Park Hill Loop

I ran the Park Hill Loop in 49:17, with splits of 9:45, 10:25, 10:09, 9:55, and 9:03.

I walked the Levy Loop this morning, and the Maple Street Loop yesterday morning.

Jeff Krupsaw and I played the par-65 War Memorial Park Golf Course yesterday afternoon. I scored a 98, with nines of 51 and 47, with 2 pars, 7 bogies, 2 doubles, 4 triples, and 2 quadruples. I used 31 putts. Krupsaw scored a 101.

North Little Rock High

I ran 2X1000 meters, with three-minute, 200 intervals, and got about 350 into the third 1000 when I realized it was going to hurt more to continue than I was willing to endure. I got the two in 4:55.7 and 4:45.6.

Yesterday I walked two miles with Basil Julian and Bob McKinney on Kayce Smith's Hash Run near Pizza D'Action and the Arkansas School for the Deaf. I walked the Maple Street Loop this morning.

Dam Night Run 5K

ARKADELPHIA — I went through two miles in 14:55, with splits of 7:27 and 7:28, and thought I might break 23 minutes at the Dam Night Run 5K and suddenly felt awful, capitulated to an onset of agony, and went through the third mile in 8:08 and sprinted to give Rick from Benton, with whom I road, along with his 10-year-old daughter Emee, on a flat-bed truck to the start line, the inspiration after he looked at my watch to say, "Congratulations on losing your bet."

I finished in 23:50.8.

Erin Vratil took the under on 23:54 and consequently won $3.

I walked the Orange Street Loop yesterday and this morning.

35th Street Loop

I ran the 35th Street Loop in 35:32 with splits of 8:59, 8:58, 8:52, and 8:44. Crazy. My life is, of course, a succession of over-unders and I put the over-under on the first mile at 9:30 ten steps before I passed its marker, a large tree near the chiropractic clinic on Orange Street. I saw 8:59 and worried for a moment, but was comfortable and remained so throughout. It's such a delight to feel light and fast, even as a 50-year-old has-been when such feelings coalesce in an 8:52.98 pace for four miles.

This makes four consecutive relatively fast days, a Sunday removed from running fifteen and a half miles, and I am not sure what the result of them will be Saturday at the Dam Night Run 5K. My over-under: 23:54.

I walked the Maple Street Loop this morning.

North Little Rock High

This is the way these are supposed to be, I think. I ran 4X1000 meters, with 200 intervals of 2:55, 2:47, and 2:55, in 5:01.6, 4:52.4, 4:45.8, and 4:32.3 at the North Little Rock High track. Maybe I should warm up a bit more; I felt far smoother on the final than the first. None were hard, and it was easy to continue at a jog for 800 meters when I finished.

I walked the Levy Loop this morning. Last night I ran the Maple Street Loop in 17:06 with splits of 8:48 and 8:18, and walked the Levy Loop yesterday morning.

Orange Street Loop

As sore as I am now from Saturday's run and as easily as I ran tonight, I was surprised to complete the Orange Street Loop in 27:15, with splits of 9:22, 8:56, and 8:57.

I walked two miles of Dumpster's and Huggy Beer's Hash run in Maumelle yesterday and the Maple Street Loop this morning.

Midnight 25K

WILLIAMS JUNCTION — I took 1:43:07 to get to the turnaround of the Midnight 25K in the Ouachita National Forest. Elaine Gimblett and Jayme Sturgeon manned the station, and I was hungry and there was a cute, 20-year-old short-haired blonde from Morrilton there, so I lingered for 5 minutes, 3 seconds. I felt great, having a little blood-sugar trouble, but still was stoked, had no idea; I ran back in 1:17:21 to finish in 3:05:31.

This negative-split business is getting out of hand. Granted, the course is uphill going out, but the difference is not acute enough to explain a 13:18 pace followed by 9:59.

Nevertheless, I am happy. I ran every step of the way back. My legs are dead, which probably wipes out my chance for a good result at the Dam Night Run 5K next weekend, but fuck it.

