2011 Baltimore Marathon Recap

Well, I did it. 26.2 miles. It wasn't pretty, but I finished, and that's all that matters. Here's how it went:

4am - Wake up, eat breakfast (two pieces of whole wheat toast with peanut butter and a banana). I wanted to eat early so I had enough time for everything to get digested and be able to clear my system before the start of the race.

~6 am - Leave for Baltimore. It's about a 45 minute drive, so we should get there about an hour early. Well, the directions for how to get to the parking lot from the freeway weren't exactly clear, so it took us a bit longer to figure it out, but we still got there in plenty of time.

First order of business, find a bathroom. M&T Bank Stadium (where the Raven's play) was open, and much closer to where we parked, so that's where I went to use the facilities. Unfortunately, there was a really long line, so I ended up waiting about 15 minutes, meaning I had less time to stretch and make my way to the starting line.

~7:50 - Time to start making my way to the starting line, and it's really crowded and people are not moving too quickly towards it, so of course, I start freaking out a little, because I don't want to miss the race. And of course, I get there a little late, but fortunately, there's a ton of people running, so I just kinda  jump into the middle of the pack and go.

Off I go...

One of the things that kinda sucks about the start of a marathon, is you have a ton of people of varying running abilities all crowded together - in this case 5,000 - and it's impossible to move through people to get enough room to run. Plus, I didn't want to waste energy weaving in and out of people, so I kinda just went a pace that easy enough to hold in the amount of room I had.

My original goal was to try to be under 4 hours, which means I would have to average around 9 minutes per mile. I planned on going out rather conservatively and just run at an easy, relaxed pace to save energy. As it would turn out, the longer you run, the harder it is to pick up the pace (who would've that would be the case?).

One thing about the Baltimore Marathon course is that it's extremely hilly. You can tell, by looking at the course elevation map, but in no way does that prepare you for what you actually face when running the race. The hills aren't too steep, but they go on for miles...and miles... And when you add in gusts of wind over 35 mph in all directions, it's not a fun time.

But back to the race. Around the 3rd or 4th mile, we ran through the Baltimore Zoo, which was even cooler than I thought it was going to be. They had a bunch of the handlers out with various zoo animals. There was a raven, an alligator (about 3 feet or so), a penguin, a rooster (they have roosters at zoos??), and probably the largest rabbit I've ever seen. Seriously, it was about the size of a beagle. It had to have weighted close to or over 20 pounds.

Any chance I had during the race, I was giving people on the sides high fives. The crowd support was amazing. They definitely helped get me through it, and boy would I need it.

Around mile 9, I started feeling a little tight in my legs, nothing too bad, but of course I started thinking about how it was already mile 9 and I was showing signs struggling. Not the kind of attitude you want to have when you're running 26.2 miles. I kept pushing on, trying to only stop to walk for the water/gatorade stations.

I was able to continue at a reasonable pace for the next few miles, but just after the halfway point, I really started to feel it, and those thoughts started to creep back into my head. I'll be honest, I definitely was not as prepared for this race as I could have been. I had missed a decent amount of training in the last month and a half, and it definitely showed.

By around mile 15, I was mostly walking, and it was a struggle to maintain any sort of forward movement faster than walking pace, but I kept telling myself that there was no way I was going to quit and I was going to make it to the finish by any means necessary. I had figured out long ago that my pre-race goal of breaking 4 minutes was extremely foolish. It's one thing to hold an 8 minute mile pace for 5-8 miles (which I had been able to do during training), but doing it for 26.2 miles is a completely different story.

~Mile 18, near complete mental breakdown. I seriously felt like I was going to die. My feet were killing me, I was having trouble sustaining any sort of running pace (if you can even call it that at this point) and I all want to do is be done with this nonsense. Ok, stop that, gotta keep moving forward, just keep moving forward, you're going to make it, just don't stop moving.

