Update.

How to recap the past few months.

During training for the Ogden half, managed to overtrain somewhat, then caught the spring flu from my kid.

Made it to the start line with a brand-new inhaler.  Coughed two minutes before the start; threw out back.

Ran ("ran") the race anyway.  It was 40 degrees, and rainy, and miserable, but I'm glad I managed to get to run down the canyon; the race is usually sold out so it's no guarantee I'll get to do it next year!

Took a week off; returned to building a base.  Became more and more tired.  Still wheezy.

Appear to have developed anemia, and more worryingly, asthma.  Working with docs for a solution.

TL;DR: this sub-2 is going to be harder than I thought.

Trying to run while having a job

Last week I had to travel for work.  The hotel where I stayed had a nice exercise area, but I know from experience that my personal limit on the treadmill is about an hour, plus time would be somewhat limited.  

So I planned this for last week, meaning to move the long run forward a couple of days:
Monday: easy, 50-60 minutes.
Tuesday: easy, 50-60 minutes.
Wednesday: easy, 80-90 minutes.
Thursday: off (travel day)
Friday: 50-60 minutes
Saturday:  8-10 hill repeats on the treadmill. (Wednesday's workout from the following week.)
Sunday: off (travel day)
Monday: 90-105 minutes (the long run)

Wednesday would get the fartlek run originally scheduled for today.

What actually happened.
Monday: 6.2 miles, easy (treadmill)
Tuesday: Eight inches of snow meant no chance to get to the road, trails, or gym.  Half an hour of Jillian Michaels, half an hour of weights.  Good workout, but not a run.
Wednesday:  So I woke up at 5AM to get to the gym.  I figured the roads would be slick,but they weren't, but I was already committed to the treadmill.  I should have come home and changed and run outside.  I wasn't feeling motivated, my body was stiff and sleepy, and by the time I managed to get out the door and warmed up, I would have had at best 70 minutes for an easy run, so I pushed a hard 50 minutes instead. 5 or so miles, with hill intervals.
Thursday: My flight got in at midnight instead of 2PM.  I got to the hotel by 2AM.
Friday:  hahahahahaha run wasn't happening.
Saturday: 3 miles + weights.
Sunday: 3 miles + core.  Flew home

Today: screw it.  Warm-up, 10 x 1 min fartlek 1 one minute recovery, cool down.  5.4 miles total.

Best laid plans gang aglee up in here....

So, I'm just pretending the weekend didn't happen.  Trying to make up mileage is a recipe for injury.  For whatever reason, the long run is the "workout" that bothers me the least.  I missed this weekend.  But I really have no fear that I'll pull two hours on Saturday with no trouble.  Long runs are mentally easy -- you just run gently, and don't stop till you're done.

The Minimalist Movement Went Flat Because It Was a Trend.

Hixson argues that minimalism went flat because "[the runners who switched to minimalism] were either unprepared or continued to run with poor technique and didn’t reap the benefits they thought were theirs."   I think this is wrong.  I think it went flat because it was a trend, straight up, and trends simply don't last.

I liked Born to Run like everyone else I knew in 2009, and why not?  It's a great tale of a completely insane race, and it holds out the promise of being special to every middle-aged hobby jogger out there.  You have the lineage, it says.  You and all human beings are to the manner born, the manner of running free and easy.

A lot of my friends -- as an educated late-20 something at the time, I was basically the target audience -- fell in love with the book.   Vibrams seemed like the sensible path for a bunch of city dwellers, and away they went.

A solid majority developed stress fractures.

Now, you can say this is a case of too much too soon.  And perhaps it was, although my friends adhered scrupulously to the guidelines.   You can say they ran with poor technique, but the thing is, they weren't getting injured in traditional shoes.  I believe that many runners could benefit from changing their running style, but the minimalist movement, or at least elements of it, seemed to argue that people should change their style solely to fit the ideal promised by a book.

If you think about it, this gets it backward.  Most of us attempting to run in minimal shoes aren't naturally talented human runners, and years of sitting, injuries, weight gain, years of living have left their imprint on our bodies.  For many of us, starting slowly and easing into isn't enough.   Why not buy shoes that work, instead of those that fit a story?

I never went fully minimal.  When I started running in fall 2013, I began by walking in a pair of Vivo Barefoot I had bought at the height of the craze.  Then I ran in Altra Torins, and learned that I have better rearfoot control in a zero-drop shoe.

