A Runner's Thanks to the Labor Movement

I began Labor Day with a trail run at Soldiers Delight Natural Resource Management Area, a small state park that protects some of the region's rarest and most endangered species. The park is deserving of a post, and I intend to write about my experiences there in the near future. However, I dedicate this post to the American labor movement and the worker-activists of the past two centuries who fought tirelessly for the noble principles of democracy and dignity in work.

When we set out for weekend races or long runs or simply lace our shoes for a post-work evening jaunt, we rarely reflect on how exceptional and privileged we are. Amateur runners, the majority of our sport's participants, depend on leisure - the free time outside of our professional lives to engage in sport. Without the extra time beyond that which is necessary to acquire our most immediate needs, we could not be competitive runners.

Unions of the late-nineteenth and early-twentieth century understood the importance of recreation, leisure, and socialization for the health of the human body and spirit. The battles for fair wages, remuneration of labor, and a reduction in working hours were to create a life worth living - a life that included time for expression, enjoyment, and self-betterment. The early labor movement existed alongside urban reformers and the budding conservation movement, both of which promoted health through exercise and exposure to natural spaces. But how could one take advantage of these social goods without time, energy, and income?

And so with strikes, sit-ins, countless publications, rallies, campaigns, and ballots, unions, and all those who wished to form or join unions, fought for and built the foundation of a great society. Over time, however, work on this project slowed and nearly ceased, and that foundation, carefully laid over many decades, began to crumble and decay under the endless assaults from malignant forces. We now have much work to do to restore that foundation and protect the rights of all workers. Much like an athlete after a long layoff from injury, we must regain lost ground before we can progress.

But back to running. Thanks to the labor movement and the nation it built throughout the twentieth century, I've enjoyed access to quality education, which I then used to attain a good job with union protections and benefits. My forty(ish)-hour workweeks, weekends, vacations, and holidays afford the time and freedom for expression and personal growth, which include running and writing this blog. I lament that the vision of progressive labor unions is far from reality, and the benefits that I enjoy, which I consider to be basic human rights, are merely a social privilege. Thus, I feel both a great debt to the labor movement and an obligation to all who lack the work-place protections, fair wages, and security that allow me participate in my beloved sport.

Running and Recreation at Robert E. Lake Park

Sitting in my car on the Jones Falls Expressway, I felt like a caged animal. After a long work week, I was anxious to hit the trails. But instead, I was in purgatory, crawling north in a vast herd of cars with like-minded drivers, all of whom were dreaming of being somewhere else to start their Labor Day weekend.

Despite the traffic, I arrived at my destination, Robert E. Lee Park, well before 5:00,  and my hopes of finishing the run in time to attend happy hour were not yet dashed. REL, as I've come to refer to it in my training log, has experienced incredible changes since the summer of 2009, when I first visited it after moving to North Baltimore. Back then, the park was under the jurisdiction of Baltimore City. But the City was a negligent steward. The park's facilities were in terrible disrepair, its trails unmaintained.  A few years ago, the County absorbed REL into its park system and began restoration, creating a welcoming spot just beyond the city for outdoors enthusiasts.  

Lake Roland, Robert E. Lee Park, October 22, 2012

I set off on my nine-mile run determined to spend 90% of it on soft surfaces to assuage my achy feet, which have suffered lately from a diet of pavement.  However, it was my psyche that needed the green spaces most of all - a mind that was tired of computers screens, electric light, and the seemingly endless fucking sea of concrete. Running at REL was freeing. This is what we labor for - recreation. And what better way to recreate yourself than an immersion in the therapeutic environs of a wooded park?

Two-and-a-half miles. The principle north-south trail in REL is not particularly long for someone who logs up to 100 miles in a week. But for five years the park has sustained me, providing relief during workweeks when the more extensive regional parks were beyond reach. Like most urban parks, REL has a high biodiversity of the birds and mammals whom we crowd out of city neighborhoods. On any given run, I encounter Great Egrets and Hooded Mergansers in Lake Roland, Belted Kingfishers in the Jones Falls, and Barred Owls perched above the easternmost trail. My most spectacular wildlife sighting at REL occurred in the evening twilight of a late-winter day. As I strode along the lakeside, I spotted a Bald Eagle at the edge of a thin strip of land that jutted into the lake. For over 22 years, I lived in a wooded, rural area, but it wasn't until I settled in Baltimore that I saw our national bird in the wild.  

Those who crave soft surfaces and seek interesting, varied landscapes are much like the animals who congregate in parks like REL. We escape congested streets and noise and filth and stress and the conveniences of our urban homes to revitalize our bodies and renew our beleaguered spirits. The short trails of REL have allowed me to accumulate high mileage season after season while avoiding the impact and overuse injuries common among runners who toil on city streets. Like so many species, human runners are adaptable and can even thrive in our plains of pavement. However, we are most at home and at our best striding easily, fluidly along the soft, forgiving earth.  

The Eugene Marathon: A Recap

I came to Eugene to race a marathon. The trip was born from conversations with Melissa, who first experienced the natural grandeur of the Pacific Northwest last summer while racing the Hood to Coast Relay. I had never been to Oregon, but I believed that I knew the place, that I would be at home there, beneath its evergreens on dark trails coated with pine needles, at the cultural epicenter of our sport. Choosing to race was an easy decision, though not without apprehension: training for a summer marathon in the Chesapeake Furnace would pose challenges.

Foremost among my goals was to test myself over 26.2 miles and experience the distance. While I've raced competitively for 20 years, Eugene is only the fourth marathon that I've trained for, the third that I've started, and the second that I've finished. I sought to accustom myself to the physical and mental suffering inherent in racing for two-and-a-half hours so that someday I might only have to race for two hours and twenty-five minutes. A marathon with a small field and a relatively flat course after a short build up were the perfect circumstances to gain this experience. 

The race begins in the heart of the University of Oregon and leads away from town, climbing gradually along a green stretch of road lined with cottage-style houses mingled within towering pines. In these early miles, it seemed that my taper had failed; my legs didn't feel fresh, and sore spots in muscles and bones niggled me with each step. Over two hours of running ahead, I settled into a pace that was perfectly slow and calmly covered several miles, passing droves of immoderate runners who were in for a long day of suffering. 