After another mile or so, I started to calm down and was even able to run for the better part of a mile. Then a giant hill, and we run around a lake that's probably about a mile and a quarter all around. While it was beautiful running along the lake, the lack of buildings does nothing for stopping the wind. It was blowing in all directions and every time I started to build a solid rhythm, it seemed like the wind was always in my face. But still I soldiered on. No giving up at this point, not when I'm getting so close to being done.

More hills, and then around mile 23, probably the most glorious sight: a long, straight, downhill section. And as it turned out, it was mostly downhill the rest of the way.

The finishing stretch was probably my favorite part of the race, for obvious reasons, but what was really cool was that we got to run though Camden Yards (the Orioles stadium). I had only been to Camden Yards once previously, and it's probably my second or third favorite ballpark that I've been to (AT&T being my favorite of course). After you cross the street, there's a huge gate leading into the ballpark, and there was a police officer there encouraging everyone as they ran by and he said what were probably the best words of encouragement I heard all race: "only 300 meters to go!" At that point, I was already moving at a pretty strong pace (I had been ever since the stadium was in sight), and when I heard him say that, I went into full overdrive. Those last 300 meters I felt stronger than I've ever felt before. I was 300 meters from completing my goal. The finish line was literally in sight, and I was going to give everything I had left to get across it as fast as possible.

Almost there!

And then, it was over. I had done it. 26.2 grueling miles. It took everything I had to make it through it, but I finished and I'm pretty proud to say that I now I have done something that less than 1% of Americans will ever do in their lifetime. A saying I saw on countless shirts of other runners in the marathon: "Pain is temporary, but pride is forever". That couldn't be more true. I have never felt any amount of pain that I felt the last 8 miles and after the race, but I know that nothing can take away the fact that I finished it.


Aside from the amazing crowd support, there was also great support from the Baltimore Police Department, who were stationed at every intersection to ensure that nobody was able to drive across the course while there were people running.

There were also a number of interesting characters running the race, from a guy in a powder blue tuxedo, a guy who juggled 4 bean bags the ENTIRE time, and all the various get-ups that people were wearing. It really was an amazing experience, event if it wasn't always a pleasant one.

All in all, I'm glad I did it. It didn't necessarily turn out the way I thought or wanted it to, but like I said already, I finished it and that's all that really matters.

Is it something I would do again? For right now, I can't say. It was a great experience, but I don't know if I really want to put myself through that again. Of course, if I were to prepare fully for it the next time, I'm sure it would work out a lot better.

Juggling Guy

Powder Blue Tux Guy

Success.

9 Days.

As I get nearer to my first marathon, I find myself becoming consumed by it. I'm constantly thinking about it, checking the BRF Facebook page, hell, I'm even having dreams about running in it. I'm so excited for it to be next Saturday because a) I'll finally be running my first marathon, b) I'll be done with my first marathon, and c) I can get into the gym and back to normal activities. That last one is basically because this taper is starting to make me a little stir-crazy.

Next week is definitely going to be hard for me to focus because with every passing day, I'll be one day closer to my marathon, and it's going to be difficult to sleep. However, given my experiences swimming in big championship meets in college, I think I should be able to manage relatively well. Granted, a marathon is a completely different monster, and a totally new experience, but I figure I'll likely not get a ton of sleep the last few nights anyway, so as long as I keep myself well hydrated and stretch a lot, I should be ok.

Next Thursday and Friday is the BRF Health and Fitness Expo. Basically it's where you go to pick up your race bib and get your goody bag, as well as check out all the cool things the vendors have on display and for sale. While there will be many shoe companies with the latest, top-of-the-line running shoes available, this is not the place to buy the shoes you run your marathon in. It's probably not even where you'd want to buy shoes for a 5k you'd be running one or two days later. Besides all the featured products, etc. that are available, there are also a lot of other cool services and amenities that the BRF offers,  most notably the GEICO pace groups, which provide experienced marathoners who will pace whoever signs up for the group to a specific time (I think it's in ten minute intervals from 3 hours to 4 hours, and then fifteen minute intervals from 4 hours to 5:15). I'm still trying to debate whether or not I want to sign up for one of these, mostly because I'm not sure I want to even-split the entire race, and I also want to be able to listen to my playlist and focus on my own race. I would like to be able to have some sort of pacing besides my watch, so I might try to tag along with a group until I decide to pick up or ease up on my pace. Another service offered by the Baltimore Running Festival is the ability for people to track runners via text message or e-mail, which is perfect for me since none of my family will be able to attend the race. For those interested, go to this website and enter my name into the runner info. It will give you updates when I cross the halfway point (13.1 miles), 19.5 miles, and when I finish. If you sign up for text updates, it says you have to respond to the text message they send you when you register in order for it to actually work.

