Big Chief- THE BEST

Completed the long 10 Mile run last weekend with other Charity team runners.  Sunday was off Monday and Tuesday ran 3 miles each followed with some more speed work on Wednesday.  Moved the long run for this week up to this Saturday and completed 12 miles.  Nostradamus would be proud as Sunday was a complete washout as the Preston household was overtaken by the stomach virus.  Apparently someone slipped some "Big Chief" into Maggie's Birthday cake and completely wiped us out starting with Maggie and Molly on Thursday/Friday and culminating with a Back to Back to Back throwup-athon of Matt, Jimmy and Pam.  Here is a pic of the girls and how they spent Friday (note the Strategically placed bucket)

Video replay of the weekend's events brought to you by The Sandlot (Matt's Favorite.) Sandlot sidenote: Jimmy has now taking a liking to the phrase "You're Killing me Smalls" after I said it to Molly when after she was freshly bathed, changed and ready for bed she decided to have some massive diaarhea.   The Preston household where the fun never stops.

Holiday Greetings-Love the Prestons

Tuesday ran an easy 2.5-3 mile loop.  Decided to add some speed to the workouts on Wednesday and that seems to be the plan to make every Wednesday a speed workout.  Thursday was a nice 4 miles at an easy pace.  Friday was a 3-4 mile run through Breakhart while Maggie got her "Tumble On" at gymnastics.   The plan for the weekend is to do a 10 mile run with the other members of the MDSC team in Medford.  

This weekend is also when we begin the wonderful, heartwarming and beautiful process of taking the Christmas Card photo.   In the past we have also used this time as sort of an impromptu renewal of our wedding vows.   That is, of course, if our vows consisted of "You're not doing anything to help," or "You're the worst picture taker in the world," or "G** Dammit make them smile," and my favorite is simply "Do Something."  Aaah good times, good times.  The problem is we took a great picture of Maggie and Nellie for our first ever Xmas card photo that it's been hard to top that.  We also have the law of diminishing returns working against us as the longer we keep the kids out there posing for the camera the more antsy they become and the more agitated Pam becomes at me (primarily because I'm in the antsy category alongside the kiddies.)  We're just going to keep snapping photos until we eventually find one we can live it.  Next year it's a fruitcake and a handwritten note to all.....

House of Pizza

Previous Wednesday added some speed work followed by a couple of 2-3mile runs on Friday and Saturday.  Sunday was a long run of 8 miles through the streets of Andover, MA.  Slowly increasing the long runs on Sunday and it was a good measuring stick for what to expect with winter training as it was cold and a little windy.  It was good to see how busy the Preston calendar is and still be able to get the long runs in.  We had a rather ambitious Sunday planned beginning with Church, picking out a Xmas tree, some shopping, napping the babies, Xmas pictures and possibly yardwork.   I was able to channel my inner Jr High mentality  in succesfully negotiating out of going to Church.  Starting in Jr High if I had sporting events on Sunday morning I could go to Church on my own at a different time than the rest of the family.  This always turned into a cat and mouse game of how do I get around going.  Eventually I figured out that I could walk over to Church pick up a bulletin (the proof I was physically in the Bldg.) and then head over to House of Pizza for a slice and some time spent playing the Spy Hunter video game.  I do feel bad about it and have promised to make amends this week by taking the family to Church on Sunday...I wonder if House of Pizza has Booster seats???


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What are you Honking at!!!

After the Thanksgiving turkey Pam ran for about 45 mins (4miles approx) followed that up with some running through the XMAS list by grabbing some Black Friday deals.  Saturday was another 2.5-3miles on the treadmill and Sunday was an elongated 8mile long run (elongated because Santa was coming to town and was tying up all the main roads and had to find an alternate route.)  Monday was an off day and Tuesday was another 3 miles. 

There are some moments when raising your kids you stop and smile because they say or do something that shows you are doing right by them.   Maggie asks why Molly doesnt talk as much as Jimmy (in all fairness nobody talks that much) to which Pam replies, "She just needs some more help which is why I take sign language lessons."  Maggie responds with, "well then we should read my sign language book every night so I can help her too."  Add that to the exercise in Maggie's pre-school where they were all printing out pictures of what they want Santa to bring them for Christmas (Catholic preschool so save the letters to the State Dept as Santa is still ok there.)  All the kids were cutting out pictures of Dolls, Wii games and everything else that they wanted and Maggie had cut out pictures of finger puppets because, "I wanted to make sure Santa knew what Molly would like for Christmas."   Of course all this was preceded by the time I had all 3 kids (a modern miracle I know) and were attempting to go to the bank in Downtown Wakefield.  We're hobbling along in the crosswalk on Main Street when a car beeps their horn and not a split second later a sweet little Maggie replies with "JESUS CHR*** Lady what are you beeping at!"  That last lesson brought to you by her 25% Italian genes.....

