A little more consistency...

I've managed to get two 5 mile runs in over the past few days so I think I'm getting back on track. The efficiency is definitely off - I think my long-lasting cold had more of a fitness impact than I thought. I should finish this week with 35 miles or so, and hopefully continue to build for a while. The half marathon is a week from Sunday and I'll be curious to see how my training goes between now and then. My best time in the half is 1:35:59 and I can't imagine coming anywhere near that but I hope to make a decent showing anyway. I'm glad to be getting more frequent running in because I was missing all of the data analysis that goes along with it (heartrate vs. pace, average pace per mile per month, etc.). Despite loving to analyze all that, I have yet to figure out how to hook my Garmin up to my pc.

10 Miles

Today was a beautiful day in Portland and I took advantage of that to get a nice 10 mile run in. My heartrate was pretty good but my legs could definitely feel that I haven't run much mileage since Tokyo. I managed 9:03 pace with an average HR of 149, so I don't think I was going too fast but I will likely run a bit slower as my long runs get longer again. I'm planning to alternate long runs with fast-finish long runs (ala McMillan) for my July marathon training.

Back in the Swing of Things

I'm starting to feel like my old self again, with 3 runs in this week and a long-ish run planned for tomorrow. I didn't feel super great on my runs this week but I could definitely feel some fitness still there and I'm hoping I'll be back to normal in a few weeks. I have a half marathon coming up in Eugene, OR on 4/29 that should be a lot of fun. My parents lived in Eugene for 7-8 years so I have a lot of good memories from visiting them there. I'm not expecting a PR in the race but it will be fun anyway. My main focus is building my mileage back up and getting my marathon training in gear. Plus, spring is finally here in Oregon so it's so great to get outside and run in the nice weather.

In unrelated news, our chicken coop is nearly built (well, we have a ways to go but made a lot of progress today). I need to figure out how to post pictures in here so I can show the coop and our chicks that we got 2 weeks ago and they're now about 3 times as big as they were. We're calling them Rhoda, Diddy and Ruttager. Rhoda is a Rhode Island Red, Diddy has puffy cheeks (get it? Puffy, Puff Daddy, P. Diddy, Diddy) and Ruttager just because we needed a Simpson's reference in there somewhere. Ruttager is all black so Black Bart was the alternate name.

Ahhhh, Running Again

Wow, that was one long cold virus. Just about 4 weeks (I'd say I'm 90% recovered at this point). I guess that's one way to take a 2 week break from running! Actually, by the end of the 2 weeks I was sort of not looking forward to running. But, 5 minutes into my run on Sunday and I remembered why I love it. Must be those endorphins or something. Anyway, I managed 3.4 miles on Sunday and 3.5 miles today, so hopefully it won't take me TOO long to get back into the swing of things. I'm going to have to do a major overhaul of my training plan for the July marathon, but it's far enough away still that I think I'll be okay. I'll have to spend a good chunk of time getting back to my pre-Tokyo fitness but I should have some time to improve upon that (barring any major setbacks). I'm psyched to be back at it!

Sunday: 3.4 miles, 8:23/mile, avg HR 153
Tuesday: 3.5 miles, 9:07/mile, avg HR 147