In other news, the 49ers are 3-1! Even after they started 2-1, I was still pretty skeptical because both their wins were rather unconvincing, and they lost a game to Cowboys, who never should have had the chance to come back into that game. But all that aside, they really showed me, and other Niner faithful something this past weekend when they scored 21 straight points to overcome a 20-point second half deficit against a team in the Philadelphia Eagles that in the preseason it seemed everyone (including themselves) was picking to go to, and probably even to win the Super Bowl. I'm not going to get overly excited, because there's still three-quarters of the season left, and thus plenty of time for them to blow it, but I must say that at this point, I am pleasantly surprised and cautiously optimistic that they will have a good season. That being said, they also do play in the NFC West, which is in all honesty the worst division in the NFL, which should give them a pretty decent chance of winning it and making it to the playoffs.

Today is also the first day of the NHL regular season, and while the Sharks have been perennial regular season dominators and postseason chokers, I have a feeling this year could finally be the year they put it all together and win it all. I also thought last year they were going to ride the momentum of the Giants' World Series victory to a Stanley Cup, but...they didn't.

There's a decent chance I might go to Spain the first week in April (my cousin Tyler is spending a year there teaching English in Cuenca, Spain, you can read about his adventures here), depending on my finances and airfare. I'm pretty excited about the prospect, and even though it would only be a week, it would still be awesome. Traveling in and around Europe is relatively cheap, so there's also the possibility of visiting other countries as well, but again, it would only be a week, and there's only so much you can do in a week, so I wouldn't want to spread myself too thin.

Well, back to marathon stuff. Even though I haven't even run my first marathon yet, I'm already highly considering registering for the 2012 San Francisco Marathon, which is at the end of July. Obviously I have to wait and see how next Saturday goes, and based on that experience decide whether or not I want to do it. It would be perfect though, since if I end up going to Spain, the week I get back would begin my 16-week marathon prep cycle. But again, I'll have to wait and see if I even enjoy myself and determine if it's something I want to do again. However, chances are since I already have the idea in my head, any positive (or basically anything other than totally abysmal) experience will probably lead to me registering with a week (let's be honest, probably the next day). Plus, it'll be another chance for me to get home for a couple days.

And while I'm on the subject of endurance events, I'm also thinking about registering for the DC/Maryland Tough Mudder and/or the Maryland Warrior Dash. If you're not familiar with these events, they're trail races (with lots of mud) with a bunch of obstacles. They're essentially the same, except that the Warrior Dash is about 5k (3.1 miles) and the Tough Mudder varies between 9-12 miles (for those interested, more info here and here).

Well, that was definitely more than I was planning to talk about, and I likely won't provide any updates until my blow-by-blow recap of the marathon (hopefully to come the Sunday after the race but I'm not making any promises). Wish me luck!

20 Miles to Taper

Three weeks from Saturday, I will be running 26.2 miles in the Baltimore Running Festival. It's been a long, interesting preparation, but I'm not quite there yet. That's because this Saturday's 20 miles will be my longest training run yet, and the longest I will complete before October 15th.

Believe it or not, I'm actually pretty excited to run 20 miles. Not only will it give me a pretty good idea of what I'm capable of when it comes to the real deal, but it's also my last run before taper starts! For those of you who have swam or run (I think they do that for track?) competitively, you know exactly what I'm talking about, and you know why I'm excited. For those less in the know, you usually cut back on the length and intensity of your training a couple weeks or so ahead of your championship meet or competition (in this case, my marathon). The idea is that you've already put in the training and built up a certain level of performance over the course of training, and by letting up on your training intensity, you allow your body to relax and recover.

