Getting a Bone Scan

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I've Been Pimped Out

Thanks to my friend Greg Barnett of Rock'n Motion Design (twitter @gregbarnett), I have a fancy new pimped out blog with my own domain name. You can now find my blog at http://chroniclesofbeast.com All of my posts going back to 2003 can be found at this location. I hope you like the new design. I think Greg did a great job and recommend him for all your web design needs. Beast

3 Weeks and a Day

It’s been 3 weeks and a day since the last time I’ve run. In that time a couple of things have happened to me. The good news is that my legs no longer hurt as much. It is no longer excruciatingly painful to walk down a flight of stairs and I can walk without feeling like I am hobbling along. On the negative side, I’ve become morbidly depressed. It’s not depression over not being able to run; it is more the fact that running for me somehow kept my depression from hitting me so hard. There is a simple ease in running and the longer I ran the better I felt. I could lose myself in running and all my pressures and worries just seemed to disappear. Having that taken away from me was like the proverbial straw that broke the camel’s back. Yes I can go bike riding or swimming, but they are just not giving me the same pleasure that running gave me. I feel good after I get in a swim or a bike, but the effort that goes into doing those activities just seems to be too much for me at times. All I had to do for running was slap on a pair of sneakers and go. My mind could wander aimlessly as the miles passed by and I didn’t have to think of anything more complicated other than what my next turn should be. Swimming and biking take a higher level of concentration and doesn’t give me that Zen feeling. When I get on my bike or go to the pool, I am forcing myself to do so. It is not something I want to do. I don’t know what this means. My nickname of Beast came from the days that I would be up at 4am every morning to do mega workouts. I’d do this right through the dead of winter when not another living soul would dare to go outside. I am so far away from that person right now and that makes me sad. I wish I could recapture it. My inner Beast has escaped leaving me a shell of who I once was. I’ve written about this before how in the past I would be heavily into training, but after a while I would burn out and return to slovenly ways. Normally a training cycle would last about 3 years. I’ve been going since June 18, 2001 and have made a very good run of it this time. I have no desire to return to being a fat bastard that is completely out of shape. I am not getting younger and it gets harder and harder to whip a body into shape. I know this in my heart and I feel much stress and pressure for me to continue to keep myself in shape. I need a catalyst to spark my interest in getting back into shape. The Vermont 100 Mile race was that catalyst for me this year, but that has been taken away by my sudden inability to run. I am supposed to wait 6 – 8 weeks before I begin to run again. It’s going to be hard to maintain some sort of fitness during this time. I’ve been managing to work out around 4 times per week. Hopefully I can continue to do so. Also hopefully, I won’t lose interest in pursuing the Vermont 100 Miler by the time I can run again. It’s happened to me in the past, where I’ve been denied something that I wanted for a long time, but ultimately getting it at a later date. However by the time I got it I no longer cared about it. I hope that’s not the case with the Vermont 100. Last week I was in New Orleans for a company convention. I had big plans to explore the city by running around it. New Orleans is a very beautiful place and as I explored it by trolley and foot, I felt an anger rising inside me that I couldn’t be outside running. I distracted myself from these thoughts by partying and drinking with my colleagues from work as much as possible. I will say I did succeed in distracting myself. I have some pictures to prove it, which I will not post here, lest one of them come back to haunt me in the future. Those who followed my Tweets on Twitter know somewhat what I was doing while in Nawlins and I am going to let that serve as my record of my adventures. I need to find something that is going to give me pleasure in life and make me happy. Or perhaps more accurately, I am going to need to learn how to be happy. I feel like it’s a lost emotion and I don’t know how to find it. There are things that give me pleasure and make me happy (such as my children), but those are at time moment circumstances. It doesn’t stay with me. I am looking for it and just can’t find it. I am a blind man in the desert searching for water. All I seem to be able to find is dust.

