  Wow, it's been a while since I last updated I just realized. I will summarize the last 4 runs I have completed since my last post. Update for 3/30/04 Cross trained at Heather & Brad's house after Brad wimped out about running in some sissy storm.
What's a little lightning?! I got to remember how difficult an elliptical really can be for 30 minutes and finished on the rowing machine while Brad sweated away on the stair climber. It was probably better that I didn't run in that storm, despite my desperate desire to do so. Update for 4/1/04 Yay for a day to celebrate fools! Lisa decided to play her own April Fool's day joke on me tonight as she told me she would be at the Rec Center. I figured it would be a great run to go over to UC, say hi, run around a bit by UC, and run home. What actually happened was that I ran hard over to UC only to find one of the Rec Center entrances was closed which caused a mile detour while I wove my way around the UC campus.
Even when I finally got into the Sho, that's when Lisa's joke hit me that she wasn't even there. I decided to run over to the Brick House via the scenic route to beat Lisa up for her unintended joke only to run across Sadie who needed someone to walk her through a "questionable" area around UC.
I gave her safe passage through to the house she was traveling to and ran home from there. All totaled, I probably completed 70 minutes, but they were hard minutes. I was running consistently at approximately a 8 1/2 minute pace and in the last 2 miles, I dropped to sub-8. My hamstrings and calves payed for it later though. Update for 4/4/04 This was supposed to be one of my longest runs of the buildup period, but due to the time change, physical exhaustion, hunger, and thirst, my body only carried me about 85 minutes of a planned 140. My hamstrings and calves were burning all of Saturday as I lugged around a 50lb gear bag for the students who we took to RRG. My calves went back to normal after about 4 miles but my hamstrings are a little tight to this day. It was still pretty cool to run through the Gorge at that time of the morning when no one else was up, except for some of our campers which is an amazing story that I can only share with runners.
The forest was very peaceful and the course (or gravel road) provided a ton of twists and turns and little hills everywhere. It was cool except for that time change/5 hours of sleep thing. Update for 4/6/04 I was able to get back to some semblance of a normal schedule today as I got up early to complete a 45 minute run this morning. I was very encouraged to find that I really have gotten faster as I had to alter my route a couple times just to get the time in for the run.
My original plan was to run to Xavier via Victory Pkwy and back on Montgomery. When I reached Xavier in just under 15 minutes, I knew I would have to extend my run from there. I came back on Montgomery but veered down a sidestreet before I got to Madison and extended my run by about 1.5-2 miles. Even though I knew I was running a little faster than normal, it was nothing my body couldn't handle and I felt great afterward. I probably completed over 5 miles in that time. I might actually clock it in my car tonight just so I have some idea of how far I am running. 
