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JT, Mistress of Races Like A Girl, posted or twittered three things today that share a theme.
First, she noted that Joan Benoit won the Oklahoma City Memorial Half-Marathon in 1:21:57.
Second, she linked to a Running Times interview of Greg McMillan by Scott Douglas on the issue of training for Masters.
Third, she linked to a typically fine LetsRun “The Week That Was.”
Separately, Robert of Cowboy Hazel twittered with a link about a “Nike coach [who] says that 2 marathons in a month are okay, but one has to be slow,” to which I asked “What’s the point.”
In the LetsRun piece, there’s the following about Kara Goucher’s apparently brief consideration of running London six days after Boston:
Should Kara Goucher Have Run London?
LetsRun.com has few official corporate policies. One rule, however, that may be our 1st formally adopted rule is advice we always give first-time marathoners and even gave to Paula Radcliffe after her first one: “Marathons take a lot of time to recover from.” As a result, we think it’s really risky to try do more than two per year (and we’re glad to see Ryan Hall has officially adopted this as his rule as well – although we actually okayed his decision to run London last year). As a result, some might find be surprised that we were actually fascinated by the talk that Kara Goucher was considering running London just 6 days after her “jog” in Boston. Normally, we’d vilify someone for this idea but once we thought about it, we said, “She should do it.”
It would wreck her body no doubt. However, Goucher isn’t probably going to race for another two years as she wants to have a baby, so who cares if her body is temporarily wrecked running-wise? She has plenty of time to recover for her next race.
That being said, there is the belief that a super-humanesque “I’m gonna totally destroy my body” type effort is something that one never recovers from, so maybe it’s just as well that she didn’t do it. But in this day and age of big-time appearance fees, how cool would it have been if she just showed up at London and raced. We kind of wish she had done it but give her a Thumbs Up for even considering it.
Separately, Ryan Hall, the gentleman to the left with “HALL” on his bib, twittered after Boston, “Another early morning. Flying to LA for photo shoot. A day of pretendind to be an athlete. My legs are trashed! No running for 2 weeks.“
I was taught the one-day-a-mile rule, i.e., you don’t run hard after a marathon until 26.21875 days after. In 2006, I ran a 5K 28 days after, but passed on a five-miler (I swore I’d go easy but knew I wouldn’t) two weeks out.
In the McMillan interview, he distinguishes among folks who start running when they are masters, those who ran when young and kind of fell out of it until they started up again when they were masters, and elites who continued to compete into mastersdom. (As the BroJos say on LetsRun, “45-year-old Colleen De Reuck ended up leading at several points in the Boston race. She ended up in a well-deserved 8th. 8th in Boston at the age of 45. That is insane.”)
Finally, the Benoit HM time. Her 1:21:27 is unimpressive. In the OT marathon, she ran 2:49:08, a US 50+ record. But she has a PR of 2:21:21, well faster than mine. Yet my 50+ time is, albeit less than a minute, faster. She also ran 17 very competitive marathons before she was 40 and has an HM PR of 1:08:34, over a minute faster than mine; but I have an HM some 3 minutes faster as a 51 year old.
I love Joannie, and her two performances in 1984 — the Olympic Trials and the Olympics — are the stuff of legend. At her peak she raced one or two marathons a year. Which brings us to Cal Ripken. Years ago, the Wall Street Journal did an article that wondered whether Ripken’s consecutive game streak hurt his career. By comparing him to other players at the start and end of their careers, it was pretty clear that the streak did hurt him. He was an outstanding player, but he would have been better, assuming he developed at the same rate as his comparables, if he had taken days off now and then.
What does this mean? A marathon is hard. It takes a lot out of you. I use Joannie because she is about my age and I can compare the numbers. She didn’t run that many marathons, but she still slowed more than I have.
It seems to me that to perform well in the short term, one needs a long build-up to and recovery after a marathon, so that the notion of multiple marathons close to one another, while perhaps having value in one’s completion tally, is contrary to performing well in those. And among the runners I know, none does more than two a year.
In the long-run, moreover, it seems that lots of marathons take their toll.
A caveat. I should note that the women’s 50+ world best in the marathon is 2:31:05, by Tatyana Pozdniakova. (Joannie is number 4 on the list.) But Pozdniakova’s (and the age-group’s) second and third fastest times were set one month apart. The male record in 2:19:29, by South African Titus Mamabolo.)
