Last night, I raced for the first time since July . A month or so ago, Tim said he was signing up for this 10k race put on by local race director Chris Lauber , and asked if I wanted him to sign me up, too. Sure, I said. (Some six-mile race over a month away? No problem.) The race was the HOT Run 5K and 10K , sponsored by the radio station HOT 101.5. It was out at Pass-A-Grille Beach, on a Thursday evening. This made it rather stressful to get to after work, but even in the hours leading up to the race, I was thinking, I'm just going to treat this as a training run. No pressure for time. But that never works. I even left my watch in my car, so I wouldn't be obsessed with looking at my pace--but also because it was raining lightly. The course was a 1.55-mile loop; 5k racers would run it twice, and 10k-racers would run it FOUR times (I love running in circles!). The 5k group had a four minute lead on our group. This further meant that the time clock would display the time based...

Over two weeks ago, the time changed to Daylight Savings time, and today is the official marker of spring. These events are a herald of two things, in my mind: hotter days, slower times. While I just run my fastest half-marathon and my fastest five-miler  to date, I know these successes were largely due to the colder, drier weather we've been having in Tampa. But as the last two evenings' runs have shown me, I'm going to have to start working harder if I want to keep my pace down. Monday night's run was actually more positive than negative. I met up with the usual Monday night crowd at Flatwoods. I'd had a lazy weekend and didn't run at all (that was not my intention; I just kept oversleeping), so I felt I should be able to have a decent run that night. For this particular run, the guys usually stick together and run in a pack at the same pace, while the ladies sometimes partition off into couples, or maybe a small group, but almost always at a slower pace th...

The week prior to the Gasparilla Half Marathon was not shaping up to be the ideal pre-race week. I was overburdened with and stressed out by work--both at my full-time job and at home with editing projects; I came down with a cold--what seemed to be a combination of a sinus and ear infection; and the weather was turning warmer and more humid than it had been in months. But I was determined to PR this race, which meant I had to be in top shape. I rested, I regularly drank a potent tea of lemon, ginger, honey, garlic (yep), and cinnamon, and I tried to get as much work off my plate as possible. I only ran twice , I did one night of yoga, and I rested Friday and Saturday before the race. My "Pre-Gaming" I was feeling pretty good Saturday morning when I got up early to go watch that day's races--the 15k and the 5k. I met up with Josh and his triathlon training group and cheered on the runners passing by. Cheering, when done well, is a lot of work. One must be constant and...

*This post was begun weeks ago, but I stopped about halfway through, got busy with life, and didn't post for the remainder of training. ------ Last week was a great week of training. I did almost everything I wanted to, aside from Ashtanga on Sunday, but I also realized that I need to have a rest day. My body was asking for it. I hate to sacrifice that yoga class, but if I'm going to be in the kind of training shape I want to be in, it's a sacrifice that must be made. Week 4: 1/14/13 - 1/20/13 M:  3.1 mi (E) T:  5 mi (P) W:  CrossBoot (XT) R:  4 mi (E) F:   hot yoga (XT) Sa:  8 mi (LSD) Su: rest Weekly mileage: 20.1 Key: (E) = Easy; (P) = Pace; (LSD) = Long Slow Distance; (XT) = Cross Training On Monday, right after work (or perhaps a teensy bit before the end of the work day), I left to meet my friend Cameron at Trout Creek for a trail run. I've been wanting to do more trails, and she was sort of familiar with this one and knew of an approxi...

Key: (E) = Easy; (P) = Pace; (LSD) = Long Slow Distance; (XT) = Cross Training Week 5: 1/21/13 - 1/27/13 M:  5 mi (P) + yin yoga (XT) T:  6 mi (E) W:  rest R:  6.1 mi (P) F:   hot yoga (XT) Sa: 11mi (LSD) Su:  yoga in the park (XT)/ swing dancing Weekly mileage: 28.1 Week 6: 1/28/13 - 2/3/13 M: 5.69 mi (E) T:  rest/ swing dancing W:  CrossBoot (XT) R:  5 mi (P) F:   9 mi (LSD) Sa:  rest/ swing dancing Su:  3   mi (E)/  yoga in the park (XT) Weekly mileage: 22.69 Week 7: 2/4/13 - 2/10/13 M:  4 mi (E) T: 4 mi (P) W:  CrossBoot (XT) R:  6 mi (P) F:   CrossBoot (XT) Sa: 12  mi (LSD) Su:  donation yoga (Bella Prana) Weekly mileage: 26 Week 8: 2/11/13 - 2/17/13 M: 6.32 mi (E) T: 4 mi (P) W:  mini strength workout R: 6 mi (P) F:   CrossBoot (XT) Sa:  8 mi (LSD) Su:  yoga in the park (XT) Weekly mileage:...

This past training week was a rather solid one. I got to run with a variety of different people and was finally pushed beyond the effort I've been putting out on my own. Week 3: 1/7/13 - 1/13/13 M:  5.66 mi (P)  +  yin yoga (XT) T:  4 mi (E  + P) W:  CrossBoot (XT) R:  3.1 mi (E) F:   hot yoga (XT) Sa:  10 mi (LSD) Su:  yoga in the park (XT) Weekly mileage: 22.76 Key: (E) = Easy; (P) = Pace; (LSD) = Long Slow Distance; (XT) = Cross Training On Monday, I went back to my running group "roots" at Flatwoods/ Hunters Green (we run Flatwoods Park during Daylight Savings and then move to the surrounding Hunters Green 'burbs after Daylight Savings, as Flatwoods is closed by the time we meet to run). These are the people whom I consider my main running family. Even when I've taken breaks from the Monday night runs, these folks have all still had a presence--sometimes at other events, sometimes just on Facebook--and have been suppo...