Jean Michel Jarre

This artist isn't for everyone. If you don't like computer generated music, you won't like him. This is an atypical song for him though, it is mostly "pan music." Steel drums as in Caribbean music. This song, Calypso, is inspired by the French oceanographer Jacques-Yves Cousteau. This is a live concert performed in Paris. Jarre holds the worlds record for the largest outdoor concerts with an audience of 3.5 million people at a concert in Russia. His set a world record of 1.5 million in Houston.
All of this information is from Wikepedia.
Oh to see him live in concert.

Run With the Bulls

Yesterday I "Ran with the Bulls." No, this is not a Pamplona style event. It is only called that because it starts and ends at the Oklahoma City Stockyards. I've run this race before, and it is well run and well attended. They give a tech shirt, and serve hamburgers after the race. The course is a simple out and back with one moderate hill that you see twice obviously. I've been feeling good lately, and felt like I could have a good race, not a P R, but maybe the best of the year. I started just a bit slow, but sub 4:10/KM. I saw 3 people I knew were similar in speed and hung with them for awhile. I passed all but one and stalked him until about the 4th K where he was steady, but I had to slow a bit. When I could see the clock, I realized that I had just missed sub-21. But that was ok. 21:01 chip time and 5th in age group. It was a fast bunch in the group. Still that is my fastest 5k this year.
Today I ran a 6 mile tempo run with the club. They were doing 12, so I drove to the 3mile mark, waited for some friends, then did the 3 mile out and back with them. After that, I decided to go to the park and run/walk 3 miles in my new Vibram fivefingers. More about them in a later post.
Later today I've agreed to run 14 miles with a friend.

Random

I had a great 9 mile run this morning, in the country, by myself. What was so great about it? See the second part of the first sentence.
Below is a paragraph I stole from another blog:
Reality: Once in a while you get a chance to impact someones life and you can only hope that the impact that was left is positive and one that will always make that person feel they were glad they met you. Your impact on this earth is very minimal in reality. We are just a second of the existence of earth. Most certainly only one or two people you know today will be here in 100 years. Most of us in our 30s will be dead in 50 years. Over half of everyone we know will be gone. That car, that house, that bill, that pain in the ass neighbor, the mean boss, the hard expectations on and on. It all just does not matter in the big scheme of life.
The writer has had some medical issues, is improving, but had in his words a "mental health break down yesterday a pretty bad one."
Why the picture above? This month marks 25 years since I've had a drink. For many that doesn't mean a thing. A few will understand. For me drinking is not an option. I didn't drink like normal people drink. And I was headed to one of three places, the street, prison, or the cemetery. I have only been running for 5 years, so the two aren't connected, at least not closely. I have at least two co-readers (we read each other's blogs) who are wine connoisseurs. I look forward to toasting our online friendship one day, but I'll have Martinelli's sparkling cider.
There are plenty of places to discuss Rick Pitino, Michael Vick, National Health Care, and all the topics of the day. This isn't one of them.
My granddaughter is in Atlanta, I miss her. As of today, all of my immediate family is out of town. A break every now and then is good, for everyone.

Two Lakes 50k

Joel contacted me around mid-week asking if I'd like to join him for a 30 mile run. I said yes. We went over our options, three times around Hefner, two times around Hefner and take the connector between Hefner and Overholser. From the time I discovered you could run between the two lakes, I've wanted to loop them both in one run. So we decided to loop both lakes. We estimated that would get us close to thirty miles. But since Joel worked near the course, we made an aid station stop there and that got us beyond 30 miles. We had planned to start at 5 a.m., but it was raining on my side of town so we started 20 minutes late. It was nice and cool then and we started off easily. Even when the sun came up it was still cloudy. When we got to Overholser it started to heat up and the clouds began to dissipate. We pushed on. Things went fairly well and when we got back to Hefner, we knew we had it made albeit at a very easy pace. We finished right at 31 miles in about 5:55, just under a 12 minute pace. We are both training for a twenty-four hour run in October.
Today I decided to do an easy six miles at Earlywine Park.

Midnight Streak & Training

Last night I ran the Midnight Streak. Two problems with that name, first it isn't at Midnight, and second it's not a streak in the old running naked sense. Anyway this was my first time running this night race run at the State Fairgrounds. It is a large race, around 1,000 people. It was hot and humid, but a cool front was scheduled to come in soon. We started at 11:00 P.M. and I had decided to run a little slow to keep from overheating. I felt pretty good and started picking things up. We had one mild uphill and there were sprinklers on the course so I ran through them. I finished and saw that my time was better than I had hoped, 21:55. Good enough for third in age group, first in my age group was a 56 year old man who ran 18:09.
Yesterday morning I ran 7 miles on trails with some friends from the trail running club. This morning I ran 9 miles on different trails with two friends. I'm feeling pretty good lately and hope it continues.

El Scorcho - No más

In my room trying to sleep. Can't seem to wind down. The short story is I didn't finish. I ran 6 loops and just couldn't do any more. Why? I hurt, I couldn't keep anything down, and I was dizzy and wobbling. I wanted it to stop, so I did. More after I get some sleep and drive to San Antonio.
Ok, I'm in San Antonio and I guess it's time for the longer version. I tried to nap before the race last night, but was unable to. It's just hard to change my routine, and I try never to nap because it makes it hard for me to go to sleep later. I got up and drove to the site around 11:00. I felt good at that time and then at midnight we were off. My goal was to hold 30 minute 5k's but to do the first loop just a little slower. Give things and people time to shake out. First loop around 31 minutes and not feeling bad. Second loop still feeling ok and pick up the pace just a bit. Finished in 29 and have my average where I want it. Third loop, working hard. Still on pace, but not feeling great. I've been drinking water and Heed at every aid station, two per loop. Fourth loop, not feeling well and had to start walking. Head was hurting, and couldn't drink anything but water, anything else to drink or eat just made me nauseous. I felt like quitting, but told myself I have to at least make 25k. Fifth loop, felt terrible, head hurt, legs hurt, feet hurt, and was dizzy. Kept drinking, lost it twice, but kept going. Decided I was going to drop at the end of this loop. I came through somewhere around 40 minutes. I decided to sit down for awhile and just see if I felt better. After 10 or 15 minutes I was going to turn in my chip, but instead started on the sixth lap. Again I was walking as much as running, still dizzy and unsteady. I decided I would drop this time. Around 45 minutes for this loop. I almost dropped when I went through the timing map but again decided to sit down and see if things would get better. After about 20 minutes I still didn't feel any better, so I dropped.
I was bummed out about this, but today I still feel like I made the right decision. I can't explain what happened, I've gone farther than this in training, but things just didn't go right. I don't know if it was the heat, if I was sick before I started and it just got worse. I just don't know. I feel ok today, just the usual soreness and some fatigue but no different than if I had run 20 miles in training. This was my first DNF and I hope it doesn't make another one easy. But for now I'm not dwelling on the negative.

El Scorcho & San Antonio

Just a brief update. I'm headed to Ft. Worth TX tomorrow to run a 50k called El Scorcho. It starts at midnight Saturday night. Then after finishing the race, and maybe a nap I'm heading to San Antonio on business.