Separately, JT noted that the More Marathon was canceled because of the warm weather. She ran that race last year, but it is not her target race in 2009. But, she writes,
I didn’t make the More 2009 Marathon my goal marathon for this year. What a colossal disappointment that would have been. The fact that we can have a severe heat wave in late April convinces me that I need to select and register for a backup race every season.
Not bad advice. Chicago in 2007, New York in 1984 (when I DNFed because of the heat and planned to run Baltimore six weeks later but got injured in the interim), Boston in 1976.
And here’s Joannie in 2008:
Until last night, I planned on running the Rye Derby today. The temperature for today was expected to reach 88, although it actually got to 91. I was still OK with it, until I read of someone dying at the Nashville Half-Marathon. Were the race in the morning, I probably would have tried it, but a 1:45 start meant discretion was the better part of valor. (The More Marathon in CP was canceled and the More Half-Marathon was turned into a fun run.)
So I planned on an easy longish run, to be followed by watching the London Marathon. In the event, however, I awoke at about 4:30 and rather than going back to sleep elected to watch the race on-line. I’ll just note that the race was not as exciting as in the last couple of years, especially with Ryan Hall’s absence, and link to the Science of Sport’s review.
So at about 7:30 I headed out. Temp was just under 80, and I headed up the BRP path I referred to yesterday. This was the first warm day of the year, and I take some acclimating. So I went out very slowly. I started to feel very good and flowing, almost effortless. But I still kept it slow, or so I thought. My Garmin had me at 7:10 pace or a bit faster. Turn around at 45 minutes at Scarsdale Station, where the Path ends, 6.25 miles.
I started to pick it up a bit heading home, and this was my mistake. Although the stride was there, I was getting warm and struggling. I hadn’t stopped for water (or for anything for that matter) and I was anxious to get home. So I struggled, not with my form but with being spent. I stopped with just over a mile to go and walked and jogged home. The jogging was a bit of a problem because my shorts had given me something of a rash. Ouch.
NY Marathon? I am at the cusp of having to decide whether to enter NY. Back on December 1 I wrote my thoughts. May 1 is decision date. I realize I can enter and withdraw, but I need to start thinking seriously on the subject. Do I run? Today’s run actually leans me towards it since it was extremely flowing and relaxed, although not as intense as Friday’s 7.75 mile barnburner. And I was energized by this LetsRun thread in which the consensus is that more miles are what are needed, a sentiment with which I agree.
We’ll see.
As an aside, I have long been a fan of the NYC Marathon and have vouched for how well it is run. But while watching London and seeing how narrow the streets were, I twittered (yes, there were others doing the same) that it could get awfully tight, and someone noted the same thing about NY. I realized that my view of NY is colored by my being able to run clear of any traffic after about 100 meters. Not so for the people behind. So I twittered back that unless you’re going relatively quickly, I don’t see NY as being a place to get a decent time, simply because of the crowds in the race. Same is liklely true for all big-city marathons. So I understand why people do them for the experience.
Twin Lakes Photos. I posted Rockies photos yesterday. Today I stopped down at my favorite trail, Twin Lakes/Nature Study. This is a County trail on which I started running back in 1971. It’s about 1.25 miles from my house so I often run to it, and I’ve done long runs, including a 20-miler there. Here are some photos of the Twin Lakes portion. It’s a popular bridle path (there are two stables nearby), but the horsemen are polite and appreciate runners being respectful of them. It’s also a popular Iona College running site.
South of Lake, Heading East
The Hutchinson River Parkway is to the right.
Twin Lakes, East Side, Heading North
The Lake:
One of the Twin Lakes
And heading west, with the Lake to the right. This is just north of the photo that I use at the top of my page.
Twin Lakes, South of Lake, Heading West
The Rockies issue is still in flux, but I was out and about with my camera and near the Rockies on Saturday, April 25 and I took some photos, from around a bridge on Sleepy Hollow Road. I was there at about 1pm, and it was very warm, so there were few runners; I’m sure there were quite a few hours before:
Sleepy Hollow Road divides the Park in two, and there are two crossings. Here’s the southern-most one (referred to in a prior post), looking west:
Sleepy Hollow Road Bridge
And here’s what it looks like heading east:
Sleepy Hollow Road Bridge, looking east
And when you come through the bridge and turn left, you have this long, brutal hill; it takes you up to a farm.