I ran miles 8 through 12 blindly, relying on feel, because there were no mile markers along this stretch - the event's principal shortcoming. Climbing the course's only true hill at mile 8 bolstered my confidence. It didn't matter that my legs weren't snappy because they were strong and doing what I had trained them to do. Inadvertently, my pace quickened through these quiet, solitary miles. When I emerged from a park into a neighborhood near mile 12, I found that I was within striking distance of the next runner. Still, I remained tentative, tempered by memories of the disastrous final miles of my last marathon. 

At mile 14, I caught the first of several runners who faltered from their self-inflicted wounds from a fast start. Upon seeing my Falls Road singlet, the runner asked if I knew Nate Brigham. I love the interconnectedness our community - a web that stretches from one coast to the other. We casually chatted despite running a pace near 5:30 per mile before I continued on to overtake the next runner. The sun was bright and hot along the roads, but I soon found that I preferred the exposure to the last section of the course that brought me back onto a concrete path for several miles. Initially, its many turns were nuisances. However, as I began to increase my exertion in the last third of the race, the snaking, undulating path extracted a mental and physical toll. The sharp and abrupt turns caused my muscles to spasm and disrupted my rhythm at a time when I need to remain composed, fluid. Worse yet, over the last 10K the path gave the impression of a continuous climb - an optical illusion that brought real anguish. 

After sloppy calculations, I estimated that I could run under 2:30 and perhaps in the 2:28s if I maintained a sub-6:00 pace for the last few miles. Initially, I believed it was attainable as long as I didn't cramp; my legs felt strong. But then my split for mile 24 was 6:11. The pavement had inflicted damage despite my conservative tactics, and I had slowed dramatically. Negative thoughts were encroaching, as I feared every step would be the last before a cramp halted my fading momentum. But the crowds grew. Then I heard music from the finish line, and multiple spectators told me that a runner, not yet in view, could be caught. So I pushed onward, fighting to maintain the integrity of my form and regain lost seconds. 

At mile 26, I passed the runner in fifth place. Though he was unable to respond, I ran scared, remembering my frustration of being nipped at the line and denied a top-ten finish at the Columbus Half Marathon. When I entered Hayward Field for the final stretch, I was, in that moment, oblivious to the track's significance and its history that had made the event so alluring. The race had drained me of emotion except the lingering fear of being passed and the increasing desire to stop. I crossed the line with an open stride, delighted to see that the clock had not ticked to 2:31 (2:30:32). Finally, I am a 2:30 marathoner. 

As a retrospective, a marathon neatly fits the narrative arc: exposition, rising action, crisis, climax, falling action. But we are not credible first-person narrators because the haze of fatigue and delirium distorts our memories, dulls our senses. Products of Western literary traditions, we nonetheless piece together our experience into a storyline and cast ourselves as compelling protagonists - the everyman whose internal struggles are made manifest in the external struggle of the race. 

The arc of my narrative for Eugene is not steep in ascent or descent. I purposefully avoided the drama inherent in high mileage, a heavy racing schedule, and a large-scale marathon. I trained moderately and raced modestly, perhaps sacrificing an opportunity to dip under 2:30 but positioning myself for a positive outcome. The crisis is resolved and the action is falling: with a new PR in hand, I'm confident in my abilities as a marathoner and eager to begin drafting the sequel.  For now, it's time to relax and recuperate, celebrate and contemplate.

The NCR: A Simple Trail

Over the past two years, I've run hundreds of miles along a simple, crushed limestone trail that bisects Baltimore County on its north-south course between Baltimore's suburbs and York, Pennsylvania.  The NCR Trail, as it is colloquially known, is part of Maryland's Gunpowder Falls State Park.  For over a century, the Northern Central Railway carried freight between Baltimore and York, before the region's industrial decline. In the 1980s, after contentious debate between landowners and environmentalists, the State of Maryland acquired the trackbed and the land bordering it, transforming into a public land for the enjoyment and recreation of all.

Season after season, I return to the NCR most weeks to complete many of my longest runs and most challenging workouts. Despite traversing the same out-and-back course, I never get bored nor find it monotonous. Rather, its familiarity has become an asset, reducing the psychological stress of workouts that typically entail two hours of running. It is a variable in my training that is constant, stable, reliable. 

As an environmentalist and historian, I enjoy observing the seasonal changes along the route. At points, the trail cuts through bedrock, exposing rock walls dressed with verdant ferns and mosses. The trail also samples the county's patchwork landscapes of deciduous forest, wetland, farmland, town center, and homestead. Like an archaeological dig, as you progress north from the late twentieth-century housing development that surrounds mile marker 0 you encounter architectural bygones - buildings that were once banks, depots, stations, and stores that bustled along the railroad. And as fall thins the foliage, the young forest reveals much older fieldstone ruins and the shadows of lives long past. These artifacts prompt my mind to wander, as I imagine what life was like for those who lived here - Susquehannock hunters, slaves, wheat farmers, artisans and, later, immigrant laborers, clerks, grocers, and even woods babies*.  

But mostly, I return to the NCR because I've found no better place near Baltimore to prepare for long distance races.  Its crushed limestone surface is packed so firmly that it prepares my body for the pounding of a violent 13.1 miles and the duration of 26.2.  Yet, it is more forgiving than asphalt, thus reducing the risk of injury. From my considerable experience there, the mile markers are fairly accurate, making it the ideal location to include threshold intervals or tempo segments into a long run. The trail's minimal elevation change is also beneficial. While I believe that hilly long runs are an important component of any training plan, a relatively flat course is, in most cases, best for faster and longer workouts. Lastly, I cannot overstate the significance that its canopy played during my current cycle. The shade allowed me to complete longer and quicker runs than I would have been otherwise able to do during the Chesapeake summer. 

In the months ahead, I plan to eulogize many of the region's parks, for we Marylanders are fortunate for our state's commitment to creating and preserving public lands. I chose to begin with NCR because it has been kind to me. I've enjoyed significantly increased fitness and collected many personal records from training on this simple trail.