The decreased amount of activity often leads to an increase in energy levels, which is one of the best and worst things about taper. Think of it as compressing a spring (a very powerful spring) over an extended period of time, and then releasing it the day of the big event. As you get further into your taper, your energy levels skyrocket, and it's really hard to sit still. You're accustomed to a certain level of activity, and suddenly you're slowly weening your activity level, but not your energy reserves.

Back to the marathon. I've been reading a lot about the Baltimore Running Festival and every time I do, I get more and more excited about it. As I already explained in a previous post, the turnout for this event (at least from previous runner's accounts) is amazing. It's also making me feel a lot better about the hilliness of the course. There's nothing incredibly steep, just more gradual hills, which is good, because running down steep hills is probably one of my least favorite things to do, while running up a gradual hill isn't too bad.

So that's what I have to look forward to. It's going to be a great experience (probably pretty painful, but hopefully not too much), and I'm looking forward to it. I'll do my best to provide updates each week and of course a play-by-play of my first marathon experience. Stay tuned...

It's September Already...??

So it's been almost a month since I updated this (oops), and I will try my hardest to be more frequent with the updates (although I can't make any promises). A lot has happened in the last month or so, most notably last week where the east coast experienced its strongest earthquake in over 100 years as well as a hurricane. Both were underwhelming.

First the earthquake. Being from California, this wasn't a strange or new experience for me, but it was clear the same could not be said for the majority of the DC population. It was a 5.9-magnitude earthquake, not terribly strong, but for a region where any sort of earthquake is a rarity, an earthquake of 5.9 is a pretty big deal. And you could tell from the reactions of the people here. It was like the world was ending or something. Nobody knew what was going on, or what to do. Everyone immediately ran out of their buildings and into the middle of the streets (THIS IS NOT WHAT YOU WANT TO DO). I found the whole situation rather amusing, but I guess for someone who's never experienced an earthquake before, it was probably a rather traumatizing experience.

Then there was Hurricane Irene. Oh what a disappointment that was... As someone who has never been anywhere near a hurricane, I was pretty excited, especially because every news station was making a pretty big deal out of it. Of course I didn't want there to be a ton of destruction or anything, but I was excited about the possibility of hurricane-force winds. And then, nothing. Wind speeds less than 50 mph? Come on Irene... Yes, parts of the east coast were hammered pretty hard (sorta), but they (the news stations) had made such a big deal out if it that I figured there would be a bit more fireworks.

The Giants are killing me right now, and I really don't want to talk about them, so I won't. I think there's still a good chance they could come back and win the NL West, but they're not making it easy to watch right now...

It's a little over a month until the Baltimore Marathon, and I'm starting to get pretty excited. And by excited, I mean intimidated. 26.2 miles is a long, long way to run. The furthest I've run so far is 16 miles (I have another 16 to run tomorrow) and the fact that I'm going to still have to run 10+ miles on top of that is a bit daunting. Although as more information about the event is posted, the more I'm looking forward to it.

For the first time ever, the marathon course will go through the Baltimore Zoo, which should be fun. Unfortunately it's at the very beginning of the race and it's also for less than a mile, so I'll probably get to see the animals for maybe 5 minutes.

From what I've read, this event has been growing more and more every year, and it seems like there is a pretty good amount of support for it in the area, which will be great because it's always nice to have people cheering you on.

There are two characters towards the end of the route that I'm especially looking forward to, Eye of the Tiger Guy and Gummy Bear Guy. It's pretty self-explanatory really, but I'll fill you in nonetheless. Eye of the Tiger Guy has been going for the past 6 years or so (maybe more, I'm not sure). He sets up around mile 23 which is typically an uphill section (I'm not sure if he's at the bottom of the hill or in the middle). He has a stereo on top of his car blasting Survivor's "Eye of the Tiger" on repeat. Oh, and he's also dressed in a full tiger suit and has been known to run the length of the hill with struggling runners. Should be pretty awesome. The Gummy Bear guy is not dressed up as a giant gummy bear (unfortunately) but he does have a station set up with a bunch of huge bowls which are, you guessed it, full of gummy bears. Exactly what you need for those last few miles. Simple carbohydrates. Energy.

