Start time: 01/29/05, 8:00am

Location: W&OD Trail

Distance: 8 miles

Run:Walk ratio: 3:1

Average pace: 12:45min/mile

It didn’t hit me until we were on the trail this morning that it’d been two weeks since I’d gone running, y’know, outside. Yeesh. It was a nice group, especially since right as we were about to begin our friend Mark showed up. He’d already run 10 miles and was going to hit 8 more; he’s training for the Fredericksburg Marathon this spring. We offered to run with him, and hey, the fact that he was running a slower pace was ok with us. (Some of my fellow runners hadn’t been running at all in, um, a while.)

Lots of ice on sections of the W&OD Trail, still, but thankfully no one wiped out on it. And despite the arctic temperatures it went pretty well. We’d started earlier so I could then take my parents to the airport when we were done, but I’d misjudged at what time we should start (and didn’t factor in the whole “people showing up late” aspect) so I ended up only getting in 8 miles instead of 10 like I’d mentally planned, but still a very good run. Now I’m just feeling sleepy and wondering if it had anything to do with getting up a little earlier this morning, or if it’s just time to start catching back up on some ZZZs this weekend…

On the bright side, I think I’m finally thawed back out. Brrrrrrrrrrrrr. Did I mention it’s cold out?

Start time: 01/24/05, 7:45pm

Location: Gold’s Gym

Distance: ~5.05 miles

Average pace: ~10:54min/mile

Time: 55 minutes

Ugh. My gym was unbearably hot tonight. How hot? So hot that around 20 minutes in, I was starting to feel like it was August and I was running on a hot summer day. By 40 minutes in I was playing the “well, maybe just five more minutes” game to keep going despite the fact that I was really planning on running for a full hour. And at 55 minutes, utterly roasting, I suddenly felt dizzy and sick. Needless to say, I slammed my hand down on the “stop” button and that was that. I’d drank plenty of water before and during, so I don’t think that was the problem. I think it was just too hot. Geez, that’s something you don’t expect to say in January.

Start time: 01/22/05, 2:00pm

Location: Gold’s Gym

Distance: ~3.75 miles

Average pace: ~10:40min/mile

Time: 40 minutes

It was snowing Saturday morning, so we cancelled our group run. I ended up walking over to the gym and ran for 40 minutes; I was hoping to go longer than that since the gym was fairly empty thanks to the weather, but I hadn’t done any stretching beforehand (bad Greg) between that and the cold my legs were pretty tight. That, and I stupidly left my water bottle on the kitchen counter and when you’re seriously considering stealing the bottle of the fellow running next to you, the thirst is getting hard to ignore. Oops.

Bad planning strikes again! 🙂

Hopefully this week I’ll get my butt in gear and start running three times a week again.

Start time: 01/15/04, 9:00am

Location: W&OD Trail

Distance: 10 miles

Run:Walk ratio: 4:1

Average pace: 12:00min/mile

It was a small group this morning, just me, Chris, and Randy. (Or as I joked, “Guys’ Morning Out!”) The weather was cold, but I have to say that we did really well. We ran an eight-miler together, but since Chris had taken some time off for an injury that was a more than respectable distance for him. Randy and I ran an additional two; when we were done I felt like I could’ve done another three or four without batting an eye, and that was a real relief; it’s nice to see that my body hadn’t forgotten how to run slightly longer distances. It was also nice to know that we really weren’t pushing or trying terribly hard and even with two long “Waiting for the light to change” pauses in the middle we still ended up with a 10-miler completed in two hours.

I talked with Randy a little bit about what pace group I’m expecting to be in, and he thought it was pretty doable and realistic. It’ll be great to run with him (and the others) for another year. We’ve got a really good group of people from this past year that look like they’ll be going through the experience again.

Start time: 01/11/05, 8:00pm

Location: Gold’s Gym

Distance: ~3.66 miles

Average pace: ~10:54min/mile

Time: 40 minutes

Oops, forgot to post this yesterday. It was raining here in DC so I went over to the gym and ran on the treadmill. (Thus the approximations, because treadmills are almost never accurate. It’s a rough guess at best.) In the 40 minutes I ran on the treadmill, I saw no less than three groups of new gym members get tours of the facility and I had to chuckle. Don’t get me wrong, if they stick with it then hurrah for them, that’s fantastic that they actually made a change and went with it. But it’s just like my running trail every year; January is full of new faces, sometimes even into early February, and then you never see them again. It’s a pity, but also a statement on how we treat making change in our life. It ain’t easy most of the time and it’s far, far simpler to give up. To this day I’m not entirely sure why I didn’t, but I’m glad I stuck it through.

Start time: 01/08/05, 9:00am

Location: W&OD Trail

Distance: 7 miles

Run:Walk ratio: 4:1

Average pace: 12:29min/mile

Went out running with “the group”, which means going a little slower. I don’t know why running with multiple people slows me down so much; I guess it’s the social interactions and all. Half of the people we were with hadn’t done much running lately, so we did a small distance. Pam, Randy, and I ran an extra mile afterwards but since Pam and Randy both had places to be even they had to stop relatively quickly, so I decided to get out of the moisture and go home and… take a bath. Hmmmm, something seems wrong with this story, I’ll figure it out sooner or later.

It was really nice to be back with the group, though, something I hadn’t done since before Christmas. (A good turnout too, with seven of us in all.) Everyone seems to be adjusting to the new pace pretty well, and I think before long we’ll have lopped off another half minute as a group. (I’ve been running faster 5-milers on my own, so I’m not too concerned about that.) Since I figure I’ll land in either the 12:00 or 11:30 pace group in May (you train a minute slower than you finish the “run an easy 3-miler, no huffing and puffing allowed” time trial), it’s nice to know that I’ll almost certainly have some of my buddies with me there as well. They’re good, good people.

Start time: 01/04/05, 7:00pm

Location: Local Neighborhood

Distance: 5 miles

Run:Walk ratio: 4:1

Average pace: 10:32min/mile

Geez. Been a while, hasn’t it? When I was out running tonight I suddenly decided that I should start tracking this sort of thing again, so we’ll see how that turns out.

It’s still unseasonably warm in the DC area (highs in the mid-60s today) and I took full advantage of the nice weather. Four 1.25-mile loops later and I was done. One of my calves was a little sore, the first time in over a year where it’s felt like that. Clearly it’s time I started additional calf/achilles tendon stretching again. Using Lush’s Freeze body wash afterwards, though? Heavenly. *sigh*

More importantly, I’m happy with my current speed; I’ve improved so much throughout 2004 it surprises me. I’m not as fast as someone of my friends but give me another year and who knows? Life is good, running-wise.