Unfortunately, I also learned that better rearfoot control is not good rearfoot control. My hip has to take up the slack, and while I don't have weak hips, they aren't strong enough to control a foot that developed bunions at age 13.

I'm fit.  I foam roll, mobilize, everything, but I do not have good feet for running.  They are fine and flexible, but trying to pretend they're really strong doesn't make them rigid.  I believe the lighter shoe might have worked well, if I had different feet.  No amount of toe exercises is going to change bone.

I can't believe I'm alone.  I'm glad the trend happened -- it's nice to have lighter shoes, and I really like the 8mm offset Saucony adopted across the board.  But the trend didn't last just because it was a trend.

Week Three: Keep on Shufflin'

Monday
Planned: 50-60 minutes, easy.
Actual: Big fat zero, zonk..

Honestly not sure what happened here.  Maybe the race caught up with me; maybe I'm underfueled.  But in any case I couldn't manage to get up at 5AM to get the run going, and then work was just too busy.  By 5pm I was dragging; by the time the baby was asleep and I zombie-walked through the dishes, I just decided to call it.

Tuesday
Planned: 40-60 minutes, easy,
Actual:  56 minutes (11:15)

The weather here in Northern Utah has been unseasonably warm, which is creating a total #firstworldproblem for me.  I always wear my reflective jacket when I'm out in the dark; it's a bright neon yellow reflective shell with wide reflective strips. The delicate piping on most gear doesn't strike me as enough protection, and I have too much going on to have time to get hit by a car.  I also have  headlamp and two handhelds as I like to see where I'm going and don't have the best night vision.

Nerding it up, yes.  Anyhow, the trouble is that at 40 degrees (in #$%^ing February!) it is not warm enough to wear the jacket alone over a sports bra, but putting it over a shirt means sweating to death.  At least I'm a visible ball of grossness, but honestly, if this weather continues I'll have to find a harness instead of a jacket.

Wednesday
Planned: 70-90 minutes, easy; strength program.
Actual: 72 minutes (10:20); completed strength program

Hey, look at that!  I hit a respectable-for-me easy pace!  I ran along the mostly flat trails up on the bench, and the loop I chose happened to be seven miles.  I'd hoped, initially, to run closer to 90 minutes but I didn't get out of work quickly enough and eventually just wanted to come home.

Friday:
Planned: 50-60 minutes, easy
Actual: 57 minutes (11:14)

5:30 AM start again.  It was a nice morning for a run, and I'm feeling a bit more confident running in the dark.  Near the end of my run I saw two charming gentlemen also decked out in headlamps and handheld lights; they shouted hello and I was warmed by their greeting and by our light-up fellowship.

Saturday:
Planned: 105-120 minutes, easy
Actual: 112 minutes (11:06)

Apparently my body's new thing is to have no speed but maintain nearly perfectly even splits (11:16, 11:16, 11:20, 11:06, 10:58, 11:18, 10:55, 10:54, 11:22, 10:40) for ten miles.  I really have no idea how I managed just over (just!) two hours for a half in September.  But the run was easy, with no pain or tightness, and I wrapped it up with a strength workout with my toddler as a coach: ONE, TWO, FOUR, FIVE SIX SE'EN AYCH NINE TEN.

Total Mileage: 27.3

Week Two Recap

Health: Hey, look at that!  I can breathe!
Injury: Hip feels pretty good; right big toe is acting up a bit.
Sleep: Good, but I am feeling beyond worn out.

Monday
Plan: 50-60 minutes, easy.
Actual: 53 minutes, easy (10:15)

A quick five+ after work today. My usual route in winter, when I'm stuck on the roads, is reasonably hilly, and today I added an extra hill just for the variety.  I'm not great at climbing hills, but they're very good for you, like broccoli, and I think they help my form.

My form is still all over the place.  I'm not in any pain during or after the run, but I feel like I'm cheating my stride length, running choppy instead of smoothly.  It's already so much better than it was three weeks ago, so I'm trying to be patient, but I really liked having 9:40 feel easy and it's been mentally a bit rough to see my leg speed so far off.

Tuesday
Plan: XT or 40-60 minutes, easy
Actual: 39:52, on a treadmill, with no music (9:52)

The run did not want to happen. I was going to run from work.  It's been unseasonably warm, so I packed for a 50 degree run, but as I changed into my gear, it started to drizzle.  So I decided not to tempt fate and instead headed over to the treadmill, whereupon I discovered that a) I had not packed my iPod and b) that the weather was just going to threaten rain for an hour.

