burgh

it's been over a week since my last run, and even longer for a real run, i finally made it out this afternoon. i'm back in pittsburgh for christmas for a week to celebrate w/ family and friends. but due to the proximity of my gym from my brother's place where i'm staying, as well as the freezing temps and social obligations, [and insert a good excuse] i haven't logged any miles. although my bro and i did walk around for some errands on christmas eve, but nothing worth blogging about.

so i figured i'd take advantage of the nice late-december pittsburgh weather by running a few k. i threw out the suggestion of trail running, as i wanted to stay in the sun, so we mapped out a route on mapmyrun.com that was a good mix of a residential and urban sights. the sun was actually shinning (shockingly, since it's been reported that there are 59 of such days per year here), and equipped w/ my polar hrm (sans footpod to measure any type of distance or pace) and oakley’s i headed out for what i thought would be a little more than a 5k. after 10 minutes or so i was on 5th avenue in oakland and could have hit my halfway point to start heading back at st. paul's cathedral (where my family went to christmas morning mass). but i was feeling good. and it was a beautiful day. and i needed to experience a more urban feel. so i continued down fifth past the university of pittsburgh's campus and made my turn to go by pitt again and headed up to carnegie mellon university. i haven't gone by these universities in anything but a car for years, but running by them and seeing the details of the surroundings reminded me of years ago when these universities were clients of ours and i worked there.

around cmu the flatness of pittsburgh ran out and i was i heading up a small incline. it leveled out, but my bigger concern was that now i was on my own and off the familiar path. but i have driven around this area a lot 3 years ago, so as the oncoming traffic was halted by a green arrow the way i was going, i jetted across the street onto beeler st. i've driven this road a bunch, and remembered it being really short. so after a few minutes of running on it, i came to the a good right in the street and after making the turn could see the end of the street was much further than i had remembered. oops. this is where the hill training started - the left onto fair oaks street was fun, as well as the left onto s. negley, but even better was when i crested the hill and started the decent. i swear that my first thought was "this is as steep, and as long, as a ski run!" most importantly i took caution on the sidewalk so i didn't end up tripping on a crack or slipping on some loose stones and doing a 'header'. thankfully i didn't and shortly after i was back near my brother's and cooling down.

while some people are lucky enough to have a hot tub at home and can just jump in for their post-run recovery, mine is the stick! i'm just glad i was smart enough to use it!

no, i do not play for a symphony...

but this is our company's holiday greeting card...

Birds

Getting up at 4.15 in the morning is for the birds, and people with 6 am flights apparently. I'm hoping for a little sleep time on the way to JFK and then even better sleep from there to Barbados! I'll be in Barbados facilitating a training and then enjoying the 80 degree weather. While Boston was in the 50's yesterday afternoon, it rained the entire day! That didn't stop me for getting in a little less than 2 miles, but that was more out of necessity than desire.

Parking in Boston can be nightmarish, especially when learning the system! That's a story for a whole other post. So last night I parked in a garage by my gym, which is about 2 miles away. Can you see what I mean by nightmarish? Anyways, the garage is safe but most importantly it's in expensive. Well, not normally, plus it's not the type of garage that caters toward or even expects multi-day stays. It's more of a multi-hour garage. But thankfully, my gym must have a deal w/ the garage that allows for self-serve validated parking at the gym. Again, I'm thinking that their intent was a couple of hours at max, not days. So half a year's of membership fees (I've got a good family deal) usually pays for itself during one of these trips.

So after dropping the car off my ticket home is a run. It was quite chilly and rainy at that point in the day, but my REI rain jacket worked wonders and I might have even been over dressed. It's was a run that was a far cry from when I trained for Chicago in that I can't give you any numbers on the run, except the total time. I didn't use my heart rate strap, and since losing my footpod I have no ability to gauge my pace. But I did feel a little sluggish and I attrubuted that immediately to the hard run the previous day. But it was nice to get out, even if it was for only 16 minutes and based off necessity. I think today will be a rest day, or maybe a easy day with walking around the island, but hopefully I'll get at least 1 good running story from the trip. Saturday my host said there was a run w/ beers and rum after it in a group setting. Sounds like my kind of run. As well as for the fact it'll be in the 80's!

