April 30. Humbled

Running day off today.  I kinda needed this.  Got home today, put the baby girl in my lap, sat in the recliner and fell asleep.  At 6:30.  For the month of April I ran 87.16 miles.  I can say with pretty much 100% confidence that this total FAR eclipses any monthly total of my entire life, counting high school.  

My wife however has really put me in my place.  The woman just went out and ran 6 miles in one hour.  I havent touched that.  I'm desperately trying to convince her that she NEEDS to be in this thing.  She has a talent that I'll never have.  

One observation...I'm really hungry.  Like REALLY hungry.  I read that this will happen.  But srsly, I'm hungry.  I also need about 2200 more bucks for the Think Pink team

April 29. Crossdressing

No goal today other than to just get in a 30 minute run to wind down from the long run yesterday. A few observations from today are that my clothes are too big. My draws were falling off inside my shorts and then my shorts started falling off. Add that to the fact that the sweat was making my t shirt fall down to make it look like I was wearing one of those moo moo's from Mama's family. On top of the wardrobe malfunctions, my ankles are starting to chafe and I am in desperate need of some gold bond. Other than that, it was a beautiful Sunday afternoon!!!
Weather: Warm and clear
Time: 6:30pm Pre Run Meal: Garlic bread, Lasagna, Salad Clothes: shorts. Shoes. 2 T-shirts. Hat
Course: Elkin Downtown
Run Time: 37:29
Stopped Time: 0:00
Distance: 3.57 miles
Average: 10:30 /mile
Fastest Pace: 9:26 /mile Ascent: 108 feet Descent: 102 feet Calories: 554

April 28. Tremendous

Today was my 3rd "long run" of the pre training. I'm having a hard time sleeping the night before these longer runs so I decided to get to bed a touch earlier than I normally do on Friday nights. We went out for some dinner on Friday and I had something called Egyptian bread which is completely sinful. On top of that I put down a vegetarian spaghetti to do the whole carb loading thing. Gameday--I got up "early" and went to my usual spot at the Elkin park to stretch and such. It was chilly and I found myself a touch tight. I did however make a quick pit stop at the Shell to grab two gatorades. Oddly enough I had never tried to drink gatorade pre run before. I had set my sights on 7 miles through the vast metropolis of Elkin city today. There were already several other runners out at the park when I had arrived. To be honest, while I no way/shape/form consider myself a runner it was still good to see others trying to better their health. Its almost like we are all part of the same fraternity or something. Everyone was nice and smiling as I ran by. I had no idea the path I was going to take today, all I know is that I needed to get in 7 miles. As I prayed for strength this morning, I also asked God to put some wings on my feet becuase I knew that today was going to be a challenge. From that point forward, I felt AMAZING. I hardly even broke a sweat and my breathing was incredible. I didnt even reach for my asthma inhaler once! I consider that a major accomplishment. I tried to focus on running up some pretty gruesome hills today and even those heels (woops) couldnt slow me down. 8.25 miles and 1.25 hours later, I completed my "7" mile long run for the week. This is what its all about right here!!!!
Weather: Chilly and overcast
Time: 7:30am
Pre Run Meal: Toast w/ natural peanut butter w/ honey drizzle
Clothes: shorts. Shoes. T-shirt. Hat
Course: Elkin Downtown-Jonesville Cherry-FBC Jonesville
Distance: 8.22 miles Time: 1:25:06 10:20/mile

April 27. My wife makes me sick

Jana disgusts me. Thoroughly disgusts me. She goes out for a solid 4 mile stretch, comes home and looks like she just got back from the beauty parlor. I go out and run THREE miles and come home looking like I've been in a 3 hour bar fight, gasping for air, begging for oxygen and willing to drink water straight out of a septic tank. Up hers. That said, today was my last 3 miler before my long run tomorrow. Not a lot of food was to be had today, for I worked from home. Have mercy I felt amazing. Almost all of my ankle pain is gone and my calf also seems to be healing. One of the things I'm enjoying most about this running stuff is the scenery. For example, today right before I ran by a broken sewage line, I got to see two crack heads run from the police, only to be caught right in the middle of downtown! Tomorrow is the big 7 miler. We'll see how that goes.

Weather: Clear and Mild
Time: 6:300pm
Pre Run Meal: Some pringle type potato chips Clothes: shorts. Shoes. T-shirt. Hat
Course: Elkin Downtown
Distance: 3.10 miles Time: 30:25 9:49/mile

April 26. Onion Funk

2nd 4 miler of the week. Holy cow I felt GREAT going into this one. Slight pain in the left ankle and even slighter pain in the left calf but that was gone about 300 yards into this run. Downtown was a little busy today...had to stop a few times for traffic. BEAUTIFUL day, perfect running weather. I THOUGHT I had a solid pace the whole time. Breathing was excellent and and I didnt feel tired at all the whole time, but somehow I only beat tuesday by about 2 minutes. I'm not sure whats worse, feeling great and getting a poor time or feeling like poo and getting a poor time. This is an Enigma, and not the mid 90's techno group. the other kind. The kind that doesnt make me want to make out with people as they pass by me on the street. One more 4 miler and then the big 7 miler on Sunday. Back to the onions. I'm not sure they are a good idea to eat for a pre run. I didnt really feel bad, but I smelled pretty awful and had some decent heart burn. Was it the onions or the Jalapeños? or the Hot Sauce? Or the Chipolte Southwest Sauce? My eating habits suck.

