The Death March: Or The infamous 20 miler.

For those of you who already read Angry's Post we did a 20 mile run along the relatively flat Farmington River Canal in Cheshire, For those of you that don't , well the cat's out of the bag now. Yes we did 20 miles of "joy"if you're idea of joy is running the last 4 miles feeling like your hip joint is about to break in two, and you've got a nail hole in your foot that feels like it getting larger with each step...alright it wasn't that bad, but I did feel considerably tight afterward and the Turkey Day foot injury was making its presence known as it slowly heals and re calluses. Here's the break down:

Pre Run: Call Angry Tell him I'm running late. Buy Parents scripts, A Hershey Bar and 32 oz Gatorade, drop scripts at home drive out to Cheshire. Consume Hershey bar and about 20 oz of said beverage en route. Call Angry ask him where the Hell he is. Look across parking lot see the Under Armor Clad Warrior on Cell phone.

First 5k.
Take off from park to the end of the Cheshire trail about 1.6 miles away then run back to the park to continue.Start out running at comfortable pace Angry's holding up. Talk Random Nonsense, How the Office was on of Comedy's greatest gift to man kind. Firing up the overworked and under appreciated proletarians of the financial world, how I do not want to remain a low level corporate under ling for the rest of my life, scoping out the young chicks in tight yoga pants. Angry pulls a nutrition tip from Jodi ( Reese's pieces.) Crank out first 5k in just over 26 min. Kinda slow for me but hey We've got 18 more miles to go.

The first split.
Start to Pull ahead of Angry. He goes down the Left fork of the trail toward this rebuilt canal lock thingy. I go down the right with a nice view of some dude's back yard. Cute 20 something year old college student on a pimped out road bike rides past. Smiles......look back and oh good lord she was cute. Meet up with Angry when the trail re-merges, run at same pace tell him about HCC (Hot Cycle Chick). Keep running talk random nonsense ( Something about a Free Tibet jersey or the Dali Lama is my Homeboy Sweatband at IM China.). HCC rides past Angry Sprints I try to sprint. Catch up. Enter the zone, suddenly I'm 400 meters ahead. At stop turn around and double back....leave no man behind. Head down trail in to Hamden several breaks. Finally hit the long ass stretch. Now I don't know why but somehow I'm able to retreat into my head and think of totally random songs and crap, to keep myself from getting bored out of my mind. ( like one of my post about one of my 12 milers stated, on a long run my mind is a scary place.) Unfortunately or maybe fortunately this a skill Angry has confessed he has not learned yet....yet being the key word. maybe its the fact I'm one of five kids and I'm used to heading into my own little world when shit stresses me out or becomes monotonous as all hell. Maybe it is the optimistic hope of a tortured person that the pain and torture they are feeling will somehow end. I don't know and I don't care because when I'm in Bobby's World it makes the long run a little more barable. We reached the turn around in Hamden I doubled back the 400 meters to angry and we began the run back. As we started at the same pace he commented " On that long stretch I honestly felt like shooting myself." I could actually agree with him. It was on the same stretch in April as I trained for the Country Music Marathon, I would have sold my soul for some cortisone for my aching knee joint. Or a bottle of water on the return run. ( this was in the PFB period ( pre-fuel belt)...which I bought in August because I was tired of feeling like I was going to pass out from dehydration on my 8 milers.) I told him to try to zone out and let the randomness fly as I began to settle back into my rhythm. The gap between the future Ironman and the Angry Runner once again began to widen.

