we live together again. Time is relative, as they say, and for me these past two months have passed both slowly and extremely quickly. For those of you who went to camp, you understand that days have the value of a week, a week a month, but those summer nights...

More often than not however, time moves slowly. But life is good for me. I have no complaints. So I will spare you the painful analogy between the the trees' lives and mine and the feeling really small thing and simply say, two and half months to go and I am pretty happy about that.

Also I get to see my lovely wife at the end of this week, so that is an added bonus!

Big Trees for Big Thoughts

Sometimes you forget

Waking up this morning with the heavy, flat bottomed clouds clinging to the mountains on the eastern shore of Lake Tahoe is pretty hard to beat.

Up at Tahoe for the first time in at least six years, you can forget the majesty of this place.

I loved coming here during college for ski weekends or retreats. Honestly I never had anything but a good time up here. Now I will do my very best to not kill myself as I rent a snowboard and hit the slopes of Squaw Valley.