Ocean State XC 2018

Goddard State Park
Warwick, RI
Saturday, September 22, 2018

This was my 2nd time running this race, both times with Tommy 5K.  In 2016, Mikey had joined in, but unfortunately he is on the disabled list of late.  With Matthew on a rare weekend home from UNH, we drove up together as we'd be spending much of the day there.  Met up with Tom for a warmup, and it was time to go.

A small field of about 50 runners toed the line, and we all got a front row position as we could spread out on the starting line.

Toeing the line with Tommy.
(Pic courtesy of Jana)

At the start:  this is the closest I would be to Tom all race.
Note Eric Winn (9:00 in picture) running barefoot.

About 1/2 mile in.
(Pic courtesy of Shara)

Most of the first mile is on grass and double-track gravel, and you duck into the woods on a manicured trail just before the end of the mile.  Someone called out "5:49" as I went by the mile.  My watch showed 6:08 for the first mile, but looking on Strava, I think the 5:49 was more accurate, as Mile 1 on my GPS was much further past the Mile 1 marker on a certified course.

While my actual Mile 1 time really means little, it just helps gives a little credence in my head why after Mile 1, I was just dead for the rest of the race.  (i.e., my first mile was probably a little too fast in retrospect, still recovering and rebuilding)

About a mile in.
(Pic courtesy of Jana)

(Pic courtesy of Shara)

For the rest of the race, it was a battle just to keep pushing it.  On the way back on the trails, I was annoyed at how many high school runners were running or walking on the course, but not nearly as annoyed at the next situation:

The Collision:  Just after two miles and before you head downhill towards the water, I saw a coach ahead of me crossing the trail I was running on, but yet seemingly oblivious that a race was going on!  OK, I can sort of deal with him as he's just one person in the middle of the course, and dodged him to his left and went past.  HOWEVER, he's leading his whole squad of high school girls walking across the course!  I cannot dodge the wall of girls now blocking the entire course.  They're chatting and looking at their phones, but not at me.  Since I've just climbed a hill and am breathing like a dinosaur racing towards them, I cannot muster up "Excuse me, could you please give me some room" or what I'm really thinking, "GET THE $#@% OFF THE COURSE!".

I crash into one girl, who looks at me like "How could I possibly do this?".  This wakes up the rest of her tuned out team, but it's just much too late now as there are about twenty of them blocking the course.  I hit a second girl and the impact is not as much as the first girl, as they're aware of me now and trying futilely to get out of my way.  The third girl that I hit is more of a graze off of her shoulder.  This has definitely affected my race, both in terms on the time I've lost slowing, dodging, crashing, picking up again, etc., as well as I am just fuming mad now about them, but more about their male coach leading them right onto and blocking the course.  Argh.

Final turn, heading to the long finishing chute.

Increasing the stride and pace, final approach.
(Pic courtesy of Shara)

I try to finish as strong as I can, but it's a combination of feeling dead and angry as I make it to the finish line.  On a positive note, I thought I saw the clock ticking away 19:5x, and was bummed not to break 20-minutes, until I saw the seconds go to zero and the clock is still showing "19:xx" and not "20:xx".  Great, it obviously must have been "18:5x" that I was seeing with my poor distance vision.

I had no idea they were there, but looking at this pic now,
I am surprised and grateful to see the support the Westerly High School is
giving me as I finish up.

Final results:  19:06, 9th overall, average 6:09 pace.  Full results here.

My time two years ago here was 18:33, so 33 seconds off as I'm recovering and building from my injury is pretty decent in my books.  I cooled down with Tom and Shara for a bit, but 6 full miles with Matthew.  I had fun watching the Westerly High School teams compete next, and when Colby asked me if I would be staying to watch his race, I was tickled pink and happy to tell him "of course!".

Plaque for my efforts.
I never expect anything for awards, and
certainly don't want to look a gift horse in the mouth,
but not sure what to do with plaques.

The highlight of the day for me was watching Katelyn Tuohy of NY break not only the course record there, but take down the all-time national high school women's XC 5K, right here in RI!  16:06!  She would’ve beaten every man out there except the top guy if she had run in the men's race, and she had the fastest first mile time of anyone at 4:56.  Amazing to watch her fly.

