A Nice 7.0 Miler – RunLog 10-7-18

On By Harold L. ShawIn runlog, Saucony

Well there, the weather cooperated nicely. Overcast, upper 50’s, a nice breeze on the way out, with just a touch too much humidity. It seems that Fall is pretty much here based on how much the leaves are turning, even with the higher than usual temps for October.

I decided that I was going to do a comfortable run out to Goodhue and either finish up with 7.0 or 8.0 miles, depending upon how the feet were feeling at the end.

Now after yesterday’s 5.0 miler my left ankle was a little sore in the place that bothered me a lot back in the Summer of 2017. Nothing serious, but for the first mile, the ankle was a little stiff and sore.

It never completely went away during the run, but it also wasn’t all that bad either, so I just kept plugging along

The first half of the run was against that little breeze and actually felt pretty good. Coming back I did pick it up slightly, but I didn’t push, it is more because it is a lot of downhill while on Tiffany Road and I like downhill running.

I slowed down in the usual places.

At about the 6.0 mile mark, my right forefoot pad started to bother just a little. A lot like the RunFasts do, but it didn’t start until a couple miles later, so it wasn’t really a big deal. Plus when I looked at the callous pad when I got done, I could see where I needed to scrape some callous off my feet (one of those constant things that I deal with on a fairly regular basis).

It was also the maiden voyage of the Saucony Breakthru 4s. No ISO Fit bootie to worry about and it was a big difference and for a first run being 7.0 miles without any shoe issues was a nice change. The only thing I wasn’t impressed about was the colorway – Purple and Black are not “my” colors, but the price was right.

Almost But Not Quite Right – RunLog 10-5-18

On By Harold L. ShawIn runlog

It was one of those pretty cool runs that you can only have in the Fall. Mid 40’s, bright sunshine and a bit of breeze. Long sleeve top and shorts – yeah just about a perfect day for a great run.

I thought that I would try a longer run outside in my Saucony Zealot 3’s today to see if my little alteration to the booties would make a difference or not. I figured that an easy run out to Goodhue Road would be a nice test.

The first mile felt good and I was pretty surprised when the first mile split was just over 8:30. I wasn’t pushing the pace or anything. This first mile reminded me why I really am giving the Zealot 3’s another opportunity. I run really well in them and they are just about perfect for where I run.

Going into the second mile nothing hurt and there was zero discomfort, so I was hopeful that I “fixed” them enough that they were going to be the running shoes that I had hoped they would be back in May.

After I passed the 2.0 mile point, I could feel the right foot starting to bother a little – more a distraction than uncomfortable, but it was there.

Shit!!!

I hoped that it would go away, but it didn’t. The distraction never got beyond just a feeling and nothing like it was when I was running regularly in them in May. Which meant that the surgery on the inner bootie was having some positive affect. Also it was only the right foot that was bothering – the left foot felt fine.

Progress but…

I wasn’t certain of how things were going to go as I got further into the run, so I decided to be conservative and turned back to the house at Notta Road for a 5.0 miler versus my planned 7.0. Which sort of sucked, but sometimes I do actually think about what I am doing and quite honestly, I have been running mostly pain-free lately and didn’t want to deal with any major discomfort on this run either.

Going back, I was a little frustrated and lost my focus for a while. I was seriously thinking about what surgery I could or needed to do to that damned bootie on my right foot as soon as I got home, because I really do like the Zealot 3s except for that damned thing bootie.

However, I still had to finish this run.

Thankfully, the discomfort in my right foot never really got any worse, but it didn’t really get all that much better either throughout the rest of the run. The right foot was a distraction because it felt as though it was going to start to really bother at any minute, so I was too focused on when that was going to happen versus just running.

Even so, I managed to run 8:40 pace overall for the 5.0 miles, with my mind more concerned about how my right foot was feeling than running. The rest of the body felt fine. So that still tells me that I still run well in the Zealot 3s.

So I am at a bit of a conundrum regarding whether I like them enough to cut most of the bootie out of the outside of the right shoe. It comes down to:

A. If I do and it doesn’t work, then I have screwed the shoes up for the next person who is lucky enough to get them.

B. If I do and my foot doesn’t bother when running in them I have added a really nice shoe to my rotation and will be able to run well in them.

