Oh, I probably could have gone out and done an easy 3.0 miler, but sometimes the best idea is to simply – I know this is blasphemy, but the best thing sometimes is just not run.

We had to get up early to get the old freezer ready to leave and make room for the new one. We were scheduled to be the first delivery of the day – anywhere from 7:30 to 9:00 AM.

Which meant everything in that side of the house had to be moved out, the door taken off, the pnuematic pull door frame attachment on the storm door removed, just so they could get in and out of her in 30 minutes or they would get to charge us more in a delivery fee. They had the old one out, the new one setup and running properly in under 25 minutes. They sure as hell don’t give you a lot of leeway on delivering appliances in today’s world do they?

Oh well, it works and it is a frost-free model, so Mary is happy. Then we had to move everything back.

Also it was opening day of duck season, so it sounded more like a minor war zone down on the lake until almost 8:00 AM, which meant Bennie was a shaky baby until after the freezer delivery was done shortly after 9:00.

By then is was already too hot to run with him, hell let’s be real it was too damn hot and humid for me to run for myself. So I decided to call it a day and not worry about running at all, which was probably a good idea anyway, since the right hip was barking a little more than I really wanted to deal with.

The rest of the day was spent puttering around the house, doing a few walks and getting over 11,000 + steps in over the course of the day.

We even put the air conditioner back in temporarily, Bennie was having a tough time and I decided that he needed a break from the heat. It did make the rest of the day a lot more bearable.

85% and high humidity at the end of September sucks, but you gotta play the hand mother nature deals, so a “rest” day became the plan for today.

By the time Bennie and I got out for our run, the temps had already risen into 80s and I was worried about how Bennie would be on the other end.

Let’s back up for a minute.

Last week I hurt my right hip a bit when running with Bennie, he went left and I planted right, which put some stress on the old hip tendons and stuff. It stayed in the uncomfortable, but runnable levels – enough that I finished a nice 7.0 mile run on it without too many issues.

However, on Friday morning, it was a bit more uncomfortable, but I really wanted to do a run in my new Under Armour Speedtire Low’s to see how they felt on something other than a walk. I was in Waterville and had a few extra minutes so I swung over to Quarry Road and planned on doing 3-4 miles on the groomed trails over there.

I wasn’t sure about how the hip was going to do, since it was pretty sore just sitting in the truck, so I started out and by the time I got to the bottom of the little hill at the start, I turned off the Garmin and walked back to the truck muttering to myself. Sometimes you just have to be smart and shut it down – I am not claiming that I am getting smarter, but the hip didn’t feel right, so I stopped.

I also took off yesterday, just to be careful.

This morning’s run with Bennie turned out to be a nice one as long as we stayed in the shade, but out in the open it was pretty miserable. Bennie did his Bennie intervals, but the anchor on the back didn’t let him go all that fast. Then on the way back once we got back to the flat I could see that Bennie was starting to fade. Once the truck went by, we ran to the lower gate and stopped there – it was too damn hot to go any further with him.

The Speedtire Low’s felt comfortable, did well on the dirt road, but the most surprising thing was that they were quiet on the tar. Yeah that really surprised me, because the tread is fairly aggressive.

The right hip was a little uncomfortable, but it never got beyond uncomfortable, so I kept going.

However, I wasn’t done yet.

After I dropped Bennie off and made sure he had cooled down for the most part, I drove over to UMA. I haven’t run there since I left at the end of June and it seemed like the perfect place to test the Speedtires a little more in their environment. Although it was more groomed trails than anything.

Driving by the bank clock on Out Civic Center Drive, read 88*F, kind of made me think that I was more than a little nuts. The 66% humidity definitely was a consideration too. However, I really wanted to try out the shoes, so I kept on going to UMA.

The hip was hanging in there, so I did easy stuff on the trails, the only places that the hip would bother a little is on the downhills, but otherwise it was just a uncomfortable run, but not a painful one. That I can deal with and there is a difference.

The Speedtires did everything I wanted and I was very comfortable running in them.

Well we are back from Lancaster, NH and the two-day flip-flop kicked my butt again. Which meant that I looked at and rearranged the training plan schedule just a little to accommodate driving over there and back on most Tuesday/Wednesday through the end of October. Moving my day off from Fridays to Wednesday and making Friday an easy/shorter run day.

I think it will work a little better for me that way.

Tuesday – I ran an easy 5.0 miler – nothing special happened, just putting the mileage in.

