W5D2

There was an easy 4 miler on the schedule today, but first I had a session with the trainer.

Sunday morning when I got there, Chris the trainer, wanted to work on legs. I wasn't up to that considering the mileage I'd run that week. I decided that today would be a good day for a leg work out. It had been 9 days since my last one, so I figured I was ready for another go at it.

I got to the gym and warmed up with a mile on the treadmill. When I got off the mill he asked what we were doing today. I suggested legs. He said "Nope, we're doing chest. We can do chest AND legs, but we're doing CHEST." Well OK then, who am I to argue. Actually I know I need to do the leg workouts but they are tough so breaking it up with some other body part was just fine with me.

I followed the workout with three more miles over in Via Verde next to the new concrete, to complete the days planned mileage.

W5D1

Today was a rest day as per the plan. Instead of running I trimmed the hedges and pulled weeds, stuff I should/could have done yesterday instead of going to the beach. The beach was more fun.

This evening we got a new higher speed modem. I've lost most of my favorites and almost broke my streak. Computer geeks, which I am not, rule the world.

W4D7

This is has been an odd week of training for me. It was my highest mileage week, at 34 miles, since November 2007. That's right 2007. I started off 2008 injured (stress fracture) and my mileage build to my one and only marathon, St. Jude, got me close at 33.7 but needless to say it has been a long time for this kind of mileage. I hope I'm not tempting fate by getting there. The schedule only goes up from here, making 34 look like an easy week.

This week was also odd in that there was no long run, i.e. a run longer than 10 miles. There weren't really any short runs, less than 5 miles in my mind. The whole week was a bunch of medium length runs. 7, 7, 8, 6 and 6 miles were the daily tallies.

The week ended with today's 6 miler. I got up and ran from home another one of my old routes on the streets. I followed that up with a session with the personal trainer. We worked out shoulders and biceps. I really like working with the trainer because he pushes me beyond what I would do on my own.

After a quick shower, Mrs J and I followed the lead of David and Mrs T, and headed off to spend the afternoon on the beach at Corona Del Mar, enjoying the sun, the surf, the cooler temps and catching up on some reading.

We returned home to temperatures at least 15 degrees warmer, took the kids to dinner, I went to church, went to the grocery store and another week has come to a close.

Next week's schedule looks doable. There's a traditional long run and even three runs of 5 miles or less. Very traditional.

W4D6

Lisa and I have dinner with Mike and Maria several times a year. Our youngest sons grew up together. They were in the same sports league but on opposing teams. The boys went to different schools starting in junior high and sort of went their own separate ways but we parents have stayed friends even now that the boys are a year out of high school.

Mike and Maria have both run at times. so they understand my mindset when it comes to that discipline. Mike is mostly into pick up basketball and bike riding now. He and I have talked about getting together for a ride one day. Back in December we made tentative plans for a ride in the spring. One thing or another kept postponing it until finally this weekend, technically summer, we made it out for the ride.

I rode the street bike with the only issue being achy shoulders. The ride from Azusa to Seal Beach was about 35 miles and took us about2.5 hours. We met our wives in Seal Beach for breakfast at the River's End Cafe at mile marker 00.00. It seemed to be a favorite hang our for bikers and the food, at least breakfast food, was pretty good.

It was a beautiful morning for a ride and a beautiful day at the beach but we loaded the bikes into the car and headed back home before noon.

W4D5

The life schedule necessitated another change in the running schedule. Rather than a rest day, Saturday's workout was moved up to Friday after work. The schedule called for a 5K race with a 2 mile warm up and a 1 mile cool down. 5K's on a Friday night are hard to come by.

I decided to modify things a little by heading over to marked trail on the San Gabriel River Bike Path. I modified the 5K to a simpler 3 miles. I kept the warm up nice and easy at around 10:20 pace. My goal for the 3 mile section was 8:00 miles.

I took off down the path at a pretty good clip. I hit the first mile mark in 7:46. "Whoa there Nellie, slow down a little or you'll never make it to the end", I thought to myself. I kept on going. At 1.5 miles I was beginning to wonder if I could really keep up the pace for 3 miles. It had been a long time since I tried to do anything even remotely resembling speed. I hit the second mile mark in 7:27. what, what, WHAT!! Way faster than expected. I tried to slow down a bit for mile 3, but I still came in at 7:27. I think I sped up a little near the end to just get the thing over with. 7:34 pace overall is way beyond what I expected out of this run. You can bet I took it nice and easy for the 1 mile cool down.

