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I’ve been lagging a little bit this week on the roads, and on the blog as well. I feel like crap.

Despite how good I felt at my race last weekend, recovering from that effort has been an absolute mess. My legs feel heavy and lifeless. My entire body is sore and tense. Work stress is adding to the pile. I’m worried I left my next marathon PB in Weequahic Park.

I still have almost four weeks until the race, and only a few truly hard days before the taper starts. On the one hand, fatigue like this is the entire point of a marathon block and I have plenty of time. Looking back at my old training logs, I have certainly felt like this before.

On the other hand, if I don’t start recovering soon I might dig myself a hole I can’t climb out of by race day. I haven’t done such a big effort so far out from race day before; I usually do 3 x 4 miles three weeks out. I can’t say if the two extra weeks around 70 miles are giving me more time for a rebound, or catastrophically delaying it.

I have been running as slow as I can to avoid adding to the damage, but that raises a good question: what kind of damage is it? Are my muscles weakened by a hard half? Is it an energy availability problem? Can I solve this by cutting intensity, or do I need to swallow my pride and cut volume too? Can I sleep it off? What if I just eat more?

I’m trying to listen to my body and figure this out, but I’m also so close to the taper that I’m not sure I’ll end up doing anything differently. My tempo tomorrow is going to tell me a lot. We’ll see if I listen.

Monday: 4 miles. I felt pretty good considering my race on Sunday, just really low on energy. Took it slow.

Tuesday: 8 miles. More sore today and took it slow. Made a lot of bad excuses to not do core at lunch.

Wednesday: 6 x 600 @ 5K pace with 90 seconds rest. It took me and Wis a couple reps to find the pace here, but we ran the last 4 in 2:04 or better. Felt good to turn the legs over a bit after a lot of plodding the last few days. Strength at lunch.

Thursday: 12 miles at MLR effort. This hurt; 7:30 pace felt like pulling teeth, and the route I picked was hilly. It might have been the downhills on the way home that finally killed my legs.

Friday: 8 miles. Got out for a late lunch run amid a busy day at work. Really sore.

Saturday: 9 miles. Even more sore. Even taking it slow, this was tough.

Sunday: 16 miles. The most sore. If I weren’t running this with my friends, I might’ve stayed in bed. I had a chance to cut it short on the way home, too, and I probably should have, but I soldiered through. Spent a lot of time on the couch this afternoon. I can’t remember the last time my legs hurt this much.

This Week: 66 miles. 66 very painful miles. I really hope I don’t have to write another blog like this next week.

Baby: My son has been in a great mood lately and is getting really close to taking his first steps. He is a lot of fun right now, but it’s been hard to enjoy it because I’ve been so exhausted. One of the hardest parts of marathon training is that your family still needs you no matter how tired and stupid you are. I want to be there for them. They have been there for me in so many ways during this buildup. At the very least, I want to sharpen up and run a phenomenal race in April. They deserve it.

For a few weeks now I’ve been feeling like I’m building towards a big leap in fitness. After this week, I feel like I made it—not like I landed on the other side, and I’m some new crystalized being, but like I pushed off into open air.

I’m definitely not the runner I was in my last marathon build anymore. There’s too much evidence now. An unexpected course best at Sunset in June was one thing. A bad race, an illness, and an injury later, I made a smart pivot to the bike, which earned me another good race and a chance to start stacking bricks again. Still, there was no guarantee.

Another injury, another pivot, two blizzards, so many tempos on the treadmill, and here we are. I ran 83 minutes for a half marathon this Sunday, after a 7-mile warmup, and it felt like a workout. We have liftoff.

Five weeks left to land the plane, but right now it’s hard not to appreciate the view.

Monday: 7 miles at lunch, and my first set of strides in ages. It’s been even longer since I did them on grass. Got a freaky hamstring cramp while walking off the last stride, but thankfully it turned out to be nothing.

Tuesday: 8 easy in the morning, core at lunch.

Wednesday: 5 miles at tempo pace on the track with Wis. This went really well; we ran just under 6′ pace for the first 4 miles and closed a little harder. I felt fantastic and probably would’ve closed even harder without Wis talking sense from the next lane. 11 miles on the day. Missed strength in the afternoon for a work meeting.

Thursday: 12 miles at MLR effort in a dense, dense fog. A few times I had to turn around and run a different way because I just couldn’t see where I was going. It was like running in the Lost Woods from Legend of Zelda, if the Lost Woods also had cars. This wouldn’t have been so bad in Standard Time! But alas. On the bright side, 7′ pace felt really smooth.