Run On For A Long Time

I reached the seventeenth mile and, with a deep gasp, released myself from the exertion and locomotive form that carried me through in 5:20, my third consecutive mile at that pace. I was then a mere mile-and-a-half from completing my last true long run of the marathon cycle. This long run, which I completed yesterday, was a variation of a Jack Daniels' workout that incorporated segments of threshold effort near the beginning and end of the run, bookending an 8-mile steady effort.  

Throughout my build up to the Eugene Marathon, I've emphasized weekly long runs, assigning each a purpose in my physical and psychological preparation for race day. And I hope that I've attained the fitness and resilience needed to not merely complete 26.2 miles or compete for 20 miles and stagger the last 6.2, but to race evenly, composedly, and confidently for its entirety.  

I've neglected my blog for the past several weeks, due in part to the fatigue of the most arduous weeks of my training cycle. With race day looming on July 27, I devote this entry to the weekly long run and its place in my training.  Experience coupled with research led me to choose the following variations of long runs, each with a purpose and place in the chronology of this cycle. 

The Steady State Long Run: For the first half of my marathon cycle, I completed a series of increasingly long weekly runs at a steady effort slightly quicker than maintenance run pace. On May 1, I ran 11 miles and over the next five weeks increased my long run to 22, adding a few miles weekly.  I'd ran these workouts progressively, running the first several miles at a comfortable pace and the second half between 30 and 40 seconds per mile slower than goal marathon pace - an approach that coach Pete Pfitzinger advises. Occasionally, I included hills as an additional stimulus. Once I began my long runs with quality, or quicker, segments, I alternated weekly between effort-based and steady-state long runs.

The Fast Finish: Coach and physiologist Greg McMillan is an advocate of the fast finish long run, encouraging marathoners to complete multiple such workouts over the last several weeks of a marathon cycle. After my phase of steady state runs, I ran a fast finish long run of 22 miles.  The first 11 miles were at a solid clip. On my return trip along the trail, I ran progressively for ten miles, leaving the last mile to cool down. Beginning with a 5:54 twelfth mile, I smoothly progressed into the 5:20s, ultimately averaging low 5:30s per mile, near goal marathon pace, for the 10-mile segment. The purpose of this run, perhaps the most difficult of the cycle, was to train my body to run fast and push hard while fatigued, after having endured many miles of pounding. 

The Marathon Pace (MP) Long Run: Two weeks after my fast finish long run, I ran 20.5 miles with an 11-mile tempo portion near goal marathon pace. Like the fast finish long run, the purpose of this run is to prepare you for the demands of racing 26.2 miles by running fast for long periods of time on increasingly tired legs. However, MP runs have the additional benefit of race pace specificity. The goal is not to run the tempo portion all-out but to feel and, ideally, maintain goal marathon pace, mile after mile. I run marathon pace regularly in midweek tempo runs of 5 to 8 miles, but longer variants should be used sparingly given the demands of such runs. MP long runs are as close to a marathon dress rehearsal as you could get. I initially considered running 14 to 15 miles at goal pace, but, after much deliberation, I opted for 11 - slightly over an hour of running at pace - to avoid over training. Given my circumstances of running alone on a summer day, 11 miles was sufficient.

Time on Your Feet: Nate Brigham, my training partner, christened this variant Megarun.  At 24+ miles, this was the longest run of my cycle. It is essentially a steady-state long run, the only difference being that it exceeds the amount of time on your feet you'll have on race day by several minutes. Thus, while it may be shorter than race distance, you run for a longer time than it will take you to race 26. 2 miles.  Some athletes choose to exceed marathon distance. Kenny Moore, a two-time Olympic marathoner, ran over 30 miles multiple times during a cycle, believing that he lacked the natural attributes to be an international-class athlete without such efforts. Meb Keflezighi recently built to a 28-mile long run in preparation for Boston. These runs adapt your legs to hours of constant pounding while depleting your body's glycogen stores and training it to draw upon fat reserves - a necessary physiological process to excel in the marathon. My Megarun was three weeks before Eugene, and my legs were very weary throughout from the cumulative effects of the cycle. 

The Long Run with Threshold Intervals: In my last post, I discussed the influence of the venerable Jack Daniels.  His marathon program is structured with near weekly long runs that incorporate some form of threshold running. For me, threshold entails running between 10-mile and half marathon race pace. Including threshold intervals in a long run is especially demanding because you must run several miles significantly quicker than marathon pace when you are already fatigued. My introduction to this post described the sole long run of this kind that I completed during the cycle. You can place the threshold segments at any part of long run to derive benefits. I, however, opted to structure the run thusly: 3-mile warm up, 3 miles at threshold effort (16:06), 8 miles at a steady pace, 3 miles at threshold effort (16:00), 1.5-mile cool down. At the conclusion of my first threshold segment, I had over 12 miles to run on tired legs, including 3 miles at threshold pace in the late stage of the workout. Accordingly, I had to muster the physical and psychological strength to run 5:20 pace after 14 miles of pounding on a hot and humid morning.  If there is a better simulation of the last miles of a marathon, I've yet to encounter it. 

Each of these long runs have contributed greatly to my fitness, as I affirmed during my workout yesterday in difficult conditions. My season is abbreviated, lasting only 12 weeks. If I had the benefit of a 15-week build up, I may have included a second fast finish long run and perhaps another long run with threshold intervals, or, better yet, replaced one workout with a longer race. Training is both physical and intellectual endeavor, and, since I am still a marathon dilettante, I've yet to determine both my training needs and optimal periodization. I suspect I'll find answers to some questions in two weeks as I approach the 20-mile threshold in Eugene. 

Self-Coaching and Self-Doubting

This past spring, training for the 5K was confounding, frustrating, and, at times, infuriating.  Now, in the heart of my twelve-week marathon cycle, again I am questioning my ability to develop and execute a sound training plan that will yield positive results.  I often ask myself: "Do I need a coach?"  Self-doubt can be positive if it manifests as skepticism and drives us to test our assumptions.  But self-doubt also can be pernicious and deleterious to training, competing, and overall well being.  In these moments, I scour my material, digital, and mental archives for guidance and assurance.

With the exception of two brief seasons, I've been self-coached since January 2004, the end of my collegiate career.  I am fortunate to have nearly continuous progress in building fitness while avoiding injuries and limiting burnout.  "Know thyself " is my mantra.  My aversion to having a coach is a product my negative experiences with coaches who lacked open-mindedness - members of that common breed who believe the only road to success is the one they envisioned within the bounds of their limited intellects.

