Here I Go Again.

I don't know where I'm going
But, I sure know where I've been
Hanging on the promises in songs of yesterday
An' I've made up my mind, I ain't wasting no more time
But, here I go again
Here I go again

Lyrics from "Here I go again".  Such a great 80's song by the classic big hair rock band Whitesnake.  That said, it does have a wicked cheesy video though with its scenes of the band playing on a stage interlaced with Tawny Kitaen doing gymnastics between two cars and polishing them while slithering all over them.  The cars that is.  So cheesy that it makes me think of a couple of other classics.  Cheeses that is: Roquefort with its sharp, sweet and nutty flavor or Parmigiano-Reggiano with its great crunch and deep caramel-y, nutty flavors.  How quickly I get distracted...  It really is an appropriate song in this situation though because "Here I go again".

I told my family that I had met my goal and felt a sense of closure after I completed the Cox Providence Marathon in May of this year.  That I was done with Marathons and would focus my attention on training and improving my half marathon races (which worked as I had both a half marathon as well as a course PR for the B.A.A. Half Marathon last month).  That's the same thing that I said a year ago when I completed my first marathon up in Hampton Beach, NH.  My wife and son know me better than that though and they told me both times that I would run a marathon again.  Well, they definitely do know me too well, because:

Here I go again on my own
Goin' down the only road I've ever known

I'm running the 119th B.A.A. Boston Marathon on April 20, 2015.  However, I'm not on "my own" as I have been accepted as a member of the Boston Children's Hospital Miles for Miracles Marathon team.  This was the team that I tried to become a member of last year but wasn't able to because they filled their team very early on so I am very grateful that I have the opportunity this year.  Being able to support Boston Children's Hospital's critical mission personally means a lot to me as my son has received outstanding professional and compassionate care from this outstanding organization over the years.  I am very appreciative to have the opportunity and to be able to be associated with such a prestigious organization in the health care community.

I have also signed up to be part of the Miles for Miracles Patient Partner program where I will be teamed up with a patient of Boston Children's Hospital.  This is such a great opportunity as we will be able to provide support and inspiration to each other during my training.  I'll provide more information about who I'm partnered up with when I get the details in early December.

My fundraising for Boston Children's Hospital has just begun.  If you are interested in helping me with my goal of $7,000, please visit my fundraising page:  http://fundraise.childrenshospital.org/goto/runner716  Any donation, whether small or large or somewhere in between is greatly appreciated. 

I want to thank my wife and son for their continued unconditional support and understanding of my need to do this.  Training for a marathon takes a lot of dedication, shuffling of schedules to fit in training and a lot of time away from family.  Knowing that they are behind me 100% makes it a bit more manageable.  Thank you and I love you both more than you'll ever know.

I'm going to blog about my training and new products that I will be using as part of my training along the way.  I've already made several trips to running stores and picked up a few new things that I cannot wait to try out.  It's a bit geeky I know.  As I'm finishing up this post, we are getting our first snowfall of the season.  It reminds me of some of my training runs this past winter.  I cannot wait for those days with 2 degree temperatures, whipping winds and snow in January.  Now that is geeky!

An' I've made up my mind
I ain't wasting no more time...

But, here I go again,
Here I go again,
Here I go again,
Here I go,
Here I go again...

Until next time, keep on runnin'!

It Takes Two.

It takes two to make a thing go right
It takes two to make it outta sight
Hit it!

What the frig am I talking about?  OK, I had to stretch it a bit and go back to my DJ days to find a song that would go along with today's post. 

I'm Rob Base and I came to get down
I'm not internationally known
But I'm known to rock the microphone

Back on topic.  Two.  Two updates on past posts.  The first?  Refueling gels.  Back in February/March I compared several different energy gels and rated them.  Guess what?  What Keith?  The first place finisher "Body Glove Surge All Natural Energy Gel- Chocolate", they stopped making it!  Say what?  What?  I love that one.  So much for the influence that my first place nod for it had on the manufacturer.  Oh, well...

The reason why, man, I don't know
So let's go, cause
It takes two to make a thing go right
It takes two to make it outta sight

 

Never fear!  Replacement Gel is here!  A new 1st place winner has been crowned (I used it during the B.A.A. Half Marathon two weekends ago).  It is an all natural product called "Accel Gel Rapid Energy Gel" and which is made by the same manufacturer as the "Body Glove Surge Gel" was.  It has all the same chocolately goodness as the original first place winner but without all the, let's see now, how did I put it before... that's right "texture".  It was as smooth as "(insert your own favorite phrase of choice here- example: baby's bum, silk, glass, velvet, butter, a southern drawl or aged whiskey- just to name a few).  It is a  dry, medium-bodied red, offering sappy black cherry and plum sauce flavors, with dried herb and olive tapenade notes. Balanced, with a moderate finish.  Sorry, wrong blog for that one.  It does however have a mild natural chocolate flavor and pleasant aftertaste.  The Accel Gel has a great consistency and is easy to get down while you are re-fueling mid-run.  It supplied an even and consistent level of energy and is made of all natural ingredients.  The only downside that I have with it?  It only has 20 mg of caffeine versus Surge Gels' 150 mg.