Weekly Post 17-Sep to 23-Sep-2018

Monday:  0 run, 1.2 swim
AM:  Mondays are typically my run day off, but as you may have "heard" (read) me espouse in recent blog posts, I am going to try to keep up cross training.  Went to Watchaug Pond with the intent of getting 1/2+ mile in, but the pond was totally ensconced in a blanket of fog.  There was absolutely nothing to sight as a marker, so I figured I would just swim close to shore.  But when I could no longer see the shoreline, I wasn't very comfortable.  The last straw was when I heard the motor of a nearby boat but could not see it.  He was going slowly (probably because he couldn't see either), which meant since I can't see him, he can't see me either.

PM:  Not wanting to be cheated out of a swim, I went back late afternoon to a beautiful sunny day with several youngsters frolicking in the water at the beach.  Felt really good swimming and after my standard 1/4 mile swim out to the buoy westbound, I made a wider return out past Camp Watchaug and back.  I got back to the beach at 0.89 miles on my watch, so just like the geek I am with running, I "had" to continue a short OAB to get to a full mile.

Sometimes you see European plates on the front of a vehicle driving around
here and then the true US state plate on the rear.
But when I saw this camper parked at Burlingame picnic area with foreign
plates on both front and rear of vehicle, plus parties speaking a foreign
language, I knew this was the real deal.
---
Of course, the "E" on the left with the European Union circle of stars above it
designates this license plate as from Spain (E short for Espana).  Had a short, but
pleasant conversation with the people getting out of the camper and setting up
charcoal for cooking.  They confirmed they were from Spain, and had
brought their vehicle over for an extended US driving and camping adventure.  Very cool!

Tuesday:  5
Was supposed to be heavy rain this afternoon, which is fun for me to run in.  (Not in January, mind you, but a 73 degree late summer day, bring it on.)  Parked in Watch Hill.  Despite a "Flash Flood" alert on my phone, it was barely raining and slowing down at that.  Ran local roads and called it a day.

Wednesday:  11
AM:  5 miles.  Workout on Pound Road.  Not sure what exactly possessed me to run on Pound Road.  Was headed to Bradford Preserve with an idea of a grass workout, and on the way realized with all the dew that it would be a very wet run and probably conducive to a workout.  Anyway, parked at the end of the pavement next to Crandall Family Swamp and ran the following:
2 x 800 (2:59, 3:03), 4 x 400 (96, 88, 96, 88), 4 x 200 (43, 45, 49, 41). 

The warm-up and cool-down were both VERY interesting to me.  Long before I moved to Westerly, Pound Road used to be a through road, but it was blocked off in 1991 by irate residents who believed the town was harassing them by trying to collect overdue taxes.

Pound Road, Westerly.  Area in red circle closed off in 1991, and subsequently overgrown.

Fascinating article I found with some online research:
New London Day, July 28, 1991

While I never knew the woman, she was purported to frequently wield
a shotgun when any visitors approached.

Fast forward 27 years to the the present:
With Arlene Crandall long dead and her husband Irving having passed away
3 years ago, the Narragansett Indian Tribe is really improving the property,
including opening back up Pound Road as a trail (cleared trail on
left of pic leading to Westerly Land Trust viewing platform),
and establishing the Crandall "Minacommuck" Farm on the old homestead,

including greenhouses with a Narragansett Food Sovereignty Initiative.  Fascinating.

PM:  6 miles.  WHS XC meet #2.  Setup, course marking, and break-down.

Thursday:  0

Friday:  5 run, 3 walk
Ran from Burlingame picnic area through Kimball and NST over bog bridges, back on VG.  Trying to get a feel for what might make a good 4-mile "half runaround" race that the club will introduce this November in order to try to broaden the appeal of Li'l Rhody.  Dip in the pond post-run.

From there, volunteered at a company "Care Day" to clean up Napatree.  There are many volunteer opportunities at the bank, volunteerism is strongly encouraged, and I probably don't do enough it.  It was a beautiful day on the beach cleaning up with colleagues.  The beach was quite clean, but we did pick up and inventory trash, mostly cigarette butts and plastic bags.

Saturday:  10
Ocean State XC.  Write-up to follow.

Sunday:  8
Fun Woody Hill run with Chris, Tommy, and Matthew.  Mostly single-track with a sprinkling of double-track.  Got some decent hills in as well, for 800+ of elevation gain.

