What? No run-blogging?

   Okay...let's see now...September...October...November. Holy crap, it's been over two months since I did a blog post!!
   Well, where to begin...
   First off, I haven't stopped running. There have been a couple of longer stretches wherein I was recovering from fairly mundane ailments such as colds and the like but, for the most part, I've been getting out there. No amazing distances or anything, just trying to concentrate on doing 5K two or three times a week and maybe throwing in the odd longer run.
   A couple of months ago, I decided to cut back a little on carbs and extra sugars and ended up losing about eight pounds, without really trying. This was quite the revelation for me as it was accomplished with only a minimum of running. Unfortunately, now that I know I can do it, I occasionally choose not to. Where the sense is in this is beyond me---why would you make a discovery like that and then not go full-throttle on it? Who knows?!
   On top of the little bit of running I have been doing, I also ran a race, of all things! A few weekends ago I ran the Halloween Haunting 5K, right here in London. So here's the recap!
   It was a cool-ish and slightly breezy, sunny Sunday morning and the race was being held in Springbank Park, one of the running hubs here in London.

"Gorilla Guy"

   There was a definite Halloween theme and many of the runners wore costumes. At one point, I ran past a guy who was dressed up as a man in a jail cell being "romanced" by a gorilla---highly reminiscent of one of the final scenes from "Trading Places". Extremely ingenious costume!
   I had been trying to decide just how "Halloweeny" to get with this race but in the week leading up to it Canada experienced attacks on its military and Parliament and there was a call out for runners to wear red and/or Canada-themed attire in their races that weekend, so this is what I opted to do.

Pre-race pic. Kinda cool so hands in the pockets!

   The race itself still had kind of a fun atmosphere to it and I was not at all concerned with my time and ended up round about 36 minutes for a 5K. This is (somewhat unfortunately) pretty consistent with most of my times this year.
   After the race, I hung around for awhile to watch some of the 10K runners come in and also wait for the results of the 5K race and the accompanying award ceremony. This was the final race in this year's London Honda Road Race series and, as one of a very small group of runners in my AG (60-65), there is always the possibility of being in the top three and getting a prize.

The back of "The Flash" and a dog
who knows a deer when he sees one!

   So I was standing there, getting colder and colder by the minute (sweat and cool temps are never a good mix), waiting through the results of all the other AGs, when it came my turn. I never come in first so my big hope is that I might snag a second or third. Sure enough, another fellow wins first and then another guy wins second. They are in the middle of announcing third place and I actually start taking a step forward to go up for my prize when they call out someone else's name! Thankfully it was just one small step I took!
   

   Okay, so no prize that day but, in the overall standings for this race series, I did end up third and that meant I won a $50 Runner's Choice gift card! Not too shabby! One of my main running goals is to be a little more competitive in this AG and to be posting much more respectable times in the near future. I've only been running for about three years now whereas my belief is that all of the other guys have been going at it substantially longer. Chances are they've plateaued and I can still get quite a bit better! We'll see!

Thanks goodness for "ALL"!

   At this point, there are no races on the horizon. I am in the middle of trying to decide how much money I want to spend on races---finances are pretty tight and sometimes it just feel pretty hard to justify paying to do something I could do for free on my own. Likely it will boil down to what a race's motivational factor  might be. If knowing there's a race coming up helps make me get out there and train then maybe the odd race is a good thing, expense be damned!

The inviting facade.

   After the race and my non-win, it was time to head for home. Doralyn had dropped me off at the race but had a prior commitment so I had decided to just walk home from there. Fortunately it's only a couple of kilometers from where I live to Springbank Park. When you're wet and headed into a cool breeze, though, stopping along the way for warmth and sustenance always seems like the right thing to do and, fortunately, my route took me right past what I consider to be my "home" Tim's and therein did I stop!

   I only had a loonie ($1, for my American friends) in my pocket so the sustenance comprised only three timbits and not even a coffee. Still quite welcome, though!
    
   
   

One third of my sustenance!

2ND in AG! LAST in AG!

