I've been slacking off from working out recently.  I've been doing the eliptical machine at my Tuesday/Thursday physical training session, and the occassional (when I'm not running off doing other things, like camping) Friday afternoon wallyball game.  Otherwise, I've cut out the weights, cross-training like bicycling, and almost all my strength and core training.  My excuse for the strength and core training was an impromptu sparring match with Chris on September 25th, where I walked away with what I believe were bruised ribs.  The good news is they aren't hurting much right now.  But for a while, they hurt like the dickens.  Especially when I went diving.  Something about the compression from the buoyancy compensator.

I cut out the running because the physical therapist told me to stop.  The cross-training like bicycling on the "off" days just fell away too.  But today, after doing a mess of house cleaning, picking up, decorating for Halloween and other jobs around the house (except my homework... guess that's tonight), I opted for a bike ride.

I set out to go around the runway again.  Last time I logged that at 9.83 miles, but this time I added in a short loop around the neighborhood to get it over 10, for a total of 10.15 miles.  In addition, I didn't stop pedalling, I don't think, the entire time.  I picked up the speed considerably, from 14.1 miles per hour last time to 15.8 miles per hour today.  I wrapped it up in 38:28, which felt good. 

Tomorrow morning I move away from the elliptical trainer to doing walk/slow jog/walk on the track to keep up with my physical therapy for the shins.  I should do some weights after that and get back to working out 5-7 days per week.  I certainly think I need it after the way I ate while camping this weekend.

Despite rain on Thursday and Friday, this was a great weekend for camping.  Chris and I went out to High Falls State Park on Thursday evening and set up.  It lightly rained on and off all evening, but thanks to a dining fly I borrowed from my Scout troop, we sat in a dry area, enjoying a tasty beverage or two, and watching our fire despite the precipitation.  We also enjoyed a magnificent grilled salmon dinner with sweet potatoes and steamed veggies.  Eating like kings really helps to alleviate any frustration with Mother Nature.

Unfortunately, we found out my new tent leaked, so we had large drops of water bombarding us throughout the night.  We still managed, and while a bit groggy in the morning, eggs with tortillas and salsa helped us wake up.  I tend to remember great trips based on the meals I eat, and I really enjoy cooking and eating while I'm out camping or vacationing.  Friday was a quiet day, as it continued to drizzle on and off.  We did a lot of sitting around and relaxing, and also took a short hike to the ranger station after the ranger came by and yelled at us for not having checked in yet.  We didn't have our pink "reserved" tag up, and apparently that upset the ranger.  Funny thing is, we had until 10:00 p.m. according to the instructions, and he yelled at us at 2:00 p.m.  Even stranger since he wasn't at his station the night before when we arrived at 5:00.

Jamie, Bryan and Marsha arrived about 6:30 p.m. that night.  We set to dinner early so we had some daylight left as we got things ready.  I had prepared a chili and then baked some cornbread to go with it, which made a wonderful warm dinner with the drizzle still going.  We topped it off with Russian Cherry Delight, which meant we all ate much more than we needed, but it tasted great!

Chris and I had set another tarp over the tent, which fixed the rain problem.  In addition, Marsha and Bryan just set up their mattress on a tarp underneath the dining fly and slept outside.  They got a little wet, but had a good time.  We could tell by their laughter and giggling.  To make up for them getting wet, we had pancakes and maple sausage in the morning.  I think nearly everyone fell back into a food coma, and most took short naps to allow breakfast a chance to prepare for lunch.  Jamie and Marsha each read a little bit, while Bryan and I threw some fishing lures in the water.  For the record, the water won, but we won't tell anyone that.  We would say we caught these magnificent fish, but at the very last second, the line broke, because they were much larger fish than our 4lb and 6lb line could handle.  Sure, that's the story.

