BWCA

I’m taking my family to the Minnesota Boundary Waters Canoe Area (BWCA) next week. The BWCA is about 1.3 million acres of wilderness that is set aside to protect its primitive character. There are about 15 hiking trails and about 2000 designated campsites. Most of the campsites can only be reached by canoe. During the six days in the wilderness we’ll traverse dozens of lakes connected by portage trails. I’ve been to the BWCA three times, twice in the winter traveling by snowshoe and once in the summer with my oldest brother. My brother and his wife will be going with us, which is good because they are seasoned BWCA experts. Well I better get out the door to do my run; it’s getting to be kind of a late start.

Time to Party

I met with my oncologist today to discuss my recent PET scan results. The up-tick in activity that was seen a month ago is diminishing. Both my radiologist and oncologist agree that the scan is picking up inflammation of the scar tissue left over from my hernia surgery, and running Grandma’s marathon aggravated it. The PET scan also shows I’m squeaky clean everywhere else. Tomorrow I’m going to celebrate with a 20 mile run. Hmmm, maybe I need to re-evaluate what I consider fun.

TC Marathon Training

My training for the Twin Cities marathon started out sporadic. There was the 4th of July holiday with a big party at our house that required a lot of preparation, then a week long business trip to Phoenix, which as very hot for running. I’m also trying not to let my training impact family life. My plan was to run only on week days. Since I’m still a working stiff, I need to start very early in the morning, 5:30AM for my short runs and 4:00 to 4:30 AM for my long runs. I haven’t been able to exactly stick to that plan. So far my long runs have been on the weekends, but I do get started very early to finish before the rest of my family is ready for breakfast. This week I have a PET scan to see if the positive results from the previous scan was just a false alarm or not. I’ll have to take a break from running for a couple of days because I cannot do anything strenuous 24 hours before the PET scan. I plan to celebrate a good PET scan result with a 20 mile run Saturday morning.

Chemo-Man Runs Again

I’ve taken some time off from my blog and I’m now ready to get back to it. This spring when my oncologist informed me I was cancer free I was eager to get my life back to normal, and I thought that partially meant to put the whole Chemo-Man and blogging thing behind me. However I have come to realize that is impossible and would be a bad move.

I am haunted by the fear of a reoccurrence of cancer every time I have a PET scan and go over the results with my doctor. My last PET scan in July showed an increase in metabolic activity in the lymph nodes in my groin. I’ve learned that this happens frequently and most of the time turns out to be a false alarm. The PET scan cannot tell the difference between cancer and inflamed tissue. It’s common among runners to have inflamed groin lymph nodes and I had just run a marathon one and a half weeks before my PET scan. I have another PET scan scheduled in August to see if anything has changed. If that PET scan shows more positive results, then I’ll have a biopsy. It may go that far just to find out it’s nothing. Based on what I have been told, these false alarms could happen again and again over the next few years while I’m being monitored very closely. So I still have in front of me a tremendous challenge of fighting the physiological haunting of my cancer.

If I let myself dwell in fear and grief, then cancer will have won. I will not give in. I will not let cancer take precious time away from me and my family. However, I can’t walk away from it, I need to take it head on and fight it. Chemo-man is about being positive and pursuing dreams despite the challenges. Writing my blog makes me feel good. It’s like being in a support group. It’s also a way for me to pay it forward. During my despair just after being diagnosed I stumbled across stories of people battling cancer with running and positive attitude. They showed me that I didn’t have to give up my life and my dreams during or after chemo therapy. My hope is my blog will do the same. If I can help just one person it will be all worth it.
There may be a time when Chemo-Man retires, but for now I have still a lot to say. My journey continues on in a new direction. I don’t know exactly where, but that’s a wonderful thing about life, it’s full of mystery.

Grandma's Marathon Photos

The marathon train at about 5AM. The marathon train leaves Duluth Minnesota at 5:30AM and arrives in Two Harbors at about 7AM to see the 7:30AM start of the marathon.

My parents and my two sons going first class. Here I was feeling bad that my family had to wake at 3:30AM to get to the train on time. But while I was running my butt off in the heat, they were sipping wine, champange, bloody mary's and being served a hot breakfest. I was eating energy gels.

