This week didn’t quite go as planned.  Family obligations prevented me from running on Wednesday, breaking my running streak at 18 consecutive days.

Thursday was in the low 70’sF, but it was warm enough that it made my 4-mile run a really tough one.  I’ve come to realize that I am terrible when it comes to running in temperatures above the low 60’sF.

Friday was 85F at the time that I was scheduled to run and I just couldn’t stomach the thought of having to struggle through another run so I took the day off.

This morning as 57F…great weather as far as I am concerned.  I decided to do a 4-mile run since I missed a couple days this week, but the weather was so nice and I felt great that I deicded to make it a 5-mile run.

I ended the week at 23 miles.  My goal was 27-28 miles.

I plan to switch to running in the mornings.  I did it the whole of last year so I know I will eventually get used to having to get up an hour earlier.

My goal for next week is about 25-27 miles.  I’m on vacation and we’re taking a short 2-day mini-vacation so I will most likely only get in 6 days of running.

Last week was another great running week for me. I managed to end the week at 27 miles for the second time in a row. I also managed to keep my running streak alive, but it took a lot of will power on one of the days…

The problem was on Thursday. We had this cold front that moved in on Thursday along with wind and rain. On Thursday afternoon, it was about 35F, raining, and windy, but I just had to run. I decided to go out and try my normal 4 miles, but I figured that once I got in at least 2 miles, I would be happy. It was the most brutal weather I’ve had to run in for quite some time. The rain was actually icy and it was stinging as it hit my face. To make matter worse, I stepped in a puddle about 5 mins into the run and so my left foot was wet and cold. I kept going and after a while my face and body felt fine, but my foot was starting to get numb. I decided to cut the run short and ended it at 2 miles.

I normally see at least 2-3 other people running when I go out, but needless to say, there was no on else out there on Thursday. I’m sure that the people in the many cars that passed me must have thought I was crazy.

As a result of only running 2 miles on Thursday, I ran 5 on Friday and made my recovery run on Saturday 3 miles so I could have ended the week at 27 miles.

My plan this week to to continue to run every day. I increased my Sunday run to 6 miles and so I hope to run about 28 miles for the week.

This has been the best week of running I’ve had since last year October.  I managed to run every day of the week for a weekly total of 27 miles.

I ran a long run of 5 miles on Sunday and then ran 4 miles each of the next 5 days. I was a bit undecided as to whether or not I should run today, or take a rest day.  I like the fact I had run for seven consecutive days when I include last week Saturday, and in the end, I decided to do a short 2-mile run today to keep my streak alive.  I wanted today’s run to be a very slow recovery run so I asked my 6 1/2 year old daughter if she wanted to go running with me.  To my surprise, she agreed and was actually excited about it.  I have never run with her in the past, but I knew it would definitely force me to run slowly.

I decided to run the first mile with her, doing a loop in such a way that I could have dropped her back home and then go on to do my second mile.  It was great running with her and she was a real trooper.  She managed to run the full mile without having to walk.  I am so proud of her.  All I could think about was the first time I went running and could barely managed 60 seconds at a time.  As expected, we took 13 mins to run the mile, but it was nice and slow.

I’m looking forward to many more runs with her in the future.

I’ve been able to run quite regularly for the year so far and my heel seems to be allowing me to go 4 miles at a time without any problems.  For the last few weeks I’ve been thinking about my approach to running and I think I’m actually in the process of evolving as a runner.  I’ve noticed a couple things about myself, one good and one bad:

I no longer seem to be concerned about how fast I run.  A year ago, I was obsessed with going further or faster.  These days, I’m just happy to be running and happy that my heel hasn’t been giving me any problems.  A year ago, I would be constantly monitoring my Forerunner to see how fast I was going.  I still monitor my Forerunner, but not as often, and when I do, it’s to see if I should slow down, whereas a year ago, I was monitoring it to see if I should speed up.

The other observation I’ve made is that don’t seem to be as motivated as I was a year ago. For example, this week has been rather cold with the temperatures hovering around the 30-35F range in the afternoons which is when I’ve been running recently and I’m finding it harder to get myself out the door in those temperatures.  A year ago, I almost considered it a badge of honor to go running in those temperatures and the colder it was, the more I wanted to go running.  The hardest part for me right now is just getting dressed and getting out the door.  Once I do that, I’m fine.

This week is going to be a bit warmer here in the DFW metroplex so I wouldn’t have weather as an excuse anymore.  As a matter of fact, the temperature this is week is suppose to be what I consider ideal running temperatures….the 50s F.