July Stuff

As some of you know, I started working at Marshalls about 2 weeks ago. For those that are not familiar, Marshalls is a discount retailer of clothing, home decor, as well as other assorted items. I have only worked there on 3 separate occasions, but I can already tell the job is not for me. I like to think I have a good "feel" for things and this one does not feel right to me. The job requirements do not accentuate my strengths, at least this is the initial impression that I have come to. I have worked 2 busy days up at the register, which is pretty stressful if you have never been up there before and then they throw you to the wolves. There are just so many little things that I have to remember to do, it can be overwhelming at times, but it is a job. I can't really complain at work, so this is the forum in which I will do it in. I won't complain too much because I have a job and that is what is important in today's times. It is a temporary stopgap to bigger and better things for me in the future. It is a good experience for me, as it provides an opportunity to enhance some of social and practical skills. It also is something I hope I do not have to do for too long. I hope to have a better sense of my future in the next few months.

Right around the time I started working for Marshalls, I had the opportunity to house sit for this family that goes to my church. They went on vacation for a week and I was responsible for feeding their animals, which included horses, goats, dogs, and cats. The horses and goats had to be fed twice a day and the horses had to be led to separate locations to be fed. It was a unique experience. I had never dealt with horses before and in fact I had only ridden a horse once in my life. So I was in some foreign territory. The woman in charge instructed me on how to conduct all the feedings a few times before they left on their trip. The animals were all well behaved, except for a few times when one of the horses was acting a little stubborn, but there was no harm done. It paid well, and I got to enjoy some alone time with a 40 inch flat screen in a house to myself.

The month of July is pretty dull for sports. You have baseball, the Open Championship, and the Tour de France (if you are into this event, which I am). I followed the Tour over its 3 weeks and became fascinated, like I do every year, over the tactics, strategy and story lines that occur throughout the tour. I love the team strategies, when to chase, when not to chase. Which team members are responsible for which tasks. The sprint finishes are dramatic, the mountain stages are epic and separate the men from the boys. I love the continual attacking on the mountain stages to see who is up to snuff. In the end the best rider is evident and this year, like it was 2 years ago, is the Spainish rider from Astana Alberto Contador. This young rider is a mountain goat and climbs faster than even 7x Tour de France winner Lance Armstrong did in his heyday. He is an incredible talent who should have many more yellow jerseys in his future. Armstrong was a big story in this years Tour as he finished on the podium in 3rd place. Quite remarkable for a guy who has been away from the sport for 3.5 years and is at the ripe old age of 37. Over ten years older than his main competitors in this years race. There was a lot of controversy between Armstrong and Contador as they were battling over team leadership and tactics throughout the Tour. They were able to put away noticeable differences in philosophies to take 2 out of the top 3 spots. The bad blood between these two is still there, and they will go their separate ways and be on 2 different teams in next years race. It makes the sport exciting and gives me one more reason to watch, like I needed another one. So that concludes this blog. I hope you enjoyed it.

Hugs and handpounds everyone.

Mb

Peachtree Road Race 2009

It has been quite awhile since I have last posted. Don't worry I haven't forgot about this, there has just been a lot of things going on and a lot of things not going on if you know what I mean. I am going to try and post more regularly as we get closer to football season and the baseball season winds on down in the second half of the season.

I guess the main thing I wanted to touch on tonight was last week's July 4th Peachtree Road Race(due to popular demand and strong urging from some fans). For those that are not familiar, the Peachtree Road Race has been held every July 4th since 1970, when 110 people ran in it. So this year marked the 40th running of the race. The Peachtree Road Race is more than just a race down Peachtree St., its an event. It is hard to describe unless you have been there yourself and see and experience it all. 55,000 people of all different ages and ability levels. People has young as 14-15 all the way up to 70 years and older. One man, Bill Thorn has ran in every single one of them, quite an accomplishment. This man keeps himself in good shape by doing pushups, situps, jumping on the trampoline, and either riding the bike or walk/running everyday. The Peachtree organizers did something really cool to commemorate the original 110 by one giving them a T-shirt and two allowing them to start 8 minutes before the rest of the field. Nice tribute. The race starts at 7:30am for the elites and the first couple of groups because obviously you can't start 55,000 at one time. A little aside, everyone gets their race numbers about 3 weeks before the race and you are assigned a number based on a time you submitted from a legitimate race within the last year. If you submit a time, period, than you will be in one of the first few groups. The time I submitted got me in the sub-seeded(3285) which placed me in the group right behind the elite runners. Which this year included many U.S. elites who were competing in the U.S. 10k Road Championships simultaneously. Pretty cool, got to see guys like Brian Sell, Abdi, and Famligetti , just to name a few. For this year's race everyone got a timing strip that could be interwoven in between your shoe laces. This timing strip can tell when you cross the actual start line to when you finish and give you an accurate time for your rice. They only start the clock once, so even for people in my group who start at the same time but don't start at the same place, you can get an accurate 10k time. Its what I would call a rolling start. The rest of the race numbers are randomly assigned and you have to start with your group. The last group does not start until almost 9am, well after a lot of people have finished. Some other tidbits about the pre-race stuff. I got up at 5:20am had a bagel and some OJ (big mistake that I will explain later) and got to the start line around 6:40am. The race starts on the north side of Atlanta at Lenox Mall and runs south down Peachtree Road. Some of the lore surrounding the Peachtree Road Race is the mystery of what the T-shirt is going to look like. 5 shirts are selected from the many that are sent in. They are then voted upon by people online. No one execpt for the race organizers knows what the shirt looks like. It only goes to people who finish the race, even though I am sure some people cheat the system and start before they should. In fact I even read about this group of women that were spotted around the 3rd mile on course even before the elites arrived at that point.

