It’s not too late to feel a little more alive

Less than two weeks to go, I can start to bring down the volume and get my body ready for 42.2km on April 13th.

The past week was a pretty typical week: 200km, 2 specific sessions, one stride session and one long run (30km).

On Thursday we did 5 x mile on a road loop. I went into this workout conservatively because the last time I did a similar session it was awful. That particular poor session was about 10 days before the NYC half marathon down in Auburn. There were a couple reasons why it was a pitiful workout. It was windy, but mainly, I was tired. I already wrote in a previous blog about being tired going into this session but I left out the awful travel experience with VIA rail hoping they would reimburse me once I wrote to them. No such luck.

My trip to Auburn, Alabama started with a trip to Detroit. It was my Dad’s 60th birthday (my parents live outside of Detroit) and I was able to book a Detroit to Atlanta flight and then Atlanta to NYC flight for $5 using Delta points. My flight after NYC was back to Toronto so I decided to book a train down to Windsor for comfortable travel and I wouldn’t need to leave my car stranded.

Friday Feb 28th was a nice sunny day but for some reason VIA rail cancelled the train and put us on a bus (it sucked, but fair enough). The bus departed 2 hours after we were scheduled to leave. The bus stopped at all the train stations so it was a long bus ride. In London they put everyone who was continuing their journey in taxis. The taxi they asked me to ride in was already occupied by three other passengers. Two large people in the back with their coats and carry-on bags left with me a few inches between them for a 2 hour taxi ride. I told the VIA rail employee I didn’t want to cram in there so I decided to wait for the next train. Well the next train wasn’t coming for five hours, I would completely miss my Dad’s birthday if I waited. So I jumped in a taxi and paid $250 figuring VIA might reimburse me since they were paying for taxis anyways, not the case. They replied that cramming into a taxi was or waiting for a train were my options. Had I waited for the train my trip would have taken 11.5 hours, it’s a 3 hour drive!

In the end a 3 hour drive took me 7.5 hours and cost me an extra $325 because by the time I arrived in Windsor I no longer had a ride and hired another taxi. (The first taxi driver didn’t have his passport).

The next morning I took out my frustrations on a 35km run and then flew to Atlanta en route to Alabama. A few days later I had a 75 minute tempo run. Needless to say I was tired a few days later for the track session.

Back to last thursday’s mile session… I purposely started slow (4:37) and then averaged 4:29 for the last four. Perhaps I could have pushed harder but more than anything I wanted to keep progressing faster and knew I shouldn’t take risks.

Today the temperatures finally cracked 10C, and yes, I shaved after the workout.  It felt good running without extra layers and seemed much easier run fast. 25 minutes at 3:04/km and then 15 minutes at 3:00/km and 10 minutes at 3:00/km. I just have to keep this momentum going into London Marathon.

A cool little piece on the 1976 Olympic Marathon.

A cool pic of us running though Central Park.