Hi Bob!

On the walk down from the athletes village to the start line, I struck-up an acquaintance with a guy about my age named Robert from El Paso. We had a lot in common since we had both been in the Marine Corps and knew some of the same places.

His number was in the 12-thousands and mine in the 9's, so we had to go off to different corrals. Actually, I could have moved back to his and probably would have if I had thought of it at the time. Anyway, it would have worked out well, had I done this since his time was 1:14 better than mine. I am pretty sure I could have done a bit better if I had someone to run with. In fact we might have both had better times since I ran a faster pace at the beginning and the time he gained was all in the last couple of miles. I could have spurred him on at the start and he could have returned the favor at the end.

I never saw him even though he had a faster time because the times are net and he probably crossed the start line a minute and a half or two behind me.

Results:

9899 Pecchia, David B. 46 M Chelmsford MA USA Checkpoints 5k 10k 15k 20k Half 25k 30k 35k 40k 0:23:47 0:46:56 1:10:12 1:34:02 1:39:15 1:57:56 2:23:20 2:49:41 3:16:10 Finish Pace Projected Time Official Time Overall Gender Division 0:07:57 3:28:28 6792 5749 948

The above is cut-and-pasted from the baa website.

I will edit and comment on the results later.

Later: I feel much better now.

Here are my 5k splits: (24:48 is an 8min/mile pace for a 5k)

5k 23:47 7:40/mile Gain 1:08

The course has a lot of downhills in this section and one is very fresh at the beginning, but the course was too crowded to go as fast as I wanted. I had expected to loose a couple of minutes in this part, but I didn't so this was a good first 5k.

10k 23:09 7:28/mile Gain 1:39

Only by the end of this 10k did the runners thin to the point that you could go at whatever pace you wanted. But by then I was feeling a little tired. Not "I would like to stop now" tired, but 6 miles is 6 miles and you feel it. So I just tried to maintain the pace I was on.

15k 23:16 7:30/mile Gain 1:32

The pain and fatigue were beginning to mount, but I was able to maintain my pace.

20k 23:50 7:41/mile Gain 0:58

It was becoming harder to maintain pace: Muscle soreness as well as degrading aerobic potential made maintaining pace very difficult. Earlier, this pace had been easy, now it took a lot of effort to maintain. I think it was somewhere in this section that I passed by the Wellsley Scream Tunnel. This gave a new burst of energy even as I resisted all offers for a kiss.

25k 23:44 7:40/mile Gain 1:04

I crossed the starting line around 6 minutes after the gun and a small goal was to make-up that time--such that the official time when I crossed the finish would be under 3:30. By the 25k mark I had done this, but was so worn-out that that I was never able to maintain this 6-minute lead.

30k 25:24 8:12/mile Loss 0:36

My pace began to decay and I hadn't even reached the hills.

35k 26:21 8:30/mile Loss 1:33

The hills (heartbreak is one of three, which all seemed about as bad) were murder. At 20 miles your legs are pretty sore even on a flat course. The early downhills around Hopkinton add to the damage. The thing is that such hills on a normal run would be nothing, but after 20 miles and lots of down hills, they really sap your will to go on. Nicely, crowds congregate on the hills to exhort you on.

40k 26:29 8:33/mile Loss 1:41

8:33 seems a lot faster than I felt like I was going. I tried experimentally to go a little faster. I would add a bit of effort and feel myself getting out of breath, but I didn't feel like that effort caused any more speed.

I saw a co-worker along the start of this section and it was nice that finally, among the million people lining the course, there was one that knew me. Actually, my wife and the older two of our daughters were on Boylston at the right time, but never spotted me. I wouldn't have heard them anyway since the crowd was deafening by this point.

26.2 Miles 3:28:28 07:57/mile

I had three goals going in:

1)Finish--check

2) Qualify for next year--check

Do better than in the Bay State Marathon--Fail. 3:39 longer. But, the bay state is a really flat course and it loops, so a head wind one way becomes a tail wind the other way. Boston is all one direction and we had the wind in our faces the whole way.

The End

The temperature was perfect for long distance running. In the hollows, I would pull up my long sleeves, at the crest of hills the breeze would hit and I would pull them back. I carried my gloves pretty much the whole way; they were almost essential at the start and not enough at the end.

Boston is colder than the outlying areas due to being close to the water, and downtown Boston was much colder and windy than Hopkinton. Mylar blankets were handed out at the end, but it only took some of the edge off. My hands went numb and stayed that way until about an hour later when I was riding home on the Orange Line.

The out-processing order was as follows, with plenty of very helpful and pleasant volunteers all around: --Cross the finish line.

Get a bottle of Poland Springs water.

Get a space blanket.

Helpers put a sticker on the blanket to hold it shut.

Turn in your timing chip in exchange for a medal.

Get a plastic bag full of edible goodies.

