Double Digit Run...Finally

Well, I can now say I've hit the double digits for a single run as I ran 10.4 miles yesterday for my LSD (long slow distance) run. And I ran that 10.4 miles without stopping (except to grab a snack and a water bottle from my car at the halfway point). It truly is amazing to me, since just 10 short weeks ago, I was NOT a runner, and now, just 2 1/2 months later, I can literally run double digits. I feel like Forest Gump, ha. In the last week, I've run 28.4 miles. In the last month, I've run 110.8 miles. Again, the only word that can describe that is amazing. More importantly, on my 10 1/2 mile run today, it felt good. I felt strong, and literally thought I could have run further and longer. And now, 12 hours after the run, I still feel good with no major aches and pains. That's a miracle in itself, that I've been able to accomplish much of my running injury free. I did have some Achilles Tendinitis early on, and occasional sore/stiff legs here and there, but so far, in my 215.9 career running miles, it's been pretty smooth. I can only keep my fingers crossed and hope that I remain injury free over the next 5 weeks. Yes, my half marathon is now just 4 weeks and 6 days away. That's slightly daunting, but also surprisingly refreshing knowing that I hit 10 miles today, and should be able to complete the full 13.1 miles just as strong as I was today. I fully intend to cross the finish line with a smile on my face, and an unthinkable amount of pride in what I've been able to accomplish. I do have a goal of finishing with a time of 2:10, which is a solid 10 minute mile. I honestly think I can do it. Has it been easy? Absolutely not, I've worked very hard for this, with a ton of sweat and determination. Not much blood in there, and maybe just one tear. Ha.

New Running Shoes...Already?

Well, my Nike Pegasus 25+ running shoes have about 210 miles on them. Yikes, how did I rack up the miles so fast? Well, I'm now up to the mid 20s for mileage each week, so yes, the numbers do add up pretty quickly. While they are still fine, I am finding that I'm getting a little more ankle and knee pain more frequently now. Not sure if that's because I'm running so much, or that the shoes are starting to lose their cushion. Probably a little of both. Plus, with another week until my half marathon, I'll be pushing 350 miles by race day, and that may be pushing it for having a smooth, ache free race. So, I went to the local running store and got a pair of Mizuno Wave Rider 12s. They recently won the Runners World editor's choice award, and are definitely a quality shoe. I went with size 12, although the running store wanted me to buy a 12 1/2, but they just felt too big and loose. I've had no problems with my feet at all in my Nike Pegasus 2007 or 25+ in size 12, so I'm not going to change now. We'll see how they feel when running. They sure felt awesome when I tried them on. I could have gotten them for a few $$ cheaper online, but decided to give the LRS some love instead.

9 Mile LSD Run, Yowza!

A couple of nights ago, I headed out well after dinner (around 830 pm) for what I thought was just going to be an easy 3 or 4 mile run. At about 1/2 mile into the run, I started to have a sugar crash and thought I should head for home. But, that quickly passed, and after that, I felt really good. It was dark, but I had a blinking red light on my jacket, and it was in the lower 50s. The miles quickly ticked off as I ran through my local neighborhoods. I reached 4 miles, and felt good enough to do 5. Five turned into six, and six turned into seven. When I hit seven, I thought I could surely hit 8 miles since I ran that far last week for my LSD run. When I hit 8, I really wanted to push myself to get 9 in this week. While the last couple of miles were hard, I indeed clicked off 9 miles on my run, and staggered home. My heart and lungs still felt strong, but my legs were pretty much done, and not sure they could have given any more. So, yesterday, I rested. Wow, it was a hard run, but now I just need to turn 9 into 10, and 10 into 13.1. The Lincoln Half Marathon is now just 6 weeks from today. Yikes, I can't believe that, in fact, it makes me a little more than nervous. But, I know I certainly put in my the required training, and should be more then well prepared for the run in a few weeks. Now, I just have to make sure I don't injure myself, and indeed, I should be wearing a medal around my neck, proudly I might add. Not everyone can run a half marathon, and I hope to prove to myself that I can do it.