Friday: 8 miles easy. Felt pretty sore after two hard days.

Saturday: 8 miles easy with Wis before our dress rehearsals: his at the United Airlines NYC Half, and mine at the March Madness Half Marathon in Newark. I was still feeling sore when I started, but loosened up nicely and felt pretty good by the end.

Sunday: 20 miles, with the last 13.1 coming at the March Madness Half Marathon. I finished a 7-mile “warmup” about an hour before the gun and took a gel to keep me energized. I took another one shortly before the race went off, then two more during the race itself at 4 and 8 miles.

The race went really well. Whether I’m getting fitter or my new racing shoes are just that good, 6:30 felt like a jog! I actually struggled to go slow enough to stick to my plan of maintaining goal marathon pace. Still, I did my best not to dig too deep for what was essentially a big workout. I ended up averaging 6:20 pace for an 83:07 second-place finish. More importantly, I finished feeling like I had more in the tank.

This was absolutely huge for my confidence going into Jersey City. I know I can make it halfway in 6:30s feeling really, really good. All that remains is to make sure I have the miles under me to finish strong. Speaking of which…

This Week: 74 miles. This week had a strong workout, a smooth MLR, and a great race, all at high mileage. It feels like everything is clicking right when it needs to be. Two more weeks of this, and then the taper starts.

Baby: My son has come down with another case of the sniffles, which this time includes a sore throat and hoarse voice. Thankfully, he doesn’t seem to mind it for most of the day, though by bedtime he is pretty out of gas.

He had a fun weekend with a visit from some good friends and their kids on Saturday, plus an always-appreciated visit from Grandma on Sunday. He is acting more and more like a toddler. We think he will be walking and finding his first words soon. He is also finding his feelings and learning to throw a proper tantrum when his favorite toy (a tube of diaper cream) is confiscated! This is less welcome but just as natural for his development, and we’re learning to work with it. Once he adds walking and talking to the mix, we’re going to have a lot more to learn!

It finally happened. For the first time since mid-January, every run this week was outside. Sunday I ran in shorts! This felt impossible just a week or two ago, but sure enough, spring is on its way.

Unfortunately, that means Daylight Saving Time is back, so my morning runs are now an hour darker and my commutes are once again directly into the sun. I have a very strong opinion that we should be in Standard Time all the time. People need sunlight in the morning because they need to get to work, get to school, and get things done before they go to either of those places, and they need to do all that safely. Being able to play yard games at 8:30 at night for a few weeks in July isn’t worth that trade.

Aside from our obvious mismanagement of the clock at a societal level, this week was pretty good. Higher temperatures and lower mileage will really lift the spirit!

Monday: Off.

Tuesday: 4 miles easy, but not as slow as I’d like. It’s way harder to run 8:30s outside than on the treadmill. I want to keep in touch with those blessedly easy recovery miles as I head into peak mileage. Core at lunch.

Wednesday: 4 miles easy. Wis and I were both feeling banged up from 22 on Sunday, and the track wasn’t clear, so we decided to bide our time and push this week’s workout to Saturday. Strength at lunch.

Thursday: 8 miles at MLR effort. This didn’t feel great; my left knee has been bugging me this week. Still, I hit my paces and got it done. I’m counting on the steep drop in volume this week to eventually give me a boost.

Friday: 5 miles. Jogged out to the track to confirm that yes, for the first time since December, the track was clear. We were clear for takeoff.

Saturday: 6 x 600 @ 5K pace (2:04 average) with 90 seconds rest. Ran this one with Wis and we traded reps. It was great to have the company. This felt pretty good aerobically, but my legs were rusty at this pace. Still, we had plenty in the tank and it was nice to turn it over a bit after a long winter on the treadmill.

Sunday: 16 miles. Joined up with some friends for the middle miles, then dropped down to MLR effort for a couple miles before hitting the last mile around marathon pace. This felt good but I was tired after.

This Week: 45 miles. This took a while to set in, and I’ve still got some aches and pains to sort out, but I feel energized and ready for another push. Three big weeks coming up, and then we sharpen up with the taper.

Baby: My son is getting closer to walking and talking all the time. Just the other day he started babbling in a whole new way, with new sounds and inflection. It seems like there are now some patterns and associations to it, like he is closing in on his first few words. The leaders in this race seem to be “dis” (this), “dat” (that), “nana” (banana), “Dada”, “Mama”, and “moo” (moo). We will see which one he can reliably use first! He is also getting pretty good at the signs for “more” and “all done”, and also waving—though he is shy.

