Days like these …

Stutler Bowl.  Wow.

Broomfield High School has two new 1600 meter records, owned by the Mooney twins.  Both of their races were “legit” – with them going someplace because of competition they have not gone before.  Madison at the finish, while in the classic hands on knees pose a runner has post such an effort, blurted out in gasping breaths … “I did it.”  Yeah, kid – you earned it.

JZ PRd in the 3200, running out in the 16 turn stagger version of the event (it is a Colorado thing) and broke 11 for the first time.   I am blessed to continue to have a front row seat to his progress in this process.  It is amazing to share a bit of it. 

Michael’s race was a true boxing match – with both Michael and the eventual winner (by less than a quarter second) running four fourteen.  Each kid was swinging at each other with all they had and not wanting to give an inch.  It is a thing of beauty to see. 

I finish days like this hungry, tired, dehydrated, wind burned, sun burned, hoarse in the voice from cheering, with sore feet, cracked lips … but exhilarated.  I am so grateful to have the experience of being a part of this journey with these young adult athletes, the coaching staff and the supporting family and communities.  It is indeed amazing. 

The ditch

Less than 100 yards from my house is “the ditch.”  It is a classic west irrigational canal, bringing water from the highlands in the west to the farms and locations east.  I run the ditch a few hundred times a year.  It has a rider road next to most of it that is publically accessible, is a soft surface and avoids most traffic.
The ditch is either empty or full of water (duh).  I have long wondered what it would look like to see it at the moment that it was filling.  Ten years of running along this and I got to see that for the first time today. 

The dichotomy of the personal record

In the UK they call it the PB.  In the US, we call it a PR, or a personal record.  In other words, whatever your best performance is for a distance you race. 

It is your own “world record” or a measure of how you have performed your best for some measured distance in your whole life.  Or some segment of your life if you consider things like “the master’s PR” or some other significant to you milestone.

PRs are important to all of us, but it is pretty clear to me that they are very important to the kids I work with on the local HS team.   Some of this is driven by the so called information age we live in.  Every officially timed track meet ends up in a web database somewhere, and it becomes your own personal brand of performance.  If you are a kid that is vying for a state track meet spot, you have to put up a performance that is one of the top 18 in the state to make it to that meet in Colorado (for most divisions).  You become very aware as to where you stack, what your performance means, and if you are “good enough.” 

Even for the kid who is not a state level athlete, they naturally want to have objective evidence that they are improving.  They put in a dozen or so hours a week on the roads, track and trails in training to run as fast as they can around a track for two or four or eight laps.  With that sort of investment, it is appropriate that they want to see a return.

I encourage a focus on PRs too.  When a kid PRs, it is a big deal and I congratulate them as such.  They have done something they have never done before, and at some point in their life may never do again. 

Inevitably when speaking to a runner the topic of PRs comes up.  What was your best mile, 10k or marathon?  What was your best performance at Leadville or Pikes?  How fast were you in high school or college or as a master?  In fact, when a runner says to me that they were a serious runner at some point in their life and they can’t recall their PRs, they tend to lose some degree of credibility.  Remember when US House Speaker Paul Ryan claimed a PR for the marathon that was inaccurate?  The back lash, especially in the running community, was pretty negative.

But the focus on numbers, and PRs can be a problem. 

When kids show up to a race and it is too windy, too cold, too hot, too whatever … in other words the conditions are not ideal, and not “PR weather” they can take a dim or less than positive view of how they are expected to perform.  Or they don’t “feel” good and hence begin to think that because things are not perfect, they won’t perform perfectly. 

So while there is a consideration of PRs (or splits, or other numbers), it is not the whole consideration.  In fact PRs are not even the most important factor.  It is how you have performed for you on that day.  How did you compete?  How did you react to that competitor making a move in the race?  How did you respond on lap three?  What did you do when the pace went out too fast?  How did you overcome the weather or your less than snappy feeling legs?  How did you feel about how you felt?

This seems hard because it is less tangible to measure than a very objective number.  But we completely understand it. 

These pics above are samples from races where the finish time either didn’t matter and/or are significantly less than what would normally be expected.  But arguably, those races are pinnacle moments for each of the athletes careers and how they are considered as competitors.  Their PR is not what is considered most important when the body of their competitive work is reviewed – but rather performances where they overcame the odds, the weather, their competitors, and … themselves. 

