My Active Adventures

Wow, what a year!  Honestly it has been one of the best years I've had in a long time and much of that can either directly or indirectly be traced back to my running.  This will likely be a long post (shocking, I know) but I want to do this year the justice it deserves before moving on to 2012 tomorrow. On Jan 1, 2011 I was in the midst of training for my first marathon ever and that day I ran 14 miles, the longest run I had ever done at that point!  I was shocked at the time by how good it felt, I commented on my Garmin activity that I felt like I could have easily run another 2-3 miles.  That was a great sign of how this year was going to go.  Today on Dec 31, 2011 I ran my final training run for my 3rd full marathon (5th race of at least marathon distance), the Louisiana Marathon, with a 20.67 mile run in 49+ mph wind gusts. I never dreamed I'd be bookending a year with distances like that!!  It wasn't all great, but it was all worth it.  Let's start with some stat

Yesterday my training plan called for an 18 mile run, no worries.  I've been feeling pretty good lately so I was excited and ready for a quality long run.  I wanted to change up my route a little so I plotted out a route that actually was closer to 19 miles.  I started at my mother-in-law Rosie's house, ran down to the Indian Creek Trail, ran down the trail to 119th & Quivira, took that up to 123rd, over to Switzer, up to 143rd, over to Antioch, up to 151st and back to Rosie's off 151st & Ridgeview.  So a little bit of paved trail and a lot of sidewalk.  It was 41* when I started and I felt great.  I felt strong the entire way, the only thing that slowed me down was a headwind for most of the 6+ miles coming down 151st St.  I ended up with 18.95 miles in 3:13:53 for an overall pace of 10:14!  This is the best long run I've had since mid-January!!  My confidence has been fairly high anyway but this really helped!!  I feel strong and I'm still hoping that my t

I know 2011 is not quite over yet, but it's time to set some goals for next year and a tentative race plan.  You can't achieve big things without setting big goals and I plan on 2012 being a great year so I want to start with big goals.  Once 2011 ends I'll review how I did with this year's goals, but right now it's time to plan for next year. Sub-4 hour marathon 40 miles at Patriots' Run 9 hour 11 minute race Get 5 Marathon Maniac stars with 3 Ultras/Marathons in 3 states in 9 days Start trail running regularly Stength/core/flexibility/balance training all year Minimum of 1500 miles running total These are not going to be easy goals for sure, but I will acheive them.  It's going to take hard work, dedication and mental toughness.  I'm excited about the challenge. My race plan plays into these goals.  Obviously at this point much of these are tentative, and many of the races in the last half of the year haven't even set their dates yet.  But

Okay, it's been a while since I made any crazy plans.  Well, that seems to have come to an end!!  I've been working on my race schedule for next year and one weekend has had me stumped.  I would like to run the Kansas City Marathon on 10/20.  Simple enough, right?  Well, my friend Carrie from the Good Guys vs Bad Girls Facebook competition had invited me to Mason City, IA to run the On The Road For Education Marathon (going forward I will refer to it as Mason City Marathon, it's too long) on 10/21.  I really would love to get to meet her and her family; she's been so supportive of me!  Also, Iowa would be a state I don't have yet and I have done Missouri (Blue Springs 50k this year).  So what's a guy to do??  I was going back and forth with what to do.  Finally it hit me, why not do both?  I could do the KC Marathon, drive 6 hours up to Mason City and run that one the next day.  Heck, that would even move me from a 1 star Marathon Maniac to 4 stars!!  Great plan

...But that's not what I do.  It's been an interesting week.  As far as running goes there were a lot of downs this week and a precious few ups; very rough week.  It's definitely not ideal since all of my 2012 plans hinge on having a good 9 weeks of training leading up to and a good race at the Louisiana Marathon on January 15th and that training seems to have derailed time and time again.  Oh well, I'll get back to this topic later, let's discuss what's gone on this week specifically. If you've been paying attention (and why wouldn't you?) you already know I've been having some problems with the cold air.  This week has been the worst by far.  Last Sunday (11/27) I met up with my buddy Mark for a nice 14 mile run on the Indian Creek Trail; well that was the plan at least.  It was 35* when we started with a strong wind out of the north and a 25* windchill.  We got started and I was doing good for the first few miles, but then right on queue my lungs