Alright now onto the race, race time temperature was around 68-69, low humidity, great weather for a 4th of July in the ATL. My expectations were not very high, I had a couple of weeks around 30-35 miles, but had only been running for about a month. Nowhere near peak condition. I was expecting somewhere between 40-42 minutes, but I had no clue really. I had done no workouts and my longest run was 60 minutes and I only did that once. The thing about the Peachtree and most 10k's in general, it really tests your fitness level. You can't cheat your body here, either you got it or you don't, this isn't like the 5k where you can get away with not training as much. What makes the Peachtree difficult is that that the first 2.5 miles is either flat or a slight downhill and the rest of it is either very uphill, slightly uphill, or flat. When you are starting to hurt is when the course gets tougher. Some other tidbits about the race is that there is so much fan support along the side of the roads, its pretty cool to see all the different people who come out to support the runners. People who live in the area will come out with their lawn chairs and line up on both sides of the road, it's really cool to have them out there. There are also bands and radio stations out there playing music along the way which makes it fun too. Now onto my race. I felt relatively comfortable the first mile, running with an old teammate from high school. I did not catch the 1st mile split but it had to be a little under 6 minutes, and around that time is when I started going backwards. I said goodbye to my teammate and tried to start enjoying the race, and settling into a comfortable rhythm of some sort, which is hard because you still want to try and beat people, but I could just feel that first mile eating me up. In fact I told my old teammate that I was struggling a little the first mile at the pace he was running (he ended up running 37 minutes, which is 6minute mile pace). I hit the third mile in 18:50, not bad but I was really starting to go backwards then as it was where the first of two hills begins to hit you. The second of those hills which comes right after the 5k mark is called Cardiac Hill because Piedmont Hospital is at the top of the hill and because of how it challenges all the runners in the race. It is difficult for sure and I have ran up my share of hills. I had not started walking yet but I felt like it for sure. My back was aching, my stomach was starting to feel a little weird. I was not feeling good at all. Still getting passed and just trying to finish. The 4th mile was reached around 25-26 minutes, I don't really remember, I was pretty delirious at the time. Now during these last couple of miles I was trying to take down some water to see if that could speed me up any. It did not really help me at all and I was feeling pretty terrible that 5th mile. So after the 5th mile, I pulled off the side of the road and proceeded to throw up breakfast. About 3 different times if I recall correctly. It just hit me all of a sudden and it all came out. Quite lovely, and cost me some time in the end, but I felt better after I had gotten it all out. I realized later that it was the orange juice that was the culprit, as the acid helped to jar everything around in my stomach. Rookie mistake, I knew better, but I wanted to see if I could get away with it, and I thought two hours would be enough, but I guess not. So I walked it out for a few seconds and then proceeded to finish out the race. Feeling a lot better than I had the previous two miles. The Peachtree makes a left-hand turn and you know you got about .5 miles to go. Thankfully it is a rolling downhill to the finish. About .25 from the finish there is a place that takes a picture of you and all runners who run underneath it. You can order the pictures online about a week later. So I finished it up in 46:05, 1701st overall, a lot slower than I would have liked, but oh well I am no longer competing seriously so it was not a big deal. At times during the race I said there was no way I would do this race again, just too much pain to deal with. But once I crossed the line, walked over into Piedmont Park, saw all the other thousands of runners around, and grabbed the much coveted t-shirt. I decided that I would be back again next year, hopeful of beating my time from this year and curious to see what kind of t-shirt there will be for next year. The experience is great and I would recommend it to anyone who considers themself a runner of any kind of ability level. Whether your goal is to win the race, (which you probably won't unless you can run around 27 minutes for 10k), set a personal record, or just to finish and get that t-shirt, it is something that you should do. If you want to get in, registration begins in March, not everyone gets in so plan accordingly. Take care, enjoy the summer.

Mb