I'm calling this a successful little test of the speed capabilities. Yasso says "the point this week is to go out and enjoy racing." Although I only raced myself, I'd have to say I did enjoy it.

W4D4

I'm Starting With The Man In The Mirror
I'm Asking Him To Change His Ways
And No Message Could Have Been Any Clearer
If You Wanna Make The World A Better Place
Take A Look At Yourself, And Then Make A Change
- Michael Jackson

I was never a die hard fan but back in the day I enjoyed a good MJ song or two. This one wasn't particularly a standout for me until I heard it while running the Las Vegas Marathon in 2005. It was playing over the loud speakers while we ran through the Fremont Street Experience early on that cold windy morning. It was a cool memory of the day. This video is a bit long, but I'm a sucker for anything with a gospel choir. Enjoy.



Today was 8 miles with Hills. The instructions were still to find a hilly route and not to treat it like an easy run. I strung together two of my favorite 4 mile routes in Bonelli. I tried by best to hammer the run, but I felt more like a tack hammer than a sledge hammer. I took a fair share of walk breaks but tried to keep them to 30 seconds before "tacking" away again.

I wore a new pair of Adrenaline ASR, the all terrain version of my favorite Adrenaline GTS. I wore these once back 6 months ago and wasn't too sure I like them. They have heavier tread and seemed bulkier all around although they do have a nice roomy toe box. They've been sitting in the closet ever since. Today I appreciated the new shoe bounce as I made my way over the hills.

W4D3

Another 7 miler today. Seven miles isn't a distance that I run often, at least not lately. Monday I mapped out a couple of routes from home. One was the route I did yesterday and the other was a route I used to do a couple of years ago occasionally when I needed the 7 mile distance. That particular route is straight out one street to a main intersection and then straight back. Not a very exciting route but an easy one to get on cruise control and just run.

During the day today I remembered a route I used to run a couple of years ago when my left hip (sciatica) first started hurting. It is mostly on equestrian trails in the city of Walnut. The loop is almost exactly 7 miles. The route is gently rolling with quite a few left and right turns that make it more forgiving on the legs and more interesting for the brain. The other nice thing about this route is that it passes two parks with bathrooms. Today was a good day to choose this route over the simple out and back. For some reason I needed to stop at both bathrooms. I guess I did a pretty good job of getting my water in this afternoon at work.

W4D2

Had a midweek visit with the personal trainer. We worked on chest and triceps today. It was a good workout.

I followed that up with 7 miles easy. I ran straight from home over to what used to be the equestrian trail in Via Verde and then back.

I need to send a Thank You note to the city of San Dimas. The equestrian trail in Via Verde extends all the way from the horse stables near the freeway up the hill to the entrance of Bonelli. There is an additional section that runs perpendicular on Puente Ave. My regular easy 3 mile route was run on the dirt along Puente and Via Verde Avenues and back again. I've run that route extensively in the last six years. The dirt has been there for well over 20 years.

For some reason, maybe it was Obama stimulus money, someone in the city government decided that the dirt on Puente Ave needed to be turned into a proper sidewalk. There are only 6 houses on that stretch of Puente Ave, why a sidewalk was necessary I'll never know. Many people ride, walk or RUN up and down that section of the street. The concrete will be nice for the walkers and riders, but now the sensible runners are forced into the street. I wish someone had consulted me before they poured all that knee busting cement. My easy 3 milers will never be the same.

W4D1

My legs are way sorer than I expected them to be after that workout yesterday. I guess I should have thrown in a few more sets of biceps. Then again, my biceps are pretty darn sore too.

I was orginally planning on switching things up a little this week too since I'd just had a rest day yesterday. But with the sore legs I opted to stick to Monday as a rest day anyway.

I did finally spend some time on the road bike. It is quite a different sensation from the mountain bike. I could definitely get up more speed, which isn't necessarily a good thing. Faster just means a harder and uglier fall, at least in my head. I had a hard time getting used to the gears and the angle of the brakes is way different than the mountain bike. I only rode for about 10-12 miles. The only thing that really hurts is my neck and shoulders. The road bike certainly doesn't have the shock absorbtion of the mountain bike either. The long ride to the beach should be an interesting one.