Dave

This message (including any attachments) contains confidential information intended for a specific individual and purpose, and is protected by law. If you are not the intended recipient, you should delete this message.

Any disclosure, copying, or distribution of this message, or the taking of any action based on it, is strictly prohibited. [v.E.1]

man vs. machine vs. man

so what a difference a day makes! from sunday's snow, and even this morning and noon time frigid temperatures, came temps in the low 40's this afternoon. while i was hoping last night for an invite to run this afternoon, it didn't come and figured i'd have to make the trek to the gym to get in a little exercise. but i was blown away by the warm temps when i walked out of work this evening. i figured that i might as well take advantage of this unexpected mid-december new england weather.

so shortly after getting home and putting on a long-sleeve t-shirt and shorts (you'd think i was in barbados or something - wait, that's on thursday!) i was off runnin'! same route as on sunday, minus the snow flakes and winter weather gear. this run also had the purposes of dropping off my apt keys so my cat, leo, can continue to be feed this weekend. after a slow first half of the run to kenmore, shortly after getting onto comm ave. i noticed a trolley emerging from underground. this happens to be the 'b' line on the larger green line, which goes through the heart of boston university and is the slowest of the green lines. one time when i was riding the t from boston outbound, but the 'c' line which is slightly quicker, i noticed a girl that was keeping with the t and would pass it during stops. i was quite impressed, and when i saw this 'b' line t on my run this evening, i figured it'd be an easy race. i picked up the pace and caught the t at the bu central stop and didn't look back. although, i did have to look slightly forward and to my right as the t passed me around the bu bridge. but that was the last i saw of it! continuing on comm ave. and shortly after the bu bridge i noticed another runner. now i'll confess that he did have a backback, but a lion doesn't feel guilty for a kill of a limping gazelle so neither will i. in fact, i dropped the hammer on an uphill portion and before i knew it the race was over and i turned off comm ave. onto winslow st. the victor. definitely an exhausting run. i think i saw my heart rate in the 180's! but thankfully after dropping off my keys i had a few minutes to jog and wrap up another successful 5k!

check out the right side of the web page - added a couple of gadgets this afternoon (another reason i had to run so i could post something about the slight changes i made) which i hope will make it easier to keep up w/ the blog without me having to send out updates. keep those comments coming and looking forward to tomorrow's run in the 50's!

snow

today was my first outside run of the winter season. only fittingly, it was snowing. i'm sure that if i had more time i would have gone to the gym instead, but waiting until 45 minutes prior to the steelers game left me two options: 1) bundle up and run my 5k route, or 2) stay warm inside. surprisingly i got bundled up, earmuffs, gloves, and all, but my first step out of my apartment door had me looking at my watch and questioning if i really could get in a 5k run, along w/ a shower, before the start of the lers / boys football game. that first step is really the hardest - especially when you're not training for anything (except not being fat) and it's snowing!

with some small flakes falling in boston, the first of the year, i headed down the eastbound side of beacon street - a nice downhill start. coolidge corner was obviously bustling given the time of the year (earlier i was even asked if i was leaving a parking spot as i crossed a street to the back of my apartment with a gap shopping bag, to which i replied "no. thankfully i live right there."), though i only saw 4-5 runners during the 3.1 miles i covered. some runners don't even acknowledge another runner's existence, but i'm now going to make it a point to throw a wave to all runners i pass - especially if the temperature is below 32 degrees! we should be bonded by our insanity!

at kenmore square 11 and a half minutes later I started up commonwealth avenue, where i realized i had a nice tailwind going down beacon but now was faced with a headwind. that seems to be the case here in boston - there's always a wind and you don't realize it until you're running into it. the sane students of bu were comfortably warm in the starbucks. i definitely noticed that, and even contemplated stopping for a warm espresso - i think that would have made the final mile into the wind a little easier. left onto babcock st put me into a residential part of brookline that i know well from all the training runs i did in the summer. a cooldown starting on harvard street in coolidge corner, and a runner's high, delivered me back to my apartment nice and toasty, and in time for the steelers game. time for a celebratory beer - for my run, not the game (yet)!