Just when you think you are hitting a plateau, and you get comfortable with what your child can do, another explosion of new skills seems to start right on schedule. The only thing you can count on is that everything is changing all the time.

It’s Tuesday here at The DNF because I wanted to finally spend a little time on a post and introduce my training partner, Wismith. You’ll meet him on Sunday. Let’s start from the beginning.

Monday: I did about five hours of shoveling, off and on throughout the day. By the time I was finished, there was no time or energy left for running.

Tuesday: Back on the treadmill. 9 miles easy. Very sore from shoveling.

Wednesday: 11 miles, with 30 minutes at tempo pace, mostly on the treadmill. I’m still approaching my treadmill tempos with skepticism, but I used a different treadmill at the gym today and 10 mph still felt very smooth. By the end of my 30 minutes I had progressed to 10.4 (5:46 pace). I was starting to get tired by then, but otherwise I felt good.

Thursday: MLR mostly on the treadmill. Started around 7:30 pace, worked my way to 7:05 and stayed there for a while, and then closed a little harder. Felt good!

Doubled back for 3 easy miles on the treadmill at lunch. This was surprisingly tough and threw me off for the rest of the day. I was just trying to make up some of the mileage I missed on Monday. Maybe that was a mistake. My left hip hurt.

Friday: Back to 9 miles easy with the treadmill. A little soreness left over from Thursday’s double.

Spent the rest of the day caring for a sick baby who had to stay home from daycare, and then started to feel a lot sicker myself. After getting nap-trapped in the nursery for two and a half hours (I should have started drafting this post!), my whole body ached.

Saturday: 9 miles easy again. I almost didn’t run at all because I was feeling so bad from my son’s germs, but with a down week coming up I kept telling myself that I was going to rest soon and only needed to push a little bit more. The rest of the day did not feel great.

Sunday: 22 miles, mostly in the 7:15-7:30 range, with a slight pickup over the last couple miles. Thank goodness I woke up feeling less sick than Friday and Saturday, and thank goodness I had a friend with me the entire way.

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I have been meaning to write for a while about my friend Wismith, who is running Jersey City with me as his first marathon.

Wismith seems to know absolutely everybody in the Montclair running scene, so it’s not a surprise that we eventually came to meet. I was starting 600-meter repeats at the track as he and some other local runners were wrapping up their workout. I’m pretty sure Wis followed me on Strava later that day, even though everyone had left by the time my workout wrapped and we were never properly introduced. He knows everybody in town because he makes the effort like that. This was three summers ago.

Once you know somebody even a little bit, you start to recognize them around town. We crossed paths on morning runs and would say Hey. Eventually we started running together on purpose, sometimes workouts, sometimes easy, sometimes for coffee. I joked to my wife about how rare and weird it was to be making a new friend as a man in his thirties. But it was also really nice.

When you run together, there’s not much to do but talk, so you talk a lot. By the time Wis and I were hanging out more regularly, my wife and I were looking for a place to settle down and have our baby. I had a lot on my mind. Wis heard all my takes on the housing market and impending fatherhood, endless rumination on the Boston Marathon and its qualifying procedure, stupid gripes about work, and plenty of high school track war stories. I heard a lot of the same from him: the night classes he was taking to get an advanced degree in nursing, new opportunities at work, race reports—Wis races way more often than I do—and high school track war stories. The pace always quickens when the glory days come up.

In August, I got a text from Wis that he “had an idea” and “we need to talk”. I said it felt like I was in Ocean’s Eleven and he said it was more like The Town.

Well, OK then. Whose car are we gonna take?

Wis met me right after I ran 2:57. That fall he heard about how I was rejected from Boston. The next year he watched it happen again, and then he watched me rush a buildup to Rehoboth for one last shot before my son was born. He even talked about signing up for Rehoboth to give me a boost, but I understood when he didn’t. Besides a college teammate or a pro on a contract, who does that?

Wis does, apparently. He wanted in on Jersey City 2026 to see what the marathon was all about, and to try to pace me to a 2:50.

It should be stated plainly that Wis is a better runner than me. He regularly runs half marathons south of 80 minutes, and 5Ks under 17. We are close enough in ability that running workouts together makes sense, but far enough apart that if I can run 2:50, he can destroy it—as long as he’s ready for the distance. That’s my job in this whole operation.