Traffic. At least I have a view of the Full Moo

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Walk the Earth

Well, I haven’t been running for the past 3 weeks in order to let my shins heal. I’ve reached the point where it became too painful to run and in fact believe I finally have a stress fracture. I have a Bone Scan scheduled next week which will tell me definitively one way or another. In essence though, it really doesn’t matter, because either way, I probably need 6-8 weeks off from running to let my legs properly heal. In the 3 weeks since I’ve run, I could tell my legs have gotten somewhat better as it is no longer excruciatingly painful to walk down stairs. My lack of running someone accounts for my lack of blog postings. However, I do have a couple of things to write about. One is about my trip to New Orleans for which I’ve already posted several pictures and this post which I would like to dedicate to my friend Jack Lhasa. Jack is going to be doing something I’ve only dreamed about doing; and that is roaming around the United States; sort of like Caine from Kung Fu. Jack [@jacklhasa] and his friend [@scarab] are going to hit the road (USA) in search of work, home and enlightenment. They are young and will probably never have this chance to experience this country as traveling writers. They will also be looking for writing work along the way if you can utilize them. Did I mention these two are highly entertaining? I ask that you reblog this and even contribute to their travels. Any amount is better than none. You can at least email them encouragement if you do not have the money or would like to offer a place to stay for a night or two. Thanks! Donations made through: [PayPal] email address is: jackstravelfund at Yahoo dot com blog: [Loki Listens] & [the entropy report]

My Alligator Head

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Alligators in New Orleans Swamp

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At the Dragons Den

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Friendly Alligator

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Driving Swamp Boat

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On Bourbon Street

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BBQ Sauce Courtesy of DaphneA

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Cake - it makes my mouth happy.

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Fluffernutter

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NY Knicks at Madison Square Garden

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Caumsett Park 50K

It is hard to write a lot about a race that is over a loop course. The Camsuett Park 50K was held in a State Park over a 2.6 mile loop. It is the same thing over and over again, so it is not like you have changing scenery to describe. I really don’t mind a loop course though. I find that I get a meditative pleasure out of it. The key to running a loop course is to see how evenly you can do each loop and for the most part this is what I accomplished. In general, you are running with two types of runners. The first kinds are those runners who are faster and wind up looping you; and the second kind, those who are slower, which you loop. Obviously, I tried to loop as many runners as I could and limit the number of runners (and number of times) the faster runners were able to pass me. I was looking forward to this race all week long. It was going to be the first real test of my shins and real distance racing. I didn’t know how they would react and whether or not the pain would build up and force me to drop out. Fortunately, the pain was never that bad, although I could tell that whatever is bothering my shins was greatly limiting my speed. I was able to keep a nice steady pace, but I was concerned with my inability to generate any real speed. This really is only a concern, because I want to run a Boston Marathon Qualifier at the upcoming New Jersey Marathon. I felt that with the number of 20+ milers I’ve done so far this year that I should have been able to maintain a faster pace. I really don’t understand why I have such a lack of speed and this is something I am going to have to discuss with my coach. Perhaps with my shins, it is just not possible for me to run fast at this point. As with any long distance race, I was riding an emotional roller coaster throughout it. There were times that I seriously considered dropping out, when I was wondering why I was bothering to place this punishment on my body. The there would be times I felt good and wanted to keep on going. I am smart enough to know now that a lot of these feelings have to do with the timing of my nutrition. I mostly found that during the first half of the loop I was pretty miserable and wanted to quit, but by the time I got to the second half, the food I had taken in at the aid station/lap counting location would start to kick in and I would feel better. Ultimately though, what I think got me through this race was the announcement I made to my friends on Twitter that I was going to run a 50K this weekend. I didn’t feel like going back later on and telling anyone that I had quit the race because I didn’t feel like going on. I did have a couple of low points. The biggest one was as I was just finishing up my 7th of 12 total loops. I was developing some nasty blisters on my right foot and I knew I needed