Running in Tennis Sneakers

I am officially registered for the Asbury Park Relay Marathon in October. The course is a U shaped loop with a Start/Finish/Transition area that is on the boardwalk in Asbury Park, NJ across from the famed Stone Pony. Teams can consist of 2-8 runners or you can run as a team of one (I chose the team of one option). I had a hard time turning this one down – it’s $35 if you sign up by March 31st as a team of one, plus $5 off if you are a NJRRC member. So for $30 I get to run a marathon that is 20 miles from my house, get a long sleeve tech shirt, chip timing, and the bizarre Tilly finisher medal – I would have been crazy not to sign up. Plus I’m pretty sure I can get Mrs. Progman to get a team together with some of her running gal friends. I encourage any local runners to check this out. (Of course, if I get into the NYC Marathon which is two weeks later, this will be tricky, but what are the odds of that happening?).

Training: Sunday I headed out for 20 miles in the hills of Marlboro. I had mapped this out earlier in the week on MapMyRun. After mapping it I also drove it on my way home from work one night. I realized driving it that it had some nasty hills at the exact halfway point. I went back and forth with myself about whether I should run the hills in the middle of a 20 miler but ended up doing it, mainly because I was too lazy to map another alternate route. I’m glad I did, it was a great run, I will probably hit this route at least one more time before the marathon.

Shoes: I was looking at the tread wear on a pair of my oldest Brooks Adrenalines recently and decided to take them to my local running store. After looking at them the guy there confirmed that I am not a heel striker, I am landing mostly mid foot. On top of that my right foot is mostly neutral, with my left foot needing a little more stability. I had always assumed I was a heel striker (since most “experts” tout that as bad) and always leaned towards wearing high stability shoes. I trained for most of the Philadelphia Marathon in the high stability Brooks Trance (I am now wondering if maybe that played a part in my injury last season).

So I will probably be sticking with the lower stability Adrenalines for a while. However, on a whim I decided to try a pair of the Nike Free 3.0. Matt Fitzgerald is a fan of the Free in Brain Training for Runners, and I found a screaming deal on them at Running Warehouse so I figured I’d give them a try. Nike advertises the Free 3.0 as a minimalist shoe designed for neutral to mild overpronators for stengthening the feet. They are a far cry from the heavily cushioned running shoes on the market, and are supposed to be closer to the feel of barefoot running. Initially I will only wear them once a week for shorter distance running since most of my other shoes are nearing their life expectancy. If I hate running in them they are my new street shoes, since I think they look kind of cool.

I had a great 19 mile run this morning in the hills of Marlboro and Colts Neck, NJ. This was a new route I ran on – I mapped it out well ahead of time but was still surprised at the amount of hills on the route. I was sorry to miss Ted, ShoreTurtle, Joy & Flyers26 on their Seaside Heights training excursion, but I was hoping to get out REALLY early since the family had some stuff planned later in the morning. And imagine my surprise when I got home and Mrs. Progman was stretching with the running duds on. Now that the temperature is rising her season has officially started (not a cold weather gal at all, can’t say I blame her too much).

I am starting to embrace some of the recommendations made by Matt Fitzgerald in Performance Nutrition. I previously only worried about hydrating on the really long stuff – I am going to start making it a point to carry some type of sports drink on just about every run I do now. For the long stuff he is a fan of drinks that contain protein, so I have started carrying Accelerade on anything over an hour long. I know this stuff makes a lot of people gag but it is supposed to be huge as far as speeding recovery and minimizing muscle damage. So far I am digging it – I don’t know what effect, if any, it had on my 19 miler but I know I felt like I coulda just kept on running this morning.

I don’t know about the rest of the running community but I am desperately wanting to wash my cold weather gear and pack it away until next season. A couple of runs last week were cold enough that my eye lashes kept freezing together. I am normally a cold weather guy but enough’s enough already, I am ready to wear shorts from this point forward.

I finally broke down and bought a digital camera to run with. I opted for the Olympus 850SW, which is part of their shockproof (I fall down a lot) and waterproof (I sweat like a baboon) line of cameras. It’s very cool and surprisingly small and light considering it can take pictures submerged in like 10 feet of water. I still need to get used to running with this thing, and more importantly snapping pictures on the run. I will need to ask ShoreTurtle for some tips, since he can manage to take pictures while also PR’ing in a race. So some pictures from running this weekend:

Saturday morning – 3 buzzards enjoying some roadkill. This is using the 3x digital zoom, so I suspect the quality is compromised a bit.

Sunday long run – hopping onto the Henry Hudson Trail in Freehold with the snow coming down.

Tons of tracks in the snow this morning – not really sure what this is, guessing rabbit.

Jersey Devil? Perhaps, if he wears a Brooks Adrenaline, size 14

Big Brook Preserve in Marlboro – very beautiful to run through, not sure why I don’t come here more often

As I was returning on the Henry Hudson Trail I spotted a red fox. This guy was pretty big – The odd fox I spot around here is usual more along the size of a big cat but this guy was more the size of a small/medium size dog. By the time I pulled the camera out he spotted me and was gone in a flash. Very cool to see though. The bulk of my running for the last several months has been on the roads so it was cool to be one with nature in the snow on Sunday.

Two copies of my drivers license – one from 4 years ago (pre-running), one from last Friday. If you can see past the translucent State of NJ emblem, try to pick which is which (the translucent emblem is not heavy enough to hide the double chin)?

This week was a cutback week, which meant 1o miles for the Sunday long run. I decided to head over to Bodman Park, the nexus of the Jersey Shore Running Club’s marathon training universe. It was the first time I have been there in a couple of months – to my glee there was a 100 mile patch waiting there for me for the runs I logged at Bodman Park in 2008. Cool stuff, I am pretty sure I am going to pick up an Endurance Bag in the next month or two so maybe I’ll stitch it on there.

Part of the decision of going to Bodman Park was I figured if I was only doing 10 miles, I might as well do some hill training as well. So I made it a point to hit Beacon Hill, which comes up around mile 7 of the route I took. Local runners would know this hill as the last downhill in the Indian Trails 15k. It is hard enough to run down this hill without killing yourself – I was running up it, so I was going much slower but working considerably harder. I’ve got the elevation chart below. The chart is a little deceiving I think. “Kick Ass hill” is at mile 3 and looks like the worst one here, but I think Beacon Hill is far worst – maybe it’s just because of where it falls on the course, I don’t know.

It was nice to run in shorts today – I have been getting a little tired of running in layers and finishing with frost all over me. I would be pretty happy if temperatures hovered between 30-40 degrees for a while, but I am sure I am not done with the frost just yet.

I got an email from a member of the Jersey Shore Running Club this week about the Adidas “Runners, Yeah We’re Different” Ad Campaign from 1999-2000. Anyone who runs (especially distance running) will appreciate these ads. I’ve only included a couple of them below – if you go to Charlie Hayden’s website you can see a larger collection of them. Thanks to Charlie for a good laugh.

Devastated about the Eagles, happy for the Cardinals. First time to the big show for Cardinals franchise – I hope they can make their fans and the NFC proud on February 1st (sorry Ted).