For Whom the Dogs Bark

Baytown Jailbreak Half Marathon

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Location:

Cypress,TX,

Member Since:

Oct 10, 2009

Gender:

Male

Goal Type:

Other

Running Accomplishments:

5K: 24:22 (March 2010); 22:33 (October 2010); 20:47 (May 2011); 21:05 (May 2012); 21:33 (September 2012); 21:23 (November, 2013); 22:31 (September 2014)

5M: 39:22 (November, 2012); 35:54 (November, 2013); 36:03 (March, 2015)

10K: 44:08 (November, 2010); 49:20 (July, 2013); 44:07 (April, 2015)

12K: 56:03 (December, 2013); 58:58 (December, 2014)

10M: 1:11:58 (October, 2012); 1:15:24 (October, 2014)

Half Marathon: 1:53:xx (London's Run 2010); 2:05:21 (Cowtown 2010); 1:37:04 (Gusher 2011); 1:42:19 (Huntsville 2011); 1:33:47 (Baytown Jailbreak 2012); 1:33:50 (The Woodlands 2012); 1:42:52 (Texas 2015); 1:49:17 (Jailbreak 2015); 1:38:34 (The Woodlands 2015)

25K: 2:01:47 (Fifth Third River Bank, May 2014)

Marathon: 5:51:35 (Texas Marathon 2009); 6:21:36 (Ogden 2009); 4:58:29 (St. George 2009); 4:13:45 (Texas Marathon 2010); 4:04:12 (Utah Valley Marathon, 2010); 5:11:14 (Hartford ING, 2010); 3:41:43 (Richmond SunTrust, 2010); 3:39:27 (Texas Marathon 2011); 3:41:46 (Utah Valley Marathon, 2011); 3:30:35 (St. George 2011); 3:41:51 (Richmond 2012); 3:49:15 (Texas 2013); 3:46:59 (Paavo Nurmi, 2013); 3:34:04 (St. George 2013); 3:49:51 (Texas 2014); 3:31:59 (Richmond 2014); 3:28:34 (Boston 2015)

Short-Term Running Goals:

3:20, 1:30, 0:20

Long-Term Running Goals:

I'm 60, there is no long term.

Personal:

I live, work and run in Houston, Texas. I have run 17 marathons, some good ones and some others. I prefer straight, flat, cold, sea-level marathons, still waiting for my first one. I feel like there are more PRs out there. When I have them, I am told it is time to dial it back, run for healthy reasons. I'm sure that's right, and I'm sure it won't happen.

My wife and I are from the mountains of the west. We have five kids, three granddaughters and three grandsons. The kids and grandkids are native Texans but we are not -- you have to be born here.

As for my blog title: I run most of my miles before sunrise, sometimes hours before. On the back road of my neighborhood two hours before daylight, I can depend on a pack of mutts behind the boundary fence lighting up when they hear my footsteps. I have wondered what they wanted; but according to Hemingway I needn't ask.

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Miles:	This week:	0.00	Month:	0.00	Year:	0.00

Sat, Feb 14, 2015

Race: Baytown Jailbreak Half Marathon (13.11 Miles) 01:49:17, Place in age division: 3

Easy Miles	Marathon Pace Miles	Threshold Miles	VO2 Max Miles	Total Distance
8.00	13.11	0.00	0.00	21.11

46F, 93% and calm. Got up very early, out the door at 3:55 a.m. and ran 8 at 7:59 pace. Then drove to Wade's house at 5:30 and met up with Wade, his brother Mark and two co-workers, Derek and Nate. Plan this morning was to run the Baytown Jailbreak Half Marathon. I got my half marathon PR in this race 3 years ago, with a pace in the 7:05 to 7:10 range. Nothing like that today, haven't been doing workouts yet.

We all piled in and I drove, about an hour to the start line, where we registered then made a quick PoP stop. The race started about 5 minutes early, not sure why, but we fell in line toward the end. Derek and Nate are young guys who don't train much, about 10:30/mile guys; Wade's plan was to run with them. Mark said he was going to run just under 9:00/mile, which was just about my long run pace anyway, so I decided to run with him just to get in my normal Saturday miles.

