Miscellaneous ramblings:
- I'm using and enjoying the new "mute" feature on Strava. Yes, we've had the option to mute individual followers for a while now, but now we have the ability to mute our own activities for posting to feeds. I want to record all of my activities and miles, and I want them to count towards my mileage and club leaderboards, but I would prefer not to clog up other users' feeds with my pithy 1-mile walks, short runs, and warm-ups and cool-downs. Problem solved!
- I read a survey of Boston 2021 finishers and was very surprised to read that 90% of respondents preferred the rolling start this year and would like to keep it even post-COVID (as opposed to mass wave starts in the past). I understand it this year of course, but personally I prefer a wave staggered start so I can judge runners around me as to where they stand in the race relative to me. The survey was not scientific as there was no random sample polling, it was just people who responded on Facebook, but surprised still. Different strokes for different folks.
- I was even more surprised to see that this year's Ragnar New England road version (this past weekend) traversed large sections of Route 1 in Charlestown and South Kingstown. Yes, I'll occasionally run on Route 1, but only short sections to get to a specific place. Again, different strokes for different folks, and I appreciate different mindsets, but for me, I would not feel comfortable running with traffic on busy Route 1 with cars going 50-70 mph even in the daylight, never mind the possibility of running at night.
Monday: 0 run, 1 walk
Two days post Run for the Pumpkins 8K. I had originally planned a hard 18-miler yesterday as a training run, but my legs were sore, so I went for an easy paced 11 miler, and figured I'd defer the hard run until today.
Until today, when I woke up to sore legs. Again. It was "only" an 8K, and that was two full days ago. What gives?! I have to listen to my body, and I feel my fitness and speed (don't laugh, I mean relative to me) are in a really good place right now.
So where do we go from here? [Now that all of the children are grown up.] Remember that one-hit wonder from the Alan Parsons Project? But I digress. Tomorrow's plan is a "reduced" 16-miler. If no soreness, I'll hit most of it hard; if soreness, well, I'll just take it easy. Not LSD easy, but still easy.
Tuesday: 6 run, 2 walk
Well, soreness was still here, although milder. Slept in and then worked the Tuesday Land Trust CCC crew (Wahaneeta clean-up today), and rethought the long hard run. What will it really add coming into my half marathon this weekend in terms of fitness? Anything? Certainly less than the risk of injury on sore legs and a tired body. I'm feeling a little sore and run down. I actually slept through the night for the first time in months, so I must've been tired.
Ended up getting in my final snipping at Grills in before the race. Race still 1 1/2 weeks away, but as we'll be away for a mini vacation this coming weekend, and having scratched the long hard run, no time like the present.
Wednesday: 10
First day without soreness in four days. Finally. Was the four days recovery from the race just a blip, or like John Hammett once told me, the older you get, the longer it takes to recover? Anyway, it was time to get out there for a road run, but play it smart, please.
Four days until half-marathon race. Not the time for a hard workout or a long run anymore in my opinion, especially observing this latest recovery. Opted for a ten-mile local loop, aimed at just a little faster than comfortable conversational pace, which I'd consider to be about 6:50 for me. Happy that I ended up running an average 6:34 pace, especially for not really staring at my watch, but again, just targeting a little into my discomfort zone. OK, easy days now until the race on Sunday. Easy.
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| Look what came in the mail today! Sweet! I can't wait to wear this, and it also makes me more excited for the race itself. |
Short and easy with Brady at Ninigret. Squeezed in what I could before early meetings and what I knew would be a long work day trying to get so many tasks done before taking a 5-day mini-vacation. That's a downside of taking vacation from work; I feel like I pay for it on both ends.
Took a few hours off in the afternoon to watch my niece Lucy's middle school XC meet in Portsmouth (and got volunteered by their coach, my brother Kurt, to man the finish chute), and paid for it in the form of working until after 10pm.
Friday: 8
Slept in, and went for a run on Vin Gormley trail with Brady. So nice that no meetings or work expectations today (vacation day). Took our time enjoying the run, and stopping to play in streams. End of the run we jumped off the dock. That water is getting chilly! Good thing I jumped off the dock; might not have made it for a full plunge had I waded in.
In the afternoon, we went to Matthew's XC meeting in New Britain, CT, before heading north to Burlington, Vermont.
Saturday: 5 run, 2 walk
Burlington, Vermont. Ran from our hotel (Hotel Vermont, which by the way was fabulous). Plan was to run a few miles on the start and finish of tomorrow's half marathon course, and get acquainted with the start/finish itself. I started out doing just that, as our hotel is right smack dab on the course (kind of why I picked the hotel in the first place). Fortunately, even on the shortened version (I had originally signed up for the full marathon, until it morphed into a half), the hotel was still on the course, and the hotel still honored the half-price "marathon" deal as the hotel rates at least this weekend were far from shy.
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| View from just outside our hotel, overlooking Lake Champlain, and New York State in the distance. |
Every time we got my car back from the hotel valet, each of them (two different ones) remarked how much they liked driving my car. A wagon? Seriously? Buttering me for a tip? One said mine was the first very modern car he had driven with a manual transmission, and liked how smooth it was. The other said almost verbatim, "We get a lot of quality German vehicles in here [no doubt about that], but yours is my favorite to drive because of the manual transmission". Both valets are decades younger than me, so that was quite an interesting and wholly unsolicited input.
