A Momma's Girl Dog

My sweetie-girl, my 12-year-old yellow Labrador, is going in for surgery tomorrow. She has laryngeal paralysis. It’s a condition not uncommon to older Labradors, although I don’t know anyone whose Labrador has had it. They’re not sure what causes it and the only way to reverse it is through laryngeal tieback surgery, in which one side of her larynx is sutured permanently open.

It’s difficult surgery. As in any surgery, there is risk of complication. Among all of the risks, the worst is that the patient could develop aspiration pneumonia. She’ll have to learn to eat slowly, even if I have to hand feed her, to avoid inhaling food down her windpipe. She’ll be in the hospital for three nights to make sure she’s stable.

In Angel’s case, her condition came on gradually over the last two years and lately it has been very noticeable. She has trouble catching her breath on our walks and really gasps when she gets excited or anxious about something. Without the surgery she would eventually suffocate because her larynx could fail to properly open and close to allow her to breathe.

I’ve put it off for months, but it’s time. It was a very difficult decision. I hate to subject her to surgery. But except for this condition she’s otherwise healthy. What’s a momma to do?

Happy New Year

Ah. It’s January 5 and I’ve survived another holiday season. It’s always a relief to survive the holidays.

I’m a little disappointed with myself that I didn’t get my Christmas lights up this year. I like to think of myself as my street’s version of Clark Griswold, but not this year. Bad planning I guess!

Now it’s back to work in earnest.

I have a very nice job. It’s nothing glamorous, and really quite boring most of the time. But it’s somewhat fulfilling in that it’s a little teeny tiny cog in the inner workings of the interactions of the workforce and education systems. I like to think that what I do helps people be good at their jobs, and helps Texas industry be competitive because there are well trained workers coming out of the community college system.

Blow it Big

It was not my day, but it was not the end of the world, either.

And, more importantly, it was a GREAT day for many of my teammates!

The plan was to run a 3:25, but if you're gonna blow it, you might as well blow it big. I'd call twelve minutes big.

I was on plan at the half, but by mile 15 the wheels had come off. Sciatic pain shot up and down my right leg, settled into my knee area, then settled itself back down in a few miles. But by then my legs had lost all their turnover. My quads and hamstrings pretty much seized and decided they would not go any faster. I tried a strategy to increase my turnover during the times when the discomfort seemed to fade, but it came back each time.

It's a blur from about 15 miles where the 3:30 group passed me to where I caught up with the Dan-O at about mile 21 or 22. Together we hung on. Dan-O was sending all his "good vibrations from the behind" to his brother Mark, who Dan hoped had qualified for Boston. I still don't know how Mark did.

We came upon Rogue Derek in the late miles and he was truly suffering. I tried to get him to go with us, and he did for a short while, but he faded. A short way ahead of me I saw the very distinctive blonde pony tail swinging that could only mean that Julia was having a good day. She looked very strong. Then Michael passed us and I was able to eek out a "Go Michael" but he didn't know it was me until I visited with him in the hotel lobby later.

The Dan-O and I held on and turned the left turn and I was wondering, "God, aren't we there yet?", but the finish line appeared and I said to Dan "there it is!". Just then I saw that I had to go left into the women's chute. I was on Dan's right so there was some maneuvering before could give each other a final high-five and farewell, and it was on to our respective finish lines.

I haven't checked my finish time online as yet, but my watch says 3:37:21. I'm looking forward to comparing notes with the Dan-O.

As I write this a few other notable moments come to mind. The bus ride was quite pleasant, with Erin, breakfast Jon, Derek, Nedra, and Christine. There were several other Austin folks on our bus, too. Robert and Trevor, Paul and Lauren, Danny, James, the Salazars, Andy and Jennifer, Fred and Patrick, and Gazelles Renee and Lisa.