I have a feeling that I will wait a week or so and maybe attempt another run in them the way they are or just a little tweak, to see if I continue to have the issue with the discomfort in my right shoe.

The run was a pretty decent 5.0 miler, now to get the Zealots so that they don’t bother my right foot.

Feeling A Little Off, But Still Getting Things Done

On By Harold L. ShawIn runlog

It seems that I am turning into a later afternoon runner for the next few weeks. 🙂 Just a lot going on around the house and by the time I get to feeling like running, it is already afternoon.

Yesterday’s run was just more of the same…

I wasn’t feeling really great in the morning, headache and a bit of an upset stomach, but not enough to really stop me from getting stuff done. One of those minor inconvenient yech feeling mornings. Nothing serious. We still walked the dawgs (sp) and did stuff around the house.

After lunch, I started the closing up the garden routine, busting up the rows and leveling out the dirt to get it ready for a good dose of lime and the winter snow pack. Gardening may sound relaxing and easy, but when doing the actual work with a hoe, it is a pretty good workout. I know that I worked up a decent sweat.

Once I got what I could do in the garden, I was ready for a run.

I was supposed to do a longer run, but the distance/time seemed too overwhelming for me right now, so I decided to simply run down to the Town Office and back to see how things shook out.

The run itself was nothing to write home about, a nice Zone 2 run, that I slowed down way too much on Blake and Stevens Hills. Today was simply about feeling better and getting a few miles on my feet.

One thing I am not too sure about is the Pegasus 34s? It seems like the outside of my right foot is bothering me a lot more since I started running primarily in them. Maybe I will take a week away from running in them to see if it is me or something about the shoes.

Maybe wearing them in a size 9.0 versus my actual size 8.0 foot has something to do with it? It shouldn’t make that big a difference, but sometimes that foot is pretty particular about what I wear on it while running. So we will see on that one.

Still it was a pretty good run and by the end of the day I was feeling a lot more like myself.

We are one step closer to SD2’s house being done! CMP connected it to the power pole yesterday afternoon. Now to finish up all the little things that depended on the house having power, yardwork finished, get the propane tank delivered and connected to the heating system, so she can close and move in. I hate to say I told you so, but when we got word for us to get the trees cut, I told Mary it would be about 1 November before she would be in and I think I was pretty spot on. 😉

I Wouldn’t Be Surprised

On By Harold L. ShawIn Running

Yesterday, I took a day off from running and went North to spend some time with Dad. It was a great visit and we talked about a lot of things. Yeah, including politics, usually one of those third rail subjects for both of us. You see he is a lifelong Democrat and I for most of my life was a pretty moderate Republican.

Now things are sort of reversed he was for a long time a die-hard Trump supporter in an area where there is a LOT of support for the Republican platform. Me, I would be called a liberal leaning Republican with damned Independent ideas, who is registered to vote in the Green Party (talk about mixed up) in a more Liberal leaning area. So we tend to not discuss politics on a regular basis in order to keep the peace between us.

Yesterday that sort of changed. As we danced around talking about the political crap going on from all the major parties. We were amazed to find that many of our thoughts were the same although we are coming to our conclusions from different directions.

1. President Trump is part of the problem and most likely not part of the solution. Although Vice-President Pence brings his own set of issues, not the least of which is how much would he bring his religion to the White House. However, Trump’s continuous grandstanding and petty meanness towards anyone who dares to disagree with him is only making the Country more divided along the ideology and purity of party lines. We both agreed that his Twitter account needs to be deleted, never to be seen again. Trump probably is not the only President who was/is/will be an arsehole, but with that Twitter account, everyone gets to see how much of one he actually is.

2. Neither of us bother to watch much news from anywhere other than the local channels anymore. He was a big watcher of Fox and I tended to veer towards CNN. We both agreed that ESPN and NESN are more enjoyable and probably more reliable in their reporting.

3. That Judge Kavanaugh with his most recent testimony before the Senate panel, did not show the restraint, humility or honesty that either of us would expect from someone that was going to be appointed to the Supreme Court. Kavanaugh came across as an angry kid, who had a temper tantrum because he isn’t getting what he wants.