Cause I'm Rob, the last name Base, yeah

And on the mic, I'm known to be the freshest

 

Number 2.  No, not that "number 2".  Boy that stinks.  That's crappy.  Courtesy flush please?  OK, the second update is on the B.A.A. Distance Medley results.  My official results over the three races are:

 

	5K Finish	10K Finish	Half Finish	Cumulative Time	Overall	Percentile	In Age Group	Age Group Percentile
	22:01 (613)	45:41 (522)	1:37:53 (449)	2:45:35	150 / 833	81%	25 / 147	82%

My 5K and Half Marathon times were PRs for me as well as the Half time being a course PR for me.  I'll take all of those stats any day.  And that is no steaming pile of number 2 but it does take two to make a thing go right!

Until next time, keep on runnin'!

That's A Wrap.

What a fantastic morning for a race.  Today was the B.A.A. Half Marathon which wrapped up the B.A.A. Distance Medley for 2014 with a big old blue and yellow bow on top.  What a great trio of races throughout the year.  Starting with the 5K in April, 10K in June and the Half Marathon today.  Great courses and absolutely the best organized and run races anywhere. 

I ran this same half last year so I knew what to expect along the way.  I loved it then and still loved it today.  It is one of the more challenging due to the many hills throughout the course (especially that beauty at mile 11).  Maybe that is why I love this course so much.  Maybe it is the beautiful scenery along the route in the Emerald Necklace.  Maybe it is the throngs of spectators who cheer all the runners on with their cow bells and goofy signs that make us runners giggle as we are pounding the pavement.  Maybe it is all of these things that makes it one hell of a wicked pissah race that wraps its shoelaces around you and makes you run it year after year.  Just maybe.

Race day started with the alarm clock rudely waking us up at 4:30 AM this morning.  How dare it?!  What was it thinking?  Well, if it wasn't the alarm clock, it would have been the alarm on the iPad or the alarm on the iPhone both set for 4:35 AM.  Yes, I am always paranoid that I'm going to wake up late and miss a race.  Always have to have a backup to the backup.  Ah, I totally forgot that I could have set my son's devices too so that there could have been a few more backups!  Darn it.

We got on the road and made it to the shuttle bus location at the Bayside Expo Center in Boston wicked early.  Like seriously wicked early.  Early bird catches the bottle of Gatorade or something like that.  We boarded the bus and made it to the field at Franklin Park next to White Stadium where the finish line is.  Boy (or girl if you prefer) was it friggin cold out this morning!  It was so cold that you could see your breath as you crunched the patches of frost on the ground.  Perfect weather for a run. 

My plan for today's race was to just beat last year's finish.  Plain and simple.  Well, that plan worked out well as I finished with a PR for both a half marathon and for the course as well as shaving 5 minutes 30 seconds off of last year's time.  "Gillette, the best a man can get".  Sorry, "shaving" made me think of that jingle (now it is stuck in my head)!  I'll take that "stubble", sorry, "faster time" and the stats below any day:

Net Time 1:37:53
Pace 7:28
Overall 553/6211
In Gender 451/2682 (Male)
In Division 52/330 (M40-44)

The B.A.A. distance medley was such a great trio of runs to participate in as they were nicely spread out throughout the year, are great courses and well run.  I'll post my final medley time and place as soon as they are posted on the B.A.A. site.

Thank you to my wife Jen for getting up early today to go and support me in the freezing cold!  We both got to listen to "Back in Black" being played over the event speakers while we waited for the race to start!  How appropriate (see my last post before this one)!

Until next time, keep on runnin'!

Rice Medley.

A delicious and wholesome medley of whole grain brown rice, wild rice and red rice mixed with vegetables and seasonings.  As Mr. Food would always say, "Ooh, it's so good!".  Sorry, I meant "Race Medley".  Such a goof ball sometimes. 

Today was the 5K race which was the first race in the B.A.A. distance medley and was the kickoff to Marathon weekend.  It was such a good feeling to run a race again after all of the training runs the past several months.  I had wondered if the fact that there were going to be 10,000 entrants running in this race was going to make the course very congested and slow the pace down.  Luckily, it didn't.  It was a bit slow at the start but once we got onto Beacon street it opened up pretty quickly. 

The race today was a bit of a dress rehearsal for Monday as part of the course included the last part of the Marathon.  It was really cool to actually run "Right on Hereford, Left on Boylston".  Making that "Left on Boylston" was a truly emotional point of this race.  The Boston Fire Department had a fire engine with it's ladder extended and a huge American flag hanging from it over the street.  As I went under it, all I could think of was the two firefighters, who passed away a few weeks ago, that were from the firehouse that this engine was from.  Really powerful stuff.  My thoughts quickly went to the events from a year ago as I was approaching where the second bomb went off last year.  I tried to imagine what it would have been like for all those people around that area.  It quickly changed again as I approached the Marathon finish and the site of the first bomb.  I continued down Boylston weaving my way through other runners and then made the final turn onto Charles street.  I put everything into it to finish strong.  I ended up setting a PR for myself for a 5K finishing in 22 minutes 1 second with a pace of 7:00 min/mile.  My race results overall were: I finished 770 out of 8,640 participants and 65 out of 451 in my division.  I'll take that any day.

What an emotional roller coaster this race turned out to be.  From start to finish.  It is something that I will never forget.  I can just imagine what Monday's race is going to be like if I thought this one was emotional! 

Until next time, keep on runnin'!