Being a Runner Again



Walney Pond

The afternoon rush hour hummed all around. If you closed your eyes, it almost sounded like waves roiling up on the shore. Almost. My CRV crunched over the gravel parking area. I killed the engine and opened the backdoor to let my dog Mattie out. The perpetually happy dog, her nose went to the grass as she hoovered whatever new smells called her all the while wagging her tail. You see, despite the major highways that crisscrossed in the background, there is a small pond inside the afternoon chaos with a little more than two miles of trails behind it. It’s just enough to help you forget that you’re in a bustling metropolitan area and only moments ago capped your eight hours at the office.
Returning to Walney Pond casts wide memories of my youth like the ripples that spread along its surface from nervous frogs. I remember fishing alongside my dad and grandfather using a bamboo pole when we first moved to Virginia so long ago. It brings back Cub Scout nature walks, elementary school fieldtrips, and the summer afternoon bike expeditions that live in coming of age novels.

My wife and I return to it now and again for short weekend walks. More recently, I’ve taken to adding it on to my 12 mile loop should the plan call for 14-16 miles.

Yesterday, however, I simply decided that I needed a change of scenery. With the Rock and Roll USA Half Marathon behind me, I have room to play. Yes, I realize this is in direct contrast to what I wrote about not too long ago, but aren’t we always tempted by that seemingly greener grass over there? And, truth be told, I already have a new training program on the fridge that includes this week of “easy miles” to just enjoy being a runner again.

So, Mattie and I set off behind the pond and across the wooden bridge that spanned a burbling stream. We went at an easy pace to acclimatize ourselves to the too warmish March weather and to simply enjoy an uncommon middle-of-the-week outing.

After a half mile running at a slight incline over wood chips and mulch, we merged onto the one mile long North Loop trail. The acrid smell of freshly cut trees punctuated the air and was quickly replaced by the soft perfume of budding trees. Clusters of daffodils add a shock of color to the muted woods.

Another half mile goes by and we tossed a nod to a pair of walkers before bearing left onto the half mile Wild Turkey Trail. Mattie kicks mud up my shins from the suddenly soggy route. The trail veered close to the street long enough to remind us that we’re not completely immersed in the wilderness.

When we reconnected with the North Loop, Mattie’s tongue lolled out the side of her mouth. We slowed the pace and made a quick diversion to the stream for her to steal a few sips. Up ahead, a gray doe stands guard on the edge of the trail. She locks eyes with us and just beyond her, we can see the mottled hides and white tails of her troupe. It’s not until we’re 10 feet away that she spooks and darts into the woods. Mattie’s lethargy disappears and she’s straining at the end of her leash to give chase. It’s enough to carry us back to the start of the North Loop trail.

We make one more pass around the North Loop and Wild Turkey Trails before ending back at the bridge and burbling stream. The heat has gotten to both of us so we walk when Mattie wants to walk and we stop when she wants to sniff.

Before heading back to the car, we walk down to the clear, cool stream and I unclip her leash. She nearly belly flops into the water and alternates dipping her belly with slurping from the stream. I peel my socks off and dip my feet in while she bounces from rock to rock and chases the water spiders. The cold rocks feel good on my slightly swollen ankle.

For a few more minutes, we let the warm afternoon breeze wash over us and just relish the thrill of being a runner and a dog.

Carrying the Weight

Check out those quads.

First came the quick machine gun jangle of my dog’s collar. She huffed and shook her way excitedly to the front door. Then I heard the faint sounds of a woman bellowing opera in German. I half opened my eyes, only half recognizing just what in the hell was going on. The front door opened. More collar jangling. My wife’s voice. “Where’s dad? Is dad home?” Then the tumbling of paw steps up the stairs and a wet nose in my face. My wife followed along with her laughter.

“Are you ok?” she asked. “What are you doing?”
“Um,” I blearily said, rubbing my eyes with the back of one hand. The wind pressed against the windows outside and I hunkered down a little further under the covers. “I needed a nap.”
“What are you listening too?”
“It’s German opera,” I said without missing a beat but perhaps wisely missing the “duh.”
“Did you run your 14?”
“Yep.”
“Did you go to the gym afterward?”
“Yep.”
“No wonder you needed a nap.”
“Mmm.”

Ah, the nap. I don't think I've taken a nap since sophomore year in college. But after Saturday, I may have to reconsider. After that initial grogginess wore off -- the one where you feel slightly nauseous and out of sorts because, well, you just slept in the middle of the day -- after that, I felt spectacular.

A few years back, I remember sitting on the table at the ortho’s office as he pulled, twisted, and contorted my leg to figure out just what was wrong with that knee of mine.

