Summer Schedule

I'm on my summer schedule at work - no classes. That means a 28 hour work week and barring the occasional meeting, I'll have most Friday's off. Plus, I will probably only have two or three evening meetings from now till September. I love summer! Of course, all this free time comes with a little drop in pay, but the time to relax and recharge is worth it.

Okay, so...I've got a little plan going. I'm calling it a training run gone bad. Two years ago, when Sonya and I were training for our first marathon, we decided to make our 20 miler a run from Puyallup to Tacoma. I really enjoyed that run and was planning to do it again this year. I thought I'd tack on a few miles and get it up to 26.2 since I didn't have any marathon plans for summer. Cat was having none of that. She said that if we were going to run a marathon distance, then we had better make it count. Specifically, count towards our Maniac totals. I looked up the criteria, and after a week or so of thinking about it, and a stellar idea from George, decided to go for it. I'm joining the ranks of many of our PNW running friends and hosting a free, no-frills marathon on Labor Day weekend. No frills means no aid stations, no shirts, and no transportation back to the start. We've modified the course, and added a couple requirements to make it interesting. Once I have it all pulled together and the web page posted, I'll let you know.

So then of course, I got to thinking. An August marathon? Well, maybe I should see if I could find a July one. I added Rattlesnake Lake Marathon to my list. It covers much of the area that we ran on last weekend, and is up near the pass, so hopefully, will be a bit cool. I have decided I will run it if it is cool, skip it if it is hot. I'll pretty much be deciding the day before.

One other thing I did this week was modify my fall schedule. Last spring in a bout of wild enthusiasm, I thought I'd go for another Maniac star by running three marathons in three states in nine days. Leavenworth, Portland and either Victoria or Bizz Johnson lined up perfectly. This past week I finally came to my senses and let that plan go. I remembered the tendinitis I had last spring after running four in four weeks, then going on to run two more in the next three weeks - and how hard and uncomfortable the last two were. I remembered the promise I made to myself to be reasonable about my schedule, and to allow at least one weekend between each marathon. I thought about running Marine Corp and how I'd like to enjoy it and do well there, plus enjoy all the sightseeing in the week to follow. I thought about how beat up my poor toes get, and about whether I could run two in two days with those toes. I finally decided to back off that plan. Now I'm signed up for Leavenworth on October 4th and MCM on the 26th. Leavenworth has been on my list of marathons to do, and I've run Portland twice now. I'm sure I'll have a bad case of FOMO (fear of missing out) when the rest of the Y Run Club goes to run Portland on the 5th, but I'll get over it.

I did better on hitting my weekly target last week - 33.6 miles. Even better, I lost that persistent tired feeling. That's good, because next weekend is a big one - I'm one of a six person team on the Rainer to Ruston 50 mile relay on Saturday, then running the North Olympic Discovery Marathon on Sunday. Given my ability to ramble on in my posts, I'll be working hard to keep the two-race-report short and readable!