Drop it like it's....carbs?

My next race on the calendar is the Chicago Marathon on October 9th. And I am actually attempting to finish at my goal time.... which is still slow enough to not get a start corral, I am in the "open" corral. Depressing. Our goal time is a good 15 minutes off my best race time to date. And that was 4 or 5 years ago, before kids! So the summer and fall are serious training times for me. I just have to stay injury free.

My last marathon before Marine Corps this past October was Rock 'n Roll San Diego. I attempted to run that for a goal time as well, unfortunately I wasn't paying attention and sprained my ankle at mile 6/7 by stepping in a pothole. And I was dumb enough to run on it (I blame the endorphins that made me think I was OK) until it really started to hurt around mile 17/18. By that point everything hurts anyway, so it has to just be regular race pain, right? Yeah.... I went to the medic tent after the race to get some ice or a bandage, and they guy's response was "Dude, that ankle is swollen....!" Well, yeah, why do you think I came to you for something to treat it... Let's hope I learned to pay attention when I run this time.


My friend has a great theory that if we lose some weight, running our goal time will be a snap. And he has lost 20 pounds and I can barely keep up with him some days, I figure that his theory may just be right.   So I found this handy-dandy chart online about how much weight loss will effect race time.



Pounds Lost           5k            10k             1/2 Marathon               Marathon
2                            :12.4          :25               :52                                1:45
5                            :31           1:02             2:11                                4:22
10                        1:02           2:04             4:22                                8:44
20                       2:04            4:08             8:44                              17:28



According to RW author Amby Burfoot, the table is based on research that runners, on average get 2 seconds per mile faster for every pound they lose. The times you see above are the amounts a runner can shave off his/her race times by losing weight.



Needless to say, the dieting has started. Ugh. I want to steal my kid's pasta noodles and crackers. And making them pancakes or waffles for breakfast is pure torture. Progress has been good so far, I am 6 pounds closer to a faster race time. Nine more pounds to go...

Happy gardening and running all!