Weekly mileage:  39

Weekly synopsis:  Had intended to get over 40, but close enough for government work.  Trying to take a slow and cautious approach to mileage build-up.

Weekly highlight:  The entire running event and day at Ocean State XC, with a close second to the Woody group run.

Weekly lowlight:  Not getting in a long run this week.

Stavros Beach Run 2018

Thursday, September 13, 2018
Westerly, RI

I just had such a fun time.  I know I probably say that after a lot of races that I run, but for all its simplicity of 1.5 miles out, 1.5 miles back, there is something unique and fun about this race on the beach at low tide at end of summer that really makes it one of my annual favorites.

Planning:  As with all of our club races, we start the planning the November of the previous year, in order to get on calendars, start the sanctioning/insurance process, secure our timing company, etc.  In the case of this particular race, it also means looking up tide charts to find the optimal post-Labor Day weekday to hold the race.  With big storm surges today, we couldn't run at the lowest hardest spot on the beach, lest we be running in knee-deep water when the waves came in.  But it all worked out.

The waves were impressive tonight, and took away some of our
low tide runnable area.

Race day:  I got there later than I would have liked (story of my life), but we still had time and ample volunteer help to get set up and ready.  In fact, of all of our club events, this one is the easiest to put on.  No course marking, no bibs, facility includes tables, chairs, and bathrooms comes pre-setup for us, courtesy of the town.  The town has been a fantastic supporter, and we open the beautiful pavilion and restrooms for use.  I kept my pre-race remarks to a bare minimum, and we started the race promptly at 6:00 sharp.

Off we go:  With the uttering of the word "GO!" from Way, we were off.  More than half of tonight's runners were aged 18 and under (57%, actually, but I won't quibble).  I give you that fact as it set the stage for what inevitably happened at the "gun":  despite my start on the front line, a plethora of high school runners just blew by me like I was standing still.  My immediate fears that the rest of the field would soon blow by me and I would finish in the back half were, fortunately, unfounded.  After a mile, I had gradually moved up to 10th place.

Start of the race.  Most are barefoot.

If I'm counting correctly, early in the race with a surge of front runners,
I'm quickly set back to 22nd place (red arrow on right of above pic)

Picking off runners:  I caught up to Tyler as we were getting to Seaside, with the 1/2 way turnaround in sight, and went past him.  He put up a fight, and ended up re-taking me.  I didn't want to use a lot more energy with more than half the race to go, so I let it go.  His resurgence didn't last too long, as just before the turnaround, I caught and passed him again for good.  Saw Steve and Polly at the turnaround, and now had eight WHS runners ahead of me.

I caught John Turo next, but based on Tyler putting up a fight and John coming back to repass me at Bottone Mile last month, I didn't take it for granted.  I ran by myself for a while and slowly edged up on Sebastian.  With about 1/2 mile to go (didn't look at my watch, but I know where the 1/2 mile mark is from swimming here), I was right behind Sebastian, and when a big wave came in pushing him up on the beach to run around it, I took advantage of the fact that he was shod and I was not, and I ran through the ensuing wave in a straight line and passed him.  Something resonated from school about the shortest distance between two points is a straight line.  Six runners ahead of me and closing in slightly on Aaron.  Didn't know if I would be able to take any more runners, as they can all out-kick me.  Came up on Aaron with the town beach (finish) now clearly in sight in front of us, and decided my attempt to pass him would have to be swift and even accelerating.  I did just that and never looked back.  I was gaining also on Sam (5th place) and Colby (4th), but just didn't have enough room to execute.

Just before the finish:
Me (back) closing in on Sam (just ahead of me) and Colby (orange),
but it is not to happen.

Sam's form is breaking down.  I just need a little more runway ...

Still very happy with my finish,
and happy to be out here injury free.

Final results:  18:40, 6th overall.  First non-high-school runner.

Post race was a blur.  I congratulated the people immediately ahead of and behind me, as well as my next adult competitor, new WTAC member Eric Ciocca, who will be sporting his new WTAC singlet at Chicago Marathon next month.  Colby said he felt I was coming after him, which was interesting.  After a jump in the ocean, some brief remarks on the microphone, catching up with runners and the Stavros family, and sampling all the awesome food, it seemed the night was over and it was time to clean up.  Such a fun night.  I just love this event.

