Another good week. I’m going to go ahead and give myself another A. It was tough convincing myself to run on the 4th of July, as well as both Saturday and Sunday, being that we were staying in eastern Long Island for a wedding. But, I still managed to knock out the mileage. I am really starting to enjoy running again, which is exactly the feeling that I was working so hard to get back. I still have a long way to go pace-wise and trim wise. But, I’m really glad to be enjoying the process again. Also– Helen, thanks for pointing out the oversight. I will make sure to affix the “nerdy stuff” tag this week

Weekly totals:

Count: 6 Activities
Distance: 39.69 mi
Time: 05:19:36 h:m:s
Elevation Gain: 1,749 ft
Avg Speed: 7.5 mph
Calories: 5,755 C

On tap for this week:

Well, I did much better this week. In fact, I think that I’m going to give myself an A. I did the proscribed workout every day that I was supposed to this week. Even though I wasn’t able  to hit my target pace again, on Saturday, I blame it partially on the miles that I did on the bike, the previous day. And on Sunday, I (accidentally) threw in an extra mile (in the rain). So, in the effort category, I definitely deserve an A this week. I have to say though, mileage-wise, this training program seems a little too easy compared to the one that I did last year. I guess we will see how it does. If my pace doesn’t start dropping in another couple of weeks, I will switch it up. Here are my running totals from the last week-

Count: 6 Activities
Distance: 36.13 mi
Time: 04:48:56 h:m:s
Elevation Gain: 3,158 ft
Avg Speed: 7.5 mph
Calories: 5,217 C

Here are my totals, including biking-

Count: 10 Activities
Distance: 70.39 mi
Time: 07:12:54 h:m:s
Elevation Gain: 4,415 ft
Avg Speed: 9.8 mph
Calories: 8,917 C

Two notable experiences this week: On Saturday, while running in Jersey, I saw a huge dead alligator snapping turtle. It was freaky looking. Now I finally believe Reagan’s story about seeing a gator cross the road on the Sprain Parkway. On Sunday my run was in Central Park, it was overcast and light rain for most of my run, until the last 3 miles, which turned into the craziest thunderstorm, ever. It was raining so hard that I couldn’t even hear my feet sloshing on the ground.

Here is what is on tap for this week–

When Reagan got home on Monday night, she didn’t waste any time showing me all of the video and photos that she shot while she was in Chicago. I have been working with her for the past few months trying to get her comfortable shooting the 5D in Manual. She took it with her on her trip, and didn’t have to call me once to ask me how to adjust the settings. The images came out awesome. I’m super proud of her. As I write this, she is in my office sorting everything out, in lightroom. If that wasn’t enough, check out her video skills! She shot and cut this whole thing herself.

Anyway, enough bragging about the wife. Today was one of those days where I didn’t waste one minute. I woke up at 5:30, Moved the car. Came home and changed into running gear, went for a run. After showering, I packed a messenger bag (with work clothes, camera and bike lock), took the train to Brooklyn. In Brooklyn, I stopped by M. Cuomo’s old apartment and picked up a bike that Mike left for me with his former roomie. From there, I rode across the Williamsburg Bridge, cross town, and down to the FiDi for work. I tried out the new parking area inside of the gated parking garages at my building. It was amazing. No anxiety about the bike getting ripped off, all day long. I was super busy, at the office, which made the day fly by. I know this is getting boring, but I must continue. After work, I rode to a gallery to shoot an opening. Then rode home. I have spent the rest of the evening setting up my new laptop that Reagan and Piper got me for Father’s Day. I’m writing this post from that very computer. The end.

It has been pretty patchy for me, over the last three weeks. But this weekend, I did try to get out and redeem myself, a bit.

I’m really hoping that I can springboard off of this weekend and get back into the saddle. Since I have been such a slacker, I dropped in some extra distance on both Saturday and Sunday. I’m glad to report that even though I was feeling sluggish, overall they were good runs. The only setback I had was running through crazytown. Crazytown is what I like to call a part of the Hudson River path where half of Spanish Harlem congregates to grill and play volleyball on the weekends. Running along the path in that part of the park is like playing frogger, except as a car, not the frog. There was a woman standing next to the path, who looked right at me, and still walked out right in front of me. She was carrying a large bag full of canned food, which smashed my shin open. Thanks, crazy town!