Whether Kavanaugh is guilty of the crime of attempted rape or not, or if it was a political hit for his past work with the Starr grand jury, we the public will never know. We agreed that we disagreed on who to believe on this.

We did agree that while he will probably be confirmed by the Senate this week, despite his performance and the number of “white lies” that he extolled to everyone that he was a choir boy who never did anything wrong. However, we both believe that he will not set aside what has happened during his nomination process when it comes to his judicial responsibilities and it will shape his judicial temperament and decision making biases even more than they were before this all started. The Democrats have made a very public enemy who in all likelihood will be sitting soon on the Supreme Court.

4. We talked about too many people are attempting to re-write history to meet the standards we live by in today’s world and not look at them in the context of the time that they lived. We agreed that for the most part people of different eras in history made choices, decisions and lived their lives the best they could, based on what they knew at that time.

They did not have the luxury of our 20/20 hindsight. Ideas of right, wrong and why have changed quite fluidly over the years, sometimes we forget that. The idea of common human decency, well that is a something that is decided culturally, during that era and is probably different from our present expectations. We did agree that it is difficult to judge people from different eras based on the today’s standards.

We talked about that there will come a day when the world we live in today will be judged as ignorant and lacking by the generations to come and they will not understand the decisions that individuals made during what we think of as this so-called enlightened time in history. It would be interesting to see who are seen as the heroes and villains from the vantage point of 100 years in the future. I think that there will be a few surprises just like when we look back in history to those who we now think of as being heroes and villains.

5. That we both agree that the churches need to stay out of politics. The separation between Church and State needs to be kept strong and that the Church gaining more power is not in the best interest of anyone but the churches or those who want to use the power of the churches.

6. Politics is all about power and control and that those who have the power and money, want to keep it that way. Not that this has really ever changed, but with the power of the Internet and social media the normal power players have new competition and that is part of the battle we are all seeing, versus seeing just what they want us to see. The nastiness of local, state and national politics is on view immediately 24/7 versus in the past when news was 1/2 to an hour at night from “trusted” commentators or a day or more old by the time the newspaper or town crier got it.

One more observation

On thing that I did notice on my way home and it was something that was eerily similar to 2016, enough so that it really made me stop and think about it. All the polls and big newspapers seem to be predicting a huge democratic victory in November. Now I am not the sharpest tool in the shed or anything like that, but the number of lawns that had Republican supported signs vastly out-numbered any other political party.

I noticed the same thing back in 2016 and like many others was shocked by the election results. Based on what I am seeing driving around the backroads and listening to conversations going on around me and yes, even on Facebook. This time I will not be as surprised, if against all the polls, editorials and television projections/predictions that the Republicans retain control of both the House and Senate. There is more Republican support out there than people are being led to believe.

So I expect more than a few “surprises” this November. Not all of them will be what I want, but it will be what the voters decide.

The reality is that

My Father and I had some pretty good conversations about a lot of things that we usually do not talk about and realized that we have more in common than not. Which is something that I have a feeling that if more people actually talked, listened and took time to look beyond their screens or perfected for media personalities and attitudes, that would be the case.

Talking about politics, religion or anything else that is controversial comes with risks, but if we are unwilling to do so and we will continue to elect politicians who espouse simple solutions and grotesquely negative characterizations of those who do not agree with their vision of the world, then we have no one to blame but ourselves.

Yeah, I do wonder who will be seen as the heroes and villains a hundred years from now. It might not be the people we think, then again it might just be that some of us see things from a different perspective.

Switching Back to Augusta & 5K Tempo – RunLog 10-2-18

On By Harold L. ShawIn runlog2 Comments

It was cold, rainy, a bit blustery…well just a nasty day yesterday. Which meant that at some point I was going to go run on the treadmill. It has been my experience that in this weather it is when I pull/strain a muscle the easiest, so I prefer to be a wimp and run on the treadmill.

By the time I was able to get a run in it was fairly late in the afternoon and it gave me a chance to think about something I have been thinking about for a while.

Switching my Planet Fitness gym membership back to Augusta. No nothing is wrong with Waterville’s PF gym and I like the outside running routes up there a lot better than Augusta’s.

