April 2011 Summary

Sometimes life just gets in the way of running and the latter part of this month was a perfect example of that.

Runs - 25
Workouts - 0
Injured - 0

The Bad: The wife going back to work, the mother-in-law moving in to help out with the little one and myself working back to back 75 plus hour work weeks. When you're working as much as I was over the past few weeks, there ain't much time left to run, sleep well and spend time with family.

Early this month I got the thumbs up to start working out again. At that time, I had been away from pushing weights for 2 months. Well you can make that 3 months now. Some folks get better at running by running more. I become a better runner when I run more and lift weights. Something about the balance between the two just works well for me.

The Good: I did have the first 10 days of the month working for me. Averaging something like 9.7 miles a day during that stretch. I also got in every scheduled long run leading up to Collegiate Peaks. So I got that working for me.

Looking Forward: One of the positives to take out of the brutal stretch at the end of April is that I can consider this span as an extreme taper with the CP25 just around the corner. In all honesty, I can't say I'm overly confident as I enter the race. I've always read "trust your training" and my training for the past few months has been strong and consistent. However I live by the line "what have you done for me lately?" And as far as I'm concerned, I have done squat over the past few weeks to justify a strong showing down in Buena Vista.

I did purchase Relentless Forward Progress last week. Went back and forth regarding the puchase, but for $10 via Amazon, it was easy to justify. Pretty much done with the book. Easy read, interesting topics but not really sharing stuff I didn't already know. But I'll say it's nice to have a reference manual like this in a small book that I can keep stashed with my other running mags next to the can in the bathroom.

Did stumble across this new race in Moab. Sounds very interesting but the timing of it is pretty bad for me as it's weeks after Steamboat. Single loop routes for the 50M and 100M is pretty cool and being out in Moab in early October usually offers up some fantastic weather. Rarely too hot or too cold. Will seriously consider the 50M if I'm able to string together a strong summer training pattern.