Anyhow, after a mile or so on roads, I saw an inviting sign to try out the City of Burlington's newest park and trails. Now how could I pass that up? Ran the fairly short, but neat, trail, which then dumped me out onto the Burlington Bike Path. OK, good, the bike path is the site of the last couple miles of the half-marathon (in addition to most of miles 4 & 5), so I turned northward to sample some of the finishing stretch. Until I got distracted again! Saw a wide stance of beach along the shore (North Beach) with a teaser of more trails! Here we go!
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| Small, but neat city park. |
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| I initially thought I was wandering into someone's private gardens here, but all part of the new park. |
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| Nice easy trails fit the bill for today's run, before tomorrow's half marathon. |
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| Oh! Let's get down there and play on the beach. |
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| I'm not sure which one of us had more fun! |
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| More trails! What an awesome city! |
I have all the time in the world this morning, so stopped to smell the roses (which in this case, was cliffs along the lake, playing stick and playing ball with an old tennis ball that Brady found). After my second detour, it was time to finish up and head back to the hotel for a shower and breakfast. Thoroughly checked out the race finish area, and then jogged back to the hotel.
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| This dog likes his comfort! We left Brady in the room while Jana and I went downstairs to enjoy breakfast (it's allowed by the hotel - both enjoying breakfast and leaving Brady in the room), and came back to find him here. We don't spoil him at all! |
After breakfast, walked with Jana and Brady to show them the short access from the hotel to the start/finish area for tomorrow's race.
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| High temps only in the upper 40s, but it didn't stop hardy Vermonters (and us) from eating outside on the popular Church Street Marketplace. |
Sunday: 15
Vermont City Half Marathon! Just an awesome race, and I'll leave the details to a separate report coming soon.
Post race, shower, and breakfast, we packed up the car and headed north to redeem our "free" 2-night condo stay. Deferred would be more accurate than free, but in this case the condo owner already lost any ability (and revenue) to re-rent his condo when we were unable to show up in August due to Walgreens taking 4 days to process our COVID PCR test (Canada border authorities require the test to have been administered within 72 hours of border crossing). Quinn, the condo owner, very kindly to gave us a "free" stay if we could make it back up here this year, so only being a 1.5 hour drive from Burlington, why not?!
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| Uh-oh. Did I take a wrong turn and head 1,000 miles south? Seriously, I had never heard of Georgia, Vermont, but that's where the very clean state rest area was en route to Canada. |
While we were stopped at the border for inspection (15 minutes?), we never saw a car passing in either direction. Of course, Canadians are still unable to cross the US border by car for non-essential reasons, but fortunately that changes for them next month. We satisfied all of our border crossing requirements (vaccination cards pre-uploaded, passports, negative PCR tests within 72 hours [only took 1 day thanks to RI DOH], quarantine plan, etc), and then were asked to pull into a separate spot for a vehicle contents inspection. Not sure if the two agents working the border were just bored, or if I drew a random number for more detailed inspection, or maybe I look suspicious? Anyway, we have nothing to hide, so go for it! They (the Canadian customs officers) asked us the three of us to get out of the car during the inspection, and I asked one of the officers if I could cross beyond the closed border gates to take Brady for a short walk, which they were fine with. Jana stayed behind as collateral, and she said they appeared to go through each of our bags, pausing when they opened and held up my half-marathon plaque I won earlier in the day!
Brady was the easiest of the three of us to cross the border! Of course, we brought his required identification (town dog license) and proof of vaccination (rabies vaccination certificate), but they seemed unconcerned.
Continued the short distance to Sutton, got some groceries in town, stopped at a coffee shop, checked in at the condo, and went for a really nice dinner. I don't mean nice as in fancy, but just a quality meal with very nice hosts in an informal setting. The province of Quebec (or maybe all of Canada? not sure) is much more strict on COVID protocols, and that's fine with me. Every restaurant where you dine in (including the coffee shop) requires proof of vaccination and identification. I know some people would consider that to be a police state (think the southern governors of Florida and Texas), but to me it was wonderful and reassuring knowing that every single person in the restaurant was also vaccinated. Of course, most people were showing a digital vaccination passport with a QR code for scanning, while we Americans had to show our handwritten paper versions, but I'll keep it positive here (mostly).
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| Returning to accentuating the positive, our condo for the next few days is cozy but comfortable. |
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| My dinner was awesome: smoked-salmon ravioli, with a variety of chopped local vegetables on top, paired with the waiter's recommendation of a local hard cider on tap. (Canadian healthy portion sizes as well, which is good for me, as I tend to eat whatever portion size I'm served.) |
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| And Jana let me eat a couple of slices of her pizza (so much for sticking to my own portion size!). Wish I could find a local pizzeria in town that served a smoked salmon, caper, and onion pizza! Healthy and delicious! |
Weekly mileage: 46 run, 5 walk
Weekly synopsis: Fantastic week! Sure, the mileage was lower this week, but an occasional "recovery" week is actually smart. So glad I listened to my body and didn't push it when I was feeling run down early in the week. I think that also paid dividends in the form of a very strong race at the tail end of the week. Having a 5-day mini-vacation, starting in the awesome city of Burlington, is just icing on the cake.
Weekly highlight: The Vermont City Half Marathon for sure!
Weekly lowlight: If I were writing this early in the week, I probably would have said my delayed recovery and tiredness post-Run for the Pumpkins Trail Race. But now looking back at week's end, with successfully managing beyond the soreness and a half-marathon result that exceeded my expectations, I happily say: Nothing!
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