11 Things You May Not Know About Me, Running Edition

In honor (if that’s the right word) of that Facebook meme about “things you may not know about me,” I thought I’d have a bit of fun and mention 11 unusual facts about myself. My focus here is narrower. Of course it’s about running, but it’s specifically about things that others runners may commonly experience that I rarely (if ever) do.

In more than 18 years of running, I have never…

• Lost a toenail. I get blood blisters, but I’ve never lost a toenail. Haven’t even come close.
• Puked after a workout. I dry heaved once, but that was it. (My stomach’s pretty strong; aside from nights of bacchanalian excess, I haven’t been sick to my stomach in more than 20 years.)
• Recorded a DNF. I’ve thought about it, of course, but I have too much pride.
• Won. I placed third in a few high school races, and I’ve placed third in my age group in a handful of small suburban races, but nothing better than that.
• Entered a race on a whim. I need to plan -- even if it’s for the two-mile Fourth of July race in my hometown that’s less road race and more impromptu reunion.

And I have only once…

• Lost time due to an injury. I had runner’s knee in college and took about three weeks off. I wasn’t stretching enough. Now I stretch after every run, as well as on my off days when I know I need it, and as a result I stay mostly pain-free. (Point of order: I typically take about two weeks off after a marathon and did the same for my wedding and honeymoon.)
• Finished a run with bloody nipples. Suffice to say this is a lesson you don’t soon forget.
• Skipped a race I signed up for. It was a half marathon a few years ago, and I convinced myself I was in such bad shape that I’d bonk and embarrass myself. Frankly, skipping the race was more embarrassing. (Oddly, since my friend ran and picked up my packet for me, I have the race shirt. It’s quite comfortable.)
• Done an entire run shirtless. It was a 10-mile race on a 100-degree day. (Why not more often? A doffed shirt makes an excellent seat rag. And I am pasty white.)
• Run barefoot. For some reason, I did a cooldown after a particularly disappointing high school cross country race with my shoes in my hands. That was pretty stupid.My teammates, to their credit, let me suffer in silence.
• Run outdoors while wearing headphones. (I was reminded of this during a social media conversation.) I remember it well, actually: Just after buying myself an iPod, I ran a loop around Lake Quannapowitt, plus the mile or so to get there and come home to my old apartment, and listened to Monster. (I skipped "Tongue." My least favorite R.E.M. song.) Music made me run too damn fast. I still listen to headphones on the rare occasion I run on a treadmill, but I don't run with headphones any more.  

Here’s hoping that I haven’t jinxed myself and end up failing to finish my next race (which I happen to be winning despite signing up that very morning) by snapping my IT band so badly that I tear a toenail off and gross myself out so much that I throw up. 

What do you do, or avoid doing, or have only done once, that makes you a unique runner?

What ‘Running Renaissance’ Means to Me

My first post promised a prompt explanation of why I chose “Running Renaissance” as the name for this blog. Yeah, yeah, this isn’t very prompt, but I’ve been mulling it over, and I think I’ve figured out how to best explain myself. 

As I noted, I’ve been running for 17 years. This works out to more than half my life. That said, my running hasn't progressed on a continuum but, rather, has hit peaks and troughs, both of which are worth examining to fully understand why I feel like I'm in the midst of a running Renaissance. 

My running life can be roughly and briefly divided into four time frames. 

Fast Times: August 1995 - October 2001

This is when I grew the most as a runner, from the guy in basketball shoes to the guy who, if memory serves me right, ran a sub-30 5-mile cross-country race as a college sophomore. I fully identified myself as a runner, even though I was never the fastest on the team and sometimes to the chagrin of my college roommates, who had to smell my stinky running clothes. (I learned that hanging them out an open window only goes so far.) 

This era ended with the 2001 BayState Marathon. It was my first 26.2 miles. For 16 miles, I maintained a 7:10 pace, which was setting me up nicely to qualify for Boston. (This was when BQ for men under 35 was 3:10.) Coincidentally, 16 miles was also the length of my longest training run; after clinging to a telephone pole for dear life, I walk-jogged my way home. 

Strange Days: October 2001 - October 2007

I ran less during these years. This was an accident of my calendar -- first the last three semesters of college were busy as all hell, then I was working the wonky hours of a newspaper reporter and finally I had a 45-minute commute to my next job. I never stopped altogether, mind you, but let’s just say weekday runs were few and far between. 