Although I  don't have a coach to subscribe tasks and provide instruction, I'm not groping blindly or acting solely on whims.  Several individuals - former coaches, training partners, authors - have informed my training philosophy, and my debt to them is substantial.  Notably, Mark Swiger, my coach at Wheeling Jesuit University, emphasized moderation.  His competitive days ended prematurely from the wear of overly aggressive training.  Entrusted with our health, he cultivated us patiently and advised that our best days of running should come long after our final collegiate race.  To this day, I still heed his call to "stay smooth" during the throes of interval sessions.

Coach Swiger was a disciple of Jack Daniels, one of the sport's most influential coaches and authors.  Daniels, an exercise physiologist who coaches with a scientist's empirical compulsion, was an early proponent of lactate threshold workouts.  Such workouts, I believe, are essential to success at any distance from the mile to the marathon.  When I stray too far from this foundational component, my fitness drops and my legs become stale and weary.

While I've never reviewed the workouts that Bill Bowerman prescribed for his athletes, his coaching philosophy has influenced my training.  Much of what I know about Bowerman is from his athlete and biographer Kenny Moore.  Bowerman advocated individualization and eschewed conventional thought by including recovery runs into his program at a time when his counterparts imposed high-intensity, one-size-fits-all regimens on their athletes.  With countless accolades bolstering his credibility, Bowerman asserted, "The idea that the harder you work, the better you're going to be is just garbage."  Yet, few coaches and fewer athletes accept this advice.

Training and competing are acts of faith regardless of whether you are coached.  To excel under a coach's tutelage requires "buy in" - accepting every facet of a training program.  You sacrifice some degree of freedom and choice for structure, support, mentoring, monitoring.  Conversely, self-doubt is the cost I pay for refusing to relinquish control of my training.  I've yet to meet a willing coach whom I trust with my health and goals.  Thus, I continue on the trail I began blazing years ago, not alone but in stride with Swiger, Daniels, Bowerman, and all those who teach and share, and not impose, their knowledge. 

Sacred Sites

Every culture has places that are essential to the construction of the group's identity - sacred sites.   Some sites are consecrated through trauma, suffering, and struggle, such as Gettysburg battlefield or the Lincoln Memorial.  Others are places of origin in a group's folklore, where a movement started or a people emerged.

I hadn't considered that runners also have sacred sites before my visit to Boston in April for the marathon's festivities.  I witnessed how Hopkinton and Copley Square have attained a profound cultural significance in American distance running. For tens of thousands of runners, qualifying to compete in the Boston Marathon and crossing its finish line is the sport's pinnacle. Another storied site is Iffley Road Track in Oxford, England, which Roger Bannister sanctified by running the first sub-4:00 mile. Franklin Field, a historic venue at the University of Pennsylvania, is home to the Penn Relays, a marquee event in American track and field.

Over the next nine weeks, I'm preparing for a pilgrimage to one such place: the University of Oregon's Hayward Field, which serves as the finish for the Eugene Marathon. Since the early 1960s, Eugene has been home to many of the nation's finest collegiate and professional distance runners, earning the moniker Track Town U.S.A. I lack the space to explain the historical significance of the community and its influence on American distance running. So, I recommend Kenny Moore's Bowerman and the Men of Oregon, a captivating narrative that explores six decades of running of history through the life of Bill Bowerman and generations of his athletes.  Over 400 pages of small font, finishing it is like a good long run - a satisfying act of endurance.

My interest in the sport's history and yen to explore the culture and natural environments of Portland and Eugene are why I chose to train for a summer marathon in the Chesapeake Furnace. I'm not ready to discuss specific goals for the race, which will solidify as my training progresses in the hot, humid weeks ahead. The preparation will be physically and intellectually challenging. An adventure.

A Long Run Through My Hometown

"Something is profoundly wrong with the way we live today." - Tony Judt, Ill Fares the Land

Last weekend, I visited my hometown in the upper Ohio Valley.  On a balmy Sunday morning, I began  my week with a 14-mile long run through Yorkville, Tiltonsville, and Rayland, Ohio - the YTR. The towns are situated on a floodplain beneath steep foothills that roll westward to Ohio's plain and eastward to the Appalachian Mountains. The run was an opportunity to explore familiar sites and reflect on the condition of the region, particularly the changes it has undergone in the decade since I last lived there.

In my log, I often describe the birds that I see on runs. My fondness for birds is a product of growing up in the Short Creek Watershed. The creek, which meets the Ohio River near my childhood home, is rich in biodiversity. At age five, I saw Great Blue Herons for the first time in the creek's backwaters. I distinctly recall the moment, and I've been a recreational birder since. While I rarely go "birding," running in parks and wetlands allows me to entwine two of my passions. Sunday's run was especially fruitful in the backwaters. Red-winged Blackbirds fluttered about the reeds; swallows swarmed from their colonies under bridges; and I disturbed a Green Heron, rousing it from its hunting grounds in the cattails. The highlight, however, was a Baltimore Oriole, my first sighting of one in many years.

When I tell new acquaintances where I am from, they invariable reply, "That's beautiful country." This weekend the foothills reaffirmed their reputation. The budding trees made the hills a kaleidoscope of green, reflecting every Crayola shade of the color. The flora and fauna enhanced the run, but their beauty masks the land's deep scars and terminal illnesses.

The towns' most prominent feature is a steel mill. Once a symbol of industrial might and a gateway to prosperity, the mill is now little more than a ruin and a painful reminder of what we've lost. For most of the last century, the mill employed many of YTR's inhabitants. My maternal grandfather and father retired there, and unknown numbers of acquaintances and relatives toiled within its walls. Steel mills formed the backbone of the Ohio Valley.  The river and its tributaries were the spine, while the mills were the structural core. In the 1990s, I recall economic volatility and layoffs. But the mills endured, and the region retained its identity and offered some degree of opportunity.

Decades ago, we collectively leaped forward into a brave new economy. Cheap steel and cheaper labor in developing nations were too alluring for industrial magnates. Most of the mills are now shuttered. The fortunate workers embraced contract buyouts, while the rest, according to conventional thought, were victims of an inevitable globalizing economy that rendered American manufacturing as obsolete and undesirable as the streetcar.