Hill, East of Sleepy Hollow Road
On the west side of the bridge, you have a number of options. If you go left here, it’s up. Go right and it’s relatively flat heading north.
West of Sleepy Hollow Road
And here’s what the path looks like from atop the bridge itself, looking southeast:
From Sleepy Hollow Bridge, looking southwest
Because I plan on racing tomorrow, today was an easy run, so I figured I’d take my camera along. This was my standard six-mile run, in which I hit the Bronx River path at about 2, after going through Bronxville:
The Start: Outside My House
Pondfield and Locust
Into the center of Bronxville:
Bronxville
Then under the train tracks:
Metro-North
Lawrence Hospital
Then to the beginning of the path:
The Path
And the path, between the Parkway and the River.
More of the Path, in Yonkers
Turn-around. The path keeps going for quite a while. JT lives near and starts many runs here.
Scarsdale Road
The Bronx River
And here’s an accidental shot of me:
Me
I know from experience that when you stop late in a marathon, people go nuts when you start up again. Here’s a video from Boston. I can imagine him being perfectly clear in his head but with his legs simply not cooperating and calmly, internally summoning up the energy to start up. It’s not one of those zig-zagging/about to collapse things.
The runner is Kevin Alessandro, a 29 year-old from Louisville, who went out in 1:16:23 and came home in 1:36:21, for a 2:52:44.
There’s a thread on LetsRun, and he responded, saying,
Dear god this video is getting around. The funny thing is that running a 1:16 isnt a problem and wasnt the issue at Boston. I actually planned on going out in 1:15, but altered the plan b/c of the wind.
My problems resulted because of hydration. The wind made it feel like I wasnt as dehydrated as I obviously was, so.. Lesson learned.
Also on Boston, here’s a nice video (from mile 23) that shows what it’s like waiting for the lead runner in a major U.S. Marathon. It’s like this in New York, with the motorcycles clearing the road. It’s unlike Rotterdam which had all of these motorbikes zipping in and out with people yelling at the runners, like in a cycling event.
Merga looks good and he looks fast:
Edited to add: JT flagged this Boston race-report. Talk about cutting it close.
One benefit of Facebook, and Twitter, is that someone may say something in passing that contains useful information. Tom O’Brien of Sound Shore — Tom was the glue that held my two Reach-the-Beach teams together, a guy who could work with the psychos like me and a few others as well as with the more reasonable, measured folks (and, yes, he’s in sales) — did that when he mentioned that the Rye Derby is this Sunday.
Rye Derby, 2008: I'm Wearing a Yellow Cap
(Photo from Rye Record, by JoAnn Cancro)
Normally, I have a real focus on that race because it comes right when I start getting into shape and it’s a useful race to shoot for. It’s the top race in Westchester, although not as impressive as in years past, with a number of Africans coming in to take the first spots. The course is relatively flat with a slight, longish hill at mile 4 as one leaves Playland Parkway, and the race starts at 1:45.
I’ve run it twice. A couple of years back it was the day after my law school 25th reunion and I had a bit more to drink at that event than usual. Had the race been in the morning, I couldn’t have done it, but I somehow made it through, although it was probably the worst race I’ve run in the last few years. But it was fun.
Last year, I ran it pretty well — 28:43 for 12th. So now I’m leaning towards giving it a shot. The northern-County based Taconic Road Runners, which has the best web address I know — runner.org — as well as some of the areas top 50+ runners put it on.
My training this past week has been spotty. I still have a number of aches and pains, in my right quad and left Achilles tendon, but they don’t bother me when I run. I took the past two days off and went out for 6 this morning. On Sunday, I was at the Rockies, but the hills did me in and I only got in 12 (and that with a stop on a hill towards the end), and Monday was a very nice 5 miles on the track in the rain in which I kept picking up the pace and did the final mile in about 5:50 with smoothness I wish I could bottle.
I haven’t done any speed-specific stuff for a couple of weeks as I’ve tried to baby my leg and really want to get in a good hill workout. But these annoyances are sapping a bit of my enthusiasm; running the race might help get me out of it.
So if I race, I’ll miss a long run this week-end and will have to try to get it in the following week-end, in Paris.
