By: Mizuno Brand Ambassador and Olympic Marathoner Dylan Wykes.
There has been lots of action in my world the past few months, so much so that I haven’t quite found enough time for an update. Read on to find out what’s been happening with training, racing, fatherhood, and more!
It’s been an interesting little battle trying to find consistency in my training of late. At the end of December I re-aggravated an old hamstring injury. I tried to ignore it for a week, before coming to my senses and seeking treatment and modifying training to manage it. The treatment involved some time with chiropractor John Ball down in Phoenix, AZ. He helped fix things up real good and sent me home confident that I could carry-on with full training. Some of the modified training involved treadmill running. The idea behind the treadmill running is that you use less hamstrings on the treadmill because the belt does a lot of that work for you. At one point I included a 2 hour run, on a woodway treadmill, staring at grey brick wall at the Fortius Centre in Burnaby, which was interesting. I’ve been over the hump and back to square one with the hamstring a couple times in the past few months, which has been frustrating. But, I seem to have it under control now and managed a solid week of training last week hitting over 110 miles for the first time in a while.
During all of this I managed to toe the line for a few races, including the Pacific Road Runners First Half ½ marathon (apparently there used to be a Second Half, so the name made more sense, now it is just confusing). This is a great event that I’ve run in twice before, and this year did not disappoint. Like most of the rest of February race day was beautiful (sorry to all those runners in the rest of the country, but mother nature has been very kind to us here this winter). The good weather got me excited about trying to pull off a really good run and challenge my own course record (1:04:22). I got out on that pace for the first few kilometres, but by about 5km this niggling hamstring thing started to rear it’s ugly head and I had to back off. That was a tough way to run the race, knowing that from a cardiovascular standpoint I could go much harder, but my body just kept telling me to slow down. I still managed to hold on for the win, it just wasn’t in quite the time I was hoping for. Still, it was yet again a great event; the course is awesome, the people out on the course are awesome (apart from the odd person who does not want to move out of the way while on their Sunday morning stroll around the seawall), and the post-race grub is always great. A big shout out to everyone at Pacific Road Runners, Mizuno, Forerunners, and all of the volunteers who make this an exciting event every year. Our baby girl Sasha even got up on the podium for the first time in her 4 months.
That’s another piece of the puzzle that has kept me busy and kept a smile on my face – being a father. Sure I’ve lost a little sleep here and there, and maybe on the odd day it’s taken away from my training. But, my wife is an awesome mom and gives me the ability to get out there and do my training. Luckily I have a flexible schedule and have been able to be home quite a bit in Sasha’s first few months. She’s a very happy baby and is growing fast. I’m an expert diaper changer and do my best to keep her entertained when her mom needs to catch up on some sleep and school work.
Last thing I wanted to write about was my next big race, the Boston Marathon on April 20th! This will be my first Boston marathon. Many people are surprised when I tell them that. They think that because I’m a high level marathoner that I had to have run Boston, at least a few times. It is a right of passage for all marathoners runners after all. But, as you usually end up explaining, I spent almost all of my time and energy in the marathon on chasing a fast time to qualify for the World Championships or Olympic Games. With the Boston course being as tough as it with the hills and the unpredictable weather, it just didn’t work with my schedule, until now! I’m really looking forward to this years race. It will be the first time for me racing in the New England area since I left Providence, RI in 2008. There is a funny story I like to tell about Boston; sometime shortly after the Olympics I was at an event related to the Olympics in Ottawa and speaking to a woman who worked at a local running store there. I was relaying to her my experience of racing in the London Olympics and my plans for the future. After telling my tale, her one question for me was “So, would you be able to qualify for Boston in your age group?”. At that point I new Boston really was ‘everyone’s Olympics’ and that I hadn’t achieved anything in this sport until I completed a Boston marathon. And, despite my training not being spot on week in and week out I am confident that with a good consistent stretch the next 6 weeks that I will get to the line ready to rock and roll.
Oh, and if you haven’t already, please check out the documentary video (Bid Me Run) that Mizuno Canada and the guys at Crimson Fish productions collaborated on. I have to say, I was really impressed with the finished product. I saw it for the first time while helping out at the First Half race expo at Forerunners and was a bit nervous to watch it with other people. I was a little fearful of how I would be portrayed and what ridiculous things I might have said. But, in the end it is a really great video and I don’t think I said too many silly things. Bid Me Run Video
Dylan
Dylan Wykes (born June 6, 1983 in Kingston, Ontario) is a Canadian long-distance runner. He represented Canada in the marathon at the 2009 IAAF World Championships in Athletics in Berlin, Germany as well as the 2012 Summer Olympics in London, England. He is a sponsored athlete of both Vega and Mizuno. In April 2012, Wykes ran the Rotterdam Marathon in a time of 2:10:47 and qualified for the 2012 Summer Olympics. With this mark, he is currently the second fastest Canadian marathoner of all time.