It has been a lot of fun to train together for this race. We haven’t shared nearly as many miles as we’d have liked because of all our days on the treadmill this dreadful winter, but we’ve been checking in on each other and showing up for the big days, like Sunday. The real fun will be in April when it’s time to rip.

Wis saw me grinding out solo 600s a couple years ago, and on Sunday he ran 22 miles because he’s training for his first marathon to help me finally secure my BQ. Most people would tell you they don’t make friends like that anymore. They haven’t met Wis.

But if they went running enough in Montclair, New Jersey, they would.

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This Week: 75 miles. Another nice big number on the board before pulling back next week. This was hard-fought and I’m really glad we got it done.

The way my treadmill tempos have been going, and the way I felt after 22 miles on Sunday, I think we could be building toward something big. I’m really good at putting limits on myself. I have trouble seeing higher up the mountain. But I want to believe I can see a little higher right now. Only a little, and only a glimmer, but maybe it’s there.

A week to rest, another push, and we’ll find out.

Baby: My son spent the week bouncing back from an illness and had a bit of a backslide on Friday. Despite some rough nights over the weekend, he seems to have finally kicked it and is happy and healthy and chatty and hungry again. He also stood without support for the first time! It was only for a few seconds, but it shows how much stronger he’s getting. We’re on our way to walking! You know what they say about walking—you gotta do it before you run.

This week was going pretty well and then ended up like something out of an Anton Chekhov story. I’m lucky I wrote most of this before the latest snowstorm hit on Sunday, or I may not have written it at all.

Monday: Forgot I was supposed to run! Took the day off like an idiot!

Tuesday: 9-mile treadmill day. It’s getting warmer, but the roads are still a mess. With the problems I’ve been having with my knees, I’m playing it as safe as possible. Core in the afternoon.

Wednesday: 24′ at tempo pace. I’m saying minutes this week instead of miles because I’m not sure my treadmill was well-calibrated. Either I’m getting stronger, and 6′ pace was easy enough that I progressed to 5:45 in the last mile, or something was off. I hesitate to take full credit until I can repeat this workout on solid ground. With all the snow we’ve had this winter, I wonder if I’ll ever get the chance. Strength in the afternoon.

Thursday: 12 miles at MLR effort. This felt awful at first, but  I eventually got into it and averaged sub-7′ pace for the last 9 miles. Really solid.

Friday: Back to the treadmill. 9 miles. Felt lousy; it could have been the hot pace of Thursday’s MLR, or it could have been baby germs.

Saturday: The nicest weather we have had in ages, right ahead of another big snowstorm. I took the opportunity to wear shorts. 9 miles. Tried to do strides but couldn’t drive my left knee. These aches and pains have been really frustrating.

Sunday: 16 miles, mostly with friends, with a fast finish once I was solo. Another run that started out awful and got much better. Stomach problems late; there was no emergency, but I think I need to take more water with the new gels I’m using. Still experimenting and trying to train my gut.

90 minutes of shoveling in the evening. The snow was heavy and falling hard enough that by the time I was done, it was piled nearly as high as when I started.

I’m struggling to imagine a future when it isn’t winter. I’m convinced I’ll be shoveling snow the night before Jersey City. I’ll be shoveling snow for my birthday in July. I’ll be shoveling snow for my son’s high school graduation. It’s never going to stop. Editor’s note: It stopped.

This Week: 65 miles, and another foot and a half.

Sitting here on the other side of the blizzard and the resulting cleanup, I feel good. A harsh winter can make you feel so helpless. My shoveling sessions on Sunday night and this morning left me feeling really low about it all. But I kept going back out there, and slowly but surely I dug us out of this mess. My hard work is a mountain in the backyard that stands about five feet high. I’m really proud of that.

I’ve said before that marathon training is about finding a way to keep going. Add “two blizzards in a month” to the list of things that will try to get in the way, and then cross it off.

Baby: My son was sick for most of this week. He has gone to daycare exactly once since February 13, on Tuesday. We have been calling in a lot of favors from his grandparents.

His daycare was closed today, because of the weather. We couldn’t call in any grandparents, because of the weather. I still had to shovel, because of the weather. I was still expected to work, because I have a laptop. I spent five hours shoveling, so good luck with that.

On the bright side of this blizzard, my son seems to finally be feeling better and got a kick out of watching his dad shovel today. He’s going back to daycare in the morning.

Maybe it will be spring, eventually.

I’ve been meaning to write more substantial posts but haven’t found the time lately. I’m happy to report that training is going well. My runs on the treadmill seem to be working wonders; I made 66 miles feel like a down week just by running 8:30s most of the way. I’m ready for more.