I had a nice visit with Danny along the course because he was doing his come from behind thing so he can visit with folks along the way. Nedra passed me with the 3:30 group and expressed very kind concern for my welfare. It was great to see our coaches Steve and Ruth along the course, but it was hard to face them when, by 19 miles, I had fallen so far off my plan. It was great to see other familiar faces too, like Mandy, Trey, Dennis, and Chris.

It will take a few days to process the rest of the ordeal. But for now it's on to my honeymoon!

Taper Madness

It's less than a week before the race, and it happens every time. Sometimes it holds itself off until I'm actually at the starting line. But it's already started.

The self doubt. The amnesia. The anxiety.

Have I done the work? Has my fitness survived the last two weeks? What's with this new ache, this new pain? Is that a rash? Why does my head hurt? I just sneezed. I'm a little warm; could it be a fever? I'm a little cold; could it be a fever?

Finally, the Pace Run

This morning at breakfast, John reminded me that I need to update my blog. Today's run gave me some material.

Today we ran our first pace run: 3 X 5 miles at MGP with a short rest in between each loop and a 4-mile warm up and cool down.

I've been worrying that we've done what seems to be so little work at sustained pace. Steve has made up some punishing long-run workouts like Soul Builder I and Soul Builder II, but I can't recall any race pace work since we started the speed phase, so I looked forward to today's run.

The weather was perfect. We ran a 5-mile loop in Travis Country three times.

I started out with Nedra, Christine, John (UT Tennis John, not breakfast John), Katie, Brenda, Julia, Michael, and Dave. If there's a way to mess up a loop, we did it, and missed a turn to cut off the first mile or so. We took some heckling, but we made up the mile at the end of the first loop and got the directions figured out for the second loop.

Christine was soon way off the front and Nedra and I ran together. Nedra is trying to break the elusive 3:30, and I'm trying to PR with a 3:25. To hit that, my race pace needs to average 7:48/mile. A few weeks ago I struggled in Soul Builder II to the point that my coach suggested that I reassess my finishing goal. I'm still not quite ready to do that, and today was my test to help me decide.

I used my watch and the mile markers Ruth had set out to figure my pace. Nedra used her Garmin, or whatever contraption that was on her wrist that kept beeping several yards after we'd passed a cone. Here are my paces for loops 2 and 3:

7:39, 7:24, 7:31, 8:03, 8:10
7:52, 7:23, 7:31, 8:07, 8:00

And by my watch,loop 1 took 44:20 with the rest period.

So, given what I was able to run today under ideal conditions and a badass fellow runner to challenge me and push me along, I learned a thing or two.

If I expect to come close to my goal time, it ain't gonna be pretty. It's going to be alot of me gritting and grunting and gasping my way from mile 1 through mile 26 point 2. There will be no dignity left at all.

I've always figured that one should be able to do this, look reasonably good doing it, keep things together, and PR if you've put your miles in. Sure, it gets difficult at a point, but I figure I've done pretty well if I haven't had to walk, I haven't sobbed, I've finished looking and feeling somewhat strong, and I haven't shmooed in my pants. I imagine someone like Christine floating along, looking lovely, never losing her composure, her sweat looking more like a glow than a struggle, and kicking 26 point 2 miles of ass behind her. Quite gracefully.

But today I learned that all of that will have to go out the window if I'm gonna have a hope of getting close to that 3:25. It's going to be ugly from beginning to end, I'm going to be - again - gritting, grunting, and gasping. There will be no way to avoid it.

As for the rest of today's run? That 4-mile cool down from the Travis Country loop, back across MoPac, through Sunset Valley and back up to Central Market? Ouch. If I could have cried, I would have. I sure wanted to. It hurt, I was demoralized, and I could barely run another step. But it's behind me now and, to quote one of my favorite pre-run songs: done, done, on to the next one. (Foo Fighters - All My Life)

And I'm still not quite ready to reassess that finishing goal, bronze standard or otherwise.

Soul Builder II Team Rogue Workout

Holy moley!