Wednesday
Plan: 70-90 minutes, easy
Actual:  82 minutes, easy (11:37)

Man, this day.  The kiddo woke up, so the run before work didn't happen.  Sometimes I sneak in a few miles after work, but I had meetings and so I didn't make it out until after dark, running around with my lights like, a passerby observed, a bionic woman.  Very tired legs and no leg speed, but a gentle, easy run, followed by weight training.

Friday
Plan: 50-60 minutes, easy
Actual: 58 minutes, easy (11:24)

Another slow run in the dark.

Saturday
Plan: Striders WRC 5K race!
Actual: Race (30:06), then weights, then another hour of easy running.

I will recap the race soon.  Suffice it to say that I had a hard but disappointing run, but the race itself was fabulous.  Since I didn't feel like I managed a good effort in the race, I tacked on the miles I would have had scheduled for a long run.  Might have been a teensy bit of a mistake, but it was an odd 70 degree day in February and it did me good to get outside.

Total mileage: 29.7

The exhaustion is pretty severe, so I've switched to a multivitamin with some iron just in case I'm running a bit low.

Onward!

Almost Hansons. Almost.

While I was out with an injury, I read running books voraciously, mostly with an eye to finding a plan that would facilitate my stepping up from a plan where the goal was to finish the half upright, to beginning to race it.  More mileage, but something that's sensitive to a beginning runner's lack of speed.

I started with Hansons Half Marathon Method, which is a version of their popular marathon training program aimed at the half.  The first part of the book explains their training philosophy, which centers on running, running, and more running, because they argue that the non-cardio benefits of running are what really improve a runner in the long run.  Hansons marathon plan became known as the plan that demanded only a 16 mile long run, but what the buzz failed to mention is that the long run topped out at 16 because all of the rest of the mileage comes during the week.

They build their training program on the principle of cumulative fatigue; throughout the training cycle, the runner's legs will always be tired and never fully rested, which will not only simulate the last leg of the race, but also ensures that the runner has to take the easy days easy.  It's hard to race your training accidentally if your legs are always a little heavy.

I liked a lot about the plan.  The "Beginner" plan, aimed at beginning racers at the distance, tops out at 48 miles a week, which would be a challenge.  Every run is planned, with intervals and tempo runs included every week.  Best, the book includes all of the pace charts that you could wish for to get you through training, and it's extremely well-organized and edited.

Here's the problem.  I want to do this plan so badly, but I don't think I can handle six days a week of running.  I know I can manage five without an injury.  Every time I've pushed it to six, the sixth run of the week is horrible and I wind up hurting.

I want to destroy my half marathon, but I also want to keep from losing hours a week to PT.    So this cycle I'm sticking to three principles:

1. Run no more than five days per week.
2. Off days are off.  No weight training or extra core work.
3. Mobility work every day on hotspots.

So I've shelved Hansons for now.  Maybe next time.

Week One Recap

I decided for my second half to increase my mileage somewhat.  The Another Mother Runner basic half marathon plan was great, but I've read some research that suggests that about 40 miles a week is optimal for fitness (beyond that is necessary for small improvements, but there are diminishing returns.)

I wanted to run more, so I shopped around a bit for a plan.  I read the Hanson's Half Marathon book, which I'd highly recommend, but I don't think I'm up for running six days a week yet.  I know I can manage four or five and keep the injury bug at bay.

So, McMillan's plan from You (Only Faster) was the winner.  I think the book will be more useful once I have a little more experience.  I don't know how to tailor a plan to my strengths, because I don't know whether I'm oriented more toward Speed or Endurance.  I'm leaning Endurance right now because my half time way out performs the predictions based on my 5K time.  But I do  like interval workouts, so we'll see.

Week One is the first of eighteen weeks, and designed to begin the process of building up a mileage base.

Health: Meh.  Last week I had flu symptoms which resolved into a sinus cold that has clogged my head.  Not awful, but not ideal.

Injury Status:   Hip gets tight during runs but I am no longer having troubles with extending it.

Sleep:  The kiddo has decided that he needs to sleep touching me.  He wakes shrieking in his crib and then comes into bed.  I haven't been this tired since he was nursing twice a night as a newborn.

Monday

Plan: 40-50 minutes, easy.  Actual: 54 minutes, easy (avg: 10:21/mile)

Easy paces for me are supposed to be between 9:31-10:27; barely kept that one together over all the hills.  And it went a little long because I was conservatively shooting for the lower end of the range to keep my weekly jump in mileage reasonable, and completely misread the chart.