Here is what is on tap for this week–

Remember that shot? Yeah… that was last fall. That was also the last time that I was fit. Training was so easy last year with the Nike+ device, because I would just login every morning and my training program would tell me how far to run and how fast to go. Since I have switched over to the Garmin, I have had a much more difficult time getting motivated to train. It was much easier to stay motivated when I had a little computer program putting another notch in the spreadsheet and telling me “good job” at the end of each run.

Starting yesterday, there are only 18 weeks until the Chicago marathon, and only a handful after that until NYC. If I were to run either of those today, it would probably be the most painful experience ever. Since I have been craving structure so badly, I broke down yesterday and decided to go with a Hal Higdon training program. Reagan has trained with his programs before, and so have several of my friends. So I figure that I will give it a shot. To be completely honest, I don’t need a “training program” as much as I just need a little thing to check the boxes and keep me organized. So Hal, you’re it, buddy!

From now until November 7th, Friday’s will be my only lazy days. Actually, I will probably take a lazy week after the Chicago race, but I’m getting ahead of myself.

To keep myself accountable, I’m going to start posting a Weekly Running Evaluation again (just when you thought this blog couldn’t be anymore boring, hehe). So far, the training has not gone well. I had a very bad run yesterday and today. I am currently as sloppy and ridden with extra body-blah as I have ever been. So, it’s a good thing that I’m starting now. I’m headed out of town later this week, so I might miss a few days. But, I’m sure that they will be replaced with some high-altitude cross training.

This is a bonus paragraph for those who made it all of the way through this post– Tomorrow morning I’m posting the biggest giveaway so far, on JNB. If you are into photography, or know someone who is, you might be interested in this round.

Reagan bought me a Garmin 410 for Christmas. Since I have basically been hibernating when it comes to running, I just barely used it for the first time last week. I love this new gadget. I think that it is exactly what I needed to help me get motivated. I was kind of fed up with the inaccuracy of the Nike Plus and had been threatening to buy a Garmin for a while. So far, I am extremely pleased. One thing that makes my new device so much fun, is the additional types of metrics that it provides (which my sportband did not provide). The GPS marks out my exact route, speed and elevation. My favorite– Elevation. The graph above is the elevation chart from a run across the bridge, then down to Edgewater and back. Don’t you love the symmetry?

Anyway, my first few runs of the year have not been that great (as one could imagine). But I’m really excited to get some conditioning done and really start to enjoy running again, now that the snow and ice have finally receded enough to see some pavement. If you want to check out my public Garmin profile, here is the link.

Like any good contributor to society, I jotted down some resolutions for the new year.  Here we are in the second week of February and I thought it might be a good time to revisit the list and do a bit of evaluation.

1. Get more rest. — This one has been patchy. But for the most part I would say that I’m doing a lot better. I have been able to cut the late nights down to once or twice per week (not counting going out on the weekends).
2. Stop eating just to break up the monotony. — I have been a lot better about this. Even though it has been a tough stretch lately, with work. I have not used buying/consuming food as an excuse to be away from my desk.
3. Stop spreading myself too thin. –I haven’t really made much progress with this.
4. Start running again.  –Finally, yes. I didn’t do the once per week for the rest of January, like I had hoped. But I did get out yesterday, then again this morning. My mileage for the year is still under 10, but hey, it’s gross out there. Check out the photo above from the weekend. There is still snow and ice everywhere.
5. Start shaving. –Shaved, then grew back the beard. I decided that this resolution is one that can wait for warmer weather.

Is it too early to start getting excited?

(photo I posted it because I was archiving last year’s stuff, and I came across it. It has nothing to do with this post, except for the fact that breakdancing is still awesome in 2011)

I have been thinking pretty long and hard about some resolutions for this year. The only ones that were coming quickly to mind were jokes. Like: Resolved, I’m going to get as fat as possible in 2011. That way, if I don’t achieve my goal, I’m stoked, because I won’t be fat. If I do get as fat as possible, I could say that I finally kept my resolution.