A crowd gathers at the finish line (between the green "Start" and "Finish" flags)

Frolicking fun post-race

Jeanne Stavros (lower right) serving up the race's trademark pizza.
(Jeanne is Charlie's sister-in-law; the race is a memorial to WTAC member
Charlie who died in a road race in Westerly in 1993)

Plenty of other food as well

True enough, Eric.  On both counts.

Looking back across the years:  Post-race I got a text from Matthew saying that he had run the race the prior twelve years straight.  Hmmm.  Got me thinking, and I went back and checked my own history on this race.  I had thought the Blessing was the only streak I had going, where I've run Blessing all 16 years since I took up running at age 39.  No, it turns out that I've also run Stavros sixteen years in a row!  Well, I'll be.  (I don't know what I'll be, but I'll be.)   In those 16 years, I've placed second 4 times, and won the race outright once in my 3-mile PR of 17:26.  Here's to the next 16 years straight of running Stavros!

Weekly Log 10-Sep to 16-Sep-2018: Cleared to Run!

Monday:  0
Woke up this morning to the pitter-patter of rain.  Felt really good and a bit odd, as I think it's been about three weeks since we've had any real rain here.

Went to my follow-up physical therapy session.  This was my 6th and final session following up to the June Adherent Nerve Syndrome injury.  Everything went well.  My range of motion in my legs is actually better than before the injury.  I haven't had pain since Schonning race two weeks ago, and I know that was due to too much racing in too short of a time.  After four weeks of base mileage in the 30s, I'm cleared to run anything I want, but obviously want to be prudent in gradually ramping up distances and racing.  Two promises I'm making to myself are 1) continue with core exercises at least twice per week, and 2) continue with some form of cross-training.  Everyone is different, and no guarantees I won't get re-injured tomorrow, but for me and where I am in my stage of life, I'm convinced this will help stave off injury.

Tuesday:  12
All about the XC today.  AM 5-mile run checking out the course post rain.  PM 7-miles in course setup (with Jeff Huckle), spectating, in the woods on course monitoring (one boy dropped a shoe!, and one girl was hyperventilating after the hill climb), and course clean-up.  Came home with dead legs.   Both Westerly boys and girls lost their meets, but it was fun out there none the same.  I've come to know runners on Westerly and Chariho teams, both threw Matthew's high school running as well as WTAC runs, and it was fun watching them progress.

Wednesday:  0
Lazy slob.

Thursday:  7
AM:  3.5 miles.  Easy shakeout on local neighborhood roads, with a few telephone pole pickups.  Rain.

PM:  3.5 miles.  Stavros Beach Run!!  Race write-up forthcoming shortly.

Friday:  6
Went out to Burlingame for a trail run.  Reminded myself a few times to take it easy, as we have a 12-miler / workout combo planned for tomorrow.  At 75 degrees and sunny (4 pm), I really didn't want to put my short-sleeve orange shirt on.  I hemmed and hawed, and decided to be a rule breaker (orange required starting Sep 9 this year) and run shirtless, hoping I wouldn't run into anyone.  Ran down to the small beach at North Camp, then Sammy C's.  No one in sight, good.  Ran back on the much more popular Vin Gormley (a/k/a "Yellow Dot" trail), and ran into a solo hiker, who obviously didn't care I wasn't wearing orange, since he didn't have orange on himself.

Nonetheless, I should be wearing orange, and mentioning this on my Strava post, I did get some suggestions from Jonny on orange running shorts.  Thanks; I will check this out.

Saturday:  12!
Ninigret Park with Tommy 5K.  Longest run since April.  Warmed up for 4.5 miles, then went into a workout.  We were running on 0.8 mile gravel/dirt/grass trail, somewhat similar to what we'll race on next weekend at Goddard State Park.  Ran 4 x (5 minutes hard, 2:30 jog).  Ran based on feel, and did not check watch much.  My average paces (which I only know after the fact) were as follows:

• Lap 1:  6:30
• Lap 2:  6:31
• Lap 3:  6:37
• Lap 4:  6:20

Clearly I fell off a bit by Lap 3 and was feeling the fatigue.  Does Lap 4 suggest that I left too much out there?  That's my usual pickup in the final iteration of a workout, when mentally I know I'm almost done.

View from the end of "Fishing" segment.  Not too shabby.

You can just make out my torso and head in the middle of this pic.
Love jumping in watering holes, ponds, and oceans at end of runs.