Tuesday

Plan: 40-60 minutes, or cross train, easy.  Actual: 49 minutes, easy (10:29)

Wednesday

Plan: 60-70 minutes, easy.  Actual: 61 minutes, easy (11:15)

I changed at the office, ran, and came back, where I ran into a colleague with whom I run occasionally.  She asked how it went.  I said, "Some days, it's just time on your feet."   The run was a slog from start to finish.  I would not recommend not sleeping and a head cold as a training regimen.

Thursday

OFF.  The plan also has running as an option but my preference now is to run Tuesdays, and take Thursdays off completely.

Friday

Plan: 50-60 minutes, easy.  Actual: 56 minutes (10:38)

I changed, ran, came back, toweled off with Wet Wipes and ridiculously fruity deodorant, and headed to an afternoon of meetings.  Dinner was an excellent New York strip prepared by the husband, and it was delicious and needed.  Then he decided to stay up with the toddler at night so I could get an uninterrupted eight hours.  I slept in our guest room.  Absolute bliss.

Saturday

Plan: 75-100 minutes, long.  Actual: 78 minutes (8 miles, 9:49)

Sleep works!  I ran with a friend along the gorgeous Ogden River Parkway.  It's very flat and great for just cruising along.  She had eight on her training schedule so I just ran with her as it met my time goals for the week. Long run paces are supposed to be from 9:33-10:51, so I was glad I nailed it, even with a large positive split.  

Total mileage: 28.7

Lessons learned:  One should not despair when one can't keep up an easy pace with a head cold on three hours of sleep.  One should instead, shake it off and take a nap.

Almost go time.

One week till a new round of half training, and with luck, some more than half-assed blogging!

Recap Part One: Huntsville Half Marathon. The rain.

I had so much fun.  In the rain. The course was beautiful, if wet and rainy, and the race was well-organized, staffed by volunteers who were as cheerful as they could be given the downpour. 


Did I mention the rain?  Autumn finally blew into Utah, and so while Friday topped out at a sunny 90 degrees, Saturday dawned wet and rainy and 55 degrees.  There was worry that the race would be canceled due to lightning, but we were lucky and at 9:30 AM, it was on, and we were soaked.
This was my first ever half, and my first race where I really was racing -- where I had a time goal, and hoped to meet it.  I finished the course with nothing left in the tank.
Nevertheless, looking at the splits, it's a bit of a classic newbie race.
Miles 1-2:  Go out way too fast.  In my defense, I was staying with the pacer for two hours, who also went out fast.  I didn't want to slow down because it was feeling easy.  The first part of the course is a significant downhill, which surely contributed to the insane splits I had. Split 1:  8:37.2 
Split 2:  8:33.9
Miles 3-4: Have a nice chat with CPA from Idaho whose son is interested in philosophy and has read lots of Great Books.
Split 3: 8:38.2
Split 4: 9:10.1 First water break.

Miles 5-9: Settle into a nice comfy pace that seems to be getting harder for some inexplicable reason, like maybe I'm trying to run 13.1 miles.

Split 5: 8:57.1 
Split 6: 9:02.9 GU (probably should have taken this at mile 5)
Split 7: 9:19.5
Split 8: 9:01.3
Split 9: 9:13.5 

At this point I'm running at around an 8:55 average, and I'm feeling great, and I'm sure that even if I slow down, I'll nail my sub-2 goal.  Legs are starting to tire a little but I'm feeling loose and happy.

Now I worry.  What if I hit the wall?  I decide that I'll take a GU at the next water station.  It cost me time, and I'm pretty sure it didn't kick in in time.

Split 10: 9:10.4 

Mile 10.6: O HAI, WALL Wow.  It was as if I suddenly ran out of air.  So, that's new.  So, that's what hitting the wall feels like.  Here on out it was a slog.

Split 11: 10:00.5
Split 12:  9:23.7 (think the sugar kicked in.)
Split 13:  9:30.4

SPRINT! SPRINT! SPRINT!  Bite me, say the legs.

Split 14: 8:55

Total time: 2:00:07.  Seven goddamned seconds.  

(to be continued.)

NOW BEGINS THE TAPER.

I did it!  13.2 miles in around 2:20 today.  This morning there was the most beautiful rainbow over the valley, and the sky was pink.  A friend and I ran a point-to-point course starting at the top of one trail, running along the Bonneville Shoreline trail, down the Birdsong trail, and then looping along the Ogden River Parkway.

