Seventeen Miles!

Today’s run was seventeen miles, and it went pretty well. The way I planned my route was not intended to play head games with me, but it did, in a good way. By the time I hit the last five miles, I was in an area that I usually get to early in a run, so even though I’d been out there for two hours already, it felt like I was only getting started. It helped that I have tentatively begun a new creative project and had a lot of ideas spinning around in my head. It sure made the miles go by fast!

It wasn’t a very eventful run, but I saw a lot of running groups out this morning, and I overheard some guys talking about 24-mile runs while I was getting water at Memorial Park. They were training for the Rocky Raccoon trail run, and I was a little envious. I’ve always wanted to try ultras, but since I’ve had such disastrously bad luck just getting my mileage back up to marathon standards without injury, ultras have remained out of the question.

The only problem I had today was tight calves. They had been tight before I started, and by the last two miles, the situation was pretty bad. My endurance sport friends know the drill—as long as you keep moving, it’s bearable, but as soon as you stop, everything locks up and you find yourself staggering around like Frankenstein. I thought I would die before I could get settled in to ice down once I was home, but Tidbit kept me amused by bouncing all around the living room like she was on springs. I don’t know what got into her today!

Once I had iced my legs, I felt a lot better, and I followed up with my usual routine of foam roller, stretching, and leg massage with my own personal blend of massage creams that leave my legs all tingly for awhile. Tonight I’m ready to bounce around the room with Tidbit. If I keep having successful long runs like this, I might just sign up for the San Antonio Marathon. Anyone want to join me? It’s November 12, and I’m not running it as an A race, since I need to stay uninjured for Houston in January. In fact, if I do San Antonio under 5 hours, I’ll be mad at myself. I would be running it just for fun and taking lots of walk breaks.

I got some reassuring news today—my university’s proposal to buy a piece of property on the other side of town fell through. Yay! I know it would’ve been a good deal for a lot of people on an academic level, but they were threatening to send all of us with “non customer-facing jobs” out to the new facility. That would’ve meant instead of a 10 minute commute, having to drive about an hour each way. That was not happening. I had been scrambling to apply for other jobs as it looked more and more like the deal might go through, but now that it’s not, I can relax a little. Moving your job across town when your “town” has the approximate square mileage of Guatemala is just so not cool. If I wanted to get jerked around like that, I’d go work for a corporation, where I’d at least make more money and have employer matching on deposits to my retirement account.

I’ve got a new creative project in the works, as I alluded to at the beginning of this post. I’m still tinkering with it, and trying to decide if I like it, if I want to continue with it, and just what I really want to get out of the exercise, but I’ll post more on that either later tonight or sometime tomorrow.

Recent Workouts
Monday: 4 mile run
Thursday: Rest
Wednesday: 6 mile run
Thursday: 30 minute elliptical
Friday: Rest
Saturday: 17 mile run