Too little, too late (probably)

Today I made a slight discovery - if I tarry at the library at all once I have dropped off the son, I have to cut my workout a bit (or a lot) short. You would think that I could manage to get in a short library visit (like 20 minutes), and still manage to have 75 minutes for a run, considering that the library is 2 blocks from the Y, and preschool is a full 2:15, right?

Nah. So instead of 10 miles, I only got in 9. But they were a quality nine, thank you very much. Quality enough to have me nodding off this afternoon while sitting on the couch, anyway.

I planned on writing more, but the baby is awake and fussy, so I'll cut this short to take care of her.

Oh my quads

I haven't done a good hill workout in a looong time. My usual weekend long run has some small and gentle hills on it, but it's essentially flat. So, yesterday I decided (on a semi-whim) to do 5 miles of hills. The lowest incline was .5 degrees (nothing, really, since I generally run with somewhere between .5 and 1.0 degrees to get a better gauge of pace), but the hill program kept shooting it up to 7.1 degrees!

And then I went home and mowed the lawn. This morning, my legs were stiff, really stiff. I skipped on running (so far), but I might do a quick 3-4 miles tonight, just to get the kinks worked out before tomorrow.

Boston denied

Or most likely delayed.

I know I haven't posted in a long time, so this might be going out to an audience of, well, zero. That's okay. This isn't a vanity blog, though it is nice to get comments.

I had a race on Labor Day, a half-marathon tune-up race that I have done twice before. I went into it expecting a slight PR (since it is flat, versus the hills on my last attempt), and I have been trying to do some speedwork over the summer. My worst case was that I would get about my current PR, but it would be an easy effort.

How about barely managing to avoid a PW? I could say that I went out to quick, I could blame a bout of the flu that sidelined me for a couple of low-mileage weeks, I could blame the weather (high 70's at the start, 80-something before the end, and humid as all heck get out), but in the end, I joined all the other people reduced to shambling along in a run/walk zombie deathmarch. It wasn't pretty, unless you mean pretty awful, and it completely blew my confidence for Chicago all to heck.

I'll still do Chicago, I'll aim for a PR, but after Labor Day, that 3:15 BQ seems like a pipe dream, so Boston might have to wait another year or two.