It went well -- my only goal for this run was to make the distance without aggravating my back too much.  The initial climb on the trails always slows me down, and I'm an extremely novice and inefficient trail runner, so it was easy to keep a relaxed pace.

Around mile eight I ate some Extreme Sport Beans.  These are quite literally glorified jelly beans. They're made by Jelly Belly and have caffeine and vitamins.  I was experimenting with refueling on the run.  Usually I don't bother, but I figure I might need to during the race and I didn't want to find out in three weeks that they upset my stomach.  Not bad, but hard to get down quickly, so perhaps I'll stick with Gatorade at the water stations.

I do think I didn't time the Beans (MAGIC BEANS) right.  Around mile 11 I started to struggle a lot, and my legs felt dead, but half a mile later my energy levels returned, so I either got a second wind or the sugar kicked in.  (Wondering if "second wind" just marks the body's transition from burning glucose to burning fat stores.  Anyone know?)

After walking a mile for a cooldown, we headed home, where I drank chocolate milk, stretched, "rolled some foam", and then had a nice relaxing day of mowing the lawn, doing laundry, going grocery shopping, and picking up the toddler, which at this point is basically a workout with a 21 lb, wiggling, kettlebell.

I'm just going to call it active recovery.

And the winner is....

... the SI joint.

So, I missed my long run this weekend.  My back was tight and spasming whenever I tried to bend over and after sitting for long periods, so ten miles wasn't going to happen.

I treated myself to new shoes!  Asics Gel-Kayano 19, for $50!  These are a stability shoe.  I'm trying something new.  I noticed that my Nikes had creases on the medial midsole, and so I think they have worn out.  If I am overpronating, which I think I might be based on the depth of the creases, while I may have high arches, I'm probably need the support.  I don't need a squishy feeling in my shoes, so I can run on a firmer surface.  It's worth a shot.

(Reasons to support your local running store:  end-of-season clearance sales.)

So, eventually, there will be a new review coming your way.

I began to feel better with a bit of rest, and so Monday I went out for an easy four miles with a friend.  Running along the river parkway was nice, and flat and stable.  My back and left glute were tight, but didn't seem to get any worse.

Tuesday I did six miles on the treadmill.  The only real problem with this is that my mental treadmill limit is about forty minutes, so it took a lot of Sportscenter on the TVs to get me through those last fifteen minutes.  I start mentally subdividing the tenths of miles into seconds.

So far, the new shoes are working out well.

And then in the evening I was off to the sports doc.  He treated my shoulder when I separated it a couple of years ago, and his first recommendation is almost always PT, which I appreciate.  Anyhow, after some fun confusing the newbie resident -- I'm flexible so it's hard to generate symptoms -- the doc determined that my pelvis is rotated on my left side, which is stressing the piriformis muscle.

It's about what I expected, given the location of the pain and my inability to stretch it out.  I'm just glad that there seems to be no disc involvement.  His guess is that the instability originates from having the baby, and that running has basically stressed it enough that my back clenched up.

I told the kid it was his fault, but he just grinned and tried to feed me goldfish crackers.  Toddlers.

I'm fine to keep running if I want.  The plan is more 'mill tomorrow, then an easy four Friday, and then thirteen on Saturday, and then I will be the happiest newbie that ever tapered.  PT starts Monday, and I'm hoping they can sort this out.  Once the race is done I have to rebalance lifting and running  -- because it's curious that as soon as I cut back on strength training, a nagging pain became a huge pain in the rear.

Literally.

Setback.

Last night I headed out after dinner for a quick four or five mile run.  This week's training has been going swimmingly.  I've knocked out the mileage, held good easy paces, and even had a nice run with a friend on Wednesday.

Those whom the gods would destroy, they first give a good week of running.

It was a warm night but nothing too uncomfortable, the route one I've run fifty times before, and the sun was just beginning to sink below the horizon.  I'm not great at running after a full meal, and so I kept the pace slow and even, just trying to get the miles in before today's rest and Saturday's ten miler.

Four miles into the run, my right lower back, which had been tight but not worrisome all day, began to get tighter, and tighter, and tighter.  I had to stop.  I walked the half mile home, where I realized something was not right.

None of the usual suspects hurt.  Right foot & ankle, fine.  Left hip-and-glute-posterior-chain-of-doom, fine.  But my lower back hurts, and while I'm fine if I'm standing or walking tall, sitting hurts, and bending or leaning over and straightening up is next to impossible.

