Off Day

With the day off, of course that means running errands the Aaron Tang way. What does that entail? Easy run to the mall to pick up some sunglasses and ran to Rhode Runner to make my annual contribution to the running gods and bought a foam roller after a year of complaining. After much delay, Miami flight's booked, registered for Miami's marathon and now the easy part; training for it (right? Should be cake?)

By the way, the foam roller has brought me as close to vomiting/crying as any inanimate object can. Hopefully, this ensures painless IT band training.

Running makes life better

I. Running makes life better

II. Life makes running better

I.

Let's face it, I hate going to the dentist. They measure my heart rate there and I am always at least at stage 1 hypertension aka high blood pressure. White coat syndrome be damned, I was determined to not think about it as I noticed the assistant had Reebok Zigs on which she said helps her knees (no Nike Frees though) and that spun in to training, mileage, "fueling" runs with beer, the "hills" of Dallas races, ankle injuries, and a half marathon in Vegas and Vegas in general.

I don't think I have ever given a dental hygienist a high five before until this appointment. All because of running.

Also, in this whole healthy approach, the hygienist does know if you floss so to stop them from complaining, floss every day.

II.

During our latest in a series of long runs called "Getting Ready for _____(half-) Marathon", Sean, Knapp, and myself went for an easy 12 miler in Cumberland. How do you determine if your run is easy? The first quarter was spent talking about the Vegas trip I just embarked upon. It also made the first quarter fly by.

VEGAS

Nike Town in Vegas, not pictured are the changing rooms that had white tile and old school lighting like a locker room

While in Vegas, the only thing running related (and street legal for me to write up publicly) I saw were some runners that irked me because that reminded me of my lack of foresight to bring shoes and shorts to kill 30 mintues in the AM in between turning my temple in to the Temple of Doom of a body.

As I was getting my Clark's Desert Boots shined on the last day by Francis, a Kenyan, you knew I'd steer the conversation in the direction of running after the usual current events banter that I assume all shoe shining exchanges go. Francis was a 10k'er back in the day in high school. I had to ask what his PR was to which he responded that they only timed the finisher. Talk about cut throat. Also, I gave him much respect for the marathoners out of Kenya. He dropped some knowledge to me about the 1996 men's marathon finishers in Atlanta; finishers 1,2, and 4 were Kenyan (3rd was Canadian, eh?).

Feeling the after effects of Vegas, I am glad that I am not doing the half marathon soon because I'll need to be in detox mode for a while.

1st world problems part two

Any entry with complaints could be filed under 1st world problems but here's some more:

Ran easy too hard, hard too easy.

The tap water in Plano doesn't taste as good as Providence.

Lunaracers are tight in the toebox if your feet aren't 3 toes wide. 1/2 size up indeed.

Batting a 1000 on runner's waves and parents walking their kids to school saying "good morning". Not really a gripe, just I know I am back in Plano because of it.

Brocation means mileage for the week will dwindle.

East Bay Bake Path and Training, the first world way

It seems as though it has been a while since I've written about a normal easy run on here. Breaking that mold ... now. With the stars aligning, 3 runners had the same day off and with weather dipping to the 60s, the trio (the Ashton Mills Duo and myself) spent 10.5 miles together on the East Bay Bike Path. In an hour and forty minutes, we found out:

-sans ice (and bikers due to it being a Tuesday), this path is great for long runs

-heckling runners isn't easy; I still haven't heard an awesome heckle, for shame general public

-no matter what, the bathroom at the 5 mile mark is always closed

-easy pace is great. Except when the point above is in play

-Bolt in Daegu is still Usain Bolt

Kevin's Corner of Thoughts:

-it smells like weed, hence the Kevin dubbed East Bay Bake Path

-there's a new species of duck or Lochness Monster thanks to Kevin

-if the mansion on the path had Ryan Gosling in it, he'd break in

-in the event sharks become super intelligent (and capable of land maneuverability), the human race as we know it will not exist. Especially if the world becomes flooded a la Waterworld

We are definitely blessed to be able to run but that also probably means we are part of the middle-class 1st world and thus, we should train like it:

Ankle weights: thanks to Lauren lending me these, I hope I can fix my knee pain.

