Race Ryan Hall...Virtually

Yeah...he's fast.

December Destination Marathons!

Looking for a December marathon? Preferably in a warmer climate? The R's is here for you.

First up, The CIM. Otherwise known as the California International Marathon. December 4th. Super-flat course in Sacramento, CA and well known as a great course to try to qualify for Boston. Usually dry and mild weather. Road trip!

Same date, just across the desert, we've got the Las Vegas Marathon. At night. On the strip. Cool.

Then on the next weekend, December 11th, 2500 miles away, we've got the Honolulu Marathon. Ah, Hawaii. How can you go wrong? This one can be muggy, but it starts early, 5:00am early, to get you out and back before it heats up too much. And it's Hawaii, how much are you going to complain, really?

If you're really looking to escape the cool Northwest weather, there's always the Panama City International Marathon on Dec. 4th. Yeah, not Florida...Panama! Trust me, you won't be cold...the average temps, year-round, are highs of around 90F, with 80% humidity. Woot!

And you thought you wouldn't get a hot, dry run until next July...

Marathon Training Plans!

Perhaps everyone in the world knows this already, but I just realized it, so pretend to be interested...

If you're like me, and why wouldn't you be, and love to run, but are basically broke at all times, you may need to get creative when trying to find decent training plans. You can always just Google "Marathon Training Plans" or "Half Marathon Training Plans" or "Marathon Training Schedule" or whatever, but that usually gives you a million links that are a)hard to sort through to find what you want, and b)often have a price tag attached to them.

But wait!

If you enter in those terms and then craftily click on the "Images" button...

BLAM!

Hundreds and hundreds of free training schedules.

Now I'm not saying they're all quality schedules, or really, even mostly quality schedules, but they are easy to browse and pick out one or two that might work for you. And of course, it works for any distance, or sport, just replace "Marathon" with "5k" or "Olympic Triathlon" and there you go.

Give it a try. Like this.


Plan up top brought to you by Elizathon's Blog!

Lucky Number 7

Yep, only seven races for this race calendar. We're getting deep into the Winter Running Season now, and the races are dwindling quickly.

Time to bundle up, strap on your jingle bells and hit the trails! Or the road. This time of year, they're both just about equally hard, so whichever you prefer...

Let's race!

RACES FOR WEEK OF NOVEMBER 28th TO DECEMBER 4th

December 3rd / Jingle Bell Run 5k / Bend, OR

December 3rd / Shellburg Falls Trail Run 10k / Lyons, OR

December 3rd / Reindeer Run Half Marathon, 10k and 5k / St. Helens, OR

December 3rd / Holiday Fun Run 10k and 5k / Ridgefield, WA

December 3rd / Minuteman 10 and 2 Run 10k / Eugene, OR

December 4th / Red Stocking Run 5k / Seattle, WA

December 4th / Jingle Bell Run 5k / Portland, OR

Awesome "Lucky Number 7" artwork from jayve1 - a homeboy from the homeland. Check out his cool stuff here.

Christopher McDougall and Barefoot Running

So Christopher McDougall, the Born to Run guy, has a new article in the New York Times about barefoot running.

Titled, with great restraint and understatement, The Once and Future Way to Run, McDougall rambles off five pages of anecdotes and questionable facts about why barefoot running is the only way to run. Ever. Period.

Again, before you hit the "comment" button and yell at me, let me say this: I'm not against barefoot running! I am against people that say barefoot running is for everyone and is the end-all for running injuries.

I have to show a couple passages:

So how did one of our greatest strengths become such a liability? “The data suggests up to 79 percent of all runners are injured every year,” says Stephen Messier, the director of the J. B. Snow Biomechanics Laboratory at Wake Forest University. “What’s more, those figures have been consistent since the 1970s.” Messier is currently 11 months into a study for the U.S. Army and estimates that 40 percent of his 200 subjects will be hurt within a year. “It’s become a serious public health crisis.”

Oh boy. First, 79 percent? Wow. I don't buy it, but OK. Second, why does it say a couple lines down that only 40% of his subjects will be hurt? I thought we just said it was around 80%? That's a pretty big difference. And finally, running injuries = public health crisis? Somebody is looking for more grant funding.

