More miles

Planned a long run today, but I ran out of time so I just went to the track for 3 quick 1-mile repeats:

• 10:28
• 10:36
• 10:53

That's actually a bit faster than I expected, since I've been feeling slow and sluggish lately. Lots going on with the new house acquisition and other stuff in our lives, but the increasingly warm weather always helps my motivation and interest in getting outside and working out.

Swimming laps

Just trying to get back in the habit of getting in the pool a couple times per week and pushing myself for a few lengths of the pool. I did some timed 100s (yards) today at the end of my swim just to do some time-checks on some different techniques - adding some more body roll, some more glide, some more shoulder shrug. The only thing I concluded is that smoother is faster. Yeah, I'm a regular Einstein.

100s today in:

• 2:07
• 2:15
• 2:16
• 2:10
• 2:11

Stir crazy

I needed to run today or I was going to have to duct-tape my girls to the wall, after being indoors with them all day yesterday. Went to the Y and checked them into kiddie jail there and did 3.5 miles on the treadmill in the relatively cool fitness center. Things are better now, even though it was already 105*F heat index at noon. Whew, close call. Might be able to survive the rest of the day.

Looking forward to swimming under this bridge in Philadelphia in 12 days - should be fun! I'll be testing my lack of running with a 10K race this weekend, first. That should tell the tale of how much my running fitness I have left.

I can't get anything done in 25 minutes

That's what I was thinking when I looked at the clock and realized that I had frittered away almost all of my valuable time when the girls were in school today. But then I caught myself and climbed out of that negative thinking trap - SOMETHING is better than NOTHING today, right?

So I headed over to the school track for a quick few laps before I picked up the girls.

Let's see, if I do this right I have time for 8 laps. I'm ready to go after my walk over.

1. 3:02. Ouch, I'm feeling creaky.
2. 2:51. OK, my knee stopped hurting. Now I can run semi-normally.
3. 2:44. That's not so creaky, starting to warm up.
4. 2:43. I wonder if I can do every lap faster than the last? Let's hit it!
0:22. Pause to remove hot vest and gloves.
5. 2:23. Woot! Whew, that got me out of breath. Not bad.
6. 2:44. OK, I can breathe again. One more time, faster than the last.
7. 2:22. That's better.
8. 2:55. OK, warm down, and go get the girls.

22:10: Total time for 2.0 miles and pause including a half mile at 9:30 min/mile pace.

Not a lot of distance by endurance athlete standards, of course, and not a lot of speed by most runner standards, but it's still probably more distance than a lot of people ran in the entire year of 2007. In less time than many moms spend sitting in their cars waiting for their kids to get out of school every day.