Monday: 55 minutes on the bike at lunch. I dialed in my heart rate by changing the bike’s resistance, rather than by pedaling faster, so this started to feel like a strength session by the end. I was aiming for an hour but was jelly-legged by 55 minutes.

Tuesday: 9-mile treadmill day. My feet and knees were still sore from my 20-miler on Sunday, but I made it through. I finally brought headphones to the gym, so I was able to pass the time with the Citius Mag Podcast. Core at lunch.

Wednesday: 9-mile treadmill day. Better than Tuesday. Strength at lunch.

Thursday: 12 miles at MLR effort. I was able to hit my usual paces, but felt more tired than usual. This is my third straight week over 60 miles, so that classic marathon training fatigue is setting in.

Friday: 9-mile treadmill day. My left knee has been a little shaky since Sunday, and it was worse today. I eventually loosened up.

Saturday: 9-mile treadmill day. Felt really easy except for my knee, but that got better.

Sunday: 18 miles, with the last 8 at marathon pace (6:23 average). Like Thursday, the faster running felt hard from the beginning, but it didn’t get worse over time. Luckily I had company today so I didn’t have to spend almost an hour thinking about how heavy my legs felt.

My right knee pain came back with about a mile to go, but I was able to run through it and close well. Felt pretty good afterward, but very hungry by dinnertime and very tired by bedtime.

This Week: 66 miles. I was amazed how fresh I felt by the end of the week just by keeping most of my mileage extremely easy (7 mph on the treadmill, or 8:34 pace). That said, marathon training stresses multiple bodily systems, so even though my heart and lungs and brain were raring to go, my muscles and joints were not always so eager. That will come.

Baby: My baby boy had blood drawn today as a follow-up to his one-year checkup, which was hard for all of us. I had to hold him while he cried and struggled as the phlebotomists worked on him. Thankfully, they got what they needed and my son quickly recovered from the stress. I wish I could say the same about myself.

Something I weirdly enjoy about being a parent is taking care of my son when he gets sick. Making sure he gets his medicine, or enough fluids, or an afternoon nap makes me feel like a good dad, and also like I’m in control. I’m sure those two feelings are related.

Having his blood drawn is sort of the opposite situation. There’s nothing I can do to make it feel better, or help him understand what is happening. I’m not in control. My baby is crying and I can’t make him stop.

Being a parent makes you helpless in ways you don’t always appreciate. I saw it in stark relief today. My saving grace was that my boy is brave.

He stopped crying while the needle was still in his arm. He took a deep breath and gritted what few teeth he has and steadied himself. He was babbling at the woman who’d drawn his blood by the time we left. It was such a relief to hear him happy again.

I was so proud.

Another solid week. I’m going to skip straight to my training log and let that do the blogging:

Monday: Off.

Tuesday: Classic 9-mile treadmill day. Core at lunch, first time in a while.

Wednesday: 10 miles with 4 at tempo pace. Ran the first 3 miles at the usual 6′ pace and the last mile in 5:55. Noticed the push, but it felt good. Strength at lunch.

Thursday: 12 miles at MLR effort. Great pace starting from about mile 5, but some discomfort in my knee in the later miles. My body has been telling me to keep up my rehab exercises, and I haven’t been listening.

Friday: 4 miles on the treadmill. Nice and easy.

Saturday: Another 9-mile treadmill day. Nice and easy, except I ended up on a wobbly treadmill that really shook up my bladder. Not fun. Rehab before bed.

Sunday: 20 miles. When I woke up, it was 3 degrees outside with a wind chill of -14. This took some finesse.

Drove to the gym, then ran to my usual long run meetup. Thank goodness some of my friends are crazy too; having company got me through some really tough miles. Pace was out the window—I barely even checked my watch.

I got back to the gym after 14 miles and hopped on the treadmill for the last 6 miles of the day. This was tough. My knee started to get tight just before 18, but thankfully never gave out on me. My feet hurt. I was tired and bored. I was glad to get it done.

This Week: 64 miles. Last week I ended up going big because of scheduling weirdness, so this was a regression to the mean, but it was a welcome one. I was very pleased to bounce back and keep putting in the miles. Marathon training is all about finding ways to keep going when you’re tired from last week, or your knee is sore, or it feels like -14 degrees on Sunday morning. I’ve had a lot of setbacks in this build so far, and I’m still fighting some of them. But I’m still fighting them. That’s how we get it done.