...And She's OFF

So we now begin the training for Pam's Big Marathon Adventure part 2.  20 Years later and there probably is a smidge more prep work involved.  20 years ago the only thing that I was running was probably my mouth or maybe the tap on the keg but it certainly was not the marathon.  It was an amazing feat for a 17 yr old(don't do the math she'll kill me), who was not a distance runner and in fact was a sprinter, to jump right in and complete 26.2 miles without ever having run more than 3 miles consecutively.     That brings us to today.  Saturday she ran an easy 3 miles on the treadmill while Maggie swam at the YMCA.  Sunday was a 2.5 mile loop in Andover and Monday was a comfortable pace for 5.25 miles on the treadmill, while enjoying Bristol Palin and  DWTS.  The mood for the training was a little hurried and perhaps a little annoyed especially for sunday as someone was gone for 12+ hours at the Patriots game (the traffic can be BRUTAL) and the training run had to be crammed in.  There was also some light weightlifting done on Sunday as Pam rearranged the furniture in the house.  This is a semi regular occurence in our house and it sometimes feels as though I'm smack dab in the middle of the Davis Farmland Mega maze.  I find myself wandering around, confused and desperately searching for the exits.  However, change is good provided I can get my bearings.

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 9B2S7Y9ERFXV

NYC Marathon in the Books

Started out the morning badly as I flubbed the turn the clocks back agenda.  My "Go to" alarm clock I manually turned back before bed but then figured out after that it was one that automatically switched.  So I went back 2 hrs.  Got through that and caught my cab which takes you to the ferry.  A nice harrowing ride through the city at 4:45am at about 100mph does wonders to perk your endorphins.   Hop on the 5:45 ferry to staten island where you then catch a bus to the waiting area just outside the starting area.  This race more than Boston had such an international feel to it.  I felt like I was the one from a different country. We get to our corrals and begin the wait until we can move off to the starting area.  In the starting area and I gots to piss so I bolt out to wizz in the woods.  Come back from that and I see Ethan, the dude who won Survivor, along with 2 of the Bachelor/Bachelorette contestants.  I, of course, proceed to chat them up.  Move along in the starting area and I am now standing next to Al Roker and Meredith Viera, Shockingly, I decide not to say anything to them.  Roker, sensing my stalker ability, was ranting about fans and being bothered.  Noticing I was somewhere in the celebrity zone I sought out others but could not find anymore.  Race went off and everything was fine, passed the tennis pro who bet Andy Roddick $10K he could finish in under 4:30 and even surived an unplanned 5 min mens room  break at the 7 mile portapotty.  if you take out the 5mins or so spent in the can and I was right on for an 8:40 pace at or around the halfway point.Got to around mile 15-16 and my sciatica starting going captn bezerko.  This was right after I found myself running with and eventually passing Bobby Flay.  Anti Social dude had his ipod on but to his credit he had no professional runners acting as pacers for him.  Flay ended up passing me.  Pain went down the whole left side of my body from the back down past my calf and it was as though my whole leg was on pins and needles.  This pretty much but a huge damper on the 2nd half.  Beginning to think my old, giant ass is not cut out for 26.2 miles.  I was struggling to press on at this point and just kept repeating the mantra of  "8 miles left, 8 miles is a walk in the park. and so on."  Saw Pam and Maggie in Central Park around the 25 mile mark and finsihed in a tad under 4:09.  First half 1:57 (included a 5 min potty stop) 2nd half 2:12.  Got my medal put on me by Miss New York and proceeded to Walk 4 miles out of the park back to Pam and Maggie, not before I almost walked directly into Alec Baldwin, decked in full sweat-xedo mode and looking rather disheveled.  Was it crowded?  yes but I don't think that it bothered me too much.  Was it more challenging than Boston?  yes if you take it as a whole. Boston has more challenging spots (heartbreak, right before 128 in wellesley) but NY had alot alot of little ups and downs and it had miles of no people no cheering (all the bridges).  Was I happy?  Yes.  It's certainly aggravating to think you can run faster and be on target to and to come up short but I could have bagged it and quit and I didnt and I am happy with that.  It's a good notch on the belt.