The planned lunch was forgone as Bryan pulled out some MREs which gave us something to snack on, along with some reheated chili.  After lunch we opted to get out and finally do something.  The weather had let up, although it was still partly cloudy.  We left the campsite and went out to Dauset Trails Nature Center.  Chris had been mountain biking there before, and he and I stopped by on Friday as he was showing me where the trails were.  None of us had ever looked around though, so we walked the animal trail and found a real gem of a destination in middle Georgia.  I plan to take the Boy Scouts back there sometime to hike on some of the trails as we get ready to hopefully go to Double-H, a Boy Scout High Adventure Camp next summer.

We stayed at Dauset until they closed at 5:00.  They have a wonderful selection of wildlife including a bald eagle and a black bear which were great to see in a more natural setting than any zoo I have visited.  We left the center and headed back to camp.  While not everyone was hungry, the girls didn't want to wait until late to eat, so we started up a campfire and prepared dinner while playing a bit of Texas Hold 'Em at the same time.  Dinner consisted of steak, sweet potatoes (except for Bryan who had a baked potato), corn, Vidalia onions all cooked over the fire along with rolls warmed in a box oven.  It was delicious and again more than enough food.  I was accused multiple times of planning too much food, but I firmly believe that one thing you should not be while camping is hungry.  You may be cold and damp, but at least eat well!

Jamie led dessert making with banana boats and s'mores, while I drank my dessert.  We all turned in early, and were able to throw off the (ineffective - but I think I'm fixing that) rainfly and look up at the stars.  It was a beautiful night... until I head a dog and something else down in the river at 4:30 in the morning.  I don't know what it was, but it sure sounded strange.  It woke Jamie too, but no one else.  Never saw any signs of what it could have been in the end though.

Low cloud cover rolled back in sometime between 4:30 and 7:30, and it was a gray morning.  Chris went back to Dauset Trails for a few hours of biking while the rest of us at french toast, bacon and honeydew and then slowly took down camp.  We burned the last of the wood and sat around long enough to eat turkey quesadillas with Chris when he got back, before we all went home to clean up and recover.

Today has been more cleaning and recovery, since it is a federal holiday and I don't have to work.  It was a great weekend, despite the dampness, in my opinion, and the best part is Jamie and I are going camping again next weekend.  Next weekend we're joining my sister Erin and her fiancé Brody at a park up near Nashville.  I asked Jamie what she wanted to eat, and she said pancakes for breakfast and steak dinner, just like this weekend.  I guess that makes it easy, since I know what I have to buy and how to cook it all.  Hopefully next time we'll broaden our horizons some more with new variety.  I'll just keep planning until then!

So it's been quiet.  My wife and I went to Savannah last weekend for our friends' wedding.  It was terrific.  They had a beautiful ceremony in Forsyth Park with a large fountain as a background.  The weather was fantastic, with low humidity and moderate temperatures.  The ceremony was quick, and moved directly to the reception.  They had a sit-down dinner and open bar at a beautiful antebellum house.

We went out Friday and Saturday night with them.  Friday had us at Savannah Smiles dueling piano bar, which was phenomenal.  The bar was not crowded at all, but had a great time hanging out, drinking Guiness (they had it on tap!) and just enjoying the evening.  Saturday night we spent on River Street, eating at an oyster bar (I don't know how anyone was still hungry; I was still full from the sit-down dinner!) and just enjoying the beautiful evening.  Sunday we drove home early.

A good buddy of mine got back from his deployment on Sunday afternoon as well, which was great.  We had the chance to have lunch with him at Moe's, a southwest style chain.  Good food, but still heavy.  Splitting up for the afternoon until dinner, my wife and I came home and I opted to get in a run.

I was scheduled to do a 5K road race over the weekend.  There was a nice one scheduled on Tybee Island near Savannah on Saturday morning.  Only I did everything wrong to prepare for it.  I ate heavy on Friday, stayed out late drinking, and didn't have time to get enough sleep.  So instead of the race, I rolled over in bed (something I hardly ever do) and slept in.  While the run on Sunday wasn't a race, I still got out and did 3.1 miles.  But running after Moe's was not a great idea.  The run was slow, but doable.  It didn't help it was in the afternoon too, when it was warmer.