I also don't have much to say about the 49ers, because I honestly don't know what to expect this year. The NFC West is wide open, so anything could happen, and I'm cautiously optimistic that Jim Harbaugh will be able to turn Alex Smith into the quarterback we thought we were drafting when we took him first overall in 2005. Who knows.

Well that's all I have for now. I'll do my best to provide more updates (I really will), especially on my marathon preparation, and I definitely plan to give a play-by-play account of the marathon (once I've recovered of course).

Camelbacks and Tennis

So that will be the last time I ever run with a Camelback... Other than the fact that I was constantly fidgeting with it, that it was throwing me off my usual rhythm, or that it was just plain uncomfortable and in the way, my run was fine.

I was actually surprised how much the Camelback affected my running, because it's not one of the bigger models, it's basically just the size of the water reservoir with a couple of pockets on it. It's great for biking and canvassing, good for hiking, but apparently terrible (at least in my opinion) for running.

Saturday night we had tickets to the semifinals of the Legg Mason Classic, and annual tennis tournament in Washington DC that's part of the US Open series. I had never been to a professional tennis match before, and was excited to see it live for the first time. Unfortunately, Andy Roddick had dropped out several weeks ago, and Mardy Fish had also withdrawn several days before the start of the tourney, so already two of the higher seeds and well-known/recognizable players were out.

The top overall seed was Gael Monfils, a French player ranked 7th in the world, and as it turned out, he was in the match that we had tickets to go see. He was matched up against John Isner, an interesting match-up because Monfils is probably one of the the (if not the) fastest players in men's professional tennis, and while Isner moves surprisingly well for a guy who's 6'9", his game is mostly based on his huge first serve and powerful forehand. Definitely a match-up that would have been very interesting to see.

Oh wait, did I say would have been? Yeah...The one problem with professional tennis (or any level of tennis for that matter) is that they'll take the players off the court if there's any hint of rain. And wouldn't you know it, the forecast for Saturday night called for a 70% chance of rain. Awesome.

When we got there, it was sprinkling. Barely. However it had been raining relatively hard earlier so they were busy drying off the court and trying to prepare to start the match as close to the original time as they could. Unfortunately, drying a tennis court isn't as fast and easy as you may think, because apparently there can't be any moisture whatsoever on the court (which makes sense, you wouldn't want any twisted ankles or worse, and given all the movement and constant changing of direction I can understand the attention to detail).

While we waited for it to stop raining and for them to dry off the court, we walked around the complex and found a smaller court that had a canopy over the seats. This turned out to be one of the more entertaining segments of the night because not only did Monfils show up on the next court over and start juggling and playing around with a soccer ball (presumably to stay loose), there were also a group of ball boys/girls, an older man (probably a director or someone of relative importance at the tournament or complex), and a woman with a camera who were making what looked like some sort of training video or video demonstration for how to properly perform one's duties as a ball boy/girl.

It finally let up, and they finally dried off the court, so everyone went back to the stadium and they brought out the players for their warm-up. That's probably one of the coolest things about tennis that you rarely see (if ever) in other professional sports, opposing players warming up together.

Of course, they didn't even get as far as practicing their serves before it started raining again, leading to the players being removed from the court and the grounds crew once more turning on a bunch of heater-fan things (I'm going to call them that because I don't know what they're actually called and because they're basically a combination of an industrial fan and a leaf blower, and I'm assuming there's some sort of heating mechanism to help facilitate the drying of the court). Anyways, after about 10-15 minutes of this, all the while the rain still coming down, they give the signal to cut the heater-fan things, and everyone retreats from the court.

