KRAC Blog

Booked our flights (see you at the airport). I can't wait to go home and see if my packet has arrived.

Next year, in lieu of marathon training, we should start a band: acoustic guitar, electric guitar, harmonica and bagpipes. I'm hearing a Big Country-meets-The Byrds kind of thing, with a little Boxcar Willie thrown in there. Of course, to fit it into our schedules we'll have to rehearse on Saturdays at 6:00am.

We can call ourselves "Libido Cream", which is a product I saw an ad for in the sports page the other day. Not sure what it does though . . .

I'll be honest about this: mostly I read Runner's World for the pictures. Sometimes, though, there is something useful, like this article about how to approach the final 10k of a marathon. "Treat the marathon as three separate entities, says Durden: That is, two 10-milers and a 10-K. The first is a training run, in which you chat with other runners, enjoy the scenery, and try to ignore the fact that you're in a race. The next is a transition, in which you gradually bring your focus inside. It's only in the last 10-K that you should enter race mode."

I like the idea of Omar Minaya as Mets manager. He gets credit for working with what he's got, which is damning some respectable players with faint praise. It is probably more accurate to say that he knows enough to stay out of the way of his talent, and he knows how to motivate. Sorry Art Howe, but it never looked like you were doing either of those things. A lot of people would like to see Lou Pinella get the job, but I'm not so sure that he'd be the right fit with the Mets' front office Minaya, on the other hand, has demonstrated that he can get the job done under the most adverse conditions short of Mets' ownership.

On to decent teams-- how can you not love Curt Schilling? Here's a guy who could have signed anywhere who deliberately signs with the Sox because he wants in on the game's best rivalry-- and he has the stones to go with the underdog. It ain't bragging if you can back it up-- the only pitcher in the AL who is having a better year is Johan Santana, and I'd go with Santana for Cy Young-- but you gotta give it up for a guy who comes onto a staff with an established ace, and then just plays his heart out to make sure the team is in contention. There are a lot of dogs on the Crimson Hose, but a guy like Schilling is like a guy like Jeter-- no matter how inclined someone might be to give it up, with a teammate like that you gotta think twice.

On the Yankees Schilling would be just another good guy. On the Sox he might be the difference. That's impressive.

Austrian wine is also quite good-- they don't export much of it, and now there is less to export. Of course the pastry is notable-- not sweet so much as rich. It's a meat and potatos kind of cuisine over all, somewhat rustic, in the sense that it is robust in its flavors. Nice venison tenderloin, air dried beef, a pork tenderloin in morel sauce that I'd like to try making at home.

The beer is what it is. I have always been disapointed in German beer, which is fresh tasting, but little else. I had a couple that were more than that-- a couple of interesting hefewiesens, but nothing that I could get all that excited about. The Austrians deniy that they are Germans, but of course they are, and one of the ways you can tell is that they insist that their beer is the best. In the spirit of science I felt obliged to put it to the test.

Maybe the Red Sox will still catch the Yankees, and maybe they'll beat them in the playoffs. But this is what Pedro said after the Yankees beat him (again) Friday night:

"What can I say -- just tip my hat and call the Yankees my daddy."

There was more ("I wish they would disappear and not come back"), but that's the quote of the year.

I've heard that many doctors advise their gout-suffering patients to travel to Austria and gorge themselves on German food and beer.

"Ach du lieber! Look at der Mann!"

Whoever described the aftermath of a long run as being like a hangover nailed it-- I was barely functioning yesterday, and took the elevator up and down the single flight of stairs to and from my office. And today, I'm okay. Maybe not ready to fight my weight in tigers, but certainly capable of my five miler. This is a traveling week for me, so fitting in my miles is going to be tricky-- but I'll be seeing some new stuff, and that should be an incentive. Not that the scenery Sunday was bad-- I was thinking of making a list: Things I Saw On the 20 Miler. A shambling guy with a mullet walking along the Riverwalk pulling on a liter bottle of Black Velvet; Roadkill deer; the guys on Niagara Street who saw me stagger up from Hamilton and said, "Oh my gawd, look at this man!"

Hal Higdon, who wants more control over your life than Scientology calls for has a recovery program, too. I like the sound of Week Zero.

As Emily Latella once said, "Nevermind!" For some reason I've been allowed back in.

You know how, in "The Princess Bride", Wesley confronts Humperdink lying in bed? He bluffs the whole thing-- "It's possible," he says, "that I am lying here because I am too weak to get up." That was me yesterday-- mostly dead, but partly alive. I'd dreaded the 20, but it is do-able, and that means the last 10k is do-able, too. There are some technical things I want to do differently on race day: Vaseline, a bagel for breakfast, sports drink instead of water, but I think I'm pretty much mentally ready.