Tuesday's run was not much better.  I had a 4.5-miler on the books and got out and did it during my morning workout.  Only my shins were really bothering me.  I've tried so many things to do to help the shins but it wasn't working.  I finished the run, and then called the doctor to schedule an appointment with the phsyical therapist to work on my shins.  That's next Friday (a week from tomorrow), so I've got to figure out what to do between now and then.

This morning I'm going to bow out of the run.  I have a week of flexibility in my schedule to slide for the half marathon at the end of October.  Granted, I'm planning to maybe take more than that off.  I'm expecting the physical therapist to tell me to not run for a while.  That's going to irritate me, but I guess it's the right thing to do.  We'll see where that goes.  There will always be another half marathon.  I've managed to run the distance of a 10K during this training, so I know I can do that.  But I figure I'll just wait and see what happens.

This weekend my wife and I are going back to Savannah with our buddy who just got back from his deployment.  We're going to hit Savannah Smiles and River Street again.  There's a microbrewery on Bay Street someone was telling us about last night, so that might be in order too.  But mostly it's getting out and having a great time.

But now, I've got to get to the gym!

Today it was about 70° and just before sunrise when my group got ready to run.  We did the same out-and-back course we ran Tuesday and last week.  Today I left the hydration pack at home and just carried the Gatorade bottle, which I think made things easier.  I also ran with my shin splint guard on, and slowed the pace from Tuesday by 40 seconds.  Everything helped, because today's run was much easier.  There was still a bit of pain in the left shin, but all together not bad.  The training for the Silver Comet Half Marathon continues to go well, and I'm enjoying myself with it.  That's what matters, I guess.

Interestingly, I just read in the latest issue of Runner's World today, that blogging can help keep runners motivated.  They listed several sites to start blogging, but Mindsay was not one of them.  Funny how I have been writing about my runs recently anyway.

One of my running vices is running with my Timex Bodylink system.  It has a GPS receiver, heart rate monitor (HRM) and a watch.  The GPS and HRM transmit data to the watch, so I can monitor how fast I'm going, how far I've gone and my heart rate while I run.  It's been a phenomenal investment, and I've grown addicted to it.

Unfortunately, the GPS also eats batteries like kids eat ice cream.  I bought some Energizer rechargeable Nickle Metal Hydride batteries, and that keeps me from buying AAs all the time, but I've already found they have lost their ability to hold a charge.  Consequently, since I had two in the charger and the rest lacking charge yesterday, I threw in a regular old alkaline AA battery.  I did my warm up and turned on the GPS to let it acquire a signal and once it did, got in place to start my run.

I should say that I do a lot of my running and physical training (PT) with my military unit.  Luckily, since I'm the PT leader, I can set what we're going to do for the day.  Since Tuesday was a four-miler on my schedule, I said we'd do four miles.  It's certainly convienent.  As Mel Brooks said in History of the World: Part I, "It's good to be the king."

As we lined up to start, I looked down and the GPS signal had been lost.  Double checking the receiver, it had no power.  I wasn't about to hold up our run for some stupid technical difficulties.  Besides, I had run the course before and knew pretty approximate distances.  Since I was hoping to do a ten minute pace, I could run and figure the pace by my rough distance markers and proceed.  Off we went.

I started leading the pack and was way too fast.  Then as I realized my mistake, some of the other guys passed me, and with my brilliance, I decided to keep up with them.  We were doing about an 8:30 pace, and that should be maintainable for me.  So I kept running.

Then my HRM wasn't sending a signal.  So, I try to check it, and the strap disengages and the HRM falls loose.  Now I don't have either a heart rate to pace myself, or the GPS.  I thought it wouldn't be a problem, since I knew the course and had a stopwatch running.  Good old fashioned pacing should work.