And this beauty:

Nigg now believes mistakes were made. “Initial results were often overinterpreted and were partly responsible for a few ‘blunders’ in sport-shoe construction,” he said in a speech to the International Society of Biomechanics in 2005. The belief in the need for cushioning and pronation control, he told me, was, in retrospect, “completely wrong thinking.” His stance was seconded in June 2010, when The British Journal of Sports Medicine reported that a study of 105 women enrolled in a 13-week half-marathon training program found that every single runner who was given motion-control shoes to control excess foot pronation was injured. “You don’t need any protection at all except for cold and, like, gravel,” Nigg now says.

I'd like to see this study's methodology. First, were all 105 given the motion-control shoes? And if not, how many? And were the motion-control shoes only given to women that had problems...such as previous injuries?

The comments section is actually more interesting than the article itself, and has better information, both for and against barefoot running.

Here's the APMA's position statement on barefoot running, in case you're curious.

Look, I don't care if you run barefoot or not (I don't have a book to sell), but if you're going to proselytize barefoot running like there's no other conceivable way, please do it away from me.

Flame on!

A New Corvallis Race? In December? Really?

Apparently, EPIC 2011 will not be finished on Thanksgiving Day, after all.

A new race, a first year debut, has appeared. And it's a "Reverse Aquathlon" of all things! Check it out here. Officially, they're calling this event the Holiday Multisport Classic and it takes place on December 17th.

There's also a plain old 5k, if you'd rather. Personally, I'm all about the swimming, thanks.

So...the pain train rolls on! Event number 28 on the EPIC 2011 list.

Holy schmoly.

Running! Acting! Be a Movie Star!

Well, sort of. An advertising agency is looking for female runners for a video shoot. They'll pay you $100 and give you running swag! That's all good, right?

If you're in Portland, check it out, and let the R's know how it turned out. I mean, free running stuff! How can you go wrong?

Of course, if it's some kind of Craigslist scam and you end up selling knives door to door, please don't blame me.

Thanksgiving Day Runs and Races!

Wow! I know Turkey Day runs have been popular for a while, but I've never seen anything like this year!

When did Thanksgiving Day runs get so HUGE?

I mean, huge-massive.

I mean, massive-large.

Large-gigantic.

Gigantic-ample.

Ample-fat.

Fat-Turkey Day.

Hmmm...

Let's race!

RACES FOR WEEK OF NOVEMBER 21st TO NOVEMBER 27th

November 24th / Huffing for Stuffing 10k and 5k / Bozeman, MT

November 24th / Oregon Mid Valley Road Race 5.2m and 3.75m / Albany, OR

November 24th / Benton-Franklin Turkey Trot 5k / Kennewick, WA

November 24th / Bend Turkey Trot 10k and 5k / Bend, OR

November 24th / Bainbridge Island Turkey Trot 5k / Bainbridge Island, WA

November 24th / OAC Turkey Trot 10k and 5k / Corvallis, OR

November 24th / Turkey Trot Eugene 4m / Eugene, OR

November 24th / Turkeython 10k and 5k / Tigard, OR

November 24th / Seattle Turkey Trot 5k / Seattle, WA

November 24th / Turkey Trot 5k / Stevenson, WA

November 24th / Southern Oregon Turkey Trot 12k / Medford, OR

November 24th / The Oly Trot 4m / Olympia, WA

November 24th / Norpoint Turkey Trot 5k / Tacoma, WA

November 24th / Twin Tunnels Turkey Trot 8k / Hood River, OR

November 24th / ORRC Turkey Trot at the Zoo 4m / Portland, OR

November 24th / Turkey Trot Clark County 10k and 5k / Vancouver, WA

November 24th / Holmes Turkey Trot / Gig Harbor, WA

November 24th / Turkey Trot 3.5m / Longview, WA

November 24th / Turkey Trot 3m / Cheney, WA

November 24th / Gateway's Run for the Hungry 5k / Washougal, WA

November 26th / Seattle Marathon 5k / Seattle, WA

November 26th / Winter Wonderland of Lights Run 6m, 4m and 2m / Portland, OR

November 27th / After Turkey Day Trot 15k, 10k and 5k / Seattle, WA

November 27th / Seattle Marathon and Half Marathon / Seattle, WA

November 27th / Hot Buttered Run 12k and 5k / Vancouver, WA

November 27th / Methow Valley Off-Road Duathlon / Winthrop, WA

McDonald Forest 15k Trail Run Review!

