Never Tell Me The Odds!: From the Hospital Bed to Club 71

Let it begin! Let it begin! Let it begin! The taper at least. The real insanity comes next week.

The taper has now officially begun although it doesn't necessarily feel like it with the holidays right here. At least it's nice to not have to try and fit in longer runs. I've also started to have those weird running dreams.

Last week featured a dream wherein I was trying to put my bib on my clothing at 11:00pm the night before the 10K, but couldn't find the bib because I had yet to go the Expo despite having run the 5K that morning. So yeah.

Week ended December 24th: 23.87 miles

Sunday December 18th: Planned rest.
Monday December 19th: 3.56 miles in 58:08.
Tuesday December 20th: 3.58 miles in 59:59.
Wednesday December 21st: Planned Rest.
Thursday December 22nd: 3.56 miles in 58:32. This also felt like the beginning of the holiday chaos.
Friday December 23rd: 6.64 miles in 1:48:27

Also I went to see Avatar: The Way of Water this morning. I did not enjoy. I felt like the movie was too long and spent too much time sort of revisiting the original film in slightly different ways. While I'm not the biggest fan of the first film, I still find it to be a visual and immersive spectacle. I didn't feel that way this time around. I doubt I'll be seeing any more Avatar films. That's my opinion. For those who love it, I hope they enjoy it.

Saturday December 24th: I was supposed to wake up early and get my 6 mile run in. But at 5:30am when the alarm went off, I was not feeling it. For whatever reason the last couple of days have been rough and I haven't been in a good place mentally. However, I was going to the 49ers game in the afternoon, so not waking up early risked not getting the run in. In the end, I decided that extra sleep felt more important so I went back to bed.

As it turns out, extra sleep worked wonders for me. I woke up in a better mood. I was finally excited to my first ever NFL game and as a lifelong 49ers fan this meant more. I really enjoyed the 49ers museum seeing so many of my childhood NFL memories replayed out was fun. I never properly realized just how much faster the NFL is than college football until I saw the NFL in person. I've attended many college football games over the years so the speed really stood out. Had a great time at the game. Hopefully it won't be my last NFL game in person, but with Sundays belonging to Church, I need the NFL schedule to work in my favor to attend more games which is beyond my control. But I did get to do it once so that was nice.

As things would turn out, my little sister forgot some things for the stockings and when I got back from the game, I had enough time to run down to the grocery store and pick them up. Naturally, I concluded that why not tack on about 5.5 more miles after running to the grocery store. So I did. 6 mile run on Christmas Eve happened anyways carrying a bag of peanut butter cups. Because why not?

6.53 miles in 1:51:23.

After dinner, it was off to my sister's for Christmas Eve. My little nephew had been told that I would not be coming over until after Church on Christmas afternoon. This was really just to surprise him as he came downstairs Christmas morning to find I had arrived during the night. We then found pictures on my phone which showed Baby Yoda driving my car with me asleep in the passengers seat to his house and tucking me in. Naturally, Baby Yoda also ate all the Christmas cookies, including the ones left for Santa. Poor Santa. Baby Yoda has swiped his Christmas cookies 3 consecutive years now.
 
Week ended Sunday January 8, 2023: 54.02 miles

Monday January 2: 2.63 miles
Tuesday January 3: Travel to Disney World!
Wednesday January 4: Race Expo!
Thursday January 5: Walt Disney World 5K! 3.33 miles.
Friday January 6: Walt Disney World 10K! 6.71 miles.
Saturday January 7: Walt Disney World Half Marathon! 13.53 miles
Sunday January 8: Walt Disney World Marathon 27.82 miles. These things can happen when you get distracted by Expedition Everest!

Race reports will come soon. The Marathon set a new PR by a few seconds, so I'm excited about that.

January 2023 total miles: 56.86

I planned to take 2 weeks off after Dopey, but that morphed into 3 weeks after coming down with something a few days after Dopey. I don't feel completely normal yet, but I decided this past week that a return to running with careful vigilance to make sure I don't overdo it might help me feel better.