At this point we're sort of wet, but not really because it really wasn't raining that hard, just a constant amount of barely anything. We go back to the covered side-court and decide that if it hasn't stopped raining in the next 15 minutes, we'll just leave and go home. Since none of us had paid for the tickets we had, we didn't feel too bad about leaving. Well, it stopped raining just before our set cut-off time, so we decided to wait it out until they had finished drying off the court (for a third time) and watch the match.

So they finished drying off the court, the players came out and got through all of their warm-ups, and they were finally ready to start (hooray!). They got through one game, which Isner won mainly because of his serving, and three points (Monfils was up 30-15 on his first service game) when it started raining again and they promptly pulled the players off the court and back into the dressing room. We sat in the stands for little bit to see if there was any chance of it letting up, but it didn't, so we left.

It was disappointing that we were able to see so little of the actual match, but none of us really wanted to sit through rain delay after rain delay. We ended up following the score on a computer later that night and they actually got through almost two sets before they had to stop again due to the rain, at 11 pm. I have no idea how long into the night the match actually went, but all I know is that it wasn't the longest match of Isner's career (see his match last year in the opening round of Wimbledon) and that Monfils eventually at some point in the wee hours of the morning (I'm assuming) finally won it after the rain let up enough for them to finish.

Hopefully my next professional tennis experience will be better.

[Insert Post Title Here]

So yeah... About posting twice a week, that clearly hasn't happened... But I'll keep trying, I promise.

Running has been going OK. Not too terrible, not great, just OK. I've missed a few days, but for the most part, I think I'm doing a decent job trying to stay on schedule. It's not so much that I'm having difficulty waking up at 4:45 am (It's kinda hard to ignore your cell phone blasting Van Halen's "Eruption" and vibrating under your pillow), it's convincing myself that I want/need to get out of bed and go run. In fact, I've gotten to the point where I'll wake up several minutes before my alarm even goes off, which is good, but also bad because I sometimes turn off my alarm, roll over, and go right back to sleep. Fail.

Nevertheless, I feel like I'm coming along rather nicely. I feel great, the soreness I was feeling when I first started has long since gone. Either I've just gotten used to running on a fairly consistent basis, or my decision to switch shoes has made a huge difference. I'd like to think it's a bit of both, with a majority of the credit going to my Saucony Kinvaras. Seriously, they really are the most comfortable running shoes I've even had.

Last week was one of the most exciting weeks in sports in recent memory. Not only was it the week leading up to the MLB trade deadline, but also the beginning (finally) of NFL free agency. As I predicted last Monday, the activity in the NFL was fast and furious. It was awesome. However, as a 49ers fan, it was a little disappointing because while other teams were making trades and signing (well agreeing to terms with) new players, all the 49ers did was sign a kicker (granted it was David Akers, a pro bowl kicker, but seeing how there were much more glaring needs, it was a bit disconcerting). There had been rumors that the Niners would make a serious push to sign Namdi Asomugha, considered by many to be one of the best, if not the best shutdown corners in the NFL. As nice as it would have been to have been able to land such a prized free agent, the more I think about it, the more I'm glad the 49ers didn't sign him, because they would have had to spend a large amount of money to get him, which would mean less money to spread around to sign other players.

Another exciting recent development in the world of sports was the USSF firing Bob Bradley (finally!) as the Men's National Team Manager and appointing Jurgen Klinsmann (YES!!!) as his replacement. As you may or may not know, I haven't been the biggest supporter of Bob Bradley or the US National Team in the past 4 years. I'll be honest, they probably wouldn't even rank in my top 10 favorite national teams. This of course has nothing to do with me being unpatriotic, but more with the fact that I couldn't stand watching the US Men's team play. Their shape, their organization, and just their overall strategy really never made sense to me. This is mainly due to Bob Bradley, because after all, it was his system, and it just wasn't working. Hopefully Klinsmann will be able to bring a different approach to the US National Team, not only in his tactics, but hopefully in his player selection as well.

