The Many Adventures of Run Fatboy Run

It has been 2 months since my last post, not counting my recent rant and rave.  So instead of making a super long post about what has happened, I'm going to do a hopefully short synopsis of the past 2 months and then elaborate later.  The events will not be in order.

On October 7th 2011, my wife and I celebrated our 5th wedding anniversary.  It has been fun and a struggle at some times.  But what relationships isn't.  Since we got married, we have moved into a great home and raised a great son.  I hope we have many more years together.  That's about all I will say on that, I don't like to make big deals about this sort of thing in public or in public domains.

At the end of August, the wife, son and mother-in-law spent a week at the Walt Disney World resort.  It was fun, hot and rained everyday.  But we had a blast and can't wait to go back, which will hopefully be for Marathon weekend 2012.  I am going to work on a trip report and go into more details about where we stayed, ate and general information about the trip.

My running has been very inconsistent since the beginning of September.  One week I would run 15 to 20 miles, and the next week I would barely break 5, if I ran at all.  As you saw from my rant and rave about my running on the last post, I had to make a change.  I am about a month away from my first half marathon, and I know that I am not where I need to be.  With that, I have changed my running plan.  I did not abandon my beloved Galloway Run-Walk method, but I did adjust it.  I Incorporated the Hal Higdon training plan into the Galloway method.  That is, I am running the prescribed mileage needed by Higdon, but still using my run-walk method and doing the Galloway prescribed long run distances.  I don't know if it is going to help that much, but I do feel a whole lot better getting in the extra mileage.

I nearly gained all of my weight back that I had lost while on weight watchers.  Thanks to eating and drinking to my heart and stomach content at Disney, and not hitting the diet when I got back; I gained almost all of the 20 pounds back that I had lost.  I am now back on weight watchers with a vengeance.  I have lost about 10 pounds since going back on, and I don't plan to stop until I hit my goal of 200 pounds.

My 3 year old son had his tonsils removed recently.  I know it is young, but it needed to get done.  He has had bouts of tonsillitis ever since he was born.  Sometimes as bad as 2 times a month, which he had to miss school and mom and dad had to miss work to take care of him.  He was taken to Palmetto Health Hospital's Children's Hospital in Columbia, SC for the procedure.  The entire staff was excellent, professional and made sure the time spent there was as comfortable as possible.  For Tyler and mom and dad.  He was taken back at about 7:30 am and we could not go with him.  He was put under at 7:50am and the surgery was done by 8:15 am.  Cindy and I went into the recovery room with him for about 2 hours.  He was eating, drinking and jumping around the room.  We were discharged and sent home.  When this post is published, I will  be a stay at home dad for about a week. It has been a struggle, the anaesthesia wore off and he is in pain.  Giving him medication is a struggle and getting him to eat and drink is damn near impossible.  However, today he went off of his prescription as in on over the counter meds.  He is now eating and drinking consistently.  My training and diet will suffer a little while staying home until he gets better.  It is a small sacrifice to ensure that he is healthy and ready to get back to the real world.

Now the fun part... The BEERS!!!

This time of year is my favorite in beer world.  It is when Sam Adams releases its Octoberfest beer.  It is my favorite non Boston Lager Sam Adams, and possibly my favorite non Boston Lager beer. It has the feel of a light beer, but the taste of a full bodied goodness.  I have tried other Octoberfest beers, and the none of them compare to Sam Adams'.  I am just sad that it is only out for 2 months out of the year.


While at Disney I tried 4 beers that I have never had. Arrogant Bastard Ale, Kona Longboard, Kona Fire Rock and Dogfish Head 60 minute IPA.  The Arrogant Bastard Ale was tasty and smooth, almost like a pale ale and is strong.  I suggest taking this one slow cause it will sneak up on you, especially if it is the first beer of a night of drinking.  The Kona Longboard is Kona's Lager.  It tasted like a Budweiser but not as heavy.  The Firerock is Kona's IPA, it tasted like most IPA's but not as sweet. I liked the Kona brand, but it seemed very generic. I tried Dog Fish Head for the first time at Disney since that brand is not available anywhere near where I live.  I had high hopes since it had been on TV and I have heard nothing but good about it.  I tried it, liked it but was not blown away.  I guess all the hype ruined it for me, but I will buy it if it is finally sold in my town.  The last new beer I have tried is Long Hammer IPA by Red Hook.  It was on sale at Bi-Lo, and since I like trying new beers, and it was cheap, I figured why the hell not?  It is sweet, smooth and bold.  Almost as good as a Sierra Nevada, but not quite.  I won't wait till it goes on sale again to buy it.





