October 22, 2013

Back again?!

Well here I am...yet again. Another 3 months  5 months!! or so without anything from me, no real excuse, just didn't feel like posting anything up. For all that don't know I have some major life changes coming up, so running has been kind of on the back burner, but I'll give you the full run down of all the happenings and to do's.

First off, I had a disappointing end to July as i couldn't just pull myself together to finish the Great Cranberry Island 50k. We arrive on the island a day before the race and stayed with some great company. I knew that morning when I took a short walk, my legs just wouldn't hold up. They were achy, complaining, and just plain ol' bitching to me.
Photo Courtesy of Kevin Morris Photography 
Running with Gary, and Ty. Legs not feeling good at all. This was around mile 6. 
Well by mile 10 I was walking and after turning around at mile 11 I plain ol' quit...it was so frigging sad. I tore off my bib and dropped. I felt bitter and totally unsatisfied with of my running career.

Moving on...

August came and went...very few miles were logged. One good race come September.

I managed a few good workouts before the Bangor Labor Day 5 miler.
  • 6x30 sec hills w/ 1 min recovery
  • 8x30 sec hills w/ 1 min recovery
  •  Two 21+ long runs with the Crow Athletics on the carriage roads of ANP

September

The plan: Build a solid base, run some nasty workouts, and come into October ready to roar!...Errrr...Didn't go like that one bit. 

Finishing the 51st Bangor Labor Day Road Race. 75 seconds faster than last year.

I ran the Bangor Labor Day 5 miler in 27:56 about 75 seconds faster than the previous year. I felt really good for this race. Legs felt decent and I finally had the itch and hunger to run and run fast. Will it last?

NO! The next week we made a quick trip to Michigan to apartment hunt and managed only a few miles. I tired to bounce back the next week with 48 miles but that didn't really help as i still fought to run. It wasn't that I didn't want to run, it just got extremely busy. Come September 29th i noticed I hadn't race in a while. Hey why the heck not? I jumped into the Mainiacs Charities Half Marathon.
Ty and I chatting post race after an decent effort of 1:20:24. All smiles. 

I wanted to know how I would fare running a half on such little running in the past month. First 6 miles felt easy. (me: All that perfected tapering). Ty caught up to me and we chatted and just kept cruising through the turn around. I soon began to labor a bit more around mile 9 or so. Luckily the last 2 m miles are pretty much flat so coasting at this point is easy. I just had to keep my legs under me and not let Ty get away. Running with a good friend who really wasn't racing made it that much easier as he slowed down with me as i began to fall apart by mile 12. We push each other over the next half mile, but i just couldn't stick with it. With a 1/4 mile to go we ran in together. All smiles, but the work had been complete. 1:20:24. 3rd and 4th overall.

The next couple of weeks running really took the back burner as life began to pick up.  Finishing off last minute work, a ridiculously great bachelor party and the our wedding kept us so busy I just didn't focus on running much.  

Now the middle of October has passed, were settled into our new apartment in Gaylord, Michigan (ok..snicker away), the first snow has fallen (about 1" today) and my running is now starting to pick up again. 

Now time to find some road races out here.