2006

Ok.... so the race on Saturday. BU has one of the best indoor track facilities in the whole country. It's very bouncy, and banked. They run a few "mini-meets" each winter before the collegiate season kicks into full gear. I had run in one last year, and Nate and I thought it might be fun to run in one again. The meets themselves are really low-key... 6 heats of the mile, with people running anywhere from 4:15 to 5:50 etc. etc. It's pretty fun to watch some of the older/slower people out there really racing hard.

Nate and I decided to both run the mile, and tried to seed ourselves in the same heat (4:30 each). I really didn't think I would be able to run this fast. For one, I haven't been running enough consistent mileage. (Probably averaged about 50-55 over the last 8-10 weeks). I also haven't run any speedwork since the summer. I did a few workouts with Lacey in July, then the LSAT class started, didn't work out at all in the fall, ran alumni run and NESCAC open race, but 5:00 pace was the fastest I had gone in a while. No strides either.

The race ended up going a lot better than I thought it would. Hog and I were both in the second heat, which turned out to be perfect. After 3 miles of warm up and some strides we lined up on the track to run a race that usually requires quite a bit of speedwork and tuning to run well. The pack went out in about 69 for the first quarter and I was sitting in 3rd, feeling pretty comfortable. The pace gradually picked up over the next half mile, and I was able to stay near the front the whole time. I realized we were actually running decently, and tried to get by Hog with about 400m left. The move proved to be a little immature, as Hog rolled by me with about 250 to go. He got 2nd and I got 4th (I think). Official time was 4:29.75 for a full mile (i.e. not 8 laps). This is great. With a few workouts and longer Sunday runs I may be able to run some decent track times this indoor season.

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New Year's Eve was a lot of fun. Skip, Cummings and I went out with Sarah Ahmed and a bunch of her friends (and Andrea Piekarski, a fellow Foley buddy) to The Harp, which is right across from the Fleet Center. Despite getting there an hour before the bar eve opened (which, Sarah, was an excellent idea. I hope you read this and feel like a terrible person), the night was a blast. Here are a few pictures from then... The first is Cummings, myself and Skip, and the second is Sarah and I. (Quick explanation, I was trying to cross my eyes for the camera, but I think the picture was taken when I was about halfway there....) Oh, I also ran 8.5 on New Year's day with Hog.






































And, in other news, Nate and I ran 18 miles this morning. Yeah, it was a pretty long run. We went out on the Charles to Watertown (and then a little farther, which was a mistake of mine, oh well), then south on Centre Street, past BC Law School, to Comm Ave, up Heartbreak, past BC Res, and then down Beacon to BU, and back up Brookline St. It took 2:05:50, which is a pretty long time to be running, even by our standards. I felt decent for the first 14 or 15, and then pretty crappy toward the end. My hamstrings and hips were still really sore/beat up from the race on saturday. I was glad to go this far though, becuase at some point I'm going to have to get comfortable running between 16 and 22 each Sunday. If I can get to the point where going out for 18 isn't so bad, then I'll know I'm in good shape to run Boston.

Happy New Year everyone!