Thank you all for reading and patience.  I apologize if this is too long.  Enjoy my blog and Cheers!

Sick of it all

When I first started doing this thing, I promised that this would be about me, my training, my weight loss, and that I would not use this for a rant and rave.  But I must now break that rule and rant and rave about myself.

I was on weight watchers fro approximately 3 months and lost close to 20 lbs.  I have been off of it for a month and gained all but 2 pounds back.  I am mad at myself and sick that I did not have the will power to continue this path of weight loss.  I was doing so well, and decided one day to quit doing it.

I was training for a half marathon.  Granted my mileage was not high by any means, but I was consistently running 3 to 4 times a weeks at 3- 5 miles at a time.  I have been back from vacation for approximately 1 month, and have ran less than 5 times.  I was also doing well, and then just not have it in me to keep going.

Am I blaming my vacation for ruining what I had going on, no.  I am blaming myself for not having the will power to keep going when I got back home.  I knew that once I returned from this vacation that I would weigh a little more, because I was eating and drinking what I wanted.  I also knew that my running would suffer because I didn't strap on my Kinvaras once.  My half marathon time goal has changed from 2:45 to finish before the cut off time and hopefully don't die on the course.

I woke up this morning and decided to get back on track.  I could tell myself and leave it that, but decided to write about it for accountability.  I am back on the weight watchers and I am going to hit the road hard.  I have a new running plan and I plan on sticking to it as best as I can.  I have also started a push up and sit up routine. 

I did not write this so you can feel sorry for me, please don't.  I f**ked up and now I have to fix it.

The Kinvara Chronicles

What it is folks?  It's that time again, time for another edition of Run Fatboy Run.  A blog post that is favored by my wife, and that's really it by now.  Anyways, here is what is going on in the life of me for now.

Weight watchers watch:  I lost 4. something pounds this week.  I was actually pretty surprised about it.  I think the 10 miler last Friday and the 4 miler I did before weigh in helped.  Is that cheating? I say no, it's a little "help."

So, I have fallen into the minimalist running fad.  I'm usually pretty strong about staying away from fads and hip stuff, but the minimalist movement is too strong for me.  I blame this on the book Born To Run, by Christoper McDougal.  If you know it, bear with me.  But it's a story about a journalist who travels to Mexico and meets with an white guy who is trying to preserve and help the tribes of the Copper Canyons.  These Tarahumara are super athletes and ultra runners respectfully who have been running in sandals or barefoot their whole life.  Without going too much into the story, there are sections in the book about basically how bad shoes are to you and blah blah blah.  Now I don't agree with the argument that shoes are necessarily bad, but I do want to explore the minimalist type of running shoes and see if it could benefit me in some ways.

That being said, I was looking at purchasing a pair of Saucony Kinvaras.  I have a few friends who use them, and some of the podcasters I listen to like them and haven't heard any bad things about them.  I have put purchasing the shoes on the back burner because, I am still skeptical and I didn't have $90 sitting around.  Plus it was hard to justify replacing my old shoes that have less than 200 miles on them.  Well finally, I got some overtime at work and I began to look around for a pair.  The only ones I could find at the moment were a pair for $100 at Fleet Feet, Columbia SC.  The only color that was available for my size 13 boats was the vizi-pro orange.  I could not bring myself to purchase the orange shoes.  I am not a fan of neon anything and I couldn't wear something that was all orange (Clemson-Carolina thing, some might understand). 