Spectator's guide to the Chicago Marathon. This is the sort of thing that this event seems to do better than any other race I've seen. The newspapers are full of tips about how to go out and support the runners, too. I was talking to a woman who regularly runs the local half marathons the other night and her big complaint was that there are long, long stretches in the races around here where there is not a spectator to be seen. The cure for this is, I think, is to encourage people to go out and watch races. Beebe's column is for participants-- and is a terrific resource-- but it does not make the sport accessible to spectators.

I was hoping there would be a way to track runners on the net via our chips, but it doesn't look like this is available.

It is not my intention to spend next summer this way, as enjoyable as this has been. However: September 26: Berlin; October 3, Budapest; October 10, Eidhoven, or Brussels; October 17, Amsterdam; October 25, Dublin; November 28, Firenze.

Odometer for my bike: $27. Knowing that we'll run 20 miles instead of 19 miles or 21: priceless.

"I need an odometer," I told the woman at the bike store. "How much information do you need?" she asked. "I don't even have enough information to understand the question," I replied. "Well," she said, taking a package down from the rack behind her, "This is kind of our basic model. It will tell you your speed, your elapsed time, your trip distance, your maximum speed, your total distance and the time." "Not my mother's maiden name?" I quipped. Blank look. I have no idea why I am flirting with this woman-- any bike store I've ever been in I'd never be worse than runner-up for best looking employee, and she is just proving my point. "I guess that'll be fine. I usually get too much information, and all I want to know is how far is ten miles." Another blank look. The guys in bike stores shave their legs. I notice that she does not. Our conversation completed, she rings me up, and I am on my way.

It's kind of a nifty little toy, actually. You mount a sensor on the inside of the front fork, and attach a magnet to a spoke. When it came time to set the digital readout, I discovered that I didn't have enough information after all. Counting is fine, but the thing needs to know what it is counting, and in order to do that it requires that you program your tire size. There are preset options, or you can program in whatever number you want, but obviously accuracy is important.

There are a lot of numbers on a tire. None of them seemed to match any of the preset numbers-- the odometer offered 27", and my tire had 28" embossed on it-- but who knows if that's what it meant? Apparently tire size is complicated.The toy seemed to be set up to default to metric-- (the directions didn't actually spell out how to change that to miles but I stumbled into it)-- and it seemed like what was wanted here was a metric number. I got it set to miles, and elected to go with 27". Since I didn't know what I would be correcting for, I knew that if this was wrong, math wouldn't help me, so I decided to see if it was wrong. I rode to Delaware Park for a calibration run. This established that 27" was emphatically the wrong answer, so I went back to the bike store to get some information. Turns out the answer is 700.

From the stop sign at the Juicery, out Nottingham to the path behind the Historical Society, along the path to Grant, across and along the path to Niagara. This bit is a little more hilly than we are going to like, particularly on the way back. Nothing horrible, just not flat. Along Niagara to Hamilton-- the Corps of Engineers bridge over the Thruway looks like it is closed for good. We know how the rest of this goes: along the path, past the water treatment plant (and the water fountain), past the Grand Island bridge, past the elusive Cousin Vinnie's, up over that foot bridge(the Chief Boyardee Bridge) and into whatever the name of that park is. On the left are aluminum light stanchions. One, two, three, four, five, six of these, and we've hit ten miles-- right before the tree with the cleft.

This is within an ace of where we have been starting our Riverwalk runs, so I had a hot dog at Old Man River's and thought about calibration issues. I don't want to run more than 20 before Chicago, and spoil the surprise, so I knew that I would have to verify that my toy was accurate-- or go back and pop for the GPS unit. For a sport that can be done in my underwear that sort of Buck Rogers technology seemed excessive-- but what if it wasn't? I resolved to press on, to the Bike Path, marked in tenths of a mile, to make sure that my measurements were accurate. Through Tonawanda, past the Colvin Extension (just past there would be the half marathon mark), on through the park the judges enjoy so much, across Niagara Falls Boulevard and on to the bike path.

I can report that my mileage findings are accurate to within .05ths of a mile. Close enough for jazz, I say. Seeing as I was in the neighborhood I picked up a six pack and went to Tom's, hoping to see the second half of the Bills game. Tom, the six pack is on your stoop, under the yellow bucket. I went home along Main Street, to Amherst, through Delaware Park once more, having cross-trained approximately twice as much as I'd set out to. Anything for science, I suppose.

One of the things that's interesting about the training for the marathon is the way it has changed the way I enjoy running. For years I would go five or six days a week, mostly three miles, occasionally four, and during the Boilermaker training I'd ramp it up a bit. I am now finding that I get as much pleasure out of longer runs fewer times a week. The Saturday long runs are killer, but I really like the Wednesday medium runs-- this week's ten miler was a pleasure, out Niagara to Ferry, down the breakwater and back, along Ferry to Delaware and back to the gym. Nice. Cloudy and hovering around 70 it started to rain at about the seven or eight mile mark, but not hard, and I felt strong. My knee didn't feel so great after, so I took yesterday off, but I'm good for tomorrow's 14. When this is over I'm going to want to find a way to keep a occasional longer run in my kit, I think.

