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2+2=
Today was my first 4-mile “easy run”, which will mark Tuesdays and Thursdays for the next several weeks. The route is an out-and-back on the Paradise Path and Latah Trail. I’m not really sure where one ends and the other begins. The western boundary of the Paradise Path is pretty obvious, as there’s this giant archway announcing that you’re entering the Bill Chipman trail. But the eastern boundary is much more nebulous. According to the website, the Paradise Path connects campus and downtown, implying that the Latah Trail begins in downtown. But, at least based on what I consider “downtown” to be, the trail goes nowhere near it! It jogs a good deal south. If I had to venture a guess, I’d say the trail changes names when it crosses US-95. Speaking of which, the fact that I have to wait at a light twice to cross US-95 during this route makes me consider finding another 4-mile route with less red light waiting time, and possibly less confusing trail name switches.
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i blame voldemort
Yesterday, a dark wizard put an Imperius curse on me, forcing me to read Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows all day rather than run. So my scheduled 6-mile “race pace” run never occurred. Oh well, it was a “stepback” week anyway. However, the curse wore off today, as I went out and did my 9-mile long run.
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farewell, washington-and-back
sniff Today was my last 3-miler until the week before the marathon. Next week, my “easy runs” on Tuesday and Thursday get amped up to 4 miles. So I said goodbye to the Bill Chipman Trail and will say hello next week to the Paradise Creek and Latah Trails, which make up the bulk of my 4-mile route. insert montage of fond memories running on the Chipman Trail and turning around at the state border, complete with sappy music
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blood, sweat, & tears
So today was my big 12-miler. Not 2 minutes into it, I tripped on my shoelace and found myself giving a very personal hello to A Street. My knees got pretty scuffed up, but I managed to finish the run just fine. I don’t think I could have gone much further than the 12 miles - the last mile especially felt like I’d lost all actual energy and was running entirely on willpower - but that’s all I needed to do for this week. I’ve also decided to start posting some video blogs on YouTube - check out the first one.
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meep meep
Today’s run was another 6-miler, and, thankfully, happened to be one of the occasional Saturdays which didn’t call for “race pace”. I did my usual route, the “Kibbie/sheep run”, which, surprisingly enough, goes behind the Kibbie Dome and through the university’s sheep farm. (My buddies weren’t out eating today…) Almost every time I do this, or similar, runs, I see a few birds running around on the road just north of the sheep farm. At first, I thought they must be roadrunners. I mean, they are running on a road - and they’re pretty good at it I might add - the little buggers are faster than me! They even have a little tuft of feathers on their heads that look like they might have inspired a cartoon version on Wile E. Coyote’s nemesis. But alas, Wikipedia tells me that the Greater Roadrunner is exclusive to the southwest, not the northwest. It’s probably just some Idaho species of sparrow taunting me.
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double digits!
Well I did it. My first double-digit long run. Today’s run was 11 miles. I tried a new route that went east of town on Darby Rd. and Olsen Rd., right in the shadow of Moscow Mountain. I thought the road names were especially cool because they happen to be the same as the names of my high school and a certain Daily Planet photographer who also happens to be Superman’s pal. I’m really starting to feel like I’ve built up some good endurance - I just kept on trucking without really feeling tired.
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chase race pace
Well, I think that might be a good sign. It took almost four weeks before I thought one of my runs was really “hard”, as in I found myself, numerous times throughout the thing, thinking, “There’s no way in hell I’m going to finish this.” The run was a 6-miler, on the same route as Wednesday’s run (behind the Kibbie Dome and past the hungry sheep), but instead of a nice, lackadaisical whatever-I-felt-like-doing pace, it was supposed to be at “race pace”, which I’ve been saying is about 9:00 a mile. My first mile was exactly at 9 minutes, the second came in at about 8:45 (probably because I didn’t have the crazy uphill I had in the first), but when I was midway through that third mile, I just felt like all the energy in my legs were gone. Somehow, I managed to keep pushing and stayed the course, finishing in 53:43, or 8:57 pace. Phew!
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all i gotta do now is run the thing
As of yesterday, I am officially registered for the Spokane Marathon. Woot.
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happy birthday uncle sam
To commemorate our nation’s independence, I ran six miles in ninety-degree weather. Normally, I like to run in the morning or the evening when the sun isn’t so high up in the sky. However, today, being a holiday, resulted in my lazy grad student butt sleeping in past prime morning run hours. Also, again since today is a holiday, I plan on spending my evening in Pullman watching purty fireworks, again during prime evening run hours. Conundrum. So I sucked it up and ran in the afternoon. It was super hot, but a really good run. I tried out a new 6-mile route, this one going back behind the Kibbie Dome on this awesome hill and also incorporating part of my sheep run route. I love those sheep! There’s like four or five little mini-herds of them, each with their little fenced-in area with a feeding trough, shelter, and whatnot. Almost every time I run past them, the last little mini-herd is always eating! I think they’re my favorite.
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care bear stare
I bought new running shorts yesterday, which I christened today on my traditional Washington-and-back 3 miler. Now I’m officially wearing nothing but high-tech designed-for-running gear. Yay. It was a nice run, although already ridiculously hot for 8 in the morning. Good ol’ July. On a totally unrelated note, with today’s release of the new Transformers movie, I had the perfect idea for next summer’s big budget, CGI-filled, based-on-an-80s-toy-franchise action thriller - Care Bears! I even whipped up some conceptual art for Funshine Bear.
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