Natural Peanut Butter/ Almond Butter/ Cashew Butter: that's right, these exist and are written in order of most main stream to hard core Whole Foods hippie.

Chia seeds: If you read Born to Run, you'd swear every athlete would endorse this instead of Gatorade. Well, while visiting Sean at work post-race, I saw Chia Pets were now selling this. Running's gone mainstream. Still haven't tried em. Yet.

Bristol 5k Race Report

Before the annual tradition of grown men running down a slip and slide commenced, Sri soccer mom'ed Knapp and myself to Bristol around 8 am despite Hurricane Irene's impending doom upon RI. Pre-race, the other runners looked intimidating; Icarus wing tattoos were on 1 out of every 2 runners. Lack of beginning runners thanks to the weather. USTA bumper stickers. Inside jokes between local runners about the running of the bulls.

Before we even warmed up, we were swimming in sweat. The pre-race chatter began as we jogged around the parking lot. No matter what, my mind set was to break my 2-year old PR of 22:18 because after 2 years, can you really be proud of the fact you haven't gotten faster?

A quick warm up out of the way, about 50 of us lined up right before the road. A brief set of instructions by the director about mile splits then a legit gun went off and we were off and running. After 200 meters or so, we banked a hard right before a cop car and that's when the winner vanished from my sight. The first mile, I passed about 4 people and 4 passed me and after that, I basically was running alone. At the first mile marker, I looked down at my watch and realized I hit stop right after starting it. Got to mile 1.5ish's water station which featured styrofoam cups. I took one out of reflex and felt bad throwing it in to the woods immediately so I ran another minute with the cup. I tossed it anyways out of sheer stupidity.

Cars still drove around us during the race. Pre-race, the director told us that the 2nd mile marker was close to older markers. There was an old white '2', a red '2', and the new '2' all within seconds of each other. Mile 2 - 2.5, I tried conserving a bit of energy for the final kick. The good news was that my knees felt great (the adrenaline talking) so I knew I could do it.

Towards 2.5, we turned right where an older couple threw me a high five right by the bay. I had never run the course before but recognized that the end was near. I made a right turn and the final 200, I could make out the finishing time as either '22:xx' or '21:xx'. As I turned the after burners on, I saw that sub-22 was in reach. With a new PR on the line, I cranked it and had my best finishing kick to date.

21:58.

Hit the chute and the older guy asked me something but after every race, I have no senses firing and kept walking. The guy shouting the times out made sure to say nice kick twice, the last time gave me a high five. I'll take that and the PR. After finishing, I found Sri and cheered on Knapp's finishing kick at around 24:36 with a 1/2 Andy Bernard going. The post-race offered water, bananas, and watermelon and the organizers were super nice.

Having hit the gym the past two months definitely helped to negate the lack of mileage this summer. Nothing the next morning felt super sore and I felt that I powered through some spots due to core and upper body work outs. Talking to Bober, I guess it's just human nature to stop working out once running gets better. Gotta keep working out.

Still like 5ks the most although that may change once mileage ramps up, per Knapp.

I now know a new PR is worth way more than a medal or plaque.

A race of 50 people, top 3 male and female got 100 bucks, not bad for less than 20 minutes of work. That's 300 dollars/hr.

That was my best age graded time to date of 68.2, according to the Plano Pacer's calculator.

What does a 68.2 mean? That I am still on the door step of one of my many goals.

100 +             national competitor             

90-99             regional competitor             

80-89             local competitor             

70-79             above average             

60-69             near average             

50-59             below average             

40-49             novice runner             

30-39             fitness walker

Mail Bag

Great job, team!

Blackstone Valley Half Marathon Plaque:

(inscription)

BLACKSTONE VALLEY HALF MARATHON

FAMILY AND FRIENDS

CHAMPIONS

A Trip Down Memory Lane

This weekend had flashbacks of the past, with the Blessing race running through the old URI stomping grounds and Sunday's Cumberland run through the Cherry Blossom half path.

The run Sunday had us dropping like flies as KOB was recovering from the night before, Knapp hit a couple miles before the night before settled in, and my knee said not today with Pat left to baby sit me for the end of July (as well as the beginning, weird), walking back in the heat. While we were running the trail, it was nice to see the path that we used for the half marathon. What wasn't nice was the lack of shade towards the end.