Regarding gear, I have purchased a few toys to help out. I did purchase a SPIbelt, which is an elastic belt with a small pouch to put small, personal items (SPI). It works great, and is just big enough to hold my cell phone and car keys, and a couple packs of energy gel if necessary. Great running accessory. I also purchased the blinking, red light that I mentioned, so I'm more visible at nighttime. With the weather turning nicer, I've definitely been out running more on trails and on the streets in the neighborhoods, so I want to make sure I'm seen by traffic.

In case I'm not seen by traffic, or some vengeful person tries to run me down, I also wear a Road ID necklace. It's essentially a dog tag with all of my pertinent ICE (in case of emergency) info, should I be rendered unconscious. It's assurance that I'll be identified if something happens to me while running.

My health has also moved into the "remarkably healthy" (words of my doctor) category due to my running. My resting heart rate is about 55 to 59 beats per minute on average, although I did measure it at 49 bpm one night a couple of weeks ago. I just tested my blood pressure this evening also, it was 98 over 58. That seems a tad low, based on my physical exam from earlier this week, which was 120 over 70. My cholesterol was 152, my triglycerides 50 (should be less than 149) , my HDL was 57 (should be 40-60), and my LDL was 87 (should be less than 90). So, all in all, I'm doing great. My weight has stabilized around 156, so only just a couple of pounds below my pre-run weight.

Wow, Accomplished So Much Today

I was up at the crack of dawn. Man, I'm tired. Had to get up early to get my wife and daughter to school by 7 am, then I had a routine physical at 8am. I was the first appointment of the day, but oddly enough, didn't get seen until about 820. No wonder doctors are always so late. Then I drove to Lincoln to the Sid Dillon dealership to exchange my punctured tire. That was an easy process, and they immediately honored the road hazard tire warranty. I stopped by my sister's work to pick up a computer monitor (one that I actually bought from her 6 months ago, but just have never been able to connect at the right time or place to get it), then drove back to Omaha. I got the tires rotated on my wife's car, got a haircut, did some shopping for a new grill and new trees in the backyard, and then mounted my new tire and put the spare back in it's hidey hole. I then mowed the yard, and created another 8 bags of mulched thatch. The bags were very dense, at least twice as dense as the unmulched thath from yesterday. I then rearranged the junk in the garage so the garage door could be installed tomorrow, and also used the blower to blow out the dust in the garage and also blew off the driveway and sidewalks. Then, yes there's more, after dinner, I headed out and ran 5.3 miles, at my best pace to date, doing 9:05 miles. Wow. Since the night was still and young and I was very sore, I headed to the gym to sit in the whirlpool for awhile. Phew. It was a long day, but the yard looks awesome, I'm so pleased. It really looks great, I can only imagine how good it's going to look this summer. I still want to get some fertilizer down before the rain comes later this week, but that should be an easy job, perhaps tomorrow evening or Friday evening after work. I wish all days were this productive. Ha.

New Toys

While money is tight right now, I'm going to go ahead and buy a couple of new toys for our house. We have a 3 car garage, a double and a single. We've always had a garage door on the double from the day we moved in, but left the single alone. I've always used the key, or just flipped the knob and manually raised it whenever necessary. But, I'm ready to get an opener on the 2nd door now too. I've wanted one for a long time, but the money has always gone for other things. Oh well, it's something that we'll really use, so it's time to get er done. We also need a new grill, since our old grill is bad shape. I've nursed it along through the years replacing burners and whatnot, but I'm tired of it and want a really nice grill for our deck. I don't want a huge grill, but I do want something better than what we've got. Again, it's not really in the budget right now, but I'm going to make it work. I also want to get another security light installed under the eave in the back of our house (we have one now), and a couple of things I don't want to mention. With the house refinance complete, I feel confident that spending a couple of months of the extra money saved will be well worth it in the end.

