Meet Tyler Darby

I went to the Grete's Gallop with the hopes of filming her talk with the Team for Kids, but she wound up not doing it this year. Luckily I ran into Tyler Darby, a new member of Team for Kids with an amazing story to tell. Click play below to watch it. For more on Tyler, visit his website:

Tyler Darby's Triathlon and Marathon Fundraising Site

The Beer Mile

Here is a video for your entertainment if you are a contributor or marathon runner enjoying the tapering period. Last year, on the Saturday after the marathon, a group of runners gathered for a race in Riverside Park on the West Side of Manhattan. Contestants were required to drink a beer at the start of the race and each quarter of a mile thereafter, for a total of 4. There was a team comprised of a runner who doesn't drink and a drinker who couldn't run, but to make things equitable a stiff time handicap was imposed on them, to make up for the fact that the runner did not have to deal with the carbonation and other issues associated with trying to run quickly after chugging a beer.

HQ Sports - Beer Mile

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There will be a 2006 Beer Mile in the same location, date & time to be determined.

The Westchester Half: What a Difference a Year Makes

Last year I ran this half marathon in 1:41:32, a 7:45 pace. I came in 79th out of 564 finishers and I was very happy, as that was my new personal record by a wide margin. Earlier this month Team for Kids did the race again, and I beat last year's time by 12 minutes and 39 seconds, completing it in 1:28:53, a 6:45 pace. I finished 32 / 685, and since 2005 my pace increased by 1 minute per mile!

One bad thing is I let the two guys visible over my left shoulder catch me and beat me, the one in the white shirt by 5 seconds (Scott), the guy in TFK green by 1 second (Coach Pete). They actually beat me by more than that on official time, but I am going by chip time, since they started before I did.

I'm not exactly sure what is going on with my hair in this photo, but it may hold the key to understanding my success. There was an analysis of my hair / hat situation in the post on the Nike Half Marathon (see the archives for August). I ran this race entirely hatless and ran 18 seconds a mile faster. Coincidence? I think not.

We ran tonight, and actually got lost in Central Park, which is kind of incredible when you consider we have been training for 16 weeks now. Actually we weren't lost so much as we missed a turn, which happened because I wasn't listening to the instructions before we started. My bad. :-(

Saw Doctors Concert

A group of TFK members and I went to the Nokia Theater on Saturday night to see The Saw Doctors perform. They are the band that graciously allowed us to use their inspiring song "To Win Just Once" for our charity's videos. So I encouraged team members to get tickets and come to the show, to help pay them back for their generosity.

A good sized group showed up, myself and 13 others. Plus we made a couple of new friends while there, along with a few enemies (some rude girls that tried to stand in front of us after we had already staked out some prime real estate - I got rid of most of them, but sadly one particularly scary one lingered for the whole show). The band played many of their classic tunes including "To Win Just Once" and "Hay Wrap" (the song "The Beer Mile" video is set to). The band gave an impressive performance, especially considering their equipment did not make the trip down from Buffalo, after the massive snowstorm of 2 nights before. They played with instruments borrowed from the opening act and still did an amazing job. A good time was had by all!

Thanks to all that came out!

Let the Tapering Begin!

Did the 23 miler and feeling good. In the middle of a G.I.B.(see prior post), due to a little tightness in my calves. It is not as cold as the last ice bath so I am tolerating it better (used only 1 bag of ice this time, that seems to be the way to go).

We ran slower than commute pace which was the plan, averaging 8:30's for the first 10 miles. I believe we were between 8:30 and 8:45 the whole rest of the way as well. I ran with a small videocamera and got a lot of good footage the first 16 miles, so that was worthwhile. I actually wound up cutting out a bit of the run, maybe 1/2 mile because I stopped to do some shooting of TFK'ers we had caught. I decided to let my group go ahead to the terminus of the first 60% of the run and catch up with them when they turned around.

Tonight, actually in just a couple of hours we are going dinner followed by a Saw Doctors concert. The event is standing room only, which some would argue is not ideal after 23 miles, but that's the way all their shows are. Plus it will help in the long run to be up and moving rather than sitting down and getting stiff muscles.

Unfortunately there is no time for a nap, so we will be dragging by evening's end. When "Hay Wrap" comes on, the extremely upbeat final song, we may lack the energy to jump up and down as is customary. It will be interesting to see how long I can stay out tonight and with what effectiveness after today's run.

So I accomplished my mission, got 23 (or 22) miles in without hurting myself, so now I'm feeling pretty confident about getting to the starting line on November 5th healthy and well trained. Qualifying for Boston is definitely possible, although it will be close. It will require a lot of effort and some luck with the weather, but mainly it will be a question of guts and being able to tough it out and race the last 10K.

Thanks to all my teammates, as always on these long runs I get bored during the long stretches where I don't see them. This was the case on the west side coming back with about 3 miles go go, when I was about to commit suicide from boredom. Then we came around a little bend and we saw the 12:00 pace group up ahead in the distance. So this gave me something to look forward, catching up to them and chatting with the people I know, so again thanks to all of you.

23 Mile Run

The 23 mile run will occur this Saturday, the longest of our training season. Last year I brought a video camera and Coach Adam and I shot footage of people during the race. I edited it together, put it to "To Win Just Once" by The Saw Doctors, and it was shown to the team at the Pasta Dinner the night before the marathon.

Here is the video, take a look for a preview of this weekend. Don't worry about the run, if you can do 20 miles, you can do 23. I would just encourage everyone to take it easy, you never want to go faster than commute pace on Saturday, and slow it down more if you feel the need.