Baby: My son is still fighting his new teeth, probably molars, so he has been up and down this week as the pain comes and goes. When he’s feeling good, he is getting even better at walking with support. He is getting smarter and more aware and more curious all the time, too; if he sees food anywhere, be prepared for him to point at it! My wife and I are learning to be sneakier at dinnertime so he pays attention to what’s on his plate—which is usually the same as what’s on our plates, but good luck telling him that.

We just changed out his nine-month clothes and added the rest of his twelve-month hand-me-downs to his dresser. He’s on the small side, but he’s growing!

We are having so much fun. We are so tired. As a runner, I can get used to this. Let’s keep going.

I’ll skip to the end and say it was a very productive week—my biggest yet since my son was born just about a year ago. After the last few months that I’ve had, that feels great. After the last week in particular, which kicked off with a big snowstorm and rolled right ahead with absolutely freezing conditions, to put up this kind of mileage makes me feel like a maniac.

I wasn’t always this way. In high school and college, I was happy just to show up to practice and do what I was told. I didn’t have many concrete goals—just “get faster,” which puberty mostly accomplished for me—and so I didn’t take much interest in my own training, or the sport at large. Like school, running was something I was pretty good at without having to think too much, and I was happy to let it stay that way.

At the same time, running—like school—had wormed its way into my identity. I took pride in being captain of my high school team, even if I didn’t take enough pride to make sure I actually did a good job at it. So when I barely made the team as a walk-on in college and immediately got hurt, I didn’t question whether I should try to come back. I was so set on running, even without any higher aspirations, even without fully appreciating how tenuous my position on the team was (I got cut as a junior after some of my best performances since high school), that I underwent two surgeries without hesitation.

My priorities were completely out of order, to the point of being non-existent. If you told that kid, even after he went through those surgeries, that he would someday wake up at 4:45 on a Thursday to run 12 miles in single-digit temperatures, and then go to work, he would call you crazy.

But he was crazy. He had no idea why he was doing any of the things he was doing, right down to why he was running in the first place. I’m glad he got those surgeries, because it means I can still run today, but I’m amazed how little he thought about it.

Since then, I’ve immersed myself in the sport, taught myself how to train, and found my why. Just like in high school, I love the pursuit of getting better at something—but I know that now, and I think about it every day, and I can call it what it is. It’s not just a vibe I’m following. I have one last thing to prove, to myself and anyone who cares: that I am good enough to run Boston.

With all that settled, I’d be crazy to stay in bed.

Monday: 7 miles, very easy in the snow as I took stock of the local roads and park paths. Not great, but not bad. My knee held up too, in spite of the poor footing. About four hours of shoveling snow between the morning and evening.

Tuesday: Easy hour on the treadmill with a jog to and from the gym, totaling 9 miles. Getting a membership is already looking like a really smart idea. Missed core because I wasn’t at the office; my son woke up with a fever and had to stay home. Rehab in the evening.

Wednesday: 4 miles at tempo pace (6:00) on the treadmill. 10 miles on the day. Strength at lunch.

Thursday: 12 miles at MLR effort, outside. Absolutely freezing. Struggled with the cold the last few miles.

Friday: Another 9-mile treadmill day. Heart rate reading was really high. Decided I’d consider it a problem if it happened two days in a row.

Saturday: More treadmill, 9 more miles. Heart rate was nice and low. Looks like Friday was a measurement error, or a fluke.

Sunday: 18 miles. Thank goodness I had company; I joined my usual long run crew from miles 6 to 13. Made the decision not to carry water, as it would draw too much heat out of my hands, but I took three gels at miles 5, 10, and 13.

I’m increasing my carb intake for this marathon block by switching to SiS Beta Fuel, which has about twice the sugars of my usual gel. Elite athletes (and sports scientists) are exploring the limits of carbohydrate intake during exercise, with promising results, so I’m following their lead. I’ve been worried about how my stomach will tolerate it, but so far so good—even without water, as I learned today.

I tried to pick up the pace in the last few miles, but my knee hurt a little after 16 miles and I had to back off. It’s frustrating that I’m still not fully healthy, but I’m trying to take these long runs as signs of progress. Last week I made it 14 miles before the pain started, and because of the difference in pace I spent a lot more time running pain-free today. I need to be diligent, but I’m moving in the right direction.

This Week: 74 miles. Thanks to the snowstorm last weekend, I shuffled things around to give myself my highest 7-day total since my son was born, by far. I don’t plan to hit this mileage regularly until later in the block, but this week was a fantastic proof of concept.

