FitOldDog Is Pleased To Achieve Ironman All World Athlete Status, But He Wishes He Was Running In The Boston Marathon Today With Jeff

Jeff at Fleet Feet in Carrboro NC USA

Jeff, ultra-marathoner, who provides FitOldDog with great advice at Fleet Feet, is running (or has run) the Boston Marathon today. What a trip that is, so I hope he has a great time.

Interesting vignettes told by Jeff, at Fleet Feet, Carrboro, NC, USA, and paraphrased here by FitOldDog:

Holly tree in FitOldDog's yard.

I don’t know if Jeff likes holly trees, but I do. Isn’t the world beautiful?

“I had a really bad case of plantar fasciitis one year, but I was entered in a 100-mile running race so I ran it anyway. It was hell for the first 60 miles, then the pain in my feet vanished, and it never came back.” [FitOldDog: How about that for a cure for plantar fasciitis?].

“I bought some new socks, tube socks, and used them for a long run, and to my surprise I developed a huge blister on one foot[FitOldDog: he showed me where, and it was huge]. Those socks felt as though they were crushing my feet after about 10 miles. I dumped the socks and the blisters never came back.” [FitOldDog: I had the problem of ‘foot crushing’ with tube socks, but it takes a while to set in, so I dumped them too].

Hi folks, welcome!

Everyone needs some encouragement, from time to time, so dish some out every day.

Letter where FitOldDog becomes Ironman All World Athlete Bronze.

FitOldDog becomes an ‘Ironman All World Athlete,’ but I don’t feel like one, I just feel like a 70-year old guy putting one foot in front of the other.

I had an interesting letter from the Ironman Association the other day, saying that I had been awarded Ironman All World Athlete, Bronze Level, for being in the top 10% of my age-group, 70-74, in 2013, which was nice. Now, I’m not that fast, but I had a busy year in 2013, so I guess that was why this happened. It was quite a year, including 2 x DNFs (Los Cabos undertrained and Lake Placid on Paleo), 3rd in my age-group in Louisville Ironman, fortunately just missing a Kona roll down slot (that was close, could have killed me, really killed me). Qualified in the Raleigh Half Ironman for World’s Half Ironman Championships in Las Vegas, where I had a bike wreck and met a great guy, Bryan. Finished first in my age group at the Outer Banks Half Ironman (surprise, surprise, the second oldest person was 10 years younger than me, so I had that age-group spot to myself, just had to finish – great race, in fact).

Rock FitOldDog uses to stretch his hamstrings.

To you this is a rock, but to me it’s a hamstring stretching device on my 3-mile run loop.

All this was topped off with a displaced abdominal aortic aneurysm stent graft, which was fixed in the Cleveland Clinic by my lovely surgeon, Tara (if you want to meet her, go to this link).

I must admit, I needed the encouragement of that Ironman letter, as I’ve had a tough couple of weeks, with two problems bugging me:

Firstly, Google couldn’t access my site due to a bunch of incomprehensible reasons listed by WebMaster Tools, so I had work to do. I spent a load of time wading through forums, all of which led me to my robots.txt file, which in WordPress is a virtual file – this is why I couldn’t find it in the GoDaddy file system (wasted about an hour on that one). Then I found a lot of advice on coding, which I ignored, as I was out of my depth.

FitOldDog's 3-mile run road loop.

This probably looks like a wet road to you, but it’s my listening post. I listen to my body as I run.

Then I discovered gold – a lady on the last forum I visited said, “Ignore those coding guys, here’s how to modify your robots.txt file in WordPress, dashboard > settings > profile > modify robots.txt file box.”

Problem solved (I said thank you!).

You might ask, “Why is he telling me this?”

I just thought you might like to know that there is more to maintaining a blog than “writing graffiti without punctuation.”

Secondly, I’ve been battling a tight calf, but I think I’m seeing the end of that road. Remember, you have to run a marathon in the Ironman, and if you end up walking you’re in trouble. Fixing this issue was critical, so I backed off on the other two events to fix this one – I think I’m nearly there – best run ever, today.

So, it’s been a frustrating but good week, and as far as I know my stent is still where Tara put it.

Have fun, and encourage people.

Cheers,

FitOldDog

 

Comments

  1. This made me chuckle. I am thinking you will get a Kona slot in the next 12 months. Remember that old adage, “Be careful what you wish for.”

  2. Oh yes! I remember it. No guarantees for Kona, but it would be fun. Hope your training is going well? -kevin

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Disclaimer: As a veterinarian, I do not provide medical advice for human animals. If you undertake or modify an exercise program, consult your medical advisors before doing so. Undertaking activities pursued by the author does not mean that he endorses your undertaking such activities, which is clearly your decision and responsibility. Be careful and sensible, please.