Wednesday – DNR. Wednesdays are just a tough day to get a run in. Usually mornings are busy finishing up stuff around the house in Lnacaster and then in the afternoon there is a three hour drive home to get done. After which, I am tired, hungry and really not in the mood for a damn run. 😉

Just being honest.

This morning was a planned 6.0 mile run, so I decided to run over to Goodhue which  actually ends up being 6.7 miles, which means – of course I have to finish up the 7th mile. I prefer the round numbers.

This was an easy day, so no speed was involved and I maintained a steady 9:00 minute pace for 6 of the 7 miles – the last one was a lot slower, but I will just call that a cool-down mile 🙂

Nothing special happened during the run, other than a few sarcastic remarks from the owner of Annie’s General Store – we have known each other for a while and she always gives me grief, when she sees me out running. Especially when I didn’t notice her in the driveway yakking away at me as I ran by – I was someplace else I guess. Not too great on situational awareness at the 4.0 mile point. So she made a point of slowing down to give me grief after she got in her car.

I WILL get even!!!  hehehee

The right hip is acting up like it usually does when I start to increase the speed/distance a little. It will take about 2-3 weeks for it to calm down, so I gotta start doing the Epsom salt baths, heating pad and Aspercreme rubs to get it to go away. Just part of the deal and something that is not a new phenomena.

I did make it to Chapter three of Neverwinter Nights (the original game) last night. Just some old school gaming to pass the time and enjoy some solo D&D time. I even got about 80 pages into The Cleric Quintet over the past few days. Not a bad way to waste a little time, escaping into a little heroic fantasy.

Just gotta get through October 20th and things will be fine :-).

Ahhhh that 100% humidity – sucks.

Oh well, you still gotta run, it just means that you run a bit slower – doesn’t it.

Well yeah, kind of sort of probably.

The first run was with Bennie and we did the usual Bennie things, stopping, starting and going like hell for a bit. Running with him is almost always like a Fartlek workout, so I have learned to just go with the flow, errrrr Bennie pace.

Although when we hit the flats, he was hell bent to go, even though I was sucking eggs and swimming more than running. We somehow managed a 1:23, which ties the second fastest time for that segment and a couple of seconds faster than yesterday. It is almost a quarter mile and reminds me that fast quarters suck hard when you run them hard.

Which means at some point I have to get to the track and do a few of them.

We slowed down going up Stevens Hill – a lot. I needed to start breathing again, instead looking like a fish out of water too long. We finished strong, although Bennie got distracted by the neighbor out walking the baby and their dog as we were finishing.

For the last 20 yards, I actually felt everything come together and I was running with that old effortless stride, then reality smacked me around a little and I got to the mailbox (my finish) and fell apart. I kind of chuckled when I looked at the Strava graph and my finishing kick (if you want to call it that) today, at its fastest point, was slower than the pace that used to be my race pace for a 10K.

This getting old does shit to the body or at least it sure does seem that way to me. 🙂

Run #2

Yeah, I am not too smart today that 100% humidity must have addled the old noggin more than I thought. Oh well, I wanted to get a few more miles in, but I wanted them to be slow miles. Which meant that I couldn’t run on the roads, because when I do I seem to get close to a comfortable 9:00 minute pace and stay there. That would have hurt this morning.

So I decided to do a trail run, not UMA or Colby’s groomed ones, but something a little tougher, but not so tough that it would hurt a lot. Which meant either Messalonskee Stream Trail in Oakland or Bond Brook in Augusta. To be honest, I didn’t feel like messing with hills in that kind of humidity.

Besides I love MST and haven’t been over there since last fall – if I remember correctly.

What I like best is that there is only one really bad hill on the trail and as I went along, the memory of what would be coming up was still pretty accurate. Although the first bridge collapsed and they had to put in a different one. Not quite as nice or photogenic, but it gets the job done.

I took a couple of photos of the water and then a section of the trail that I do love. But otherwise I just plugged along, being very focused on where and how I was stepping. Then when I got about half-way up the hill, I just walked. I was out for a good effort, not killing myself.

I escaped without any new injuries, no face plants or knee/hand scraps – the trail gods didn’t demand a blood sacrifice today. A good thing.

However, I did what I wanted a nice and easy (well as easy a running on a root and rock strewn trail is going to be), but most of all slower run. It did feel good to be running in the woods again and even though the Bandit 3’s did just fine on the dry trail, I could see how much a pair of trail runners would have helped out going downhill and in the loose dirt sections that had leaves on top.

Yeah a pretty darn good day of running, even with 100% humidity.