Then I started coming up with things like “demonstrate more patience.” How in the world can something like that be quantified, though? I mean, do I keep tally marks from month to month for each time I catch myself groaning about someone’s (possibly my own)  incompetence– then if December has less tally marks than January, I succeeded? What if I encounter more incompetence in January than in December?

Finally, it dawned on me. I have fallen out of some pretty good habits, and into some less than good ones. Reversing those items will be a win-win. Instead of grinding away with the tally marks all year long, I can knock out all of the hard work in just a few months, while I force myself to get back on track. After that I can coast through the rest of the year by just doing maintenance while I reap the benefits. So, down to brass tacks:

1. Get more rest. During the winter it is so easy to just get sucked into all night projects. I mean, it is dark for more than half of the time that I’m awake each day. I have fallen into the habit of burning away the night working on projects that I invent for myself. Then I wake up feeling like crap. After a few days, my productivity starts to wane and I eventually just have to waste half of a weekend catching up on sleep. This is not only totally unproductive, but it also pisses off Reagan.. bad.
2. Stop eating just to break up the monotony. Even when I was burning through 90000000 calories a day by running, I only ate one meal per day. Partly because it was all I had time for. Partly because that was the only time that I was really hungry. In reality, I’m still only hungry once per day. But I have fallen into a stupid habit of eating just for an excuse to get away from my desk. I find myself eating second dinner at times.
3. Stop spreading myself too thin. Sometimes I will overbook myself, because I have a hard time saying no. Sometimes I can pull it off. Most of the time, at least one job ends up suffering. I think that if I slow down enough to devote my whole attention to whatever I’m working on, the results will definitely reflect it.
4. Start running again. Hi, I used to be a runner. Then the temperature dropped and it was dark a lot, so I stopped. Completely. Reagan got me a Garmin 410 for Christmas that is still sitting safely in it’s packaging. Starting this week, I’m going to run at least once per week until I can catch the fever again and dive back in headlong (probably when the temps start getting above 50, again).
5. Start shaving. I just threw that one in because it will be so easy, hahahaha. Sorry Mr. Beardo (and Reagan). It’s the end of the beard as we know it.

And, that is kind of a lot to tackle. But, here we go. Hold me accountable, amigos.

Wow, I don’t really even know where to begin, on this one. As I mentioned last week, I was a bit nervous going into this race, given the large span of down time from illness. So, I set a goal for myself to forget about a target pace, and just soak up all of the positivity of the experience. In a lot of cases it is difficult to measure success in achieving goals that are based on intangible and subjective qualities.  But, such was not the case on Sunday. I can whole heartedly say that the 2010 New York City Marathon was the best race that I have ever run. And my time? Let’s just say that I have done worse. Hehehe

I’m just going list out a couple of things that made it so amazing (and try not to get too wordy [because Reagan says that makes it boring]). The first thing is kind of corny- When it comes to trivial things like sporting events, etc., I like to pretend that luck plays a role. So I was a bit nervous that my bib number started with a 13. But I reconciled things, thinking that since this was my 7th marathon, that the lucky seven would beat out the 13. Well, my friends, it totally did. First, the weather was phenomenal. Sunday was the first break in a 3 day streak of rainy gloomy weather (that incidentally picked up again Monday), it was blue skies and sunshine. Next- Having a cheering section that was 2+million people deep was beyond description. It is pretty hard to have a disparaging thought or feeling, when both sides of the course are lined with people cheering so intensely that if you didn’t know better, you would think you were winning the race. Third reason- having family and friends along the course adds another dimension. It is so great to see those familiar faces when you need that extra little boost. I could go on for days. But, I will spare everyone.

Top Photo– Me between mile 23 and 24 waving to Sarah, Becca and Brittany (Photo by Sarah M.)

Above– Reagan and I about to board the bus at the Staten Island side of the SI Ferry terminal, to get to the staging area near the Verrazano Bridge. (Photo by M. Cuomo). Below– Reagan at mile 23 (Photo by Sarah M.)

Above– Some post race hugs. Below– All smiles on the train returning up town. (Photos by Sarah M.)