Run to the Moon

I finally returned to the Run to the Moon race in Wapakoneta, after quite a few years. I avoided it due to issues that happened the last time I ran it, such as the finish line getting pulled due to a storm, and getting assigned a finish time that was not accurate. Honestly, that was 8 years ago, which was a bit too long to hold a grudge. 7 years, maybe, but by year 8...

Much like 8 years ago, it didn't take long for the rain to start. It didn't get as bad this time, but with my breathing problems, it was still rough. It also dug in how much speed I have lost. While I didn't take any walking breaks (I am sort of proud about that) I still only averaged a 16:53/mile for the 5k. 8 years ago, I averaged 13:43/mile for the 10k. (I also weigh a lot more than I did last time.) 

That being said, with my youngest and my wife both running, and my son being a bit faster than me last time, I hoped to improve over Fly Me to the Moon 5k. I was successful, cutting about 30 seconds/mile from my time. My son was more successful, no only setting a PR for himself, and only about half a minute behind my PR. From 9 years ago at a cemetery run. Neither of us even came close to my wife, who set her new 10k pr and got 3rd female overall. So yeah... She got an extra medal from a few astronauts. 

Since this was the sister race to Fly Me to the Moon, this race also gave out a series medal. I came home with two medals, as did my son. (My wife came home with three, counting her place award.) 

I don't know if I will do this again next year, but I probably won't skip it for another 8 years.

 

Fly Me to the Moon 5k

Last night I did a nighttime 5k, which I can not swear to if that is a first for me. The light show was unique though.

Fly Me to the Moon held their first 5k at the Neil Armstrong airport just outside New Knoxville Ohio, not far from where he was born. It only had one runway, which I suppose is normal. I'm not a pilot, I don't know. The race started at 9:30 pm with a Delorian for a pace car. Not really moon-related, but hey, a Delorian! I didn't see it in action much, since I am not fast, but there was also a bit of distraction from the sky filling with lightning. It was about 30 miles away and never got within 20 miles, so safe and disturbing while I ran.

I didn't hit 3 miles per my watch, though. I had 2.98 miles, my son had 3.03 and my wife only hit 3.08 which sort of robbed her of a 5k pr. 

After the race, they held a firework show, which was interesting with the concurrent lightning. We didn't have any of my good cameras with us, but my phone did decently. More or less. 

It was a largely uneventful ride home, though I did have to go into another lane to prevent the decimation of a raccoon family. I'm glad there was no oncoming traffic. It probably helped that it was nearly midnight. 

Carmel Marathon Weekend 2021

 

Carmel Marathon Weekend is sort of a sore spot for me. Not this year so much, but my first attempt was a dumpster fire that would have fit well with 2020's year of the plague. Maybe substitute my great 2020 R'n'R Nola race weekend with this one. 

Still, this was set to be a better weekend. I packed what I needed, and I only signed up for the 5k this time. I should have signed up for the 10k, partly because I could probably push myself that far, and also because I forgot my wife was signed up for the full marathon. (To be fair, she had signed up for the 2020 Marathon, which got deferred to this year because 2020. I signed up a week before the shirt deadline.)

We got to the downtown outdoor expo, got things in place, and went to find the hotel. I would like to say this was less of an adventure than last time, but the hotel was on a roundabout and the GPS thought it was a different exit from the roundabout. We finally found the right entrance though and got checked in. 

It was still early, so we headed over to Meijer for food for the hotel room. As we were finishing, my wife got a message from the Cincinnati rep of Half Fanatics, and we met her at a Mexican restaurant nearby. It was really good and cost us a bit less than what we pay locally. For us, it is better than pasta before a race.

The 5k for me went decently enough, especially since I really haven't been running a lot recently. I had almost the same pace as a race I did last December. I am still staying sub 50, maybe one day I'll get back to sub 40 again. (My pace for this race was very similar to the first 5k of the Half course from 2018)

It took another three hours for my wife to finish her race, which was a large PR for her. We had the hotel for an extra night, so we didn't have to rush back. That was nice, other than the higher cost from it being Easter weekend. I don't know if I will return to that race, though. If I do, it will need to be for a race longer than a 5k. It did have nice medals...

The small things

 My youngest son tried out for Cross Country this summer, and it didn't go well for him. He lacked the drive really, though a few other things factored in. Still, he decided that he likes trail running, and since I am the trail runner in the family, I'm the one to take him running. (Also, I lost a lot of speed over the last few years, so we are close in pace.)

I've taken him out twice now, and it has never been a dull trip. The first trip out last week had us just missing a car crash from a pickup truck pulling a trailer running a stop sign then smashing into another car. It rattled us a little, and we only got a mile in. He got to see four bunnies, so that made him happy. Seriously, he hates seeing an odd number of rabbits. Four is good, three is bad. Also, five is bad. We did a new section of trail, so I didn't really know a lot about it. Still, it was fun.

So, this time we went back to a different park entrance, and off running we went. However, this time I introduced a new challenge. We were going to cross the river. Now, I have done the river crossing a few times, once in a race, and at least once on a training run. It isn't a huge river, and maybe a foot deep in a few places. My son has never done a river crossing, so new territory. I told him to be careful and promptly fell into the river with my first step. I managed to keep the phone and key fob out of the water, and got up. My leg is scratched, and will probably be bruised in the morning, and my leg just kind of hurts. I asked him if he still wanted to cross, and he gleefully jumped on into the river and we walked across. (This all wound up being witnessed by a family that was playing in the river, including some smaller kids. So, yeah, fun.) 