The picture is the happy graduate on his way to reality. Notice he's still smiling!!

W3D7

My second rest day this week had gotten pushed out to Sunday since I took advantage of the mornings at home at the end of the week to get the miles on the books. I was looking forward to not running although I usually like to "celebrate" holidays with a good run. I had already tallied up my weekly/annual/lifetime miles on Saturday evening. The numbers, in case you wondered, were:

32 for the week (5 days of running)
472.7 for 2009
7794.2 Lifetime (since June 2003)

I had an appointment with my trainer this morning. He always has me do about 10 minutes of aerobic activity before beginning the weights. Since I've been on the marathon training plan, I've used the elliptical to accomplish this. I don't track those miles. For some reason I jumped on the treadmill this morning and put in a mile before the work out. When I got home I upped all my totals by one. (I'll let you do the math.)

I did a leg workout with the trainer but it was tempered somewhat by inserting a few bicep sets into the mix.

When I got home, Lisa made breakfast for us. That was nice, since weekend breakfast is usually my forte and responsibility. The whole family went out in the middle afternoon for Father's Day Mexican Food. We've been doing this annually for 22 years since Lisa was pregnant with Tyler and I wasn't quite officially a father yet.

I hope all the Dads out there, especially the running variety, all had a wonderful family filled day.

Off to week 4 of the plan with 11 weeks until the big day in the Heart of America. I'm #66, Joe is #61. Looks like there's still plenty of room for you. You've got plenty of time to train for a marathon, right? Anybody else want to predict #65 as the winner?

W3D6

The graduation ceremony went off without a hitch. By the way things went it wasn't too difficult to tell that the place is a liberal arts school in California. All the regular pomp and circumstance was just a bit more casual and twisted than you might find at an East Coast Ivy League school. The place is full of talented out-of-the-box folks, both teachers and students. Afterwards we headed over to the Little Italy section of downtown San Diego from some great Italian food (of course). Ten friends and family enjoyed a wonderful meal at Cafe Zucchero.

We had made arrangements to spend the night in San Diego, so I woke up this morning and ran 4 miles on the San Diego River Pedestrian and Bike Trail. Being concrete, the trail is very well suited to pedestrians and bikes. Concrete is not a runner's best friend, at least not this runner, but for a one off run it was a nice little route.

On the way home we accidentally came across Road Runner Sports store headquarterd near San Diego. We decided to stop in and Lisa bought me a couple of pairs of shorts and new shirt as a Father's Day gift. The RRS stuff was buy one get 40% off a second item. Can't pass up a sale. While I was there I decided to have a running analysis done. It seems that I've been using the right style shoe - stability - all along. It is always good to have confirmation, especially in light of the last two years injuries.

We made a leisurely trip back home by 2:00 in the afternoon. Tyler and his girlfriend on the other hand had left San Diego at 5:30 a.m. to rush home to spend the rest of the day doing food prep and final arrangements for a 75th birthday party with appetizers, salads, main dishes and desserts for 60 people. They have been doing a couple of catering jobs on the side but this is their most ambitious project to date. They've been prepping for the better part of the week. The graduation ceremony mid stream just when the major work needed to be done added an extra little wrinkle to the whole project.

I pitched in a little at the end by helping grill some steaks and picking up the cakes that had been stored in Grandma's fridge and delivering them to the party. Otherwise the two of them did all the work on their own and from the reviews I heard at the party (we were invited guests) the clients and their guests were very happy with the food. Hopefully this will be the beginning of a new venture.

W3D5

Friday is supposed to be a day off but because of the graduation festivities later today I took to opportunity to get it done this morning on familiar paths near home.

Last night I loaded up some new music on the ipod for today's run. Mat Kearny makes some good music for LSD runs (not the 70's kind), especially the City of Black and White album. I have two of his albums on the ipod and with it on random his songs came up frequently.

Strange coincidence the first song that came on today as I started the run was "Hit the Ground Running" by Keith Urban. I'm not usually a country music fan, but I really like the duet he sang with Kris Allen on the American Idol finale, I Want to Kiss a Girl, and ended up downloading the entire CD from itunes. I've probably already listened to it too many times, but I really like it.

I did the 13 mile run over on the San Gabriel River Trail. I ended up running into a friend of mine out for a bike ride. He and I are supposed to ride bikes to the beach next weekend, but I have yet to get on the road bike for any kind of practice. I usually ride my mountain bike but I will be hopelessly behind since he'll be on a road bike.

