Hills for breakfast, hold the gnats

Objectives: endurance, dealing w/ elements, practice taking gels on the run, winning mind games...

Conditions at 7:15 AM:  50F, very windy (15-20 w/ gusts 40), light rain.  Later, during run, variable...  Wind lessening at times.  Rain heavy at mile 7,  gone by mile 10.  Some sun breaks, one rainbow. 

I'll try to keep the whining to a minimum.  I really don't feel well today.  It's like the cold was almost gone and then yesterday I started feeling cruddy again.  So today's 20+ planned miles turned into 18+, and I was very happy to get that much, since I thought of going home a lot sooner.  I know better days are ahead, so I'm not going to worry about this.  What was really a treat was being able to face the elements and actually enjoy the morning.  There were  a lot of robins out today, and I saw a rainbow.  :)  Now I get to spend the rest of the day sitting, knitting, eating, and (later) watching the Oscars.  

Objective:  easy/recovery

Conditions: 45F, wind ~10 mph, cloudy, a few spinkles

20 min. strength work

I'm pretty stiff and tired this morning, but as the run progressed I felt my muscles loosening up. It was light enough towards the end of the run that I could run up around the duck pond.  (I tend to avoid dark trails, even w/ my headlamp, for safety reasons.)  It was just gorgeous. 

Objective: general aerobic. 4 mi easy, 4 mi moderate, fast finish (I was late .)

45F, windy (5-15 w/ occasional harder gusts), rain showers turning to steady rain

Pleasant run. I can't really complain about the rain, since we've been in somewhat of a drought the past month.  I've had it coming to me. 

Is it just my computer, or did all our comments disappear last night?

ETA: Ok, this is just really weird.  I can't see any comments on my own blog, nor the comments that I make on others' blogs.  But my comments are listed in the "recent comments" box.  For example, on Deborah's blog, Carolyn had already commented and I saw her comment; but when I added mine, they both disappeared but mine was listed in "recent comments."  What can the matter be?

Objective: easy / one notch above "rest day"

40F, gusting breezes, showers

4:15 AM is a bad time to revise running plans, but that is when The Cat Who Must Be Obeyed woke me up to let him go out.  (The litter box is beneath his dignity, but the bedroom carpet is not.)  Being awakened just 30 minutes before the alarm is so frustrating. 

Although my running has been fairly good quality this week, I've been feeling more and more "run down" later in the day.  Last night I could barely function after dinner. The residual congestion from my cold is still hanging on too; I don't think I ever recovered enough.  Enough for...?   Well, maybe I'm splitting hairs here, but I think I have been well enough to run, but not well enough to get by on less than 8 hours night after night. 

Anyway, I opted to sleep a bit more, and skip my speed workout.  I just hated to do that, but I think it's the right way to avoid Doing Something Stupid.  It's hard to make these choices about when to push and when to pull back.

A word about running in the rain.  I love getting the kudos in my comments, but it's not really that big of a deal with the right gear.  If anyone is interested, there are 3 essential pieces to my rainy-run wardrobe:
1) Tights.  The legs can get wet without feeling heavy-laden or cold.
2) Cycling jacket.  Cycling jackets are heavier and more waterproof, they have vents, and they have super long sleeves that can be pulled over the hands.  People who get extremely hot while running will have a hard time with cycling jackets, but I can wear one in temps below 50F.
3) Baseball style cap to keep rain out of eyes.

As long as I'm feeling a little cranky anyway, I have soapbox moment to get off my chest. This has nothing to do with running, just a rant that's on my mind.  I heard last evening about an acquaintance with a young child who is getting a divorce.  This is the second one I've heard about this week, and the fourth one in the past three months!   I know people make mistakes, misjudge character, etc. and I will not sit in my glass house picking stones to throw.  But what is eating me is this: out of these 4 people, I know that 3 of them viewed "having a baby" as a kind of experience on a bucket list.  Go to college, get married, visit Paris, have a baby, get promoted at work... "Have a baby" is not something to put on a list -- it's one tiny component of something that none of these women ever seemed to even consider putting on their list: "Dedicate years of my time, energy and resources to raising a child." I knew them intimately enough to see how they viewed the choice, but not intimately enough to feel I could point out the mistake.  Now I have to watch the aftermath and see the children get hurt.  OK, end of rant.

Well, I'm just a ray of sunshine today, aren't I?   Thanks for listening, and have a good day.  :)

Objective: easy/moderate

29F,  light snow flurries turning into steady snowfall.  About 1cm of snow on everything except the pavement at first; snow sticking everywhere by end of run. Streets very icy, sidewalks tolerable.

20 min. strength work

A pretty good run. The snow is always nice from the viewpoint of aesthetics. That is, a run in the dark is no longer a run in the dark.  Being able to see more of my surroundings adds a lot of the quality of my running experience.  Slipped a little at times, but I did pretty well considering I had no Yaktrax on. 

I have some questions for my fellow fastrun bloggers.  The first is about naps.  I recorded yesterday afternoon's nap (yeah, I got a nap!) on today's post because it occurred to me that it only affects today's run. I used to add naps to the previous day's post, ie on the day of the nap.  But this way, the nap plus the night sleep will add up to a total number of hours that have their impact on the next run.  Does that make sense?  Which way do you all do it?  Never nap? Well, which way would you do it if you did?

My second question is about cadence. I may have mentioned this before, since I've been wondering about it for a while.  There is a school of thought that recommends a cadence of 170-180 (about 3 foot falls per second), no matter what your overall pace is.  So an "easy" pace would still clip along at that cadence, but the steps would be very small and not very powerful.  I have yet to be able to achieve this.  No matter how small I make my steps, moving my legs/feet that fast always gets my heart rate up. And in the first couple of miles of  run, when I'm warming up, it's just plain uncomfortable.  What are your thoughts about this philosphy and what is your cadence:pace relationship?

Objective: moderate / general aerobic

32F, mostly cloudy, wind 11mph, snow remained on plants but pavement dry & clear

My plans for a Friday-off, Saturday-long run fell apart yesterday when DH and I sat down to have one of our much needed Planner Pow-wows.  Very illuminating.  (Gr.) We don't keep a family calendar. I guess we need to have these little chats more often.  So I'm on mom duty Saturday morning and that means no run.  Ah well.  I wanted to sleep in Sunday after staying out late Saturday but I guess I'll manage.

Speaking of illuminating....  I feel both stupid and happy about the cadence question I posed yesterday.  Stupid, because I hadn't really counted steps with my watch for a while, just assuming that my intuitive "feel" for the cadence was still accurate -- it was not.  And therefore happy, because I am at 180 even on my easy pace.  I have been working on it for a while, and I don't know when I crossed over to success, but this morning's count -- this time using the watch instead of my faulty mental clock -- was right on the dot.  It was funny, really: "twenty seconds yielded 60 steps, times 3... oh no that can't be right. Try again...."  I finally did the waltz thing, watching the seconds and thinking 1-2-3, 1-2-3. Yep, 180.   I guess I can move on now and start focusing more on push-off and other speed enhancers.

So that's February, since I won't run again until Sunday.  I'm not as far along as I had hoped probably due to a week off from illness and this past week of still feeling kind of run down.  I hope you all had a good month.  Three weeks until the official beginning of spring!  I'm planning my victory party. :D