Spring: Where Are You My Old Friend?

Here's hoping the new colors of my blog help to push in the spring season in Western New York. I don't mind riding my bike in the basement but it would be nice to get outside a couple of days a week.

We should feel lucky that only 1-2" of rain is falling in the 35-42 degree temperatures. The Adirondacks and New England are getting anything from freezing rain to 12" of snow. I truly would be depressed if that happened to us. My Southern Comfort supply is not adequate enough to make it through another snowstorm, wind storm or massive electric outage.

This morning I was at a committee meeting at work. I walked in when a couple of professors were discussing how they don't exercise due to time constraints and other excuses. I stayed quiet and listened and tried to be non-judgmental. Then one of the professors looked me over and asked if I was "one of those people" (the kind that worked out). I'm hoping she thought despite the face of an old man my body looked like it was possible I did exercise. I'm taking it as a positive that there wasn't an immediate vocal display of shock when I said I did.

I mentioned that my wife and I were training for a half-ironman as a couple of other people walked in the room. That got everyone's attention, which actually was nice. A few questions about what the race distance was and my history followed. I really wasn't trying to impress anyone, but honestly I kind of enjoyed some of the attention. After three months of the majority of my running on indoor tracks or treadmills and riding in the basement conversing with "average" people about my activities felt nice.

Training for an event that is personally challenging, whatever the distance, can be mentally as well as physically draining. I seldom talk about what I'm doing unless asked, that can quickly get boring to a listener. It is nice when a person is genuinely interested though. And who knows, maybe we serve as an inspiration?

Lessons Learned This Weekend

As March slowly rolls toward April in upstate New York and the hope for calmer, warmer weather continues, Jan and I made some interesting discoveries over the past few days.

1. We learned how to make our own deep-fried dill pickles. Sunday, after a triathlon training day of grocery shopping, running and biking, we had a hamburger cookout. We decided to turn no-calorie, no vitamin, really having no redeeming nutritional value at all, dill pickle slices, into a greasy, tasty treat. Our first time having deep-fried dill pickles was at a barbecue joint a few miles from our daughters' home near Clanton, Alabama. The pickles tasted great, so why not replicate them at home?

I looked at a few recipes online and then Jan and I kind of winged it. Dipped the pickle in egg, then into a bowl of flour, seasoned salt, ground pepper, garlic, paprika, red pepper flakes. Drop into a hot oiled pan and three minutes later a tasty treat! We didn't even use dip, which typically is a ranch flavor. We are sure the spices added tons of vitamins, along with a hearty serving of grease.

2.Never discount the craziness, I mean dedication of long-time running friends. Saturday was 37 degrees, slight cooling breeze from the east, and a drizzle. Two running partners showed up to run with me. We did keep it short, six miles, but it was nice to have company on the muddy Erie Canal trail. Jan waited until 9am to run, by which time the rain had really started to come down. Hah!

3. The NCAA basketball tournament is much more fun to watch when you have a couple of teams still in the pool from work. Jan picked her final four teams, I filled in the rest of the games and she is in second place in the pool! We were cheering loudly for NC to beat Kentucky Sunday and knock about 10 people out of the top of the standings. We have never done so well. If Gonzaga wins the tournament Jan wins first place. Go bulldogs.

4. The Roberts Wesleyan college pool was empty at 5:30pm Saturday. Strange how people must go out to dinner, parties, or have "better" things to do than swim. Lucky for us our social life mostly consists of exercise.

5. March has been one long month. First a wind storm knocking out power for days to many homes and closing schools, then twenty-four inches plus of snow, closing the area again. Let's hope April brings some nice weather to our area. January, February and March should each be 30 days. Same number of days but March would end sooner. It's all psychological.

St Patrick's Day

Denis Leary‏Verified account @denisleary 9m9 minutes ago

#StPatricksDay Irish History Fact: We invented whiskey, sarcasm & bare knuckle brawling. All on the same night. In that order.

A few members of our "club", the Sals Racing team, participated in the annual Johnny's Running of the Green 5 mile race on March 11. Just coming off of power outages due to high winds (and thousands in the area still without power) we weren't sure if the race was going to happen. Over 800 people showed up to run though, with another 1,400 registered but not at the race. It was a balmy 15 degrees with the wind averaging 15mph, making a nice cooling effect. 

Save for one large tree that had come down across the road near the 1.2 mile and 3.8 mile section of the out and back course, the roads were pretty clear. Someone had chopped enough of the tree so that about 20 feet was clear for runners to get by, which was nice. Johnny's was the first race in the Rochester Runner of the Year series and we all got off to a good start. Pete won his age group, Mike W was second in his group and I was fifth, Jan was tenth and Eileen third. I'm not happy about getting older but it definitely helped to earn RROY points by moving into a new age group.

