Hills for breakfast, hold the gnats

Objective: endurance.

9:15 AM: 34F climbing to 42F, mostly cloudy w/ a few brief sleet showers, about an  inch of new snow on the ground (yards and trees - pavement just a little slushy)  which mostly melted by noon, a few sunbreaks and some wind in the last hour.  Traction good after the first couple of slushy miles.

A fine run, w/ spring and winter duking it out around me. Melting snow, birds singing, heather in bloom.  Having brought my Dearest home from the hospital yesterday afternoon, I felt a lightness and happpiness throughout the run.  And check out that sleep tally!  I generally prefer to run pretty early in the day, but I knew the snow was going to stop and melt around 9 or 10 so I enjoyed some extra z's. 

Bravo to all of you who raced this weekend!  We've got some pretty swift folks on the blog!

Objective: recovery / easy.

5:30AM: 36F, wind 10-15 mph, cloudy, dry.

15 min. strength wk

A little stiff this morning, but I felt pretty good all things considered.  I ran extremely slowly, even when I felt like I was moving faster. 

I have a couple of commercials I would like to deliver this morning.  The first is that I hope everyone will consider making a donation to the blog if you have never done so. I figure it is at least as valuable as a subscription to Runners World, if not more so, and I'm sure Sasha appreciates some help paying for it all. He has a lot of little mouths to feed. There is a handy "donate" button on the page.

The second commercial is for ladies only; unless you gentlemen have female runners in your life who struggle with hormonal interference, feel free to wander off and discuss basketball or barbeque methods amongst yourselves...   Back in January, my NP gave me an herbal supplement for the hot flashes I was having at the time.  It not only stopped them immediately, the supplement had some very positive effects on the monthly fluctuations in running quality I have always experienced.  It used to be that if a race or a long run fell on the wrong day of the month, I could depend on poor performance, dead legs, and a feeling of heaviness that sapped my energy.  Since I'm going through the big M, I wasn't sure at first whether this supplement had "evened out" my running during the month, or if I was just closing shop so to speak.  But I now feel there is a definite benefit, having tested it for the past 3 months.  I take this supplement every day and increase the amount I take as soon as I feel my hormones slipping out of control.  It is called MMS Pro (brand) Women's Formula H (440 mg).  My NP said she does recommend it for PMS as well, and that some women take quite large doses if necessary, with no ill side effects.  I wish I had found it long ago, so I pass it on in the hopes that it can be helpful to others.  :)

 A little pre-blogging... it looks like I will have an opportunity to go skiing tomorrow (Tuesday).  It is the end of March, and I have not been skiing even once yet this year.  Amazing. There was a time in my life (before DD) when I skied every weekend in all conditions. Perhaps I'll get more snow time next year, once I've conquered some running goals, but I'm so pleased about my running this winter that I cannot complain.  And this might be the last ski day as well...

Foiled again. We were about 5 miles from the summit (Stevens Pass) when we found ourselves in a line of stopped cars. Avalanche control. When the avalanche danger is high, they stop all traffic and shoot dynamite off the sides of the highway. Then they have to clear the snow.  After we had sat there for about 40 minutes, I got out and hiked up to where I saw a patrol car had stopped earlier, to ask the people standing around there if they had any news. The pass wasn't expected to open until 1 PM, and the ski area closes at 4 on weekdays this time of year.  So we turned around, came down the mountain, had Mexican for lunch, and stopped at the Reptile Zoo (after all, we had a free day and no place to go). Saw a two headed turtle and a ton of scary animals.

We were home by 3:30 PM, so I decided to get a few miles in.  Low 40's, rainy, breezy.  I like morning runs better. For some reason I always seem to have invisible sand bags strapped to my legs in the afternoon. 

Objective: VO2...  ~30 min. warm up, 10 x (2 min. hard, 2 min. easy) plus an 11th rep of 3.5 min by accident (misunderstanding between me and the Garmin), cool down

5:15 AM: 36F, windy (15mph), cloudy, dry.

I have an announcement.  This was a difficult workout. Too difficult as a matter of fact. I've had it. I'm giving up running and will devote the rest of my life to the goal of eating at least one gallon of every flavor of ice cream produced on earth.    ... April fools! 

Garmins are amazing.  With all the hills and the wind, I wasn't looking at my pace during the reps but rather going by feel.  But with the Garmin, I later saw that they were all pretty much the same: about .22 to .25 miles for each 2 minute segment.  Given conditions and terrain, I think that's a pretty good pace for me, but it's the consistency that surprised me. 

So, bye-bye March. And what a fabulous month it was for me.  I am so pleased with myself it's disgusting.  I survived the time change with not too much suffering (albeit with quite a bit of whining), I raced two back to back weekends and did well on both races, and I ran about 225 miles in mostly crappy weather.  Woohoo!  Onward to April! I've got about 2.5 weeks of more hard fun work and then a 2 week taper for Eugene on May 3. 

Objective: easy

5:05 AM:  43F,  light rain, wind 3-7mph w/ gusts to 17

20 min. strength & stretches

I've got dead legs this morning.  Even after my warm up miles, when I felt a lot looser, I was still slug-slow.  I'm going chalk it up to my hard workout yesterday. 

It was nice to have the temps above 40. But I do wonder whether I'll have an opportunity to practice a little running in my skort before I do it on marathon day.  I'm still in tights; we old ladies get cold easily. Comon' spring!

Edited to add:  Couple of recommendations for all my blog buddies... 1) A great tune for your iPod: Michael Tomlinson, "Run Like the River Runs" - not the solo version!  2) Spring cleaning inspiration website: http://organizedhome.com/

Objective: just miles, and try to have some fun...

5:15 AM: 33F, snowing hard, 1-3 inches on ground during run, light breeze 3-7 mph.

15 min strength & stretches after

"What the? Oh surely not." Those were my words when I looked out the window this morning.  Even the Cat Who Must Be Obeyed was hesitant to go through the door.  I know it hadn't been snowing in the night, because I got up a couple of times and it was just foggy and wet looking.  Maybe the anticipation of our forecast for 50's this weekend made it so unbelievable.

Ah well, I do live in the mountains and it's been a pretty hard winter. To wit, my husband informed me last night that our March weather was the coldest in 33 years!  I found that rather comforting, actually.  It did seem overly harsh to me, but this is only our 4th winter in this house and I thought perhaps my benchmark for a "normal winter" had been erroneous.  I love believing that next March will be much warmer! :D