There is no way I'm running this weekend.  I'm pretty confident that if I were to do nothing the rest of the month, I could finish my half, which is my first goal of course, but if I aggravate this I'll miss it completely.

Kind of bummed.  Trying not to cope by eating all the M&Ms.  And I have a doctor's appointment for Tuesday.

It's a month away!

I ran a nice easy 4-miler with a friend today.  Our half is only a month away, and from our conversation I think our feelings are mixed.  On the one hand, we're both in the hardest part of our half marathon training programs, and so I think we're a bit ready to be done with training.  I'm really ready for tapering just so some of my nagging non-injuries have a chance to heal.

But I have to decide which shoes I want to wear for the half:

• My workhorse Nike Pegasus 30s.   I have nearly 200 miles on these now, and they're still holding up great.   They're a bit squishy, however, and I find myself wondering how much energy I lose compressing the sole.
• Pros:  I know I can run twelve miles in these without trashing my legs.
• Cons:  I think they force more of a heel strike than I'd like, and I think they might slow me a bit.
• My Saucony Mirages.  These are sort of the stability version of the Kinvara, with a plastic insert on the medial side and a stiffer, less flexible sole.   They're very light and they feel fast.The uppers don't fit my feet as well as the Nikes, but I ran 6 miles at an 8:48 pace in my last race in them, and they are extremely responsive.
• Pros: Quick, light feels.
• Cons:  Worried the lack of cushioning will trash my legs if my longest run in them is six miles.

So, I'm really not sure.  I'm tempted to take the Mirages on a longer run, but I'm worried that I'll introduce an injury before the race.

What should I do?

Too much Radiolab?

I think I've hit the point in the training cycle where I am wondering why on earth I thought it would be fun to have running as a hobby.  The 12-mile run last weekend was a slog from the very first step, and while the week improved, I've been dragging all week.

The seven miles I was supposed to do on Tuesday turned into 6.68 on Wednesday.
The interval workout on Thursday went great, even though I had to do it on a treadmill.  Ten minute warm-up, 8 x 1min with 2 minutes of recovery, ten minute cooldown.

I switched the speeds between 4 mph for the walk breaks, and somewhere between 8mph and 9mph for the run intervals, with most of them hitting in around 8.5mph, which I think is about a seven-minute mile.

Friday was an easy quick 3 miles.

Today was eight miles following a night in which my son decided that night-time was for shrieking, and a morning full of thunderstorms.  I managed a good workout but I felt awful from beginning to end.

It didn't help that I somehow managed to put only one episode of Radiolab on my iPod Shuffle.  Most days, and most runs under an hour, I don't bother with music or any audio, unless I'm on a treadmill.  But today I knew I was feeling a little off, so I figured I'd listen to Radiolab, and This American Life, and that would carry me through a workout that I didn't feel like doing.  

The episode was a short, the Robert Krulwich birthday episode.  This was a lot of fun, as most of the episode was a retrospective of some of the more hilarious events in his career.  But at the end of the segment, I heard the familiar pop-hum of the Radiolab opener. My shuffle was repeating the episode!

I have no idea where the This American Life episode got to.  I suppose I must have forgotten to load it.  But here's the thing.  It takes me about an hour and twenty minutes to run eight miles.  The birthday episode?  Only about 28 minutes long.

So I listened to the birthday episode three times, because while I am fine with running without audio, I am not so fine with running without audio while my headphones dangle and bounce.

I have to remind myself that I'm doing this voluntarily, and only two more weeks before tapering starts, and that I've come so far in the ten months that I've been running.

Still, it's one of those days where I think my next hobby will be competitive napping.  Who has the most comfy quilt?  Who can sleep the longest?  What teddy bears provide the best performance for your long nap?

Maybe there's a niche here.

The running philosopher.

What would it mean to take a philosophical attitude toward running?

Here is the Stoic Sage Epictetus:

In every affair consider what precedes and follows, and then undertake it. Otherwise you will begin with spirit; but not having thought of the consequences, when some of them appear you will shamefullydesist. "I would conquer at the Olympic games." But consider what precedes and follows, and then, if it is for your advantage, engage in the affair. You must conform to rules, submit to a diet, refrain from dainties; exercise your body, whether you choose it or not, at a stated hour, in heat and cold; you must drink no cold water, nor sometimes even wine. In a word, you must give yourself up to your master, as to a physician. Then, in the combat, you may be thrown into a ditch, dislocate your arm, turn your ankle, swallow dust, be whipped, and, after all, lose the victory.

