Roller Coaster

There's been a lot of up and down with both the weather and my running lately. We've had 10+ degree swings on a regular basis making it hard to figure out what to wear. Today for example it was +9C (48F) during my lunchtime run around town as I ran in shorts and a long sleeved shirt. Tomorrow's forecast high is -4C (25F) with a strong northwest wind which will bring the feel like temps down even further calling for at least a few extra layers.

My blogging has also been a little erratic with long pauses between my posts. I'm tempted to just do short little daily updates like Andrew has been doing but there really hasn't been much to write about. Total miles last week were a bit down with only 41 miles in 5 runs. Since the MDI marathon there has been a slow mileage build with weekly totals of 27, 35, 41, 50 and now down to 41. The down week was partially due to missing a run and because I was taking it a bit easy on the knee issue that came up. Hopefully that's past and the build to Boston can now continue.

Sunday's long run of 16 miles around town was long and boring without my usual company. The lack of running companions can make even a medium long run seem to take forever. It was also a slow run with an average pace of 8:34 and my stupid knee started 'talking' to me again over the last mile. I'm not sure what the whole story is here but it seems to come and go almost at random. I've been running in some older shoes that have close to 700 miles on them and will try retiring them to see if that helps. I'm also committed myself to taking an extra day's rest after any days where 'it' starts acting up.

Monday - rest day, no problem!

Tues - todays run was another ride on the roller coaster and this time it was way up. As I said before, the weather was perfect with shorts and long sleeved shirt attire. I was also wearing the relatively new Loco shoes which have only 60 miles on them to date. Started out very easy for the 1st 20 minutes and then was ready to pick up the pace. It was fun to do a series of 1 min, 2 min, 3 min at tempo pace followed by the same times at an easy jog. This was the first bit of faster running since the marathon and things felt great except for the breathing being a bit labored. The knee and hamstrings were perfect and maybe this is exactly what was needed to shake out the doldrums. Total of 6.1 miles in 48:20 (7:55 pace, avg HR 138). Great run and I'm 'allowed' to run again on the 'morrow.

145 days to go... Might be time to think up a plan. Have a good week!