Once on the other side, we continued down the trail for about a half-mile and turned around. By this point, my son realized that he forgot to put on his anti-chafe before we left, so we walked the mile back to the car. (Without falling in the river again!) He actually found it amusing how his feet seemed to dry quickly, which makes sense because we bought him trail shoes a few weeks back. I was in an older pair that were cheap, but still, trail shoes. He is already looking forward to the next time he can do a water crossing. 

It isn't the grand adventures I'd love to be able to partake in all the time, but it was fun to be out with him running trails. I've hiked or run trails for years, and that seems to be the format my son prefers as well. My wife prefers roads and paved trails, so it works out better for me to be the one to take him. Now if we can just get our speeds up a bit more, we might enter some races. (If they ever start having them again...) 

Vintage: Qualified for Half Fanatics

Edited from one of my previous blogs... Edited August 2020, originally posted June 2016

Recovering from the Achilles injury sucks. On National Running day last week, I tried running at the track while my kids had track club, and it was a horrible failure. I couldn't do it. I just need more time. Time was something I didn't have, as I was only 4 days out from my next half marathon, the second of two that I would need to qualify for Half Fanatics.

The weekend got off to a cluster of a start. Friday afternoon my wife left for Cincy to prepare to pace the Race 13.1 Cincinnati half marathon, which was Saturday morning. Lacking a car, and the kids lacking the motivation to put down their video games, I made ramen and tea. I then proceeded to sit down to eat, spilling the tea onto my leg, burning myself just below the hip.

The sounds I made scared the kids a bit, and I got out of my shorts really quickly. I'm sure it could have been worse, so there is that. Also, my mutant superpower is that I shrug off most burns. My wife was always concerned about me because I just tend to get sunburns, and then I act like I don't have a sunburn. I need to actually blister from a sunburn before I really even notice it because it really doesn't cause me pain. This burn is one I can hardly feel, but I felt it a bit during the race, though it was distant. 

My wife came home after pacing and we packed for the Sunday race. As I mentioned before, this would qualify me for Half Fanatics, though for my wife, it would 'moon' her up a few planets for doing two half marathons back to back. So, we left just after 5 pm for the wastelands of northwest Ohio, as the storms rolled in.

We had decided to leave on Saturday instead of Sunday for the race, because the GPS suggested it would be a 2-hour drive, and neither of us wanted to leave at 3 AM. On the plus side, the car's GPS pointed out it was a 3-hour drive instead and that would have cost us the race. As it was, there really weren't a lot of hotel options in the area of Bryan, so we packed up the camping gear, and aimed for Harrison Lake State Park. As we pulled into a gas station just outside Defiance, due to rain too hard to see through, we really questioned the sanity of camping. 

The rain let up, and we got to the campground about 7:30 or so, and being tired of driving, I got an electric campsite. The tent isn't electric compatible, but I wasn't driving around the lake to the non-electric side. If we were staying longer, the extra $6 would have been really worth it, but our portable phone chargers did their jobs quite well.

My wife watched me set the tent up from the car, while I worked in the rain. I think she really thought I would have just given up and gotten a hotel room, but those were starting out at $125+, if I could even find a room, and the campsite was $25. We unloaded the car, and made a quick drive to Burger King. Really, for the region around the Park, the options were local places, and Burger King. For the night before a race, Burger King was the better choice, which is really sad. If not for the race, or if we were staying an extra night, local places would have been great.

I actually got a decent night's sleep, though forcing myself to go to sleep earlier than normal wasn't easy. The last two times I camped, there was a party going on until midnight, so the quiet was nice and strange at the same time. We could hear people in the park, though the noise level was much better than many hotels we have stayed in, especially one rather nice place near Columbus that had a very noisy toilet in the room above us. The double sleeping bag worked great (for me) and my pad under the sleeping bag held up sort of well, as long as I was on my back. (Sleeping on the burn wasn't really an option anyway.) My wife, however, did not like the hard ground, even with the pad under her. Next time, she is demanding an air mattress. (Which sure as beats "never again") She also didn't think to unzip the bag a little for ventilation, but one learns as they go.

We headed over to the race site for the Mainly Marathons Heartland Series day 1 race, and got set up. We were originally signed up for the full, but there was no way I could have done a full that day. With the half two weeks ago put on by my son's scout troop, and the potential for HF qualification, it was a reasonable downgrade.

The course was an out and back, repeated 8 times for the half. This was rather mind-numbing, but you saw the same people a lot.

Like the (in)famous Larry, whom I
encountered once before at the Flying Pig

My wife ran with me for the first 7 laps, and the first 2 were decent. Then, something went awry. I was fighting dizziness, the Achilles pain, one of my knees began to hurt, and a blister formed on both of my feet. The remains of my blister from the previous HM got its own blister. I really had hoped to push for another PR, but ultimately got my worst finish ever for a HM.

My wife told me later that she was really concerned about me because while I had slowed down, I wasn't complaining and whining, which was strange enough that she became concerned about my health. Still, I carried on and finished. It wasn't a good time for me, about 30-40 minutes slower than the Half I ran two weeks ago. I got my medal piece, synced the run to Strava, and put together my medal.

At least I didn't need pliers to assemble it.

We headed back to the camp, where we relaxed a bit, changed clothes, packed up the car, and came home. We ended up on Ohio 66 rather quickly, which was laughed about as the GPS tried to trick us onto the Toll road. I had one dollar in cash and I refused to use it for a toll road. Also, even though we were two and a half hours from home, it just so happens that Ohio 66 ends behind the running store, one mile from our house. I really didn't care if I took it all the way home. We did eventually end up on I-75 though, which was a bit easier than going through a bunch of tiny towns that only had Subways. Seriously, tiny towns in that area all had Subways, and McDonalds were really rare. It was strange.

At any rate, I'm glad to be home. I am not looking forward to actually climbing the stairs to bed, but at least I know I will sleep well tonight.