Man in Motion

Friday's Hill repeat workout went well and worked out to be a little more than 5 miles.  Avg heart rate is still to high for my liking which brings me to Saturday's workout.  Saturday was to run for 1hour and a half and to slow down even walking when my heart rate rises above 140.  This caused me to keep a very snail like pace and was actually quite a chore.  I kept it slow and tried to increase the speed slightly until the HR went up.  Wondering if I should have tried to run in extremes for this workout (go out faster and then really walking when the HR is over 140) rather than staying in the middle.  I know I'm not going to get faster/stronger unless the HR can stay down also I'd prefer to not have my heart explode so thats another good reason to keep the rate down.  Finished the Sun-Sat week at about 37miles should have been less but I had to more last saturdays long run to Sunday.  Today's workout is an endurance run with a focus on a fast finish (hows that for alliteration...proves I paid attention in Mrs McDonough's english class.)  Ipod song of the workout was St.Elmos Fire by John Parr.  Didnt realize until I saw a VH1 hits of the 80's show that this song was originally an inspiring song about a man in a wheelchair who was going to ride across Canada.  That fact makes it exponetially less cheesy than if it was just created for that incredibly bad 80's movie.  The only good thing about that flick was that the main characters all went to Georgetown.  Seriously, am I really to believe that Rob Lowe is the cool guy because he plays the saxophone?  With all due respect to Kenny G and Clarence Clemons, I simply cant buy the fact that rocking the sax scores the big points with the ladies but as always what do I know....

Shake that Thing

The training schedule for yesterday had me running 4 miles at my endurance pace (9:30) focusing on on good form and quick foot turnover.  I ran about 4 and a half miles and averaged out to be about a 9min pace (the last half mile was more of a walk/cooldown and messed with the Average.)  I tend to start out slower and then pick up the pace and then run much faster than I should.  I'm sure these runs are designed to be run at the slower endurance pace but I get a little antsy and I'm sometimes trying to squeeze them in during lunch so I pick up the pace a little.  The Ipod song of the workout for today was "Get Busy" by Sean Paul.  This was a song originally added by wifey to the itunes directory and I'm only slightly ashamed to say I've hijackled it for my playlist (there are others and some even more embarassing than Sean Paul.)  I have no idea what words Mr. Paul is actually saying (I think I hear a "shorty", a "Rebecca" and a "Don't sweat it") but it's upbeat and helps keep my foot cadence up without overstriding.  I think alot of the lyrics are in Jamaican which I think is pretty much english but in more of a Jamaican me crazy English style.  It in a way reminds me of Cool Runnings which is a total "flipping through the channels, nothing else on, oh wait I'll stop and watch this for awhile," type of movie.  It's not something I'd go out of my way to put on but if I happen upon it well then all bets are off. 

Today's activity includes some hill repeats which will be run on the treadmill with a 5% incline.  A 5% incline is fairly steep and then I realize I signed up for the Mt Washington race and that averages out to a 12% incline for the full 7.6 miles. Total mileage thus far for the week  Sunday-Thursday  is at about 24miles.  Healthwise feeling good not great but no major issues. 

Matthew 3:15

I have officially begun my quest to try and see if an average Joe who is slightly on the heavy side and with average running abilities can qualify in his age group to officially run in the Boston Marathon. For a male 35-39 you need to have completed a Marathon in 3hrs 15 mins. So Ive now taken to calling my Vision Quest (I hope to never find a copy of that movie in the $5 bin at Walmart it would bring me to tears,) "Matthew 3:15" The actual passage from Bible is: "Jesus replied, "Let it be so now; it is proper for us to do this to fulfill all righteousness."" So as long as Jesus is not too busy being other people's co-pilots it appears he's on board to help me out. This may take a year or 2 or 3 or never but I'm going to give it a whirl. My fastest Marathon time was a 3:57 in 2006 and my most recent time was 4:20 both having been run in Boston. I have enlisted the fine services of breakthroughperformancecoaching.com to help me in this endeavor and Coach Cap has had me on a grueling training regime for the past 2 months or so. I am officially entered into the New York City Marathon on November 7 and the Mt Washington Road race on June 19 (7.6 miles straight up Mt Washington, should be a real treat on the recently repaired torn calf.) I plan to use this forum as means to record my progress and my thought process along the way. So in the immortal words of Tone Loc...."Let's Do It"