Competere in Latin means "strive in common, strive after something in company with or together or to seek together.”  We seek a greater self than a PR in our competition, and so while a PR is likely to be an outcome from that, it should not be the only or most important outcome we seek. 

For me as a coach, I will continue to seek how to motivate and compel student athletes to these outcomes over a focus on the PR outcome, but it is clearly not a one or the other affair.

Local wildilfe

The open space just a couple hundred yards from our home and where I do most of my running if busy with wildlife.  This morning it was eagles and coyotes.

With the snow yesterday, the first light views to the west were ridiculous.


This came out yesterday.  Fun.

It is an oval

It is 400 meters.  And a second is a second.

While I believe there is a great amount of life that takes place on the tracks, the oval is not alive.  And hence it does not care.  It is a measured object, like a ruler or a gallon of milk.  It is just a thing.  It can’t care.

It does not care if you have trained well or not.  It does not care if you slept well or not.  It does not care if you got likes on Facebook or Insta or someone dumped you on Snap.  It does not care if you are 14 or 49 years of age.  It does not care if it is snowing or hot and humid.

The track is a measuring stick that you measure against.  You can’t outcry it, debate it, manipulate it, or force it to do something.  It is you and the clock when it comes to measuring performance.  You can’t create a different standard for you because you don’t like the standard.   Just because you don’t like what it tells you, doesn’t mean the message can be changed. 

Of course, you can ignore that standard, or walk away from it.  Maybe that is right or maybe not.  But that is you.  Not the track. 

Sure, we – that is people – we can say what we think it means when we perform on the oval.  If it was good or if it was bad.  If we felt good or if we felt bad.  If we think we left it all out there or if we had too much left.  But the track doesn’t really care.  You can make of it what you want.  But it is just a big measured loop.  It is an oval. 

JAMming it all in

It was a busy back half of the week.

On Thursday, with a storm coming in for the weekend, Fairview HS pulled their Saturday scheduled meet back to Thursday.   With Colorado HS track, there always seems to be attempts to outfox the last bit of winter during spring.  It worked with this attempt and it was a nice meet.  The added bonus was it was at the Broomfield track (so local).

On Friday,  Legacy held a JV meet over at the Adams Five Star Stadium. JV meets tend to be less formal, less competitive, have less participants, and timing is generally done by hand (versus FAT).  Also, Adams Five Start School District is one of those places where their are about a half dozen schools sharing the same venue for football, soccer, and track.  These seem to be the direction that more school districts take these days. The weather at this event slowly degraded to snow and rain, but between the two meets, nearly all our kids got some competition in.

Saturday – it was still snowing in the AM but we had practice anyway.  The kids all had prom and the bigger event later that night:  JAM (or Just After Midnight).  I have written about JAM here before, and as I am sure I have said there – “you have to see it to believe it.”  The HS gets transformed into a wonderland of carnival, arcade, games, food, and fun with the theme.  The theme is held secret to the kids until the night of prom while the community of parents, volunteers and donors put together the whole affair in the background.  The Friday of Prom weekend, the transformation of the school starts.  The kids show up Saturday at midnight and the affair runs until 4AM.  At the end, the attendees are eligible for raffled prizes. 

This year’s theme was “Turn the Page” and many of the rooms were based on books.  TZ and I worked the kitchen area, serving up food to the kids.  It was great because we got to see a lot of kids through the night.  Staying up to 4 is ridiculous (I had to remind myself this was something I had done for ultras without concern before), but it was a lot of fun.

JZ and his prom date looked great of course:

So it was a big weekend.

On the exercise front, I managed 70 plus miles.  Again, nothing spectacular here but with the other events I was happy to get it.  Sunday was rough as I was feeling the sleep deprivation. 

Four weeks at 70 or better going now, with efforts occasionally at a higher level of breathing.  Might be time to get back to thinking about stuff. 