It's Never Easy With Me

On the way home from work last night, the air pressure sensor for my tires came on. I pulled over to check the tires, but they all looked fine. I made it home OK, but this morning, the right rear tire was half flat. So, I limped up to the gas station to refill it, but it didn't last long. Within a couple of hours, it was half flat again, and I could hear it leaking. So, I filled it with my portable air compressor and headed to the tire store. Of course, the nail nicked the sidewall, and if they repaired it, it probably wouldn't last. Doh! Why are things never easy for me? I do have a road hazard warranty for the tires from the car dealership, but that's in Lincoln, and I live in Omaha. Double Doh. So, I had the tire company put the spare tire on, and I will drive the tire down to the Nissan dealer to have it swapped out. The bad news, I'll now have 3 tires with 16500 miles on them, and one brand new tire, assuming they also agree that it can't be fixed. I honestly don't have time for this, but have no choice. I'm guessing that they will try to repair it first, rather than having to pony up for a new tire, and when it fails, then, and only then, will they replace the tire, which means "another" trip to Lincoln, and possibly being stranded on the side of the road somewhere when the patch fails. I said it before, why is it never easy with me?

And So It Begins...

I noticed that over the last few days, as the weather has warmed up, that the grass was starting to show some green. The problem with my yard though is that it literally gets choked with dead thatch. This will be the 6th year for this yard, and I did dethatch the yard about 3 years ago, but it really needs to be done every year, although I have aerated every spring and fall for the previous 2 years. This year, I decided to do a full dethatch again. It's a delicate balance as you want to pull out the dead grass, but don't want to chew up the ground an destroy the new shoots. Well, I can only say that it was a huge success. After renting the power rake and running over the yard twice on setting 2, (from 1 to 6), I was amazed at the amount of thatch being pulled out. I wanted to go deeper, but the ground was still soft in some areas, and I did get a lot out. In fact, it took me about 6 hours to rake and bag the thatch, all 19 of them. Yes, that's right, I bagged 17 30 gallon sacks of thatch, and 2 54 gallon trash cans. Holy moly, that was a huge job, and I'm so sore this evening. In fact, I loaded the last pile of thatch just as the sun was setting in the west. Wow, I'm tired. But honestly, the yard looks so good right now. It's ready to be mowed, and hopefully, I can get that done tomorrow, and possibly get some fertilizer down by the end of the week as some rain is in the forecast for the weekend. Phew, a big job, but I'm so happy that's it's done. My neighbor thought I was a little premature, but I honestly don't think so, I think my timing was perfect this year. I still need to do an aeration too, and I should have a kick ass lawn this year.

With regards to other gardening chores, I do have to replace my two apple trees this year. I naively didn't put bark guards on last fall, and damn rabbits chewed the bark right off them. They are dead. There are a couple of welling buds on them, but it's not worth it to nurse them back. So, I think I'd like to replace them with a pear tree and a plum tree perhaps. A lesson learned.

I also want to build a cedar arbor, and get a couple of Concord grapevines going. I don't really know much about the pruning of the grapes, but I do have some friends who might be able to help. They own a winery in northwest Iowa, so perhaps they can give me some pruning and training advice. I'd also like to plant a couple of non-fruit-bearing crabapple trees. I think there is a Snow Crab variety that does not produce fruit, but they do flower nicely in the spring. They really weren't in my master plan last year, so I may need to develop a new plan. Ha. Oh well.

I also do have a couple of sink holes to fix this year, along the side of the house, and at the back of the property where the electrical cables are buried. It's always something. I also would like to pull up my landscaping brick and relay them, to get them in a nice straight line again. Ah, never-ending chores.

OMFG, I'm a Runner

Well, 8 weeks into my training for the Lincoln Half Marathon and I just knocked out an 8-mile run (full loop around Lake Zorinsky here in Omaha) for my weekly long run. http://trail.motionbased.com/trail/activity/7802342 Eight weeks ago, I couldn't run for more than 15 minutes. And now, I just ran for an hour and 20 minutes, non-stop (had to stop once to retie my shoes), at a solid 10-minute mile. I've been able to do my tempo runs during the week at 9:15 pace, but I slow it down (long slow distance) on my long runs. I never would have imagined I could have come this far in just 8 weeks. But I feel great, and ready to push for more. No major aches and pains. The Lincoln HM is still 7 weeks from today, so am just over halfway through my training. I'm not quite there yet, but I'm truly starting to believe that this goal of doing a HM will be reachable. More importantly, I'm having fun. I've gone from not being a runner, in that I didn't like it, couldn't do, to absolutely loving the idea of running, and find that if I don't get my runs in, I'm not happy. Weird. I'm now at 24.2, 24.2, and 26.0 miles for weekly mileage for the previous 3 weeks. OMFG, I'm a runner!