Week ended Saturday February 4, 2023: 8.16 miles

Sunday January 29: no run. Watched Sleeping Beauty to celebrate the anniversary of my favorite animated move ever.

Monday January 30: no run.

Tuesday January 31: 2.84 miles in 0:46:21. I had hoped to run 3 miles, but felt like my sore throat was starting to not like the exercise, so I opted to start the cooldown early. Something is better than nothing.

Wednesday February 1: no run.

Thursday February 2: 2.72 miles in 0:53:53. A lot slower than Tuesday. Called it short again in the hopes to feeling better.

Friday February 3: no run. Work is now very intense for a few months so running becomes something that can require a significant sacrifice of what little spare time I now have.

Saturday February 4: 2.62 miles in 0:42:60.

Honestly, I had hoped to hit 10 miles this week. Between still getting over either allergies or just bad post nasal drip and some necessary house cleaning, that didn't happen.
 
Congrats on the PR! Even with Everest- amazing!
Thank you. I'll have more details when I finally get around to writing race reports, but for the moment, here's a preview.

This particular marathon reminded me about the importance of preparation. I'm not very fast. Running is something I do for health reasons, both physical and more recently, mental. My previous efforts to really increase speed also brought with them increased injury. Perhaps I will attempt those speed increases again with no races on the horizon anytime soon, but for this race, I decided I would rather be slow and injury free.

I started as close to the start of the last corral as I could get. Once I settled in doing my thing, which includes character and/or photo stops if I want to, I found myself somewhere between the 6:30 pacing group and the 6:45 pacing group. I prefer to avoid the pace groups if I can because my run/walk/run ratio is different from theirs. If congestion keeps me "stuck" with a pace group, I'm not able to go as fast I want to.

As we got closer to Animal Kingdom, I began to give Everest much more serious consideration than I usually do. As I checked my phone for time and remembered @DopeyBadger projected Everest times, I knew it was possible. When the moment came, I actually turned around after missing the Single Rider line (runners only) and went for it.

It was a surreal experience. I felt a mixture of I can't believe I'm doing this with a fear of "oh no it's shut down every time the ride stopped." Honestly, after getting off the ride, I just felt weird for a while. I'm sure it's a combination of the abrupt shift from running a marathon to riding a roller coaster and then back to running a marathon. I was sure that my splits were not good, but after reviewing the actual data, it looks like my post Everest miles were nowhere near as rough as I felt they were at the time.

After exiting the ride and not seeing any sign of the balloon ladies of hearing any warning whatsoever of sweep point, I knew I was good enough. For Disney races, the only time goal I have is finish. Don't get me wrong as I like to finish faster relatively speaking, but these races are about the experience for me and I do not want to give up the various photo and character stops if I feel like it in the pursuit of a time goal that might physically wipe me out for the post race fun I have in the parks.

Based on the rumored character leaks, none of them interested me enough, so I briefly considered a just keep moving strategy to finish. But as I thought about things I might want to do in the parks after the race and any potential surprises not on the rumored character list, I decided to pursue my usual 1:20 run/30 second walk intervals and build up my cushion. At a few of the out and backs along the course, I saw the balloon ladies way back in the distance and knew that I was fine. Eventually I found myself once again caught up with and passing the 6:45 pace group. So it felt good to recognize what consistency had brought. I would have finished anyways and thus met my goal. But it stands as an important reminder to me about how much my intervals can pay off even though they are challenging.
 


Week ended Saturday February 12, 2023: 11.07 miles. Honestly, this was a rough week. I'm still adjusting to longer hours at work and not liking that. This is normal and something I always deal with, but I also never look forward to it. So the middle of the week fell off because I perhaps was running too fast for how I feel right now, but towards the end of the week, I got to feeling a bit better.

I had hoped to hit 3 mile runs this week, but I'm either not quite there yet or being lazy. Most of this week consisted of 2 mile runs and then a 10 minute or so cool down. I also remind myself that right now with increased workload, stress, and a corresponding decrease in free time, something is much better than nothing.

