Benched by a half mary injury

AAAAAAAAAARGH!!!

Shooot, this is not good. Just when I signed up for Bloomsday and the Fiasco in Pasco!!!! Now, I have a minor, but debilitating injury. So, I ran a bunch to achieve my 100 miles for the month, I did it!!! It wasn't bad, I crammed the last 14 miles into one run, it went well, apart from a nagging pain in my foot. It started at mile 7.5, "I was too far along to stop," I thought, "I don't want to walk this far back home," I thought. "I CAN do this," I thought. So I did it. I was at a moderate, but constant pace. I even threw in a sprint to the last 500M, and I did it, all 14 miles, no breaks, no stops. My feet hurt, but not as bad as expected. It was good. I ate well that night, I went to bed early, I massaged my feet... I woke up, I could not put pressure on my right foot. I grew very concerned. I went about my day, noticing that it didn't get any better, couldn't walk on it normally, and limped around on my heel. I made calls to get it looked at...1st place, can't see me until 5/14, no good; 2nd place couldn't see me until 5/1, not good enough; last place got me in today, thankfully! X-rays were good, no breaks, spacing good, bone structure is great...so what's the problem? Seems to be sore connective tissue, maybe I could benefit from additional arch support, take some aspirin for the pain and swelling, when it starts feeling better, gradually begin working back up to the distances I was already at, cross train on low impact...AAAAAARGH, this sucks, I so wanted to do Bloomsday in less than an hour, now, I may not even walk it...not cool. Never the less, music is saving my soul. I'm enjoying the following:
Lykke Li

Late Rage, Old Days, and Golden Ages...

Where to begin? There's been many moons since my last post, and I can barely recall what I did last night...ARG!!! I've been running late for most of the that time it would seem. Never the less I've been able to keep up a bit with my training(only a few miles behind the goal). But I was actually pretty successful with the Rage in the Sage race. It must have been that iTunes gift certificate that my roommate gave me! I took 3rd for my age group and had a reasonable time 1:28:28!!! That's a little better than how I performed on my practice runs, but still room for improvement. Pretty good for a first timer and I got goodies and a wine glass with the even engraved on it! Next is Bloomsday and I seem to be shaping up ok for that...I'm projecting a sub 60 min completion time. About a week after that is another Duathlon. I'd like to have a new road bicycle for that, but time is running out and they just don't come cheap...

I'm now into a new age group for competition. It's the SO old(30-34) age group...oh my! I had a nice birthday on the slopes, which was pretty dang good for this time of year!!!! I should have gone the day before on the fresh stuff, but there was still some good stuff on my day! It was a nice day with my sister for a couple runs, and a couple of my friends. One buddy, Mark, and I had a small collision which left a cut on his face, but otherwise it wasn't bad. I felt horrible about it, but he said he was good. Hopefully he'll still board with us... Also I got treated to a last meal of my 20's dinner and a birthday dinner... and 3 batches of cookies!!! from Kate... It's been good.

Otherwise, I've been running, surprise, and looking for the Golden Age... There is this lyric that keeps bouncing around my head about it being the "golden age," and I just can't place the song. It makes me think a lot about the way things are going in the world right now, and I know there has got to be the golden age out there somewhere, but where?

New goals:
Run more stairs - I did some at Fran Rish and I just need to do more
Sub 6:30 mile - I've been consistently around 7:00...I CAN get that extra .30
Plyometrics - this will help my speed and explosiveness, I also need the variety in workouts
7 miles a day - Just trying to up my mileage

Misc:
I'm interested in Adventure Racing, used to watch Eco-Challenge and that always impressed me. I went ahead and bought a couple videos of Primal Quest. In planning for the Mt St Helens dash I'm setting a personal goal of doing a 6 mile an hour pace...So finish in 5 hours. I know the terrain is irregular, but I think this is a doable goal. I ordered an ultra light first aid kit for these type of adventures....
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Now playing: Kissy Sell Out - Kissy Sell Out Xfm DJ Set!!!!!
via FoxyTunes