My brother and his wife. My brother is a Emmy award winning professional video journalist. Many of the pictures you see were taken by him. In fact, he is so good this picture you are looking at was taken by him.

Passengers of the marathon train are allowed to get out on the tracks to see all the hubbub at the starting line just outside of Two Harbors, Minnesota.

A view from the bar car. Passengers were allowed to roam about the train to get many different vantage points.

7103 runners packed in like sardines at the starting line. The blob of runners eventually stretchs out, where the first runner finishes at about 2 hours and 17 minutes and the last runners finish at about 6 hours.

For the first twenty miles Grandma's marathon offers beautiful country side scenery along Lake Superior, then the last 6 miles is through residential and urban neighborhoods of Duluth, then ending at the Duluth harbors on Lake Superior.

The open air car on the marathon train.

A water station for the runners. There were many tables like these at each water station. I'm just guessing but there was probably about 30 to 50 workers at each water station. This picture was taken while the elites were running through, otherwise there would have been hordes of runners gulping down water.

Running through Duluth Minnesota. This part of the run was in a relatively open area near the harbor. The course runs through the heart of downtown Duluth.

Grandma cheers on runners as they cross the finish line.

Some runners were carried across the finish line and some were wheeled across. Imagine running 26 miles only to break down within a hundred yards of the finish line. That's got to hurt.

Chemo-man nearing the finish line.

Crossing the finish line. All of a sudden it's all over. Several months of training, recovering from injuries, maintaining a constant focus on a goal, and then it's all over. It's common for a marathoner to go through some depression after completing a marathon. Not me, I just set sights on the next big event, like a canoe trip in the Minnesota Boundery Waters Canoe Area Wilderness with my family.

My brother.

My parents.








My wife and two boys.

Running Grandma’s Marathon: A Joyous Celebration of a Victory over Cancer

About seven months ago I was diagnosed with an aggressive form of cancer and was giving two to sixth months to live without successful chemo treatment. That news initially crushed all my hopes to run Grandma’s marathon. How can I overcome the devastating effects of chemo and be in condition to run 26.2 miles? Then I read stories about others who have beat cancer and chemo with endurance training. These people showed us that the human body and spirit are capable of imaginable accomplishments while battling one of the most dreadful things. At first I really didn’t expect I would be running a marathon shortly after chemo and there were times during my training I had doubt. Now I wish I was a writer, so I could express in words how I felt last Saturday while running Grandma’s marathon. It was glorious.

At about 6:45AM I arrived at the starting line on one of hundreds of school busses shuttling only runners from various places. There were thousands of runners already there and thousands more coming in a constant flow of school buses. Rock & roll music was playing loudly and there were decorations along the starting line which had two long fences on each side to corral the runners on scenic highway 61. There must have been hundreds of porta-potties; but not enough to keep the lines short. I’ve learned the first thing a runner should do when arriving at a marathon starting line is to get into the porta-potty line. You can tell first time runners, the ones that make a stop at the trees shortly after the race has started.

The North Shore Scenic train arrived with its whistle horn blowing and then stopped on the tracks that ran alongside the starting line. My wife and two boys, my parents and my brother and his wife were on the train. The train passengers got out and walked on the tracks to check out the sights and look for their runner. I’m very fortunate to have family sharing the experience.

When I arrived at the starting line the temperature was cool in the lower 50s, but as soon as the sun rose above the horizon the temperature jumped up quickly. The humidity was higher than expected too. It turned out to be on the warm side for a marathon, but not devastating heat like there was during the TC marathon last year. The winner of the 2007 TC marathon said that he kept as cool as possible by pouring water on his head at every water station. So I tried that at Grandma’s and it worked very well. Every water station I would grab two cups of water, drink one then pour one over my head. Then grab two more before leaving the water station. Volunteers were also handing out white sponges soaked with cool water. I quickly learned to grab those too. After each water station I was soaking wet. But that combined with a breeze had a tremendous cooling effect.

The energy at the starting line was just amazing with 7,103 runners lined up and rock & roll playing over the loud speakers. Then there was a moment of silence for last year’s Grandma’s winner Wesley Ngetich who was killed in his home country of Kenya during a peacemaking situation that turned violent. After that there was the national anthem and then two F-16 fighter jets flew over. I didn’t hear the horn that signals the start of the race. But when the train blew its whistle and started rolling I knew the race had begun.