Rain

at first when i started posting to this blog again i thought it would mostly be about running and my training, knowing how exciting that is for everyone to read. then i talked to my brother and told him a story about my barber here in brookline and how on a saturday morning he was completely wired and sniffing, a lot! he suggested i blog about everyday stuff like that, with all the interesting details, and i thought that was a great idea. until i realized i'm lazy (i'm sick of saying i'm busy. in fact, i'm sick of everyone's excuse of they're busy. there's fat we could all trim from our day, but i get joy in watching around the horn every evening on my dvr!) and couldn't manage to post every time something interesting happened. so it's back to me running - maybe with a twist thrown in for good measure.

it seems as though the best time for me to post is on tuesday evenings in my office downtown after a run with the city sports running “club”. so if it works, stick with it, right? today was the second time i've run with the "club," and i use that term as loosely as possible because after a decent turn out last week, today the "club" consisted of 4 members:

1. me (the regular)
2. bill* (the guy from atlanta who was in the store because he needed a pair of socks)
3. kyle* (city sports "leader" - i'm using that term loosely as well)
4. alex* (kyle's brother, who also works at city sports)

* - refers to the fact that these names may or may not have been made up by me as i don't really remember their names.

missing from the "club" this week was the running shoe / apparel company rep, who was supposed to be from nike this week. this leads me to one of the points i'd like to make quick mention of - runners love freebies! kyle mentioned that "so-and-so" from nike wouldn't be here, but not to worry, he'd give us a free nike technical t-shirt after the run. this immediately prompted me to inquire if puma actually gave something away last week. in fact they did, according to kyle - one of those small nylon drawstring bags. damn, my cooldown cost me the opportunity to add to my nylon drawstring bag collection! grrrrr. no worries, i did get 1 red nike coolmax shirt today. i picked it from a box that contained about 45 red, blue, and white shirts. really, they couldn't have spared one more for me - the regular club member? i guess it wouldn't have hurt to ask, but i would have insulted myself further by having to ask for an additional freebie.

i normally haven't run with people in the past. i've done most of my training hans style - solo. i think the biggest reason is that it's hard to find the right people to run with - either they're too slow and they hold you back, or they're too fast and you get shattered. however, recently i've been running more with other people - the city sports "club" and a couple of guys from around my neighborhood with whom i work. the area that i've found running with others most beneficial is accountability. when i make plans to go running with someone else i feel obligated to run no matter what - except a real emergency (which doesn't mean "i feel tired"). this past thursday i made plans to run with a partner from work who i've run with on occasion and even gone out with for dinner / drinks. keith is a cool dude, and even dominated the boston marathon this year - his first marathon! as i was driving home that evening, i noticed an apocalyptic sky directly above brookline. after parking and strolling into my apt, it started to rain. not sprinkle, but rain. nine times out of 10 i would have bagged the idea of running. the one other time i would have went to the gym for an easy 5k. but, because keith wasn't interested in staying dry, i had to get out there and run with him. yeah, it was a monsoon. about halfway through the sky opened up and it just started pouring! but, at that point who cares because you're already wet, right? and then the weather in boston has been interesting today. overcast morning, humid and sunny afternoon, downpour at 4, sun trying to break through with sprinkles as i walked to meet up with the "club", and i'm sure you can guess what happened as soon as we took off on the run. yep, cats and dogs were falling from the sky in the form of raindrops! we kept going, because if you don't wuss out immediately and head back to shelter, you might as well log the almost 4 miles we got in tonight. i guess this is a good sign also that i'm not being affected by the weather much. my running is evolving into training... scary.

i'm going to leave off one additional subject that i wanted to mention. it has to do with races, so before i make statements based of my first race of the season on sunday (5 miler - 7:50 pace), i'm going to wait a couple of weeks till i do a couple more. see if my observations really are true.

next week brooks running is going to be the sponsor for the city sports running "club" so i'm going to have to do some name dropping, thanks to julie and her connections at brooks. maybe i'll even wear my brooks hat? and hopefully afterwards, i'll have a free shirt to wear with it.