Put in the reps

I was able to put in another week where I eeked out 70 plus miles, finishing it off with a 17 plus miler today with Greg and Jen.  TZ asked if I felt like I was getting stronger and I replied that I really was not sure.  It is good that I am getting in the mileage, but I am not sure it translates into me getting stronger or faster.  Certainly, it is helpful to get me better prepared for a longer race but I can’t see it necessarily translating into a faster mile or 5k at this point.  Some days the runs come easy, some days they sort of slog on. 

But I recognize the need for some level of consistency. 

TZ and I recently had our 22nd anniversary.  Some friends asked if we did anything special or if we got each other any special gifts.  While we certainly recognized the day and what it represented, and toasted each other with a beverage, the day itself was pretty similar to most days.  We worked, with exercised, we connected with each other, we did stuff to support the family, we made dinner, we walked the dogs …

So I replied that it was another day where we “put in the reps.”  My friend scoffed and asked if that was what I put in the card.  

Putting in the reps ain’t necessarily made for Hollywood and might not be romantic, but it is necessary.  You show up, you do the work, you build on it and inch the ball forward.  Marriages, relationships, work efforts and running.  Put in the reps.  Some days you might seem to go nowhere or even backwards.  But with efforts over time, you build something. 

Half stepped

His easy pace is 7:15 out the door.  Mine is about a minute a mile slower than that so our AM run together looked a bit like this:

It was all good though because I got to give him the obligatory “yeah, well we will see what the hell you can do when you are this age punk” speech that feels good coming out until you realize how much you sound like a cartoon character version of yourself.

Morning jogging is not my favorite time to go, as I usually feel a bit heavier, less springy, but I recognize it is better for me:  it gets the bulk of the exercise done, clears my head, and sets the tone for a productive day.

This blows

The day after I post about getting out and getting it done, I was delivered my own little test on that in Colorado.

Yeah, that is ridiculous windy.  Got out for five though. 

We told the kids at practice that practice was cancelled, that it was just not safe or practical to have a workout.  Go home. 

Then they circled up and asked anyway, “yeah, but if there was hypothetically a workout, what would it have been?”

Keep showing up

If you are reading this, you are no doubt aware of the results of the Boston Marathon today.  The interwebs in the spaces we visit are abuzz with the what we love about the sport:  you have to run the race, and sometimes nature throws you a curve ball.  The most fit on paper end up as DNFs, the those that can and will carry on overcome. 

That is not to say the 23 elites that DNFd today are weak, but today’s results show that they did not have something that those who carried on didn’t. 

Keep showing up.

Weekend wrap up

80+ miles last week, capped with 17 this AM with Greg and Jen.  Admittedly a week of significant volume and runs where I was moving a bit better had me thinking of possibilities.  A slight nice mental shift from exercise to training, but I recognize it came on the sweet trip to the Pacific Coast. 

Saturday fun

Track meet.  Yes. please.

A brief check in on the running

I got a good chunk of running this week – clearly boosted by the ease of the engagement I am on here, the wonderful weather here on the SoCal coast, and the availability of beach side running. 

I have 75 plus miles over the last seven days, with two of those days in Colorado, one of those days being a track meet day.  Getting out for 12 and change over a couple of runs while in California has set up for the closest thing representing training rather than exercise this year.  The miles have not been “slogs” either.  Admittedly, my first thing in the morning runs are still a bit slower, but even those tend to open up after a few miles.

I am not certain this will lead to anything in particular but it has been nice to get back at it a bit this week. 

Back to CO tonight.

38 Special

“Hold on loosely and don’t let go.  If you squeeze to tightly, you’re gonna lose control.”

If there is a something I have had to relearn countless times in life, it is to relax when looking to attain a particular result. 

It is an obvious lesson.   We have all seen the batter who is swinging too hard to crush the ball and ends up getting nothing but air rushing by.  Perhaps if they had focused on just making contact with the ball versus swinging for the fence, they would have not struck out.

Countless times in my life, I have been focused enough on a particular result that I have “tensed up” and then created a chain of stumbling events that usually undermines what I am trying to get to.

Racing of course is the obvious example.  At some point in my 30s, I felt I was sub 4:30 mile within my reach.   I lined up for an effort where a friend of mine’s wife was taking pictures.  The photos reflected my mindset:  intensely focused, determined, driven. 

