Patience; the new endurance sport.

5 @9:40 ap.  Just a maintenance/recovery run for me and the dogs. 

9:03/8:57/9:21/9:25/9:30/8:41/9:55 

I ran a warm up mile.  Then ran 60 second pickups about every quarter mile, then for two miles ran a pick up for a quarter mile every other quarter mile.  My legs were a little tired. The spits never indicate the effort, which always feels discouraging. So the last mile I just picked up and ran a steady pace.  I have to keep it up these next two weeks.  I have to remember that these tough work outs make maintaining a decent speed during a race feasible.  I remember last summer, after Hobble Creek half marathon, my next long run was extra tough.  Have to find the balance between continuing to build strength & endurance, without exhausting my body this week.  I think I've been doing a pretty good job recently.  In spite of the cold weather, my never-ending bronchitis I was pretty happy about my performance on Saturday.  I felt strong.  I just want to feel that way again a month from now.

I have been trying to get enough sleep.  I am dedicated to good nutrition and adquete rest in reciprocation for my body's cooperation. But in addition the race on Saturday-- in which I felt the effort was good, but rather moderate-- I feel like I have not 'caught up' since daylight savings.   Also, everyone in my house has had strep--my son a reoccuring case (round 2).  I am sick of bleaching counters, doornobs, lightswitches, water faucets and boiling toothbrushes, washing pillowcases, bedclothes.  It's a lot of work -- on top of the worry they are going to die.  Yes, you don't just get a cold at my house-- you get tuberculosis because in spite of being blessed with good health, I'm a hypochondriac and generally psychotic.  It's always the early spring that's soo good for bronchitis-strep-flu-cold.  I blame the abrupt change in weather.  Although the snow melts, it's still cold and everyone is underdresses this time of year--thus stressing the immune systems via exposure making the body less resistent to bacteria and virus (at least that's what I think).  No one wants to wear winter gear when it's sunny --even if it's only 37 degrees and windy. I'm just hoping I'm not next.  My hands still smell like bleach, so I hope that helps keep the germs at bay for a few minutes.

After the kids got off to school it took me 15 minutes to decide if I was going to run hill repeats by my work, or to stick close to home for some faertleking (still funny after all these years).  I'm very distraught over the situation with the bridge construction that denys me a straight shot at the lake.  I have to run down my neighborhood.  I don't mind my neigbhorhood as long as I don't have to run through it and remind myself that I don't, in fact, live in the South of France or Chile (as sometimes time on the trail will lead me to believe).  Also, I like to take the dogs along for the ride, and there's just no way to do it thorugh the neighborhood without bringing a *plastic bag* yeeuuck.  I tried very hard to day to run 100 Meter strides and sprints.  I am at war with what might be considered VO2 capacity.  When I get going that fast for 100 or so feet, I feel like I'm going to pass out.  My eyes feel like rolling into the back of my head, and I have a hard time keeping them open (weird, I know).  I don't think my body likes being pushed very much, and it tries to shut me down and I find it extremely hard not to stop, bend over, and catch my breath before running again.  I jog so slow at the end of a pick up, it's slower than walking I'm sure.  I wish I knew what in the hell I was doing.  All I know is that pushing my speed a couple of times during a run a couple of times a week has made racing a better experience.  How it works, I do not know.  I just hope my legs can handle the next two weeks. Crunch time. Two of my longest Saturday Runs, and all the rest of my hill repeats and speed work need to cement their effect now.  I CAN do this!!!I CAN CAN CAN! 

Today I ran 4 miles to save up a little energy for the 23 I'm going to pound out tomorrow. I didn't calculate my weekends right and didn't realize until yesterday my last long run is tomorrow.  I hope my knees can take it. I haven’t felt ‘recovered’ from Moab.  But I’ve gotta getter done.  Catherine will accompany me on the last 18 and I’m going to finish heading up the canyon, up past Vivian so we can get a good incline on those last miles in preparation for the ‘heartbreak hills’.

Help me finish this sentence….I feel like a 'real runner' when:

(example:  a 4 mile jog doesn't qualify in your mind as 'running').

So many things went wrong on this run.  I'm wondering now how I can try to make up for it.  My plan was to run 5 before Cath came, but the minutes in the morning just slid one into another after I woke up and groggily tried to prepare for the grueling (what should have been 23) run ahead. I got only 3 under my belt before Cath showed up 9:34/9:45/9:09.  The plan was to run up to Big Springs from the house, which I estimated to be about 18 miles.  My legs are still feelin' it from last week, but we kept a good pace 9:40's, stopped at Will's Pit Stop, filled our bottles at the mouth of the canyon.  I was really thirsty, but only brouight my small hand-held.  I can tell right now I began to dehydrate somewhere around mile 11.  My Garmin had somehow lost a mile or more between my house and mile 12.  I don't know how, but it played with my mind since my legs/hamstrings were so tight and I was relying on checking the splits in 3 mile incriments.  Once we got past Nunn's Park and up onto the trail under Bridal Veil we were VERY surprized to learn the ENTIRE trail for the next 2-3 miles was 15 inches of solid ice or porous layers our feet would fall through and suck off our shoes.  It was slow going 14 m/m for those two or three miles.  I wonder if you can even count what we did as running.  I was not breathing hard, but man it was tough to keep your feet  moving without turning an ankle or falling.  By this time I did not trust the Garmin mileage wise because it was showing 12 total, when I know for a fact it's at least 15 to Vivian Park.  We stopped briefly at Vivian so I could stretch my ailing hamsrings and stated up the windy uphill grade to Big Springs. That was calculated torture.  I wanted to end my 21-23 on that uphill grade in anticipation for the hills in Boston.  I know a 7 mile slight uphill grade (particularly the last 3) is overkill, but it did feel good to get to the top, where I dry heaved for about 2 minutes.  We then ran down 1 more mile where we caught our ride at south Park.  I am THRASHED.  I'm not sure about the mileage, I'm dissapointed our 'run' was broken up so badly between  mile 13-15 by the snowy trail and ice and I'm not sure the incline at the end produced the kind of fatigue I was hoping to conquer.  I was sore, more than tired, but mentally beaten.  Catherine is counting the run as 18 miles, I'm counting mine as 22.  I'll run two cool down in the evening to keep myself from going rigormortis.  Fish oil, calcium, magnesium is on the menu.  I have no idea how that work out will translate at  Boston since our AP ended up being 10:45 and I stopped at least 5 times.  I wanted a tough, fluid 23 mile run to get my confidence up for those last 6 marathon miles that always wreak havoc :( Oh well, I did what I could.