Sunday February 5th: 2.69 miles in 50:06.
Monday February 6th: 2.61 miles in 43:50.
Tuesday February 7th: nothing.
Wednesday February 8th: nothing.
Thursday February 9th: nothing.
Friday February 10th: 2.7 miles in 44:25.
Saturday February 11th: 3.07 miles in 51:13. I finally felt up to 2.5 miles before the cool down so I'll take it.
 
As per usual, I'm really bad at doing kind of regular update to this training journal, but once again I'm attempting to restart it however late I may be as per normal.

As you may have noticed, there's a pretty dramatic title change that needs an explanation.

Running wise, this year had been better than last year. I once again finished Dopey, only this time I rode Everest during the marathon and then still broke my PR. So hooray for keeping up intervals after Everest. Running always falls by the wayside in February through April if there's not a race looming in April. The nature of my job for better and for worse.

This time around I was much better at starting back up again and stayed fairly consistent until late September when everything went haywire. In early September, I started to deal with back pain, sometimes really bad, but ultimately manageable. Kept up my training because I knew what was coming. Interestingly enough, that consistency may have made my hospital stay a much less awful experience.

During the cool down walk home portion after finishing a run the last Thursday evening in September, the back pain became very intense and my breathing suddenly went from normal to very short and sharp, with no ability to take a deep breath whatsoever. The pain was such that once I got home I couldn't even lay down on my bed for more than 5 minutes. I thought the back pain would go away so I decided to rest. After a few days of sleeping in the recliner and rest, I realized that this wasn't going away.

When the doctor saw me, she ordered me to get an x-ray and the next thing I knew I was being ordered to head to the ER. So much for a painkiller like I thought would happen. A CT scan at the ER showed a massive fluid build up in my chest and I was admitted to the hospital. So days after completing a run as per usual, I found myself in a hospital bed hooked up to oxygen and a chest tube in my back draining the fluid. I had been completely independent days ago and now couldn't walk more than 5 feet by myself given all the stuff hooked up to me.

I'll spare you the daily details, but thankfully a few days later, I had started to improve dramatically, the chest tube was taken out and I was sent home. However, I remained under strict orders to do not much more than 3 10 minute walks a day until I was stronger. In the hospital, I asked the doctor about the marathon and he said that as long as I continued to improve, he saw no reason why I couldn't and so here we are nearly 2 weeks away from Dopey.

After 3 weeks of working my way up to longer sustained walks and feeling stronger, I decided to start running albeit slowly the very end of October.
 


Holy smokes!! That sounds scary. Glad to hear you are doing better and still on the path to Dopey! Good luck! :)
Yes, it was a wild roller coaster ride, but definitely not the Disney variety. Before October the last time I had been in the hospital was as a newborn.

I alluded to how running likely made this whole ordeal "better." Here's why. First off, I asked the doctors if there was anything I could have done to prevent this. They said no and that if I had waited too long, I would have required surgery to get the fluid out of my chest. So the run that ended painfully may well have saved me from surgery.

Second, I had extra motivation to move around as much as possible including short hospital walks and/or marching in place as much as possible to help the process of moving the treatment chemicals around to break up the chest fluid.

Third, at one point during the daily vital signs checks, one of the nurses commented that my heart was strong. I think running plays a part in that for sure.

And last, but not least, I think the goal of running the marathon helped provide more motivation to make sure I consistently did the walks the doctors told me to and provided motivation to increase the duration of those walks instead of being content with where I was.

The return to running has been an interesting one. Only now when I look at the numbers do I realize how crazy this looks.

I ran less than 6 miles in all of October. The last 2 days of the month. I ran 91 miles in November. I'm on pace to reach 100 miles this month.

The first week or so back was as difficult as I expected. The per mile pace was rough. I had to constantly remind myself I would get stronger so long as I kept it up. A couple of under pace miles early on helped remind me that I still had enough in there, just needed to strengthen it.

