Day 27/Winterman!

Post-op PB, yay, me!
This was my first race since my minor heart operation back in September. Last time I raced was Emilie's Run in June, I think.

I use the term 'race' loosely, but it was a good effort today. Recovering from the operation in September hadn't been too bad, but the three-month gluten challenge/celiac test afterward was horrible. I was expecting that eating wheat every day would result in more gut issues; I was not expecting the inflammation. It got worse and worse. Some days it hurt to walk and I had to take pain killers so that I could sleep. My long run withered from 2:45 post-op to the 40-45 minute range, and not every week, either; it didn't seem productive to run in pain for much longer, but I had to run something. Last month was the worst--I didn't run much more than 17.5 miles in January. That's about a third of my weekly mileage the year before.

Fortunately, things started to clear up a few weeks after giving up wheat in late January. Last weekend, I was able to jog for 1.5 hrs comfortably albeit slowly: 8.5 miles. I was debating giving up the Winterman race entirely, but I thought about it a bit and decided to switch to a shorter race and not feel obliged to finish. I'd hoped to complete the 1/2.

Which I did!

I was visiting/ice fishing yesterday; it was a blast but I didn't eat very well. There was a bit of ground pepper (my other dietary nemesis, a minor henchman to wheat) in the soup for lunch--it was just a few flakes, and the soup tasted good and I was hungry, and I think it was prepared especially for me and my wheat issues and I wasn't going to be rude by turning it down. Things were a little liquid this morning, but ok. No pain! Supper was salad...there was nothing else I could eat at the restaurant. Salad is definitely not a good pre-race option. Nor is booze and ice fishing, but it wasn't going to be a stellar race anyway!

I walked to the race this morning, pondering the lack of timing chip in the race package. Did it fall out? Should I have triple-checked? Or was I supposed to pick it up at a separate table yesterday? I decided I didn't really care about getting timed. I got to the race about 20 minutes before the start. This was a little later than I'd hoped for, but it was better than last year (I'd arrived after the gun had gone off). Fortunately, I also passed the timing chip tent and recollected that this was the same deal as last year: line up before the start to get a velcro timing chip thingy around my ankle.

There was a light dusting of slightly greasy snow. I was wearing trail shoes on my way to the start, but they felt too stiff to run in, and the grip wasn't that good on that type of snow anyway. I decided to wear the lightweight speedwork shoes I'd cut up a bit a few days ago. My foot felt fine, but I wanted to pamper it with soft shoes.

I figured that I wouldn't be able to use the bag check--the crowd was so thick I couldn't see where it was--so I lined up for the bathrooms. They were much more important. There wasn't anything valuable in my bag except for a change of clothes. if someone stole my bag, I could jog home before I cooled off too much. I figured I'd dump my bag close to where the relay teams had themselves and their stuff sprawled out.

On the way back from the bathroom, I walked by someone writing numbers on sticky labels and putting them on bags--score! So my bag was secure.

I ate a banana and drank a can of coffee; I decided to carry the other can for at least 10K. I'd had juice for breakfast--my stomach was too messed up for anything solid then--but the banana and coffee went down well so I was optimistic.

I had no idea how slowly I'd go--my miles have been somewhere around 10:30, or slower, this winter. I went near the back of the pack, but ended up passing a bunch of people at the start. Still, I was nowhere near the front.

My legs were stiff but not sore. This is an important distinction! Just stiff, compared to what I've been through this winter, was a relief. I had a watch on but decided not to look at it. I would just go at whatever pace my body chose. I ran the full marathon last year, 8 loops--I knew the course well. This time, I had to do just four loops and the little bit at the end to make up the last 1.1K.

Knowing that I was going to be done in just four loops made the race go by pretty quickly. The ground was greasy in spots, and sometimes there was wind and snow, but it was ok. The neat thing about that course is the slight hills; there's two rises, and they break up the course nicely. The best one is the bigger and later hill on the way back: at the top of it, you can see the race start/end of the loop! It's still about a mile off, I think, but it's all downhill from there! This wasn't something I'd fixated on much last year, but it really helped me this year. Get over one hill, coast, get over the other, coast and turn around, and then back, get over one hill, coast, get over the other, and the loop's pretty much done.

My legs never got any worse. They stayed stiff, heavy, but not in pain. My breathing was pretty slow for a while, and then it started to pick up on the uphill sections, and then the last two miles or so, I was breathing 2-2. Effort-wise, I was kind of mailing it in above the hips, but I didn't feel like squeezing more out of my legs. The last time I was able to run roughly the same distance/duration was on December 6th; that day, I covered just 11.2 miles in two hours. I knew from the 5K splits that I was running faster than that today, and I was happy with that. My PB for the 1/2 marathon is 1:41...not a big deal to push for under 2 hrs or whatever. I'll save it for sub-1:40 (and, yes, I really want to try for that down the road!)

My 5K splits, as far as I remember:

30:xx
59:xx
1:28:xx
1:57:xx

So a sub 2-hr 1/2 wasn't going to happen but my miles were under 10 minutes!

Finish: 2:03:xx, I think. 11 out of 17 in my age group. Last year, I was the 2nd woman overall for the full marathon, but I have to restart somewhere.

Oh, yes, I almost forgot: this time, I made through the proper finishing chute! I've done two loop races before, this one last year and the Delaware marathon, where I went over the wrong mat at the finish and had to go back to go over the right mat...anyway, I was on my way to the finish, and some guy yelled "finish, go left", thank goodness, and I did.

My heart feels a little raw now...this was something I noticed during my recovery from the operation whenever I increased the difficulty of my workouts. The first time I ran after the operation, it was for five minutes and my heart felt raw. Next time I ran, it felt raw after 10 minutes or whatever, and so on. With every improvement, it felt raw but adjusted, got stronger, and then sometime in October or November, I stopped feeling it. And now I feel it again today. It makes me think that I am once again improving, after a few months of going backwards. This makes me feel really good. The team that performed the operation was top-notch; I'm really grateful for their work and it's proper and satisfying to put it to use. What's the point of getting a fancy operation and then letting things fall apart? There have been times these past few months, mainly those days where I struggled through 20 minute jogs, that I regretted getting the operation. What was the point? All that time, skill, and effort was wasted on me. Someone else could have benefited from the operation more...well, now I won't believe such things anymore and I will use my revamped heart to its fullest potential.

My plans--short term, eat, watch Olympics, lol...long term, I would like to gradually increase mileage, reintroduce speedwork (what's that, eh?) and aim for Emilie's Run. At this point, I don't know if I'll be able to PB, but if I can resume tempo runs by then and do an honest tough 5K, that would be great. I think I'll do the Army 1/2 in September.

And, definitely, I want to do one of the Winterman races next year, the full or the 1/2 depending on how I feel. I like the course and the people who work on it do a great job--I find it has such a fun, friendly atmosphere.