Demolition Day aka Founders 5K

Yesterday was the Founders 5K in Prospect Park.  This was my first time racing in my hometown of Brooklyn, NY!  My prior PR for the 5K distance was 49:19.  It had been a while since I ran a 5K, so I was shooting for a sub 44:00 finish time.

Before the race at the Start

The first mile felt really good, I decided to ditch my usual intervals and just run and take short walk breaks as I felt necessary.  When I got to the Mile 1 marker I almost did a double take, 12:25??  My fastest mile EVER!

The second mile was the hardest of the run because there was a really big hill that I wasn't expecting.  This hill had a LONG and STEADY incline that just never seemed to end.  I asked the guy at the 2nd mile marker when the hill was gonna end, he didn't sound like he knew so wasn't very encouraged!  I wound up finishing mile 2 in 14:29.

The 3rd mile wasn't too bad, but I knew the hill during the 2nd mile took a lot out of me, but I had enough energy reserved to make sure I finished strong.  3rd Mile time 13:42.

Official finish time was 41:33!!!   DEMOLISHED my prior PR and my goal of 44:00!!!

I went to my Weight Watchers meeting when we got back, and figured Id kick the scale's ass too while I was at it.   Down another 1.4lbs, bringing my total weight lost total to 205!! 

Here I am wearing a jacket I bought in size LARGE!!  My first time wearing anything without an X in front of it in 20+ years!!

A Milestone Day!

This morning I ran the NYRR Run for Central Park 4 Mile race.  The race start was at 8AM, so woke up early around 4:45AM.  This morning was a BEAUTIFUL morning for a run, cool and no humidity!

CPC Tent

When we got to the race, we met up with my friend Amy who was volunteering at this race.

Amy and Me

Also met a few other people before the race including these folks who were looking ready for a great race!

Last time I ran this course, I finished in 56:42 with a 14:10 pace.  My goal for this race was under 55:00 with a sub 14:00 pace.

The following were my splits as per my Nike GPS

Mile 1 - 13:11

Mile 2 - 13:04

Mile 3 - 14:19

Mile 4 - 13:30

Official Finish time 54:45, almost a 2 Minute PR with a pace of 13:42!! Wooohooooo!!!!

Here I am coming into the finish, as well as a video shot by Amy as she was cheering me on!

Then after we got home, I went to go for my weekly weigh-in at Weight Watchers and I lost another 3.2 lbs!  Ive now lost a total of 202 lbs!!!!!

My Weight Watchers Charms

Screenshot from my online tracker

Certainly a milestone day!!!!!

What a Day! Walking, Climbing, Flying!

I went into the city with my wife Gail today at around 11AM.

First we went into Central Park to meet my friend James at his restaurant by the remote controlled boats and had a great lunch and catching up with him since I hadnt seen him in about 2 years.

On the way to meeting James, I saw a great looking tree and a branch to use to take a great pic of Gail, was fun getting her up on the branch!

After lunch we walked thru the park which included climbing a number of hills on the way.

We then went to the Museum of Natural History to see a bunch of dinosaurs, I hadnt seen them since I was a kid, and guess what, they didnt look like they aged much since the last time I saw them!

After the museum, we then went back into the park to walk some more and get back to the east side to pick up my shirt and bib for saturdays race.

So now we headed down to 67th and 3rd, and by that point we had been walking for about 6-7 hours and around 10 miles total if not more, what did we do???

We went to Flywheel Sports where my friend Jesse Alexander is an instructor.  For those who dont know about Flywheel, its "like" spinning but 100x better!  Its a 45 minute workout that totally kicks your ass and i kid you not, I felt MORE energized after that class then when we first walked in!  Thanx for the great class Jesse!

I forgot to take a pic while we were at Flywheel so Im posting this pic of Jesse with another happy Flywheel client!

This was definitely a great day all around, and for me, I had so much to be proud of!  The fact that I made it thru this day feeling the way I did, it just made me remember why Im doing what Im doing.  This is a lifestyle that I missed out on for too long, not anymore!

What does 400lbs lost look like???

Gail at 175 lbs

Melissa at 394 lbs

Me at 476 lbs

                                                        

The 3 of us today

Melissa @ 242 lbs

Me @ 277 lbs

Gail @ 129 lbs

Journey to the HALF Marathon

As you may already know, I've decided to challenge myself with the task of completing my first HALF MARATHON this year!  I'm signed up for the Hershey Half Marathon on October 16th.  I will have 2 Goals for this race, A) To Finish B) To finish in 3 Hours

In order to prepare myself for this race I have decided to follow Hal Higdon's Novice Plan and I will be incorporating the Galloway Run-Walk-Run technique.