This training cycle may have finally taught me to train slow. Maybe. In previous cycles, I either went too slow or too fast. Perhaps because I scared myself with too slow. The last couple of weeks or so, I finally realized that I already know that the fast enough pace is possible. I've proven it to myself. So I'm trying to essentially not care about my training pace. Training runs at more than 16:00 per mile are not an issue because I have already had training runs under 16:00 per mile. But if I learn to accept slow runs now, then I am hopefully reducing injury risk now and giving myself less wear and tear for when I actually need to run less than 16:00 per mile.

In essence, below race pace does not really matter right now because I'm between 16:00 and 17:00 per mile. I already know it's not that much more demanding to go under 16:00 per mile, but by not worrying about it now, I give myself the best opportunity to run healthy and injury free, if undertrained.

As I have done before, I can to some degree rely on what I will call psychological muscle memory. Because I've finished 4 marathons, then I already know how to power myself through when they get difficult. And I can work on assorted mental strategies now to be ready in case the going gets difficult earlier than "usual."
 
Week ended December 23, 2023: 23.67 miles

Monday December 18th: 3.44 treadmill miles in 59:07. I don't like running in the rain, so the treadmill it is.
Tuesday December 19th: 3.53 miles in 1:02:37.
Wednesday December 20th: Planned rest.
Thursday December 21st: 3.54 miles in 1:01:09.
Friday December 22nd: 6.73 miles in 1:52:09. Longer cooldown because Christmas lights and Yoda reasons.
Saturday December 23rd: 6.43 miles in 1:46:39.

Now, I just hope to stay healthy. I'm not dealing with anything so that's good, but that doesn't mean I throw caution to the wind.
 
Week ended December 31, 2023: 105.36 miles

Sunday December 24, 2023: 3.98 mile family walk (not reflected)
Monday December 25, 2023: 3.56 miles in 1:01:23
Tuesday December 26, 2023: 5.09 miles in 1:16:24. Marathon tempo, but likely too fast for where I'm at now.
Wednesday December 27, 2023: Planned rest.
Thursday December 28, 2023: 3.6 miles in 1:03:40.
Friday December 29, 2023: 3.44 miles in 1:00:53. Treadmill run due to rainy weather.
Saturday December 30, 2023: 3.58 miles in 0:58:35.

2023 total miles: 582.38.

Next stop Dopey to Disneyland!
 
Wow! Thats a crazy story. I’m cheering for you!
Thank you. I appreciate it.
I had not noticed the title change until today. WOW! That is both scary and inspirational.

Good luck with the marathon!
Thank you. While it's always exciting to go through the entrance to Disney World on the shuttle, it was more emotional tonight as I've been reflecting a lot the past few days on a wilder and more unexpected ride than usual.
 
Brief update from me.

2 races in the books, 2 to go. I started both races faster than a normal training run, so I forced myself to slow down even though the pace felt comfortable.

I eventually walked the 5K to keep going slow. I did maintain intervals during the 10K in case Sleeping Beauty was on the course given the focus on the 40s through 1964 today.

However, once I got that photo, I did light intervals for a while and then decided to abandon intervals for a straight up walk.

The weird corrals for the 5K/10K worked out great for me in corral D, but tomorrow is back in F so I have less cushion.

But I feel strong and it's been a long time since a run felt this easy.

Billy trying to throttle me back in condensed training is paying off now.
 
I'm not very consistent at updating this training journal and often do so very late with minimal race reports, but after this last experience, I think it's valuable for me to do so and hopefully helpful to someone else. At the very least, I hope it can remind others that your muscle memory from having done it before does matter. Missing significant time during a race training cycle due to illness and sometimes injury does not have to derail your hopes of finishing.

