Auntie Em Goes Running

Recovery run on Galbraith mountain.  This climb up to the top didn't seem like recovery, but I kept the whole run short and easy pace.  A little less mud now since the rain has let up a tiny bit.  We are on the second day in a row of mild temperatures with no rain!  Could it be summer?

No track work until this evening, so I wrote this during yoga class:

Into the silence

birdsong bursts, bright and happy

my mind has wandered. 

There has not been enough haiku in my blog lately. 

Track workout 6:00pm.  I dislike working out this time of day; it always seems so much harder.  Windy at the track,  about 60 degrees.  1.5 miles wu, then 5X5 minute tempo intervals, with one lap at easy in between.  Target pace is 7:38, actuals were:  7:17, 7:20, 7:15, 7:39, and 7:49.  Then I joined my group (they were doing a different workout), and did some leg tiring exercises with them, then jogged about 2 miles with them to cd.   Came home and had Spanokopita and greek salad - delicious!

No sleep last night; I hate when that happens!  Nice bike ride this morning to get myself warmed up.  Then some easy running miles in the rain.

 Busy day, helping my son get all his gear assembled for his summer internship in Alaska.  This is the coolest thing ever.  He is majoring in Biology, and his internship this summer (for which he actually gets credit!) involves backpacking around the Wrangle Range in Alaska, studying Dahl sheep and climate change.  Life is sweet.  It means I won't really get to see much of him all summer, but it is exciting for him nevertheless.  He is one of those people who really marches to his own drummer, and it really works for him!  Things really do just seem to fall into place.

Didn't have to get to the track this morning until 8:00, so I got to hang around and visit with my parents before they headed home.  Had a very nice visit with them.  

This seemed like it was going to be a relatively "easy" track workout, and it was!  Just two 800s at "I" pace, which I had to look up.  I hope I got it right.  It is somewhat slower than 5K, in my case 7:00 per mile.  So each 800 should have been 3:30.  They were 3:26 and 3:30.  Close enough for me.  Then there were four 200s and the same old familiar .48 seconds.  Usually, though, I do some of these on a hill near the track and then do four more at the track.  Today, it was just the track ones.  Usually I go much to fast, but today I did better; they were .47, .42, .44, and .45.  I jogged only 1 mile for cd, including a bathroom break, because I had to get to yoga.

Yoga is different this week; it is the last week of the session, so we are doing "restorative" poses, which means lots of blankets, bolsters, blocks, and straps, lots of headstands and arm balances, and somewhat more relaxed class in general.  I think I prefer the regular yoga, because it is more strengthening, but I am sure "restorative" yoga is very good for me.  

Did I mention that I have a 5K on Saturday?  So exciting to race again.  I'll drive down to Seattle with my son, do my race, then a bit of shopping and eating with Peter in Seattle.  I will then leave him somewhere to spend the night (he flies to Anchorage early in the am), and head back North.  I am thinking I'd like to stop on the way home at this incredible Korean Spa and have a body scrub treatment or something.  I have a gift certificate to use! 

Short, slow run.  9:15 AP.  Temperature in the low 50s, overcast.  No excitement whatsoever.  

Yoga class later, 1.5 hours.

Coffee.

Nice and easy 1 hour, 40 minutes on the bike.  Its sunny for a change, so it was lovely to just be outside and not be wet!  I did some sprints at the end (kind of like doing strides, in theory).  It was great to pull out the summer bike club kit - really bright yellow and black shorts and jersey.  I like our club outfits, but some people are complaining that it makes your butt look fat to have all that yellow.  I don't care; I like looking like a bumblebee, and a butt that is visible to cars is less likely to get hit, right?

Legs are nice and rested for tomorrow's race.  Out to get some gardening done!  Yoga class is not until 5:30 today. 

5K down in Fall City today.  Had to leave pretty early, but I got there in time for a leisurely warm up on the flat roads of Fall City.  I warmed up for 2.5 miles, and included 4XStrides near the end.  I started out a bit too fast, my first mile at 6:43.  I was thinking that 6:50 should have been my first mile.  Anyway, I don't have my Garmin splits yet, so that might not even be accurate.  When we passed the first mile marker, a guy yelled out 6:55, which is more like what I thought it should have been.  Anyway, I think I slowed in the second mile, and picked it up again in the last mile.  Overall, my time is not very exciting; I think when the official time is out, I'll be right about at 22:30, just where I was in February.

I really should feel good about this, given all the healing and leg issues I've been through in the past few months.  Its great that I haven't LOST any fitness through it all.  But, still, I was hoping to be just a bit faster.  I am REALLY happy that I was able to run this pain free!  There have certainly been times in the past few months when I thought I'd never get back to faster running again, and I am so grateful to my body for being able to fix things up for me.  I did not even think about my leg or knee, not even once.  And, this race was hard running on pavement, which I rarely do!

So, all in all, a good race, not a great race, but good.  And confidence building and a step back into running again!