   This past Sunday, I ran in the 5K event of the Springbank Road Races. I believe this was the 47th year for these races , making them the oldest in London. Along with the 5K, there was also a half-marathon and a Kiddie Trot.
   This was a run I had not trained for. A general running funk and some niggling groin/upper hip issues have essentially kept me off the roadways the past while so I had no real intention of running a good race, it just felt kind of good to be out there running with a group of like-minded others.

Milling around before the start of the 5K.

   I also had no true strategy for the race. I had no plan around actually attempting to run the whole thing, no plan around doing run/walk intervals, no plan around pacing, no plan around anything.
   Essentially, what ended up happening was that I ran to keep up with the last third of the runners and I walked whenever I got tired. Which was often.
   It was, though, a wonderful day to run!  Hardly a cloud in the sky and there was the tiniest chill to the air, a precursor to fall, I suppose, and a welcome relief from the heat and humidity we'd been having the previous week. I'd also decided to give my race photographer (Doralyn, my wife) the morning off as the race was an early start and she gets so few opportunities to sleep in that it seemed a shame to waste this one. Hence not a lot of pics!

And more milling around AFTER the 5K.

   So I ran and I walked and I got very, very tired.  There's my re-cap. My time was about what I expected (38.00 on the button) and this landed me 106 out of 113 runners. Frankly, if I'd known I was going to come in that close to last, I'd have been shitting bricks for the last week or so...
   Likely the most remarkable part of the day was the overall camaraderie of all the runners. Everyone seemed to be in good spirits, lots of laughter and high-fives, hugs and cheering. This is pretty hard to beat and part of the reason I sign up for races in the first place (it ain't about my performance!)
   The capper of it all was that I placed second in my age group! And won some Brooks running socks, to boot! Not only did I place second in my AG, I also placed last---to be truthful, ladies and gents, there were only two runners in my AG (60-64) and the other guy beat me. Badly. Like by about 14 minutes! Thank goodness the other couple of guys who normally run in my AG were busy doing the half!
   If nothing else, it got me back into the running mood (mode) and the idea of getting back out there on some kind of regular basis now is, for whatever reason, a lot more appealing! I'm also starting to wonder if the running doldrums I experienced over the summer might also have had something to do with the added heat. Now that the fresher air feels like it's arrived, the urge to get out there and run seems to be re-kindled!

How I Capped Off My Extra-Long Weekend

   Today is Day 4 of my Extra-Long Weekend ( I already have Mondays off so when a long weekend pops up they give me the Tuesday as well) and my plan was to have a little breaky this morning, go for a run, and then meet my son, Bryant, later on for some driving.
   Well, I had the breaky and was leisurely wandering around, collecting my run stuff from laundry baskets when, all of the sudden, it started to pour. And thunder. And lightning. So the running was temporarily put on hold.
   This gave me the opportunity to re-wash a load of clothes and cook up some granola.
   Re-washing the clothes was necessary as I believe some young lad already washed them and then took them out of the dryer and then left them in a heap in the laundry basket. Which meant that the following day (today) everything was wrinkled. No big deal.
   Doralyn's everyday breaky consists of yogourt with Holy Crap (google it), granola, and fruit. She had one more serving of granola left and seeing as how it was raining and I had to do a load of laundry anyway, why not cook granola? So I did! Here's the "prep" pic!

The stuff you need...

...to make this!

   After I finished making the granola, out came the sunshine! I re-found all my running stuff and headed out on the same 5K run I did the last time. Basically I run one big square, encompassing several blocks, in my neighbourhood. This neatly takes 5

Yay for dry streets!

kilometers. The street I live on forms one side of the box and it is a long street which slopes gently upward until it gets near the end, at which point it slopes steeply upward. Because I live halfway up the street, the real steep section is the first one I encounter. It's actually kind of nice to get it out of the way when you're at your most rested. Psychologically, but not actually, the rest of the way seems downhill.
   A little over half a kilometer into the run, Doralyn called me. I'd neglected to text her that I was headed out on a run otherwise she wouldn't have called me but I was happy enough to walk and talk briefly.
   The rest of the run went pretty well and not quite as much need for walking as when I was out last. I also ended up running it about a minute faster, once I factored in the telephone conversation so all is well. At this point I've been out running three days out of the last four and the one day I didn't run I was busy doing yardwork. Just have to keep at it!
   After the run, it was time to make meatloaf! The plan was I make the meatloaf and leave it for Doralyn who then sticks it in the oven later on at the designated time and temperature so that it's ready to go when I get back from driving with Bry. The plan went off more or less (we ate late) without a hitch. And this is what the meatloaf looked like!

I also made the other half--you'll
just have to take my word for it!

   Bryant and I did some driving around and some errands and by the time I got home it was almost dinner. Tomorrow it's back to work but my extra-long weekend means only a three-day workweek for me and that ain't tough to take! To top it all off, in about ten days, I've got two weeks of vacation! And lots of running!
   



     

     

Mr. Yasso, The Joke's On ME!

      I ran yesterday but felt like I wanted to get up off my butt (as people have been suggesting) and run again today. But I wanted to do something different.
   For a while now, I have been reading and hearing about how runners incorporate Yasso 800s into their training plans. These training sessions are named after Bart Yasso, running guru and CRO of Runner's World magazine. The man is a bit of a legend in the running community.
   What Yasso 800s involve is running 800 meter timed intervals, generally on a track, with timed rest periods in between. The rest periods should be about the same length of time as it takes you to run the 800 meters.
   This training method is primarily used by marathoners and it's Yasso's theory that your interval time should pretty closely correlate, by extrapolation, to your marathon time. As an example, if you found you could run an average interval of 3:30, then your marathon time would be close to 3 hours and 30 minutes.
   Now, I have never run track at any age, so I have absolutely no past experience as to what's fast and what's not, for amateur runners. What I have seen a lot of, though, is running bloggers saying they've run 800 intervals in around the afore-mentioned 3:30.
   When I read this I went what?? it took them a whole three minutes and thirty seconds to run around a piddly little football field twice?? No way! I could do it way faster!
   Are you giggling yet?
   So today, because I wanted to do something different, I headed out to my high school alma mater, Oakridge Secondary, to run Yasso 800s.
   I was really hoping to have the track to myself and such was the case when I arrived. I set my stuff down right at midfield, took a sip of water and off I went.
   Well, round about the time I hit the first turn I realized what a total miscalculation I'd made!

Starting line, right at the 55-yard line

   Thinking I was just going to breeze around this track, I immediately started off in (somewhat) high gear and knew by the first turn that I was done for, particularly at that speed. I dialed it way down the rest of the way and, gasping at the end, discovered I'd done my first ever Yasso 800 in the awesome time of 5:friggin 11! I'm sure the whooshing sound I heard just about then was the universe settling back into place and Brian gaining knowledge!
   I walked around for a few minutes, gaining my breath and enjoying that holy crap feeling of discovery. My original plan was to have run five of these intervals. The way I felt after the first one made me unsure as to whether I'd be able to run another one!
   When I thought I could breathe again, I set off on the second one, dialed down right from the beginning. Without the preliminary burst from the first one, the second one came in at 5:23. At the end of the second, I was pretty sure I only had one left.

The "sort of" track.

   I set off for the last time, this time paying a little more attention to my watch. Coming around the last bend, I saw that I had an opportunity to beat the previous interval and, knowing it was last interval of the day, I kicked it up a notch. Managed to come in at 5:17. Hooray, a negative friggin split!
   So, needless to say, I have new-found respect for anyone who can run a Yasso 800 in 3:30. Actually, I have new-found respect for anyone who can run a Yasso 800 period.

Sad high jump pits.