to take care of them. I stopped at the aid station, grabbed some Vaseline and lathered it on my toes with the blisters. It helped somewhat and I was able to proceed without being in too much pain. The delay cost me 3 minutes which I came to rue later on as it caused me to miss breaking 5 hours on the clock. I came in at 5:01:40 and in addition got passed within the last few feet by another runner as we sprinted to the finish, but more on that later. If only I was man enough to deal with a little more pain, I would have broken 5 hours and moved up a couple of places in the standings. I kept myself fueled throughout the race by drinking from a bottle of HEED that I prepared at home. I am really glad I took that I didn’t rely completely on the food provided by the race. The food at the race was mostly PB&J sandwiches, or which I did eat several, cookies, M&M’s and cola. I alternated my fueling with the HEED and PB&J and cola. It worked well for me and I was never really hungry or low on energy. During the entire course of the race, I was alternating between being too hot and too cold. There were times that the wind was behind you with the bright sun shining down upon you and I wished I didn’t have my running jacket on. Inevitably though, I would come around a last turn that led into the aid station which had a strong cold headwind blowing right through you. At those times I was glad to have my jacket. All I could do was marvel at those runners who ran in short sleeves, singlet’s and shorts. I was dressed for harsh winter conditions. Perhaps I should have dressed a little lighter, so I would have been encouraged to speed up to generate body heat. Once I got past the 7th loop I knew I was more than half way home. At this point I thought I had to do 13 laps, so I was saying to myself, just keep steady and keep running. I guess the high point of the race came around the 10/11th lap when I finally realized that we only had to do 12 laps. I found this out when I was at the aid station and I asked the race director how many total loops we had to do. He told me 12 and I replied “That’s all”. He thought I was a little crazy so I explained to him that I thought we were doing 13. It was like being given a little present. My pace was starting to slow down from the mid 9 min/mile to somewhere in the 10’s. I was happy to know that the race would soon be over with. Once I got into double digit laps I knew I has the race complete. I passed the marathon point at about 4 hours into the race so I knew I had an excellent chance of breaking 5 hours. I wasn’t really paying attention to my watch; otherwise I would have pushed it a little harder on my last lap. It was this last lap that annoyed me as someone passed me within 200 yards to the finish line. I let him take the lead for a little while and then decided to make a move to try to retake him. I held him off until about 30 yards in front of the finish where he caught me and beat me by 3 seconds. I should have waited a little while longer to make my move so as to have the surprise and more importantly, I shouldn’t have stopped to fix that blister, since that is really where I lost the time. In the end, it really didn’t matter though as that extra place had no impact on whether or not I won an age group award. It was though a great sprint to the finish and we both looked at each other and laughed and thanked each other for the strong finish at the end. I felt pretty good after the race and took my time getting ready to leave. I drank some Recoverite to refuel and had a little bit of the post race food. I really couldn’t tolerate anything solid in my stomach at that point, so I was glad to have my recovery drink. Later on when I got out of my car from driving home, my shins were completely shot. It was agony walking to the front door of my house from my car. It made me a little nervous, because I was wondering if I just crippled myself. However, a few ibuprofen fixed me up and I was able to move relatively well after that. To further soothe my legs and shins I took an ice bath. That always a brisk and semi-torturous experience depending on how hot you are after a race. As it was winter time, this bath felt a little more frigid than when I race hard in the summer. I also knew that one of the reasons why my shins hurt so badly was running on worn out sneakers; well at least the right shoe. I wear them out unevenly. Here is a picture of my quite dead right show. I did see my podiatrist the next day to get the blisters on my feet taken care of and to ask him about my shins. He gave me a bit of cortisone in each shin and fitted me with some special orthotics that he invented and is looking to bring to market. He is using me as a case study to see how they work. I need to wait 72 hours before I run again (after the cortisone shots), but I can’t wait to see how I feel in them. Hopefully, I will feel a lot better. I’ll also be starting on a new pair of sneakers as the shoes I wore for the 50K were very sadly worn out. There was no way I should have been running in them. Here is a picture of one of the shoes that shows how worn out it is. Anyway, I hope I recover quickly. My next ultra race is the Queens 60 Kilo (37.2 miles) on March 29. It’s another loop course and I am looking forward to it. Hopefully, I’ll get to do it with a couple of friends. It’s always good to have company of these long runs.

