There is internet on my flight! (SLC to BOS)

This thing almost became completely defunct again. Or perhaps it did become defunct. June 23rd to December 4th is a long time to go without an update. Better late than never?

June was a fairly successful month of running. I topped 200 miles on the month; an accomplishment that I have not since managed.

In July I was healthy, home and had a relatively large amount of free time but only ran about 98 miles. I had enough residual fitness from earlier in the year for second place at the Tonneson and Co 5k in Wakefield in a time of 17:34 which ran my streak of consecutive years with a sub-18 min 5k to 7 and notched my fastest 5k of the year (of 3). The less shiny side of this story is that I was registered for a marathon that weekend but didn't feel like I had the fitness so I took the DNS and ran a 5k instead.

In August I went out too fast to start the Beverly Homecoming 5k, got injured and finished the month with 35 total miles. This was not a promising sign heading into September, with another marathon on my schedule for September 12th.

The September marathon was the Marathon du Medoc so the pressure was not so much.

With our numbers at the giant inflatable wine bottle. There were free wine and cognac tastings at the expo. So best race expo ever.

There were 22 wine stops at various chateaus along the way and I made sure to get out toward the front of the race to take unimpeded advantage of the all you can drink wine buffets at chateaus such as Lafite Rothschild. I finished in drunken 3:56:50 which was good enough for 326th of 10000 starters and 7650 finishers. Mark, who was both in better running and drinking shape passed me in the last 10km to finish 300th. Sarah did her first half marathon; our smiles below were more due to the wine than how comfortable it is to run long distances on dirt paths in the rain whilst wearing fancy dress.

The theme of the race was to put on your 31s. This means to put on your best clothes which you would wear only once per month. The English translation was "dressed to the 9s" which doesn't make as much sense for the theme of the 31st installment of the race.

In addition to the finisher medals each finisher gets a boxed bottle of Bordeaux wine; generally Medoc wine as the race name would imply:

My bottle was a 2008 which was a bad year for Bordeaux wines but this bottle was still better than most of what I buy at home. I think Mark got a 2012 from another chateau.

After we got back from France I was straight back out to Salt Lake City for work where I picked up an indoor track membership to start getting back into shape. Before I move onto talking about October though, here are some more pictures from France:

Dinner cruise in Paris

Catacombs in Paris

Worries Guaranteed!!!

Back to October.

I managed 115 miles in September and 110 miles in October. Given that I ran 260 miles in March in the build-up to Boston this was not a good sign going into the NYC marathon on the first of November. I did manage to find a small enough 5k in October that I was able to notch my 12 win and first of the year. I went out hard an passed the 1 mile mark at 4:44 which I take to mean the marker was short. I jogged in the final mile at recovery pace but was never challenged. I won in 18:20 with a 2:49 lead over second place. Not great but not too bad given that I landed after midnight the night before after flying home from Salt Lake City for the weekend.

There's no glory in winning a 5k with an 18:20 but I'll take the gift certificate to cut a few bucks off of my next pair of trainers.

I missed the FOOGI 5k the next weekend to attend Sarah and Grant's wedding. It was a great time and while I didn't have the chance to defend my title from my neighborhood's annual 5k at least I didn't miss out on any real competition. The winner ran it in 20:55...3 seconds slower than when he finished second to me last year.

October eventually ended and I found myself on the start line of the NYC marathon. I was given the number 3161 which meant that I was a just a few rows of runners back from the start line in Wave 1, Corral 1 of the Green starting area. It was a bit crowded very early on and I managed to hold back as I went up the bridge but with fewer than 200 runners between me and the Green start I found a nice juicy open lane to run in coming down off of the apex of the bridge and forgot about my goal of running a 3:15. My first mile was slow, and then I clocked a 6:09 second mile and never really got it under control until I burnt out. Here's my projected finish at each mile based on my GPS splits. This is a map for one of the most painful ways to run a 3:24:28 marathon:

Hello wall.

By comparison, here is the same plot from my run at the Boston Marathon in 2015:

The step function between miles 15 and 16 was when I stopped to throw up. The step function right at the end was when I stopped to take off my outer layer shirt so that I could finish with my GLRR singlet showing. The rain had plastered my shirt to me and with my injuries from the face plant 2 weeks earlier it took longer to strip that shirt than I had planned. Looking back at this data, taking off that shirt could have cost me a place in the 2016 Boston Marathon.

The NYC marathon was painful but it was a fun experience and Sarah and I had a great time hanging out with Emily and Tom for the weekend and there is nothing like a bad race to trigger a good month of training. I finished October with 195 miles including some long runs, some tempo runs, some hill workouts and some track work. Another couple months of this and I might be back in racing shape.

I now have 2 races on my schedule for 2016 that will require the marathon fitness that I'm trying to get back:
Salt Lake City Marathon, Salt Lake City, UT 4/16/16
Edinburgh Marathon, Edinburgh, Scotland, UK, 5/29/16

Here is my YTD mileage trend comparing this year (red) to other years. After running hard for the first 6 months of the year I fell behind my 2013 pace but have started working my way back in November. 2015 is now my second highest mileage year ever and I still have a chance at topping 2013 if I can manage 215 miles in December. Through 4 days I am on pace for 225 miles this month so it will be close.

Here's to wishing everyone a good indoor track season! When I finally shake this cold that I've been battling for the past 2 weeks I'll be looking forward to joining you!