Yesterday's workout: 18 miles from Gateway over to Mesa, down North Hills to Balcones, Hancock, down Shoal Creek Blvd, 38th to Jefferson, down to Enfield, west to Lake Austin Blvd.

Then the fun began. The route took us up Redbud to Westlake Drive, and turned around to take us to the dreaded Stratford Drive. Stratford spit us out into Zilker, and an out and back through Zilker brought us to the Austin High track. That was the first 18 miles. At the track, the plan was to run six more miles (for a total of 24 miles before the mile-or-so cool down back to the pool) hard at these paces to test our fitness and mental toughness and to try to simulate how you'd feel at the end of a full marathon:

2 miles at marathon goal pace (mgp) - 1:57/400m
2 miles at half marathon goal pace (hmgp) - 1:51/400m
2 miles at 10K pace - 1:46/400m

Looking at my watch, this is how I did:
Mile 1 - 1:59, 2:02, 1:59, 1:57
Mile 2 - 1:56, 1:55, 1:56, 1:56 - held mgp nicely in the first 2 miles
Mile 3 - 1:52, 1:53, 1:53, 1:54
Mile 4 - 1:50, 1:51, 1:54, 1:50 - was hovering around hmgp in the second 2 miles
Mile 5 - 1:49, 1:54, 1:53, 1:56
Mile 6 - 1:57, 2:07 (spaced on the lap button), 3:30 for my final 800m (spaced on the lap button again) - never quite got to 10K pace in the last two miles except for maybe late in my last 800 meters when I knew it was my last lap.

Somewhere in my last lap I remember thinking, "I wonder if I'll make myself barf if I keep running like this?"

By my coach's assessment on the team forum, since I couldn't quite get to 10K pace, I'd be what he's terming a "bronze" standard, as opposed to platinum or gold, and I should reassess my marathon goal of 3:25.

Hmmmm. I'm not quite ready to reassess just yet, even though that cool down jog from the track over to Barton Springs Pool was the most painful post-workout I've had in 14 years of marathon training.

Ouch!

Hurricane Ike spared Austin. I'd have loved some rain, but I'm happy we avoided any damaging wind. And I'm happy I was able to get the Saturday morning run in.

The Saturday morning run looked uncertain as late as Friday night. Yes, the funk had me hoping for a day off, but I still went through all the Friday motions anyway; I hydrated carefully all day, ate dinner early, shaved the legs, gathered the running stuff, and set the alarm.

In the morning Ruth's note on the website said "we're on." Skeptical, I checked the weather radar online, and it looked safe.

Thankfully the coaches decided to put off the "soul buster" run until next week. With all of my preoccupation with the hurricane and with Ken leaving town for the weekend I would not have had a chance to familiarize myself with the run and visualize it. I would not have been able to take full advantage of it and get out of it what its inventor intends.

But we still ran Mt. Bonnell. And I have a full appreciation for that m-f'er.

I ran the course as my coaches recommended we run it - hit it hard in the final three or so miles at marathon goal pace.

I don't know what my pace was (remind me to ask Santa for a 405), but I was pushing. I felt okay along Lake Austin Blvd and across the MoPac bridge until I felt the fatigue creep into my legs and up through my torso and down my arms. It's a really bad feeling. I'm afraid of it. It's one (just one - there is at least one other) of the fears that I had to confess to my coach when he suggested that I'm afraid. I thought of Kamran's remark that he spent some time training for 5K's so he could find out how much it hurt. I reminded myself that it's SUPPOSED to f'n hurt.

Sure, I slowed down and got passed there in the last half mile. But I think I got more out of that run than just 18 miles that took me up and over (and up and over) Mt. Bonnell. These training runs are for "that which you fear the most" to "meet you halfway." In this case it met me in the last mile.

Hello, pain. I'm Kate. I'm going to stop avoiding you.

Thanks, Coach.