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ice bath

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Ice Bath

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ice bath

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Sushi Deluxe and a Sapporo

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Three Borough Tour

Sunday (2/24) I went on another running journey with my friend Larry through New York City. We started out with a partial lap of Prospect Park, exiting through Grand Army Plaza and then down to Lafayette Street where we picked up the NYC Marathon course. The roads were a bit icy, but not too bad, although on occasion my foot would hit the occasional icy puddle and get cold and soggy. The course was nothing new at this point and we slowly and steadily made our way through Fort Greene into Williamsburg. Once in Williamsburg, we stopped for a moment at the Russian Orthodox Cathedral of the Transfiguration . It’s supposedly the most beautiful cathedral in Brooklyn. Either way it made for a nice picture so I stopped and snapped a photo. We then ran into McCarren Park for a quick stop at the comfort station. Normally at this point we would then head for the Williamsburg Bridge, but today we decided to go for the 59th Street (Queensborough) Bridge. To get to the 59th Street Bridge, we picked up the NYC Marathon course again and headed towards the Kosciuszko Bridge for our trip into Queens. The Kosciuszko Bridge is the half way point of the NYC Marathon and in my opinion one of the more difficult parts of the course. The view from the bridge is spectacular though. We were fortunate to come across someone walking over the bridge at the same time we were crossing it and asked this person to take a picture of us. Here we are on the bridge with the picture looking southwest towards midtown Manhattan and the Empire State Building. The Newton Creek runs below the bridge and separate Brooklyn from Queens at this point. I also took a picture of the skyline alone so you can get a better idea of the view from here. Once over the Kosciuszko, we ran through Long Island City towards the 59th Street Bridge. Larry and I talked about a future run in which we would skip the 59th Street and head to the Tri-Borough Bridge instead. In the meantime though, we kept running and made a pit stop at corner bodega about a half mile from the bridge. The pit stop was just in time as I was getting a bit hungry and I unfortunately forgot to bring some Hammer Gel with me, so I bought a Snickers bar and a Gatorade to refuel. It wasn’t what I preferred to eat, but it will do in a pinch. Honestly though when it comes to ultra running, you need to train your stomach to take on a variety of foods which includes something solid; not just gels. After eating and drinking we made our way onto the 59th Street Bridge. This was undoubtedly the least pleasant part of our run. Only the north side of the bridge was open for running, which meant that you didn’t get the nice views of Manhattan. Plus this side was in the shade and also very icy, in addition to being very cold, windy, noisy and had freezing water dripping down on us from the upper roadway. I would have liked to have gotten several pictures from the bridge, but it was pretty miserable on it and I really didn’t feel like stopping. The only picture I took was looking north from the bridge, on the east side of Roosevelt Island. The most distinguishing landmark of this picture is the smoke stacks which were featured in the movie Conspiracy Theory starring Mel Gibson and Julia Roberts. Once we made our slow miserable way off of the bridge, we headed south on First Avenue until we could make our way onto the East River Greenway. The East River was flat as glass and the path offered great views of Queens, Brooklyn, and the Manhattan skyline and was just in general a very pleasant place to run. As we made our way south, we ran into another ultra runner that Larry knew, so we stopped to chat for a while. This gave me an opportunity to take one last picture during the run. What you see here is a view of the east river looking north towards the 59th Street Bridge from somewhere around the 30’s (streets between 30-39th Street). Once we got going again, we decided it would be non-stop until we made it back home. We ran along the East River path under the Williamsburg and Manhattan Bridges and made our way onto the north side of the Manhattan Bridge. We once again did a nice tempo run over the bridge into Brooklyn and made our way back up Flatbush Avenue, through Grand Army Plaza and back into Prospect Park to complete the loop we started earlier that morning. As we approached our normal exit/entrance to the park Larry asked me if I wanted to go for the extra distance and run down the hill to the Ocean Parkway exit to tack on a couple of extra miles. We were approaching 22 miles at this point and I could feel my pace slowing down a bit so I decided that I had enough for the day and said that we should just call it a day. I also figured that I should perhaps taper a little bit as only a week from now I will be doing the Camseutt 50K out on Long Island. Larry gave me no argument, so we exited the park at the Bartel Pritchard entrance and made our way to the local bagel store for some post workout bagels. I was a bit tired after this run. I could feel it in my muscles. I attribute that mostly to having taken the past few days off running due to skiing and avoiding running due to shin pain. I hate how it feels like I lose fitness so fast. But maybe I am being just too hard on myself and this new course was a little tougher than I’ve been used to. Anyway, I knew I needed to refuel, so I make a delicious shake consisting of Soy Milk, Chocolate Syrup, 2 Scoops of Recoverite and some Malted Mix. I drank that along with eating Peanut Butter and Jelly on a Multi-Grain bagel. It was a lovely and quick and easy meal. I was satisfied with how my shin felt during the run, although I will admit it was a bit painful the next day. I am really going to need to learn how to ignore this pain so that I don’t even recognize it anymore.

At the Dentist Office

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Enjoying @gregbarnett's Zinfandel. Delicious!

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Sledding in Prospect Park

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Snowmen

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Cry Uncle

So I finally cried uncle last night and gave up a run. I only made it around the corner of my block when I decided that my 9 mile run just wasn’t going to happen. It felt like I was running on stumps instead of legs. All I could manage was an awkward trot and a very painful one at that. If it was just pain in my legs that I felt I think I would have been ok, however, my form was very poor and resembled nothing like running. I finally had to decide that discretion was the better part of valor and turn back home. Once inside I sulked on my couch for a good half hour. I sat there fully dressed in my winter gear thinking that perhaps if I gave the ibuprofen I took just before I went out a longer chance to take effect, that perhaps I may be able to salvage the run after all. I knew in my heart though that I needed to be off my legs. I think part of the problem was taking several days off from running when I went on my ski trip Sunday – Wednesday. I think my legs start to heal, but that when I just pick up running again my legs rebel and say what the fuck are you doing? We are trying to heal over here. Damn, I really think that amputation is a viable alternative at times. I haven’t read anything else that seems to offer a quick fix for shin splints. So as I was saying, I sulked on the couch for about an hour, while my wife insisted I go get on my bike in the basement. I’ve been feeling very depressed lately, which is no doubt due in part to my lack of exercise for the past 4 days. I start to feel really bad if I don’t get a regular fix in. Missing workouts can also put me in a downward spiral as the longer I go without exercise, the worse I feel and the less I feel like exercising. But anyway, I finally managed to get myself into the basement and onto my bike. I was pleasantly surprised to see my legs reacting well to the work and I easily and quickly ticked off two hours while spinning. I entertained myself while riding by chatting with friends on Twitter and on IM and watching movies on TV. I felt good and actually enjoyed the sweaty workout. I don’t know when I will try to run again. It was both legs that were painful and I think they are crying for rest. Either that or amputation. I’ll try for another run this weekend.

