Blogging through the cold

It has been an extremely cold week here. We had ice on Monday evening and Tuesday. I had to travel to Memphis Monday morning for a meeting. The original plan was to spend the night but after watching the weather deteriorate, I decided to high tail it home after we had an early dinner. It was 36 degrees and a light mist when I left Memphis. Before I made it 30 miles into Arkansas, the temperature had dropped to 30 degrees. Can you say major pucker factor when you cross bridges! Actually, never encountered any slick spots for a long ways. I was worried about the White River Bridge on I40 but it was clear as a bell. Between there and Lonoke though things started to change. Just before Lonoke the temp had dropped to 28 degrees. The first bridge west of Lonoke was icy and had a bad wreck off on the side. I had my fire radio on so I heard South Bend getting paged out for another accident on I40 between the 169 and 170 mile marker. I looked where I was and I figured it would be about Remington. Sure enough, it was just west of Remington so I managed to get off the exit with no problem. Still one bridge on 89 to cross before home. When I got to it traffic was stopped and I guess the police were turning people around so I turned around and came back to Cabot via Kerr Road. No problems after that but it was a stressful drive home for sure.

Tuesday was pretty bad in some places but didn't really affect me any. It was suppose to get worse on Tuesday night but that never materialized here. The northern part of the state got it bad though with a lot of ice and power outages. We missed the bullet here!

Wednesday night I ran 4 miles on the treadmill. It was actually a pretty good run. Just an easy get it done run in 42:00. Average pace 10:30. If it was cold on the treadmill it would be easier but mine is upstairs and it always seems to be too warm for me even with a fan. But that's ok, it makes me sweat which is good.

Tonight I did a little speed work for the first time in a long time. I wanted to see if I could do a timed mile on the treadmill. Started with a 1 mile warm up and then went into the timed mile. Well, it's kind of hard to really do a timed mile on a treadmill. All you can do is start out at a pace you think is moderately hard and then increase. Pretty much what I did. Could have been faster but I didn't really have a clue as it's been so long since I really ran fast. Timed mile ended up being a 9:15 and I know I could have done better. I at least have a number to start basing a little speed work off of. I also wanted to get a feel of what my 5k time could be. This is a start and I think I am going to try one tempo or LT pace run once a week. I am just going to try to stay away from the repetition pace as that's where I get hurt most of the time.

Oh yeah, Annette and Bailey are headed to Huntington Beach, California this weekend to run the Surf City Marathon. It will be Annette's 4th marathon in less than a year. I think she will also qualify as a "Marathon Maniac" since this will be three marathons in a 3 months time period. I had plans of doing the same back in the summer but injuries forced me out. In fact, I doubt I will do another marathon until fall, but that's subject to change. Right now work is too stressful to get the needed training and have the right frame of mind that I need. Going to work on the shorter distances and improving my 1/2 marathon times without getting injured. That's the main goal. Stay healthy!

Good luck this weekend Annette and Bailey!