Since neither of my gadgets was working, I took them off and stuffed them in my hyrdration pack.  I've been carrying the hydration pack since I nearly overheated on August 21st.  That was an ordeal in and of itself, as I was also carrying a small Gatorade bottle, and definately had my hands full while I kept running and tried to put things away.  It's much easier to do that while I'm hiking, I learned.

Back to running, I kept going.  I found I was at about 17:30 when I hit the halfway point.  That shocked me a bit.  It was an out-and-back run, so one of the slower runners just turned around when the lead pack got back to him.  After catching up to the slow runner, I tried to slow down.  Having someone else to help me control my speed really works well, as I also learned when riding bikes with my wife the other day.

My shins had started hurting again during the run.  Interestingly, the pain subsided but I knew it was likely going to be a problem.  I kept going, and tried to keep up a 4:30 to 5:00 half-mile pace.  That was probably too fast, since I had already gone much faster than planned. 

Long and short, I stopped running at 35:05 when I hit my finish marker.  At that point, the shins felt inflamed.  The pain shot up through me with each walking step.  I had over done it again.

I went home directly and stretched and iced my shins.  Unfortunately, they're still hurting tonight.  I've iced them again and been popping ibuprofen as has been directed by my doctor in the past.  Tomorrow I'm going to wear my shin brace, which I also forgot to do Tuesday, and try the four miles again (it is on the schedule) with the group.  This time, however, I'm going to pay closer attention to my pace and my body.  If the body tells me a bit of pain is there, I'll slow down more.  Better to do a light run rather than put myself out another week.

Lessons learned: I'm more reliant on my gadgets than I thought; I don't listen to my body very well; shin splints hurt; I don't have to impress anyone but me, and speed should not be something that impresses me.  So, tonight I shall rest and tomorrow I shall run.  Ah, how the road already calls to me.

Jamie and I just went on a nice evening bike ride.  We had shared dinner at our neighbors (everyone bring your own meat to grill, share everything else), which was fun and enjoyable.  We let dinner settle a bit and I convinced her to leave the computer behind and go on a bike ride.  After my bike was stolen the other day, Jamie's co-worker had offered to her two nearly new bicycles.  My bike was found, but Jamie had agreed to the deal, which was hard to pass up because the bikes were free.  They required air in the tires and a few adjustments, but we had two new bikes.

The men's bike is a bit small for me, and I've still got mine.  We had given away Jamie's old bike - which she bought nearly sixteen years ago - after she had not ridden it and we believed it would take more fixing it up than we wanted to spend.  Her new bike is a lady's mountain bike.  It is quite nice, actually.

Jamie took it for a spin around the neighborhood on Friday after I had fixed it up, and today we went and bought her a helmet of her own.  So, this evening I managed to convince her to go on a ride.  We took it easy, as she is still getting used to riding again.  The fitness aspect came whether we pushed ourselves or not.  Actually, it really helped having her along, since that forced me to slow down some.  I need to ride with her more often.

We made it a 7½ mile ride in the end, going from our house to the fitness center, past the stables and the two lakes, and out to a radar site before coming back towards home.  I gave her a couple of different possible routes she could do on her own in the future, which is good, and she built confidence.  I was very happy with how easily she handled the ride, both the actual mechanics as well as the distance.  The whole ride took about 45 minutes, which was terrific time well spent together.

Now, of course, I'm writing instead of spending more time with her.  Since I, at least, burned about 250 calories on the ride, I think it's time for ice cream.  Maybe we'll watch a DVD while we eat dessert.  And of course, we'll get ready for another ride tomorrow, which will be great fun!

Being Sunday, it was time for my long run of the week.  But I get ahead of myself.  Let me back up to yesterday.

