i dropped my damn keys somewhere, so had to double-back to look for them, never did find them. it was too hot to be running, but i did ok. same pace as Thursday's 4-miler, so that seems good. i made my own electrolyte drink that i carried with me. did it help? i'll just assume it did, with the oj in it & sugar/salt. i'll just assume it did.

i think i'm going to switch to alternate day running. i'll aim for one long run each weekend, similar to what the Higdon plan has. but since i don't have weekends, as such, i can wait til Monday to run 13 miles. no reason to do it tomorrow. i'll just build my own plan to develop the miles and get in the 20-miler, or 2, by14th or 15th week.

ugh. horrible. had to walk almost half. not sure if it was a carb-heavy breakfast, 4 cups of tea & 2 of coffee, fatigue or what. just could not get my breathing easy (still isn't). from Chavez/Clinton back, i ran ok, however. i have no idea what was missing. electrolytes? protein? just one of those days?

i read that an ice bath after running (for the legs) is very healing. i didn't do ice, but i ran a cold tub & sat in that. it hurt initially, of course, but then felt good. i will definitely do after long runs. some ice baths just for my feet would be a good idea, too.

i think maybe the 5-1/2 hrs of sleep might be my big problem. gotta start getting to bed early.

3 miles now seems so short. nothing like doing a couple of 9-milers and having a 12 coming up this weekend. i probably ran a bit harder than i should have; tomorrow i do a 6, and i'll definitely take that easy. i have to remember that my biggest danger is over-doing it and getting a stress injury. i have over 300 miles of training left before the marathon and my shortest "big" training run from here on is 10 miles. these midweek runs are supposed to be gentle.

i sunburned the tops of my feet badly on Sunday watching the World Cup final in Pioneer Courthouse Square. yes, i did. so it took until today to recover enough to run. which means i missed my 10-miler on Sunday (or even doing it Monday). today was a good enough run, given that i'd missed several days.

2 laps around the neighborhood, was able to push a bit more today. a few times got into a nice groove. this is my 6th week, and my body is finally getting into running condition. not going to push it, but it does feel good.

9:30pm - rode my bike back from Mult Dems picnic in Gresham: 11 miles. downhill most of the way, but one long hill in Gresham & then another, not as big, around Mount Tabor. the running & riding are paying off: i got up both without killing myself, just a basic amount of work. and given the heat was still in the 80s, it was a good ride. i'm getting in better shape. it's great!

forgot to check distance before i left - assumed it was 4 miles. realized about 1/2 mile out that it was probably 5 miles. i had to guess at a route & i ended up guessing about .2 miles too short. d'oh.

still slow. clearly the effort of 9 miles gook a bit of a toll. but the good thing is i was able to run fairly easily for the full hour. Saturday's 10-miler will be interesting; i'll probably need to go early to avoid the heat. it will the longest i've ever run in my life. whee?

slow, plodding - just like Higdon said. Saturday's run took a lot out of me, and the 2 parades probably didn't help much! then not doing anything yesterday: big mistake. an easy long bike ride would have been a good idea. but i did the 3 miles (a local loop, run twice, avoiding Chavez & Division).

according to Higdon, i'm doing great: i'm a marathoner!

ow. 9 miles is a long way to run. last time i did that, a 15k, was over 20 years ago, and i trained several months for that. i've only been running a month now. the hard part was on my legs & feet. plus i discovered if you go east past 50th, you start heading quite a bit uphill. that made it tough. i ran the route clockwise, so i did most of the uphill from the river to 58th in the middle of the run, not at the end. but i wish i had picked a route that skipped the hard uphill.

right now my knees and feet hurt quite a bit, but i did walk in the parade in Hillsboro this morning, too. we'll see how i am tomorrow. i'm going to bike a bit today; that will help. tomorrow is the Monmouth parade, so my cross-training day will be Monday, since i have to bike up to the Q Center anyway.

pace just under 13/mile. i'm pretty happy with that for now. if it's the same next week, with a 10-miler, i know i'll be on track for the marathon.