updates

The Massanutten training has been going quite well, considering time availability. I seem to be able to get in mid-week runs pretty consistently, by going out for an hour at lunch. No matter how crappy a job may seem sometimes (and given enough time, they all seem to eventually get crappy), I am infinitely thankful that I have the flexibility to run at lunchtime. Granted it is road running, but there are some decent hills in the area, and on Wednesday I usually run hill repeats up the huge hill right outside my office. Long runs going well too, I ran a 4.75 hour long run on a Saturday a couple weeks ago, and decided that I hated being away from my family on Saturdays. So, the compromise is that I go to Ohiopyle on Fridays after work (or leave work a little early) and do the hilly section of the LHHT. I usually end up doing a fair bit of running in the dark too, which is good practice. I reckon I probably miss ~ 3 hours with the baby, but the upside is that I wake up Saturday at 7, and I have the whole weekend to spend with my family. This past Friday was an epic long run, I started at Ohiopyle and did 3 hill repeats of the huge hill, then obviously had to run all the way back to the car. There was snow on the mountain at the top, and it was quite cold when the sun went down. I was fried by the time I got done, and took two full days off to recover. This week is a "reduced load" week (i.e., no long run this week), then going to hit it hard again for a couple weeks, for one final push before the race. It is a fine line between being disciplined and working hard/pushing yourself, and just pummeling yourself into the ground. Last year for Wasatch, I did the latter and while I finished the race, I wonder if I would have done a little bit better had I not insisted on pounding it as hard as I possibly could, every time I went out and ran. The first clue should have been when I couldn't fall asleep, despite working myself ragged. So, trying to avoid that this year by being a bit smarter about the training. My daughter rules, I love her more than anything in the world. Last night we listened to the A side of Apostrophe by Frank Zappa, which I listened to about a hundred million times while a freshman in college. We also re-read The Cat in the Hat, which still continues to freak me out. Amidst all the chaos, which include the little boy and girl, the cat in the hat, Thing 1, and Thing 2, the voice of reason is the fish. Weird, but my daughter loves it.