Wind Power & Snowmageddon

Last week we had the wind storm of the century in the Rochester, NY area. More than 100,000 people lost power, some for days, with the sustained 50mph winds and gusts of 80mph. Trees and phone/electrical lines came down by the hundreds across the region.Schools were closed, businesses shut, cars and houses damaged by the storm and trees falling.

Here's a question - telephone poles, are they really necessary anymore? How many people have a land line? Telephone poles and assorted wires are good for squirrel highways, bird perches, visual pollution and stopping cars suddenly that veer off the road. Electrical and other utility lines should be underground, this isn't an unusual practice. When a series of poles go down take them away, dig a trench and bury the lines. The process of burying the lines can be done gradually, sort of like TrumpWall, except lines underground will save lives (no cars will smash into the poles), trees will be saved and I will have one less thing to rant about.

We were lucky, our power was only out for about 6 hours. But how do you exercise if there is no electricity or other utilities, especially in the winter when the temperature drops below freezing? If you get all sweaty you can only shower with cold water. Doable, but not enjoyable. It's a bit dangerous outside, especially with 50 mph winds. The treadmill obviously doesn't work. I was able to climb on my bike on the trainer and ride in the dark in the basement with the sound of voices in my head for entertainment. That lasted for an hour. I could also lift weights, in the dark. At least it was something.

A few days later the snow began and didn't stop for two days. We ended up with twenty-four or more inches. Insane for a March storm. The village snowplows tried to keep up, they really did a good job under the circumstances. Our snowblower died two years ago, so Jan and I shovel, which is a good strength workout. We have a nice neighbor who came over yesterday with his snowblower, which helped immensely with the 15 inches that had fallen in the previous 10 hours. We never lost power, hurray! Exercise consisted of biking, treadmill running and weights, so not too bad. We just couldn't go swim. Actually we didn't leave our yard.

Any other exercise ideas in times of no power/storms? Any good or bad experiences with the storms?

Too Old to Wear? Ten rules to go by

Every runner/triathlete signs up for a race wondering what the official "free" race shirt will look like. We've all received shirts that go straight to the car or bike washing pile. Reasons for this include the color, the fit, a badly organized race you don't want to advertise, or you ran poorly.


I have another rule, if I pre-register for a race but don't run it, usually due to an injury, I won't wear the shirt. The same is true if I DNF. I just don't want all the questions about the race and then have to explain why I really didn't do it. I also don't get people who wear the race shirt during that race. That's just wrong to me. The shirt should be worn later, after completing the event. If it's a big race, like a marathon or long triathlon and you go out at night it's a badge of honor. Save the shirt for some bragging rights.

Eventually you reach into your shirt drawer and put on one of your favorite shirts. Of course today is a good day to wear this shirt, it still fits well, no stains, no embedded stink, so pull it over your head and be proud. Except then you look down and see the shirt is at least ten years old!

 

This shirt is from my 2005 Steamtown Marathon, a race where once again I failed to make the Boston qualifying standard by less than 5 minutes. A bad habit of mine. I found the shirt buried in my drawer a couple of weeks ago and began wearing it a bit. I like the sleeves, not short but not too long. But 2005? This shirt is 12 years old. I don't keep shirts for work longer than 2-3 years. 

There must be rules for tossing out race shirts, maybe ten of them? 

1.  Are there food or drink stains on the shirt that won't come out in the wash? Automatic rag pile. 

2. Did the shirt go through the wash, even with super power detergent, and keep a body odor smell?  Toss in the garbage. 

3. Are the colors too weird for the general public? I have a Marine Corps Marathon long sleeve shirt that is bright gold/yellow. A really nice thick material shirt, but it's kind of too flashy for wearing outside of the house. 

4. Did your significant other just say, "oh, you're wearing that shirt again?". Toss it. 

5. Does the design seem better for a younger generation person to wear? I did have, until recently, a tie-dyed shirt. I wore it a couple of times before realizing I'm 60, not 19, and the tie-dye look doesn't go well with me. 

6. I get it. You have an emotional attachment to the race, and the shirt keeps that memory alive. It was a hard race, or your longest or fastest or first time at that distance. Eventually it has to go though.

7. Everyone needs a pj top. Old race shirts are perfect for lazing around the house at night while watching tv or reading a book. But only until the dessert stains don't come out. Then garbage time!

8. Your significant other says, "Absolutely NO. You are  not wearing that thing out to dinner!" (much more vociferously than #4's passive-aggressive approach).

9. You have gained weight and the shirt no longer fits. Or you lost weight and it's baggy.

10. It's just old. Twelve years for my Steamtown shirt? Is that really relevant anymore? It may be time to let it go.