The bottom line is that I just do not feel comfortable at the Waterville Planet Fitness and really haven’t been since I started there back in March. For some reason, even though I know and talk with more people in Waterville and the facility itself is much nicer, every time I go into the Waterville PF, I feel rushed (even when it isn’t busy). That feeling that I just want get back out the door as quickly as possible.

Augusta just has more of an “open” feel/atmosphere that makes me more willing to stick around to do some weights, stretch and foam roll after I get done running on the treadmill.

So yesterday I went to Augusta and changed my membership back to that Planet Fitness.

Then I stretched.

Ran a tough for me tempo/progression 7.5 mph to 8.6 mph 5K on the treadmill.

Stretched/foam rolled

I left the gym feeling good about my workout and knowing that I had done the correct thing for me in switching back. I know that I will whine about the lack of running routes at some point, but like they say “a bitching sailor is a happy sailor”.

While I was writing this, it came to me at least part of the reason for my comfort level in the Augusta Planet Fitness was that the staff while I was completing the transfer process was joking around with me. They were smiling, laughing and taking time to talk with me as a person, not just another number.

A lot of the same staff that has been in Augusta for a while was still there. Maybe that is a part of my comfort zone – the staff seem friendlier/more relaxed around the members.

Which is very different from my experience in Waterville. It isn’t like the staff was unfriendly or anything, it was more that I had zero interactions with them beyond hello, excuse me and goodbye. The staff there was always busy, stressed and seemed to be on edge all the time.

Maybe that is what I was feeling.

I think that might be a bigger part of my comfort level than I thought.

All I know is that it felt good to be back at the Augusta Planet Fitness where I didn’t feel like I had to get out of the building as quickly as possible.

Treadmillin It and Zealot 3 Resurrection? – RunLog 10-1-18

On By Harold L. ShawIn runlog

I was thinking seriously about running outside this morning…well until I did Bennie’s long walk and it was raining fairly good and with the temps in the mid 40’s, it was pretty raw out there. Especially, when Bennie turned around early in his walk because he was starting to shiver pretty good.

Which meant a drive into Waterville to beat on Planet Fitness’ treadmill.

It also gave me a fairly safe day to run in the Zealot 3’s to see if they were going to bother or not.

Even though I did a little quicker run yesterday, once I got going, I decided to do a small progression run, nothing super hard, but getting things into a little quicker pace than usual.

So I did the following:

1.0 – 7.0 mph

1.0 – 7.1 mph

1.0 – 7.2 mph

2.0 – 7.5 mph

0.5 – 7.6 mph

0.5 – 7.7 mph

Now I wasn’t attempting to set any land speed records and kept things fairly reasonable.

I did have a quick pit stop at 2.0 miles to fix my toe sock on my right foot. The little toe felt “off” and I had to stop and take my shoes off to fix the sock. After that it didn’t bother and I was able to keep running without anymore sock issues.

Now to talk about the Saucony Zealot 3’s. After the 4.0 mile mark, I could feel my feet starting to tingle a little. Not nearly as bad as they have in the past in the Zealot 3’s and it never got to the point where it was more than slightly uncomfortable. However, it is still not the same level of comfort as the Pegasus have for me.

I will attempt to do one more change to the lacing and see if that makes any difference, but I am not optimistic that it will make much of a difference. I really think that I would have to cut the outside of the bootie complete to the end of the toe box for it to really make a difference for me. I really do not want to do that for the next person who might own them after me.

However, I do run really well in them which makes it really tough for me to give up on them. Maybe if I could get a pair of Saucony Breakthu’s since they do not have the bootie style, they would work for me.

We will see.

I just wish that the Zealot 3s didn’t bother my forefeet as much, they are just about what I am really looking for in a shoe. However, comfort is the most important thing I am looking for in a shoe and they haven’t quite reached that standard.

Another Week In the Books – 10-30-18

On By Harold L. ShawIn week in review

Some weeks are tougher than others. Well last week was a tough one physically and mentally. While we are getting closer to SD2’s house being done, it just isn’t done enough that she can move in yet. Which means she gets to live with us for a while until it is.