Get a banana and put it with the rest of the goodies.

Decide not to get a free Power Bar.

Go to the end of a very long line of buses to pick-up clothes/cell phone & etc. In all fairness, it is the start of a very long line of buses for some runners--someone has to be at the end.

Find an empty spot to put on sweat pants, change shoes, put on dry shirt and jacket.

Go to the family meeting area and find the "P".

I spot my wife, look below her and spot children, notice the younger one spot me and hear her say, "Momma, look! There is daddy!"

I could barely keep up with them on the walk to the Back Bay station. Once on the train, blessed relief: Warmth, a soft spot to sit and a chance to finally eat the banana, some nice salty chips and finish the 2nd water bottle.

A tale of two cities

When I was at the convention center today picking up my race packet, I stopped at the NYC Marathon kiosk to sign-up for that run. I know I could have just done this at home, but their site is pretty incomprehensible, so I thought it might be nice to have help standing by.

The only way for someone like me to get into the NYC marathon is by lottery: Their qualifying times are significantly harder than Boston's are and yet the race is bigger--38,000 v. 25,000. My age-based qualifying time for Boston has to be under 3:30, while NYC requires a 3:10.

An initial reaction might be that the New York race is just bigger and more competitive and that is probably what they want people to think. It isn't true.

Neither organization makes it easy to crunch their numbers. But here is what I found:

NYC has about 38,000 runners and in 2008, 997 came in under 3:00 and 3,651 under 3:25. Meanwhile Boston had 25,000 runners in 2008 and about 1,282 were sub 3:00 and 5,293 were under 3:25.

Boston attracts a lot more good runners than NYC. It would be difficult to determine what percentage of the NYC runners get in through qualification v. lottery, but I would guess around 90% were the latter.

What one would have to do is search the results for each age/sex category and then find the ratio of runners who came in under the limits. For instance: I found that there were 1470 US Male entrants in 2008. Only 106 of them ran under 3:10.(which is the NYC qualifying time for men that age) That is only about 7%. Just do that for every age/sex group and then scale the percentages by the proportion each group contributes to the total...etc...

I question the wisdom of NYC setting the qualifying times so hard. Their times are not realistically obtainable for most people--so there is no incentive to work at it. Boston's are pretty hard, but most people can, with sufficient effort and a little genetic luck, qualify.

Lots of fun in store...

We took tomorrow off to take the kids to the circus. I think we will get a good price for them, even though they don't know any tricks yet.

The circus it at City Hall Plaza in Boston, though it is quite distinct from the circus that "mumbles" runs in the upside-down building next door. Anyhow, after the circus, we will go down to the Hynes Convention Center to pick-up my Boston Marathon race packet.

That night my wife is going to a ladies-only 1980's party--so it will be a full day all around.

The usual hectic schedule for Saturday and Sunday, then Monday is the marathon! If you want to track me, the information on how to do that is here. I am 9899

Maxine? Really?

All of the dialog is taken from some of the comments on the Phil Spector guilty post on Althouse' blog.

Story here.

All singing from the same choir-book...

Yesterday I was listening to NPR on the way home from work and there was a show about inflammatory speech coming from right wing pundits. That is fine, par for the course: Back when President Bush was being compared to Hitler, they had a show which dissected the pathology of the left-wing flamethrowers. Right? No. Actually, they had lots of shows where the left wing flamethrower was an honored guest of the show.

Then, today this comes to light:

Rightwing Extremism: Current Economic and Political Climate Fueling Resurgence in Radicalization and Recruitment

From the US Dept of Homeland Security.

Ah, this is rich. The folks who could never call people who fly airplanes into office towers terrorists without feeling a little icky, now are all too happy to use the term on their political opponents.

Happy Easter!

via Chip Ahoy

A rainy dreary Saturday

I tried to have things cancel-out today: I had to do my taxes--something I don't like to do, but have to do. So, I made some nice yeast doughnuts too--something I like to eat, but shouldn't.

It was all good. The recipe worked out okay, I changed it slightly in that I added orange zest instead of nutmeg and then glazed with orange juice glaze. Also, will be getting a refund as always. Which is why it is odd that I hate doing my taxes. I don't mind refunds.

One step forward, one back.

Vermont became the first state to use its legislature to make gay marriage legal. Taken in a vacuum this is the desired method for changing laws in that it provides legitimacy in a way that judicial rulings do not.

That is all fine & good, but the Vermont case is not as clear-cut as one might expect. Back in 2000, Vermont became the first in the nation to legislate civil unions. The Vermont legislature was (and probably is still) far to the left of the population of Vermont. And so they would have liked to have instituted civil unions/gay marriage long ago and they finally got the chance to do so when the Vermont Supreme court handed -down a ruling requiring either/or. The legislature happily obliged and then-Governor Howard Dean quietly signed the bill.