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Oops! Part II: The Solo Run

Just got back from my 16 mile run, which actually turned out to be 16 miles, surprisingly enough. The big problem when I would train alone, as was the case for my first two marathons (4:54 and 4:40), was actually doing the long runs. Even when I would summon the initiative to leave the house and hit the road, I would often curtail the duration of the run. But I found a way to stay motivated and do the whole thing, and here's how it went...

I live at 103rd & Lexington, so I just walked over to 102 and the Park Drive on the east side and stretched near the ball fields and got going. I noted the time of day, 2:14 (2/14 is Valentine's Day which is the mnemonic I used to remember), and started my running watch as well. I planned on doing two 6 mile loops and maybe a 4 mile loop, or maybe just a couple of reservoir loops (only 3.14 miles, see I was already thinking how I could make it shorter).

The next decision to make was which direction to run. My first instinct was to go the same way the team went, clockwise, but I decided that since I need work on hills it would be a good idea to run the other way. Running counter clockwise brings the two nastiest hills in Central Park, Harlem Hill and Cat Hill into play (you run down them the other direction). So I was going to make things a lot harder on myself on purpose. Train hard, race easy, that's what Coach Alem always says! The temperature was a balmy 68 degrees Fahrenheit.

Off I went, and again my goal was to duplicate my goal pace for the first 16 of the marathon, which will be 7:40. I did the first 6 miles in 46:01.53, which is 1.53 seconds off the total target time and less than a half second off the pace.

The second 6 miles was much slower, thanks to a couple of lengthy water stops. I stopped at the fountain at the SW corner of The Sheep Meadow, where an elderly Japanese gentleman was taking his own sweet time enjoying our fine public water. He seemed to be a tourist and I am not one to bother our visitors from foreign lands, so I let him enjoy our tasty New York City waters, fresh from the Catskill Mountains, and waited patiently until he was finished.

I stopped for water again on the east side by the boathouse and had a hard time finding the water fountain, which I knew was there (somewhere), but was hard to see (it was in plain sight). So that cost me a minute or so. And then there was a stretch where I kind of just lost concentration for a bit and slowed down, no excuse for that but it happens.

Ok so my second loop time was much worse, 52:18, an 8:43 pace. During one of the many daydreaming moments on that leisurely loop I actually came up with a good plan for the last 4, so at least something was accomplished. Being something of a masochist (as all runners are to varying degrees) I decided that another trek up Harlem Hill would be a grand idea. Of course the math would not work out if I ran up to 103rd, but before I dismissed that idea I calculated that I could do 4 if I stopped by 84th Street rather than running back up to 102. And that would have the added bonus of having me finish near Jamba Juice on 86th & Lexington, which is where I usually go to get a recovery drink after a long run. I congratulated myself on my brilliance and only then realized I was running close to a 9 minute pace and woke up from my trance.

So for the 3rd and final loop I decided to speed up since I had dug myself a hole on Loop 2. And then this guy had the audacity to try and pass me, which doesn't happen to often when your'e doing 7:40's in the park when there's no race in progress. So I decided I was going to let him stay in front of me, but not get too far, and then I was going to take him out on Harlem Hill.

So I had him in my sights as we were approaching the second big incline, the super long one that doesn't end until it reaches the top. That's when I decided to make my move. There were also two women that we had come upon at that point that were moving pretty briskly also. He passed them going slightly faster than they were and was 15 feet in front of them when I kicked it into high gear. I took off my hat and started flying up the hill, not quite as fast as I could run, but pretty close. I was breathing very heavily, not as bad as during the 1 miler yesterday, but we were getting pretty close to maximum effort level. I maintained the pace up to the pinnacle, turned around, and saw that he was a good 100 feet behind me.

I reached the 1 mile mark (102 on the west side) and noted the time 8:30. I was a bit surprised when I saw that, because I was motoring up Harlem Hill, at least in terms of effort expended, so I was expecting something faster. But then I just chalked it up to the hill and it made me realize that big hills like that one really slow down your time considerably. After making that realization I started feeling a lot better about last week's time, which was a minute off the target pace for the whole run. But here I had just done 1 mile up an awful hill as fast as I could go essentially, and lost 50 seconds to the pace. So overall I considered this a helpful piece of information to have.

I got to 84th street without incident, in 30:37.23, or 7:39.03 pace. So as Meatloaf says, "Two out of Three Ain't Bad." I hit the pace within 1 second per mile for the first 6 and the last 4, and helped promote tourism and good international relations while on the 2nd 6 miles. And I gave myself another much needed incline workout, tangling with Harlem Hill and Cat Hill 3 times apiece.

There will be a third installment in the "Oops!" miniseries of blog posts (today was an eventful day), which will include a video from Grete's Gallop, which I will post later. Even though I missed the race I managed to make it over there and spoke with some of the TFK'ers who were hanging around after the race had ended. Coming soon...

Oops!

Ok, I slept through my alarm this morning and missed the race. That's the first time that ever happened to me, but now I am going to buy a new alarm clock since we don't want that happening on marathon day. I woke up and right away I realized that it was much later than it should have been because (a) there was way too much activity outside for it to be 6:30 on a Sunday morning and (b) I felt way too rested. Sure enough my clock said 10:44, more than 4 hours than my first alarm was set to go off (yes, I actually slept through 2 distinct alarms, 1 hour apart). The race started at 8:45 so I was pretty much screwed.

Heading out to do the run by myself, only now instead of cool and wet with teammates and frequent manned water stations, it will be just me alone in the sun and heat. Sigh...