A good way to end the week

On Tuesday I went out for my first 'real' speed workout this training season.  I hit a mile in a 7+/mi pace, then a 4-5K in the 8s and finished with another mile ~7.15/mi pace.  If felt good during the run but on Wed started to have some muscle tightness in my right leg/hip.  Of course I couldn't help but think of my hip and hope that I didn't make a bad choice.  I decided to take the rest of the week off and not push it.

Today was our team run and we hit the course for part of it.  I ran 14.5 miles and after taking most of the week off, I felt remarkably good.  I finished the run at a good pace and it was a great day to be out there.  Perhaps not quite beach weather, but that was the theme at one of the water stops today.  Hopefully we won't have a beach day on April 18, but today was a good one.

A Welcome Change

2012, before the snow really started

During the last 4 years I've made it to most team runs and thus I've run the same routes many times.  Our run in Wayland has always been a pretty run, but usually not a fun run.  The rolling hills are nice to start, but less so as we wrap up 14-16 miles.  The 'quiet' back roads quickly get busier and about 1/2 the drivers see no need to slow down for us.  On top of this, the run in Wayland has usually had snow and gotten quite sloppy (see pictures from 2012 and 2014).   This year was a welcome change as we didn't have any snow, just some wind and cold.  I felt good during the run and was happy to finish the 14 miles at a sub-9 min/mile pace.  Definitely wasn't trying for this but chatting with teammates helps the miles go by.

2014, mile 10 of 14

Following the group run was the Patient Partner Match Party.  This is our chance to meet and reconnect with our patient partners.  Having run in honor of RJ these last 5 years, we have a great relationship and 'reconnect' throughout the year but it's always great to see him, as well as the other runners and patient partners.  After some ice cream sundaes, we heard from Dmitri and his runner about what the program has meant to them.  It's always a great to hear from the patient partners as a reminder how much us runners mean to them since we already know how much the patient partners and 'in memory of' families mean to us.  It was another great event and I'm looking forward to our fifth year in the patient partner program!

Winter is Here

It was a cold night tonight with the wind helping the 20F temps feel like 5F.  Luckily the wind also helped me up the hills a bit.  Since we're not inside on the track yet, I took on a nice 0.2mile hill with a gradual incline.  I decided to run this 8 times and push the pace while going uphill, but I didn't want to push too much as I'm still getting back into running at speed.  Overall, I felt good and had a nice sub-7.30min/mi pace going on these hill repeats.  With a possible winter storm this weekend, hopefully we won't have a repeat of last year's winter!

Longest run since April!

What a week and way to start 2016...
Donations and company matches topped $4,100 this week!  With a goal of $13,100, we're just over 8 miles into our fundraising marathon :)  Also, this $4100 total brings our 4+ year total to over $53,500 thus far!  An amazing feat that is certainly beyond what I would have expected when I first ran with DFMC in 2012.
This week a number of generous companies also donated items for our March fundraiser which will help raise even more money for DFMC!  Thank you to the following companies for supporting DFMC and our efforts!!

        

So our team run...this was my first DFMC run of the 2016 season.  It was also the furthest that I've run since the marathon in April.  After a cool and soggy 12.5 miles, I felt pretty good and was happy with the run.  It would have been great to be pain free, but similar to my return to running in the fall, I'm experiencing some soreness in the adductors/quads.  Of course my mind immediately wonders whether there's any issue with the hip, but after an MRI and CT scan in the fall, there was no indication that the stress fracture was still here.  Here's hoping that with continued strength training, stretching and massage, things begin to feel 100%.  At least there's a good group of DFMCers to run with and see every week