1/2/06 GTS in Central Park

Welcome to the New Year!

Are you ready to run? To be quite honest, no I wasn't. I had kind of a long weekend, what with the holiday and all. I went to a lovely New Year's party and didn't get home till much later in the evening.

Work was tough. The heat was still on full tilt boogie. Again I was sweating through out the day. By the time it was the end of the day, I was ready for a nap, not a run. But I managed to get myself up to Urban Athletics.

There were a lot of people there. Happy New Year's were shouted through out the store.

The exercise for this evening: Effort Levels 1 & 4!

We warmed up from 91st street up to the 103rd street traverse. On the traverse, most of us did this: run like the wind (effort level four) till you see Ramon (he was the half way point), then for the rest of the way run at effort level one till you get to the end of the traverse, then turn around and go back to Ramon at effort level four. Get the picture, run hard, run slow, run hard, run slow. We did this for frickin' ever. It wouldn't have been so bad, but I swear every time I came to Ramon he'd start moving away from me.

I was pretty well plum tuckered out, by the end of practice. And I had pains in parts of my body that I didn't know could have pains. When people talk about "a pain in the butt," that phrase takes on a whole new meaning. For some reason I was having pain up the back of my leg and deep inside the gluteus maximus! Yeoow!!!

I'm recovered. For now. I just sat in a bucket of ice when I got home. It's all good.

-Jim

12.30.06 Coaches, we don't need no stinkin' coaches!

Today we were scheduled to do our long run in the park. But practice was canceled It's not even New Years and our coaches are out celebrating the New Year.
Look at them, smiling having a good time. You know why they're smiling? Because they know they're going to sleep in on Saturday morning. And you know what they deserve it. These people donate hours of time, not just watching us run, but out side of practice fielding questions from people like me. Questions like, "I'm chaffing in a very private area, what should I do." or "is my toe nail supposed to be that shade of black?" They answer these questions quickly and with out judgment. (Although, a couple of them were looking at me funny last week.)

A group of us banded together, and we declared, "with or with out the coaches will run our long run this Saturday!" Secretly, we were all like, "won't the coaches be impressed by our dedication?" even more secretly, at least to myself, "I just want to run because it makes me feel good." Cheesy, I know, but it's the truth. As it turns out there was a group of us who all felt the need to run, so we organized our selves and had us a little run in the park.

Happy New Year!

-Jim