Even as the bill made civil unions exactly the same as marriage, except for the name, the bill was sold to the public as a way to prevent court-mandated gay marriage. Left unspoken is that it had always been possible to thwart the will of the court. Now, they are finishing the job they started back in 2000, undoubtedly selling it as a change in name only since civil unions had only been different in that one way.

It kind of reminds me of boiling lobsters: Start with the water cold, the pot heats so slowly that by the time the lobsters realize it is getting hot they are already cooked.

Nice Trend

While I like the direction of the trend suggested by this chart, I am still rather daunted by the revelation that around 30% of my fellow citizens would welcome life in a police state.

Of course, one must not forget the most important gardening task: Mow the lawn.

Just Windy Enough

I wanted to burn today because there is no burning on Sunday in our town. Burning is allowed the rest of the days, weather permitting. I called the hot line and the weather was not permitting. It is damp out, so the problem must be the breeze.

Okay, fine. Lemons, lemonade, whatever--I took the kids & dog to a play field to run around and try and fly a kite. After an hour of mixed success, I came to the conclusion that the wind is just slightly not strong enough to fly a kite in. That is; there was just enough wind to keep me trying, but not succeeding, for about an hour and a half.

Mother Nature, you are no lady.

Acting

I'll tell you; that short balding guy with the beard has got a heck of a lot of star-power!

The Rime Of The Ancient Mariner--just the good stuff

DYI Animation

At the courthouse

My wife and I were at the probate court and my keys set-off the metal detector. So I tossed them into the bin and the officer noticed my Swiss Army pen-knife. He was totally cool about it though. I could put it into an envelope and then turn-in a receipt for it when we left.

On the way out I handed the officer (a different one from the one there when I came in) the receipt and he gave me back my pocket knife. I looked at it quizzically and asked, "Hey, wasn't this a Glock when I dropped it off"?

It got an amused smile.

Only later I realized that it is just the kind of thing that gets you trouble you were not expecting. But not this time!

Aha, insight.

My wife and I were in Cambridge this morning and had to walk from the Kendall T station down to the Middlesex Probate court. This is the heart of the biotechnology sector here and so, as Spring follows Winter, we saw a Segway rider.

All of a sudden I figured-out what it is that makes Segway riders look ridiculous:

It is the flapping of pant legs in the breeze.

English to Morse Code translator.

.. ..-. --- .-. --- -. . .-- . .-.. -.-. --- -- . --- ..- .-. - .- .-.. .-.. --..-- -.. .- .-. -.- .- -. -.. ... --- -.-. .. .- .-.. .. ... - --- ...- . .-. .-.. --- .-. -.. .-.-.-

Hat tip Lileks, via Twitter

Translator

I wish I could write as well as my 12 year old daughter

Cinderella looked down at her feet. A hot tear ran down to the tip of her nose. She shook her head, no. The tear rolled off her nose and left a splattered mark on the floor. "Oh, and Cinderella- you missed a spot!" Stepmother said motioning to the spot on the floor.

Her whole re-telling of the classic story is here.

I wish I could say this as clearly

The biosphere is the most complicated of all the things we humans have to deal with. The science of planetary ecology is still young and undeveloped. It is not surprising that honest and well-informed experts can disagree about facts. But beyond the disagreement about facts, there is another deeper disagreement about values. The disagreement about values may be described in an over-simplified way as a disagreement between naturalists and humanists. Naturalists believe that nature knows best. For them the highest value is to respect the natural order of things. Any gross human disruption of the natural environment is evil. Excessive burning of fossil fuels is evil. Changing nature’s desert, either the Sahara desert or the ocean desert, into a managed ecosystem where giraffes or tunafish may flourish, is likewise evil. Nature knows best, and anything we do to improve upon Nature will only bring trouble.

The humanist ethic begins with the belief that humans are an essential part of nature. Through human minds the biosphere has acquired the capacity to steer its own evolution, and now we are in charge. Humans have the right and the duty to reconstruct nature so that humans and biosphere can both survive and prosper. For humanists, the highest value is harmonious coexistence between humans and nature. The greatest evils are poverty, underdevelopment, unemployment, disease and hunger, all the conditions that deprive people of opportunities and limit their freedoms. The humanist ethic accepts an increase of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere as a small price to pay, if world-wide industrial development can alleviate the miseries of the poorer half of humanity. The humanist ethic accepts our responsibility to guide the evolution of the planet.

(All bolding mine)

From: A Many-Colored Glass: Reflections on the Place of Life in the Universe (Page Barbour Lectures) (Hardcover) by Freeman J. Dyson

Put me down on the humanist side of this debate. I should note that this kind of humanist is not the kind meant by religious folks when they find themselves opposed to "secular humanists". Rather the opposite; they would find themselves more likely on the humanist side of this humanist/naturist debate.