As I mentioned earlier, the doctor cleared me for the marathon while I was still in the hospital and days before they took the chest tube out. So while I knew I was medically cleared to run, I also understood that it would take some time to get back into race shape and that I had to accept that I would likely be slower. I still placed a lot of internal pressure on myself and as Billy will attest to, I clung to a bad idea of trying to squeeze in an 11 mile long run for the very long time on my new modified training schedule. He patiently continued to answer my questions and explain the risks I was undertaking given the circumstances. Eventually, I came to realize than an 11 mile run as opposed to 9 would make very little difference in my ability to finish the marathon on race day, but because of the ramp up, I could get injured and thus absolutely destroy my chances. From experience, I already knew that 9 miles would be sufficient to finish the Half Marathon and thus keep Coast to Coast possible so I decided to conserve the big ramp up for when I needed it.

January 2024 Total Miles: 100.03. Yes, I made sure to reach 100 last month. I felt like I was too close to not go for it.

Week ended January 7, 2024:

January 1, 2024: 2.68 miles. Last training run before the madness.
January 2, 2024: Travel to Walt Disney World.
January 3, 2024: Walt Disney World Marathon Weekend Race Expo!

January 4, 2024: Walt Disney World 5K 3.55 miles in 1:06:48.
January 5, 2024: Walt Disney World 10K 6.61 miles in 2:00:36.
January 6, 2024: Walt Disney World Half Marathon Grumpy Edition Due to Rain 13.1 miles. Between counting walk to corral, and the bus, and then finishing up at the resort, I had no interest to put anymore time in after reaching 13.1. The time is a mess.
January 7, 2024: Walt Disney World Marathon 27.69 miles in 6:47:40. Dopey Challenge number 5 in the books!

Week ended January 14, 2024:

January 12, 2024: Disneyland 5K 3.55 miles in 1:06:48.
January 13, 2024: Disneyland 10K 6.84 miles in 1:44:02.
January 14, 2024: Disneyland Half Marathon 13.85 miles in 3:26:38.

Note that most of the time I use a Sunday through Saturday mileage week. However, for Disney race weekends, I use a Monday through Sunday mileage week because I like the Disney races to be in the same week.

Monday January 15, 2024 through Saturday January 20, 2024: 0 miles recovering from Dopey to Dumbo.

Week ended January 27, 2024: 12.26 miles. I took it easy because I just wanted to reach 100 miles for the month.

Monday, January 22, 2024: Planned rest
Tuesday January 23, 2024: 2.9 miles in 57:52
Wednesday January 24, 2024: rest
Thursday January 25, 2024: 3.14 miles in 0:57:54
Friday January 26, 2024: 3.04 miles in 0:58:50
Saturday January 27, 2024: 3.17 miles in 0:58:22

Week ended February 3, 2024: 8.63 miles

Sunday January 28, 2024: 1.79 miles in 0:41:03. More like a walk with my sister and nephew, but it still counts towards 100 miles. Perhaps I'm too focused on reaching that number this month.
Monday January 29, 2024: Rest
Tuesday, January 30, 2024: 3.7 miles in 1:00:03.
Wednesday January 31, 2024: 3.14 miles in 0:54:19 on the treadmill. I planned this run to guarantee that I hit 100 miles and then not worry about it.

My knee is feeling a bit off, so I decided to pack it in for the rest of the week. With no races on the horizon, making sure everything is right is paramount now.
 
Week ended February 3, 2024: 8.63 miles. All of them before February began.

Week ended February 10, 2024: 2.63 miles. It's a very busy time of year at work so my hours are mounting along with my stress. My desire to run goes up against my desire to relax when I get home. It's just hard to fit in right now with no live races on the horizon.

Week ended February 17, 2024: 8.84 miles. While this looks better, that's exclusively a function of my Princess Enchanted Virtual 10K medal arriving yesterday. Between a very busy schedule next weekend and rain in the forecast for this weekend, I chose to run the virtual 10K last night. So that's done.

Hopefully, I can figure out a good balance between work and running this next week. The good news is that I did get in for the Disneyland Halloween Half Marathon Weekend, so that will at the very least provide good motivation to get back to consistent running after work quiets down in a couple of months.

And for another attempt at a race report.

October 3, 2023: 2,451 steps. All of them exhausting.