Baby: We are pretty sure my son’s first molars are coming in. He has been extremely irritable all week. When he’s not in pain, he’s as happy and playful as ever; he just learned pointing, and he is getting even better at cruising around with support. Unfortunately, he’s in pain a fair amount of the time, and even Motrin can only help so much. We are doing our best to support him as he tries to tough it out. Being a baby is hard.

I didn’t even start writing this post until Tuesday, when it was already late. That’s what happens when an entire family recovering from illness has to host a party and then gets snowed in immediately after. It was quite a week.

Monday: Another day completely off to recover from being so sick on Saturday morning.

Tuesday: One more off day. I can’t remember which days I did rehab in the evening this week, but I know I did rehab at least once or twice. Missing my daily hand-written logs in times like these.

Wednesday: 7 stubborn miles on the treadmill. Strength in the afternoon, but only one circuit. I was definitely still tired from my illness.

Thursday: 10 miles, mostly on the treadmill at 8 miles per hour. This felt pretty good for the circumstances.

Friday: 8 miles, outdoors, at a surprisingly moderate pace. Was scouting locations for my long run, which moved to Saturday to accommodate the snow. Decided on a tried-and-true road loop in Montclair where I’ve done similar workouts before.

Saturday: 15 miles with 2 x 4 miles at marathon pace (6:27 average). This was a tough one, and I couldn’t have done it without my friends. My knee got weak in the last hard mile, which was disappointing but still huge progress compared to where I’ve been.

Sunday: Snow day. Aside from two hours of shoveling, this was a nice relaxing day with my wife and son. Rehab in the evening.

This Week: 40 miles. Not bad at all for a week that started on Wednesday! I’m nearly back where I want to be. If I can keep my knee pain-free, I know I can get there.

Baby: My son is one! I can’t believe it. He’s still so small, and yet he’s gotten so big! It is all a whirlwind of emotions. My wife and I are so happy and proud.

We had our families over for a party ahead of the storm so we could all celebrate together, and it was a lot of fun. He got some wonderful gifts, which he now loves and plays with all the time. He was starting to get the hang of ripping wrapping paper by the end of the day. He tried penne vodka for the first time. He liked it so much he ate it until he puked! That is a glowing review!

My wife also baked him a pumpkin cupcake, because he really likes pumpkin, and he inhaled it! Another five-star review. We were so happy watching him enjoy everything so much. It was so nice to be able to give him a fun birthday.

Most recently, my son has learned pointing, which has been a really interesting window into what he’s thinking. Every day I feel like we connect with him a little more, and it makes me feel like a better dad. Here’s to another year of getting to know each other, and eating our favorite foods until we get sick! From the mouths of babes, such wisdom.

It’s pretty appropriate that this post is late.

As recently as Friday this blog was going to be about recovery, momentum, and forward progress. Today, it’s still about recovery, and still about momentum, but not the kind of momentum that leads to forward progress.

After my PT appointment last week, I settled into a rhythm of nightly rehab exercises as follows:

• 3 x 10 Knee Extensions with Squeeze
• 3 x 10 Single Leg Glute Bridges
• 2 x 10 Clamshells
• 2 x 10 Side-lying Leg Raise
• 3 x 8 Step Down
• 20 Calf Raises
• 4 x 20″ Wall Sits
• 2′ Balance

Even better, I added this to the routine without sacrificing Core on Tuesday or Strength on Wednesday. This was going great. I could run a little farther every day before my knee started to feel weird, and I stopped once it did. By Friday I was cruising six miles uptempo with minimal discomfort.

The problem is that on Thursday, my son was sick with a stomach bug. By Friday night, I was sick with a stomach bug. In the wee hours of Saturday morning, I threw up some blood and got myself to the ER. By the normal hours of Saturday morning, I was home again after an IV bag of saline and two hours of sleep. My wife, after taking care of me before my hospital visit, was working with four. Our son, by this time, had gotten over his stomach bug and was working on an ear infection. He was cranky. We were cranky.

Saturday was very hard for all of us.

Sunday was a little better. After barely eating all day Saturday because I was too queasy, I was finally able to eat a modest amount of bland food. My son’s antibiotics had another day to do their work. Naps were taken. Chores got done. But my 15-miler with 2 x 4 miles at marathon pace did not.

The longer I am unable to fully jump into this marathon block, the more worried I get that I’ll never be able to. When my friend and I were already hurting after a couple weeks of Pfitz’s 18/70 plan, I decided to rewrite the plan to soften things up for us and give us a chance to get to the start line healthy. Now, I can’t even get to the start of the training program healthy.

