It’s been an interesting 10 days. Earlier this month I spoke with the Houston Marathon about showing “Running for my Father” in its hometown. It’s on! We’ll be showing the film several times preceding the marathon at the Expo in January. (Details coming soon!) Given this, I’ll be running Houston again. (!) I’m knee deep in training, and after my surprise performance at the SB Half I’d decided to try to and push it as hard as I can.
My cousin and I went backpacking last weekend...and it didn’t go so well. Thankfully we had a happy ending, but it involved being rescued from the top of Mount San Gorgonio (11,499 feet) in a blizzard with the wind chill bringing the temperature down to -29’! Long story short, my cousin Josh and I owe our lives to the San Gorgonio Rescue Team. If you’re on Facebook you can read the whole story here...(btw, the pic at the top in the middle is me the morning after the blizzard rolled in...) Also...the article written about the rescue...http://www.pe.com/localnews/inland/stories/PE_News_Local_S_rescue08.3b90ec3.html
Anyway, on Sunday my schedule called for 15 miles. The fires in LA made the air absolutely unbreathable. I paired up with my friend Billy (who had a 20 miler scheduled) who snuck me into his gym, where we proceeded to run for about 3 hours on a treadmill! Miserable, but I ended up doing a “progression run,” where I go faster and faster throughout the run. Arduous, but good for the training.
Today I went out on one of my many tempo runs... (warm up, go fast, cool down.) I had 3.5 miles at tempo pace (the go fast part.) After my 2 mile warm up I was feeling really crappy - the legs were not working...probably still recovering from my 15 miler. After some thought and some advice from Billy I decided to give it a go. .4 miles into the tempo part I ate it. Big time. Tore open my knee, elbow and hand. Gnarly - pics of the hand and knee above... Was this my excuse to stop? After I washed the wounds in the nearby drinking fountain I decided to see the run through. I got home after the run and felt good about myself. Another run in the books, despite some obstacles. Houston...60 days away!
