Tucson

I'm in Tucson working with some colleagues. This means running in absolutely gorgeous weather. Of course, lately it's been pretty nice in Philly but for some reason running in Tucson is always better. Maybe it's the lack of humidity. Maybe it's the scenery (the Catalina Mountains are quite beautiful). Maybe I just miss the place. I don't know but I thoroughly enjoyed my run this morning. The five miles felt good - no aches or pains. I'll get to do one more run here before I head back to Philly. One week until the race.

Lowering the mileage

I'm now to the tapering part of my training. I ran 8 miles on Saturday and felt fairly good about it. No major aches or pains. The weather has been gorgeous as of late. Warm (almost too warm!) and sunny. The rain has moved in a bit now but at least it's still warm. I don't miss wearing my tights and fleece. There are two weeks until the race. I think I'll be fine. We'll see how the decrease in mileage sits with me this time around. Last time I got anxious about it, however this time I'm feeling much more tired. I hope we get nice weather for the race.

Good weather, bad run

The weather was perfect for my long run yesterday. Unfortunately the spirit was willing but the flesh was weak. What was supposed to be a 10 mile run ended up being a very slow ~9 mile run. At that point I was just exhausted and didn't have the energy to push on. I can come up with all kinds of excuses for it but they would just be cop outs. It really doesn't matter why anyway. The bottom line is that I didn't meet my goal and I'm annoyed to no end by it. I just hope this isn't an indication of how the race will go in 3 weeks.

Warm weather!

The high yesterday was 74. When I ran on Monday it was 47. What a change! It was absolutely glorious to be running in such warm weather! Of course, a 27 degree change in temperature is a bit of a shock to the system. I would prefer a gradual increase but I'm not going to complain. I was out in shorts and a T-shirt and even then I was a bit warm. The forecast for the rest of the week is still warm but with intermittent rain. That's OK. I'm just happy that it's finally warming up. Tomorrow is my longest run before the race... 10 miles. It's supposed to be 71 but with scattered thunder storms and showers. I'll be out there, rain or shine.

A pleasant surprise

A wise person once said that without the bad days you wouldn't have the really good days. Today was an amazingly good day, especially considering how bad things have been recently. I was dreading my run today. I had a horrible night's sleep last night, the weather was gray and cold, and I was expecting more aches and pains when I hit the road. I was about a quarter mile into the run when I realized I felt fine. No tightness, no hesitant steps, no wincing. It was awesome! I was running for time today, not distance, and as I neared the spot where I usually finish up I got another surprise... I still had 10 minutes on the clock! So not only was I feeling great but I was running fast as well. Of course, when you're running for time and you go faster that means you just have to run farther. Not exactly a reward. The end result was a 6.7 mile run with 8:56 splits. Like I said, an amazingly good day.

Having doubts

My runs have not been great lately. I can chalk up the difficulty with the long runs to the increase in mileage but even my "short" runs (typically 5-6 miles) aren't going as well as I'd like them to. My legs just feel tight much of the time. Yesterday my knees were actually sore, which is never a good thing. This makes me worry. Now, they were fine as of this morning so that gives me a little confidence that I'll shake this all off but there is still a little nagging doubt in the back of my mind. My long run on Saturday will be 10 miles. After that I start to taper. I'm sure I'll make it to the race but these recent problems have me wondering if a full marathon is really within my reach.