Running with Type 1

A random phone call from my Dad on my brother's birthday almost had me skip a heart beat or 2.  It had been over 2 years since he moved out west, and I had yet to visit him.  Life and limited vacation days weren't on my side.  Due to some hip trouble, my Dad couldn't fly and wanted my brother to have support for his first 50k.  I found out there was still registration for the Half Marathon distance.  I sent a snap of my registration confirmation to him, and he called me 30 seconds later, and the adventure was on. As we talked amongst the giddyness of our upcoming adventure, the realization hit me, this race began at 7,300 ft, and topped out a few feet shy of 9,000 ft of altitude.  My house sits at only a few feet shy of 1,100 ft, and I've only been over 5,000 ft once, and that was just standing there for a few minutes. "Dude, I don't want to sound worried, but how much of an affect will the altitude have on me?"  I nervously asked. "Haha well,

In the words of ultrarunning legend Hal Koerner, "Some will boil it down to chemicals, emotions, reasons why we crave it, but honestly, it's just a combination of all those things brought together in that moment, it's a beautiful, joyous thing."  My god, that's beautiful. I find running, even more so racing, metaphorically aligned well with our day to day.  We have those days, you wake up feeling refreshed, heart rate super low, you tackle the day before it has a thought to tackle you.  Then, we have the opposite.  Days where you seemingly can't get ahead, foggy and lethargic, just struggle busing on through. Ya know, those races, where everything possible aligned for you to have one of those magical runs, relatively speaking, you feel like Superman.  Paced appropriately, breathing and stride in sync, finishing strong.  Then, the races where almost immediately, your thoughts turn to, "oh for the love of god, just get me to the finish line."

Born and raised in the Pittsburgh region, your existence with the outdoors varies from one extreme to the next every few months.  I was born in June, yet the older I get, the more I don't enjoy summer as much.  Just so damn humid, and unless I am at the beach, anything above 70 degrees is too much. Which brings me to my current state of affairs, winter.  My relationship with December-March has changed drastically in the past few years.  My disdain for winter took on new heights my freshman year of college, trekking around our campus' hills and enduring wind gusts that seemingly never ended.  5am hikes across campus for workouts in the winter of 2007 further enhanced my loathing of the winter blues.  During the month of February that year, for the first time in my young life, I experienced seasonal depression.  It was very real.  Maybe a combination of stressors from school, and football, but my serotonin had to have been all kinds of whacked out. I couldn't shake the ha

"Son, I've said it once, twice, a thousand times, so I'll say it again.." *Andrew braces himself for another Dadism* "Life is the only subject you get the test first, and the lesson later."  My Dad loves that line, and if I had a dollar for everytime I've heard it, I'd be retired at 31.  Behind the cliche, it's so damn true and spot on though. I read through an old notebook from the last 18 months a few days back.  From the original inception of my intentions to commit to the marathon, to this past summer where I did my best to work well with high humidty and new venture into parenthood. For awhile I really questioned if I trained correctly.  Like any competitor when the outcome is far off from the intention, you're naturally forced to sit and reflect.  Ok, what went well and what went terribly wrong? After 4 months of reflection, I was patient with where my thoughts took me after that rough go in Morgantown.  A few thoughts that

"Hey, let's do a quick warm up lap then head up the hill, I need to wake up a bit" I suggested. "Ahh come on, let's just power hike up the hill and begin running from there," my brother nonchalantly rebuttled back.  So we began our "warm up" power hiking up the steepest incline in the park, watching my HR spike into the 150s, "hey dipshit, the key to a warm up is to get the blood flowing, not flirt with going anaerobic to begin a trail run," he laughed and shook his head in between heavy breaths.   As we finally settled into our Christmas Eve run through Brady's Run, our backyard stomping grounds, the trails were quite Beast Coast beautiful.  Mostly cloudy sky, 38 degrees, a frozen layer crusted the ground from the cold, as we climbed, descended and swung around switch backs for an eventful 7 mile run with 1100 ft of climb.  We solved the world's problems a few times, and tossed out crazy ideas for ourselves to tackle in

A week before flying overseas last August, I finished out my summer block of training with a 14 miler.  Somewhere later in that run, I committed to the marathon.  I called my brother later that morning, I jotted some notes, and for 54 weeks, it was thee unicorn. I had established a better understanding with my blood sugar management through 2 full years of half marathon training, and racing the last 5.5 years.  My blood sugar wasn't as much of an issue as 10-15 years ago as discussed in the past.  While always a priority in my training, and daily life, I've gained a lot of confidence in that realm.  I stick to a game plan that works best for me.  My blood sugar isn't perfect by a long shot, but it's consistent. Becoming a father and balancing our own endeavors forced me to become more creative with my time management.  Running wise, a supportive wife and being open to early mornings is the backbone to getting the time and mileage in.  I had an absolute blast gettin