When you have evaluated all this, if your inclination still holds, then go to war. Otherwise, take notice, you will behave like children who sometimes play like wrestlers, sometimes gladiators, sometimes blow a trumpet, and sometimes act a tragedywhen they have seen and admired these shows. Thus you too will be at one time a wrestler, at another a gladiator, now a philosopher, then an orator; but with your whole soul, nothing at all. Like an ape, you mimic all you see, and one thing after another is sure to please you, but is out of favor as soon as it becomes familiar. For you have never entered upon anything considerately, nor after having viewed the whole matter on all sides, or made any scrutiny into it, but rashly, and with a cold inclination.

Thus some, when they have seen a philosopher and heard a man speaking like Euphrates (though, indeed, who can speak like him?), have a mind to be philosophers too. Consider first, man, what the matter is, and what your own nature is able to bear. If you would be a wrestler, consider your shoulders, your back, your thighs; for different persons are made for different things. Do you think that you can act as you do, and be a philosopher? That you can eat and drink, and be angry and discontented as you are now? You must watch, you must labor, you must get the better of certain appetites, must quit your acquaintance, be despised by your servant, be laughed at by those you meet; come off worse than others in everything, in magistracies, inhonors, in courts of judicature.

When you have considered all these things round, approach, if you please; if, by parting with them, you have a mind to purchase apathy, freedom, and tranquillity. If not, don't come here; don't, like children, be one while a philosopher, then a publican, then an orator, and then one of Caesar's officers. These things are not consistent. You must be one man, either good or bad. You must cultivate either your own ruling faculty or externals, and apply yourself either to things within or without you; that is, be either a philosopher, or one of the vulgar. 

Epictetus aims his counsel at anyone who would seek achievements, but there's a lot here to think about as a middle-aged weekend warrior.  More on this later, but here's the question I wish to entertain.  Is the pursuit of physical excellence, as an adult, valuable?  If so, why?

Twelve miles a-runnin'

So, I would not recommend a two-day car trip plus subsisting basically on caffeine and sugar as preparation for a twelve-mile run.  My lungs were fine, but my legs decided that they were going to hang out on the slow end of my easy run pace and refuse to turn over any faster.  After three miles in I figured out that it wasn't that I wasn't warmed up, but that I wasn't going to go anywhere quickly.  GI tract was not happy after a week of junk food, and halfway into the run I had to search for a bathroom.

But all twelve miles got done in a little over two hours.

I'm starting to wonder if my sub-2 goal is too ambitious.  It's really hard to say.  I'm an inexperienced racer, but I can run a 10K in around 54 minutes, so if everything goes well, I should be okay.  Huntsville is a fast course.

I found this podcast to be really interesting.  Greg McMillan (yes, that one) talks about, among other things, whether a sub-2 goal is reasonable.  My takeaway for myself was that it's really hard to say.  It's my first one, and I have almost nothing to judge my speed or preparation.  I think right now I'm hoping for sub-2, but I'll be pleased with anything under 2:15.

Achievement is weird, isn't it?  Here I am, a beginning runner with no discernible natural talent, and running thirteen miles is almost already something I'm willing to regard as not really an achievement unless it's under a completely arbitrary time.  Keeping this in mind is important, I think.  A year ago, four months after a rough labor and delivery, I wasn't sure I'd be able to run at all.  And now, I'm wondering how fast can I go?

Probably sub-2.

Unless I fuel with Timbits for a week first.

Ups, downs.

I had another great day with the weights yesterday.  It was a relatively easy workout, consisting of form work on power cleans (Coach has ambitions of getting us all into powerlifting), deadlifts at 85%, and a quick circuit, but it was followed up by simply hanging from the pull-up bar until we had to let go.

First set, I made it 45 seconds.  Second set, 41 seconds, with ten pounds weights added.  Third, 30 seconds, and then my grip said NOPE NOPE NOPE.  All in all, a lot of fun.

Today I was too tired to get out of bed early, so I tried to sneak in a workout at midday.  It's only 78 degrees, I figured.  Not too bad.  But the sun was beating down and by three miles in I was completely cooked.  I had 4-6 on the schedule and called it at 4.3, walking the rest of the way home.  I think it was the right call; I need sunstroke like I need another hole in the head.

