Really?

If North Carolina, where tobacco was king, can pass an indoor smoking ban (including bars and restaurants) then any state can do the same.

Uh, Michigan?

Why, you ask, am I blogging about this?

Well, Friday night I went out to a small (about as big as our living room), quaint neighborhood bar to help a friend celebrate their birthday. To say it was smoke filled would be an understatement of epic proportions. It was so bad that when I got home I took my clothes to the basement and T requested that I shower.

Woke up Saturday morning with a cough. A cough that is lingering and now I'm feeling less than 100% - no, it's not the flu, or even a cold really, just a cough.

Fucking smokers.

Week #3 Update

Did so-so this last week. Logged 58% of my miles (didn't run Saturday or Sunday - work and not feeling 100%) so that's a big thumbs down, however I did a much better job of doing my core/general strength stuff so I'll give myself a thumbs up on that part.

I'm really looking forward to this weekend and the end of Daylight Savings, finally. It's not the easiest thing to get my runs in the morning when it's not safe enough (read light enough) to run until well past 8:00. I know, I know, I could get a reflective vest, and I have a headlamp, but still too much traffic (in my opinion) to risk it and I'm not ready to log that many of my miles on the TM just yet.

Just need to beat back this "off" feeling and I'll be okay. I mean I'm only 4.3 miles off pace to reach my year mileage goal.

And the Grand Total Is

11.

Read 11 books this summer. Not bad, but that really wouldn't have put me a top the leader board at the public library when I was a kid.

The End of Summer Reading

I know it's October and summer has officially been over for a bit, but I'm just now getting to this post to wrap up the books I finished this summer.

Columbine - Dave Cullen

Lance: The Making of the World's Greatest Champion - John Wilcockson

The Devil's Punchbowl - Greg Iles

The Lost Symbol - Dan Brown

and I'm currently about 1/2-way through the new Jon Krakauer book on Pat Tillman and I'm slowly but surely making progress through Turning the Mind Into an Ally by Sakyon Mipham.

Much Better

I completed 108% of my scheduled mileage this week.

Plan called for 28 miles and I ran an extra 2 miles so that I would hit 30 miles for the week (I may have mentioned it earlier on here and I'm too lazy to look through the archives, so I'll risk repeating myself in a future post but at least for me nice things happen when I'm consistently over 30 miles/week).

So week #2 of my base building phase went much better than the first.

Detailed race report from yesterday coming later.

The Results Are In

2:10:02 for today's race. That works out to a 9:56 pace.

I am very pleased.

Twas The Night Before....

A 13.1 mile "race".

I put the " " around the word race simply because I am drastically under prepared for the Grand Rapids Half Marathon tomorrow.

I ran an easy 6 miles this morning. I checked my log: today's run was the longest I've run since Sept. 6. That day I only did 9.8 miles. For my last run in double digits I have to go back to Aug 23. If you look at a calendar, that's 8 weeks ago.

Can I run 13.1 miles tomorrow? Yes.

Can I race 13.1 miles tomorrow? Probably.

Can I have a time that is comparable to my best efforts in a half marathon? Most likely not.

So what is my goal for tomorrow?

I would like to finish with a time under 2:15:00. Why? Because besides the aborted Glass City Marathon in April (a DNF at the halfway point with a time of 2:22:18) my first attempt at a half marathon here in 2006 was 2:15:06 (a 10:19 pace). I think I can do better than that tomorrow and I'll find out in about 12-13 hours from now.

53%

53%. That's a failing grade on 100% of all grading scales (or if it isn't, dear god how hard is the class that there's that big of a curve?!).

53%. That's the how much of my plan I completed last week - no excuses here, things got in the way but I didn't do a good job of prioritizing my runs.

Schedule called for 28 miles and I ran 14.9. Must do better this week.

A Plan Is In Place

So, while I was watching the Bengals try and lose to the Browns today (thank god they finally made a field goal as the overtime was ending :rolleyes:) I mapped out the weeks until I need to be on an official training plan for a spring race - I have a couple of options I'm exploring and not sure which one will win out, hell maybe I'll run both who knows! - and created a base building schedule (or a return to regular running for KP schedule) for the next 11 weeks. Incorporated some principles from Dr. Daniels and Hudson:

Even put together a core/general strength plan, but only planned that out for the next 3 weeks (21 day training cycle, will write out the progression for the next 3 week cycle when I see how well I complete this one)!

Keeping my fingers crossed.

10/2

I'm a big fan of the person who is probably the most famous cancer survivor on the planet.

I've supported the foundation he created to mobilize the fight against the disease that recently took a family member and has another loved one fighting as hard as she can.

I've worn yellow every day for the last 5 years.

So, today is for all the people out there suffering from this terrible fucking disease.

LiveStrong.

Hello? Hello? Is This Thing On?

Just to set the record straight, no I have not fallen off the face of the earth.

Yet.

Without going into the gory details, I will just say that the last two weeks of September have not been smooth, easy sailing. Everything, including running, was put on the back burner. But, things seem to be settling down a bit and it feels like I'm starting to get a better grip on things now.

It's the start of a new month. And it's hard to believe that there are only three months left in 2009 (but I gotta admit, after this summer/fall I'm really looking forward to 2010)! My goal this month, and beyond, is to blog more, get my running mojo/consistency back, and be firing on all cylinders as 2010 gets here.

I will admit one thing now: the HM in 17 days? Most likely will not be a race effort/shooting for a PR. See the above statement about not running for two weeks and you'll understand. I'm still running, but I've thrown 99% of the goals for that day out and I'm just going for bettering my time the first time I ran GR in 2006: 2:15.

So here is to a good fall, taking control of things, and a good end to 2009.