Sunday:  8
Woody Hill trail run with Tommy and Jonathan.  Start/finish on Fallon Trail, to mix it up, with a CCW tour of Wahaneeta, Woody, and Bradford Preserve on some of the usual trails.  Soupy weather with fog rolling in.

These three guys were hanging out when I arrived for my run.

Weekly mileage:  46!

Weekly synopsis:  With being cleared to ramp up the miles and basically run anything, I'm trying to be smart about it.  My own guidelines, some of which I am reiterating from above:

• Continue the leg and core exercises weekly.
• Continue (or resume) cross-training.  This will get harder in cold weather.
• Be smart about ramping up both weekly mileage, long run and race distances.  The 10% weekly increase is a good rule of thumb, and it also means no marathon in 2018.

With the above in mind, after four weeks of "base" mileage in the 30s, this was my first foray north of 40 miles in months.  Will plan a slow ramp up from here, with a lesser mileage recovery week every four weeks or so.

Weekly highlight:  The Stavros Beach Race, no doubt about it.

Weekly lowlight:  Being too lazy on Wednesday, and having to run my shakeout on Thursday morning for a Thursday night race.  I need to "man up" a bit on my morning motivation and stop hitting the snooze button.

Weekly Log 3-Sep to 9-Sep-2018:

Monday:  bike 19, run 5
Often I take Mondays off, but on holidays (today is Labor Day), it's harder to pass up.

AM:  Met up with Mikey B for the usual easy ride along the coast (Watch Hill, Misquamicut, Weekapaug).  We stopped at the Innlet in Weekapaug for iced coffee and conversation.  Had really good talks on our kids off to college, Tom and Chris at a different stage with their kids, our respective injuries (although I'm definitively on the mend and Mike is not), and how we both want to get back to more biking next year and resume tris.

PM:  After taking care of some home chores, the sun came out, and since it is Labor Day, seemed appropriate to head to the beach.  I people-watched from my towel for about five minutes, but then got bored and went out for a run.  Every part of my run had a distinct vibe, from dodging tourists at the state beach, watching the drunkards and very scantily clad ladies at Paddy's Beach Club, to the enjoyable quiet section headed down to Seaside (where we'll be running the Stavros Beach Run in 10 days!).  Mikey had a cold water bottle waiting for me at Seaside, and I caught up for just a moment before finishing and jumping in the ocean.  Good finish to the day.

Tuesday:  0 run, 2 walk
Morning exercise was a fairly intensive set of PT exercises.  I feel like my range of motion is really improved because of these, even in my uninjured leg.  The side planks and single-foot jumps up onto/off of a box are still the hardest for me to do and also maintain balance, but others are now relatively a breeze, and I'm looking forward to a PT assessment next week.

Spent the rest of the morning at Avondale Preserve working with the Westerly Land Trust's Coffee & Clearing Club to spruce up the preserve.  My task was to liberate an old split rail fence from various weeds and bushes that taken it over.  Not the most fun task, especially in the heat, humidity, and direct sun, but I love the Westerly Land Trust and giving back to it is a no-brainer for me.

I thought about running in the afternoon, but hearing a heat advisory on the weather forecast made it easy for me to nix that.

Wednesday:  8
Workout Wednesday.  First speed workout since the injury in early June.  Temp was only in the low 70s, but humidity was pretty bad.  I was soaked early into the run.  Declining ladders from 5 minutes hard down a 15-second sprint.  I wanted to quit and walk so many times.

Got to Misquamicut State Beach and was salivating for a long drink at the bubbler.  It was completely shut off and removed!  What gives?  Cruel.  Matthew told me that the Watch Hill fountain was also shut off.  Ugh.  Google searches on both yielded no clues.  Anyone know anything about the Westerly water fountain caper?

Thursday:  5
Disappointingly sore and tight from yesterday's workout.  Baby steps, I guess.  Ran campground and Kimball trails at Burlingame.  Very easy, relaxed pace.  Dip in Watchaug Pond afterwards.  Lingered there and then at Dave's Coffee post-run, making me late for work.  That's not like me.  In a bit of a rut mentally; I need to reset.

The dregs of humanity:
Burlingame and Watchaug Pond are so beautiful,
and it annoys me to no end where careless people
treat the outdoors as their trash can.