I know, I said no more lists. This one just appealed to me for some reason: The Ten Most Hated Men in Rock (Besides Sting).

Here's a product review. I've used sports gels in the past, but now that we are into serious distance I am finding that they are essential. In years past I'd take a packet of PowerBar's Power Gel into the Boilermaker, and have it at the top of the golf course. I'm picky about flavor and found that the vanilla was the least offensive. Chances are that anything ostensibly fruit flavored is going to taste like that medicine you hated when you were a kid, and the chocolate seemed a bit heavier than I wanted in the middle of a race. Twenty-eight grams, 110 calories. It may seem like a trivial complaint, but the PowerGel package is a little too big to fit easily into the pocket of my running shorts. During this time Tom has been a Gu user, no doubt attracted by the aesthetically pleasing name. Gu's Chocolate Outrage lists "Belgian chocolate" as one of its principal ingredients-- which might sound like lily gilding, but actually seems to make a difference. If I wanted a Belgian chocolate and was given a packet of Gu I might cry, but as energy gel flavors go Chocolate Outrage is a whole lot closer to something I might eat and enjoy than anything else I've tried. In fact, I'd have to say that it is better tasting than the Snickers bar I usually have for lunch. Thirty two grams, 100 calories, so it's somewhat less efficient that the PowerGel, but the packet size is better. Gu's Orange Burst and TriBerry flavors offer the chemical aftertaste I associate with children's antibiotics. The most I can say in their favor is that they do not linger overlong on the palate.

I figure I'm going to want three packets of this stuff out on the course-- one before starting, one at an hour, one at two hours, and one in reserve. We get a Cliff Shot at the twenty mile mark, but I am dubious: I haven't seen this product in either Fleet Feet or Dick's, and the flavors give me pause: Sonic Strawberry, Mocha Mocha, and Cola Buzzzz. Sonic Strawberry-- what do you bet that's all that's left by the time I get to the table where they are handing it out? Thirty two grams, 100 calories, and the package is designed to eliminate litter.

Today's lesson is, "You Can't Cheat on Miles". What with one thing and another I hadn't run since turning in a hurtin'' six a week and a half ago-- and I paid for it today, turning in a pokey 16 instead of the 18 I was supposed to do. I'll make it up-- today's 16 was more ground than I thought I'd cover, and I hung on better than I had any reason to expect I would.

Man, it is dark in Delaware Park at 6:00 AM. There are more people there than you'd think, and to my surprise none of them were Basil Rathbone or Lon Chaney, Jr. . Because it was so dark when we started, four laps around the Ring Road weren't so bad: the scenery kept changing as it got brighter, it was pretty to watch the sun come up and the mist on the golf course burn away, and Tom was in a particularly funny groove. I wish I could say that the five laps around the lake were as enjoyable, but by that time we were two hours in, and two hours in is where I begin to struggle. I have a month to work on that.

I presented a pretty comical sight getting on and off my bike, I can tell you. It's a downhill run, so that was no problem, but getting my leg high enough to get over the seat was a real challenge.

It really wouldn't be wholly truthful to say that I treat my body like a temple-- in fact, it would be a complete fiction, made up from start to end. Still, now that I am afflicted with a malady that deviled Henry VIII, Alfred Lord Tennyson, Immanuel Kant, Samuel Johnson, Thomas Jefferson and Benjamin Franklin, among others, I'm paying a little more attention to what I consume. Of course, I'm not the only one-- you'd have thought I was shooting up last night when I had a beer if you were gauging strictly by Andrea's reaction.

Dr. Z has been on my case to take vitamins for some time now, and this summer seemed like a good time to start. Kate brought in a box of something called "Health Pack 100", full of AM and PM cellophane packets of foul tasting pills apparently intended, if size is any indication, for the horse who will someday adorn the "KRAC Presents: The Bill Altreuter Memorial Run for Gout Research." I have been dutifully choking them down every day, serine in the knowledge that I was improving my health. Today I had a look at the contents. "AM Packet contains: 2 Mega Antioxidants; 1 Chelated Mineral; 1 Proflavanol 90; 1 Active Calcium. PM Packet contains: 1 Mega Antioxidant; 2 Chelated Mineral; 1 AO Booster; 1 Active Calcium."

Maybe I'm missing something, but don't vitamins have names like A, B, C, D, and so on? I mean, I'm reasonably sure that these aren't uric acid acid pills, but what the hell are they exactly? "Chelated Mineral" sounds like something you clean your aquarium with, and I'm pretty sure I used to collect Mega Antioxidant comic books when I was 12.