Sunday 031313

3.5 juggling the dogs, and then on my own for a bit for a total of 17.2.  Felt a bit tired and hot from the get go, but still pleased that tired these days means I jog at just under 8 pace without thinking about it.  Ramped it up a bit at the end because I was thirsty (warm and I did not bring water).  Considered 20 for a bit, but I was ready to get back to the family, and to wrap up the run because of the warmth.

317.1 miles, 19925 vertical feet and 43.55 hours for the month.  On 3 Greens, but obviously impacted by two weeks of travel, and the weather.  Will look to see what I can do in April to attack the vertical.   2 days off in March.

With the travel, as would be expected this was … my lowest vertical month, most days off in a month, my least amount of time running, but my most miles (more quicker flat stuff).

Annually, 897 miles, 87065 feet and 136.55 hours (13 weeks into the year).  Averaging just over 10 hours, 69 miles a week.  Vertical is all over the place from a little as 1000 feet (like this last week) and as nearly as much 17k.  23 Greens on the year.  Four days off total this year.

240.4 miles on the Hokas.  Will do a bit of a shoe analysis on that shortly.

And zero days on the mill.  I have come through the spring unscathed by injury yet.  I need to keep the right eye on balance on that – particularly as I start to ramp things up a bit.  But I feel avoiding the mill has helped me in that regard.  It is not that a mill causes injury.  It is the games that end up playing on a mill that contribute to injuries. 

I might have just given myself the whammy.

20 weeks until the big hill. 

Saturday 033013

Happy Birthday to this wonderful woman.

… today we head back to sweet home CO!

 

Last run in Orlando before heading home.  14 miles.  Was cruising along enjoying the air, but then I had to stop when I saw a river otter.  I could not get a good shot of this shy guy as I only had the phone camera.  Most of my shots were this:

But then I got a half assed shot.  This looks like a turtle but it was an otter.

There has been no lack of wildlife that we have seen down here:  all the typical southern swamp birds, gators, turtles, armadillos, but the otter was a first I had seen “in the wild.”   They are pretty flippin’ cute for sure.   These guys were watching the otter with me.

A bit warmer today, but man – running here is fun with the flats and air.  Just roll and let the legs play.  I let this run come to me as a progression run today.

Additionally today’s run had me thinking (again) of altering the training to have more periods like what I have done in the last couple of days.  An easy five on day 1, then a good long progression on day 2.  Not revolutionary, but certainly not what I get after as my time windows are usually a bit more constant day over day.  Ish.

Listening to latest Lucho and Tawnee has me thinking that MAF has jumped the shark but I have been wondering about how it should adjust as folks age.  I guess technically it would bump a beat a year (down).  But I know I have not done that when I go for those sort of runs.  A sub 150 run is easy for me, sub 140 is super easy (on a separate note, I have started to finally feel the often described difficulty that come with MAF paces at lower elevations).

Done with travel for a few weeks so I am looking to see if I can put together a solid block for April.  I do have a tight work week for one of them, but I am going to try to roll a 300 mile month with 50k of vert and at least a dozen Greens.  Within that volume (which I think will be about 40-50 hours), I am going to try to make some of those Greenies (say 20 percent of them) are going to be shoving the effort to see what I can do.  Simply, I feel good and stoked to start to get after it.  We’ll see how it rolls.

I caught up on the Joe G posts regarding the ITI.  I did this while on a flight so I did not have internet access, so I could only read the text, and not see his typical amazing pictures.  I think this actually made the story all the better.

Some highlights from our trip …

… sort of hard to beat a couple of days at Cocoa Beach.

… we ended up for a day over at the Kennedy Space Center.  The Saturn 5 rocket still is an amazing thing to see.  Nearly 400 feet long, this flipping bomb is what got folks to the moon.  What an effort.   We wrapped up there, and walked out to catch a tour bus.  At that moment, the phone lit up that there was a tornado watch in the area.  I looked up at the grey skies and noticed a few drops starting to come down.  KSC staff got the warning at that point too because they shooed us all back into the rocket display area.  Within 2 minutes, the entire area was pouring hard.  Envision those pix you have seen of palms blowing in high gusts.  We were there for another hour until the weather cleared.

… yeah, KZ did a tryout at American Idol.  I bugged her about it for 10 minutes- which meant she was completely NOT going to do it.  She then texted her friends and they were all “DO IT.”  So she did it.  Shows you the influence I have.  Actually, I threatened that if she didn’t do it I was going to sing either “I Believe In a Thing Called Love” by the Darkness or “Supremacy” by Muse.  That might have nudged her a bit.  But that is a bit tough:  sing acapella looking head on into the eyes of a complete stranger who is judging you.  She completely winged it and was not even sure what she would do until she got in there, so her voice was not warmed up – but it was fun to watch her take that on.

 

… in “Olivander’s” at Universal (in the Harry Potter part of the park), they told us they’d let in 30 folks in at a time.  One “wizard” would be selected by the wand maker to have a wand find its wizard (ala the books).  JZ was doing the odds:  “let’s get all of us in line together to increase our chances!”  Of course, we walked into the dark room and boom – he was selected by the guy right off the bat.  They do a fun little routine then with the selectee and he ends up with a wand.  Needless to say, the kid was stoked. 

…I got selected by the cast at Disney as a “champion” to pull the sword from the stone.  Of course I could not get it out.  And a little girl immediately after me did.  That was cool to see her light up.

… finding Yuengling in the fridge when we got to Orlando was nice.   A bizairre but completely random and legit find AT DIA landed me a three of Dale’s. 

Friday 032913

AM – easy five miles.

Another day of theme park.  Guess where.  Last day … I am ready!
        

Wyatt pointed me to this.  I expect to be at the Stargazer next week.

Thursday 032813

early AM, moon was up, sun was not.  Easy easy 5.3 before heading out to the parks.  Listened the guys new podscat.  I think I like the term podscat better than podcast.  Definitely hope Tim and Matt keep at this.

Disney Hollywood Studios today.

I remember watching this nuttiness for a brief period while I jumped in with Arturo’s group.

Evening, couple of yuenglings, couple of brauts with peps and onions … and then stepped out for a couple of miles.  Felt fine.  Easy 5.5. 

Wednesday 032713

13.4 miles.  Thought I’d go out and do something like 10 by a minute or 20 by a minute, but I was enjoying the steady pace of the run that I just went with that.  Was at 7:07 pace through the first six so I touched the gas a bit to keep it steady and ended up with a 6:54 average.  Fun.  Sea level is nice that way when it is cool.

Got to read a little bit today … good stuff from Lisa.

I am saving Joe G’s posts for the plane ride home.

Dave D has a consistent streak of mileage, often on multiple short runs a day.  He also has PR’d as a master quite a bit this year. 

Interesting and fun take on the drug testing at Pikes.  A slightly different take on drug testing.

Looking forward to what these guys produce.

Tuesday 032713

All day in Universal with a large emphasis on Harry Potter.  I exceeded my roller coaster limit by 9AM but the kids were just getting started.  I might have been able to fake my way through it, but I have had a clogged ear since Saturday (salt water from the ocean is trapped in there, been working with alcohol and peroxide to get it out).   I held my own with them on the rides though, but that stuff is way harder than it used to be. By the time we got home at 8 I was fried.  Goose egg on running on the day.