Guessing by where I was in the starting line, I would say there were about 4000 to 5000 runners ahead of me. Unlike the TC marathon, Grandma’s has some long stretches where you can see the course ahead for at least a mile. It was an awesome sight to see scenic highway 61 packed solid with runners out to the horizon. I had no problems starting out at a good slow pace, because I had no choice for about the first two miles. After that the runners were spread out just enough for a little wiggle room. But it wasn’t until about 5 miles that I was able to really set into my own pace.

I did exactly what I had planned to do, set my pace to keep a good heart rate rather a pace to finish at a specific time. During the first few miles I maintained my heart rate in the mid 150s. At about mile 10 I let my average heart rate reach 160. My heart rate would vary between 157 and 162, depending on if I was going up hill or down hill. I monitored it very closely by checking the heart rate monitor on my wrist about every minute or so. I crossed the halfway marker with an elapsed time of about 2:04, which made me to believe I was in striking distance to break the 4 hour barrier at the finish line. However, I stayed to my plan of maintaining a heart rate of 160 or less. At about mile 17 my pace had to start slowing to maintain a constant heart rate. By mile 20 I knew that a 4 hour finish was not obtainable and I stuck to my plan. If I would have tried for a faster pace, I most likely would have succumbed to exhaustion and retreated to walking much of the last few miles. But my planned worked out and for the first time ever I was able to complete the entire marathon without walking.

About the last 6 miles of the marathon runs though Duluth and was continuously lined with spectators cheering on the runners with words of encouragement. My favorite part of the race is the interaction with the crowd, high-fiving and screaming victory cries. But after mile 23 all I could muster up was a little nod and a squeak. About the last mile I was starting to get a little delirious. All I could do was focus on the finish line.
I had absolutely no problems with tendonitis I had a couple of weeks ago in my foot, but at about mile 23 I was feeling a lot of pain in my thighs. Every little hill was a challenge, but rather than reverting to walking I adjusted my gate to short but quick running steps. Not only does this help maintain a good pace, I’ve found that maintaining some type of running gate is actually less painful than walking.

I crossed the finish line in a gun time of 4:23:09 and a chip time of 4:19:54. Gun time (official time) is the time from the start of the race to when a runner crosses the finish line. Chip time is the time from when the runner crosses the starting line to when crossing the finish line. With thousands of runners in front of me, it takes a few minutes just to cross the starting line. My original goal while going through chemo was just to finish under 6 hours; after that they close the course and pick up stragglers with buses. Even though my time wasn’t a personal record, I felt the best about my performance at Grandma’s. On my previous two marathons I regretted some of my decisions on strategy and execution. This time I had absolutely no regrets; I wouldn’t have done anything differently.

I was glad that I had printed on my running shirt “Chemo-Man” on the front and “Run Chemo-Man Run” on the back. That was all that was needed for spectators and runners to know my story, which most people have felt in their lives in some way or another. Many runners pulled up beside me to ask about details. Spectators were constantly waving, giving a thumbs-up and yelling out things like, “way to go chemo-man”. One elderly woman sitting in a chair along London road in Duluth yelled out, “Chemo-man, I’m a chemo-man too”. There were times that I got choked up with tears. Just about everyone has known the pain and devastation of cancer and what one goes through to fight it. It not only wreaks havoc on the patient but family and friends too. So those times when we win the battle calls for a joyous celebration. My victory is not a personal victory. I did not do this on my own. There are so many people to thank, millions of people. My wife, family, friends, doctors, nurses, hospital staff, volunteers, those who have donated money for cancer research and those who have sacrificed their lives are all a part of my victory.

Now what’s next for Chemo-man? I’m signed up for the Twin City marathon that runs on October 5th. Do I go as Chemo-man? Do I keep updating my blog? I’ve heard through the grapevine that there are people that read my blog. My hope is that my story will inspire others to use physical conditioning as a way to fight cancer, the side effects of chemo treatment, or whatever troubles they may have. I would like to hear from you. Please click on the comments link at the end of this post. You can remain anonymous. Or send me an email at: runchemomanrun@mchsi.com. There is also a voting button at the top right of my blog.