UNT (Barely) Beats Div I-AA School

The Mean Green were on the field of battle this weekend, and in piss poor weather in Denton, TX (39 degrees, rain) the Mean Green squeaked by the Western Kentucky Hilltoppers 27-26. Now, some of you may not be surprised by this razor-thin victory, and quite frankly neither am I. Many have to ask if the Sun Belt is even a Div-IA school (hell, some of our STUDENTS don't even know).

Regardless, this season is nearing a merciful end this Saturday, as North Texas will take part in the final college football game to ever be played in the Orange Bowl.

Thanksgiving Runs

What a crappy week for running.

First, I had a tempo run scheduled for Thanksgiving morning... the same morning I was flying to West Virginia to visit family. I was late getting up, having slept until 4:00am, and only got half of my 6-mile run in before heading home to shower and head to the airport.

Then, I never made it to run Saturday morning because again I was late getting up and had to drive four hours to Columbus to catch my flight. Not that a run would have been a good idea... by the time I got to the airport I was puking and running a fever. And I puked on the flight.

On Sunday, my usual long run day, I was still sick so I just laid around the house and watched football.

Today I finally got my long run in, but all in all it was a very low week.

Total miles for the week: 12.59

This Monday's after-illness long run:

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Easy Week

This is the 4th week of my training cycle for the Texas Half, and it is scheduled to be a recovery week. Three 'easy runs' of 5mi each. The problem is, I couldn't run that slow and that infrequently. It felt like I was going for a dilatory walk instead of a run, and yes I know it is supposed to allow my body to catch some rest. In fact I was looking forward to the easy pace this week, but once I got out on the road I just couldn't help but pick up the pace.

I wound up running 4 times instead of 3 and nowhere near the slow 11:58 pace set for me, more like 10:30. In a couple of my runs I tried to force myself to go slower at the end of the run. Maybe I'll regret this decision later on in training, but I felt like as long as I wasn't running all out I should be fine.

I bought my first true pair of running shorts, a set of gray Nike. They were freakin' $35! I honestly could not tell the difference between these shorts and the $14 Champion shorts I've been buying at Target other than the built-in underwear. But after last week's testicle scraping run, I figured they might be worth the money. I'll wear them on my next long run.

Total miles for the week: 23.2

This Sunday's languid 'long' run:

Ron Mendoza Must Go

Are you fucking kiddin' me?

Up 21-0 in the 2nd quarter, North Texas once again collapsed in the second half to lose on a last second touchdown to the Arkansas State Hillbillies. Ron Mendoza's defense is ranked dead last in the NCAA and gave up two touchdown drives of less than 2 minutes in the fourth quarter.

Fuck you, Mendoza. Your ass needs to go back to coaching high school while you still have a reputation for being a decent coordinator. Either that, or you need to graciously step aside and announce that you will embrace your new responsibilities as Water Boy. Either way, you need to go!

The Mean Green Nation had mixed expectations for this season, and the chief concern was whether or not the offense would gel... well it has! But nobody thought that when Mendoza announced a shift to the 4-3 defense that it would mean disaster for this team.

Ball Chafing

OK, so I have discovered a very, very unpleasant side effect of training for a marathon... chaffing. Specifically ball chaffing, which is... you guessed it, the chaffing of a man's nut sack.

Now this may not be a pleasant thing to discuss, but it's probably necessary to share this information for other beginners. It started about 6 miles into my 8+ mile run last Sunday. I started to feel a burning in the area between my scrotum and my rectum. And the sweat irritated the chafe (oh, GOD the burn!). All I wanted to do was stop, but then what? So I gritted my teeth and stuck it out to the end of the run. I drove home and showered, spread a huge glob of Vaseline on the area and by the next day it felt a lot better.

Chaffing is caused by either skin rubbing on skin or clothes rubbing on skin. In my case, it was skin on skin, which probably means I need to lose a lot of weight... speaking of which, I am now at 204, which is 6 lbs less than when I started in September.

Total miles last week: 18.05

Last Sunday's nut-chaffing long run:

Denton Rail Trail

On Sunday I did my 7 mile "long run" on the Denton Rail Trail. This trail used to be the old Missouri-Kansas-Texas railroad, or "The Katy", before they pulled up the rails and made it a bike and jogging trail.

Some parts of it are nice shady canopies of live oaks and walnut trees, wood foot bridges passing over small streams, and a soft small gravel and sand trail that is relatively flat and straight. Another part runs behind a trailer park. Not so nice.

I wish it was completely contiguous, but there are a couple places where you need to stop and cross a multi-lane divided road.

Last week's total miles: 19.37

Last Sunday's long run:

Welcome!

First blog post and I wonder to myself... what makes me think that anyone... ANYONE... would ever want to read my random thoughts. Oh well, I suppose it is therapeutic.

I recently started running... no really, serious running. I'm wanting to run in the Texas Half in February and the Texas Marathon in April. My goal... to run in the Boston Marathon next year. But I'm not telling anyone I know about my plan. It's not that I fear failure or ridicule... I just look at this as a competition against myself. Can I motivate myself to hit this goal? We'll see. And I'm going to share my experiences here, posting my weekly long runs like this: