Post Pig Celebration

We had a Post Flying Pig Marathon party at Wayne’s house on Saturday night.  It was a lot of fun, and good to see some of the team.  Team for Life raised over $62,000 for the Cystic Fibrosis Foundation.  That’s amazing, considering there are only 50 of us. 

Wayne did announce that he would be back next year.  I talked to him about it, and he said that it’s in his blood and there is no way he can not come back.  I also mentioned that I may try to organize a reunion run sometime in August.  Everyone thought that was a great idea. 

I’ve started back to Sunday morning long runs with Mo and Vic.  We ran 5 last weekend, and will progress upwards over the next few weeks.  Vic registered for the Columbus Half Marathon already.  I’ll end up running it with her.  Mo can’t run it, as she has other plans.  So, she may find a Half in Lexington, Dayton, etc.  If it’s not too close to the Columbus date, I’ll probably run it with her.

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Allegro

I’ve finally gotten back into the running groove, and this morning I went for my first tempo run in quite a while.  It was only a 20 minute, but a good start.  I plan to run them each week and increase the run time or increase the speed.  Depends on my performance.  I’ll probably, however, stick with 20 minutes for the time being.  Looks like Wednesdays will be my tempo day.

I ran a 5 minute warmup, then stretched for about 2, and then ran the 20 minute tempo.  My goal was to stay around a 9:20/mile, and I ended up at a 9:16. The first 10 minutes were fairly easy, although I was a little nervous that my groin pull would act up.  Luckily, it didn’t.  The next five were a little tougher, the final five were flat out hard.  My body just isn’t used to that stress yet.  However, I did fight through and keep up the tempo. 

I honestly don’t know how anyone could run a tempo run, or a race for that matter, with an iPod, etc.  I had to concentrate for this run.  It was difficult mentally to not just stop and rest.  I tend to get lost in music, so I guess I may have ended up going faster.  But, that can be bad too, now can’t it.

I have a 5k on July 4th.  It’s on my usually running turf, so it should be fairly easy.  I think I’m going to set a goal of under 28:00:00.  I just ran 2.15 miles in 20 minutes, so if I can do a 27+ minute tempo run by then, I’ll be set.  The funny thing is that this morning, my Forerunner said I ran 3.11 miles (5k) in 31:45 with a 1:45 stretch break.  So, I can break 30:00 easily. 

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Back to Morning Running

The kids are home for the summer, so I don’t have to take Katie to daycare.  So, I can actually run in the mornings again.  The summer is going to be too hot to run in the afternoon/evening.  I ran an easy three miles this morning.  It felt terrible, but good to get out there.  I did manage to keep my speed under control so I wouldn’t die after the first two miles.  I could have been out the door at 5:30, but didn’t rush so I got out at about 5:50.

I was thinking during my run this morning.  I may look at running a couple of halves this fall.  I may run the Air Force Half in Dayton, OH as a tune up for the Columbus Half.  They are about a month apart, and I know I can recover by then.  I could run Dayton as just another training run, with the last say 45 minutes as a tempo run.  I’ll have to see.

I am also going through a bit of withdraw.  I miss the Team for Life, I miss running on Saturday mornings with the team, I miss Wayne and Amye and Juan and Bethany and …  We are having an after party on the 23rd, so that will be a fun night.  I’ll get to see them all and talk about the Pig.  Kristen will talk to the medical types most of the time, but that’s her comfort zone.  After that, it’s 6 more months before I see most of them.  Although, I may be able to get together with some of them for a group run, etc.

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