Are You Fit?

i'm such a liar. "more to come." actually, i'm not a liar at all - here is more. it's just several weeks later than i originally anticipated. but since i didn't write "more to come later" or “more to come in a day” i'm not a liar at all. hah! i feel so vindicated. anyway, before posting to this blog i enjoy reading my previous post, so that's where i read "more to come" at the very end, but that more never came - until now.

no, i'm not drunk (unlike the previous post). i am high - on a runner's high. i just got done with a "training" run for a couple of races that i have comin' up. this one was sponsored by city sports - although i'm not really sure how it was "sponsored" by them since all we did was meet at their store on boylston st. anyway, it was also "sponsored’ by puma (again, they didn't give out freebies) and harpoon - as their 5 mile road race is coming up in the beginning of june. so before we headed out on the run, the leaders - one from puma and the other from city sports - decided that there was going to be 2 distances, a 3 miler and a 5 miler. i thought i would try the 5 miler, but i didn't commit to anything, until i passed that last bridge. hah! i went out with a couple of guys and a couple of girls, and paired up with one other dude as we headed towards the science museum. armed with my trusty polar hrm, i glanced down and my running partner asked what pace we were clocking. 8:30 - just about right for me for this run, but apparently too fast for him. it was like in top gun when maverick says "i'm gonna hit the brakes and he'll fly right by" and merlin says "you're gonna do WHAT?" the dude practically stopped on a dime, and i was on my own - in no-man's land, trying to bridge an impossible gap. i wasn't able to close the gap, but it wasn't a race so i wasn't too upset. and apparently i was the gap between the 5 miler led by the puma dude and 3 miler, of which i already passed the bridge on memorial drive so i was stuck doing the 5 miler. i still had the 5 mile group in my sights, until we got onto the windy esplanade where i lost sight of which bridge they went over to get back into the back bay area. anyway, to make a long story short (too late, i know), i decided to go with the 5.25 mile group - there was only 1 person in it, me - and ended up in beacon hill, which was about a half mile back to where we started. on my way back (i figured i'd head back in case they were worried about me - i'm sure everyone was wondering "where's dave?") i was making excuse of why i went further like "I didn't know if you guys were going to do a cool down, so i wanted to make sure i got that in." when i got back the 5 mile group was still there (it consisted of 4 people, not including me) and the puma rep who lead it.

i didn't have much to say except "can i get a water," so i was ready to leave after assuring everyone i was still alive (you should have seen the worried faces just as i made it back), and said thanks to the puma rep and the city sports guy (who was maverick hitting the brakes). the puma rep guy then says, "i've seen you around running." now, i love how people communicate - it fascinates me. i've always observed that it's easier to confirm someone's statement or question, and proceed with what you were doing or about to do the second before they opened their mouth. so naturally i said "yeah, i'm sure." i've never seen this dude before, and quite frankly probably will never see him again (he's much faster than me so even at races i won't see him). instead of that being the end of the conversation, or him ending with "well i hope to continue to see ya around" he says "yeah, you run down here with that ethiopian guy." now, kenyan's get all the hype about being the best runners in the world, but there are some pretty amazing ethiopian runners as well - for instance haile gebrselassie. anyway, to be mentioned that i, me, dave papp, run with an ethiopian guy is hilarious - i mean, i probably couldn't ride a segway as fast as an ethiopian guy can run!

what makes this story even more remarkable, and the reason that i'm sitting in my office at this hour having to write this down now, is that i felt similar when i was hanging out with my friend julie, who visited in april to run the boston marathon. julie is an awesome runner, who has even won a marathon OVERALL, and is very involved in the sport. julie knows some people at brooks running, who are great guys, and we visited their booth at the expo the day before the marathon. we talked to a couple of guys specifically, both who exceed at marathons - 1 of who was running boston and the other that was pacing him since he ran london and placed in the top 20! so needless to say, i felt intimidated, but both asked, "are you running boston?" i guess it's not that strange of a thing to ask while at a marathon expo, but along with all the talk about "are you fit?" and racing strategies it made me laugh and feel pretty good.

oh, so my response to the puma rep who said i run with the ethiopian guy was a mumbled "i... don't... know..." and a quick departure from the store.