Rather than be relaxed and let the race and the effort come to me, my determination came out like the over eager batter.  I exploded out of the start for a 63 first 400.  I ended up running a 4:36ish in that race.

Alternatively, one of my regular training partners, the late Andrew C ran 4:30 on the nose.  His prerace pictures had him smiling and waving at people.  In fact, pictures of him at 400 meters still had him smiling.  He won the race. 

The point here is not to specifically point out how mindsets at a race impact the ability to physically perform.  Admittedly, I see this sort of thing as a person who observes high school athletes all the time …  both with the kid who is clearly freaked out before the race and the kid who is overly dialed in.  The race point actually is an example for other behaviors, interactions and expectations as well.

(I could give many more race examples, especially  from the “Ws” at Pikes Peak but you can probably figure that out).

Another example that comes to mind is in the context of an argument.  In that very moment of an argument, I can feel angry, hurt and very impassioned to make it known how I am right and I will be heard.  But that never works.  Even though I really want that result, I am at the point where I am least likely to get that result because I am trying too damn hard. 

I guess the advice I’d provide myself here is … relax.  If you put in the daily effort to move the ball forward with the project, the effort, the relationship, you are going to reap the reward.  Yes, of course, there are times you have to dial that in, but overly subscribing to a specific result in a specific time with heavy handed intensity … it often creates the opposite.   An overly burdened mind can burden the outcome. 

That said, I have struggled to follow my own advice on many things. 

Hold on loosely or you’re gonna lose control.

277 Marriott Nights

The first steps are almost always the hardest. 

There are of course the days where I fly out the door, and every step is light, quick and with spring.  Or at least it feels that way.  I am sure if someone captured video footage it would appear to be exactly what it is – a middle aged suburban living white male lumbering down the street with a ridiculous grin on his face looking like the greenskeeper from Caddyshack.

But most days are not like that.  On business trips, where I know that half my opportunities to run are going to be before I go into the office, I am often slow to get out of bed.  Then slow to get dressed.  I might play around with prepping my clothing for work for the day.  Or getting on my phone or my computer to check the weather, the news, FB, grab a podcast to listen to … a bunch of stalling activities to delay the start.   There could be the fuddling with the GPS as well if it is synching for the first time out of town. 

Actually once I get out, the first steps are not too bad.  They look like I am running with a stick stuck in the wrong end of me but that works out within about 100 strides.  But then it is actually the worst part:  the body waking up into that “oh you want to run?” and firing up the muscles, the lungs and the head for all of that.  This environment of not wanting to run usually lasts for anywhere from a half mile to the entirety of the run.  Typically it passes around a half mile and I find the groove or what we called in the 1970s – the “second wind.” 

And then I am glad I got out.  Even if I never get the second wind I am glad that I got out when I am done.  I really can’t recall a time where I was absolutely dissatisfied with the fact that I got out and did something.  I might be less than stoked with how I performed but I am glad I got out and did something …

So I promise myself that I won’t stall or screw around the next time. 

But I still do. 

I recently learned I have spent 277 nights in a Marriott chain hotel.  That is not counting probably another 200 nights I have spent in other hotels.  And probably another 100 nights before I even set up a Marriott rewards account.  What I am pointing out is that I spent close to TWO YEARS of my life with nights in a hotel. 

But I have probably spent twice that time fuddling around to prepare to do my run, my work, my event … I stall too much versus do. 

Stall less.  Do more.

277 Marriott Nights

The first steps are almost always the hardest. 

There are of course the days where I fly out the door, and every step is light, quick and with spring.  Or at least it feels that way.  I am sure if someone captured video footage it would appear to be exactly what it is – a middle aged suburban living white male lumbering down the street with a ridiculous grin on his face looking like the greenskeeper from Caddyshack.

But most days are not like that.  On business trips, where I know that half my opportunities to run are going to be before I go into the office, I am often slow to get out of bed.  Then slow to get dressed.  I might play around with prepping my clothing for work for the day.  Or getting on my phone or my computer to check the weather, the news, FB, grab a podcast to listen to … a bunch of stalling activities to delay the start.   There could be the fuddling with the GPS as well if it is synching for the first time out of town. 