Leaving Ashton Mills, Pat and I found this so to finish out the college-like weekend, it's now sitting in my apartment. I hope the thing doesn't steal my soul or take pictures from the future a la Goosebumps or the Twilight Zone.

And to round it all out in throwback mode, I had to hit 100 miles for the month (albeit the weirdest way to a 100 month if you check my log) due to my OCDness and ran the 3.1 mile out and back to Wild Colonial Pub. What was odd was half of the run was painted with a green line that followed the exact path (maybe from Waterfire over the weekend?). I also managed to see that there was a house music street festival. Mind you it's Sunday night, 9:30 pm.

LunaRacers+ bought; 25% off road runner. FYI, if you sign up for their VIP program, it's 1 dollar the first year. They auto-charge you 25 bucks the next year so be wary of that.

Blessing of the Fleet Race Report

Blessing of the Fleet Eve

I am trying to look at pre-race preparation as another goal. I made sure to get as much sleep as possible the week of (average 9 hours/night), have all my gear ready, iPod charged, and obviously Kara Goucher and Without Limits queued in my Youtube tab. Pasta the night before. Everything that I'd want to optimize race time. There was this one tiny issue; 2 weeks of riding the pine since my knee and lower back decided, "Tang, 1:20? Fahhgedaboudit". (Apparently my body is also Italian)

Blessing of the Fleet

Since the crew of Danato, Jess, and I worked the day of, our car pool didn't hit I-95 traffic until 4pm with a race time of 6pm. The good news was the weather was 10 degrees cooler than what I expected, settling in to the mid 70s with drizzle. Despite the lights of South County, we managed to arrive at 5:15 just in time to mark our territory in the woods as being a male proves an advantage in that aspect. That put the kibosh on coconut flavored coffee sending me in to 6-year old me, dancing around cross-legged while waiting in line for the portapotties.

Jess and Dr. Estus had to wait in the obscene line that snaked through the parking lot. Meanwhile, I'm parked underneath a speaker that's pumping "Girls Just Wanna Have Fun" and Danato, today's quote machine, noticed that there was surprisingly a lack of runners wearing Blessing shirts, the ultimate runner's faux pas.

Danato and I waited until the last 10 minutes to see if they were going to join us but the time had come.

The race officials must have wanted to get us out of there early as we heard the familiar gun shot about 7 minutes before 6pm.

And we were off to the usual crawling pace as the immediate left turn on to the course narrowed to two lanes. Now in any other circumstance, I would have loved this but the first mile or so I was boxed in by 6 girls as I tried to ride the sidewalk with Danato to avoid weaving through the crowd. We stayed together through roughly the first 3 miles at a bit over 8 minute pace. At this point, I knew this wouldn't be 1:20 and under with an intact back so I told him if he goes, leave me behind. I caught up to Jess at this point and went along my merry way. Further along, I passed by Sri's old place and remembered that in my younger days, I was planning on running there and back for 10-11 miles a long time ago when we lived in Bonnet.

Due to the possibility of rain, I didn't feel comfortable breaking the Shuffle out which I definitely needed to zone out today. The fact that the front end of my shoulders were getting sore meant I had to down shift my gear.

The turn in to the woods was a nice break as it was less humid and cooler than Ocean Road. I saw the building where a pre-pharm Tang in the rain promoted voting Yes on getting the new pharmacy building (Vote Yes on 2?) and then we popped out on to 108. Somewhere along the way people were handing out bags of ice.

Yea, bags of ice.

But beggars can't be choosers (apparent by every pit stop at every water station to swish, spit, shower and repeat) so I took that and applied to the lower back.

The long stretch of 108 left me a lot of time to think, yea this is me positive splitting. We then turned back in to the woods as I tried to tangent my way as much as possible seeing as how my lack of training wasn't going to make up for it. I kept thinking, get to mile 8 then turn the speed up as I was still within my 1:20 goal.

We started to see more crowd support in this neighborhood (and even a PBR/ Miller Lite water station). Around mile 8, who do I see?