   About the only saving grace to the morning was that fact that I was back on the playing field of my high school days. It was pretty easy to look around the football field and recount past glories and failures, junior football adventures, phys ed classes, cross-country and yay for cheerleaders! It was also the first time I'd really been there in slightly over 40 years. Memories running rampant and all that. 
   On the way to the track I passed another and much newer high school track. It was tempting to stop there but my old school was just another minute of the road and, besides, it was a Catholic track and I'm not Catholic. Or anything for that matter. It is kind of embarrassing, though, that they have an

Ah, the good old days...

actual track and  Oakridge has, well... a gravel road that goes around in circles (see pic) Even the long jump pits are kinda pathetic (once again, see pic).
   If nothing else, I got out today for a tiring, heart-elevating run. It was also a change of pace, which is never a bad thing. On top of all that, I now have a bit of a Yasso baseline for the future. Oh, and by the results I guess I'm running a marathon in about 5 hours and 15 minutes! Oddly, about what I would have predicted!

How I Got To Where I Am This Very Minute

   I ran today for the first time in a long time. It's been so long that I can't actually remember when the last time was. I suppose I could dig out the Garmin and check back but the fact of the matter is that it's not coming to me right now.
   I should be able to go oh, yeah, I ran yesterday and that was a hard one or maybe even enjoyed the rest day after that long run on Tuesday but none of that is coming to me.
   I did go for a 10K walk last weekend and that was quite the workout but, prior to that, I don't remember any runs.
   What this all means, of course, is that I'm not running enough. And there's been no cross-training in the interim, either. If that's not bad enough, I've more or less abandoned my gluten-free lifestyle, giving me more access to more carbs more often. All of the above has simply been a recipe for disaster, of course, and my body's showing it.
   Last night, I had a perfectly good chicken dinner with fresh veggies. It filled me adequately but then, as I was passing through the kitchen, I noticed a cooked turkey burger sitting, unwanted, in a frying pan on the stove. It looked lonely so I ate it. And then felt awful afterwards.
   So now we can add "poor choices" to everything I've already told you about and you get a pretty good idea of the dire straits I'm in!
   

How to take a sidewalk and
turn it into a trail run. From
my run today.

Earlier on today, I was standing in front of the bathroom mirror (should they be outlawed?) and asked myself if it would be appropriate to do a "selfie", without my shirt on. Ostensibly, it would be the "before" pic and at some point (later and about twenty pounds less) I would post the "after" pic. Then I thought to myself but what if there's no "after" pic to show people. The "before" pic would simply become "the pic" and would just fester there in cyber space. My boobs also rival many women's and I understand there are obscenity guidelines....so no selfies today. You're welcome!

You lucky bastards!

   I ran 5K today in around 40 minutes, about as bad as it's been. My goal is eventually to get under 30. Last summer, I was running around 34 and 30 seemed reachable. Today, a sub-30 5K seems way, WAY off.
   But no big deal; because I can walk, it doesn't matter so much how the running's going and I know way too many people who can't walk. As far as tomorrow goes, I can certainly get out and run again---nothing can really stop me and, if I choose not to run, I can go to the gym and if I choose not go to the gym I can go for a long walk or if I choose not to do any of these things then I can sit here and soak in the world somehow!

My 10K Walk Huge Photo Dump!

   My plan had been to run 5K today but I spent the day yesterday doing yardwork and it felt like every bone in my body ached today. The thought of jarring those same bones around by running was pretty intolerable.
   What I thought I could manage, however, was a long walk. As a bit of a trade-off, I figured that a 10K walk might take the the place if a 5K run, workout-wise. And it does, right...?

   So, because I was walking, I thought I would take some pics along the way. Anything that looked pic-worthy was fodder for my phone camera so there are a lot of pics, couple with my sometimes-whimsical commentary! On the plus side, you don't have to sit there and listen to me ramble on! So here we go!

My street. I love the trees!

Commissioners Road. Busy street but still lots of greenery.

Commissioners and Oxford. A busy intersection and I am on the wrong side of the street!

The McCormick Home, one of the best places for seniors in London. How
convenient, I won't even have to leave my neighbourhood!

Where the rich people live---I'm not even sure I'm allowed to be in the general area...

The Oxford Street extension bridge. It's all downhill, that's why I want to run it so bad!

This pic is a little out of order, it's the pond just before the bridge.

View of the Thames River, from the bridge. All sorts of
visions of my phone falling over the railing!

Had to make a choice here! Which path do you think I picked?! 

Sad part of the walk. A couple of months ago, a 19-year-old girl was killed
here in an early-morning accident. I drive by this every day.....

The VERY nondescript  entrance to the London Hunt and Country Club,
home of several high-profile gold tournaments. You need to be
very careful how you pronounce it....

The track at St. Thomas Aquinas high school. I kind of lust after it.

This was about halfway and I'd forgotten fuel. Thank goodness for the corner drugstore!

Used to live here!

Construction work. Because this is summer. In London.

Riverside Drive, one of the most scenic roadways in London.

Hmmmm...I wonder what goes on in there?

I started singing "Follow The Yellow Mark Road". In my head, though.

But don't follow it TOO closely or you'll get smucked by a car.

I love junk pics. Should have done this one in black and white

Obviously some lazy bastards around.

I don't remember being here! (but maybe that's because of the alcohol...)

The bridge into Byron, where I live. Byron used to be a small village
but then it got annexed by London. Great place to live!

Another view of the river, from the Byron bridge.

The sign, announcing I'm home! Well, apart from the kilometer and a half I still had to walk...

Did I mention it was summer? In London?

   So there you have it, thank you for viewing my huge dump! (giggle)
   Hopefully, the next time around, I'll actually have some running to tell you about!

So did you pick the correct path I took in Pic #9?
Leave your choice in a comment and I'll let you know!

Another "I'm Back" Post!

   Hi, it's been awhile since I've posted! Generally this means I have nothing to post about but this time around, it's more indicative of not having to have been able to access my own freakin' blog!
   I went to sign in a couple of weeks ago and got this message saying that I did not have permission to access that service and that I needed to contact my domain administrator (whoever that is). Multiple attempts at Googling my problem solved nothing and, to make a longer story shorter, what I eventually found out was that being signed in to my new work gmail account prevented me from signing in to Blogger at the same time. So I signed out of gmail and here I am!
   Okay, regardless of all that, it's not like I had a ton of running stuff to talk about anyway, the training's been extremely sporadic. I do however have a race re-cap!
   On July 11, I ran in the Summer Night 5K here in London. This is part of the London Honda Road Race series and is the fourth in a series of six this running season. The 5K was the only distance offered and there were a lot of people running.

Before the start

   The race was an out and back affair, beginning at the Barking Frog, a bar in downtown London. It was a beautiful evening for a race and the crowd was festive, right from the beginning.
   Doralyn and two of our boys, Callum and Quinlan, accompanied me downtown, saw me off and then did a little window shopping while I was running.

The crowd, milling around,
waiting for the start.

   The first half of the race was a gentle downhill which was kind of nice but meant, at the same time, the end of the race would be a not-so-gentle uphill and it was hard trying to forget that. Once again, I had started at the back of the pack but found that I was slowly passing people. Nevertheless, by the time we had reached the 2K mark we were already being greeted by runners coming back! Hey, no big deal except that they were kind of serious and there weren't too many acknowledging smiles as we were congratulating them!

   One of the runners passing me the other way was an old friend from the early seventies. Said hi to her as we passed but then I eventually ended up catching up to her after I made the turn. We chatted as we ran and then both of us ended up taking a walking break. I had sort of planned on a walking break about there but the chatting part of it kind of prolonged the walking and I actually ended up losing a little time. Nice chatting though!

   Pretty close to the end of the race, I notice another friend from both public and high school who was there volunteering. I called out to her, told her who I was, and kept on running. I had never seen her at any other race and wondered why exactly she was there. At the end of the race, it kind of dawned on me. The race was being run as part of a fundraiser for the Bereaved Families of Ontario and I remember running into this woman a few years ago in a grocery store who, as we were catching up, broke down into tears as she recounted her young son's drowning. Hence her involvement with the race. It was then I wished I'd stopped and had a few words, this will probably bother me for awhile.

Happy man at the finish line! They should hire my wife, she takes the best pics!

   Finally the race was over and I was pretty happy about that. Came in with a time of 37:41 which was right around anything I'd been doing in training. Should I have slowed down to chat? Yeah, sure, why not?!