Performance-Enhancing Jerry

Are the Dead on the list of banned substances? WADA, if it doesn't already, needs to know about these guys.

I don’t listen to the boys very often anymore, but on my three-hour run today, man, a red-hot Franklin’s Tower gave me a jolt. I can see why they don’t allow MP3 players in most competitions. But maybe I could hire someone to trundle alongside me, at a key moment during the CDA run, blasting the Greek 9/11/81 Franklin’s that features crackling, lightning-bolt Jerry riffs alternating with delicious meanderings all powered along at a freaky double-time pace by Phil? (The China-Rider from the following May—a sunny Sunday afternoon back at the Greek—would be a fine mid-race accompaniment.)

So, yeah, a three-hour run. Not in the plan. “Tomorrow, I'm in the pool for 3500 yards and then out for a 10-12 run with some marathon-pace intervals,” I wrote fewer than 24 hours ago. Well, you see, what happened was, I started running, the sun came out, the Tabor trails were soft, the music was sweet (see above) ... so I just kept going. Actually, the other thing that happened was that I realized that I do 10-12 mile runs all the time, and a long run every 10 days to two weeks really ought to be part of the program. Next time I’ll plan better for it. Today, six or seven miles in I remembered that it was nearly May and by then the Portland sun, even with the temps in the low 60s, packs a punch. So about midway through I headed home and grabbed a cap—and a PowerBar, about 8 oz. of water and some body glide for that region where chafing might occur.

I ran the first half at about 10 minutes to the mile, which sounds slow, and is slow, but is not as slow as it sounds. This was a hilly run. In fact, according to my Garmin it featured 6,500 feet of climbing and descending. The second half I consciously picked up the pace to around 9 minutes per mile, which brought me to 20 miles in 3:05. I immediately downed a gel and a Hammer powdered recovery concoction. I felt great. Man, my long run is very solid. Tomorrow, I’ll see how the long swim is faring (so he says).