Mr. Hartnett handing off water to none other than Eamonn's sister. My pride, despite my back, was on the line so I caught up and asked where ol' Eamer was and in air quotes, I got "he's working". Towards the last two miles, I knew I had to run 7 minute pace for a shot at 1:20 which wasn't happening so I slowed up to avoid blowing up. What didn't help were the false mile markers made infamous by some of the crowd. "Only x miles left". Erroneous. Erroneous on all counts.

The walkers took off an hour ahead of us so towards the end, you'd get these roving obstacle courses made of walking walls of women 5 wide in one lane traffic. Since I am not a walker I can be insensitive in saying this but could you possibly go single file? Same with people in the hallways at work, but I digress.

There was someone in the crowd handing out tiny USA flags the last half mile and following the race mantra of "beggars can't be choosers", I took it and held it high. I couldn't just jog it in with Old Glory. Due to the random wrong mile shouting going on, I wanted visual confirmation of the finish line before I could sprint waving the flag in what I hope was caught on film. Future motivational poster candidate for sure.

Danato spotted me as I went through my usual post-race pseudo-dry heave. I think I could run blindfolded and ear muffed and still know where the finish line was based on my Jedi gag reflexes.

In my best Charlie Murphy impression after basketball in the Prince skit, the race served us hot dogs.

Hot dogs. Who is in charge of food?

Also spotted at the end, a Jersey Shore faithful with a blow out. I give you credit for keeping that up the whole race random Guido dude.

Jess and Dr. Estus (aka the mayor of the Blessing) both creamed last year's times.

After a while at the finish chute, we walked towards the shuttle stop near the old Narragansett Casino/ Coast Guard House as I got a free shower thanks to the fire engine. Let me tell you, the school bus we got on reeked thanks to the ten miles x 60+ runners.

I got to talk to a fellow runner who is going to run the Providence half next week with a cousin from the Woodlands/ Houston and the only reason I mention this is I feel every time someone has a relative or knows someone from Texas up here, that is where they are from.

Since we arrived later and parked in the auxiliary parking lot, we were dropped off a ways away from the car. Jess, 'the glass is half full' girl, said we will hopefully miss traffic and we definitely did as we walked around for 20 minutes.

quote of the day:

'I'm going to do awful things to my foam roller.'

-Danato

Post-race, my hammies are sore so that tells me I definitely was undertrained for this. Shaved head > mane for racing. Sorry, Pre. The jury's still out on PM racing. I'll have to reconvene on this topic once I get back in to race shape.

Despite all the negative aspects I brought up, all in all I was happy for what was somewhere between a training run and race pace in terms of effort. The course was mostly flat and the crowd support helped towards the end. Running around our old stomping grounds definitely helped me feel better. 3 out of 3 on the PR front ain't bad either.

Blessing of the Fleet Week

-Glad to see residencies have decided to return two runners back to the team. Brian splashed his way on to the blog, and via phone Sri sounds like she's geared up for her first half in Miami.

-Team's rocking 2 returning runners from last year and a rookie Blessing runner. Since most of my miles have come in the form of treadmill mileage (from the same guy who loathes them), I am hoping for a decent time.

-One of the x-factors for getting a decent time, weather, is being watched as excitedly as the stock market. Keep dropping, Friday's high temp.

-Due to some nagging issues in my back and knee, my 1:20 or less dream for the race may just have to be replaced by just finishing.

treatment:

frozen vegetables for my lower back + belt = ice belt

future:

yoga/ back stretches

-Packet Pick-Up

Saturday, I took a nice drive down to the south side of Rhody, with memories and flashbacks of my roots at URI. Never having gone to Narragansett High School, I was shocked to see it is a left right before New Dragon/Exxon/ O'Neil's Package Store. After the fiasco of Cherry Blossom's tech shirt, I was pleasantly surprised at the Blessing's shirt (especially since I google'd Blessing of the Fleet shirt and found our site). Finally, another shirt to add to the rotation. I'm also told this is the first year they used tech shirts. No bags or swag, just a shirt and a bib number with a weird foam tag/chip timer.

-Post-Blessing, I am going to try to add some muscle in between that race and the half in October. What does that mean? Lifting things up, then putting them down. And ingesting tons of cottage cheese.

Why? To discourage everyone at work from confusing me with a girl at work and for a brocation. In the immortal words of Eamer, VEGAS BODY.