I actually was able to pull of negative splits on this. I hear about this practice all the time, especially in training plans but I rarely am able to pull it off. My first few miles were 9:45, 10:01, 10:13 and 9:41. With 5 miles left to go I was able to ratchet things up a bit with the last 5 clocking 9:33, 9:30, 9:33, 9:02 and 8:40. Good stuff.

Now its off to San Diego as Tyler gets his Bachelor's degree in Culinary Management.

W3D4

On vacation today. Had another good workout with Chris at 7:30 a.m. and then just over 12 hours after the hill run yesterday I was back out running again. This time it was 4 miles easy.

I decided on the picnic loop at Bonelli; into the park, 2 times around the picnic loop, then back out of the park is 4 miles. It was a beautifully peaceful morning. At times it seemed like I had the hold place to myself. On the first trip around the loop I came upon the grassy section and it occurred to me to give barefoot running a try. I've heard good things about it so on my second loop around off came the shoes and socks and into the grass I went.

It felt sort of cool to run barefoot, kind of free. The grass was wet and cool from the dew and the ground was even sort of soft and moist. I ran for about a half mile on the grass. Putting my shoes back on for the run up the road out of the park felt a little odd at first. My feet were warm with the shoes on, the weight of the shoes was noticeable and the tightness of the laces was even a little annoying at first. I'm not sure how much barefoot running there will be in the future, but it was fun to take advantage of the opportunity that presented itself.

Lisa and I spent the rest of the day in Temecula visiting with her Dad and step-Mom. We visited a couple of our favorite wineries and then had dinner at Rustico. Tomorrow is the big graduation day so we'll be back in San Diego in the early afternoon.

W3D3

7 miles hills - Done!

At this point in the Yasso schedule the hill runs are described as: " The seasoned schedule calls for runs on hills this week. Later in the program, these will become hill repeats; but this week, just pick a run with lots of hills with possible." This week the hill workout adds this little tidbit: "As usual, this should be the hilliest loop you can find for the distance and shouldn't be treated as an easy run."

Well, I got the hills and the distance right. I may have messed up a little on the part about not treating it as an easy run. Last week's note on hills did say "You'll know you've found the right (hill) loop if it's too steep to run easily." I did get that part right. My hill is runnable but not entirely easy.

The route I've used the last couple of weeks includes a hill that is 0.7 mile up. I've been keeping track of my up and down times. This week I ran the hill 3 times. The up times were 7:41, 7:59 and 7:58. The first two downs were 6:38 and 6:40. On the third downhill I decided to kick it in gear a little. I concentrated on keeping by chest up and my shoulders back and just let my legs fly a little. I made it down in 5:48. The rest of the flatter part of the route was taken at a fairly easy pace.

I'm not sure how I feel about the idea of hill repeats coming up in the future. I've got a couple more weeks before they show up on the schedule so I've got a couple of weeks to fret about them.

W3D2

I took full advantage of the rest day. My sister and her boyfriend arrived from Ohio. It seems like only yesterday that I saw them. We took the whole family to In-n-Out Burger so the boyfriend could be properly indoctrinated to SoCal. He enjoyed his Double Double and Fries Animal Style.

Tomorrow, I will be back at it with 7 miles of hills.

W3D1

Running plans are an ever changing thing. Once its on paper I like to stick to it the way it is written but I'm not so rigid that I can't change things around as the rest of my life dictates. Really, I'm not and I can.

In anticipation of my sister's arrival tomorrow evening; in for the graduation ceremony later this week; I ran my 4 miler today, a scheduled rest day. I ran the same route I ran yesterday but didn't feel nearly as peppy as I did then. It may just be the difference between running in the morning and running after a day at work. I took about 1:30 longer than the day before to cover the same distance.

My favorite little spot of local running haven has been marred by violence. It really is too bad that people feel the need to shoot each other, but can't they do it in their own backyard rather than in mine?

W2D7

Week two complete and pretty much the way it was written on paper. 28 miles in 5 days.I made up for the shortage on the hill run when we accidentally missed the turn around point on the long run on Saturday. It's nice when things work out like that.

I went back to the gym this morning for my third session with the trainer this week. I followed my trainer to his new gym and finally used up the last of the sessions on Friday at the old gym. I will settle into a routine with one, maybe two sessions a week at the new place with Chris and once or twice a week at the old place on my own. I used the gym extensively during my rehab to cross train but now that I am in full swing marathon training it is harder to get there.

