The Wind, The Wind

RIVERBANK...

It felt like I got the wind knocked out of me and socked in the groin at the same time. I was running a 500 last Friday at Red Bank Regional High School and was rounding the turn into the 200 meter mark when it happened. Whabam! I was stopped cold. No matter how hard I pumped my arms or how quickly I picked up my legs, I couldn’t go fast enough. I thought it was one of the windiest days I had ever worked out on. But I forgot about the Riverbank Track at 145th St.

This morning was one of the worst possible days to run. Rainy, humid, and WINDY. The track is right on the Hudson River next to a sewage plant (I always used to joke that I had eaten the wrong foods if we ever worked out there at Columbia), and the gusts are plain foolish. I have been doing my tempos in Central Park, which is a little tough because of the hills, but I would have loved to be there this morning blocked from the howling wind. Instead, kicking up puddles of water in my face were Will and Delilah as we all took turns taking the brunt of the wind.

I have no one to blame except myself however. I have consistently chosen windy tracks as places to train my entire running life. And the least windy track I have ever been on (aside from high school), wasn’t even a full 400 meters.

The Bath track has actually been the least problematic weather-wise of all the tracks that I have called home. It would get some gusts on the back-stretch here and there, but overall it was a darn good high school track.

The Baker Field Track opened my eyes to what winds could be. Situated on the northernmost tip of Manhattan, it gets some bursts of wind off the Hudson as well. It also seemed that whenever it was calm there, someone, *cough*CoachWood*cough*, would mention how calm it was and within minutes a monsoon would be approaching.

The Duke Ellington Track at Georgetown didn’t have many meteorological mishaps, but 4 and ¾ laps to a mile? C’mon.

Now, my two main home tracks are Rutgers and Riverbank. Somehow, Rutgers is windy as hell. Not as bad as Riverbank, but not much is.

Nothing you can do about weather, unless you choose to live somewhere with great weather. But in my mind, it’s not really worth it. I’d rather live in New York and toughen myself up than somewhere without wind. Now if only it would stay light past 5pm.

Workout Wednesday

There seems to be a new trend developing on runLBP.com: The Wednesday Post. I guess it’s the day that works best for the working man, so from now on, check back Wednesdays instead of Sundays for new journal entries. Fittingly, I will often times be working out on Wednesdays (hence the name steal from FloTrack), so there can hopefully be a few good posts to check out.

And thankfully…the workouts have begun for me! Last Friday I was able to put my first workout in at the Rutgers Track and drop 4x800 in 2:32, 2:32, 2:30, 2:29 before rocking some strides after. Then yesterday, I was able to hop into some 1ks with Delilah and Frances Koons (one of my new teammates). As chivalrous as I am I led the last two. Then I discarded my gentlemanly ways and tried dropping them…alas, it was to no avail. But I did get in 4x1k at around 3:15 (~2:36 ½ mile pace) before running some 150s and concentrating on form.

On top of getting back into running, I have been doing some more strength-based exercising and trying to get jacked. I am incorporating a lot of hurdle work, drill work, and push-up work so that I can rock that last 120 of a race. Delilah and I were doing some exercises a week or two ago. One in particular proved extremely challenging:

Someone must be sitting in a chair in front of you, their back and the backrest facing you (they are sitting there to anchor the chair). You lie face-down on the ground and reach up with your hands so that you are grabbing the top of the chair, thus your back is arched (kinda like the cobra pose in yoga but your arms are up in the air grabbing a chair). From there, you pull yourself up using your core strength. The book we were using told us that it may feel as if your back was going to break in half. But that you would make it through and then complete the exercise by standing over the chair, it defeated below you.

I got about halfway through the exercise and, sure enough, I thought my back was going to break in half. I stopped immediately and cried out in horror.

Needless to say, I didn’t beat the chair that day. I have always known it, but I am really starting to understand that to be great at this sport, you really have to work your ass off. So keep in touch for when I start beating that chair, and really start to fill out the shirt in the picture below... Let’s Go!

East Coast Enemies

All Black Outfits are a Must for the East Coast Criminals

After struggling through last year’s 5th Avenue Mile, it was great to be a spectator at this year’s event. It also was a somewhat upsetting event as last year I remember sucking air through a 1:55 first half mile and this year they crawled through in a pedestrian 2:02 that I would have been much more capable of running last year at the time. Alas, I wasn’t out there, and was viewing from the sidelines this year knowing that I will be out there next year giving it a go.

