Track and Field Blogs - RunDMC

Everybody wants to be a rock star. I ain't it. I wanted to go to the Olympics but just don't have the talent. Don't get me wrong, I am a decent local road racer, but not world or even national class. I do love to run and train almost to the point of obsession – at least that’s what my brother says. But I am going to try something that I never have before and most people don't do or get the chance to do.

My wife and I decided that we wanted a change of scenery in our lives and have been coming to Mammoth for years in both the summer and winter. This year we decided to rent a place for the summer and spend most of our time here. Our jobs allow us to work remotely so we did not exactly “chuck it all”, but we did make a big change in our lives. As if to solidify our decision, the weekend we came to look at rentals I saw Meb Keflezghi running through the woods near town. At that point, my excitement could not be contained as I thought of all the runners here who were training for the Olympic Trials and Beijing. Like the famous guy said, “This is the place.”

My intention in Mammoth is to put my beliefs about what really works for distance runners to the test. I hope to reach a new level as a runner and hopefully run a Marathon and some shorter races I can be proud of later in the year. I will be running trails and trying to work out with the local runners. I will have a greater focus on running than any other time in my life, including college. I was an Engineering student and running was always secondary to that, although I did neither very well. I will do Lydiard style base training at nearly 8000ft altitude. I will supplement my daily runs with bike rides to keep loose. This is especially important since I will need to build up to my desired mileage from my current 35mi/wk. I will do a core workout 2-3 times per week and will do tempo and local running club workouts once or twice per week.

We have made the move to Mammoth now (as of June 28, 2008). I will post a journal on this web site of my training, interactions with the runners here (famous and not so famous). I will keep the writing interesting and the tangents plentiful. I will worm my way into situations that will keep the stories exciting. In the end I will have a thesis on whether high altitude and Lydiard distance really makes a significant improvement in performance on a regular Joe Runner like myself.

About Me:

I am 38 years old and started running when I was 8 years old. My father would take my brother and me to local all-comers track meets and we would race 100-800m. I found that I could beat much older and bigger kids at 800m because they would die and I would not. I began running consistently in my freshman year of High School.

I am not terribly talented, but can run for overall places in local road races. At 27 I injured my foot and at 29 (1999), I finally had a foot surgery (Plantar Fascia Release). It took me several years to get back to regular running, but in 2002 I ran the Chicago Marathon and that marked the beginning of my ability to run consistently again. I now keep 2 sets of PR lists. Of course the first is the fastest I have ever run. The second is my post surgery times. These are the ones I am trying to gun down now.

Stay tuned. Same bat time, same bat channel.