Tell us about your recent races.  Have you been running the Women’s Distance Festival Series this summer?  Did you finish your first race?  Did you PR, place in your age group, or win a race?  Travel somewhere new to race, or run a new distance?

Share your stories by adding your comments.

by Robert Grumbine

Hi folks,

No, I’m not going gonzo about my race times. Nor am I feeling
a ton of stress from work or other things.

My second metatarsal, however, felt excess stress and fractured.
So I’ve got a fancy boot to keep the foot bone from getting broken
and even encourage it to heal. Not what I was hoping for by way
of diagnosis, but better than some of the alternatives.

I emphasize injury avoidance, and here I am injured. Grr. Still,
I did some things right. I first felt the pain after a run/walk
on the 26th of April. As it was pain, I didn’t run again until it
felt better. It didn’t improve, in fact got worse over time, so
about 10 days later I was in my doctor’s office. Ordinary running
injuries will improve in significantly less than 10 days. Doctor
was able to rule out neuroma (my fear) and plantar fasciitis (common,
but I knew enough about it to be pretty confident that this wasn’t
it), leaving the generic ‘your foot hurts’ diagnosis (metatarsalgia)
and a referral to a podiatrist.

I saw the podiatrist on the 29th, and had a speedy diagnosis of
stress fracture. It’s just as well perhaps that I wasn’t in the
podiatrist’s office immediately, as stress fractures aren’t normally
visible on x-rays until after you’ve started to heal. Still, a
week earlier might have saved me some pain.

As it is, I’ve got the elegant boot for a month and then back
in to the podiatrist to see how it’s progressing. Fingers crossed,
it’ll be finished healing by then. On the other hand, as I’ll
be going to France and China with Vickie (my wife, some of you know
by way of this year’s Running Start program or earlier club events),
I’ll be covering some ground which isn’t exactly the perfect prescription
for speedy recovery. But Vickie seems ready to tackle me if I
start overdoing, and she can outrun me.

I’m now about half way through the response to injury list:
When you have pain, stop the activity that caused it (and treat the pain)

• Figure out what caused it
• Recover
• Start back after figuring out how to avoid re-causing it.

Now part of my cause was walking (rather than running). In my
high speed mode, there’s a lot of stress on the ball of my foot
and my left foot’s big toe (ball) moves out of the way rather than
take up the stress it should. Not a problem for my previous 12
years of running, but this March-April was my first time doing
a lot of high speed walking. So that’s one thing — keep down
the amount of high speed walking.

Second the doctor recommended is that since my shoes are a very old
model I should go up to the Road Runner Sports in Columbia
and see the ’shoe dog’ there to get matched up to shoes. I could
(given 12 years of changes in my feet) now be better of in a
different pair of shoes.

I’ll also be grilling the doctor about how to schedule my
ramp up in terms of distance, time, pace, and mode (walking
vs. running, and high speed walking vs. my casual lope (which
is not terribly slow either)). If an expert is available,
pick their brains thoroughly!

Happy trails,
Bob Grumbine

Several of us ventured out to Howard County for the Striders’ All Fruit Relay. Running for the Prince Georges Running Cranberries team were David Ferris, Christina Caravoulias, James Scarborough and Cindy Cohen. Sharyn and Kirk Gordon ran as part of the Orange-U-A-Runner team. Alas, the Cranberries came in last, and were crushed by a team of young men running with a watermelon for each 2 mile segment. But a good time was had by all, and at the end, there were cranberries and watermelon to feast on.

See photos and results at http://striders.net/races/all-fruit-relay/2008/ (You’ve gotta see the photos of the guys running with the watermelon).

Team Cranberries — http://www.striders.net/photos/v/2008/08_all_fruit/mf_DSC_2593.JPG.html

The mountain laurels in Greenbelt Park along the Perimeter Trail are blooming now and are absolutely lovely.  Come run with the club in the park on Saturdays and we’ll show you the trails.  

If you haven’t visited Nadim Ahmed’s website rundc.com, it is worth checking out for its detailed descriptions of many DC area running trails.  Here’s the excerpt on Greenbelt Park — http://www.rundc.com/Doc/MD/PG/GreenbeltPark.htm

It was a gorgeous day for the Cicada Crunch 5K, in Cheverly, MD, directed by PGRC member Dave Rapp.   Kudos to Dave and his team for putting on a fun race, featuring killer hills, a well-marked and supported course, and chocolate strawberries and cicada-shaped cookies at the finish.  PGRC runners fared well today, with Christopher Hamley taking the overall win, more than 2 minutes ahead of the second place runner.  Monica Lewis outleaned Cindy Cohen, to finish second and third place overall for women.  Elliott Hamilton took the top spot for masters men, and Sharlene Deskins and Emily McLaughlin placed first in their age groups.  13-year old Linus Hamilton also ran a fine race on the hilly course.  And Gene Lehr was out working the time machine, ensuring accurate results.

Here are the full awards and results, with PGRC members highlighted in blue.

Awards

Order of finish

Christopher Hamley received the top ranking by the Washington Running Report in the Mens 40-44 division for the winter 2008 period. Way to go Chris!

While the rest of PGRC was busy timing Pathways, coaching the Running Start, and attending the May board meeting, I traveled north for my next race.

Sunday (May 4th), I ran my 4th Philadelphia Broad Street 10 miler, a point-to-point race from the heart of North Philly all the way down Broad Street to the Naval Yard. This run has a special place in my heart because it was the first run I did that was longer than a 10K. Here are my past results:

2004 (~10,000 total finishers) 1:38:27

2005 (~12,000 total finishers) 1:32:51

2006 (~14,000 total finishers) 1:27:16

This year the weather was ideal (about 55 degrees and overcast), I had a great running partner (my college friend, Kevin), and I was looking forward to matching or beating my 2006 PR. And… I DID (by exactly 1 second/mile).

2008 (~19,000 total finishers !!!!) 1:27:06

Also this year, the race was much larger than my first race in 2004. It looks like the BSR is preparing to overtake the Army 10-miler as the most popular 10 mile race in the country!!! Yay for PHILLY

I didn’t see any other PGRCers at the run… did anyone else run?

<3 <3 <3

– Emily –

PGRC’s 2008 beginning runners program starts tomorrow (Saturday) at 8am.  If you haven’t yet registered you can do so tomorrow.  Registration forms are available at http://www.pgrc.org/training/beginning.html.

Here are detailed directions to the meeting spot for the Running Start program.

DIRECTIONS TO LAKE ARTEMESIA

Lake Artemesia is accessed by turning onto Branchville Road from Greenbelt Road Rte 193. From Greenbelt and the east Branchville Rd. is one mile from the entrance of Greenbelt Park, and past the Beltway Plaza Mall. Turn right just past Pearle Vision and Siri’s Chef’s Secret Restaurant; there is a traffic signal and a brown Lake Artemesia sign at the intersection. The SunTrust Bank branch is on the corner on the west side of Branchville Rd.

From College Park and the west Branchville Road is the first left turn past Rhode Island Avenue with a Shell Station and SunTrust Bank on the left before the intersection.

Proceed on Branchville Rd. on a course that resembles a reverse question mark. You will pass under Rte 193 – the street name changes here to Ballew Ave - and then past the Washington Post Printing Center on the right. At 0.8 mile you will reach an intersection with Berwyn Road and Ballew Ave with a police department building on the southwest corner on the right. The PGRC Running Start Group will assemble at the Lake Artemesia parking lot on the southeast corner across Berwyn Road on the left.

Photos from Springburst are now available.  Here are some photos from the kid’s fun run.