Running Man...That's Me

The half marathon training is going well. I've run 18 miles this week already, and still have an 8 mile run planned for Sunday. The weather had turned cold late last week and much of this week, but the temperatures have rebounded into the 40s today, headed for highs near 70 by Monday and Tuesday. I ran 5 miles yesterday in 31 degree temps, and it was chilly. My daughter was also doing track practice during the same time, and she was frozen popsicle by the time she got done. I feel that I'm really accomplishing something during my runs, and have improved my pace from 16:40 minute mile when I started 8 weeks ago, to a solid 9:15 minute mile as of this week. My VO2 max (whatever that is) has gone from 14 to 33 in that time. I still need to remind myself to take deep breaths, which seems to help, but otherwise, I'm doing pretty well. My aches and pains are not major anymore, and I find that I'm recovering pretty well after runs too. There's only 7 weeks left until the Lincoln Half Marathon, so that gets me nervous at times, but as long as I continue on my present track, I should be able to complete it without any trouble. I hope. One day at a time, and slow and steady wins the race.

And Another Week Begins

Another training week has begun for the half marathon, which is now just 7 weeks away. I've consistently run 24.1 miles in the previous 2 weeks now, and will continue to ramp up my mileage, eventually reaching 11 miles on my long runs. The runs are going OK, and I find that I'm able to do them without stopping, so that's good. Getting into the runs is the hard part though, as I struggle through the first couple of miles, but eventually get into the groove. But, unfortunately, I'm now coming down with a chest and head cold. I don't know where that came from, as no one in my family is sick, and no one at work is sick. Ugh. That's not what I was looking forward to right at the mid point of my training. If it comes down to it, I can use this as a taper week if I get sick enough to not run. Let's hope it doesn't come to that.

We've also had a recent cold snap here, with freezing drizzle yesterday, and now wind chill values below zero again this morning. Just can't believe this, and am so ready for winter to be over. Well, I was ready for winter to be over when it began 3 months ago. I just want it to be warm. It's coming, but just not soon enough.

Went out to dinner last night at the Chinese buffet. We haven't eaten there in a long time. Now I know why, I ate way too much. We were in utter disgust at the family at the table next to ours. The four kids were completely out of control, throwing food, spilling food, dumping food on the floor, etc. Then, they spread to the next table, pulling out the sugar packets, tearing them open, spilling it everywhere. Why can't people keep control of their kids in public. I wish I would have said something to them, but didn't want to make a scene and just wanted to eat in peace. They were complete morons, and oblivious to how miserable they were making everyone else in the restaurant. I can only imagine what their home life must be like.

Busy Week

Well, we did close after all on Monday night. I got a call later in the day on Monday, and since the title office Bank of America works with has an office on Omaha, they were able to send a closer directly to our house. So, indeed, we signed all the papers Monday night, and the loan officially disbursed yesterday (there is a 3 day waiting period if we had changed our mind). So, that's a huge load off my shoulders to know that our mortgage is now tucked in and put to bed. Phew. Now, we just have to wait for our old mortgage to settle out and refund back a huge chunk of money that had been sitting in escrow. That will be a good feeling since I really had to drain our emergency fund in the meantime.

I also need to submit our taxes in the next week or two. I've got everything entered into the program and it's all ready to go, mostly. I do have to re-tweak some of capital losses, but otherwise, it's ready to go. We do owe money to federal, but will get most of that back with a state refund, so in the end, it's a wash.

Running has gone well this week. I'm at 21.1 miles this week so far, and actually did my long run today. I did another 7 miles on the treadmill at the gym since it was cool and rainy outside. I seem to have worked through most of my pain issues once again, and everything continues to click well. The Lincoln Half Marathon is now just 8 weeks away. I feel fairly confident that I should be able to do this, especially since I've still got 8 weeks to continue to increase my mileage. Ideally, I'd like to get to about an 11 mile long run in that time, and the remaining 2 miles on race day should be powered mostly by adrenaline. My 7th grade daughter is also starting track this coming week. While she's never really done any athletics because of her back, she's excited about the opportunity. We'll see how she feels after the first week. Ha.