Not really a big deal it is only for a short time, but it did mean moving her out of her apartment and all her stuff into our garage – then it will have to be moved again when she can move into her new home around mid October.

However, it does mean that schedules, routines and all those other things that go along with any major change like this have to be revamped, updated – you know all those words we use to say that what we did last week is not what we will be doing this week.

It will all be fine, the three dogs, four cats and four adults will all get along, with a few hisses and dog spats along the way that really don’t mean anything.

Yes, there is a cat in the cube behind the dog and the dog didn’t realize it until the cat reached out and tapped her on the shoulder. There was a little barking at that point. Damn cat. 🙂

I think that it is more that I like my routine and when things change even if it is for a short time it takes me out of sorts for a while. Boy am I getting to be an old curmudgeon or what. 🙂

Also I noticed last week that my sleep hasn’t been as great as it usually is, I think worrying about what still needs to be done at SD2’s house, starting to get our’s ready for winter and the political partisanship crap that has taken over the guise of leadership of America’s government makes me think too much.

Running

Even so I still got in almost 30 miles on 5 runs for the week and had the longest run I have had since July.

Monday – A comfortable run out to Goodhue and back.

Tuesday – It was rather nasty outside so I went inside to Planet Fitness and played on the treadmill. I didn’t have a lot of time, so I cranked out a pretty hard run, so I could get back to the house on time.

Wednesday – I was just exhausted mentally and physically, so I decided to take a day off.

Thursday – At the last minute I decided to go around the Pond Road and do a course I have done for a few years. While I ended up over 9:00 for the overall pace, most of the splits were under 9:00. Bartlett and Stevens hill skewed the final pace numbers.

Friday – A comfortable run to recover from the long run. Before I ran I did notice that the outside of my right foot was bothering more than it should, but when I ran it felt completely normal.

Saturday – SD2’s moving day – too busy and tired to get a run in.

Sunday – A quicker but fairly consistent on the splits run around the Middle Road. Lots of traffic to deal with, plus I was pretty meechy between the school and the Town Office since that is where I seem to pick up my nasty hamstring issues when I run this course. Once I got down on the Blake Road the guy with the White Chevy let his chocolate lab out to run ahead of me and it decided that it would be more fun to run with the old fart. He helped me maintain a decent pace until the Blake Hill. Then at the bottom of Stevens Hill I came up on Mary and SD2 walking the dogs, so I took Bennie and ran with him.

The plan was to run to the top of the hill and then catch back up with the girls. About halfway up Stevens Hill, my running belt came flying off and Bennie was loose. However, he was great and stood ahead of me waiting for the old fart to catch up. So I had to hold the leash, which makes it a lot tougher to run with Bennie. We finished up the 5.0 miles and called it good.

A very decent run 42:30 for the 5.0 on this hilly route.

Injuries or Soreness

Other than the usual hip and Achilles issues, this issue with the outside of my right forefoot probably has something to do with my Tailor’s Bunionette being irritated on the long run on Thursday. I don’t think it is anything serious, but I will keep an eye on it and see how it is going forward.

Running Shoes

I have three pair of shoes that are right at 99.+ miles. I couldn’t have done this if I had tried.

Nike Pegasus 34 are turning into favorites and go to shoes for my comfortable and longer runs they don’t bother my feet until I get over the 8.0 mile mark and that is more because my feet haven’t toughened up to doing that much work than anything else. I am liking them quite a bit. Though I would get a pair of 8.5s versus the 9.0s that I have, which are too long.

Reebok RunFast – I only ran once in them this week, but they just remain a comfortable shoe to run in. They were starting to look pretty nasty, so I cleaned them up and put them through the washer. While they still have a few stained spots the RunFasts look more like racing shoes than trainers now. I imagine they will go over 100 miles this week.

Nike Rival 6 – I had them with me and hadn’t run in them for a while, so they were on my feet for the treadmill run. No issues and if it were not for the Reebok RunFasts the Rival 6’s would be on my feet a LOT more. It is good to know that I have two pair of “go faster” for me shoes that I can rely on

Reebok Grasse Road – While I haven’t run in them for a while because they do feel a bit snug in the forefoot, the primary reason is that I have turned them into my walking shoes. Unfortunately, in that role they have developed a stench, not just a stink, that will not go away even after I put them through a rinse cycle. When I can smell a pair of shoes walking by their storage bin, I know that others in the house can really smell them. Not a good thing. So they are now airing out in the back of the garage and if they do not unripen a bit, will go away.