My search continued and I found another pair of orange Kinvaras at Dick's Sporting goods.  They were $10 off and a $30 difference from fleet feet.  I tried them on, and ran on them.  My 3 year old son, who was with me, thought I was playing while I was running.  He said "Chase me daddy," and we he was off.  There I was with shoes that I have not paid for, running down the aisle toward the front door.  My son thought it was fun, the very large employee at the front door did not think it was quite as fun.  Fortunately I caught my child, returned to the shoe area, boxed the shoes up and made the purchase.  I know I said I wouldnt' wear orange, but I'm cheap and can't pass a deal up like that.

When I got home I showed Cindy my new shoes.  She was none too happy when I showed her the orange shoes.  I though her being a Clemson fan, she would like the bright orange Las Vegas Neon Sign style shoes.  No, she was unhappy that I bought something that I wasn't happy with 2 days prior.  Oh well, I got my some Kinvaras and I was happy. 

Later that night, just for smiles and giggles, I went to runningwarehouse.com to check out their prices.  They had no Kinvaras but they did have some Kinvara 2's.  The price on the screen said $90.00, add to cart to see price.  I added a pair of grey, black and orange Kinvara 2's to the cart.  To my surprise, not only were they cheaper than my out of date Kinvaras, but they were way cheaper, I'm talking $30 cheaper.  So I did what every logical man would do, I bought the shoes from running warehouse and returned the orange things to the store. 


I am now awaiting my shoes to arrive in the mail.  I will write about them at a later date.

Well hope all is going well with you all.  Keep on running, enjoy that beer and have fun.

And Now for the Random Blog Post...

It's Saturday, 7/30/2011.  Nothing super exciting has happened since the last post, but I am trying to get in the habit of doing more of these things more often, regardless of what might or might not have happened.

I have been on day shift for the past two weeks.  The temperature has been a average of about 186 deg F, with a heat index of about 399.  Yeah, that bad.  It is just so hard to get out of that air conditioned car, with 40 pounds of gear into that blazing sun and standing on the asphalt for up to an hour or more at a time, for a 12 hours shift.  Then once you get home and take off all of the gear, the smell that emanates from the body is nauseating.  It smells like an orangutan had ran a marathon,showered in it's on sweat, and then dried off with a moldy towel.  Yea, that bad.  I'm just excited that the night shift starts soon, and all I have to deal with is the humidity.  Plus one more night shift and two more days on day shift, then it's onto vacation.

Speaking of vacations, we are heading to the happiest place on the planet for a week.  Walt Disney World (enter your woo here_____).  I am so looking forward to this, not because it's Disney world, but we haven't been on a vacation in 4 years, and this will be my three year old's first trip there.  That being sad, I don't know what's worse.  Worrying about spending money on the trip, or all the money needed before the trip.  We just got Tyler a DVD player for the car, stocked up on diapers and snacks for the 8 hour ride, and we have to give the car a tune-up.  Sheesh, this is hard.

One of the highlights of my week was my 10 mile run on Friday.  I didn't know if I was ready for this one.  I had just gotten over a knee injury and stomach issues, plus I had only run 2 miles in about a week and a half, but it had to get done.  This was on of those runs that if something was going to go wrong, today would have been today.  First off, I was planning on getting to Lake Murray dam around 5:30 am.  I didn't wake up till 5.  And because my pre-run rituals my take a while to take place, I didn't get out to the dam till 7.   The temp was not bad, maybe 78 with high humidity and a nice breeze. 

Usually I do the 3.4 mile loop and stop by truck for water and such after each lap.  Well on that day I decided that I didn't want to get bored by doing lap after lap for 10 miles, I decided to run straight for 5 miles, and then head back.  Again the start of my run was not bad at all, temperature wise.  I left my water, and gels in the truck and took off at a slow 2/1 ratio.  I ran the dam and kept going.  Now, that track on the dam is nice a super flat, the hills on either side of the dam are horrible.  I forgot how hard they were and kept trucking for about 3 more miles.  Decided that I was thirsty and failing, and started to head back.  I past about 3 gas stations on the way back, but of course, I didn't bring cash or card with me.