Pre-Game

to respond to the one, and only, comment about my last post (which i'm not sure of how it was viewed so quickly when i didn't make it public), no - there isn't a "desire" to run the nyc marathon. there's no pleasure of running 26.2 in one day, in under 5 hours, that makes you want to do it again and again. but there is some type of enjoyment of having a routine, when ever day, or at least ever few days a week where you know you have to run - where you have to train so that the marathon itself it's as painful as it could be. but, that being said, apparently my desire to have a routine isn't high thus far since i haven't been running much. in fact, i haven't run since - yeah, i don't know. it might be about a week by now.

but, that's the fun of not having much responsibility. i'm single, i have a good job, i don't have any children, i don't even own a home now, so i can just stay out after work or do whatever i want to do. that's what happened on monday. one of the reasons that i saw a bright spot in life. i always appreciate it when there's a large meeting for work, where many important people are - manager, sr. manager, and partners - and you hang out when yo don't have to. by now, most of the people in these positions are comfortable with where the are in the firm. but a consultant or sr. consultant in the same situation, they'll do almost anything to get face-time with people noted above, especially parnters. but regardless of your status in the firm, you can never be or work with the people that really matter in your career or life. so after a large meeting on monday, and after "everyone else" had their one or two cocktails in the office and decided to leave, a core group of us, including a couple of partners and a couple of sr. manager, we decided to go out to dinner (a freebie). grill 23. my naiveness didn't comprehend where we were going, but after a glass or two of the chosen wine (by the partner), i started to get the sense of it. the filet was amazing; the sides were awesome; but the company was really the best part of this work dinner on a monday evening.

so, isn't blogging at 3am the best? like i said on my first return post - i wanted to this more for myself than anyone else to read. it was a fun evening tonight; after an afternoon of recovery thanks to a Guinness night last night. it started with the ncaa final four (after taking a nap) and at half time of the blow out between ku and ncu, went over to a friend's for the pre-gaming of a sing-a-long (more of that to come). by the time i left my place, there was only about 1:30 max to pre-party, but i brought along 4 beers - the blue moon spring ale. not too shabby of an ale. anyway, i knew i had to be in high gear and even though i had to take 1/4 as a to-go cup, 3 and 3/4 beers were downed at the pre-game. the sing-a-long itself was a blast, although i was displaced from sitting with 3 beautiful girls to sitting next to "the guys" - in the middle of two committed guys. whatever. it was a fun time. and definitely more to come.

The Blogsphere

i'm not sure exactly why i'm writing a new post to a blog that was about my training for the 2007 chicago marathon. yes, the marathon that was 85 degrees the first weekend in october - in chicago! i survived, although some people were shattered beyond belief, along with my running companions. it really was like a battlefield out on the race course though. people on the side of the road with either support staff or spectators around them, but out of the race for sure. i'll always remember the sight of some of those people with their eyes glazed over just starring out into space. i remember afterwards saying it was the best first marathon that i could have run. that's because it was so much more difficult than most other marathons (thanks to the weather) and it would never inspire me to run another. in fact, some of the others i ran with decided to do the akron marathon in september, but it didn't even come into question for me. i settled on doing the half.

but... something's got me more interested in running another 26.2. i think it's the fact that the boston marathon, the most traditioned marathon in the world quite possibly, is quickly approaching. it's a terrific day to be in boston - especially if you're not running it! ;-) i don't have any desire to run the boston marathon - at least not right now - but i know i won't be qualifying for it any time in the near future, if ever. prior to starting this post, i checked out the NYC marathon website. they are accepting applications. the processing of the application will cost $11. if randomly selected, the registration fee is $155. wow. that's a lot of cash - to punish yourself voluntarily. but wouldn't it be cool?

anyways, so some of my other friends have picked up my slack since falling off the blogging wagon and started their own. i enjoy reading them, and have found a cool tool developed by google called 'reader' that allows you to create an online 'inbox' of all the blogs that you'd regularly check and read. it's pretty sweet. but more so than other people reading my blog, i'm interested in reading this months later and see what was going on back then, or now, or whatever. so i'm not going to email everyone and say i have a blog again. because knowing me, this will be something i do for a couple days until i get busy again. busy like training for a marathon? not yet..