Nike Pegasus 33 Shield – I have been able to put them away for nastier weather running.

Nike Wild Horse OG – Waiting in the back of the truck for some trail running.

Saucony Zealot 3 – Yeah, I might be adding these back into the rotation if my experiment works. I am not a big fan of bootie construction in running shoes because it snugs up my forefoot too much and after 4-5 miles seems to get my metasarglia going. So the other day I cut about a two inch incision on both sides of the forefoot bootie to see if that relieves the snugness. If it works I will be very happy, because I did like the ride and road feel of the Zealot 3s.

The reality is that

Life is getting in the way of my running a little more than I would like right now. However, my running is doing pretty well in spite of the other stuff. Sometimes I have to just go with the flow and keep moving forward.

I did remove the Apple News App for a couple of day, just to get away from all the “stuff” going on. The 24/7 news cycle awareness seems to wear on me more than my physical activity. I just have to ration the news and hope that the politicians don’t totally screw things up so badly that…well we will see. Both parties are not impressing me with their theatrics and money grabbing or is that money grubbing, but from where I sit – one is really becoming the party of the rich and entitled moreso than the other.

It is just a question of which side of the aisle you are looking from – me I sit somewhat closer to the middle than either extreme and maybe that is the problem, we as an electorate have become too concerned with which party wins versus what is best for our Country.

Oh well it is now a new week and things are going to get better.

Lots of Little Things – RunLog 9-28-18

On By Harold L. ShawIn Running

I did not go to the Rise ‘N Shine 5K in Augusta this morning. Right now there is just too much going on and I don’t have the extra umph left to race for right now. Maybe in another month or so when things settle back down, but right now I am too damn tired all the time it seems to push the extra gears it takes for racing.

Congratulations to all those who did run at 6:30 this morning, you did great!

I decided to not run the race earlier in the week and when I did the long run yesterday, I knew that I wasn’t going to run race this morning. Which was probably a really good thing, since SD2’s contractor dropped off his excavator at the job site at 11:30pm last night. It woke me up and I went over to investigate what was going on and who was over there. I wasn’t too impressed with that decision of his. Didn’t get to sleep too soon after that let me tell ya.

So it was just as well I hadn’t planned on racing this morning.

Although I did run today.

Another afternoon run, it almost seems like that is becoming more the norm lately than I would like or expect, but it is what it is. At least I am still getting out there and running down the road more often than not.

A very good thing.

However, I was wondering what was going on with my right foot. When I walked around the house barefoot and turned or came down on the outside of it, there was some sharp pain flare-ups happening more often than usual. It happened enough that I wondered if I should run or not. The thing was when I had shoes on walking around, the foot felt fine and I could twist, bend my foot with my hand, so I figured that I would go ahead and start the run and see how things felt.

It doesn’t feel like a stress fracture, more like a ligament or the tailor’s bunionette giving me a little more grief than usual. I ran a longer run for me yesterday, so that might have something to do with it? It is something I will keep a close eye one and shut things down if it continues to bother.

The weather was just about perfect, so I started out real easy and the foot felt fine. So I decided to keep a steady but comfortable effort through the first 3.0 miles and if everything felt good pickup the pace a little for the last mile.

Coming back from Bartlett I saw a woman with two dogs running in the other direction. We waved and I marveled/was jealous of how well her dogs behaved off-leash. The stayed right with her and didn’t hardly look at me, but they did place themselves between us.

If only Bennie could do that…never happen he is too hyper and too damaged by his previous owners to be let off leash. He goes and doesn’t come back and we have to chase/distract him, so we can catch him again, which can take hours.

I was feeling pretty good at the 3.0 mile mark, so I picked up the pace. Nothing crazy, just lengthened the stride out a little. Enough that I got down around 8:00 for a while. As I was finishing, I did go back by the woman with the dogs again and she yelled out to me “that is a great pace you got going”. Which made me smile and of course, I said “Thanks”. It is still nice when someone that you don’t know gives you a compliment out of the blue.

