On the Run

Summer proved a nice time to read, crossword, and run. Despite the time to sleep in, I continue to rise at pre-dawn hours to make miles in the cool morning climate along the river and through the park near my house.

Since the start of the school year nearly one month ago, the dust has yet to settle. With typical rapidity, the Woodland Joint Unified School District continues to approve changes to educational approaches, school schedules, and district policy. As a result, the Pioneer High School teaching staff is diligently trying to navigate a schedule with seven 52-minute periods. Furthermore, these seven periods split on Wednesday and Thursday to a rotating block, with students attending periods 2, 4, and 6 one day, then 1, 3, 5, and 7 the next, for 93 minutes. I find myself struggling to make use of my prep time, and it always seems like I'm shoring up last-minute elements of the day's agenda in a frantic rush before the bell sounds.

I also stepped into the position of head cross country coach. When the position was offered, I figured the job would provide running time, and thus allow me to continue working on weekly mileage goals while coaching and supporting like-minded runners. This notion proved completely misguided, and now I find myself facilitating workouts that meet the varying needs of a variety of running types. When we run intervals on the track, I am able to jog in the opposite direction and provide encouragement and critique. However, if I send them on long/easy runs, they're strung out across town, and my attempts to join them prove either shortsighted, or just plan ignorant. I learned the hard way when, as I tried to keep two fatigued runners talking through the workout, another set of students had to hail a ride from a passing teacher to stave off an asthma attack.

With the running world unable to coexist with the coaching world, I've found myself doing something I once chastised my teammates for doing: Two and three times a week, I rise at 4:30 a.m. to put away 8 or 10 miles before work. With this decision I've had to eat crow, essentially, because in addition to finding a way to make it happen, I've started to absolutely love it. I'm sure the end of daylight savings and the onset of an autumn chill will have me humming a different tune, but for now, I'm a convert to the 5 a.m. run.

Two things to point out beyond the obvious difference in temperature and the fact that, for the rest of the day, the workout is behind you: 1.) I've seen an inordinate number of meteors; 2.) I enact my revenge on the automobile by running right down the middle of the street, which at that hour is free from obstruction.

The training has worked, and my speeds have increased along with my overall mileage. I've graduated to a higher training group on the racing team, and as a result I will face harder workouts as October--my biggest racing month this year--approaches. I'm slated to run in October 2's Urban Cow half marathon, then slated to recover and revamp for October 31's Marine Corp. Marathon in Washington D.C.

Hopefully in the interim I will have figured out how this cross country monster works...