During my run, I observed the social effects of these economic choices.  Several houses in YTR are abandoned since the recent economic crisis. Some abandoned homes never had the chance to decay, thanks to arsonists. Oddly, I feel less safe running in sections of my hometown than I do in Baltimore. At least in Baltimore, I know the lay of the land. YTR, however, is in flux. Streets that were once home to working-class families with middle-class aspirations are now dotted with drug dens (such houses are easily recognizable). There are two truths in post-industrial America: people will dull the pain of reality, and as one economy suffers another thrives.

I completed my long run in 1:31, averaging 6:29 per mile. It was a great start to my 12-week marathon cycle. While the natural environment provided a distraction from these realities, it's best not to look too closely, lest the effects of industrial pollution become evident (Where have all the shad gone?).  I began this blog with the intent of describing the social and environmental spaces that I inhabit as a runner. Many of these places are inspiring, motivating, and profoundly beautiful. Sadly, my hometown is no longer such a place.

Season's End: A Time for Decisions and Revisions

"There will be time...time for decisions and revisions." - John L. Parker, Once A Runner

Competitive runners divide the year into distinct seasons, often treating races like holidays and anniversaries that, over time, come to define specific months and provide focus during a repetitive or mundane schedule.  I concluded my spring season on Sunday at the Pike's Peek 10K in Rockville, Maryland (30:59, 12th place).  Such races can be cathartic - the culmination of more than a thousand miles over a period of months. Like many runners, I am a  planner, and, in order to plan analytically for the next cycle, it is necessary to assess the accomplishments and missteps of the last: a time for "decisions and revisions."

I began my "spring" cycle at the dawn of winter, after my body healed from the bruising it endured at the Philadelphia Marathon.  I was single-minded in my approach: vigorously pursue a 5K personal record and hopefully inch under 15:00. After consulting with my trusted training partners, I altered my mileage-heavy regimen of past cycles, in which the target races were at least 13.1 miles, and developed a program that emphasized speed endurance. To attain my goal, I'd have to composedly run 72-second 400s for three miles and blitz the remainder of the distance.

Tentatively and skeptically, I introduced new stimuli and emphasized components of my training that I had previously neglected or sacrificed for higher mileage and long tempo workouts.  

• Core:  For several years, I've floundered in attempting to establish a core routine. This cycle, I began executing a 20 to 30-minute core routine at least twice each week. I hoped it would improve my running form and thus my economy, or efficiency. 

• Speed/Form Drills:  In January, I began completing a series of drills before each intense workout, usually twice per week.  Rather than 3 or 4 miles for a warm up, I would run 2 or 2.5 miles and then complete 2K of drills and strides.  In doing so, I sought to regain and preserve speed and improve my form.  

• Short, Fast Fartlek: Early in the training cycle, I implemented a weekly fartlek session of 8 to 12 short, fast intervals, ranging from 40 to 75 seconds with full recovery after each. A typical workout consisted of 45-second intervals at mile race effort followed by 75 seconds of brisk recovery.  The purpose was to build and maintain speed and more easily transition to the longer and more demanding interval works at goal 5K and 3K paces. By March, I replaced most fartlek workouts with weekly track sessions.  

• Shorter, Faster Threshold Workouts: I eliminated longer, steady-state tempo runs and alternated weekly between 4-mile lactate threshold runs (half-marathon to ten-mile race pace) and sets of 1K intervals, or a fartlek equivalent, at about 10K effort or  critical velocity pace.  With the 10K-paced workouts, I sought to attain the same physiological benefits of a longer threshold workout while running at a quicker pace and thus also deriving VO2max gains.

• Reduced Mileage: After much cajoling and constructive criticism from my running cadre, I  reduced my mileage significantly from past cycles by virtually eliminating double sessions and long runs over 17 miles. We reasoned that the extra mileage was overkill, and I could invest my energy reserves into the aforementioned stimuli. 

As noted in earlier posts, the winter posed obstacles and precluded me from running many of my early season strength workouts.  After two mediocre races in February, I had a breakthrough in March at the Shamrock 5K, running a PR of 15:05.  I then spent four weeks focused entirely on training. During this period, I ran some of the best interval sessions and short threshold runs of my life.  The work was fruitful.  A week before the BAA 5K, I raced to a post-collegiate best at the 1500 in 4:07.55.  

These indicators projected a personal record at the BAA 5K. However, as I began tapering in the two weeks before the race, my legs remained flat - a term I use for a state of muscular malaise. Instead of feeling fluid, fast, and wispy, I was sluggish, heavy, even clumsy.  Consequently, my last two races, while solid performances for me historically, were slower than anticipated.

It's difficult to identify the specific variables, or combination thereof, that inhibited me from peaking.  I have theories.  Straying too far from the essential elements of past cycles may have reduced my overall strength and fitness, even while I increased my speed. I sensed this acutely during the 10K on Sunday, explaining afterward that I simply didn't feel as fit as last year. Additionally, I have a mixed history with hard (5K pace or quicker) interval workouts. In my early twenties, when I completed such workouts weekly, I was chronically fatigued and rarely snappy. An increased emphasis on speed was essential for improving at the 5K, but my body may not have been able to handle so much and, consequently, couldn't recover from the cumulative effects.  

It's been a good year, whether measured by experiences or race results. And there are valuable lessons and takeaways. Looking forward, I want to continue including core and speed/form drills in my regimen. These components benefit both the miler and marathoner.  The speed sessions, usually in the form of mile-effort fartlek, also paid dividends, and I will sprinkle these workouts into my upcoming marathon cycle to retain speed.  Never neglect anything is good mantra for distance runners.  I've yet to strike the balance, but I'm learning. Onward. 

Church of the Sunday Long Run: A Morning at Walden

"Every man is the builder of a temple, called his body....We are all sculptors and painters, and our material is our own flesh and blood and bones." - Henry David Thoreau, Walden, 1854

Last weekend I returned to Boston to pay homage to the city and its marathon.  In 2013, I competed in the BAA 5K, and, thanks to a stellar field, attained a then personal record of 15:17. I again targeted the BAA 5K, making it the focus of my season with the intent of running a second faster than 15:00. Staleness in my legs, perhaps the result of a poorly executed tamper, prevented me from bringing my season’s work to fruition. I finished in a lackluster 15:25, far from my personal record and even farther from my goal.

