#33 weak week, fun race, a great team and stormchasing......

Storms on the horizon?


After racing from Lake Placid back to NJ last Sunday (in an effort to make it home for the last call g’nights) it was back to the real world, the beginning of a long stretch of getting back into my groove.  Work had piled up (small business owners NEVER complain about this…..but a challenge nonetheless); dad stock was nearing its 52 week-low from spending so much time putting final touches on BaseCamp31 (#bc31 for you tweet-ers) and not at home; body was feeling sore (4 weeks off followed by 70 miles bike, 1 mi swim, 13-ish run on challenging terrain will do that); but my mind as cagey as ever, just as ready as ever to send synaptic reverberations pinging off the walls of my skull……I’ve learned to recognize that for me this usually means it’s time to get organized, re-prioritize and reinvest some time/energy in things that have fallen off a little, b/c there’s a wicked curve-ball coming……not always sure exactly what I’m preparing for, but it’s that never-fails, calm-before-the-storm warning signal that I've learned to listen to.

And so, after a hectic week where I saw magic hour “40” (you know that mythical hour when the work week is supposed to come to a spontaneous halt) come and go early Thursday AM, I took some time yesterday to prepare for 2 important projects I’ve been working on, coaxed (in a loving and never frustrated way of course) my children to clean their rooms, which collect “stuff” at an alarming rate, even got a little spring cleaning done myself (timely, now that it’s summer) and watched my hip-hop 7 year old do her recital-thang. Followed that up with some suspect pre-race fuel and some sleep.

When the 5A bell rang, I wasn't really feeling so juiced up to race a 10K.  Having not really trained for this race, I was hoping to just go out and do a respectable time, somewhere around 45 minutes, which would be around 7:15 min/mile pace.  But the disappointing thing for me was that there were so many good opportunities this weekend......a 40 mile bike ride for the NJ Burn Center which is sponsored by one of our corporate clients, a 5K in New Providence for the very worthy NJ Sharing Network and the Orange Classic 10K a race I've been trying to nudge folks from another client toward this year......and there was simply no way to do them all (you know I would've tried).....and thus, we are only as good as the people around us.  While Nick (who achieved a 60+% age grade for his "bronze") and I headed North for Orange Classic, Jeff and Tim went Northeast for the Ride and Amy, Amy, Eric, Lindsay, Linda and kids went East to support the sharing network.

By the time I got to Middletown, I was feeling more ready.  Nick needed to break 44:50 to get his goal and at 7:13/mile, that was a perfect pace to shoot for even though this course was hilly and therefore challenging.  We set out somewhere around a 7:20 pace and having read the race course description I knew it would be best to chip away at that only after mile 4 when the hilly sections were (mostly) behind us......of course I didn't mention this to Nick until mile 3.  Overcast and relatively cool and things went according to plan.  After mile 4 we started to pick up the pace a little and I watched the average pace start to drop on the trusty Garmin.  By mile 5 we were down to 7:10s which was just about right to guarantee we met the goal.  We hit the Middletown HS track somewhere around 43 and change and then kicked the finish for a 44:05-ish (figuring 5-10 clock vs. chip time).....7:07s.

Felt pretty good about this, but (as usual) left feeling like I had more and wondering what "coulda" been should I have actually trained for this distance.......oh well, that's the fun of this stuff I guess.

Haven't heard how everyone did at the other events, but saw the FaceBook Posts that Eric and Amy W both won their age groups at the Sharing Network 5K and Lindsay was only a few seconds off a PR.  So assuming the bike-ride was a success, it was a solid day of racing.

And now back to the Ironman training show?

It’s tempting to think so, but as reality should have it, I’m guessing the remainder of June is going to be more of the same.  Even with the end of kid #1 lacrosse and kid #2 dance AND soccer, the workload will continue to percolate, wife-soccer has started, wife-marathon training is on the very near horizon, the Fuel Good is almost open-able and school’s (almost) out for summer…..and that's not even the curve ball (too predictable) but I’m not afraid……mostly b/c that would be sensible, and that’s just now how I roll.

Bottom line is that I need to work toward getting into a reasonable groove soon though b/c things are about to get interesting.......

Stay thirsty my friends, (and here's a little video to help)

Mike E.