“What do you do for strength training?” he asked.
I gave an arrogant sniff. “I run hill repeats and about 50 miles a week.”
“Uh huh,” he said, just as dismissively. “You should really get into the gym and lift some weights.”

Then I heard the same from my uncle. And so (many) months later, I found being injured (again) the perfect time to get into the weight room and do something about it. I recruited my friend who has a personal trainer certification to put a program together for me. I have an upper body day (Wednesday mornings) and a lower body day (whenever I can fit it in).

While those upper body days make an afternoon run a tad sluggish, I’ve been trying to find the ideal time to get that lower body day in. I knew I didn’t want to do it on a Friday before my long run. Nor did I want to do it Tuesday night after an interval workout or Monday the day before said interval workout. So, I’ve been doing it early Saturday afternoon following my long run and breakfast club meal, subscribing to the idea that you keep the hard days hard and the easy days easy. That gives me roughly 52 hours until my next run.

After getting up early to run last week and again on Saturday, “it,” as they say, caught up to me. I walked into the house after breakfast, cold-faced, wide-eyed, and slack-jawed. I went upstairs, eyed the bed, and turned away so I could quickly get out of my running clothes and into some gym clothes without being seduced into that perfect homeostasis where the air is cold but it's warm under the covers.

The gym was eerily quiet, made more so by the softly falling snow outside. I shivered watching the flakes fall onto the covered pool outside before lugging some dumbbells off the rack. I methodically went through each exercise, knowing that with each set crossed off, I was closer to that nap.

My lower body workout looks like this:

- 4x10 dumbbell squats
- 4x12 calf raises
- 4x8 deadlifts
- 4x10 kettlebell swings
- 3x10 single leg squats with weight
- 3x10 twisting lunges with a medicine ball

It takes about 45 minutes and not only chisels your legs but gives you the best night sleep of your life week in and week out.

The snow swirled around my car on the way home and the wind pushed my car from side to side. Luckily, my gym is in my neighborhood, so it’s a short drive (.8mi to be exact). In other words, it was the perfect day to pull on some compression socks, flannel pj pants, and a hooded sweatshirt and climb (gingerly) into bed, and close my eyes. And of course, a little German Opera to carry you into dreamland.

The Payoff

Not the actual sunrise this morning since I regrettably did
not have my camera. But this comes courtesy of photolvr35
on Flickr.

The alarm went off at 7:00 this morning. I know what you’re thinking, “He said he was getting up at 6:00 to ‘feel the day’ and squeeze in a morning run.” Everybody relax. On Fridays, I get to work from home, which also means I can cut out my commute and snag an extra 30-60 minutes of sleep.

However, this morning, as I said, the alarm went off at 7:00 and I wobbled. Do I really need to walk the dog longer this morning? She’s going on a hike with Rachel this afternoon. The rationalization was in full effect, as went through the motions of pulling on my warmups. The longer morning walk for the dog is secondary, I shouted in my head. The longer morning walk for you is primary.

Still wrestling with the idea, I slid on my gloves and tuned in my iPod, all the while thinking, If you don’t get out the door to walk long every morning, how are you going to get up to go run short every morning?

This morning, the payoff came almost immediately, and it’s not even ankle related. No, the payoff was this: a magnificent sunrise. My only regret is that I didn’t have my phone with me to take a picture.

Normally when I wake up, the sky is still dark or the eastern horizon is beginning to soften. Somewhere between taking a shower and getting out the door, night has officially receded and the sun blares through my windshield causing all traffic reports to reference the dreaded “sunshine delay.”

At 7:00 today, however, the timing was perfect. I stepped out of the house and glanced over to my left to see the fleece of clouds glowing like the orange embers of a roaring fire. All of the rationalization and second-guessing burned away.

Mattie and I walked toward the sunrise to start the front end of our 1.6mi round trip out and back. The sky continued to glow, changing from orange embers to the buzzing of neon pink signs. And when we reached the turnaround point near the 18th hole, a haze of pink water shimmered in the hazard where the reflection of the bare trees swam.

We stopped for a second to take it all in. Mattie sat down at my side as if appreciating the moment with me. It quickly became one of those times that no matter how much you didn't want to get out the door and run (or walk in this case), you're always glad you did.

We continued on with the sunrise at our backs until we reached the house again. By then, the sky had lost its palette of colors and instead reflected an ordinary crisp winter morning.

Today, the day felt good.

Deer Chaser

The Deer Hunter

With about two miles left in a scheduled five mile run, I picked my way over the Fairfax Cross County Trail, careful not to turn an ankle on a hidden root or ill-placed rock.  There was nothing special about this run, except perhaps to mention that the 2-5" of snow called for turned into a half inch, and did more to muddy the trail rather than add any other real hindrance.