Splits were as follows: 9:13, 8:39, 8:24, 8:25, 8:29, 8:43, 8:24, 8:00, 8:09, 8:15, 8:06, 8:12, 7:46 and 7:15 for the stub. 8:21 overall average, 1:49:17 total time. There is a mile-long bridge, the Fred Hartmann bridge, that is cleared for the race. We run up to the top, which is the turnaround point just prior to the halfway mark. Coming down we booked it pretty good and never really slowed up after hitting level ground again.

Mark is the guy who has the new treadmill that goes up and down and can program different courses in it, such as Boston. I'm trying to be nice to him, so when he cranked it up another gear at the end I let him go, wanted to make sure he medaled in case we were in third place. Sure enough, he got second and I got third. First place was about 5 minutes faster than us, a time that both of us can beat under better circumstances. But I won't be fast again until I start doing workouts. One more race in this age group in a couple of weeks (Woodlands Half).

We stayed for food (Chick Fil A) and awards (bobble head cops) and drove home. Not a good race result necessarily, but fine under the circumstances.

Day after update: Was totally wiped out yesterday, took a mid-day nap and didn't get much done most of the day. I thought taking a 2-hour break would be like doing a morning/night double but it wasn't, it was almost like running 21 straight. Very glad in retrospect I ran with Mark and didn't go out hard trying to break 1:40, or I would have had almost the equivalent of 21 at GMP, which I don't want to do anymore unless it is race day But luckily tonight I feel great and will probably be ready to resume low heart rate running in the morning.

Comments

From Yasir on Sun, Feb 15, 2015 at 11:26:59 from 99.20.240.157

first congrats on the Bobble head im sure this what its all about :-) Wow what a workout 8 miles worm up and then race a half. I was suppose to do a workout like that in feb 7th, but chickend out. You are going to be supper fast once you start some speed workout.

From MarkS on Sun, Feb 15, 2015 at 15:21:28 from 58.91.25.26

Congrats on a good race. It looks like you are really getting it together. Should be well prepared for Boston.

From SlowJoe on Sun, Feb 15, 2015 at 19:16:00 from 107.77.80.84

Sounds like fun - you must've been blowing by everyone in the last few miles! Who runs 8 miles before a half??

From Tom K on Mon, Feb 16, 2015 at 06:53:51 from 73.27.178.76

The 8 before the half is typ. Flatlander stuff, at this point. I wouldn't have even done the 10 Friday afternoon! 18 miles in the 24 hours leading up to a half? You are a Wildman!

From flatlander on Mon, Feb 16, 2015 at 07:27:36 from 76.31.29.220

Yasir, thanks. Not sure if the speed is going to happen or not, I am getting old pretty fast right now (that's the only speed I have). It's like running up the down escalator. But it might happen, we'll just see. Two more weeks of the slow stuff then starting workouts in March.

Mark, thanks. I'll do my part if somebody up there will please melt the snow on the course.

Joe, yeah, we had to teach a couple of young guys a lesson in the last mile. And it was fortunate we did -- we scored the last two donut holes when we got in.

Tom, wild and slow, if that is a valid category. It was kind of interesting that I ran the race slower than the "warmup". Part of it was taking Mark's lead, but honestly it was pretty much all I had even if I had been running it alone. I felt more tired at the end of last week than the week before with 30 more miles. Speed matters, but I already knew that.

From allie on Mon, Feb 16, 2015 at 12:42:23 from 73.207.133.226

nice race, flat. quite impressed with your 4am miles + race.

good luck at the woodlands in a couple of weeks. bummed i won't make it out there this year. i heart texas.

From Burt on Wed, Feb 18, 2015 at 09:13:48 from 184.101.110.192

Jailbreak? Were you required to wear black and white stripes? If it was here in AZ you would be wearing pink undies.

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