Things picked up toward the end. I squeezed in my second marathon, the 2006 BayState, but a bout with runner’s knee during my taper led me to take things slow. Naturally, I took this personally and vowed to come back stronger. I recommitted to training, raced more and ran my marathon PR at 2007 Baystate -- 3:13:02. (Why BayState? It’s flat, it’s fast and it’s 15 minutes from my parents’ house.) 

The Wonder Years: October 2007 - November 2012

Missing a BQ by three minutes naturally had me dreaming of sprinting down Boylston Street and into the arms of an eagerly waiting throng of supporters. It never happened, of course. My BQ attempts all failed -- I fell short of distance goals during training, I neglected speed workouts, I spent an inordinate amount of time pulling weeds in my garden and, simply put, I didn’t take training seriously. The nadir was the 2012 Manchester Marathon, during which I bonked like I have never bonked before and ran a PW of 3:51 and change. 

The Renaissance: November 2012 - present

All runners wallow after a bad race. This is especially true for marathons, as we spend months preparing for a single race that can fall apart for any number of reasons. After Manchester, I brooded for several days and even went so far as to question whether I had even one more marathon in me. 

Then I stopped feeling sorry for myself. (Like all runners do when faced with disappointment.) I signed up for a Turkey Trot and surprised myself with a sub-7:00 pace over 5 miles. I committed to the Runner’s World Run Streak -- and, just as importantly, the Runner’s World Pun Streak. (I lasted about 12 days until my toe started to bother me and I opted not to push it, but it was still pretty fun.) I signed up for dailymile so I could join the 21st century and stop tracking my mileage in a day planner. I committed to a general yet flexible schedule that included at least one speed workout each week. 

Along the way, a funny thing happened: I started getting faster and feeling better. My 5K, 5 mile and 10K race times dropped. My training runs got faster. My thighs burned a little more after speed workouts. My flexibility improved (albeit from a fairly low baseline). Despite my Manchester debacle, I started to get excited about the prospect of running another marathon. 

"Renaissance" is French for "rebirth." Over the last few months I’ve undergone a running rebirth of sorts, to the point that I’m almost -- almost -- as fast as I was in high school. Age and amount of gray hair aside, the difference is that I’m not going to take this for granted. It took me more than a decade to get back to this point, and this time I’ll be damned if I let it slip away again.

Welcome to the Renaissance

Hi there. Welcome to my blog, "Running Renaissance." Over the next few posts, I'll explain why I'm blogging, why I chose the name Running Renaissance, why I run and why I think my experiences are worth sharing. I’ll also make this look more like a blog and less like a bad experiment in Web publishing.

At the outset, I'll tell you this much: I've been a wannabe writer since elementary school, a runner since high school, and a professional journalist for more than a decade. I figured it was high time I combined these interests.

Now, since "running blog" can mean different things to different people, it's worth outlining what I intend to accomplish.

First, here are a few things I won't do on Running Renaissance:

• Talk about food. My metabolic blast furnace is the envy of everyone I know. (It helps that I tend to stick to the Mediterranean diet, albeit largely unintentionally and with the occasional entire-pizza bender..) I also have no digestive problems or food allergies. I'll leave nutrition to the experts.
• Post pictures of food. I'd rather eat it.
• Break down my workouts in exquisite detail. I'm neither a coach nor a certified trainer. Plus, I often improvise. (If you want the dirty details, you can find me on dailymile. I log all that stuff there. You can also make fun of the inane names I assign each run.)
• Provide stream-of-consciousness recaps of races. Trust me, this is for the sake of everyone's sanity.
• Tell you what to do. If I could actually persuade people to do things, I'd be a lawyer, not a journalist.
• Discuss how awesome I am. Really, that's in the eye of the beholder.

What I will do, though, is share what I've learned about running through the years. I'll do my best to put things in context; that way, those who neither fast nor veteran runners will nonetheless get some value from what I say. I'll keep the personal stories relevant but stay unafraid to let my writing reflect my personality. I'll open up a little bit -- runners, after all, discuss chafing and bowel movements more than the general population -- without making anyone uncomfortable. I'll remain open to dialogue; for all my experience, I still have a lot to learn.

Above all, I'll never stop running -- and, now that I've started Running Renaissance, if all goes well I'll never stop writing about running either.

Welcome aboard. I look forward to hearing from you.