Friday:  0

Saturday:  5 walk, 5 run
AM:  Work crew at Bradford Preserve.  Met up with Jeff Huckle and Schane Tallardy at 7am for a couple of hours of solid work.  Jeff and I focused on liberating the "Pumpkins Connector" trail, which was quite overgrown, in fact in a few places unrecognizable.  This will change over time with use.  Schane worked the XC loop and cleaned that up really well.

PM:  Solo run back at Bradford Preserve.  Ran the full Pumpkins 8K course.

Sunday:  11
Longest run since April!  Ran Carolina Management Area (South and then North sections) with Tommy and Chris.  Thanks much to Chris for putting this one together.  Mostly single-track, and felt good throughout.  As we finished up, I was only half-joking that we should go on the rope swing (over a deep swimming hole in Meadow Brook), but since Chris had stopped right near it, we went over to check it out.

Good ol' rope swings over the river.
Reliving my childhood.

That water is COLD!
The big kid took the plunge; the other two characters did not.

Weekly mileage:  36 run, 19 bike, 7 walk

Weekly synopsis:  Consistent week.  Ready to gradually up the distance and speedwork, pending favorable results from the PT next week.

Weekly highlight:  The group trail run and rope swing!

Weekly lowlight:  Garbage carelessly discarded at our state parks.  They come and use our beautiful state parks for free, and don't have the courtesy, respect, or common decency to clean up after themselves.  Makes me angry!

Weekly Log 27-Aug to 2-Sep-2018: Pawtuckaway 1st Visit

Monday:  0
My traditional rest day from running.  30 minutes of core and injury-specific PT exercises.

My "equipment" for PT exercises is slowing growing.
It certainly pales to Tommy's "torture chamber" in his basement.

Fresh-picked bounty from the garden.  Yum.

Tuesday:  6 run, 0.5 swim
AM:  Met up with Tommy for a pre-dawn run at Weekapaug.  Air was thick as pea soup, and I was having a tough go of the breathing for the first few miles.  Ran a bit of the sand trail and beach, before continuing on roads.  Somehow away from the beach the humidity was just slightly less oppressive.  Saw SS on the bike on the way back, and dawn broke as we got back to the beach and took a dip at Fenway Beach.  There were tiny no-tentacle, non-stinging jellyfish in the hundreds (or thousands) in the water around us.  Moon jellyfish?  Comb jellyfish?

Sun was just coming up as we finished.  Stopped at Town Beach
to take this pic.  I love the ocean.

PM:  Brutally hot today.  Upper 80s very close to 90 degrees downtown, only slightly better at the beach at 85 degrees.  Went straight from the office to the town beach, changed and went for a 1/2 mile swim sans wetsuit.  Those same tiny jellyfish were out again; at one point on return swim, I swam into a swarm of them and got a few in my mouth.  No harm, no foul.

Wednesday:  6
Sweaty, deerfly run in Noanet Woodlands, Dover, MA.  5 DFKs.  82 degrees already by 6:30am.  Ugh.
Short walk from office (Wellesley, MA) to get lunch; 98 degrees.  Just horrible.

Thursday:  0
Another scorcher.  My energy was just sapped, and lost motivation to run.

Friday:  5
Finally a break from heat and humidity.  7am run in Bradford Preserve.  Was on the field, just about to start my run, when I heard some yahoo yell from his truck going by on the road, "Hey buddy, get to work".  I turned; my brother Greg ribbing me.  Good stuff. Comfortable temps in upper 60s.  XC and 5K Pumpkins course in great shape; minor trimming only needed.  8K connector needs work, but that's short.
Deep in the woods, ran into a questionable character with his car up on blocks and scatter car parts and debris around the car and him.  Really, really weird.  He said, "I know this doesn't look good, but I was out test-driving a car".  Whenever I test drive a car, I usually drive it deep into the woods, and partially take it apart, so I told get that.  Yeah, right.  Like I said, weird.

Saturday:  10
Pawtuckaway State Park, NH.  We're up camping for 2 days as Matthew had his collegiate XC debut today (home 5K at UNH, 15:44, 3rd finisher for UNH!).  Rolled out of bed ... er ... sleeping bag, and hit the trails running.  Started off on a double-track which wasn't exactly what I was looking for.  But careful what you ask for!  Soon was on single-track with plenty of rocks, some mud, and definitely some climbing.  Later found out from Crutch that I was on part of the Vulcan's Fury trail race course.  Legs and lower back were feeling it after this run!

