Pass the lemons

Monday 1/24 (7.4mi, 1h 02m, 8:25/mi) I went for a recovery run in the rain after Sunday's longish run. I looped around on trails less traveled in the Bridle Trails and got a little bit lost. I ended up running about a mile and a half longer than I'd planned. Felt pretty good with a little residual knee pain.

Wednesday 1/26 (6.5mi, 51min, 7:51/mi) Easy enough start from the gym and out again to the Bridle Trails to test out my new Brooks Cascadia 6 shoes. They weren't scheduled to hit the stores until February but I got a tweet from @brooksrunning that they were available on their website last week so I snapped up a pair. Too early to give my thoughts on them so I'll just throw some muddy winter trail conditions at them instead. My stomach was horrible on the run and I had to stop twice mid-run to umm... rest briefly. Ugh. I hate my guts right now.

Friday 1/28 (8.2mi, 1h 16m, 9:16/mi) I got out for a night run on the Bridle Trails to see how the new Cascadias performed on muddy trails in the dark. It was a little darker than my usual night runs as my small LED flashlight kept blinking off and my headlamp's batteries appear to be dying. Good thing I've run the trails enough that I know the perimeter loop pretty well by now. There was a little rain but I was dressed just enough to be very comfortable.

I missed my planned 18mi long run over the weekend. I finally gave in to the cold that the kids and wife have. I figured I was in trouble when the boy coughed in my mouth twice Wednesday night. It's started out pretty mild but enough that napping was a much better idea than running on Saturday and Sunday.

Monday 1/31 (6.4mi, 49min, 7:45/mi) I was feeling a tiny bit sick but not bad enough to skip the run. I ran out to the Bridle Trails starting slow and then picking up the pace as I got around. Again I tried to run on some of the interior trails that I seldom use to shake things up and enjoy different scenery. I also went with the Cascadias again to see if I can get a good feel for them before Chuckanut in March. It'll be between them and the New Balance 101s for that race.

After running on Monday I finished January out with:

133.4mi
19h 49m
Avg Pace: 8:55/mi

My cold got much worse and the family and I are all very sick now. I called in sick to work 3 days last week and have barely left the house since then much less gotten out for a run. I hope to resume with some easy jogging on Monday and somehow rearrange my training for Chuckanut to still get my long runs up over 27mi and fit in a few runs in the real mountains in Feb and early March. After seeing how much fitness I've lost I'll rework my goals for Chuckanut. In my current state, just finishing sounds great to me.