After my recent post on changes (possibly) afoot at the Rockies, a flurry of emails in addition to the comments posted ensued. To summarize, I got wind of the possibility that a portion of the Rockies would be off-limits to runners on parts of the week-end and I said I didn’t understand the need for it. In the storm that gathered afterwards, I heard from a number of people who counseled patience to see what the ultimate proposal would entail. I heard from others who are concerned that the restrictions are targeted at runners and only at runners and that it is part of a broader attempt to limit and potentially eliminate running for all or significant parts of the Park, notwithstanding that runners are a major constituency and a major the Park is what it is today.
I happened to be up there yesterday and spoke to a friend at the Sleepy Hollow HS parking lot, who said, in essence, “it’s their park, so we have to be careful about how we deal with them.” Separately, someone said that there’s been an effort to bring the various constituencies of the Park — runners, walkers, horsemen — together for an event in late June, at which a shared appreciation for our various perspectives might be furthered.
I find it heartening to see the degree to which those who are involved are committed to the Park.
One of my points was that I see no reason why those perspectives need be in conflict, as long as each group doesn’t think it’s the only one up there. (Hence the St. Peter reference.)
Which brings me to the photo on the right. It is from September 30, 1938, and British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain is waving a document signed by Hitler and Mussolini ceding part of Czechoslovakia to Germany, assuring, Chamberlain said when he returned to Britain, “peace for our time.”
To the sentiment that conceding anything to the Rockies is appeasement and that the Park administration will, I guess, end up invading Poland is overwrought. There’s no line in the trail to be drawn. I don’t agree that “it’s their Park,” since it’s ours, so I don’t think we should accept whatever dictates are instituted and ask for another. But I doubt that that’s the agenda. Why even negotiate Swan Lake closure times if “they” want to keep runners off? Why allow new races, a 5K last fall, a 10K this summer?
No, I don’t see it as appeasement. I would like to know, however, what are the complaints being lodged? Is it large bands of HSers (although a limit on week-ends wouldn’t seem to have much of an impact on them)? Must access to the water and bathrooms be cut-off (although I hear there may be an alternative spot nearby)? I’m late to this game, and only speak for myself, so it may be that this has been discussed. I just don’t know.
Oh, and the Edward G. Robinson reference:
No, it’s not the end of the Rockies.
Peter was showing a new arrival around, the gym’s over there, the dining hall here, etc. when they turned a corner and came upon a tremendous wall, extending left and right as far as the eye could see. Startled, the newcomer turned to Peter and asked what it was. “Oh, that’s for the Catholics. They think they’re the only ones up here.”
This joke was told to me in sixth or seventh grade by a nun. I recalled it during today’s run — a relaxed eight-miler along the BRP — as I thought of a recent group of emails I received and a conversation that I had concerning the Rockies, that cathedral of New York-area running. Last year, signs went up around Swan Lake saying that runners’ access to that area was limited to no more than two. This is a difficult rule because your normal group consists of four or five and I confess to having violated it with some Warren Streeters. It was put in place, I was advised by someone at the Rockies, to address hordes of high schoolers that descend around the lake and disrupt other Park users.
Fair enough, if too limiting. I was contacted the other day by Tony, an ultramarathoner who clued me in about the two-person limit — for posting on my WestchesterTrails site — who said something was afoot regarding further rules and regulations.
After some email exchanges with someone actively involved from the “running community” side and a telephone conversation with someone else from that community, I came away with the following.
There is an interest in barring running around Swan Lake and running to the Visitors’ Center at certain times during week-ends. My sources suggest it will be between 11 and 5 during the summer and fall. An alternative, apparently hellish route to the Visitors’ Center is being made. This is important because the Visitors’ Center is the sole source of water, and bathrooms, in the Park. (I say “hellish” because it involves going up an additional hill once one gets to the top of the hill from Bedford Hills Road, which is a hellish hill in itself. As a practical matter, there is no way this affords meaningful running access to the Visitors’ Center. Anyone who’s run up that hill will understand.)
What’s the point of mentioning St. Peter? In all my time at the Rockies, the only problems I have had have been shouting at clueless WTC people blocking the trail and calling to walkers spread across the path that I was “On your left.” Actually that “calling to” should be “shouting at.” And it happens to the oblivious. Not just at the Rockies, of course. People blocking the sidewalk or the path, and I shout so I don’t have to slow down. And if they move with one shout, I’ll say “thank you” as I pass. If I have to do it twice, no “thank you” from me. That shout can sound rude, but it has its purpose.