The plan is a 12 week plan Mon-Sun which I will be starting the week ending July 31st.  Each week consists of 3 short runs and 1 long run.  The long run progressively gets built up along the way.  Also during the course of training, there will be a few races as well.

I will be blogging after each training run with details of how it went and how the training is coming along, so I hope you will stay tuned!

I do have a couple races in July to work on before the half marathon training begins, July 16th 4M run in Central Park and July 30th 5K in Prospect Park, both of which are on the event calendar on the site.

Pride! 5 Mile Run Race Report

Yesterday I ran my first 5 mile race, and also my first attempt at the hardest course in Central Park, the top loop with Harlem Hills.  This was another NY Road Runner race in honor of Pride Weekend, celebrating the gay and lesbian community, and it made it even more exciting given the fact the the NY State Legislature passed the Marraige Equality bill the night before!

Before the race I met up with some friends from the Runners World forums: From L to R - Dahlia, Amy, Me, Rebeca, Jennifer

When we got to the corral, my beautiful wife Gail (aka my photographer and #1 cheerleader) had a surprise for me!

Then yet another surprise, when I met another friend from the Runners World forum, Beth!

Race started at 9AM, it wasnt too hot, around 70 degrees, but was VERY humid out.  Since I had never run this course and it included the most difficult part of the park, Harlem Hill which ive never run before, my ONLY goal besides finishing was to finish in under 1:15:00 or sub 15:00 miles.

Mile #1 - This first mile included the Harlem hill, so my strategy was to run a 45/30 run walk interval till I get to the hill and then switch to a 30/45 interval and told myself not to push it TOO hard up the hill in order to make sure I didnt kill myself before the rest of the 4 miles.  Harlem hill wasnt as bad as I expected it, it was long and just kept going, and then when i thought i had reached the top, it still went on, but after reaching the top, the downhill to the west side of the park was nice.  My strategy worked and Mile #1 was my fastest mile in the race @ 13:37!

Mile #2 & #3 -  These 2 miles were along the West Side of the park which is basically a series of rolling hills, Ive ran these before and knew what to expect.  I did make water stops twice since I was feeling a little dehydrated. Mile #2 - 14:29 Mile #3 - 14:25

Mile #4 - Cat Hill which is another big hill, but one that Ive run before, so again I knew what to expect. I also stopped again for water after the hill. Mile #4 - my slowest at 15:11

Mile #5 - After Cat Hill, I was pretty much done with the hills, and there was some downhill as well.  I knew I had the energy to speed up after my last mile a bit and by the time I got to the last half mile, i ditched the intervals and ran the rest of the way.  Final Mile - 14:58

Finish Time - 1:14:28 - Goal Accomplished!!!!!

Some interesting Pics my wife took:

Me and Amy post race, Congrats to my friend Amy for finishing 9+1 which guarantees her entry into next years ING NYC Marathon!

Corporate Mayhem!

Last night I participated in the JP Morgan Chase Corporate Challenge.  I knew going in it was going to be a large crowd (15,000 to be exact), bigger than any Ive dealt with.  I guess I'm spoiled with how well organized the NY Road Runner races are organized and ran that i ASSUMED that even though it would be a large crowd, i would be somewhat organized..  I WAS WRONG..

Got to my company's tent area at around 6:15 and didn't see anyone I knew, so I just grabbed a couple snacks since I hadn't eaten dinner (bag of peanuts and a banana with a Gatorade G2) then headed over to the cattle call, i mean start area around 6:40.




This was the only pic that was taken during the race, because my wife had a hard time getting to the finish area and I certainly didn't want her anywhere near this mayhem!  People were bottle necked into the area, people kicking down fences, runners supposed to be in the front corral trying to squeeze their way thru the mass of people, not to mention some of the foul odors coming from some of the folks in the area.

As far as the race was concerned, this was my first time running a 3.5 mile race so I knew it was gonna be an auto PR, and since I was a little tired coming into the race and being aggravated from the start, I didn't expect my finish time to be all that great.

The course was pretty much a  reverse course of the 4 milers I ran in central park, and I prefer the course the other way.  This time you start out on the west side rolling hills and it just seemed like there was a lot more Uphill then when running the other way.  

Also since many of the people participating doesn't consider this competitive there are a lot of people who walk the entire thing, which isn't all that bad, but then you get 5-6 people walking together and getting around them sucks.

Anyways, not gonna drag this RR out much longer, my finish time was around 52:30 and almost a full minute off my best pace.

After the race they gave out finisher t-shirts, I was so aggravated with the whole thing I just wound up getting one for my wife, cause I didn't even want it!

Definitely NOT running this next year.