"We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act, but a habit." Aristotle

Sunday, May 25, 2008

23.2 Miles and I Can Still Walk

My 23.2 mile long run went very well yesterday. I really noticed the difference in proper preparation and technique. I started out slightly slower than my last 20 mile run, which didn't go so well. I also brought some energy gel packs. I was able to complete the 23.2 miles without walking and at an average pace of just under 10 minutes per mile. For about 30 minutes after the run my legs did pulsate in pain. My wife thinks I'm crazy. "What is the fun in that", she says. Sometimes I wonder. It took about an hour to recover, but I was able to walk pretty normal the rest of the day. One more 23 mile run next weekend then I'll be ready for Grandma's and will start my taper down.

Wednesday, May 21, 2008

Fast Recovery

It’s been six weeks since my last chemo treatment and I’m feeling great. Many of the chemo side effects are gone and I’m no longer taking any medication for side effects. Some of the medication I was taking for side effects is habit forming, so I’m very happy to be done with it. My stomach problems are gone and I can eat apples again. My red blood count must be going up because I have notice a huge increase in my running speed without having to gasp for air. About 4 weeks ago the fastest I could run 6 miles was at a pace of about 10:30/mile, now I can run it at 8:30/mile. I no longer need weekly blood tests; the next one won’t be till July. My hair is now coming back. It’s nice to have a little shade up there with summer around the corner. One of the side effects I still have is tingling and numbness in my toes and fingers, mostly in my toes. My doctor said it’ll take about a half of year for that to go away. No big deal, I can handle tingling.

Training went well this week, but my left ankle is showing some signs of stress. I’ll have to monitor it closely so it doesn’t grow into an injury that requires some recovery time. I no longer have slack time in my training schedule for injury recovery. I ran my 16 mile long run in 2 hours, 36 minutes, which was a huge improvement over the 3 hours, 12 minutes it took to run 16 miles 4 weeks ago. With the rapid increases in speed I started having thoughts of trying to finish Grandma’s in less than 4 hours. But I have to get those thoughts out of my head. There’s just not enough time to properly prepare for running 26.2 miles at that speed. My next two long runs will be 23 miles each. I’ll prepare for and run them as if it was race day. The biggest challenge now is not to let greed and adrenaline dictate my pace.

Monday, May 12, 2008

The Wall

I goofed up on my second 20 mile run. My energy level has been increasing fast over the last couple of weeks and I’ve been able to run my short 6 mile runs much faster. So when I started my 20 mile run I started out at a faster pace than my first 20 mile run. The faster pace felt good. Based on my heart rate during most of the run it seemed to be the optimum pace. After 16 miles I felt good and I was on pace shave off 17 minutes from my previous 20 mile run. But at mile 17 I totally ran out of gas. It wasn’t due to a high heart rate, just a lack of energy. This is what runners call “The Wall”.

When running fast the body burns glycogen for quick energy. The body can only store enough glycogen for about 18 to 20 miles. After glycogen runs out, the body needs to burn fat for energy. Fat does not convert to energy as fast as glycogen and therefore cannot sustain the energy level needed to continue running. When a runner hits The Wall the body starts shutting down for protection. Then how does one run a marathon (26.2 miles) without hitting the wall?

One way to extend The Wall to a longer distance is to run slower at the begging, thus burning more fat and saving glycogen. However that increases the time for completing the race. Another way is to maximize the amount of stored glycogen by eating a lot of carbohydrates during the last couple of days for the run. This is called carbloading. A third way to extend The Wall is to consume some carbohydrates during the run, such as an energy drink or energy gel. I did none of these for my second 20 mile run.

I’ve learned my lesson, again. One cannot go out and run 20 miles without good preparation and expect a fast run. This week I need to give my body some time to heal so my long run will be only about 16 miles. The following next two weeks I plan on making my long runs 23 miles. I’ll carbload the evening before by eating a big meal of spaghetti. Then I’ll bring some energy gel packs on the run. I did this last year and I noticed a big improvement in how fast I could complete a long run without running out of gas. If I prepare right I think I can complete my last two long runs at a pace of 10 min/mile or better. That would result in a marathon finish time of 4:22. I would be very happy with that considering a few weeks ago I wasn’t even sure I would be able to complete the race within the 6 hour regulation time.

Thursday, May 8, 2008

Cancer Gone

I met with my oncologist yesterday and the latest PET scan shows no evidence of cancer. I am done with chemotherapy. I will now go into a monitoring phase. If there is a reoccurrence, it’ll most likely happen in the next couple of years. For the next year I’ll need PET scans every two months. After two years it’ll drop to about one scan every 6 months. After 5 or 6 years the risk of reoccurrence is so low that monitoring is not required.