Now I know How Floyd Landis Feels:
As I ran back toward Cheshire I kept trying to look for mile markers and familar land mark. 5.0 miles 7 miles until the end. That pain in the ass little climb 6 miles to go. People's Bank and the intersection of doom. 4.5 miles to go. A Group of guys rode past, two of the guys looked like Vin and Dean from HEAT, but I digress. My hip was now starting to feel pressure form a long day in the saddle combined with a long day pounding pavement. I tried to numb it out but as I continued to plod along the dull pain in my pelvis grew more intense with each passing mile. To make matters worse the wound on my right foot began to feel like it was ripping open with each foot strike. I looked back for Angry he was nowhere in sight. " I should Double back." I thought to my self."If you do you won't be able to drive." My hip, foot and now Achilles chimed in. I ran past the last set of port o lets before the park. Only 4 miles to go. Maybe I should stop to pee I thought to myself...then the Falshbacks of Nashville came back. Each bathroom break was pure Hell on my joints, each stop took more out of my battered body on that hot April Day. I kept. Going. " I'll double back for Angry on my cool down." As I crossed into Cheshire all I could think of was finishing this run. I tried to add up the distance in my head....21.5 miles + 2x 400 double backs = roughly 22 miles. I looked at my watch. Just over 3 hours. I was on pace to run a sub 4 hour marathon. I almost thought about tacking on the extra 4 miles, then my hip reminded of its inflammed state, also the fact that I was out of the Fruit Punch flavored drink of the gods, Gatorade, presuaded me from not risking futher injury upon myself. I drated back into the parking lot. 3:11.33 was my time for 22 miles. 8:42 min/miles 3:47 marathon pace. I began to walk to cool down drinking the ater that was left on my fuel belt. Walked back to the trail waiting for Angry to appear....one minute went by....then another....and another....after about five minutes he came into sight...he was walking....." My hips are killing me." he stated..." Same Here." I replied...."I'm going to have to name my Post My hips don't lie and throw up the Shakira video." he said with a grin. Angry's time for 21 miles. 3:18.19 9:26 min/mile 4:07 Marathon pace. Not bad for a first 20+ mile run. ( My first attempt at this I did about 3:20, this one was my third 20+ miler. Well technically 4th. April Trainer, The CMM, The summer Zen run, and this one.) Well that was it. It wasn't pretty, but it got done. Today I rested my legs and my bank clients reminded me why I hate Christmas so very much. Now I've got to formulate how to get my shopping, training, and take home finals crammed into my tight budget for time and money. Well that's it for tonight...I'm going to collaspe.

The Exhausted Extremist
R.D.
P.S. Free Tibet!!!!

Fifa, Long Runs, Steve McQueen and cholera,

These four almost non related items are what made up my weekend.
Fifa World Cup 06 for my xbox took the boredom out of procrastination as I struggled to get 3 pages ( at post time I'm currnetly on 5 ) of my 8 page cholera paper done. Surprisingly I have made the U.S. a power in World FOOTBALL! ( yes I said it it's football.football football football you wankers.) the highlight of this video game football mania was me beating Germany 2-1 for the world cup..so yeah I was sitting around on the good black box of laziness for way too long.

On Saturday, after my plans for a long ride were dashed by a phone call from the boss lady. I went for a long Zen out/ hallucinogenic 13 mile run in the lovely cross winds. no for anyone who's read my comment on Angry's site, yes I am crazy I was running clad in my blue wind pants a long sleeve bike/ running jacket, with my fuel belt 4 bottle endurance clasped around my waist running my loop of the town. the start and the finish weren't so bad but the middle 3 miles where I was running past Scovils's dam were brutal. Wind kicked up off the water blowing me around with tremendous force and I gritted my teeth and plowed through it. About mile 6 or 7 I started seeing a vision of some buddist monk, whether he was encouraging me of taunting i'm not sure, all I know is if I'm seeing shit it probably means I'm not hydrated enough. After taking a few swigs of gatorade the Dali Lama disappeared and even more random shit starting going through my head, first I was envisioning Willie Nelson's whiny manager's interview slot on the Kona 2006 dvd. then I got scenes from the Rocky VI training video stuck in my head, by the time I finished my 13 mile run I had been through a whirl wind of visions, training montages, and tracks from my i-pod that I some how committed to memory. My head ...well it's a scary place to visit....and no to answer everyone's question I was not on drugs....

The cholera...or slim fast gone wrong as I like to call it, has already been mentioned. It's my medical Anthropology paper which is due tomorrow. and for the sake of all my readers who are not in the medical field I will not go into details all I will say is this if you've got cholera you should grab about 6 IV's of Saline, some, minocycline, the last six issues of triathlete , inside triathlon, and runner's world , a gallon sized jug of Pepto and barricade yourself in the bathroom....if that hasn't given away the effects of the disease nothing will.

So where does Steve Mc Queen feature in all of this random garbage. Yesterday, as I was procrastinating, I mean researching and working diligently on my paper I happened across one of my favorite you tube videos and quotes of all time. The video was from the movie Le Mans ( yes I have a thing for sports car racing especially the endurance shit, nothing like watching a group of 3 guys bitch stomp the hell out of a 911 for 24 hours, while about 70 other psychos are doing the same shit to other exotic marquees.) the most philospophical item I was able to pull from this 7 minute clip of Rock music, and automotive carnage came in the last two minutes of the clip. when he describes racing, it's similar to my view on triathlon. To qoute Mc Queen:

" Racing is important to those who do it well. Anything you did before or after is ..well...just waiting."

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8ORa-y0TkFA

R.D.