I got on the scale at the gym this morning and I'm down 6 pounds from about 3 months ago. Almost down to 160. I ran my best marathons when I was closer to 155. I was down to 150 at one point but most people thought I was too skinny then. If I could get back there, I might actually be able to see the abs I've been working on beneath the layer of middle aged blubber.

After the workout, it was off to Bonelli as usual for a 4 mile run. I felt really good. Many times on the return trip I'm just pushing forward to the finish. Today I felt like I could have easily kept going for awhile.

Back home, I made breakfast for my wife and me. Bacon, egg and cheese sandwiches on whole wheat English muffins with some sliced strawberries on the side and a pot of coffee.

I can actually see glimpses of blue sky peaking out between the clouds today. We may see some sun for the first time in nearly two weeks.

W2D6

Time for the long run of the week, the second one of this training cycle. It is the shortest one on the schedule except for the run in two weeks which includes a 5k race.

I met the CA Cruiser for our old faithful run along the river path in Yorba Linda. I had invited my friend Terry from work to join us. Part of the group this morning included Kevin. Kevin is husband to a woman who runs with us frequently. Kevin is a much less frequent member of the group, being self employed Saturday is often is day off from running. Kevin and Terry have never joined us on the same day. It turns out that Kevin is Terry's accountant. Small world.

The three of us ran together at a fairly relaxed pace, taking walk breaks every 7 minutes. The kettle corn from last night did not materialize into the disaster I dreaded, but I did take advantage of the restrooms that were conveniently located about 7 miles into the route. Weather conditions were as expected; coolish, overcast, yet a tad humid. We did catch a very brief and faint glimpse of our shadows on the return trip, but otherwise the gloom continues on unabated. We totaled just over 10 miles in around 1:45.

The rest of the day's activities included some much needed yard work and shopping with the older son for appropriate graduation attire. Being a youth in California he rarely has need for real grown up clothes. The color of the shirt was the big sticking point. Black is the usual fall back color. He wanted to branch out a little but was afraid. Finally he picked a tie that he really liked and we went from there to find the shirt to go with it. He assured me he had a decent pair of dress pants. He was planning on wearing his black canvas Vans with the ensemble. I talked him into some real shoes and we found a pair of pretty hip looking black leather lace ups to bring him a little further into adulthood and fashion forwardness. His mother and girlfriend approved so I guess we did all right.

W2D5

Its Friday and a scheduled rest day, at least from running. I got up early and headed to the gym and road the bike for a while and then did some ab work before meeting with my trainer for a leg workout.

When I got home from work today I grabbed a bag of kettle corn the kids had brought home the day before from a trip to zoo. I sat and watched TV and munched kettle corn for over half an hour. I could stop myself even though I know that popcorn is not going to bode well for my intestinal health during tomorrow's long run.

Tyler cooked dinner for us. We had steak, sauteed carrots and risotto. I ate my helping of risotto and ended up cleaning up another portion left in the pan. I'm calling that carbo loading.

The June Gloom continues on with another sunless day. My gut may not hold up well tomorrow morning but I'm sure the weather will be runner perfect.

W2D4

Under the category of "Really!! Are you kidding me??!"

When I returned to work after my trip to Ohio all of the paper towel dispensers, the ones in cafeteria, in the lab and in the bathrooms, were adorned with the following laser printed sticker:

"The paper in this dispenser is recycled and EPA compliant"

Again I say, are you kidding me? How are we supposed to react to this. My morale meter certainly took a huge leap in the right direction based on this announcement. Yeah, right! This year many things have happened at work; A) our department was downsized by 25%, B) there are no merit increases for 2009, C) we are being forced to deplete our vacation balances and D) the CEO's base salary is $1.7 Million and with bonus, stocks and options can reach nearly $13 Million, for the year. For crying out loud what does he actually do to earn that amount of cash? But hey, our paper towels are EPA compliant! Good grief!!

(I know some would say I should be happy to be employed and I admit I'm not as happy about it as I should be. But being employed or not doesn't change the truth of A, B, C and D above.)

On the physical fitness front, I had a great work out with my trainer. I've being seeing some rewards in upper body strength lately. I followed that with a planned 6 mile run with hills. I had mapped out a route last night but altered it on the fly and ended up running 5.6 miles with 3 pretty good hills in the mix.

