Part One, where a purely rational decision is made to purchase a new electronic toy necessary piece of equipment for my safety.

As you can see from the recent posts I have been doing some running to get in shape, relax and enjoy the great out of doors. I have been using a combination of the pedometer I bought in August 2007 when it looked like I might exercise for more than two weeks without giving up, and an antique stop watch I got as part of some training years ago. (I had thought I lost the key to wind it up!) This was working pretty well for walking, but as I ran more and became more interested in “pace” and “miles” logged it wasn’t working out as well.

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Every year the local Running Fit stores hold what is called “The Road Ends 5 Mile Trail Race” also billed as “No Wimps Allowed!” race in Pinckney Michigan. This is the short version of the Trail Marathon and half marathon held the following day at the same location.

Added a nice new T-Shirt to the small, but growing, collection.

Some stats for the race:
a) 5 Miles, not a 5K
b) finished 276 out of 355
c) finished fifth out of five in my age group…. later adjusted to sixth out of six.
d) won my first “award” for the fifth place, but later seems I should not have after results were adjusted…. oh well.
e) took a great tumble skinning up a knee and (can this be done?) spraining a foot, not an ankle.
f) learned to make sure I remove glasses before I take off on a run! (The bifocals make seeing your feet difficult without looking down, thus losing the ability to see where you are going.)
g) had a 11:09 pace (55:44 total time)
h) had a great time in spite of e above, and since it was the first 5 mile I have run another new PR! Hey, three races, three new personal records, what’s so hard about this?

The course is at the State Park in Pinckney Michigan. The area is relatively hilly, and the course takes great advantage of that. There are a couple gentle hills to sort of warm up on, and then a couple monster “never ending grades” that will make the thighs burn, and these come after the 3 mile marker, so you are I am already running on shaky legs! Yeah, I walked part of them, I am sure this contributed to the slower overall pace since I have been keeping it to around 10 minutes on flatter courses. This shows a need to get more hill work in, maybe need to find a stadium with steps to run up… or maybe even enter the annual climb at the Detroit Marriott Renaissance Center.

Full Climb 70 Floors - 1035 Steps
Half Climb 40 Floors - 585 Steps
Yeah, right . . . . Oh, I would have, but already missed it for this year, darn. (It was Sunday, February 24, 2008)

I also cannot figure out how the course can gain over 1,000 feet in total altitude, but never descends more that 50 feet total through the course. . . or at least it seems that way.

Update May 1, 2008: I was kidding about the elevation above, but I just got the weekly email from the sponsors “Running Fit” and they had this to say about the race:

“As usual, the weather was spectacular and everyone set a P.R.! (Seriously, we just checked out the vertical climb in each loop of the half marathon and it was over 7,000 ft! For those of you who ran the 5, a very serious 5, it had over 3,000 ft of climb!”.

Now this to me seems like a serious amount of climbing to me! No wonder the legs grew weary!

I did have the old Peugeot 10 speed out awhile back. The tires still held air, and I did a couple miles around the neighbourhood to see if I could still stay upright. Seemed to provide pretty good thigh exercise also, maybe need to get out on it more often. . . or maybe even squats (?) to build them up.

Well, nursing the foot now, resting it a couple of days, then have to get back on the path. Need to keep on track since I have the Toledo Zoo and Mackinaw Bridge races coming up in just a couple of weeks.

Until the final bruise heals,

It is spring in Michigan - finally! Daytime temperatures are getting into the 70’s, and making all the living things come alive. Grass is greening up, soon the mowers will need to come out, the Tulip trees have new large buds on them, and in the garden are signs of new life.

The results and long, patient wait after the trip to Holland Michigan is coming to the dramatic conclusion! The bulbs have survived the trip here, the fall planting, and now are beginning to open up. It remains to be seen a) how many will be eaten by the rabbits, and b) what the final colors will look like in the arrangements! Stay tuned for the conclusion.

Until the final bulb is lit,

This morning I did the Martian Marathon - 10K race portion. I had a good time for sure. Having never gone 6.2 miles before except once in training, did not know for sure how it would work out. I did not finish first… come on only been three months since I could even go 3 miles at a time…. but I was pleased with my stats.

• There were 617 total finishers (do not know how many entrants)
• I ended up 426th out of that 617
• In my age group there were 43 runners
• I ended up 30th out of that 43.
• The official time was 1:03:01
• That makes the pace 10:09, not burning up the pavement, but better than the 5K pace (10:30)  just a month ago, and twice the distance!
• Then of all the runners, 69% finished ahead of me, while in the Shamrocks & Shenanigans 5K a full 77% finished ahead of me.

The numbers here confuse me a little, they are just slightly different than the spreadsheet data on the Gault Race Management web site. But the spreadsheet looks to be more correct to me.

If I hang in there it will be interesting to see what happens at the same races next year.

Will get I now have some photos posted, but finally got the main system is down for an upgrade right now  running enough to get this done.

Until the Martians make face to face contact,

A cool updated widget to translate the blog to the language of your choosing! Just click on the desired flag icon on the right hand column. Neat huh….

Until everyone speaks Esperanto,

The count down has begun to the Martian Marathon, well in my case the Martian 10K, which is pretty much a marathon for me!

The race is less than two weeks away on Saturday April 5, 2008. I think I can go the distance, probably not non-stop, but a short enough “breather” to still keep the time pretty reasonable.

Should be a fun race! I am hoping the weather does not decide to dump more snow the night before - or during the race! After the latest round on Friday the 21st, Ann Arbor broke all annual snowfall records that went back to 1880 when the first records were kept, so it would not surprise me since we sometimes get snow that late! Better get out and buy those YakTraxs to have on hand foot feet!

Until the last alien abduction is solved,