Blog - Josh Spector

Coaching Team NutriBullet

(pre-practice coach/mentor huddle) When my good friend, running mentor, past race pacer and race pacee, Jimmy Dean Freeman, signed up to coach Team NutriBullet for the LA Marathon again this year, he and I started talking about whether there was a way I could help out with the coaching and team administration. I’m really psyched he was…

Monthly Summary – August 2015

August was a transition month for me. I’m transitioning from surgery recovery to active surgery recovery. I’m also in the middle of a professional transition and I have a lot to say about that, but I’ll spare the readers of this blog from that. For now. For the first half of the month, my activity was…

#100FewerThings. Progress!

After months and months of very little progress with my #100FewerThings goal, I finally made some progress in the last few days. It helps that I have a little extra time on my hands right now (more on that later, probably), but in truth, once I put my mind to it, it wasn’t the least…

Monthly Summary – July 2016

On July 13, I had my spinal surgery and that effectively splits my year into two pieces. Before surgery and after surgery. In the 6.5 months before surgery, I swam a ton, got myself back into running shape, and was fairly consistent about doing strength training and stretching. When I realized that I’d be having…

Post-surgery update

EVERYTHING WENT GREAT! The surgery was a huge success and they were able to remove even more of the tumor than they initially hoped. It was a huge relief to hear that when I first came out of the anesthesia last Monday evening. Most of the rest of the last week has been something of…

Third Time’s a Charm?

So… here we go again. Yesterday was the 12 year anniversary of my first spinal surgery. (My second surgery was in September 2010.) Tomorrow morning, I’m going to UCLA for my third spinal surgery (officially: Lumbar 4 to Sacrum 4 laminectomy and resection of intradural extramedullary tumor) to hopefully get this guy removed: I’d love…

Monthly Summary – June 2015

(Pre-travel to States taper run at Runyon with Billy. photo: Billy) June was a really fun month. If I’m not going to run any big races this year, I can at least participate as a crew member and pacer for friends. At the beginning of the month, I went out to San Diego 100 to…

Becoming a fish

With strong swims yesterday and today, I have now swam more this year (5 months and 2 days) than in any prior year of my life. I’m currently at 256,967 meters.* My previous best in any year was 252,592 in 2007, my first year training for an Ironman. (I actually broke my record yesterday, but…

Monthly Summary – May 2015

May was a busy month. Work was busy, life was busy, training was busy. For me, that’s a good thing. I like being busy. Especially when it’s a well-rounded type of busy like May was. Quick recap of May: I ran my first race since Badwater. My performance at Whoo’s in El Moro 25k wasn’t anything…

Whoo’s in El Moro Spring 25k – Race Report

Race report-ish, actually. Earlier this year, when I was still trying – and failing – to get back into running, I decided that I wouldn’t do any races in 2015. My plan was to just get back into running and concentrate on running for fun. I’d run when I wanted and where I wanted, without…