So after missing out on running the Corvallis 5k earlier in the morning, I had to quickly clear my head, and my irritation, and get ready to run a tough trail 15k at the McDonald Forest Trail Run.

We arrived at McDonald Forest with the rain coming down pretty good and the promise of mud awaiting us on the course. Which was fine by me. Really, I haven't had a muddy race all year and with only this race and one more to the end of EPIC 2011, I was sort of hoping for a little mud!

This race was looking like it would start right on time, so a quick trip to the Honey Bucket, then I lined up in the starting chute.

And POW! Off we went. The 5k runners quickly went left, around the lake, and the 15k runners went right, around the other side of the lake, and that was the last I saw of the 5k folks. The first two or three miles of this one is pretty nice. Mostly flat or downhill, with nothing too steep up or down. But as soon as you hit that three mile mark...OOF. This race goes up.

This is an interesting course in that there are a couple spots where you can see the runners ahead of you, but then you take a quick turn and don't end up back where you just saw the other runners for a number of minutes. Tease!

At one point, just past four miles, and going up a nasty hill, my Garmin told me that it lost satellite reception. That's the first time its ever done that to me. It was very cloudy and raining, and we were deep in the middle of McDonald Forest, but it's still annoying to know that your trusty Garmin isn't keeping track of where you're going any more! And if you look at the pace chart above, you can see where it loses it - right where my pace goes to a spiffy one minute per mile pace!

Eventually the Garmin came back online and we were finally nearing the top of the brutal, never ending climb. And then came the part that feels so good the day of...and so bad the next day. The screaming steep downhill section. It's all you can do to keep up with your feet through miles six and seven. You're just flying through the woods! And strangely, even though it was still raining, there were very few patches of mud. The course was actually pretty solid.

So after one last uphill at the nine-mile mark, we were back to the lake and then downhill to the finish. Yes!

I crossed the line with a 1:24:21 time. Not stellar, but hey, that's one steep course. Over 2900 feet of elevation gain, according to my Garmin. I finished dead on in 100th place. Woot! Check the results here.

You might notice that World Champion Mountain runner Max King finished in second place. What?! I know, right? One Chris Reed beat him to the finish line, in an upset for the ages. But as you can read here, young Mr. Reed does in fact know how to run. Still, that's quite an upset. Congrats to Chris!

Also, note the winner of the 5k: Case Regan, a 7th grader from the cross country squad at Linus Pauling. Go LP!

And of course, we've got the always cool McDonald Forest 15k shirt. This year, it was a quality tech tee in a sweet purple color!

And the back, as usual, shows the pain!

Well, as far as I can tell, the EPIC 2011 train has but one race left. Oh noes! And that would be the OAC Turkey Trot 5k on Thanksgiving morning. Be there!

Corvallis 5 Race Review!

Or not, as the case may be...

So this was the first of a race double header for me on the 30th. The Corvallis 5k, at 9:00am, was to be my 25th race of the year and the McDonald Forest 15k Trail Run, at 10:00am, was to be my 26th.

Didn't happen.

Hey, I was ready and willing, but the Corvallis 5k wasn't.

All of the runners were literally lined up in the starting chute, at about 8:55am, when the race director announced, "Looks like we'll be a couple of minutes late. The 5 mile race will start a few minutes after nine, and the 5k will start at 9:15."

What?

I mean, WHAT?!?

Hey, it said in the flyer that the race started at 9:00. It said at the website that the race started at 9:00. I was on a tight schedule, with no room for error. I had to start at 9:00!

So I stood there and talked it over with my manager, otherwise known as my wife. Even if the 5k started right at 9:15, which was debatable, it would only leave me about 15 minutes to drive from downtown Corvallis to McDonald Forest and find a parking spot and get to the start line. Too tight. We came to the conclusion that I had no choice but to call this one and take off for the McDonald Forest 15k.

Not happy about that. I'll probably run the course later this week just to make myself feel better, but it's not the same. Here are the results. Yeah, I'm not in there.

Shirt is pretty boring, except for the fact that the back says, and I quote, "Spread the love like you spread butter! Mad Love!" Um, ok.

On to the McDonald Forest 15k!