This is an odd article.  I mean, fascia isn't that mysterious.  Ever take the skin off a chicken breast -- see that white membrane?  Fascia.  It holds muscles together and sections off the body.

I am completely willing to believe that we don't know much about whether massaging fascia helps, and I'm completely willing to believe that many practitioners are full of non-scientific woo.  That said, there are a lot of athletic practices, like foam rolling, that seem to work even though the science is shaky, and the tricky part is figuring out when the science is not there because it's not there yet, or because it's not there because there's nothing there to test.

For now, massage feels good and you will pry my Stick out of my clenched fists, so I'll keep it up. But it's worth keeping in mind how little we know.  Rolling might be good for you and have nothing at all to do with the fascia.

Oh, ew.

Hey, look, pictures of a doofus from Skirt in the Dirt!

Is it possible to like your own race pic, ever?  I think not.

Yesterday we had a massive cloudburst-style thunderstorm.  Rivers of water pouring down the streets, poor little xeriscaped plants not knowing what to do with themselves with all this water.

After the storm ended and everything drip-dried a bit, I went for an easy 5 mile run.  Usually I'm in my Nike Pegasuses on the trails unless I'm doing hills, but I grabbed my actual trail shoes due to the puddles and the mud. (Saucony Peregrines -- review on them after I have 100 miles on them, but man, these are a great light shoe.)

The humidity was not bad compared to places that actually have humidity, like the armpit that is the East Coast this time of year.  But for northern Utah it was a swamp, and within a few minutes I had a sheen of sweat covering me instead of the usual instant salt wash resulting from a normal evening run.  I dodged puddles and kept a good pace, even when I had to run through a cloud of little flying ants that swarmed the wet trails.

I arrived home and prepared to stretch, when I noticed a couple of little flying ants had stuck to me.  Ew.  I then looked in the mirror.

It turns out curly hair doubles as an excellent bug catcher.  Screw stretching.  Hit the showers!

I sometimes hate nature.

Up, up, up.

I usually run on trails, but most of the time the ones I choose are relatively flat, with a few rolling sections, but nothing too technical or challenging.  This I do largely for reasons of timing.  I run in the morning, as soon as it's light, and I try to be back before the baby wakes up, which means at most I have about 70 minutes.  I'm not great at running trails.  I take about a billion steps and I'm extremely inefficient, which makes it harder to squeeze a workout in.

But this morning, I met a friend for an eight miler (for me -- six for her.)  Rocky, steep in sections, and I really should have opted for my Saucony Peregrines over the Pegasus, but I didn't, and this is what my Garmin has to say:

Elevation Gain: 1,440 ft
Elevation Loss: 1,467 ft
Min Elevation:4,649 ft
Max Elevation:5,327 ft

This is what my body has to say:

Owowowowowowow.  Right toe, IT band, and ankle are all tight tonight.

I had to walk in some sections, but the nice thing about trails is that because I'm so remarkably inefficient at them, I don't really care much about my time.  That's a nice thing on a long run, where I sometimes fight the temptation to turn it into what I would call a tempo run if I had any solid idea of my race pace yet.  8.1 miles in 1:36.  

It was a beautiful run.  The Bonneville Shoreline Trail and associated feeders and canyons snake high above the city, and we ran most of it just as the sun cleared the mountain.

Not a mountain, but a nasturtium!

Tomorrow is a rest day.  I wonder -- do rest days preclude yoga?  Because I think I could use a little mat time....

Oh, Snap!

I've loved snapdragons since I was a kid.  Squeeze their cheeks and they open and close their little mouths!  Snap, snap, snap.  So when a friend offered me some of her volunteer (read: self-seeded) snapdragons, I jumped at the chance to use them to fill out my garden.

Snapdragons are supposed to be annuals, but in northern Utah, it's just warm enough that it's possible for the seeds to winter over.  As a result, what were originally ordinary solid-color snapdragons pollinate each other, and turn into gorgeous tie-dyed, ombre manic dragons.

There's probably a halfway decent metaphor in here about hybrid vigor and friendship and beauty and strength, but the last thing the Internet needs is some hobby jogger trying to squeeze a metaphor out of some pictures of some flowers.

Yesterday's run was a comfortable, tentative five miles, in which my main goal was not to fall on my face again.  Achievement: unlocked!  Today I hit the Birdsong trail again, because not only is it so pretty, but it's sufficiently challenging that I have to take it as an easy run.

Eight miles tomorrow, in which I hope to explore a new (to me) trail!