I resolved to not let this shortcoming hamper my trip. I am grateful to have witnessed inspiring performances of friends and two of the greatest exhibitions of patriotism in the history of American distance running from the top U.S. finishers. Furthermore, I celebrated the sport in a fashion appropriate for an environmentalist runner with a Sunday long run at Walden Pond in the company of like-minded runners.

"I think that each town should have a park, or rather a primitive forest...
- common possession forever, for instruction and recreation."

Students of literature and history will recognize Walden as the temporary home of Henry David Thoreau, where he resided alone in the woods to “live deliberately.” During his tenure there, Thoreau explored the world within himself and the world around him. His experiences and writing there became the basis for Walden: Or, Life in the Woods, which, after his death, established his place in the canon of American literature and profoundly influenced environmental thought. Thoreau’s philosophy of the human person and of nature have shaped my worldview more so than any other philosopher. In regard to my training, his writing resonates as strongly as theories of Lydiard, Bowerman, Daniels, and the pantheon of distance coaches. 

The week before the marathon, Shalane Flanagan, the race's top American finisher, reintroduced the phrase "Church of the Sunday Long Run" into the distance runner vernacular. On Sunday, Walden was a cathedral for my companions and me, as we ran 11 miles across the park and adjacent lands, exploring the patchwork New England landscape of meadow, farmland, forest, and wetland. Soft, manicured trails wind through these varied landscapes, while the pond's clear, aquifer-fed waters is inviting even on a brisk spring morning. Walden has changed dramatically since Thoreau's day, but, thanks to mindful conservation, it continues to offer recreation, solitude, and interaction with the nonhuman world - a gaggle of wild turkeys, not a park ranger, greeted us as we entered the park. 

Like Thoreau, I attempted to "live deep and suck the marrow of life" during my brief time at Walden. Foremost, last weekend was a moment for runners to exhibit resilience, practice forgiveness and celebrate life, love, sport, and solidarity - actions that Thoreau would exalt. While exploring his one-time home and reflecting on his words, I was grateful for the life-affirming adventures I've had as a runner. Our moment is finite, and few of us ever enjoy the privileges of exploration, recreation, and competition. Thus, I strive not to measure my success as a runner solely in the currency of personal records and races won or lost, but also in the enriching experiences I share with others, like a long run in the woods of a sacred site, Walden Pond. 

“I was not designed to be forced. I will breathe after
my own fashion. Let us see who is the strongest.”

Maybe We Ain't that Young Anymore

I awoke early last Saturday morning, rising with the sun as I typically do. As I bounded about my apartment, I knew that the muscular fatigue and staleness that had nettled me earlier in the week had subsided. The skies were clear. The temperature was warm. I was competing in a collegiate track, and it would be a great day, regardless of the race's outcome.

After a morning of lounging, I gathered my gear, negligently leaving behind my track spikes, and walked to the car. Driving north to the Johns Hopkins University track, I inserted Springsteen's greatest hits and instinctively skipped to Thunder Road. While I favored Born to Run, a rebellious anthem, when I was in my twenties, I now prefer its thematic companion, a song that champions redemption and hope.

In Thunder Road, Springsteen meditates on social conceptions of youth, as the song's narrator confronts his lover, Mary, about the limitations she imposes on herself: "So you're scared and you're thinking that maybe we ain't that young anymore."  Springteen's message resonates with me because, like Mary, I have at times restricted my aspirations and doubted my potential for fear that my youthfulness had dwindled. As competitive runners, like athletes in most sports, we are hyper-aware of the deleterious effects of aging: once fluid joints become frictional; muscles degenerate, reducing our strength and speed; recovery after workouts, and especially from injuries, is prolonged. We attained great fitness, and with it much joy and fulfillment, because we are so keenly attuned to our bodies. However, our physical self-awareness also can be detrimental when it generates negative thoughts. Someday, we will no longer improve at our beloved craft, and we will begin a digressive process that culminates in the inevitable - the day when we can no longer run.  Haunting indeed.

Since graduating from college over a decade ago, I've raced intermittently at collegiate track meets. I usually return to the track only when it serves a utilitarian purpose and fits within a seasonal build-up to a peak road race. And for these reasons, I chose to race the 1500 at JHU. As noted in my previous posts, my target race for this season is the BAA 5K on April 19. To sharpen, I needed to a race, or at least simulate a race, of a shorter distance. JHU's 1500 seemed ideal, exactly one week before the 5K.

I experienced trepidation in the weeks before the track meet.  Racing the 1500 against college runners was intimidating, considering that I have spent many years focusing principally on distances between 10K and the marathon. Furthermore, most middle-distance runners - specialists at distances between the 800 and 5K - peak in their mid-twenties. At 32, I was probably one of the oldest, and perhaps the oldest, runner competing at the meet.

My fears proved unfounded after the race began. Racing in the third of seven heats, I was not among the fastest thinclads at entered in the 1500. Still, I immediately was off the back of the pack, running in last place for approximately 500 meters.  This did not perturb me in the least. Once a headstrong "youth", I knew that many of my competitors would squander their precious capital in the first 800 meters. I also was content to watch from a safe distance as the race unfolded violently, rife with collisions and contact. My miler's instincts, honed long ago, led me through even splits of approximately 66-seconds per lap.  I eased my way through the field and surged hard the final 200, ultimately crossing in 4:07.55. While the time is much slower than my personal best of 4:02 (2003), the race served its purpose, and I exceeded the goal I had set in advance.

Most importantly, the race corroborated what I have long believed, or at least tried to believe, about aging and decline in distance runners.  Compulsively dwelling upon perceived physical capabilities and the personal histories we've recorded in race results and running logs, we often prematurely pen our own obituaries.  When we impose an arbitrary shelf life on our abilities to excel, we limit both our aspirations and capabilities.  More damaging still, we fulfill our dire prophecies, misinterpreting correctable problems as the inevitable result of an aging. We misdiagnose injuries, burnout, and chronic fatigue, attributing these issues to a body that experienced too much wear and tear. I, too, am a perpetrator, and thus a victim, of this mentally. Like all forms of negative thought, it is a hard pattern to break.

