9.4 miles

Felt good. Good run to close out September. I did two big runs in September. One went good one went bad. This week-end I will do my penultimate run. The last 20.

I don't have better run data because I couldn't find the Nano, so no Nike+ and I listened to the Tigers win the 3rd game of the critical 4 game stand against the Twins. hen I talked to Joel while running. Couldn't have been fast but I got in 2 parking decks.

I did my Twenty!

September 19, 2009: I turned 40 and I ran my 20.

Top four moments from the run:

#1: Meeting Cathy and the Kids

I find Simon, Laura, Maddie and Cathy all with pom-poms cheering me on. It was great.

#2: Running up Cranbrook Hill

Cranbrook Road, just before it runs into Woodward, has the steepest hill I know of. (Though the parking structures at Beaumount are pretty bad.) Here is the profile of that hill as seen by RunKeeper Pro:
Mike Sklar and I used to ride a twenty mile circuit and the half way point was that hill and it always took my breath away. Jeff Stefeil used to tell me about climbing Cranbrook Hill on his long training runs. Everybody has been telling me that I need to be ready for the hills of the New York Marathon. So I knew I had to climb that hill. On the profile it looks straight up. The significantly higher hill just after Cranbrook Hill is the long climb up from the lake to the corner by the Art Institute and Lone Pine.


#3: The most Tweetable moment.

At mile 8 Nike+ crashed for the second time in the 3 years I have been using it. The first time was before I started to run. This one occured 8 miles into the longest run of my life. I had been listening to some tunes and decided to switch to The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo. When I went to turn off the music down went the Nike+ App. I couldn't revive the Nano. Luckily RunKeeper never missed a beat and captured the whole run.




Here's the tweet:

#4 and Cathy's top moment: Running with the family

I start my runs with an almost two mile loop around the southwest corner of the Woods. Cathy, Simon and Bo all sent me off in grand style by joining me for this warm-up loop. As we came around the loop and approached home, Simon said, "I'm glad we are close to home because I'm getting tired." I had almost 3 and a half more hours of running at that point.

One last pic...

from where my legs were dying. 20 miles is really hard and yesterday I couldn't have run 20.5 miles. Can't believe I will have another hour on November 1. Ughhh.

The post script

The punch line is that my wife had planned a surprise party for me. She took me to LaserQuest and I walked in to see Lyle, Steve Williams, Dave and Jill Hart, Susan and Trey, Amy (Matt had to deal with the babysitter), Jeff and Rachel. What a blast. I was destroyed tired but the entertainment was so high charged it was awesome. Great fortieth.

Thanks Cathy.

Tomorrow I'm going 20

I turn 40 tomorrow and it's Rosh Hashanah. Tomorrow is a watershed run. I have been running scared since the failed 18 miler two weeks ago.

I'm going to crush it.


-- Posted from my iPhone

September 4: The worst run

It was Labor Day Week-end and I knew I needed to get a long run in sometime in the three days. But I got change to get out early on a Friday and thought, "lets get that run in."

It was supposed to be 18 miles but I was feeling that Angry Whopper Ihad for lunch from the first mile to the 17th. And that was all I could do. I did complete a couple of errands. I went by Hanson's to buy some Goo. Then I went to the Apple store to pick up Snow Leopard and a Mophie Juice Pack Air. That would turn out to be a good thing.

On the return limb I just started dying. At mile 17 my iPhone lost it's charge and shut down. I could manage about another two blocks before I completely lost my charge...

I had to borrow a phone to call cathy to come get me.

With my new Mophie Juice Pack Air this will never happen again. Yeah.

Over 110 miles in August

Most miles ever. I had to squeeze in the final 9 miles in the last two hours of the month but I got it done.