Seeking a better country...

Lately miles have been hard to come by.  Work is crazy busy at both jobs.  I looked at my weekly graph, and guffawed at my hubris of paying for UVM when this is my training volume.  I gotta hit 50-55 this week and 55-65 next week to be legit, I think.  IDK.  That might help, or it's too late to do any good.  Reasonable long runs might be my only saving grace.

Anyhow, this morning Ash joined me for 10k on her bike.  She was all bundled up with double pants and a sweater while I ran shirtless.  I added on while she finished her breakfast and played at a park for a while.  It was so nice to have her along.  May mornings in the 50s are incomparable.   

p.m.  My neighbor Travis is beginning to run.  I joined him on his ladder workout;  he runs a modest distance north, then returns home running up and down every cross street.  He didn't like that I wasn't breathing heavy.  When he spends the next 4 years running consistently, he won't breathe heavily at that pace either.   

10:50 p.m.  I need to get a watch.  My garmin is giving up the ghost, and by now I have a pretty good sense of distances for my usual routes.  Tonight's 10k started much later than I would prefer, but the cloudy, moonless darkness, along with the late hour, made for a quiet run.  There were only 2-3 cars the entire run, so I was enjoying the middle stripe of the road, rather than stumbling along the shoulder and gutter.

Medium-hard effort tonight, with a pause at 4 so soak my head and get a drink.  I startled the amorous couple on the swings who were also enjoying the moonless darkness. I'm sure they were just visiting.  Um hmm.

Something I ate wasn't sitting well, so I thought about skipping tonight.  Then it occurred to me this was an excellent chance to practice running while feeling lousy.  1 mile warmup, then 7@6:40, slight downhill.  The crocs worked great, and I felt better from 1 to 6.3.  I'm always glad for the treadmill for runs like this; lock in a pace and hang on till it's over. 

Good luck to all the Ogden runners!  I'm joining friends for a loop around the lake.  

My friend Nate and his sister Liz were running the Ogden marathon, and I got to pace.  I planned to meet them around mile 8, just after the turn to run around the lake, but I saw Kelli running down, so I tagged along with her for a couple miles.  She ran well!  Shortly after getting dropped, I saw Amber, and ran with her for a mile or so.  She PRed by a long ways.  It was fun to see waves of runners coming along, with clusters around the pace groups.  I heard the 3:35 pacer quit at the half, leaving the course, tossing the balloons and signs in the trash and disappearing into the crowd.  It would be pretty discouraging to be part of THAT pace group.

I saw several other neighbors and friends, before finally spotting Nate and Liz.  We ran from 9-19.  Liz was doing her 1st marathon.  She was having a tough go, more mental than physical, so we did all we could to keep her distracted and moving along.  I laughed at one point she said, "I thought this was going to be fun."  She mostly held on to 10 minute pace, so it was easy to keep up an endless stream of prattle to keep her distracted.  

At the parting of the ways I was tempted to continue along with them, but logistically, it wouldn't have worked out very well to collect the car parked in Huntsville.  So I turned around at mile 19 and headed back up the canyon.  I wanted to run 20ish miles, and pick things up at the end.  My final miles were considerably faster, but not as quick as the couple I ran with Kelli.   My garmin is giving up the ghost, so I can't get any numbers, but I stuck pretty close to 7:20 mm.

I'm making long run plans for 5/26, pondering an up-down on skyline drive, or some BST nonsense, shooting for 17-20 miles, depending on difficulty of the trail.  Company would be welcome!