And, oh yeah, this was my 365th consecutive day of doing no less than a two-mile walk. I ran and walked 1,570 miles this year, for an average of 4.3 miles a day, or 30.1 miles a week.*

Yesterday I walked the Maple Street Loop in the morning, the Levy Loop in the afternoon, and walked the Maple Street Loop this morning.

*If I average my mileage from today next year, I will cover 6,570 miles, or 126 miles a week.

35th Street Loop

Tim Cooper drove us to Louisiana Downs in Bossier City/Shreveport, where he won about $125, and I $18.20. We drove into Coop's driveway at about 9:30 p.m. Central. Maybe 25 minutes later, I began a slow jog of the 35th Street Loop. I ran as easily as I could to complete the loop in 41:37, with splits of 10:32, 10:31, 10:23, and 10:10 and felt great. I hope to feel so good 48 hours from now; tonight I felt I could have gone forever.

My over-under for the Midnight 25K is 3:05:59.

Gimblett Loop

Almost four years ago, on July 23, 2005, I ran the Midnight 25K in 3:30:04 and was delighted, I guess because I hadn't attempted any long runs and was drinking a lot. I finished with negative splits typical of my recent long races; out in 1:57:54 and back in 1:32:10. I wrote afterward, at 1:09 a.m., "I felt very, very good. All I wish now is for Pam to stop meowing so loudly. And she will. Within an hour she will be asleep at my feet."

A month earlier, I ran 4X1000 meters in 4:27.0, 4:23.0, 4:17.8, and 4:14.2. I detect little congruity between that and my satisfaction over a three-hour, thirty-minute 25K, and wonder how now I can imagine running 25 kilometers under three hours. I ran a 5K in 22:54 the next weekend. I will have to study my over-under for this weekend.

I jogged and walked the Gimblett Loop in 58:18 tonight, with splits of 12:08, 12:10, 11:21, 11:26, and 11:13.

Yesterday morning I walked the Maple Street Loop, and this morning the Levy Loop.

North Little Rock High

These went a little better than last week. I ran 4X1000 meters, with a three-minute, 200-meter interval, in 5:02.0, 4:42.7, 4:46.0, and 5:05.4. The first one was easy, which was the idea. The second felt easy; I just misplaced my pace judgement. Likewise on the third, so that the final was a struggle far from the idea. Maybe I'll smarten up someday.

Park Hill Loop

I jogged and walked the Park Hill Loop in 57:36, with splits of 11:56, 11:48, 11:29, 11:10, and 11:14. That's about the pace I would like to maintain through 25 kilometers of the Midnight 50K on Saturday. I hope the weather is nicer. It's 11:22 p.m. Central, and still 86 degrees.

BDB Twilight 5K

This confirms my idiocy. Two or three days ago, I registered online for the BDB Twilight 5K. "BDB" did not register with me. "Get the fuck out of my way you acronymic son of a bitch," I said. "Twilight 5K, down on that flat-as-my-singing-voice course along the river. Sounds good." I ignored "BDB." Didn't consider it.

Afterward I told Hillary DeMillo I didn't know the race would go over the Big Dam Bridge, which doesn't seem nearly so steep when walked across holding pretty girls' hands. She said, "BDB. Didn't that tell you something?"

"Is that what it was? BDB? No, it didn't. I didn't even read it, just brushed by it like all those other meaningless acronyms for bullshit diseases I don't believe in."

In truth, I felt awful anyway. My splits for the first two miles were 8:19 and 9:08. I slowed to a walk at the end of the second mile, walked for exactly five minutes, looked at my watch, at something like 22:30, and decided to try to break 30 minutes, which was, I soon discovered, a conservative goal. I guess I ran in at about an eight-minute pace; flew past fat men and little kids and old people through the third mile in 10:31 to finish in 28:45.