My dog, Mattie, and I had just crossed the critical creep jump where she gets let off leash to go for an icy plunge and steal a few gulps of water while I tiptoe across the rocks.  Except this time, rather than hooking her back up, I decided to let her stay off leash with full knowledge that dusk had started to settle and the deer may be brave enough to step out into the clearings.  

Mattie generally does well off leash, only going a 100 feet ahead or so before waiting for me to catch up.  And this time, she stayed right behind me on the single track...until her jingling collar started to recede farther behind me. A new smell? I thought.  Something else's pee?  Only when I turned to call for her did I hear the sharp snap of branches and crunch of the brittle grass.  

Mattie was gone.

For the past two weeks, my dog and I have hopped into the car, driven the few miles down the road to the trailhead, and raced the sunset.  My wife and I have what we like to call "shelter moments" with the dog.  These are snapshots we mentally take of the dog doing outdoorsy things with us that we would -- in our imagination -- send to the shelter to show them what a good life we're giving Mattie.

I was not impressed.

However, these moments usually end in disasters that we wouldn't want the shelter to see.  For example, hiking down the backside of a mountain, feeling euphoric in the Shenandoah sunshine, we had one of these "shelter moments."  We let Mattie off leash, and true to the tale above, she stayed with us.  Life was good.  Until a deer got spooked and took off into the woods...and Mattie after her.  We had instant terrors of combing the woods for our dog...and never finding her again.  Of course she came back -- twigs hanging off her and prickers velcroed to her fur -- because let's face it, she's never going to catch the deer, and if by some miracle she did, well...then what?  And to add injury to insult, Mrs. Onthebusrunning sprained her ankle shortly thereafter.

Mattie's favorite things: chasing deer
and rolling in poop.

Cast against the brown landscape, she was still easy to see, her white coat flashing between the trees.  Then I saw the shock of white on the backside of the deer clustered on the creek's shoreline.  And those same shocks of white lifting and bounding deep into the woods. 

I became the moron yelling, "Maaaaaaatttttiiiiiie! Mattie come!"

Finally, with the deer out of reach, Mattie gave up the hunt and came trotting back to me, tongue lolling out the side of her mouth and head hung between her shoulders.  The look was not one of "I'm sorry I ran off," rather, "I'm sorry I didn't get them, Dad."

A very dirty dog.

Before she returned to me, I noticed that she was no longer the white dog I remembered just minutes ago.  Instead, she'd camouflaged herself with the mud, gravel, and grass native to the trail.  As I went to her, leash at the ready, she dove neck first into the grass to ground whatever deer, rabbit, or goose poop she'd found into her and her collar.  It should be noted that aside from being fed, these are Mattie's two favorite past times: chasing deer and rolling in poo.

"All right, you," I found myself saying out loud.  "I bet you're pretty proud of yourself aren't you?"  She snorted and rolled again.  I clipped the leash back onto her collar and we trotted back to the car...less careful about where we stepped or what we stepped in.

Double Dipping

The alarm went off this morning at 5:50 and I sprung out of bed and over to the running clothes I'd laid out what seemed like only a few hours before.  Still, with some of that excitement/anxiety that comes with a new routine, I was off and padding down the stairs.  For some reason, I'd hoped to actually catch a middle of the week run with some sunlight, but at 6:00 a.m., still no sun.  

I wrangled the dog who saw from the looks of things that this was more than just a morning walk.  She bucked and yowled as if she'd been penned up all day.  I kissed my wife good bye and Mattie and I started off in the dark around the golf cart path, both of us at an easy trot and on the lookout for deer.

I did my best tin man impression in the beginning, waiting for those stiff joints to finally get oiled and come to life.  Eventually they did and we were off.

Rounding the first mile, I started realizing that I actually felt much better than I had on the run I did less than 12 hours ago, and that only helped forge me on.  It's interesting to feel your body waking up on a morning run and the charge of cold air that wakes up the senses.

When we turned to the house, it was feeding time, and not just for the dog.   I filled both our bowls, mine with an apricot, banana, and some Kashi Warm cinnamon, and hers with, well dog food.  We scarfed it down and then the normal routine took over.

Coming out of the bathroom, I found Mattie sprawled out on the floor in front of my closet.  When I moved to get into it, she picked herself up off the ground and meandered to her bed, let out a long sigh, and promptly fell back asleep.

I went about my day, business as usual but with that afternoon run always in the back of my mind.  My concern wasn't so much that I couldn't complete the second workout, but more so that the extra run would put strain on my ornery IT-band that had tensed up some over the weekend.

Meanwhile, today's eating habits took on savage, garbage disposal proportions.  I'd go from completely content to ravenous in a matter of moments.  As I mentioned yesterday, though, I packed a yogi bear style picnic for myself with food never more than an arm's length away.