Accurate prognosis is difficult at this time, especially when there is some uncertainty to what type of Non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma I have. If I have follicular lymphoma, which cannot be cured, a reoccurrence is more likely. The time between reoccurrence can vary wildly between patients. My oncologist has had patients with follicular lymphoma that have been in remission for over 10 years and are still going strong. If I have a reoccurrence, a more aggressive treatment will probably be considered, such as stem cell (bone marrow) replacement. That will not be fun, so my mindset is that I have the other type of lymphoma, diffused large B-cell (DLBC), which is curable in about 50% of the cases.

DLBC is what my clinic first diagnosed me with. The Mayo clinic later came up with the follicular diagnosis. My oncologist explained that it’s a judgment call between the two types of lymphoma. My clinic had three different pathologist look at my biopsy and all three agreed that I had DLBC. So I’m going with the numbers. Since DLBC is curable with the first round of treatment, I may never need another treatment. I’m going to do whatever I can to make sure that happens. There are medical studies that report exercise can greatly reduce the chance of reoccurrence. I plan to continue marathon running the rest of my life. When I ran my first marathon, at about mile 15 a 70+ year old man passed me up. (If you’re over 40 you have to wear a tag showing your age bracket). Some day I plan to be that 70 year old passing up young bucks on the marathon course.

My 20 mile run went very well last Sunday. I was able to complete it without walking and in a time of 3:32. I can feel my energy coming back this week in my short 6 mile runs. Each day my speed gets a little faster. Now that I won’t be having chemo my remaining training program looks good for Grandma’s. This weekend I’ll run another 20 miler. Next week I’ll taper back my long run to give my body some time to repair. Then I’ll do two 23 mile runs the following weeks. After that I should be in very good shape for Grandma’s and will start my taper down – where I run shorter and shorter distances during the last 3 weeks of training. This gives the body time to fully heal before the race.

Sunday, May 4, 2008

Grandma’s Marathon on the Horizon

Three Sundays ago on an unusually warm late April afternoon I did a 16 mile long run that turned out to be really ugly. I ended up walking several times that probably totaled about 2 miles. After the run my legs pulsated with pain for about a half hour. I was really getting concerned that I lost ground over that last two months. Back in February I ran continuously for 16 miles at a much faster pace. How could I finish Grandma’s if I was going backwards? Maybe the chemo did too much damage to repair between treatments.

Marathon coaches say not to worry about walking, if you have to walk do it, just make sure you complete your entire long run. However, I see that the need to walk is sometimes an indication of non-optimum technique, usually caused by starting out too fast at the beginning of the run. I found the fastest time to complete a long run is obtained if I start at a slower pace and keep my heart rate below 160 bpm for most the run maintain the same pace all the run. There were times during my last 16 mile run that I had to walk to slow down my heart rate. The chemo induced anemia limits my speed, but my spirit wants to go faster. To maintain a constant pace I need to be extra careful to set the right pace at the start of my run. I just need to find that right pace.

I planned an 18 mile run for Sunday last week. I saw this as a pivotal run since it would be the longest in my training to date, and close to 20 miles, which is the pinnacle of most beginner marathon training programs. This time I started out at a slower pace. My heart rate stayed in the low to mid 150s during most of the run. The change in technique really paid off. I didn’t have to stop or walk during the entire run, and I finished the 18 miles in less time (3:08) than the ugly 16 miles (3:12). I feel confident now that I will be able to cross the finish line at Grandma’s, even if I go through two more chemo cycles.

Last Wednesday I had another PET scan. The results will be used to determine if I need two more chemo cycles. At this time I’m planning my training around two more chemo treatments. This morning I’ll go for a 20 mile run. My next (7th) tentative chemo treatment is scheduled for this Wednesday. Then before my last (8th) chemo treatment I’ll go for another 20 mile run and a 23 mile run. If I can do that then I should be able to run Grandma’s and enjoy it. That’s the first goal in any marathon training, to get into a condition where the marathon race is enjoyable, not dreadful.

Last year when I ran the Twin City marathon my goal was to finish in less than 4 hours. I trained hard for that goal over last summer and based on my last 23 mile training run I was well poised to make it. However race day turned out to be the hottest TC marathon on record and the sweltering heat kept me from reaching my goal by 9 minutes. So after the TC marathon my focus was on Grandma’s, which is considered a fast course because it doesn’t have large hills and is downhill on the average. Then I was diagnosed with an aggressive form of cancer, which at first erased any hopes of just running Grandma’s. Now I feel confident I can finish the race in the regulation time of 6 hours, and maybe within 5 hours. But even if I don’t receive any more chemo treatments, I will not recover fast enough to reach my 4 hour goal. So I signed up for the TC marathon that runs this fall on October 5th. Hopefully I can get my speed back over the summer. My oncologist says it takes about 6 months to recover from chemo treatments. I’ll have to beat that by a couple of months.