I'm slated to run 11 miles tomorrow, which will be my furthest run thus far in my training. The 5 miles I ran this morning felt pretty good and I feel like tomorrow shouldn't be too bad, it won't be too hot and hopefully not too humid. Since it will take me longer than an hour to complete, I'm going to try running with a camelback so I'm able to stay hydrated. I've tried running with a water bottle, but it's kind of awkward holding it in your hand while running. I'll do my best to try to recap how it went as soon as possible, maybe even after I've cooled down and stretched afterwards. I'm also going to the semifinals of the Legg Mason Classic (an annual men's tennis tournament in DC) tomorrow night, so I might wait until Sunday so I can recap that as well. I've never been to a professional tennis match before, and while there won't be the biggest names there (Mardy Fish and Andy Roddick both dropped out before the tourney began, and none of the really big names in men's tennis are there), there should still be two great match-ups to watch.

If there's anything in particular you think I should talk about, let me know! Hope everyone's doing well.

That's all for now.

Random Thoughts.

So yeah... I'm not doing a very good job of updating this regularly. I'm going to try get better at that (I promise!), and hopefully I'll be able to do at least two each week (slightly wishful thinking, but we'll see how much time I have). My plan right now (that I literally just thought of) is to do one random one during the week, and then another one sometime on the weekend recapping my marathon training for the week. Seeing as Saturdays are my long run days, we'll see if I have the energy to do it afterwards, so I reserve the right to put it off until Sundays (it's my blog damn it and I'll do what I want).

Anyways, today is Monday, but not just any Monday, it's the end-of-the-NFL-lockout-Monday! Finally, after listening to ESPN update us daily (was that really necessary??) on the current situation with the lockout, it's finally over and the owners and players have agreed to a new CBA. And now we get to listen to ESPN talk about it 23.5 hours a day! They would be covering it 24/7, but for some reason unbeknownst to me they continue to put Sportsnation on the air. I'm sure Colin Cowherd will have some unintelligible thing to say about it, but seriously, that show is the worst thing on television (well, at least on ESPN). I would tell you what I think of Colin Cowherd, but I'd like to keep this a PG as possible and  I'd rather not spend the entirety of this post about him, but suffice it to say I think he's a worthless POS and never has anything important or intelligent to say about anything.

Back to there finally being football again. The one good thing about there being a very abbreviated "offseason" is that free agency is going to be ridiculous. In a good way. By this I mean that instead of weeks (even months) of speculation about players signing new deals or being traded, it will all happen in a matter of hours or days, which for me - being the impatient person that I am - is awesome.

I was recently introduced to a band called The Joy Formidable (thanks Johann!). They're a three-piece alternative band from Wales, and they make enough noise that you'd think there were at least three times as many people in the band. They're one of the most original bands I've heard recently and though they only have one full-length album, it's an amazing album. They're definitely a band worth looking into. Here, I'll even put one of their songs right here so you don't have to waste the two seconds it would take to look them up on Youtube (hopefully it works):

For those of you on the West Coast (the best coast), you've been lucky enough not to have to endure the heat wave we've been experiencing for the past week+. Upper 90s with humidity through the roof and the heat index consistently near or waay over 100 = awfulness personified. Today, it rained A TON (for about an hour), which cooled everything down nicely. ...Unfortunately the forecast says it's going to be back up towards 100 by the end of the week.

The new Old Spice commercials with Fabio are ridiculous. That is all.

X Games 17 starts this week. Super stoked.

For those of you not brave enough to sit through an entire 90+ minutes of Spanish broadcast, or didn't know or don't care, Uruguay won their record 15th Copa America, thus proving that last summer's World Cup semi-final appearance (and but for a Diego Forlan free kick off the post at the end of regulation, very nearly a WC finalist) was no fluke. But seriously, for a team with Uruguay's pedigree (2 World Cups and now 15 Copa America titles), it shouldn't be that surprising that they've done as well as they have in recent tournaments.

Well, that's enough for now. Hopefully by Saturday afternoon I'll have run over 20 miles this week and I'll let you know how that all went.