Monthly Archives: July 2009
Long run on a Friday night
Friday nights are meant for going out to dinner, having a few brews, kicking back, relaxing. Tonight, though, Friday was meant for a long run. Eight miles to be exact. And eight good miles too.
I moved my long run to tonight mainly because it’s the last day in July. When I added my monthly miles up the other day, I realized how close I was to breaking 70 miles for the month. I wasn’t about to fall short.
With all the complaining I feel like I’ve been doing lately, this turned out to be a good month logging 72.3 running miles, my second best month of 2009. After a disappointing first half of the year, this is a great way to kick start the last six months.
A good mid-week run
This summer has been lacking good runs. This week has been no exception. A bad Monday led to nearly getting caught in a storm on Tuesday; heading into today I had just 3 miles for the week. But tonight things seemed to be on my side.
After an afternoon storm earlier today, I thought I was once again doomed. The weather, though, cleared up nicely this evening and I was able to get in 6 miles. While still slow, I felt great. Everything just seemed to flow along well for me for a change. It was a good run to set this bad week straight.
My next marathon?
No, I’m not jumping ahead yet. In the middle of a relatively bad summer of training, I needed a boost. No, tonight’s meal at Cheeburger Cheeburger didn’t count. The boost comes with thinking about my next — and second ever — marathon. I’ve been wanting to do another marathon, but I just haven’t found the time to commit to it, nor have I found the one I want to do (or maybe I’ve just run out of excuses).
Today on Twitter, BRP26pt2 started following me — that’s the Blue Ridge Parkway Marathon. There’s really not much to tell about it right now, except that there’s a blog entry about it here and they’re on Twitter. I’m not committing to it yet, but the timing of it would be perfect. It’s late spring and it comes about a month and a half after the Shamrock Half that I’ll likely do again. The Parkway is a bonus — I grew up near the Blue Ridge Parkway in Bedford, so it would be somewhat of a homecoming. Besides the Virginia Ten Miler that I’d love to do again, there are very few long-distance races in that area that interest me.
So for now, we’ll leave it at this … it’s a big maybe, but it’s the biggest maybe to come along in some time.
* * *
I think I’m pretty much over what was bugging me last week, except I had an awful meal tonight. It’s a WTF kind of meal. Like, why did I do that? Perhaps I did it to wake me up and set me straight for August. It’s kind of a weird thought process — eat what I shouldn’t eat just to remind me how bad it feels.
* * *
Speaking of last week, even though the whole week was bad, I had a good long run of 7 miles on Saturday. I’m right where I want to be with my long runs, but my overall mileage is down from what I’d like. I think maybe I’m being hard on myself since it’s the summer, but at the same time I’m staying injury free, and I can’t really ask for more than that.
The endless circle of bad things
I’m in a much better place than last year — a year ago at this time I had a tailbone injury that just made everything awful. However, after a few pretty good weeks, this week I’ve been stopped in my tracks with some stomach issues. It happened last night when I was a mile and a half into a run with my dog. It didn’t seem so bad at first, but I really didn’t feel like continue running. I’ll do more the next night, or so I thought. I ended up falling asleep on my couch at like 9:30 and had no energy at all this morning.
I haven’t really felt “bad” today, but I haven’t felt great either. I certainly haven’t felt like running very much. So I went out with my dog like usual tonight, walked a bit, ran a mile and then was done with running. The pounding action just bothered me too much. So instead of doing nothing, I hopped on my bike and rode a little more than 4 miles.
It certainly hasn’t been a total loss of a week — I’ve now had two days of good cross training including Monday’s workout at the gym. But my hope of increasing my mileage for a fifth straight week most likely won’t happen. I plan to increase my long run this weekend, but my overall miles just won’t get there. It’s not really a big deal — I’ll readjust my plans a bit and all will be fine. I’m just a little pissed that I set some goals and something out of my control got in the way.
Where is the time going?
It’s so hard to believe that July is 2/3 of the way over. I feel like every post I’m playing catchup, like I don’t have time to write more specifically about workouts. It’s not ideal, but I’m not complaining about it either. That being said, here’s to playing catchup and having some random thoughts.
***
After Friday’s miserably hot day, Saturday was really nice. But with an afternoon trip planned to see the Washington Nationals with a group of Lynchburg College alumni, and the need to get things cleaned up that morning since my house was dogless and babyless for the first time ever, I put my long run off for another day.
By the time I finally got to my long run - 6.4 miles and more than 17 for the week - it was Sunday evening. It capped off a crazy-busy, but fun-filled weekend.
***
As I just stated I ran more than 17 miles last week — 17.3 to be exact. This is the fourth straight weekly increase. My goal to make it five weeks in a row this week, scale back for a week and then have another strong four weeks before having a taper week for the race. Talk about time flying by … breaking down training like that makes the Rock ‘n’ Roll Half seem extremely close.
***
I’ve come to really hate the gym in the summertime. It stinks to go when it’s light outside and be done when it’s still light. In the winter, it’s not so bad. When it’s dark, it’s dark … and it’s easy to just go inside and have a good workout. With some rainy weather today I ventured over to the gym and immediately felt like doing nothing. I did get in 5 miles on the bike and 2 miles on the elliptical machine, but it felt so … I don’t know … kinda worthless.
So I’ve already vowed to run outside tomorrow even if it is raining. The weather forecast for this area shows that we’re stuck in a few days of on and off rain and storms.
As weird as winter
I’ve become accustomed to winters in Virginia being weird — 60 one day, 40 the next, record highs and record lows within a week’s time, etc. — but I’m not used to weird summers. And these past few weeks have been, well, weird. It’s been relatively cooler and less humid than normal, which is GREAT! It made for an awesome 5-mile run on Wednesday.
But today I day I took off from work due to some out-of-town evening plans and the fact that I just wanted a day off, so I planned to do my long run for the week — at least 7 miles, maybe more.
That just wasn’t going to happen.
After some great cool weather earlier this week, it was miserable this morning. It’s the kind of heat and humidity that just slaps you in the face and keeps you pinned down. So, I didn’t get in that planned long run. I did get in a total of 2.7 miles and will just move my long run to the morning or Sunday evening. With 7 more miles, I’ll continue my streak of increasing my miles week to week, so it’s not like I really lost anything today. In fact, much of my run was pushing a baby stroller and then running a mile or so with my dog — it was certainly a high quality 2.7 miles. I just didn’t feel like doing more …
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