The right foot felt fine the entire run, so I am not sure what is going on there. I did run in the Peg34s and they felt great for the whole run.

One thing that I did this afternoon while dog sitting was look closely at my old Saucony Zealot 3s. They are a shoe that I really like everything about except for the way the bootie was too snug on my feet and after 4-5 miles my Metatarsals felt squeezed and would start to hurt until I stopped running.

When I got looking closely at the bootie construction without the insoles in, there is not a lot of give to the bootie and I got to wondering if I put a slit on each side of the bootie if it would loosen them up enough to make them shoes I can wear without discomfort. So I did. I figured that they are useless to me otherwise, so why not?

I will wear them sometime over the next week on a run to see if they still bother. I really do like the Saucony shoe styles, but their bootie construction in the Zealot 3s just doesn’t seem to work for me. Which is just my luck, I finally find a Saucony shoe that feels wide enough, but has that something that is not quite right about it for my feet. I hate to give up on a shoe that I like so much about…this is their last chance I have a feeling.

Overall, another one of those busy arse days, but I still had time for a pretty good run. 🙂

A Longer Run on the Pond Road – RunLog 9-27-18

On By Harold L. ShawIn runlog

Happy Birthday to my little sister – another year older.

I started this last night and just ran out of brain power to finish it until this morning. With the negative political scene unfolding where no one wins and we all lose, SD2 house adventures, the normal getting ready for winter stuff, I am totally exhausted. I think that like many people life is getting more and more complicated, and not as enjoyable as it could be.

Sometimes I think that Bennie has the perfect life.

The rains ended last night and this morning was just about perfect for a run.

I haven’t had a chance to do a longer run for a while, I have been capped at around 8.0 miles since July, so I thought about going for double-digits for the first time in a while. However, once I got going I was pretty sure that wasn’t going to happen and figured that I would just go out to Goodhue and finish up with my typical 7.0 miler.

The first mile was comfortable and I was surprised at how I felt when I got there, which got me to re-thinking that going for a longer than usual run. I was just plugging along listening to my running playlist – an eclectic mix from the Archie’s Sugar, Sugar to hard thumping stuff.

By the time I got to 3.0 miles I was beginning to think about running around the Pond Road Loop. A course I haven’t done in years and used to run quite often in 2012 & 2013. As I have gotten older instead of seeking out hills, I tend to avoid the worst of them. I slow down too much going up one compared to the rest of the run. So in order to do the Pond Road, I have to go up Bartlett Hill and then Stevens.

How much I slow down nowadays going up those hills hurts the ego too much I guess to seek them out regularly.

Even so, when I got to Goodhue, instead of turning back like I normally do, my feet carried me down the hill towards the Pond Road. I was feeling good, the feet didn’t hurt and I was comfortable running.

Of course the bad part about the Pond Road is that it is also Route 23 and the there is a lot more traffic on it. Today wasn’t much of an exception and of course the worst possible place for me to meet a vehicle is where I met a couple and had to bounce pretty far into the ditch to feel safe.

After that it was just plugging along, every so often singing along with the playlist. I am sure that I scared every critter and person along that route. It probably sounded like someone was choking a chicken hehehe. Oh well, I know that I can’t sing, but if I have my ear buds in I can’t hear myself sing.

Once I got onto Bartlett my fears were confirmed and I slowed down quite a bit going up that hill. I just can’t seem to shift into a lower gear and keep moving at the same pace like I used to be able to.

Coming down the other side was pretty good once I got my wind back in the sails and then I slowed down again when I hit Stevens Hill – same thing.

When I got to the house my feet were starting to bother a little. It takes about 5-6 long runs in a pair of shoes to to actually get them feeling more comfortable running long. I was still feeling pretty good though. However, I didn’t want to push the feet too much and I was starting to get tired and I shut it down at 9.0 miles.

Not quite double-digits, but a pretty damn good confidence builder for going forward. I just know that I won’t race well on a hilly course. Not that I am racing all that much anyway.

I think racing will have to wait until SD2 gets in her house and things calm down a bit more around the house. My mind really just isn’t into the race scene right now, I am really too tired mentally to add that into the mix.