A handful of the people I passed resisted. I recall one in particular; a muscular, short-haired brunette woman perhaps 25 years old. She responded to my passing with something close to a sprint. She charged ahead. There was a half mile left. She shortly buckled, and I turned to her and said, "Dear, I am not of you. I have crossed into your paradigm through a membrane of temporary exhaustion. I am now revived, and you are consequently in my world of 24-minute 5K totality. You have two choices: assimilate or succumb."

What's nice is, I stuffed my short pants with a dozen 0.6 ounce tubes of Neutrogena UltraSheer Dry-Touch Sunblock with a skin-protection formula of 70. That should be a lifetime supply.

35th Street Loop

This was the best I have felt running since late April. I ran the 35th Street Loop in 38:02, with splits of 9:38, 9:28, 9:22, and 9:35. I didn't feel great, didn't float along, but it wasn't hard and I was never stressed; a good sign is that I had to remind myself to slow down. I have registered for a 5K near Rebsamen Park Golf Course. It starts at 7:30 in the evening this Saturday. My over-under is 24:15.

I walked the Maple Street Loop at about 2 p.m. Central.

North Little Rock High

I ran 4X1000 meters, with three-minute, 200 intervals, in 4:57.0, 4:46.1, 5:00.2, and 5:18.0. I felt sluggish from the start, nearly exhausted after the second, and backed off for the final two, though they were not easy. It was nice at the North Little Rock High track so late; I was one of five people there.

I walked the Maple Street Loop on Monday morning, and the Levy Loop yesterday morning and early this afternoon.

Hash

I set the second-annual Miracle Mile for the Little Rock Hash House Harriers. Then it rained like two motherfuckers, so I set it again. John Kelley won the men's division in 6:06. Lacey won the women's race in 8:17. Then it again rained like two motherfuckers, and 20 people crammed onto my front porch for two hours.

Firecracker Fast 5K

Here's what I want for an early Christmas present: The Cal Ripken Jr. batting DVD, so I can make an American or National League roster and obviously enhance my chance of winning Beat the Streak, but more assuredly to gain free access to a sports psychologist and therefore perhaps eliminate whatever the stress or anxiety disorder is that keeps me from sleeping the night before goddamn 5Ks.

I slept for 15 minutes last night. From roughly 4:15-4:30 a.m., I dreamt former neighbor John Lucas and current neighbor Tom Jennings were on my front porch, with several of their friends, playing with my cats and trying to get me to join them as they smoked marijuana. The rest of the time I read the last 100 pages of Haruki Murakami's Norwegian Wood, and the first 100 of Richard Russo's Straight Man. Then I got up, drove to the Heights, and followed in the wake of an armada of Kenyans, Leah Thorvilson, high school girls, and an assortment of skinny people twice my age to the finish of the Firecracker Fast 5K in 24:21, with mile splits of 7:52, 7:39, and 8:05.

Levy trek

I wandered slowly around Levy for 32 minutes at about 6:30 this morning, aimlessly, a bit like Haruki Murakami's character Naoko walks around Tokyo in the novel Norwegian Wood, except he reported nothing about her smelling bacon every two blocks.

My over-under for the Firecracker Fast 5K remains 24:30, though I returned an hour or so ago from eating a very large plastic basket full of catfish at the fish restaurant in Conway with Walt Webb. We first drove to Backwoods Barbecue in Greenbrier, but it was closed. Its new owner was inside with his son "refurbishing," said they should reopen late next week. I'm fearful.

North Little Rock High

This qualifies as a tempo run, I believe. I warmed up for three laps, and ran 1000 meters in 4:44.4, or a 23:42 5K pace, at the North Little Rock High track tonight. The idea was to run at a pace I felt I could maintain for another 4000 meters. I think I went too quickly; I felt clunky with odd feelings spread about. Maybe I will feel fresher 36 hours from now. My over-under is 24:30. We'll see.

I walked the old four-mile Ridge Road Loop on Tuesday morning, the Maple Street Loop Tuesday night, and the Levy Loop last night. This morning I jogged and walked the Levy Loop in 25:53.