We had another pretty gloomy day, but the sun did shine for about an hour in the late afternoon. Even without the sun the temperatures were in the mid 70's, but still pretty enjoyable for running.

W2D3

This time of the year most of the mornings are grey and overcast. The phenomenon is caused by the clouds coming inland off the ocean; known by the meteorologists as marine layer or on-shore flow. The mornings are cloudy, but the sun usually takes over before noon. We call it May Grey and June Gloom. Today was the mother of all June Gloom days. I don't think the sun ever peeked through. We ate our lunch on the patio at work in the gloom and I drove home and then ran in the gloom as well. I really don't mind it. It makes for good running weather. Although for the most part I am a sun worshipper.

For my 4 miler I was back in Bonelli, heading out on the trail that goes north along the west side of the park and then back on the road from the dam. After the run I went to In-n-Out Burger to pick up dinner for the family and to celebrate my return to SoCal. If you've ever had a burger and fries from In-n-Out you'd agree that it was a good choice.

W2D2

Memories are funny things.

I have a sister that is 13 months younger than me. She recounted a story of a January when she and I were 18 and 19. She had just left the house and slipped and fell on ice on the sidewalk and broke her ankle. She crawled back up onto the porch and knocked on the door. I let her in and apparently questioned her on how she knew her ankle was broken. I called our Mom at work to come home to take her to the hospital. My sister remembers the whole ordeal in vivid detail, of course. She went back to college with her foot in a cast and on crutches. I have absolutely no memory of her with a broken ankle.

We both remember a story when she was 8 and had fallen off a bike riding down a hill and I ran back to the car and took care of her knee with a bandanna and left over water from my lunch box thermos. Wonder why I remember that incident and not the other?

For my last day in Ohio I headed back over to the Wellington Reservation and ran every inch of the trails there to get in my 4 mile run. It seems to be a pretty popular little destination. There were quite a few other folks out there walking the loops.

Tomorrow its back to work and back to my old faithful routes.

W2D1

Still in OH. My niece's graduation was yesterday. It sure takes a long time to read off 371 names. One cool thing during the ceremonies they had groups of students - athletes, honor students, etc - stand to be recognized. The group that got the most resounding and longest lasting applause where those that had enlisted in the military. Pretty cool, I thought.

Today is a scheduled rest day. I had hoped to take a long walk this afternoon. We've had rain showers this morning. I would have run in the rain, but see no real reason to walk in it. The weather seems to have cleared up for the moment so I may head out while the getting is good.

Tonight is the graduation party. Tomorrow afternoon I get on a plane and head back home to my real life. Hmmmmm..........

W1D7

Spent the rest of yesterday afternoon sitting on my parent back patio, reading a (running) magazine, watching the birds, took a little nap, then came in to catch up on some long overdue blog reading. Ah, vacation.

Up by 7:00 this morning. I only wanted to run about 3 miles this morning. The plan had 5 miles but I am trying not to increase my weekly mileage too much too soon so I had decided to scale back slightly. My plan was to go out and run around the above ground reservoir just outside of town. My Dad told me about a new park just across the road. The Wellington Reservation is also part of the Lorain County Metro Parks. There were about 4 miles of trails, some asphalt, some crushed gravel. I ended up running 3.8 miles. I will definitely add this run to list for future visits back home.

Week One of marathon training is in the books. The plan as written called for 30 miles in 5 days. I had hoped to keep that to no more than 28 miles. With the extra I ran on Thursday in Findley State Park, a little extra on the bike trail on Saturday and more than planned this morning at the Metro Park I actually ended up exceeding the plan by 0.3 for a total of 30.3 miles. The best part is so far the leg pains and aches are in check.

Off to week 2. Thirteen weeks to race day.

W1D6

Woke up at 6:00 to go pee. Decided that was too early to get started on the run so I laid back down. Didn't wake up again until 9:00. I haven't slept that long in quite a while. My Dad asked if I was going to run. My comment was that I should be almost done by now and I hadn't even started yet. I had some oatmeal and a cup of coffee before heading out on my run.