The sun started to rise, but the temp was still not bad.  However, the combination of the hills (and my lack of hill of training) the beaming sun, humidity started to take it's toll.  My nice 10:30 pace with a 2/1 ratio changed to an 11:00 pace with a 1:30/1 ratio.  By the time I hit the dam again, I was wasted.  I ran back to the truck, looked at my Garmin and realized that I still had about 2.5 miles to go.  This just killed my spirits.  I took another gel, drink some water and took off at a 1/1 ratio with about a 12:00 pace or slower.  I just had to get it done.  I finally finished, came home, got some water and an after run Boston Lager.  I deserved it dammit.

I was planning on doing a 5k on Saturday as well.  It was for a good cause; the Richland County Sheriff's Department K-9 unit.  I was looking forward to it, because I was actually planning on "racing" this one, and not just enjoying the scenery.  I really wanted to have a sub 30 minute 5k.  However, no one I knew was going to be there, I had just run 10 miles the day prior, and it's about 45 minutes to an hour away from my house.  Plus I wanted to sleep in.  Oh well, there will be other races.


The weight watcher watch:  I gained .4 pounds, not bad.  I had a few too many beers and excersised a few too little times.  It didn't break my heart, but the weight wathcers app on my phone stated, "It looks like you gained a little."  What an ass!

Week in Review, IPA's and the "Currently" Thing

This past week, week and a half, has been a little hectic.  Did some construction, ran a little bit and went to a friend's house for a get together.  Which turned into, everybody watch their kid so they don't get hurt party, but it was still fun.

I started to have some pain in my left knee last week.  It didn't hurt after a run, but getting out of a car.  It's not excruciating, but I do notice it.  If I walk on level ground it's OK, but if i climb a hill or go up some stairs, it hurts.  All that aside, I took a couple of days off.  Then on Saturday I headed to the Lake Murray Dam walking path at about 5:30 am for the 9 miler.  The temperature was about 70 degrees, slightly humid, but had a nice breeze coming off of the lake.  The walk path is about a 3.4 mile out and back, flat, so it wouldn't bother my knee, and wasn't crowded at all.  However, I think the women walking were a little on edge when they saw a fat tattooed man running toward them.  One of those ladies even shined her LED light in my eyes as I was running by...that wasn't nice.

I did my run in about 1 hour and 50 minutes.  After each lap, I would stop off at my truck, rehydrate and get some gel.  This was nice because I didn't have to carry anything on the run itself.  The ratio for the first 2 laps was 2/1.  I was feeling good for the last lap and cranked it to a 2:30/1 ratio.  I know what you're thinking... but I knew what I was doing.  It was a great run because I ran the 9 miles 4 minutes slower than my 8 miler two weeks prior.

That same Saturday, was the Saturday that the wife and I were going to put up her closet organizer ( you can take a look at the details on her blog, http://ostranderfam.blogspot.com/)  In short, when we took the old system down it left a lot of large holes.  So a one day putting up a closet organizer task, turned into a 2 day spackle, paint, paint some more the put up the closet organizer.  The most time consuming aspect was putting the anchor on the wall that would hold the system.  After that it was just busy work to put all the pieces together.  It took a while, but it looks nice and now I'm awaiting my closet organizer and two day construction time.

The weight watchers watch: I lost 4 lbs, even after a weekend party of great non weight watcher friendly food and about 10 beers. I think the long run helped a little.

My favorite beer right now is the Sam Adams Latitude 48 IPA.  This is the first IPA that I have partaken in, and I love it.  It's probably my favorite beer right now.  This being said, I decided to do a little taste test and try some other IPA's.  I went to the local Food Lion, and built my six pack with, Magic Hat #9 (I know it says "almost pale ale" but who's counting), Sweet Water IPA, New Belgium Ranger, and 2 Sam Adams Lat IPA. 

After drinking the other beers, I discovered that the IPA has a grapefruity taste to it.  I didn't notice it in the Sam, but now I do and the other beers brought that out.  The first I tried was the Sweet Water.  This had a strong grapefruit taste to it, and was very sweet.  The Ranger had the same taste, not as sweet but leaning more toward the hoppiness that I like.  Magic Hat, again had the grapefruit taste, but was more subdued.  All in all I didn't hate any of them.  I probably won't by the Sweet Water again, but I won't turn it down if someone offered me one.  My favorite is still the Sam.