I am not advocating that we gleefully neglect the aging process. To progress, we must be ever cognizant of the many changes our bodies undergo during the course of our careers. Physically, we are very different people than we were a year or decade ago. Our needs change. Our training preferences change; workouts that once elevated us to the pinnacle of fitness may leave us flat.  However, lamenting the loss of days gone by only limits what we can achieve and who we will become. At its best, the social construct of youth inspires us to live fully and utilize our talents and resources. And we should do so prudently by conserving our bodies, adapting to change, and eschewing self-imposed limitations. The end will come. But we shouldn't hasten it. 

I've devoted this racing season to celebrating my youthfulness and testing limits. In doing so, I challenge myself physically and psychological - to make fitness breakthroughs and to break through stifling paradigms. This track meet was incredibly fun, and it has prepared me to compete well on April 19. Had I passively accepted that I was too old to still compete and excel at the middle distances, I would have missed this opportunity and resigned myself to more modest endeavors.

Spring on the Jones Falls

Shortly after I posted my last entry at the end of last week, the daylong deluge of cold rain became a mix of snow and ice. Undoubtedly, it was one of the worst days for running in 2014, a year that thus far is marked by harsh weather. On Monday, however, I encountered a positive indicator that winter is relenting. As I ran with my training partner, Nate, westward along the Wyman Park Drive bridge toward Druid Hill Park, I spotted a Yellow-crowned Night-Heron perched in a tree far above the Jones Falls. While Yellow-crowned Night-Herons are common denizens of the Jones Falls watershed, I had never seen one of these shorebirds so high in a tree.

We quickly discovered that this was not a solitary bird; its partner was roosted nearby. As we focused our vision closely on the many layers of branches in the canopy beneath the bridge and above the stream, we noticed other pairs of herons and at least two nests, carefully constructed safe havens far from the reaches of the predators who prowl the shoreline - a rookery of Yellow-crowned Night-Herons! These beautiful wading birds are characterized by their distinct yellow crests, or crowns, which, as I discovered in my recent observations, they flare when interacting with others of their species.

Yellow-crowned Night-Herons

Such seasonal occurrences are easily missed in twenty-first-century urban America.  Few of us engage the non-human world with the frequency that our ancestors did. The developed world's conveniences allow us to continue the rhythms of our lifeways largely unaltered by seasonal changes. We may bemoan temperature extremes, but our diets, work, and sleep patterns change little, if at all, over the course of a year. Running, however, has helped me become far more attuned to the seasonal cycles of flora and fauna. When one's days and ways entail traversing familiar landscapes in all weather conditions, it is much easier to perceive even minute environmental changes. With heightened senses, I especially delight in running during the transitional phases of the year, as one season blends into the next.

Wetlands and wooded waterways are fascinating environments to explore during times of seasonal change for their abundance of biodiversity, particularly migratory birds. During my six-years in Baltimore, I have been fortune to live along the southern-half of the Jones Falls, a stream that played a significant role in the city's growth and prosperity. This wooded stream snakes for nearly 18 miles from central Baltimore County to the city's heart, where it meets the harbor near the National Aquarium. Compelled by warm temperatures and blues skies, I set about this past weekend to look closer, listen carefully, and absorb the Jones Falls' environments during my runs. 

The Jones Falls was one of the city's principal arteries for agricultural and industrial production. To follow the stream's course from the Inner Harbor northward to its source is to trek backwards through time, passing antiquities from various stages of the city's economic and cultural development. Mills that are composed of local field stone and chunky bricks baked from Maryland's ubiquitous red clay line the falls between Mt. Vernon, where the stream disappears into subterranean tunnels, to Woodberry. In the early to middle decades of the nineteenth century, these mill complexes housed the production of textiles, including fabric used for the sails of Baltimore's merchant fleet that enriched the city through global trade. As sails gave way to steam power in the later half of the nineteenth century, the textile mills converted their production but continued to hum, manufacturing a variety of cloth and yarn products. In recent years, developers, with the aid of government funding and support of community groups, have revitalized these remarkable but once derelict structures. The restored mills now house a diverse array of new businesses, reflecting Baltimore's vibrant cultural and economic life. The preservation and restoration of these landmarks - a process called adaptive reuse - has accelerated during my short tenure in Baltimore, significantly transforming and redefining the landscapes of the lower Jones Falls.

Looking north upon Mt. Vernon Mill

The ecology of the watershed also has undergone improvements in recent decades, though it is still recovering from two centuries of industrial use and degradation. The Yellow-crowned Night-Herons' rookery and the multitudes of bird species that populate the stream's shoreline and canopy, however, are signs of progress and the potential for a richer future. The presence of these birds, who sustain themselves on crustaceans and other aquatic life, are evidence of a complex ecosystem and improving water quality. These natural and historic resources, unique to Baltimore, are best enjoyed and explored on foot along the Jones Falls Trails, where I run a considerable portion of my mileage.  After a bleak winter of short days and inclement weather, now is the ideal moment to seek out these spaces and gaze upon them with fresh, perceptive eyes. As runners, we benefit greatly from the conservation and restoration projects that are revitalizing the Jones Falls' built and natural landscapes. Take advantage of these resources and participate in the remaking of our city.  

Postscript

I emphasized the places where I run in this entry, with scant mention of my actual training. I am happy to report that I am progressing well. I will post again midweek after my next interval work and devote the entire entry of the last phase of my training cycle, which culminates at the end of this month.

A Rejuvenating Landscape: Myakka River State Park

I arrived on Florida's Gulf Coast on the night of Thursday, February 27. Like so many of my previous vacations, I began this one feeling deeply weary, both physically and mentally, and emotionally drained. My fatigue and anxiety were largely the result of the longest, harshest winter of training that I've experienced as a runner. Winter began early, in late November, and, as I write this entry in the last days of March, I am uncertain whether it has ended or temporarily subsided before delivering one last blast of deep chill to spite all who prematurely proclaimed and celebrated the start of spring.