Instead, I continued my trend of exercising inside all last week. I get in an hour on the elliptical before work and then 30 minutes to an hour afterwards. Once the orthotics make their way to my antsy feet, I’ll be out and about in the parks of New York and working my mileage up. While I’ve been a 70 per week guy the last two years I’ll be going in 3 week stints at 70-70-60. Working in that “recovery” week will keep me nice and fresh and fast for the upcoming races.

But the big news from last week was the introduction of our yet-unnamed team. Let’sRun had this up on its site:

“Gags (Frank Gagliano) Has Started Another Training Group--From the Reebok Enclave to the Farm Team to OTC and now an unnamed team in New Jersey. It seems like every prominent East Coast grad is in the group, including Erin Donohue, Rob Novak, Julie Culley, LBP and Max Smith.”

I had to like the call out…especially that the running community does recognize my LBP self-proclaimed nickname (although it wasn’t really self proclaimed, they are my initials and all). Here’s a link to the article that Walt Murphy put together with a roster line-up of our team: http://www.trackandfieldnews.com/index.php?option=com_content&id=290&Itemid=115

Practice on Friday had us all thinking of names for the group. Gags liked “No Money Track Club” and the boring—yet most likely actual name—“New York/New Jersey Track Club”…but Delilah had my personal favorite: “East Coast Enemies.” We would wear all black or gold and purple. My Jordan Brand headband wouldn’t seem out of place in the least.

Any suggested team names would be great. As always, Let’s Go!

The Gouchers and Amsterdam Musings

Amsterdam...

It came to my attention recently that the Columbia Track Team adoringly called my brother, Will, Adam Goucher. For the non-runner out there, this is in reference to a running couple, the Gouchers (Adam and Kara), who are fairly prominent faces on the USA running circuit. The thing is, Kara is WAAYYYYY better than Adam. She’s a World Championship Bronze Medalist, an amazing marathoner, and, as it turns out, extremely good looking. Nothing against Adam, but Kara is definitely the bread winner in terms of being the better runner. As you can guess, Will was referred to as Adam Goucher due to Delilah being a legit runner. It’s not really fair because Will isn’t trying to be a professional runner, but I thought it a fairly funny nickname nonetheless. Then something terrible happened. I became an Adam Goucher as well.

My girlfriend was a pretty damn good runner, but then she had to go and place higher at NCAAs than I did the year before. I was watching the race in Indianapolis with my brother and Jeff Moriarty (Columbia’s runner who has taken all my school records). We watched nervously – me especially – as Christine rounded the turn and passed two runners to place 5th in the 800 at the National Championships. Pretty cool. I was pumped. Sent her the usual text. Then Moriarty called me Adam Goucher. It was like a knife in the heart.

Christine called and I forgot about it for a sec. Then she said this: “Wait a second…what place did you take at NCs last year?” as she realized that she had placed higher than me and laughed…Classic Kara, always rubbing it in.
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Now just a few musings about Amsterdam…

1. There must be no problem with stage fright here. They have a lot of co-ed bathrooms and also have public urinals that are just out in the middle of the street. I am terrified of them.

2. The street names here are insane and when someone tells me to go towards one, I have no idea where to go. These are some of the street names: We are on Karthuizersstraat, next to us is Lijnbaansgracht, the Ann Frank Huis is on Prinsengracht, and I almost had an accident on Poopinmypantsinstraat. (ahahahaha. Elizabeth has told me I’m funny on more than one occasion on this trip. I always remind her that I’m trying really hard.)

That’s all for today. Had a nice workout with Bumbi and now relaxing on this nice Sunday evening. Last full day in Amsterdam tomorrow, I’ll have a treat on runLBP because of it…Let’s Go!

And for those of you holding your breath in anticipation...I did eat a Pizza Dog. It was awesome/awful all at once.

A World Champ and Two All-Americans; What a Bunch of Losers

I spent Thanksgiving in New York this past weekend. My mom, step-dad and little sister made the drive out from Michigan to spend the holiday at my brother’s apartment on the Upper West Side. They had a place rented out for the weekend near Times Square, but I was lodged up near Columbia the whole weekend.

Thanks to two separate dinners, I had my fill of turkey and stuffing and mashed potatoes and green beans and gravy and apple pie and ice cream and cupcakes (only thanks to a trip to Magnolia for the caboose of that list).

