From Left to Right Me, Brodie, Katie before the CCR NCR 20 Miler

I guess when I used to think about running I thought of it as an individual sport.  I was wrong. These past few months of training has made it crystal clear.

I have trained for all 7 of my previous marathons with Jeff Arricale.  At the end of the Spring marathon season Jeff let me know he was taking a break.  The training has not been the same.  Having a partner to run the long Saturday runs with makes a huge difference.  When you run with a partner you push each other to run faster even if you don’t feel like it.  You make it out to the start of the run with purpose.  I find myself running slower this training.  I think a lot of it is that I don’t have anyone to keep up with.  I am running Chicago next month and have no clue what my time will be.

On the flip side other running friends are helping me out.  Juda’s Tuesday track nights introduced me to a group of pretty decent runners and had me doing organized speed work.  Mean Jeanne the BOMF running machine and I have become closer this season and have done some of our own track workouts followed by a cup of coffee and some conversation at Starbuck’s.  Katie from Charm City Run joined me for some of my last runs around the Baltimore harbor and showed me how fast she really is when she finishes 20 mile runs 30 minutes in front of me.  My friend Brodie and I reconnected with in the crowd of runners at the Maryland 1/2 Marathon. Brodie came up from Silver Spring early in the morning to Baltimore for the Charm City Run NCR trail 20 Miler last weekend to run it with me.  Brodie is a much faster runner than me. I really appreciate that he stayed by my side giving me encouragement the entire time.  Thanks Brodie.

Once I realized that travel to the Montreal Marathon was going to be prohibitive, Katie let me know she knew someone that had extra rooms reserved in Chicago for the marathon weekend.  Jeff had an extra bib for Chicago.  Everything fell into place and now I will be running the Chicago marathon.  Awesome.

One other set of friends that have helped out are all the people I virtually run with on Dailymile.com.  So I guess I did not train all by myself for this Falls race; I had a lot of help.

PS – I found out that I did not make the wait list cut offs for the North Face Challenge 50k.  Might be a blessing in disguise.  I am really looking forward to Chicago.

This was a HILLY race. I run out in Timonium MD for a lot of my long runs so I know the roads out there. These guys picked an uphill every time there was a chance. This course made the Annapolis 10 miler and the second half of the Baltimore Marathon look only slightly hilly. The only thing that kept me sane was the fact that this might be good training for the TransRockies. (ha) The race was managed very well with plenty of water and Gatorade stops. There was even pretty good fan support considering it was the inaugural running of the 1/2. The whole event went very smooth.

Photo credit Kristen F

As a designer I did not like the logo for the race, they did make a nice medal with it.  The medal is “gangster” in size. It is the largest medal I have earned to date.

I would recommend the race to anyone looking for a challenging, hilly, yet beautiful course.  Personally it was not a strong race for me. My unofficial time was a PR for the half in a negative way. (2:04:36)

Getting ready to go!

Hot and Sweaty and Finished

Jeff Arricale, Jen Arricale Colla, Bob Wilkes and I all ran the MAC (Maryland Athletic Club) 1/2 Marathon on the NCR (North Central Railroad) trail this morning.  Yes, three out of the four of us pirate ran the 1/2 Marathon.  It is a public course, we did not use the water stops (all two of them), and of course we did not take medals.  It is a weird 1/2 Marathon to pay for considering it did not benefit a charity and is on a course that is always open to run.

There was a lot of talk about how slow everyone was going to run.  Jen said “I should be at a 9.5 to 10 minute pace”.  Bob said he would be running at about the same pace that Jen mentioned.  I knew Jeff would be out in front of me, the last few runs we have done together he has been pulling away.  I felt very comfortable that I should be in the 8′s.  So as we headed out on the trail I was thinking the order would be Jeff, me, Jen, then Bob.  I was wrong.

I am not sure who finished first between Jeff and Bob but, I do know who finished last with a time of 1:59:30.  It was me!  To add insult to injury on the way back in the Westy Jen confessed that she had downed an entire bottle of wine by herself last night, to which Jeff added “I had 1/2 a bottle of champagne”.  I am not sure what Bob did the night before (he was in another car).  I however drank plenty of water and went to bed early.  I guess I need to re think my pre-race prep.  I forgot to mention, Jen being from Arizona wanted to take pictures of the beautiful Maryland sites as she ran the 1/2.  So, with her bottle of wine the night before, her stopping to take pictures, and oh yeah, she is older than me too, she still was able to out run me today.  As an added gesture Jeff offered me a rootbeer when we got back to his house.  He served it to me with ice in a pretty little pink princess cup purchased at Disney World.  Thanks Jeff.  It was still fun to get out there with everyone.

Wow!  After the weight training I did on Monday my legs felt like lead! Once I warmed up I was able to really push it today. At one point I felt “strong like bull”. We (Jeff, Pacer Katie’s dog, and Katie) ran past the Harbor around the Ritz Carlton and the Domino Sugar factory to Tidepoint and then back to Mt. Vernon.  Great little run!