Actually once I get out, the first steps are not too bad.  They look like I am running with a stick stuck in the wrong end of me but that works out within about 100 strides.  But then it is actually the worst part:  the body waking up into that “oh you want to run?” and firing up the muscles, the lungs and the head for all of that.  This environment of not wanting to run usually lasts for anywhere from a half mile to the entirety of the run.  Typically it passes around a half mile and I find the groove or what we called in the 1970s – the “second wind.” 

And then I am glad I got out.  Even if I never get the second wind I am glad that I got out when I am done.  I really can’t recall a time where I was absolutely dissatisfied with the fact that I got out and did something.  I might be less than stoked with how I performed but I am glad I got out and did something …

So I promise myself that I won’t stall or screw around the next time. 

But I still do. 

I recently learned I have spent 277 nights in a Marriott chain hotel.  That is not counting probably another 200 nights I have spent in other hotels.  And probably another 100 nights before I even set up a Marriott rewards account.  What I am pointing out is that I spent close to TWO YEARS of my life with nights in a hotel. 

But I have probably spent twice that time fuddling around to prepare to do my run, my work, my event … I stall too much versus do. 

Stall less.  Do more.

I’ll, err, rather we’ll come back

It was not far from this spot that I saw dolphins.  I am not sure what they were doing but it certainly looked like they were just playing because they would ride a wave in, head back out, ride a wave in.  Of course and disappointingly,  a good picture of that was not going to happen with the phone camera.

Maybe they were not playing.  Maybe they were fishing.  Or maybe they were challenging each other to see who would get closest to the shore before chickening out.  Or maybe they were taking a nap and the waves were just pushing them around.

TZ mentioned (cuz I called her on the phone) that perhaps dolphins were the donkeys of the sea.  If they were, I’d get into that sort of racing for sure. 

Enjoying a sunset is good.  Enjoying it with the ocean as part of the backdrop is better.  Dolphins?  Good grief.  I am almost shouting at all the people around me “look it’s dolphins” (to which they would then recognize I am an out of town visitor).

The only regret was not having the family there to share it with me. 

I do encounter some level of pleasure meets guilt  on these sort of business trips.  There are those trips of course where I am getting my butt kicked, and the pre/post work jogs, while a welcome respite, are challenged by dark, cold, wet conditions in some clover leaf of highways.  But trips like the one I am on now … and say Tel Aviv, or Cork … I find myself irked at the guy in the mirror for not dragging my family out of their lives to be in a pretty incredible place. 

When feeling this, I make myself the promise that I will get them to such places someday, but I have yet to really fulfill that. 

I think I’ll follow KZ’s lead from a couple of years ago and get TZ/JZ down here next year for the half marathon or 10k or something this coming January.   

299 v 302

299 versus 302.

Meaning that 299 seconds is your goal and you have done it in 302.

Or said in terms that perhaps more would understand – sub five minutes for the mile.   (yes, I know the 1600).  You have run 5:02.6 as a best and on a couple of other occasions been just shy of breaking five minutes.  Or better than 300 seconds.  Or less than 1 percent difference.

I want you to know I only care about this because you care.  Of course, I have an appreciation as a lifetime runner as to how slipping through the completely arbitrary number barriers seems to represent something great.  Heck, the athletic performance of the 20th century is often considered to be Bannister’s breaking of four minutes.  These numbers are something we put some sort of value on.

So I get it.  And you’ll get that number someday I am sure.  Probably pretty soon.  And we will celebrate that.

But I want you to know that it only matters to me in that I know that goal is important to you.  What is more important to me is that you dedicated yourself to it.  That you have spent countless hours preparing for it, run a ridiculous number of miles, sweat gallons, and gone through blocks of ice on your shins.  You dedicated yourself to being something more than you are.  And that is great.  That is worth celebrating.  The lesson of that coming from spending all that time and effort to do something in less than 300 seconds … and some day less than 290 or 280 or whatever … it is the process lesson I think that is a template for so many other things in this life.  I am proud of you for that.

So, know I am going to be screaming for you every step of the way to get it.  And I am confident you will.  But if for some reason you didn’t, you are still a better man for chasing it.   But remember, you are not that number.  The number is the output, but the input is more important.

Thanks for sharing the ride with me JZ.

Love,
THE DAD.