Looking toward the fall

So to catch up on the week:

Wed. Ran 6 in the evening due to having an appt. over my lunch hour.

Th: Ran 8 lunch, not as hot today but still 70s dew points. 3 evening which was highlighted by at dusk with about a mile to go running out in the country, came up on what appeared to be a large black cat...wrong! It was a skunk. It looked up at me, sniffed the air and watched me pass by. Kept running in a straight line as he was about 15 yards away. No harm, no foul.... smell that is.

Fri: Ran 10 at lunch, again temps were in the 80s and it was cloudy. Sweat wicking clothes are routinely soaked as cotton garments just about every day now.

Sat. 13 AM, it was a bit foggy and was just starting to warm up seriously by the time I was done. 3 evening in hot, humid air with no air moving.

Sun: 4 AM, 4PM, easy recovery pace. Tonight it was 90/77 104 HI at 8:30. Tomorrow it's supposed to be brutal 110 HI.



Ended up at 61 for the week. Last four weeks progression 34/41/54/61



Have been reading a lot of your blogs, I will make it a point to do some commenting tomorrow when I have an opportunity.



Also have a 102nd birthday to celebrate. Not mine, my grandmothers. Should be fun! Can't believe how she keeps hanging in there. It's all good.

Some serious running in his heat/humidity! We had fog Saturday too. Are you planning on stepping back this week after 4 weeks of increase in mileage?

Peg, my family is out of town until Friday so I may take advantage of that to get in another similar week unless my legs and body tell me otherwise. I also may run indoors some too but I've said that the last two weeks so who knows?



Thanks for asking.

Nice weekly mileage. Are you planning a stepback week?

Happy birthday to your grandma! Very cool!

Looks like a really strong week of running! Good job!

Nice week of running Jon. Thankfully you survived the run-in with the skunk.

Jim Lentz wrote:Nice weekly mileage. Are you planning a stepback week?

As of now, probably not. Planning on matching or exceeding last week. Especially now that the weather is in the mid 80s and the dew point dropped below 70 for the first time in a month.

Julie wrote:Happy birthday to your grandma! Very cool!

Looks like a really strong week of running! Good job!

Thanks! Grandma's birthday party was great! She has maintained a sense of humor despite not being able to walk very quickly, see well or hear that great. Her mind is outstanding however. I feel truly blessed to still have a grandparent living at my age.

Alex Kubacki wrote:Nice week of running Jon. Thankfully you survived the run-in with the skunk.

Yes that did give me pause for thought. Best bet was to continue forward and not have the skunk perceive me as a threat.



Ran the skunk route again last night. No sign of it though.



The heat was a bit less yesterday but still heat index over 100 for my lunchtime 9. Then added three in the evening. Today I ran 5 over lunch. It is decidedly cooler and less humid. Hopefully this is a trend that can continue. Sounds like we may get rain tonight and or tomorrow. I plan on running again this evening.

Rain here today, I hope you get some too. My tomatoes will love it.

good for you for getting out and running over lunch. I about dissolve in the heat when the sun comes out I can't really fathom going out mid-day.

Julie wrote:Rain here today, I hope you get some too. My tomatoes will love it.

good for you for getting out and running over lunch. I about dissolve in the heat when the sun comes out I can't really fathom going out mid-day.

Yep it's raining here this AM too! Only bad part is that the humidity is still here, but whatever. Can't do anything about it. Honestly, getting up at 4am is more intimidating to me than running in the heat over lunch. So props to you! I'm thankful that it's only been in the low 80s the last few days.



Think I left off Wed. night. Ran 6 in a light rain that lasted until about mile 3. It has been cooler here but the humidity remains. Tried out an AM/FM old style walkman I had bought in order to use to listen to live sports events. Worked fairly well.



Yesterday I went 8 over lunch and 4 in the evening. I've begun using the stick more before my second run to loosen up the leg muscles a bit. Still hoping to up the mileage this week with the intent of a drop back week next week. I plan to run over lunch today and then drive to Okoboji late this afternoon and join my family there for the rest of the weekend. There are some nice trails there and running lakeside should be a nice break from the rows of corn. The corn plants are freaking huge this year, many over 10 ft. as I run by.



The legs are definitely tired when I start out but that is what the intent is. Doing doubles does help to lighten the load once you're used to it. The other piece of encouraging news is that there are no niggles to report at least as of yet.

How long have you been doing doubles Jon? I started doing one a week towards the end of my previous cycle and I grew to love them.

Where is Okojobi?

Nice looking week so far Jon.

Peg Coover wrote:Where is Okojobi?

It is in northwest Iowa close to the Minnesota border. Very nice bike trails and small lakes. It is just under a 5 hour drive from my home.



http://www.vacationokoboji.com/

Jim Lentz wrote:Nice looking week so far Jon.

Thanks Jim, hope yours goes well also.



Friday, ran 10 at lunch before taking off for Okoboji.