And now the grand finale, the "currently" thing.  The wife did it on her blog (see the link above) and encouraged me to do one.  So away we go...

Currently

Current Book: Born to Run: A Hidden Tribe, Superathletes, and the Greatest Race the World Has Never Seen, by  Chris McDougall.  Great book.  I love the section of the tribes and Caballo Blanco, but I think the sections on natural running and scientific stuff could have been saved for another book.  I am also listening to Once a Runner, by John L. Parker Jr.  My first audio book.  It's on the iPod, and is used for the long runs.

Current Song: "My Hero," by the Foo Fighters.  I'm going through a 90's and early 2000's phase right now.

Current Drink: Sam Adams Latitude 48 IPA

Current Wish: Saucony Kinvaras or some Vibram Five Fingers.  The Vibrams are not for running, just lounging.

Current Triumph: 9 mile long run completed.

Current Guilty Pleasure: Jimmy Dean turkey sausage biscuits.

Current Favorite Blog: Rocky Mountain Dirt Running, by Nick Clark.  http://irunmountains.blogspot.com/.  I stumbled across this one.  He had just completed the Western States 100 and Hardrock 100.  I'm a sucker for ultramarthoners.

Current Goal:  To leave for Disney at 4am like planned on August 20th.

Current Indulgence:  Sam Adams Latitude 48 IPA

Current Bane of My Existence: Tyler playing with the computer mouse and keyboard while I try to type this...hghjyhhjjnjhgjhjrhuyujyujjng44343h3rtfggbgvbegvb3g3g... see what I mean.

Current Excitement:  Vacation is less than 30....

Current Mood: horny

Current Favorite Pic:  Oldie but goodie.

Here you try it.  What is "currently" going on with you??

How Ya Been?

So it's been about a month and a half since I lasted posted anything.  Frankly, I haven't had a race to report on.  However, I have been listening to a lot of podcasts, reading a lot of blogs and I got inspired just to post something.

Since my last post:

1. I started my half-marathon training.  If you have been following me (thanks Cindy), you know that I  have been using the Jeff Galloway run-walk-run method for my previous races and training.  I am going to continue to use it for my first half-marathon. Before committing to the Galloway training for the half, I have been using it just to build my base.  No speed, pace or interval training.  Now that I have started it I will be utilizing those kind of training methods.  This is in preparation for The Myrtle Beach Mini-Marathon on October 23rd or The Governor's Cup Half-Marathon in Columbia, SC on November 5th.

2. I have discovered Body Glide.  Oh, that wonderful, magic paste.  Put it on those special places, in between the toes, on the heel above the shoe and go for hours.  Or until you pass out, whatever comes first.

3.  I finally bought myself a Garmin Forerunner 305. Thanks to some extra hours at work and a Disney Visa, I was able to get that watch.  So far I love it, no complaints.  Yes, it is like wearing a laptop on your arm, but it works great.  Now I don't have to rely on the overpriced Nike+ pedometer (even though I still take it for a backup), and the inaccurate as all give out Android apps. 

4.  I have joined Weight Watchers.  I finally broke down an joined.  I have lost about 15 pounds just by running and exercising, but have plateaued for about a month.  Which I blame on still eating like I usually do.  The wife has been on it for about 6 months now and has lost over 30 pounds.  She is helping me understand it and being a big supporter.

5.  And finally, on a non-running or fitness note.  The University of South Carolina (The Real USC) Baseball Team won their 2nd National Championship in a row.  WOOOOOO!!!!!.  It was probably the most dramatic series in sports that I have ever witnessed.  Many tears and beers were shared when the World Series was over.

2011 Jail Break 5k

Hey folks!  I ran a 5k, and since it's been a while since I wrote one of these blog deals, I decided to write about it.  On a side note, why do they call it writing something, even if you're typing it?  Something to think about.  Now on with the show.