Wednesday January 3, 2024 Marathon Weekend Race Expo:

Knowing that today would be my only chance to get great sleep for a few days, I woke up a couple of minutes before the virtual queue for race merchandise opened up. Got a pretty good return time, I so I stayed in bed for about 30 more minutes, showered, and then headed to the Expo. I could have stayed in bed even longer. After waiting for my return time to open, I went in. I anticipated that this race weekend would be far more emotional than usual given that the races are all taking place 3 months to the days of being in the hospital. I'm usually not a very emotional guy, so this could be interesting.

The first wave hit when "When Can We Do This Again?" from Wreck It Ralph played. Because 3 months ago today, I went to the doctor in the morning and would find myself being ordered to head to the ER in the early afternoon, and admitted to the ER before 6:00pm. So it's a bit surreal to realize that 3 months, I was only capable of short, shallow breaths and completely unable to hold any kind of breath for even a few seconds. I had to walk very slowly and was usually winded after maybe a minute or two., if that long. Yet now I was in Disney World at the race expo preparing for my fifth Dopey Challenge with the long awaited return of Disneyland races one week later. As it would turn out, the cancellation of Disneyland races wound up creating a cascading effect that changed my views on running and resulted in me running the marathon, which had been something I had previously vowed I would never do. And after being unable to run for just over a month in the middle of marathon training 3 months ago, it just hits differently.

I got a photo with Chip and Dale in their tuxedos along with Mickey and Minnie in their formal wear. Those two mice are among my oldest friends in the world as it were and the hug from Minnie just hit differently given that 3 months ago, I had very real worries that my Coast to Coast in one week dreams would be destroyed.

As for the merchandise, I always vow to cut way back at the "next" expo and usually fail. Given both Coast to Coast in one week and the roller coaster of the last 3 months, I feel pretty good about managing to somewhat rein myself in.

I "only" walked out of there with the race weekend jacket, the Dopey jacket, mileage pins for each race and challenge, the medal holder Loungefly bag, (which turned out to be a great purchase I must say), the Marathon I did it shirt, and the Dopey humorous shirt of Running is No Miner Feat. My mom disapproved of me becoming a runner (because she has serious problems in her life), so this Dopey shirt just feels like a perfect way to continue to rebel against her even though she has not been a part of my life for many years now. In short, I know she disapproves of it, so seeing it and remembering what running has done for me just makes me smile. And I love a good runDisney humorous shirt. See also the 2023 Chip and Dale "Running Again Tomorrow" shirt, the assorted sleep challenge shirts for non runners (which I have purchased to celebrate sleeping the following weekend), and so forth. I gave myself permission to get 2 race jackets and the marathon I did it shirt precisely because of the circumstances surrounding this weekend. Next time I vow to be better. And might actually succeed.

After picking up my big, I ran into my flight friends from yesterday. We were on the same flight from California to Orlando and started talking about the races while waiting for the connecting flight into St. Louis. We all got a kick out of the small world coming into play at Disney World of all places.

As is my tradition, I checked out the race medals on display and was pleased to see that, at least based on how the medals were the displayed, my preferred Coast to Coast (the rectangular suitcase one) would be the back to back race weekends medal. RunDisney took a lot of heat, some of which as too harsh, about the Coast to Coast medals on social media. The rectangular one grew on me and I like how it displayed both state outlines on the front of the medal and had the castle spinners. Having the Partners statue on the back was a very nice surprise. I will also note that the finish on the medal looks so much nicer in person than in photos. It doesn't photograph well.

I think reception would have been a little bit better if runDisney had shown the back of the medal when they revealed, and honestly, I wish they wouldn't have left it up to guessing as to which medal was for which track. There was no confirmation until Disneyland Race Expo the next weekend, but I'm getting ahead of myself.

I headed back to my resort and nearly went to Disney Springs for dinner, but after just missing the bus, I decided to just eat dinner at the resort. Day one is in the books. Now the fun begins tomorrow with the 5K.

Final step count for the day? 13,599. This time around, I'm paying close attention to step count as a way of looking back on where I was 3 months ago and how far I had come.
 

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