Sat. ran 4.75 in the AM, 8.25 in the afternoon. It is a bit cooler here 88/68 but still warm enough to carry a water bottle. It is supposed to be cooler tomorrow so looking forward to that. The lakes are up a bit this year but still a lot of people are here for the weekend.

Alex Kubacki wrote:How long have you been doing doubles Jon? I started doing one a week towards the end of my previous cycle and I grew to love them.

I started doing them a couple summers ago after talking with Mr. Matt and several others who encouraged me to try them. As I have done them only periodically it does seem like I have adapted to them. I do think that they helped me a lot in getting used to running on tired legs so feel like they are a valuable part of training for marathons and beyond.

Nice double yesterday Jon. Hope you and your family are enjoying the weekend away.

nice double run! I hope you are having a good time in Okoboji. I know my aunt and her family have done some vacations/rafting? there. Have you ever been to Niobrara? That is pretty fun for a family weekend, there's the Niobrara river there of course and hiking and tubing, canoeing and all that.

Seth Harrison wrote:Nice double yesterday Jon. Hope you and your family are enjoying the weekend away.

Thanks Seth, it went very well! Got back late in the evening last night. Still is humid here, but not quite as warm.

Julie wrote:nice double run! I hope you are having a good time in Okoboji. I know my aunt and her family have done some vacations/rafting? there. Have you ever been to Niobrara? That is pretty fun for a family weekend, there's the Niobrara river there of course and hiking and tubing, canoeing and all that.

Julie, I have canoed on the Niobrara before, it is a very scenic area especially up around Valentine. The one thing I remember about it though was that weekend in June was cold. That made it not as pleasant for me at least. It was a neat experience however.



So yesterday I ended up doing 6 in the morning and 6 in the afternoon before leaving for home. It was very enjoyable to run by the lakes and in some of the wooded areas of the bike path. It was a little cooler there and slightly less humid so that made it even better!



I am planning on a step back week this week. We'll see how it goes. My goal the past several weeks was to build up some mileage and see how things held up.

I hear you on the doubles Jon. I think it's really nice to look at the mileage log for the week and see a bunch of double digit mileage days and not have worked all that hard to get them. The only real downside, for me anyway, is that whole rolling my butt out of bed early enough in the morning to get the first one in!

Awesome mileage!

The one time we went to tube at Valentine, it was the weekend before school started so about this time of year, and the high was 54! It was soooooo cold! No one wanted to tube but the teenagers did so Jim and I were the brave ones who went. We stayed pretty dry but the kids ended up getting wet. It rained a lot too....who would think it would be so cold in mid August!!!

I could see the cold weather making any river experience not so pleasant.

I hope the step back week goes well, probably good for healing up/preventing injuries before building back up again.

You are killing me with this cool weather talk! My inlaws from North Platte have been with us for the last week and a half - they have been dying in this heat, but are really looking forward to getting back home. Enjoy the week!

Hey Jon glad to read that everything is going well.

I love running doubles and like the effect I get out of them now with running on tired legs. I remember when I started them it was more of a doing a double recovery run and they were short. Now these days it isn't uncommon for me to do 12 and 8 or 12 and 12.

There is no doubt that doing those type of runs makes you a stronger runner and come into play late in a race.

How feeling about your up in coming 50 miler?

mul21 wrote:I hear you on the doubles Jon. I think it's really nice to look at the mileage log for the week and see a bunch of double digit mileage days and not have worked all that hard to get them. The only real downside, for me anyway, is that whole rolling my butt out of bed early enough in the morning to get the first one in!

Yes Jim, I'm not real big on early running either. That's why I usually run over lunch except on weekends. And I agree that once you get acclimated to a second run, it isn't that hard to get over ten in a day routinely if you don't overwork.

Peg Coover wrote:Awesome mileage!

The one time we went to tube at Valentine, it was the weekend before school started so about this time of year, and the high was 54! It was soooooo cold! No one wanted to tube but the teenagers did so Jim and I were the brave ones who went. We stayed pretty dry but the kids ended up getting wet. It rained a lot too....who would think it would be so cold in mid August!!!

That sounds almost exactly like our experience! It was June but it was cloudy and rainy with temps in the 50s. Not what we signed up for but that's what we got.

Julie wrote:I could see the cold weather making any river experience not so pleasant.

I hope the step back week goes well, probably good for healing up/preventing injuries before building back up again.

Thanks Julie! Hope your week goes well also!

John Kilpatrick wrote:You are killing me with this cool weather talk! My inlaws from North Platte have been with us for the last week and a half - they have been dying in this heat, but are really looking forward to getting back home. Enjoy the week!

John, North Platte doesn't have the humidity that we do further east in Nebraska so I can understand them having a tough time with Georgia. Yesterday was the first day since around the 4th of July that we had dewpoints in the high 50s for awhile.

Schuey wrote:Hey Jon glad to read that everything is going well.

I love running doubles and like the effect I get out of them now with running on tired legs. I remember when I started them it was more of a doing a double recovery run and they were short. Now these days it isn't uncommon for me to do 12 and 8 or 12 and 12.