The highlight of Thanksgiving day may have been the first (and most likely last) “Boylan, Fanta, DiCrescenzo,Boylan-Pett Turkey Football Game.”

In a backyard football game that took place in Riverside Park, My brother, Will, quarterbacked a team of himself, my mom, and my sister, Annie. My team included my step-dad, Charlie, and Delilah.

To give more meaning to the title of this entry, Charlie is a World Champion Taxidermist. No Joke. The guy is incredible at stuffing animals. If you ever kill a deer or a turkey and want it kept as a memento, look no further than http://www.fantataxidermy.com for all your needs. Then, add in the fact that Delilah and I were both All-Americans in the last track races of our NCAA careers, we had a pretty stacked team.

However, it doesn’t always work out the way that you think it would. In a defensive duel that yielded only 3 touchdowns, my leadership led to nothing but a letdown. On one play I even took out Delilah and seriously jeopardized both of our running careers. We ended up just fine, and I also made the catch.

In the end, with Delilah threatening to “throw the game,” my Mom made the game-winning catch as the sun set on the leaf covered field. 14-7, the World Champ and the All-Americans lose. What can ya do?

There was some running this weekend, but as in all Thanksgiving weekend runs, they weren’t the lightest. The mileage keeps on upping and the workouts will start to pick up soon enough, but for now its miles and miles.

No Racing Allowed

July 15, 2009 (part I)
Forgot to write one up last night, wish I could say I was trying to concentrate on the race, but when I concentrate too much I end up running poorly, I’m the kind of guy who needs to have fun racing…however, when I woke up this morning, I found out that I was not. There were some misread texts and as it turns out, I am in the HEUSDEN 800 this coming Saturday, which is both scarier and cooler. It is a much bigger meet, called the “KBC Night of Athletics” (I imagine it being said in a big boisterous voice), and it is going to be fast and fun. (Flotrack will also have someone there taping the races.)

I am still going to try to make it to Liege because my good friend from Columbia, Erison, is racing there. He’s a 400 runner and ran at Beijing last summer for is secondary country, Dominica. Ever since we roomed together at NCAAs his senior year, when he took 3rd in the 400-meters in 45.40 seconds, he has hated me. Spending a week with someone can do that…and I think I am only kind of joking when I say he hates me. But it should be good to see him, he has been based out of the UK for a good month now, so I think he needs to see some familiar faces.

But now I have to go do a workout since this race thing didn’t work. I have an 800 in 2’30”, 5×200 in 30, 29, 28, 27, 26 with 2’ rest and then a 400 in 75 to get the lactic acid out of my legs. Won’t be easy, but not something I haven’t done a tone of times. Finishing up my coffee then will be on my way.

July 15, 2009 (part II)
A day of not racing. So as stated earlier, I thought that I was going to race today. Lo and behold, I was not. But, as it turns out the Heusden race is probably the biggest meet in Belgium, so I am pretty syked for it.

I did go up to the meet today. Got to hang out with Delilah and watch Erison race. Erison ended up winning his race, a 300 in 32.8, and supposedly won some serious prize money along with it, although he wasn’t sure how much. He hadn’t seen anyone he really knew in about six weeks, so he was glad to see us.

Delilah and I were standing on the railing to the track watching a race, and some guy comes up behind us and says: “Yo, did you see that guy who won that 300? He was rooooolllling.” It was Erison.

He’s going to take a little bit of time off from racing now since he is running at the World Championships in Berlin…he also said that he will be overseas racing until September, pretty crazy.

It is kind of fun being at a meet with Delilah. There was a group of runner nerds (and runner nerds are one of my least favorite types of people…they constantly compare workouts, diets, but mainly talk about other runners as if they are gods and most likely post on message boards about what Alan Webb should be doing differently) and they were trying extremely hard to hang out with Delilah, but she is pretty content just chilling on her own, or in this case, with me. I felt as though I was pretty cool, although I am pretty sure that most people thought I was just her personal assistant.

The meets are also really cool. They have a huge bar/café where a lot of people sit and watch the races. The beer flows and a lot of people actually show up to watch us run. It’s a little different than your average invitational with family and friends showing up…although its not nearly as cool as Penn where for some reason 46,000 Jamaicans show up and scream their heads off. But the weather was perfect for running and now I’m looking forward to finally getting my feet wet on Saturday…boo yah.
In one sad piece of news, they do not have Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups in Belgium (at least I have not found any so far)…more on that in my next post.