Now to Focus on Running!

Finally done with finals! *happy dance*

Just finished my last one yesterday afternoon.  Then I packed up and drove home and had a good long sleep.  I never realize how sleepy stress makes you until it wears off.  I am super excited because this gives me the next five or so weeks to focus solely on running, fitness, and being well!

I had a realization as I slowly ran today.  We had absolutely no rain this summer when it was over 110 almost everyday, and now we have had nonstop rain for the past 2 weeks.  I am not complaining, because I love the rain.  In fact, I even go to rainy mood when listening to music or studying!  But I would have loved it more if it were to have come to cool us off over the summer.  But the good news is, it looks like we shouldn't shrivel up like we originally thought was going to happen over the next 5 years.  

Now onto my run!  It was a simple 2 mile run, back on the path I ran over the summer.  To summarize it, it is a flat path out and back. Flat, in Texas? Crazy I know!  But it was a pretty peaceful run.  It was like all the stress of the last 4 months were washed away and I was a new runner!  Sadly, it didn't wash away that nagging in my knee.  I did stretch before it this time, and it made it so I went all 2 miles without having to stop, but it did creep up late in the run.  I am going to the chiropractor after this weekend though!  Overall was a pretty slow pace because I did the 2 miles in a little less than 20 minutes, but I shouldn't complain, at least I was able to get out there and run!

I won't be able to blog this weekend though, which is both good and bad.  Bad because I really want to put some more time into this blog over the break but good because I am going to go see my cousin graduate from college!  I always find it inspiring to see someone accomplish something you are also striving for.  Its like they are telling you that it IS possible, even if not directly.  So I should be back on Monday and ready to write!  Something else I have noticed is the lack of pictures on my blog.  I am not a great photographer, in fact the only camera I own is on my phone, but I think I am going to try and take some more pictures to make this more than a wall of text for everyone.

But to break the monotony of this text, here is some music!  The artists name is Ellie Goulding, and I think her music is pretty catchy!

Until next time, have a safe weekend, and happy running!

Muddy Fun Run

This week had gone by in a blur, so I figured I would wait until the end of my running week to talk about it all at once.  A quick breakdown of the week would be as follows:

Tuesday - 3 mile run
Wednesday - 2 mile run
Saturday - 2.8 mile run

Far from spectacular, but that is about 7.8 miles more than I have done in the past 2 months!  Although I did vary from my original plan which would have been 3 miles on Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday and Saturday.  The reason for this variation is that my right knee acts up when I start to run again after a long break.  I am starting to think that it is because of the years I Wrestled, because that was the knee that would get slammed into the mat more often than not.  But from what I remember this summer, as long as I take it easy and run until it bothers me then stop for the day, then I should be okay in a couple weeks.  That is good news because that means I will be healthy for the rest of the marathon training that I will be doing starting next week!  This time I swear I am going to stick to it too, for real.

Back to this title of this post though!  It has been raining non-stop for the past 3 days and my campus does NOT drain well.  And if you know my thoughts on the treadmill, then you know I was really sad to think I would have to visit it again.

Luckily the rain let up!  I was able to run outside with no rain! Yippee! The only downside (upside if you like this I guess) was that the trail I run on campus was thick and muddy.  I thought I avoided getting muddy by not running the warrior dash, but it seems I was meant to be muddy anyways! So in preparation, I dug out my old shoes from a couple years ago that I didn't completely run into the ground and used those.  I felt great running outside in the cool mist though, and I was sad I had to stop .2 miles short of 3 because my knee started to pinch sharply.  While I was running though I started to wonder about others and how they deal with weather, so I thought of a couple of questions:

Do you have backup weather gear?
What is the worst conditions you have purposely ran in?