I headed on over to the North Coast Inland Trail. I love that the trail is known as "the skinniest park in Lorain County." I jumped onto the trail in Kipton at the 2 mile mark and headed northeast. The first mile was 9:40, the second and third with just over 9:00. I needed to slow down, but once I'm in a rhythm I am pretty powerless to change it. The mile markers disappeared after that. I'd run for about 57 minutes when I came to an intersection that had a trail sign. I tried to mentally add up all the trail segments (from Rte 511 to Oberlin Road) and figured I run at least 6 miles.

I turned around at that point and headed back. I had a nice breeze on the way back that kept the heat level in check. It was too late to be running and the sun was shining brightly. Once I hit the mile markers I found that my pace had slowed due to fatigue with the last three being: 10:02, 10:13 and 10:48. This is really the pace I should have been all along.

Back home I g-mapped the route and determined I ran 12.5 miles in 1:57; 9:26 pace overall.

W1D5

Findlay State Park is just a couple of miles from my parents home in Ohio. When I was a kid our family camped there frequently. It was nice that we could pick up at a moments notice and be there. No reservations necessary. As kids, my oldest two sisters and I would wander all over the trails of the park. It seemed like we were gone forever exploring. Our parents usually had little idea of our exact whereabouts. We always made it back when we were supposed to. Times have changed.

Today I headed out to Findlay for a run on the Thorn Mountain Bike Trail. This trail didn't exist when I was a kid, but it is a fun little place to run. I ran here a couple of years ago when I was in town for a visit, my brother's wedding I think. The trail twists and turns like a snake on an acid trip. It was a little muddy, but that made it all the more fun.

The entire trail is just over 8 miles. I planned to run 6. I ran for 1:20 then walked the remaining distance back to the car. I got a little twisted around early on and ended up where I started about 20 minutes into the run. I finally figured out where I was and got on track. I figured I probably ran about 7 miles in reality.

Tonight I'm meeting with my brother and sisters to try to finalize the plans for our parents 50th wedding anniversary party in September. Another trip to Ohio so I hope another spin around the bike trail at Findlay State Park.

W1D4

Up at 4:00 a.m. to get to the airport. Arrived in OH at 5:00 p.m. Flew on Continental Airlines and actually got food on the flight. Cereal, milk and raisins from CA to TX; tuna sandwich, carrots, and a KitKat from TX to OH. I was shocked, I haven't gotten any kind of food on a flight in a long time.

Scrambled the schedule around a little and will run today's planned 6 miler on Friday.

W1D3

Yesterday's weather was beautiful, today's was So Cal June Gloom at his fullest. We even had rain, an actual bonafide thunder shower. I sit outside on a patio at work most days with several coworkers for lunch. One of the lightning flashes hit so close and exploded into thunder almost immediately that we all jumped.

The rain continued on into the afternoon. It was pretty light and wouldn't affect my planned run later in the evening. The problem was the thunder and lightning continued on until well into the afternoon. When a coworker left work they cautioned me about running outside. They'd just heard a report of a women getting struck by lighting at an outlet mall about 60 miles east of us.

The weather subsided sufficiently that I got my planned 4 miler in after work, outside. I texted my coworker "4 miles and no lightning strike." 24 hours after yesterday's leg work out I could really feel the effects on this run.

More foam rolling is in order. Now I've got to pack up my suitcase for the third time in 5 weeks for a long weekend trip back to OH for my oldest niece's high school graduation.

Today was National Running Day. I hope you were able to get your run on today.

W1D2

After the rest day yesterday, the real work began today.

Right after work I met with my trainer and did a 30 minute leg workout. That guy loves to do leg workouts. Me, I tolerate them. Today made me realize how tight my quads and hips are. I need to get back to the stretching and rolling. I've gotten lazy about them since I've been feeling better. Marathon training will be better served by finding the time to include them.

I followed up the leg work out by an doing an easy 3 miler. I ran in Bonelli- down Raging Waters Drive, across the dam and back again. I keeping the pace easy. I broke the run into quarters and took a one minute walk break every 3/4 of a mile or so.

I'm off to roll the quads and hips.

W1D1

I think I can do this. Marathon training has gone well so far. Today, W1D1 (week one, day one), went well. Today, like every Monday in the plan, was a Rest Day. I think I can do this.

Ryan Reynolds had an interesting quote in the March Men's Health magazine after having run the NYC marathon about goals versus expectations. He tries to avoid expectations saying, "When you have expectations, you are setting yourself for disappointment. I didn't expect to finish the marathon; I trained to finish it."

And so will I.