Both the fire tower and boulder field sound like fun, but
they're in different directions.  Chose the fire tower for today;
will come back to play in the boulder field.

Yikes!  Slow down crossing this "bridge".

Fun trails!

The "Devil's Staircase" en route to South Mountain

Firetower at South Mountain peak

Views from the firetower

Sunday:  7
Had hoped to explore more, but with legs still a bit banged up, conservatively dropped the distance just a bit and slowed the pace to more of a recovery.  Tried some new (to me) single-track today.  Plenty challenging and with massive boulders.  I'll be back.

In the afternooon, met up with Matthew and went for my first ever stand-up paddleboard (SUP).  Felt wobbly at times, but a lot of fun, and seemed less effort than kayaking.  (Although I certainly want to do more kayaking.)

Weekly Mileage:  32

Weekly Synopsis:  Mileage right in the "base" bandwidth I'm looking for.  Will be glad when this heat passes for good and we get into true fall weather. 

Weekly Highlight:  Running in Pawtuckaway State Park.  Really fun trails; look forward to coming back.

Weekly Lowlight:  The heat.

Weekly Post 20-Aug to 26-Aug-2018: Empty Nesters

Tuesday we became empty-nesters.  That is, for the first time in 20+ years, we have no children at home.  I'm only a week in thus far as I write this, but I think I set myself up that this would be much worse than it is.  Grief?  No, I have none of that.  Loneliness?  Yeah, a little I suppose.  When I went off to Maine to school decades ago at age 18, we didn't have Internet or cell phones, and it was just a shared wired phone for an entire floor of a hall, and the phone was usually occupied, so keeping in touch in 2018 with both sons on a daily basis is much easier than it was for my parents in 1982.

It is a definite life change, and I need to slowly figure it out.  The house is quiet and too big now, but they'll both be back for holidays and other vacations, and we'll visit NH and FL as well.  My guess is that holidays and family vacations will be even more special to me going forward, just the same as ski trips with Mark and off-season running with Matthew will be.  On with the blog ...

Monday:  6
Local roads.  Last run with Matthew for a while.  :(    Hip did not feel good today.  After 6 miles run at easy pace, Matthew had planned out a few strides (which he did), but my body said I'm done. 

Tuesday:  6
Hampton Beach, NH.  Helped Matthew to move into his dorm, get his ID, and get him to a team XC meeting.  Stayed busy during those processes, and then it was late morning and we were done.  Now what?  I had the day off, and didn't want to go home yet, so we had lunch in Durham, and then went to the beach where I ran a mix of roads and beach.  Pensive run before driving back to an empty nest in RI.

Car fully packed.  In retrospect, I should have put the cargo box on the car.

A little cramped for the ride to NH.

At Matthew's dorm.  Why am I the one pushing Matthew's stuff
uphill?  Is he laughing at me?

Matthew's dorm room until May.

Taking a pic, as we probably won't be allowed in here again
until move-out day.

Dropping him off near Wildcat Stadium, before heading home.

Wednesday:  10
2nd annual Stonington XC 5K.  Got there early to meet up with Tom to mark the course and setup for the event.  It all went well, but it was disappointing to see the participation in this free XC race decrease from 112 finishers in the 5K down to 66, and the majority of the 66 coming from the Westerly High School XC squads.  We knew going into this we likely only had a lot of the runners last year because we held our end-of-summer youth awards ceremony there so we had kind of a captive audience, but probably didn't figure in that it's a busy late summer week for everyone with several other races on the docket as well.

As for the race itself, I ran 20:36 this year as compared to 19:19 last year, and I'm OK with a minute off given my recovery (hoping most of it is injury / lack of running related anyway, although some may be due to a year older).  Last year I was in 6th with my 19:19, and this year in 2nd with my 20:36, but again, that's because a lot of the competition dropped off.  Tommy was way out in front and once he turned off onto the trails, I didn't see him again.  I had gradually passed a few high schoolers, and being the same competition I ran against at Wahaneeta just a few days ago, expected them (especially Colby) but it didn't happen.  Colby finished 15 seconds behind me in 3rd place.  Fun race.

Start of the race.

After a lap plus on the track, leaving the school with a few WHS XC
runners in tow, headed towards the fields.  Colby in orange just behind me.