The race in question is the 2011 Jail Break 5k put on by the Lexington County Sheriff's Department in Lexington, SC on 5/28/2011.  I believe it was the 5th annual.  I wasn't planning on doing this one because I had to work, but by the grace of something holy, I was able to take a half day. The race started at 8:30am, with registration and festivities starting at 6:30 am.  I arrived at about 7:15, got my number and t-shirt.  No swag bag; kinda disappointed in that.  I was number 1311, which is translated into 311 out of 480 people. I was also registered in the Clydesdale division, which is any male over 200 pounds and any female over 160 pounds.  AKA:  The fat ass division, and I loved it.

 As I was leaving the registration table I saw a couple of African-American gentlemen heading to the table.  I didn't think anything of it until the lady asked their names.  They spoke with an accent straight from Africa.  "Great" I thought, "The Kenyans are here.  Now I have no chance." headed back to my car and dropped my shirt off, pinned my number on, grabbed the Ipod and interval timer and changed from my crocs into my Mizunos. 

By the time I returned to the staging area and fairly decent crowd had started to congregate and the DJ had showed up.  With a computer and crappy speakers he cranked out the sounds of classic rock and the COPs theme song (several times).  I didn't know anybody there and I wasn't planning on meeting anybody.  I did a few acceleration gliders to loosen up and waited for the announcement.

The announcement was made to move to the starting line.  Of course they had to make it right when I had to pee.  I did my business and headed toward the starting line.  When I exited the facilities everybody was at the starting line.  I took my place in the rear of the pack with the strollers and old folk.  I set my interval timer to a 4/1 ratio (that's 4 minute run with 1 minute walk), got the Ipod ready and waited for the start.  The DJ with with the crappy sound system was going to start the race off.  I could not hear a single word that guy was saying and just waited for everybody to start moving.  I heard someone yell, and everybody started to move.  I started the Ipod with the classic "Blackened" by Metallica and started the timer.  I was off, and got passed by several strollers.

As I crossed the start line I heard this god awful "roaring" sound.  What the hell was that.  Was it the second coming of Christ, a zombie apocalypse... No, it was the Lexington County Sheriff's helicopter, flying low and scaring the turds out of people. 

After my first 4 minutes, came the walk portion.  People, as nice as they are and not knowing my plan, began to cheer me on and say stuff like, "keep pushing," and "you can't walk now."  I just nodded, waved and took off after my minute walk time.  The course was not bad, it just had a lot of slight incline hills.  What I mean by a slight incline hill, is that it is not steep enough to kill you, but steep enough to burn your legs.  As soon as the burn was over for one hill, I was going up another hill. 

At about the half way mark a guy in a yellow Navy shirt passed me.  Now, I was passed by a lot of people and since I'm not a racer I did not care.  Navy shirt guy got about 40 yards in front of me and began to walk.  Why does this guy stick out from the rest?  I'll tell you.  As I got close to this guy, he turned around, saw me and began to run.  My 4 minutes of running was up, I started to walk, he looked at me and he began to walk.  I passed him when I ran, and he passed me when I walked.  This went on for the entire last half of the race.  I was not trying to beat this guy, but he sure as hell wanted to beat me.  He began to take more walk breaks and kept on trucking and passing him with some distance. 

I turned a corner and saw the finish line.  This guy was out in front, and I was in my walk portion.  He began to run.  I decided to run, then sprint.  This is where the Galloway run-walk method comes into play.  Since I was taking frequent walk breaks, I was conserving energy and recovering from my runs.  I was able to spring the last .10 of the race without pain, or being winded.  I passed Navy guy and left him way behind.  I finished with a time of 34:29 and a pace of 11:17 and PR'ed.  Only by a little less than 30 seconds, but a PR is a PR.

Unfortunately I was unable to stay for awards and festivities.  As soon as I was done I grabbed me a bottle of water, walked around for a bit, got in my car and left.  I had to go to work.

I like to think that I help motivate a person today.  I'm pretty sure that the Navy guy was thinking to himself, "I got to beat that fat guy."  He was so determined to be beat by me that he pushed hard to the end.  Your welcome Navy guy.