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I did this playing soccer tonight. My right knee feels about the same as the right ankle looks. I played through it, but it hurts to even walk now.

After a small detour, John, Greg & I are outside Scraton, PA. The clouds have finally broke – check out what we’ve been driving next to for the last 15 minutes:

This morning I ran the Run for the Grapes Half Marathon in St. Catherines, Ontario. I completed with a PR of 1:36:10 – a 7:20/mile average pace. I’m very happy with this. My splits were:

1. 7:53
2. 7:02
3. 6:57
4. 7:03
5. 7:06
6. 7:13
7. 7:33
8. 7:30
9. 7:12
10. 7:31
11. 7:11
12. 7:40
13. 7:29
14. 6:29 (.1 mile)

After the race, I was happy to find myself on the first page of the result sheets – my time placed me 70/400 overall, 61/213 of all males, and 9/12 in the 25-29 male category. (Geez they’re fast north of the border!) More details can be found on the results page.

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This past Sunday I ran the 2008 Rochester Half Marathon, completing in 1:41:29 – a 7:46/mile overall pace. This is the third year I’ve run the Rochester half, previously finishing with 1:45:05, 08:01/mile pace (2007) and 1:52:40, 8:36/mile pace (2006). While this was technically a PR (personal record), the split from the first half of my 2008 Buffalo (full) Marathon time was faster, falling in the 1:38s.

Ask anyone who participated this weekend about the race and odds are they will tell you about the weather. Wham, the D&C & RNews all mentioned the oppressive heat and humidity in their marathon article summaries. Forecasts the week prior called for race day temperatures in the 70s, a 60% chance of rain and wind. The day prior to the race was rainy and depressive, but still warm. As I headed to bed the night before the race around ~11pm, it was 72 out. At 5am the morning of the race, it was still 72 – but there was no rain. After the race, when I arrived back at my friend John’s place near Cobb’s Hill, it was a scorching 85. The heat and humidity were no fun for me, yet others on the course suffered even more – the wind arrived up shortly after my finish & those who ran the full were exposed to the sun for the majority of their extra half along the canal.

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This past Memorial Day weekend I ran the Buffalo Marathon & successfully completed it with a chip time of 3:29:53 (8:01/mile average pace), just reaching the goal I’d secretly set of a time somewhere in the 3:20s and besting my previous 2007 Niagara Falls time by nearly 9 minutes. Overall, I finished 124 out of 710 full marathon finishers & 8/43 in my age group. (Detailed results can be found by following the link from the results page.)

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I’ve been running with the Nike+ setup for my iPod Nano since this past December. Since then, I’ve used it for nearly 50 runs & 365 miles. (You can see the results on my Nike+ page.) After all those miles, I think it’s time for a review. (more…)

Last night I completed Again to Carthage, the sequel to the legendary novel Once a Runner, both by John L. Parker, Jr. I’d seen Once a Runner mentioned in quite a few places, but have yet to read it since it’s currently not in print. Used copies are highly sought after and can currently be found used on Amazon starting at $244! I purchased Again to Carthage from the Buffalo Fleet Feet several days after reading a good review on it in the November issue of Runners World. At the time I asked one of the owners if he had a copy of Once a Runner & was informed he did, but that it was currently lent to a friend. After finishing Again to Carthage, I might have to head back and see if I can get in line to borrow it.

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This past week I ran the Niagara Falls International Marathon. This was my first marathon & I’m extremely happy to say that I completed it in 3:38:45.9!!

Katie, Greg, Myself & John

Additional photos in my Photo Gallery.

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It’s hard to believe it’s coming this weekend, but the Niagara Falls Marathon is a mere two days away. A couple people have asked me “Are you read?”. Am I? I think so. All the training says I am & I’m starting to realize how large of an event the race will be.

Last night I ran my very last training run – 2 miles in 14:30. With this and the last couple around 7/8 miles, I’ve earned for more when done. It’s going to be hard to slow from the pace I was at last night (well at least at the beginning of the marathon…), but now that I’ve come down from my long training runs, my body wants to run that speed now. I need to drop around a minute and a half a mile from that pace. There is no more running before Sunday.

The weather for Sunday is a high in the upper 40s, with a low in the high 30s & a chance of morning rain. I still haven’t decided what I’m wearing up top – ideally I’ll just wear one shirt, but if it’s absolutely pouring and miserable out, I’ll go with my waterproof running jacket. If it’s low 40s to start, but expected to warm up, I’ll start with a long sleeve cotton shirt over a running shirt & ditch it after a couple miles. If it’s expected to stay in the low 40s, I may wear two running shirts (tried this out last night). I have a pair of cheap gloves and a headband to start with and throw away either way. I’d prefer to be worrying about having to wear sunglasses or not…

The only other thing I have to figure out is what headphones I’ll be wearing. I’ve been training with a pair of over-the-ear style, but sometimes in high wind they get pulled out. I brought a pair of Skull Candy Smokin Buds, but the left ear doesn’t fit as nicely as I’d like.

I still have to edit my playlist on my iPod & plot out my planned splits,but other than that, I completed the last preparation by heading to Bed, Bath & Beyond today to get a salad & pasta serving bowl for the guests I’ll have this weekend (John, John’s brother’s girlfriend & hopefully Greg!).

Technically, it’s 1 week, 6 days and counting to the Niagara Falls Marathon, but I meant to write this yesterday and “1 week, 6 days and counting” just doesn’t have the same ring to it as a headline as “2 weeks and counting”… Regardless, I headed out for a 12 mile run Sunday. I was watching my brother all weekend & a little afraid I either wouldn’t be able to do it at all or stuck doing it late Sunday night, but fortunately my mother found a friend to watch him for a couple hours and I was able to get it in.

The weather was perfect for running to start: low to mid 50s. Half way through it felt like it cracked 60 – running the entrance/exit to Evangola State was hot!

A couple things went wrong for the run. None of them were major, but I am concerned about one – while making pancakes Sunday morning, I dropped the (sealed) package of pancakes & attempted to catch them with my foot before they hit the floor. I did manage to catch the package with my foot, but my attempt to kick it back up was foiled by the bottom overhang of the kitchen cabinets (picture a blocked punt, except replace the charging defender with a piece of immobile cabinetry). <begin sarcasm>Luckily it was my weaker left foot, as surely my powerful right would have destroyed the cabinet.</end sarcasm> The only thing that resulted was the equivalent of a scraped knuckle on my middle left toe. If toes have knuckles, then it wasn’t the equivalent – it was the knuckle. It didn’t bleed at all, but I could see the skin peeled back. I placed some Body Glide on it & it didn’t bother me during the run at all, but has irritated me a little more than I’d like since. I’m going to keep it under a band-aid and Neosporin.

Other than that, I forgot to charge my GPS watch, which died shortly after the first mile. A couple hundred feet after it died, my cell phone not only popped out of the pouch on my Amphipod RunLite running belt, but it landed perfectly in front of my (non-injured) right foot for me to kick it down the road for ten feet or so. It was scratched up a little, but managed to survive both the fall and skid across the pavement.

It was a little strange “only” running 12 miles. Next week’s long run is an 8 mile run. My body is not used to these distances, but all marathon training plans cut back a couple weeks before the race – this is called the taper. Not having to squeeze in a really long run is nice though – there’s not much light left these days after work & bow hunting season has started. My body feels great today – I look forward to my 3 mile run tomorrow.