I did a great geocache run yesterday, driving about 500 miles round trip to check off a few counties in the Nebraska 93 County Challenge. It was an awesome day with sunny skies and temperatures in the 60s. Geocaching is very interesting, mostly that it usually takes me to places that I wouldn't otherwise go, and I often learn interesting tidbits of history along the way. Plus, it's just a fun way to kill some time, although I certainly have enough at home to keep me busy.

I am so ready for spring to arrive. Tonight, we actually "spring" forward, and set the clocks ahead one hour. The grass and trees still are dormant, although the buds on the trees are welling up more and more. I expect it will be another week or two before things begin to wake up, although, while out geocaching in south central Nebraska yesterday, I did see a few yards that were already starting to green up. I need to get the mower tuned up and do have some necessary yard work, but progressively warmer temperatures will be nice. It will also help to get outside more and more for my runs.

Great Visit with my Brother

My brother from Colorado Springs was here this past weekend for a quick visit. He arrived Friday night and flew home yesterday. While it was a quick trip, we had a great time catching up with each other, and just overall relaxing and having some fun. It's always good to visit with family, especially when you live quite a distance apart and don't get to see each other very often. Glad to see you brother!

On an unrelated note, we are supposed to close on our mortgage refinance today. Ha, I'm having serious doubts whether that will happen. We were supposed to have been sent the papers on 3 separate days this past week, but nothing showed up, and now, I can't get ahold of our mortgage representative on the phone to find out what's going on. It's making me more than nervous, since the whole deal expires in another 2 days. I'm also beginning to wonder if they aren't stalling on purpose since they ultimately don't have the available cash line to complete the deal right now. Who knows. All I know is that it's giving me an ulcer worrying about it, trying to keep the logistics straight.

One of our credit cards was also compromised over the weekend. Not sure how, but the crooks apparently made a fake card and tried to use it about 800 miles from here at a local Walmart. The activity triggered a fraud alert on our account. I contacted the company and immediately closed down the account. The only problem, all of our automatic payments through various companies are on that card, so it will be a hassle to get all those payments changed to a different card. Since it happened on 2/28, and at least 3 payments come out on 3/1, I've got a bit more to deal with to get the extra charges for a denied transactions and late fees removed as well. This will be the 4th time in our adult lives that we've had something like this happen. I think we've paid our dues, but dumbass crooks will always be on the prowl. It's crazy.

I woke up this morning with a very bad pain in my back too. I apparently slept wrong last night and tweaked my back. That happens if I sleep in the wrong position. I know that, and consciously try to not sleep in that certain position, but I must have been so tired last night I didn't know the difference. Ugh. That will probably take a week to work itself back out. Hope that doesn't affect my running training, but we'll see.

7 Mile Long Run

Well, today was a new milestone in my running, I was able to do a 7 mile long run, without stopping. The run felt pretty good, although my right ham string did cramp up about 4 miles in, and didn't go away until the end of the run. Not sure why that happened. It's not that I pulled the muscle, it just cramped up. So, that's 24.2 miles of running this past week. I feel stronger each and every day I run, and am able to go farther each time. The half marathon is only another 6.1 miles, so I've been able to get myself past the halfway point. That's an exciting motivator that should carry me through. My first race in Lincoln is now 9 weeks away, still plenty of time to take and slow and steady, and continue to build my long runs up to 10 to 12 miles eventually. I'm beginning to think beyond Lincoln, and what options would be available. I tossed around the idea of trying to run a half marathon a month thereafter, however running marathons through the summer doesn't sound like a lot of fun. Ha. There is a marathon in Kansas City in early June. I may consider that one, but would probably then not race until September in the Omaha half marathon, and perhaps another half marathon in Kansas City in October. Who knows. I still have to get through my first one, but that's becoming more and more likely as I continue to build my miles.