There is no doubt that doing those type of runs makes you a stronger runner and come into play late in a race.

How feeling about your up in coming 50 miler?

Schuey, I hear you on the doubles. I haven't gotten to the point of doing 20 mile days during the week and probably won't but still think there is room for me to push the weekly mileage a bit more during this buildup to 50 miler. As for how I'm feeling about the 50, I think one mistake I made last fall was to have the expectation that not only would I finish, but I expected a decent (for me) time also. Probably should have primarily focused on finishing and so when I ran into trouble, that mentally did me in along with being physically challenged. Since it is a night run, I plan on doing a midnight run or two toward the end of the month or in September. I'm also going to need to eat earlier in the run than what I did last year. So we'll see where all this leads up to.



This week is a step back week, I am planning on targeting around 50 for the week. Did 6 yesterday and may do a tempo run today.

This is going to be what might be considered a “rogue” entry in my running blog. You might question why this is included in my running blog and that’s OK if you do. I would contend that this has everything to do with my running and the reasons that I train and run seemingly without end.



On the morning of August 9, 2002, Connie and I were at Okoboji in northwest Iowa. I was intending to drive home that morning and get an afternoon of work in. Noticed that there was a voice message left for me on my cell which was a bit unusual since I did not use my cell phone much at that time. Decided to listen to it before I left. It was a representative of the Nebraska Childrens Home Society who announced, “Congratulations, you have been picked by a birth mother to potentially adopt a child. And oh by the way, we would like you to contact us right away as she was born yesterday and her birth mother would like to meet with you today or tonight if possible.”



We were stunned as we had no inkling that this might be forthcoming. We had been in the program at the Nebraska Childrens Home for about two years without any major opportunities coming up. Needless to say, we packed our things and headed for home. We drove to a community about an hour from our hometown that evening and met the birth mom, the baby girl and some of her extended family. The case worker informed us that it had gone well enough that we should buy some formula, a car seat, a change of baby clothes and one package of diapers before we went home that evening. So we stumbled around a Wal Mart at 10:30 that evening, did what we were asked to do and headed home. Got home around midnight realizing that we would get up early the next morning to see if it had been finalized.



Drove in to the hospital again in the morning and by noon we were driving home with a two day old baby girl. This whole process of listening to a voice mail to driving home with a child had taken all of 28 hours total. We did not know what to do next, but we were consoled by one of the nurses who told us after showing us how to change diapers and a few other things.. “Don’t worry, she’s never been a baby before so whatever you do will be just fine.” I’ll never forget that statement. And it was humbling to realize that even though we were 45 at the time, we were as clueless on how to care for an infant as any 18 or 21 year old might be. We were even older than the baby's birth grandmother!



Fast forward to today and we are halfway through on the road to 18. Hannah turned 9 on Monday. What a true blessing she has been in our lives. We realize that there are a number of years remaining that could be challenging both for her and us. Leaving childhood behind, and getting into the tween and teenage years will unfold many challenges of the like we have not faced as parents. But we are confident that whatever may arise, that we are privileged to be parents and we cling to the hope that the examples we set for her, while far from perfect, will be something that she can look back on in her adult life and see that she was loved and cared for, even if in an imperfect manner.



We have an open adoption which is where we are able to see her birth family periodically and keep in touch. Hannah will always know where she came from, where her birth relatives live, and what her family health history is. Her birth mother was on meth during the pregnancy, and there is a lot of diabetes and addiction issues on both sides of her birth family. So we have that to help her wade through. I guess it could have been worse… she could have been Connie and my birth child.



So back to running…. One of the things I hope to teach her through running is that if you want something, you’ll need to be persistent, keep working at it, and realize that it will not be handed to you in most instances in life. I also want to instill in her that it is a very important aspect in life to stay healthy as best you can. True health is not something that you can put on cruise control and wait till something happens. It is a lifestyle. If a person thinks that waiting until a crisis in your health happens is the way to go, go visit a nursing home sometime. A lot of those people probably thought they were healthy because they didn’t have any symptoms or felt OK… until the stroke hit or the heart attack or Alzheimers began to set in. And regular exercise, however that may look in one’s life is one of the pieces of the puzzle to staying healthy.



So anyway, I hope that this was not too much of a bore to read for those of you who waded through this. Connie and Hannah are a really important part of my running to me. They travel with me just about to every race I have gone to with only a few exceptions. They have been my support team at the races and they put up with my training and the time it takes. Connie has been a great mom needless to say. Plus she has to contend with the likes of me on a daily basis. So I wanted to give them credit where it is due.



So…happy birthday Hannah!

I was reading your blog and the song Father and Daughter by Paul Simon just happened to play on the radio. Got tears in my eyes reading that - Happy Birthday indeed! You all have some story. She is lucky to have a father full of love - I don't even want to think about my son being 9 - his first 5+ have gone by so fast. Thanks for the reminder of what is really important in this world!