Yesterday, Saturday, my wife and I had a fun pool party for Labor Day weekend.  We had some friends over (about 10 total) and grilled out and just had a good time in the sun and pool.  The only possible detrimental factor was when I threw one friend - a wonderful young lady the same age as my sister, and who really feels like a sister to me - into the pool.  Well, more that I was carrying her when another friend pushed both of us in the pool, but I was planning (or debating) to throw her in.  When we hit the water, I guess her pool towel got wrapped up around her legs and she started kicking, hitting me just above my left eye.  No big deal, just a small cut, and all is well.  She's doing well, she told my wife this morning, which is good, because that's all I was concerned with.  I'm used to getting injuries.

So, naturally after a pool party that lasts seven hours or so, a person is tired.  My wife and I slept in - which is unheard of for me - until about 8:30, getting about nine or ten hours of sleep.  We still woke up a bit groggy.  Anyway, a quick check of the weather showed a beautiful day, with the temperature around 70°F at 9:00 and topping out around 90°F this afternoon.  Still, procrastination being what it is, I didn't get out for my run until about 12:00.

As evidenced by my writing from two weeks ago, me running in the sun can be a bad thing.  Especially since I knew I was partially dehydrated from the pool party.  But I had drank some water before the run and felt pretty good.  I checked the temperature again, and it was in the mid eighties, and would be for the duration of my run.

The running training plan has me doing a six-mile run today, and figuring the pace I've been running on long runs recently, I knew that would take me about an hour.  I partially filled up my hydration pack, grabbed a bottle of diluted Gatorade, and biked to the fitness center where I'd start and end my run.

I stayed in the shade for the first two and a half miles, but then had open road for a while.  That got hot, but bearable, partially because I kept drinking fluids.  The run was good, set to the music of cicadas singing their summer song.  I was alone for most of the time, which is usually okay by me.  For some reason, most of my friends think I'm nuts to enjoy running, and to want to get out and run for six miles or so on a weekend.  I think it's fun.

My body was telling me it was hot and tired, and I had the inkling that doing six miles was not going to be easy today.  But I'm a goal-oriented guy, and running is a goal-oriented sport.  I had a goal to reach today, and I knew I was going to meet it.  I just kept putting one foot in front of the other.

I got back to the fitness center after five miles, so I pressed on, picking up my loop again, figuring I'd run another half-mile beyond, turn around and come back.  I tried to pick the areas I knew there was more shade, so it would keep me a bit cooler.  Instead, I kept going past the 5.5 mile mark, and stayed in the shade longer.  I was approaching 5.75 miles when the shade was about to run out, so I turned back and pressed on.  I met my goal of six miles, but saw I had some more shade in front of me, so I set a new goal of running until I lost my shade.  I got there, looked at my distance and saw I had just a short bit to go to make 6.2 miles, or a nice 10k run, so I set that as my new goal.  As I got to 6.2 miles, I checked my watch and found I had 6-7 seconds left to make it a full hour of running, and pressed ahead the last few seconds in the hot sun.  I ended up with an hour of running, 6.22 miles completed, and an average pace of 9:38.

When I got home and logged my run, after a stop in the fitness center to splash cool water on my face, and stretching once I got home, I found I had burned just over 800 calories.  Luckily, my lovely wife pan-grilled us some hamburgers, which really hit the spot.  I also checked my logs again and found that I just barely made today my longest run ever, topping a previous best of 6.21 miles from December 26, 2003.  While today is a new record, that run was much more beautiful, as I recall (without checking the journal) seeing a family of deer in the housing development I was running through during the early morning.  My wife and I also headed out later that day to go and visit family for Christmas, which was quite fun.

So, today is a new longest run.  In the next weeks leading up to the half-marathon at the end of October, I'm going to set new personal bests for distance.  That's exciting.  This has been exhilerating, and at the same time a much better pace and safe building of distance than other plans I have tried.  I'm loving meeting these goals and pushing my mind and body to new limits.  The distance usually helps to keep me less stressed as they give my mind time to wander and relax.  It's like a moving meditation sometimes, and I love running for that reason.