Brooklyn Water Tour

I switched my long run from Sunday to today since I am leaving for a ski trip tomorrow morning and won’t have a chance to run long. I think this is just as well as today was beautiful and the forecast for tomorrow is not as good. I decided to run along the Brooklyn water front, which is a run that I’ve wanted to do for a long time. I headed out from my house near Prospect Park and headed into Sunset Park. I ran along 2nd Avenue, which is still paved with Cobblestones and has trolly/train tracks running through it. I am fascinated by this area. I can imagine it 50 years ago and around the time of WWII. I could just feel all the activity happening in all these waterfront warehouses and all the train activity. This area used to be so vibrant with commerce and you can feel the ghosts of the past with every step through the neighborhood. Here is a picture of me looking into an alleyway of a warehouse that used to accept freight cars for the loading and unloading of cargo. There are many buildings like this along the way. From Sunset Park, I continued up 2nd Avenue and ran into Bay Ridge. I went past Owls Head Park and ran onto the 69th Street Pier. The pier offers fantastic views of downtown Manhattan and the Statue of Liberty. For me this view will be forever scarred. I can’t get used to seeing it without the Twin Towers. But life moves on and so did I. From there it was along the bike/running path that runs right along the water and underneath the Verrazano Bridge. I stopped at the bridge to admire the view and take a couple of pictures. The biggest shame about the VZ is that they built it without a pedestrian lane. Running over that bridge is great and something I only get to do when I am in the NYC Marathon. Once past the VZ Bridge you can see the landmarks of Coney Island coming into view. My route was also taking me past the neighborhood where I grew up. I was able to see the building where I grew up across of the Belt Parkway. Many years ago the area I was running past was an illegal dump. I’ll never forget exploring in this dump one day when I came across a pair of sawed off horse legs surrounded by a bunch of losing Off Track Betting tickets. The apparent meaning was very clear to me, but that was almost 30 years ago and there was no sign of that now. I just kept going and made my way into Coney Island. My first stop into Coney Island was on the bridge that crosses the Coney Island Creek. Years ago this bridge was a drawbridge and unfortunately, I never got to see it being used in my lifetime. When I was a kid you could still see fish swimming in the water, but I don’t think anything has lives in it for 3 decades. From there is was into the heart of Coney Island and onto the boardwalk. I ran out over the pier and took a picture of the soon to be obliterated Astroland Amusement Park. I also got a picture of me underneath Brooklyn’s Eiffel Tower, the famous Coney Island Parachute Jump. I never got to ride on this, but I understand my parents did before I was born. I then ran the rest of the boardwalk into Brighton Beach and then took to the roads to run into Manhattan Beach. It had been years since I was in Manhattan Beach, having not gone there since and old friend moved out in his own. I ran to the end of Manhattan Beach, which is essentially the end of Coney Island and then headed back towards Sheepshead Bay. I ran over the small footbridge that crosses from Manhattan Beach into Sheepshead Bay, took a left and made my way back towards Ocean Parkway. On my way to Ocean Parkway, I encountered what I believe to be the largest NYC rat I’ve ever seen. Fortunately it was quite dead, having been struck down by a car. At least I think this thing is a rat. You can judge for yourself with this picture. Once I got back to ocean parkway I had run about 15 miles. I knew the trip back to Prospect Park would be another 5, plus one additional loop of the park would get me to my goal of 24 miles. It was getting late in the day, so I just put my camera away and ran a nice tempo pace all the way back to the park. I covered an uneventful lap in Prospect Park and exited it just as my wife was calling to inquire as to my whereabouts. Fortunately, I was able to tell her I was just a block away and would be home within a minute or two. It was a very successful run and capped off a 7 day period that saw me running over 61 miles. Here are some other pics from the day: Running from Manhattan Beach into Sheepshead Bay Shoot the Freak on the Coney Island Boardwalk