Thus when I shout at people walking completely across a Rockies path, I’m sure I’m labeled “rude” and “inconsiderate” by those I pass. And apparently walkers have been complaining to the Rockies administration about being unable to enjoy the peace of the Park and the administration believes something needs to be done to address these complaint and that something is restricting access.
I don’t know what the basis for the complaints are. I just speculate that if I were in a group walking completely across the path and someone shouted at me to move over, or worse, I’d be put up upon. And if I were the type I just might call the Park and complain of an unruly old guy who was rude as he raced past.
Putting aside large groups of runners, which can be handled in any number of less-restrictive ways (and thoughts to address that are apparently being batted around), I don’t understand why the recognition that there are multiple users of this park — and the same can be said of any other park, especially Central, or trail or sidewalk on which we run or walk or ride — isn’t good enough.
Restrictions on the use of Swan Lake and the Visitors’ Center are important for two reasons.
First, except for trails at the far south of the Park, one must go through Swan Lake to get from the eastern to the western side of the Rockies.
Second, water. The sole source is the Visitors’ Center, as is the sole bathroom.
Non-runners may say, “why can’t you just walk?” They say that because they’re non-runners. Like the guy who told me as I was doing intervals on a track that I should “take it easy.”
As a practical matter, I don’t particularly care about these restrictions since I would rarely, if ever, be in the Park at those peak times. The same is not the case for ultras, running (I don’t know how) for many hours.
I just don’t understand the need. Runners shouldn’t be rude. Walkers, or runners, shouldn’t be blocking the path and letting their dogs walk off-leash. (Apparently a 10-foot leash is allowed, but that seems too long for me; I believe 6 feet is the rule in NYC.) Horses? I give them a wide berth, and so should everyone else.
I’ve been running on trails in Westchester for nearly forty years. I’ve had few problems, even on single track trails far narrower than those at the Rockies.
LetsRun did its analysis of/prediction for Boston. In reference to Bill Rodgers, it has something worth setting out separately.
A topic of discussion around LRC’s central offices this morning was about how people (well, at least people we know, including ourselves) limit themselves. With the emergence of Kenyans and Ethiopians on the running scene, it’s very easy to see the dropoff in American and European performances in distance running. Africans win the distance races. They run fast. They break the world records and run amazing times. They DOMINATE. But look at Cheruiyot. Is he THAT much better than little old Bill Rodgers? Yeah, he’s better, but if we take Rodgers and make him born in 1978, he’s almost as good as Cheruiyot if you go by the numbers.
We think, and this is one of the main reasons we do this site in the first place, that more people need to unfetter themselves from limits, need to dream big! Take away some of the science and history and expectation and just try to run like the best runners in the world. It’s certainly easier to grow up Ethiopian and see your countrymen beating everyone in the world and thinking: “I can do that,” than it is to be American and have very few real winners and champions to look up to. We think that’s one reason Ryan Hall does what he does, because he just runs with such unbridled joy and doesn’t worry too much about what his limits are (this is the same Ryan Hall who could not, for the life of him, break 4:00 for the mile while at Stanford; who would have predicted his marathon and half marathon success?).
This year could be a great year to make a new hero and inspire Americans to new heights (or old heights, like the heights Rodgers reached in the ’70s). While Boston Billy hopefully will complete Boston again, hopefully an hour ahead of him will be Ryan Hall putting the finishing touches on an amazing (even if he doesn’t win) Boston Marathon performance that millions will be able to see. Even if he doesn’t end up beating Cheruiyot, we’re pretty confident Hall will make a race of it, and just that should be enough to show American athletes that they too can run with the best in the world at the ultimate distance.
With Boston just around the corner, there is some great stuff out there.
JT clued me into the Science of Sport blog. It has great articles on Boston (read the comments too):
- The men’s race.
- The ladies.
(They recently made a reference to the Ashenden interview about which I wrote. They will comment on it after marathon season.)
Here’s the LetsRun preview of the women’s race. And now the men, from LetsRun.
Kenny Moore’s great “Best Efforts” is a compilation of Sports Illustrated articles, some of which I remember from the 70s. A must read, newly available.
For anyone interested, my photos from the Scottish race are out.
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