Running field perimeters before entering the trails.

One lap to go (running outside lanes).

Finishing up (inside lanes).

We made the bibs more interesting this year.
The pond is on the course, as you run around it.

Thursday:  5
Noontime barefoot run at Old Town Beach, followed by a dip in the ocean before headed back to work.

Friday:  5
Schonning 5K.  19:57.  Yikes.  This race was my undoing, and I'm pretty sure I know why.  It's really not that complicated.  This was my 4th race in nine days.  Probably not a good idea ever, but especially not when I'm recovering and my PT has asked me to gradually ease back into it.  I don't want to write up a race report on this one.  I can't report my splits because my watch wasn't working, but looking at Strava splits of people around me, my guess is I ran about 6-flat for Mile 1, and 6:40 - 6:50 for Miles 2 and 3.  Just ugly.

While I don't think it was as horrible as whatever awful face I'm making,
it was a painful finish for sure.

 By the end of Mile 1, I knew I was done.  Breathing out of control and fatigued.  By the end of Mile 2, I was starting to feel pain.  Came across the finish line just barely under 20 minutes, and my hip/nerve were really in pain.  Tommy asked me to join him for a cool-down, but it was a little painful even to walk at that point.  I was embarrassed by my time, but more than that, angry with myself for just being stupid.  I always enjoy supporting community events like this, but I should've taken it easy and just run a 7:30 - 8:00 pace or something.

Saturday:  0 run, 1 mile swim!
Both my body and my ego are still bruised from last night's Schonning 5K fail.  I know I need a day off from running, so I took it.  Slept in and then headed to Watchaug Pond for a swim.  I swam my usual 1/4 mile out to the red buoy, but was feeling really good so I kept going, and picked other objects out to sight and follow.  I try to raise my head and sight my target every 5 strokes, and this works well for me to stay relatively on course and adjust slightly as needed.

When I got back to the beach, my watched showed 0.8 miles, so why stop now?!  Still feeling good, I saw in the other direction to Camp Watchaug and back.  One mile swim!  I know to "real swimmers", one mile is laughable, but I hadn't swam this far since 2015 (Rhode Warrior Half Ironman) and I was really happy and feeling good about it.

The part that was weird was finishing my swim, raising my head and body out of the water and finding people in robes singing in a foreign language.  What is going on?  Fortunately, they were engrossed in their activity, so I didn't seem to infringe upon them.  When I came out of the water, I asked one beach-goer what was going on, and he told me it was a wedding.  Hmmm.  Walking back to my car, one of the celebrants had separated from the pack, so I told him I was curious as to the ceremony.  In heavily accented English, he told me this was a baptism (not a wedding!), and that they come down from Pawtucket twice a year to perform baptismal rites here, as they don't have such a place in Pawtucket.  No, I don't think they would!

This was not the picture, of course,
but it was very much like this with people in the water signing from books,
except wearing robes.

Sunday:  9
Long run at Burlingame with Tommy.  Fortunately the hip/nerve pain from Friday is completely cleared up.  We met up at 6:30am and ran Rhody in reverse, plus tacked on trails to North Camp.  55 degrees!  Fun catch-up, ending with a swim in Watchaug Pond.

Between the fog and zoom, I know this pic isn't clear.
On the way to meet Tom for a run, at the end of my street,
I see this coyote carrying home its prey for breakfast.
It has something with a furry tail in its mouth.  At first I thought
it was a squirrel, but when it turned slightly, I could see the
body was much bigger than a squirrel.
A neighborhood cat?  Small dog?
--------------
Two days later there are signs up in my neighborhood and surrounding
areas that their small dog is missing.  Hope it's just a coincidence.

Weekly mileage totals:  39

Weekly synopsis:  Other than me stupidly overdoing it with racing too much, it was a good week overall.  Trying to follow PT plans of building up a base of 30-40 miles, and then holding there and re-evaluating.  It's working so far.

Weekly highlight:  One mile swim!  Was so happy with this.  I've been loving swimming lately, maybe because it feels so good and always pain-free.  I want to keep it going as cross-training, but once the weather gets colder, don't know if I'll have the discipline to swim in a pool.  I so much prefer open water.

Weekly lowlight:  The empty nester "syndrome".  It's all natural and I'm happy for both boys for their independence and successes, but as with any life change, it will take some adjustments and getting used to.