Stiff rest in sunny suburban pasta

It would seem I've been taking a bit of a rest from posting and running and all that I've been up to for the past month. It's been a really nice week, the sun has been shining a lot and I've tried to get out in it. I ran a 9 miler Sunday and that was the last huge run before this weekends competition. I've purposefully tried to take it easy. I ran again, working on speed, Tuesday and it sucked pretty bad. I just wasn't performing well. I did get a new best for the mile, 6:17, but it took a lot out of me and I was only able to barely squeeze out 2.5 miles. My opinion is that isn't good enough, especially considering how I felt. The next day my legs felt kind of stiff, I got busy at the house and had intended to run down to ULTY, but it got so late and I wanted to take it easy, so I just drove. It was so nice we played until probably 7:30 or 8. Again, my running wasn't up to par. Really slow compared to normal. I had endurance, but not my top speeds, and stiff legs. Yesterday I didn't run at all, just trying to rest my legs, and they still feel stiff, even today. I plan on running on them a bit tonight, to hopefully loosen them up. In prep for the race, I've been eating a lot of pasta all week. With all this sun, I've laid out on the hammock for the past couple afternoons for about an hour. It's nice!!!!
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Now playing: Midnight Juggernauts - Road to Recovery (Curses! Remix)
via FoxyTunes

Blogs about Mt St Helens Trail Run.

Click this link: Loowit
Another
Route
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Now playing: Deep Blue - The Helicopter Tune (Rob Playford & Rennie Pilgrem remix)
via FoxyTunes

Ultimately Running Late.

All last week I've been running late, I hate that. I don't think I woke up for the first ring of my alarm clock once. That only trickles down to the rest of my day. Dragged butt at work, Didn't get out of work in a timely manner, meetings ran late, then, to top it off, I ended up running in the dark, it was so late.

Monday's run was the longest I've gone. It was really good, took a while, but still good! unfortunately I succeeded in getting a blister on my foot. Not a big deal, just left it be, didn't even pop it, but tried to take it easy. I know I need to log miles in order to achieve my goal of 100 for the month, so I still ran on the blister. I did an easier run Tuesday, and it went fine, without too much aggravation of the blister. I took Wednesday off except that I was playing Ultimate, so that basically gave me sprint work. It was one of the nicest days we've had so far, 60 with no wind. I played well and ran pretty hard, still not much aggravation of the blister. Thursday was the latest day yet, I ran a bunch of errands after work, was preparing for a run when I remembered I had a meeting at 7. CRAP! That meant I was going to be running sometime after 9. Not that big a deal, but I don't have much in the way of night running gear.

I did go on that run, dressed in white, with a headlamp. It went pretty well, but then my blistered foot started to feel funny. It got to the point that I couldn't run on it. I decided to take a seat and take a look at what I was worried would be some kind of mess. It wasn't all that bad, just the blister had totally burst, and the skin was tearing away. I couldn't let that be, so I tore the rest of the skin off, only to reveal a smaller blister beneath that. AAARGH! I hobbled home and didn't get in until very late. I medicated it, and resolved to buy running specific socks.

I took Friday off from running. Tried to find somewhere in town that had the running socks I wanted...no dice. I did buy a pair from REI, but they aren't the ones I had in mind. Saturday was a long day for me. my foot wasn't bothering me that bad and I know I've still got to get miles. I put on those running socks, got all stretched out and went out to the race course for 'Rage in the Sage.' I did the whole course, in the wind and the sun, in 1:31:23. I don't have any idea if this is a good time, we'll see this Saturday at the competition! My blister didn't bother me at all, and it should be even more healed by then. Just need to keep training.

Planning continues for the St. Helens run, logistics may prove difficult. May just end up doing it twice or something crazy like that.
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Now playing: Corrupt Souls - The Singularity
via FoxyTunes

Mt. St Helens 30 miler

Here is a link to a rough map of the trail, Loowit Trail 216, surroinding Mt. St. Helens.
http://www.fs.fed.us/gpnf/recreation/trails/locations/msh-0216-loowit.shtml