I fought off a 10:00 dip in energy with a bowl of oatmeal and some yogurt and made a requisite stop at Starbucks at lunch for a coffee...just in case.

On my way home from work, I chatted with my dad who assured me that my IT-band would hold up.  "So you top out at 13 miles today," he said.  "Haven't you done 13 miles in a day before?"  A wise man, my father.  He told me about the days when he would set out for a double.  "It's just an easy way to add mileage," he said.  "Of course I remember those 'easy' morning runs.  Easy pace being, oh, 6:30ish, you know, it felt like nothing."

Uh huh.

Still, taking extra precaution, I put some heat on it whilst stretching this evening, then headed out the door (again).  The morning run seemed so long ago, that it almost felt like a completely different day.  Instead of the jerky, sluggish stride I somewhat expected, I found my legs turning over cleanly and efficiently.  I glided through my 2.5 mile warmup and when it came time to pick up the pace for my steady state run, there was a pop there that I haven't seen in a week or so.  I fell into a smooth rhythm and cruised easily at 6:20 pace for 4.5 miles and when it came time to take my cool down, I slowed the pace and my breathing and heart rate immediately settled down.

Back at the house again, and extremely pleased with myself, I plugged the iPod in and started bouncing around the kitchen to some Sly and the Family Stone while sipping on a recovery smoothie.

Now, I'm just kicking back watching the Caps destroy the Islanders, and melting into the couch (with a precautionary ice bag on my IT band).  Channeling my inner-George Costanza, I dipped the chip today...and then I dipped again.  And I loved it.  Is that bed calling?

Have Dog. Will Run...Reluctantly.

Four years ago, Rachel and I introduced a wonderful addition to our lives. She was cute and cuddly, and it was love at first sight. Of course we had to get used to one another: getting up in the middle of the night, the feedings, and the obligatory picking up of poop (which is as bad as they say it will be). Yet the good always outweighed the...the what? the bad? the gross? the undeniably, life altering circumstances? Right on! And here we are, today: proud parents of a four-year-old, four legged creature, who somehow managed to survive the tidal floods of Hurricane Katrina and make her way up to Virginia. From mangy mutt, to spoiled bitch. That's our Mattie.



Mattie is my first dog (there was a brief moment in my youth where we had a very ornery cat named, Groucho, who didn't take too kindly to my arrival, i.e. birth). And I couldn't wait to get her on the road running with me. Once she figured out -- as many of us do in our first races -- the importance of not going out too fast and running at the front, she adapted quite well. In fact, last year I had her running nine-milers with me after work. We were inseparable, Mattie and me, particularly when Rachel started commuting into D.C. every day. Running was our thing and we were out on the roads scalding dogs.



But then something happened. All of the sudden, Mattie decided she didn't like running anymore. She'd see that harness come out and she'd shirk away, head drooping between her shoulders, tail wrapped tightly around butt. I had to lure her out from under the table, ususally invovling some high-pitched emasculating voice, and once I did, we trotted down the stairs AND...she hit the brakes. I mean emergency brake style. This dog wasn't going nowheres.



I didn't know what to do at first. I tried to coax her along. She turned to sniff something in the grass. I tried the stern, parental "stop embarrassing me in front of these people" voice. She bent down and licked herself. Sure, I could have been sad. My companion ditching me after all those great trails together. F-that. I was pissed! I tugged, and I pulled, and I swore, and I muttered under my breath. And after this mature stand off, I said, "FINE," and led/force marched her back to the front door, unclipped the leash, tossed it in the house with her, and went on my merry way...alone.



*cleansing breath*



Mattie and I are fine now. Occassionally she runs with me, but mostly not. However, today became one of the few days she joined me. I took her to Burke Lake, a leafy 4.7 mile loop around, you guessed it, Burke Lake. Everything started off fine. I've tended to run slower with her whenever we do go out, so she was my built in recovery pace today. A half mile in, she stops. She gives me the look that says, "I'm done, Pop," In my head she calls me Pop. "I won't be tricked." I forgot to mention I've tried different tactics, like not bringing the harness and pretending we're just going for a walk. "That's right, see, just a nice mosey, and oh, oh, look we're running. We're running and it's fun." That only worked once. With each step back toward the car, her pace quickened. With each step forward down the trail, she stopped. After a couple rounds of this, she agreed, or relented, I'm not sure, which. She's a dog after all and can't speak.



We got through the 4.7 miles at a nice conversational pace I might add. She trotted the entire way, but a good leash length behind me...just enough so that I had to pull her along some...bitch. And now, she's sprawled out next to me, snoring softly, and dreaming the dreams of dogs. No doubt running through a field, chasing after that stupid rabbit that keeps coming into our backyard.



Anyhow, you might say that my runs have gone to the dogs. Except I wouldn't say that, because she hates it. *sigh*