This blog was supposed to be about rewriting Pfitz’s program. I’m still going to talk about it now, but I feel less smart about it and a lot more desperate.

As the gold standard for dedicated hobbyists like me, Pete Pfitzinger’s plans have a lot of good ideas about training baked in. Unfortunately, those ideas are baked into plans that are trying to squeeze as much quality into as little time as possible. It’s a tightrope walk. One little slip on a snowy day and I lost two weeks of training. As a new dad, I need more margin for error.

For my first marathon back in 2019, I cobbled together a plan based on stuff I found online. That went well enough, right up until I bonked hard around mile 18. For my next one, I picked up a new edition of Daniels’ Running Formula and followed the 2Q plan. I ended up as a DNF there, but it wasn’t the fault of the training—I repeated the plan for a big PR a few months later.

While training with the 2Q plan, I came to a few principles that have worked for me while writing my training since:

• Long runs always count as quality. Trying to squeeze two workouts into a week after even an easy two hours on Sunday never seemed to click for me. This is the bedrock of the 2Q plan: a long run, with or without pace work, and one other workout every week.
• The hour run is undefeated. I read somewhere that fitness gains increase significantly at 30 minutes of exercise, and again at 60 minutes, so at some point around adopting 2Q I also tried to run for at least an hour as many times as possible every week. Whether I got fitter from the magic of 60 minutes or just from consistent higher mileage, it worked, and it stuck.

This basic approach got me to three PRs, 12 minutes in all, over the course of two years. I abandoned it for Pfitz because that’s what everyone else seems to be doing, and because it seems to be working, and because his principles make sense. That said, I think I need to make Pfitz’s principles work for me. Specifically:

• I need more work at marathon pace. Pfitz’s plans prescribe more of these workouts than I usually do, and the workouts themselves are bigger. This is the most specific work in any marathon plan, so it makes sense to do more of it.
• The MLR is a great idea. In past plans, my non-long-run quality day was often the second-longest day of the week. That’s the way it’s drawn up in the 2Q plan. But the MLR is more marathon-specific than, say, 800-meter repeats at 5K pace. So why is my interval day totaling 12 miles? I can spend some of those miles better elsewhere.
• I can’t neglect Strength, Core, or Strides. It may seem silly, but having the simple exercise routines from Advanced Marathoning has made it so much easier to go to the gym twice a week. I’m already seeing improvement. I want to keep this up, along with regular strides and rehab.
• Weekly routine is important. Pfitz’s plans are hyper-optimized to the point that workouts can fall on Tuesday, Friday, or even in place of the usual Wednesday MLR. I don’t like this. It may cost me a few workouts over the course of the training block, but a consistent routine serves my busy life better.

Most of Pfitz’s core principles actually fit into my pseudo-2Q plan pretty well; going forward, I’m going to run my workouts on Wednesday, with the MLR on Thursday. I’m going to keep the marathon-pace workouts and do my best to complete them, though I may soften them a bit—14 miles at marathon pace during peak mileage is almost too daunting to comprehend.

None of this is to say I think I know better than Pete Pfitzinger, who has led countless runners he’s never met to new PRs with his training plans. What I do know is I know myself, and that has been the most important knowledge in writing my training these last several years.

My attempt at 18/70 was off to a really rocky start, and maybe it wasn’t all the plan’s fault, but I have to trust my gut here and figure out the best way forward. We’re doing it my way.

Monday: 4 easy. Rehab in the evening.

Tuesday: 4 easy. Knee felt a little bit better. Core at lunch. Rehab in the evening.

Wednesday: 4 easy. A little better again. Strength at lunch. Rehab.

Thursday: 5 easy. Better still. Skipped rehab after a long day taking care of a sick baby.

Friday: 6 uptempo. Just a little tightness in the knee. My nightmare begins in the evening.

Saturday: Spent the wee hours of the morning in the ER. Terrible day.

Sunday: Utterly depleted. Almost as terrible as Saturday.

This Week: 23 miles. A fine rebuilding week until the rebuild fell apart.

Baby: As you may have gathered from the stomach bug and ear infection, my son had a rough weekend. Fortunately, he has his appetite back now and the antibiotics seem to finally be controlling his ear pain. His fever is gone. My wife and I are hopeful he will be happy and healthy for his first birthday in a few days. Whether we can say the same for ourselves remains to be seen.