Last fall, my 2013 campaign ended brilliantly. I was fortunate to attain personal records in the 5K, 10K, 5 mile, and half marathon, before completing my first marathon in a respectable 2:33:27. Imbued with confidence from these accomplishments, I began training for my spring season in earnest on January 1, striding comfortably in a t-shirt and shorts during a 30-minute tempo run. Spring held promise. I was determined to train, and live, to the fullest in an attempt to squeeze the utmost potential from body at the distance of 5000 meters before fully transitioning to longer distance events, for which, at my age and temperament, I am far better suited.

Describing Baltimore's winter as uncharacteristically bad would be a cruel understatement, denying due respect to both the season and those who endured it. Each week of January and February brought heavy winds, bitterly cold temperatures, and precipitation in all its wintery variations: cold rain, freezing rain, sleet, and snow. Compounding these conditions, I suffered from a cold that lingered for all of January and half of February. By the end of last month, I was physically spent from my efforts to maintain a regimen of speed and strength under these adverse conditions. I had allowed myself to succumb to the tyranny of statistics, an obsession with mileage and interval splits that left me in a state approaching physical burnout. I was already mentally burnt out from the stresses of life and work that exacerbated the pressure of my relentless pursuit of my competitive goals.

The day before my departure to Florida, I ran a paltry 4.5 miles at a gentle pace on tired legs and then resolved to liberate myself from the pressures inherent in targeting a specific and challenging numerical goal. Above all, I wanted to establish a mindset in which I would be more cognizant of the many pleasures that running affords - camaraderie with training partners, health and vigor, exploration, adventure. At Myakka River State Park, a short drive from my motel in Nokomis, Florida, I found the perfect venue to begin the process of self reflection and physical recovery. Furthermore, I discovered the site's history intersected with my personal history. This preserved landscape and I are both products of the same social policies and philosophies of conversation.

The State of Florida established Myakka River State Park in the 1930s, during the depths of the Great Depression. The park was one of thousands of conservation projects that the federal government undertook during the presidential administration of Franklin Delano Roosevelt. Such projects served the dual purpose of employing young, jobless men in socially meaningful work and restoring and preserving the nation's degraded forests and agricultural lands for posterity. While many of Roosevelt's New Deal programs targeted conservation projects, his Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC), established in 1933, was the largest and most significant, ultimately enlisting millions of working-class young men in Roosevelt's "Tree Army" in thousands of camps across the United States. Myakka River State Park was home to one such camp.

Roosevelt and the CCC's administrators embraced a Progressive Era environmental philosophy that argued exposure to parks and "wilderness" served to rejuvenate the mind, body, and souls of individuals who endured a life of industrial and urban drudgery. This philosophy - the wilderness as a place for renewal - dates at least to New England's nineteenth-century Transcendentalists. However, its most extensive and significant manifestation in social policy was Roosevelt's CCC. While work, life, and mission varied from camp to camp, as diverse as the lands they inhabited, each unit had the common goals of restoring landscapes and lives and building social goods and good citizens.

The accomplishments of the young men who converted a remote tract of Floridian forest and grassland into a 58-square-mile park were immediately apparent as I drove through the park's entrance, greeted by a sign that read "Welcome to the Real Florida." The structures the CCC built for the American people still facilitate recreation today: several cabins, hewn from the park's native palm, accommodate campers; a visitor center and pavilions are educational space that interpret the park's history and resources. While I was unable to lodge in the park during my visit - the cabins book up months in advance - I had the opportunity to traverse the fire roads and trails that lead away from the park's physical infrastructure into its seemingly remote interior. Once I was over a half-mile from the park's main road, I was alone on the soft trails. As I ran deeper into the park, the forest transitioned to grasslands, an environment that felt more foreign to me than any I had previously explored.  The landscape, which had been undergoing restoration since the inception of the CCC, promoted contemplation.  I was alone and in awe of the park's innumerable natural resources that wove together a unique ecological tapestry.

Dry prairie in the interior of Myakka State Park

At that moment, I was running for recreation with the principal goals of exploration and immersion, freed from the burdens that I had imposed upon myself.   Gone were the numbers that had haunted me for weeks. Similarly, the soft trails were a significant relief from the unforgiving urban pavement on which I had completed most of my runs after the winter rendered Maryland's parks inaccessible. Like the CCC enlistees of my grandfathers' generation, I was working with this landscape to strength both body and mind, and in this park I found relief from the stresses of life in urban America. Reflecting on the experience, it appears that I helped fulfill Roosevelt and the New Deal conversationists' mission for the CCC. Decades after the CCC camps disbanded, their work continues to benefit the American people, providing landscapes for recreation, education, and exploration along thousands of miles of trails across tens of millions of acres of land. As a runner, I find these landscapes especially inviting; there is, I believe, no better way to explore a park than on fleet feet, immersed in the sites and sounds and smells of its environs.

I returned to Baltimore rejuvenated and emboldened. I had largely recovered from the physical fatigue that had derailed workouts and sapped my motivation in the preceding weeks. I began consciously redirecting my focus to enjoying the social aspects of running. I now strive to be more cognizant of my fortunes as a runner, and I continually draw motivation from these fortunes whenever I encounter a disappointing workout or unpleasant running conditions. I've adapted my training to compliment this outlook; I no longer fret over missed or altered speed session. Unsurprisingly, for the past two weeks I've completed some of the best workouts of my life. On March 16, with a rested body and relaxed psyche, I ran a 12-second personal best at 5K, finishing in 15:05 at Kelly's Shamrock 5k (Baltimore, MD). Now, I am a mere six seconds from the goal I established at the season's onset, 14:59. As my target race approaches, the BAA 5K in Boston on April 19, I am equally excited for the race and to run and explore the parks in the Boston area with friends from that region.

I intend to use this blog to document the remainder of this racing season and future training cycles. In forthcoming entries, I hope to establish my voice as a writer and narrow the scope and purpose of my writing. This blog will serve as a medium for logging runs and expressing personal reflections on the spaces I inhabit as a runner. I will emphasize the landscapes that are products of the environmental thought and social policies that I discussed in this entry.  I also hope that this digital history will inspire others to explore these places and will instill in the reader a curiosity for the social investment and environmental policies of past generations that produced so many social goods from which we immeasurably benefit. Like training as a distance runner, honing my writing will take patience, thoughtful training, and ongoing reflection and revision. It's going to be great fun. Onward.