Still Alive

Yo.

Things are nuts. I've got a job offer from those interviews last month, so I've been on a crash course about faculty negotiations, and I've been trying like all hell to finish a long overdue publication. The bigger negotiation, however, is the one involving the family. Do we move? Does my wife stop her current program? It's hard not to feel like a dick, dragging her around the country like has been happening over the past 8 years.

I've been running a bit. I miss a day here and there, but 50 miles a week isn't terrible.

This week I got back to something resembling what Will had me doing before I hurt my back, got sick, and traveled afar for the interviews. I think today was the first day I felt like I was really getting back into things. I ran too fast though.

It was supposed to be WU 1600 in 5:40 1600 jog 4x(1600 400rest) cutdowns from 6:10 to 5:55. The first two "hard" miles were spot on, but I was running into the wind, and on a slight incline. The remaining two hard miles (I'll get to the lost #5 in a moment) were then 5:40 and 5:35. I didn't feel like I was pushing it though...3-2 breathing and pretty smooth. Then I unfortunately had an "emergency" and had to find a private spot in a very public area. Bloody hell. I couldn't bring myself to resume the workout, and, full of shame, I jogged back home.


Thursday was also right on, the 200-400-600-400-200 workout all at 4:48 pace. My pacing was just about exactly on for those, and it didn't feel tough at any point.

Tuesday's workout didn't happen...in an emotional rut due to all the stress lately...I ran it on wed instead. It was okay....8 miles at 85%. Very windy conditions, 6:30-6:40 into it, 6:00-6:10 with it behind me. Not that great.

Looks like the Shamrock shuffle won't happen for me, which is a bummer, since it's been my big spring race for the last two years. Oh well.

I head to Santa Barbara, CA in a week. Fun in the sun, here I come! I'm gonna miss my wife and kid like hell.

Crawling Back

Hola Amigos. It's been a while since I rapped at 'ya.

And if you don't know Jim Anchower, that made no sense to you at all. It's been a couple weeks of insanity, and very little running. I was sick as anything for my first interview, and still recovering through the second, but I managed to get in about 24 miles this week. The first two runs were rough, since my lungs still hadn't completely healed, but this weekend I got through a couple 8 mile runs lung-pain-free. My weight is still really low. Part of this is surely lower plasma volume due to de-training, but a large part of it is probably also bad diet during my travels, and poor appetite due to illness. I'll probably rebound soon.

7.5 minute miles feels kind of tough after 5 of them (at least tougher than it should), but I'm sure I'll be fine again after a week or so of training. My hope is to get back on the 3 week cycles after this coming week. My plan is to just do 50 or so miles of easy running, and then hop on to a maybe slightly modified program.

The storm is mostly over at this point, so hopefully there won't be any major setbacks for a while. It's tough to keep up the running when there are so many other things going on.

Week:
Wed 4 easy - pretty lousy, but felt a little better mentally afterwards

Thu 4 easy - still not great, but better then Wed

Sat 8 easy - felt okay, but was tired after 5 miles

Sun 8 easy - felt okay, but same as Sat...