Weather: Clear and Mild
Time: 7:00pm Pre Run Meal: Subway 12" Veggie sub w/ ONIONS, Jalapeños, Black Olives, Hot Sauce, Chipolte Southwest, Lettuce, Pickles, Banana Peppers
Clothes: shorts. Shoes. T-shirt. Hat
Course: Elkin Downtown
Distance: 4.075 miles Time: 43:02 10.34/mile

April 25. Running at Night is different

My daughter had dance pictures tonight that lasted until dang near 10:00pm. My wife was with her while I had my baby daughter at home. I didn't get to hit the track until 10:00. PM. Thats fine, I like to do the extreme or whatnot, however for the entire run I felt like I was in the middle of the newest version of "I know what you did last summer." Not sure if you knew this or not, but there are lots of shadows at night that follow you while you run. Also, the lights go OUT as you run by them. Why? Why does that need to happen. FWIW I'm still miffed about my poor run from yesterday. I need to set a better pace. I do feel MUCH better than the day before. 
Weather: Misty and chilly
Time: 10:00pm
Pre Run Meal: Subway 12" Chicken/Roast Beef w/ the regular stuff
Clothes: 2 pair of shorts. Shoes. Tshirt. Hat
Course: Elkin track Distance: 3.05 miles Time: 30:26 9.59/mile
I was not really out to set any track records tonight, but I did want to keep up a decent pace for the entire run. I'll take it.

April 24 Run. Pure Fail

Its cold. Its raining. I'm coming out of a day off from my 6 mile jaunt on April 22. Goal is 4 miles. NOT feeling it today. At all. Left ankle hurts. Cant breath (thanks pollen). Right ankle hurts. Stress from work. 

Weather: Cold. Misty
Time: 6:30 PM
Pre Run Meal: Piece of flat bread w/ All Natural Peanut Butter and a drizzle of Honey.
Clothes: Long pants. Shoes. Tshirt. Hat
Course: Elkin downtown
Distance: 4.07 miles Time: 44:31 10.56/mile This is over 2 minutes worse than my last 4 mile run on the same course. Gotta do better tomorrow.

And so it begins

And so it begins. Little did I know it, but I have been training to run the New York Marathon this November since December 16, 2011. It was on that date that I "ran" a PATHETIC 5K with my wife and daughter. I "finished" that 3.2 miles in just under 47 minutes. Thats right, 47 minutes. At that point I was right around 220 lbs. Pretty much the heaviest I have ever been in my life. It was that day that I decided/realized that something had to change or my beautiful daughters would be forever ashamed of their fat dad who was too tired and lazy to get off the couch and away from the delicious bag of doritos.  I also wanted to restructure my greek god'esq psychique that my adoring wife so loves and craves.   I began researching some apps on the interwebs to help me with my weight loss attempt and came across a nifty little doodad called "LoseIt." I plugged in a modest goal of 188 lbs and hoped to achieve that by sometime in June of 2012. I've never really been one to halfarse anything and this little project was no exception. Not only did I lose the weight, but I lost in about 2 months ahead of schedule thanks to cutting back on my daily caloric intake by around 2000 calories (thats right, I was busting out dang near 4k calories per day. Srsly). I also thought it to be a good idea to start moving around a little so I began running. Fast forward to April 17, 2012. By this time i've lost dang near 30lbs and I'm running pretty much every day. Not only am I running every day, but I'm talking about running every day to everyone who will listen. On April 17, my dear mother went into the hospital for a routine'ish procedure to remove a spot from her lung. She's doing just fine today. I'm sitting in the waiting room working when I get an email from one of my more persuasive friends, Bryan "Doubles" Timmons. Timmons says that I need to jump on this New York Marathon application. I laugh out loud (LOL) and say ok, sure man. SO I did, figuring that there was NO WAY IN HELLO that I would EVER make the "cut" or get any further than the $11.00 application fee. The instant I clicked submit on that application one of those preverbal "fires" began burning inside my soul. This was something that had to happen. 26.2 miles. A lifelong asthmatic. Fat and lazy for the past 12 years. 26.2 miles. A 47 minute 5k. 26.2 miles. Twenty Six point frikin 2 miles. Failure is NOT an option. To lock myself into this commitment, I have put myself on the hook for a $2500 donation to the Think Pink Rocks team for the guaranteed entry. I'm in. NO looking back now.