Back on Track

Four miles today, and everything felt pretty good in this the first week of my marathon training, and the first actual run.  The weather has turned nice and cool - Joe Pye weeds are bowing their tall heads along the roads, and everything is beginning to have that mature musky fragrance of early Fall,

And the light is so beautiful, too.  Last night Martha and I walked down the road and the sky had this peach-colored, pastel color to it that seemed to illuminate the entire world in an otherworldly kind of light.  And there was a cool breeze!  Have we actually turned the corner on all that rain, and all that warm weather?

 All along my route, people were out walking and enjoying the morning.  As I approached the corner where my Mom used to live, near Satulah Ridge, a couple walking a little black dog told me they had just seen a Mama Bear and her two cubs.  Sure enough, another car was stopped in the road, the window down and a mobile phone taking photos, and a little cub scampered across a driveway less than 50 feet away.  No Mama in sight, and I was glad.  They are unpredictable creatures, after all, and they can run a lot faster than I can.  Especially today.

Mt. LeConte

My marathon training plan kicked off this week with a planned four mile easy run on Monday and six miles of hills today.  I missed both of these workouts.  But only a fool would not consider Sunday's 10-mile hike to the summit of Mt. LeConte a good replacement for those workouts, the adequacy of which can be felt even today in sore muscles.  Muscles are supposed to feel this way after that kind of workout, though - climbing from 3800 to 6500 in elevation - and it is a good, healthy feeling as they go through the process of repairing and getting stronger, not unlike having run a hard race.

There is always a benefit to be gained in good cross-training, and Sunday's glorious hike - on the most perfect day I remember for climbing this mountain - was no exception.  This was my 27th climb to the top - just me and Martha (who is in GREAT shape) this time - and I hope it will not be my last. 

New Beginnings

It has been some time since I posted an entry to this blog, but with Fall on the way and a possible marathon on the horizon, I thought it would be instructive (for me at least, if not for the slim handful of friends who are followers of this intermittent blog) to begin again. 

Yes, there has been a touch of Fall in the air! - those cool temperatures a harbinger of good training days ahead, if only I can shake these annoying injuries of the past two weeks.  I had planned to run the Twilight 5-K in Highlands Saturday night and would have, despite the rain, except for an IT Band issue that seems to be more than just the usual niggle.  And then Friday I apparently stepped on a dead or dying bee while walking barefoot at home.  (Do they die lying on their backs, stinger pointed upward, just for the opportunity of that last dying blow?)   I thought they had all been killed last month when in desperation I fogged the upstairs bedroom with poison (after getting in bed one night and discovering one waiting for me there).  But this one must have survived, and hit the middle toe in my left foot, which swelled up so badly that I could barely pull on my boots.  I limped around all day Friday in increasingly excruciating pain, and Friday night found me applying ice most of the evening to reduce the swelling.  Thank God for a beesting that put the exclamation mark on my wavering decision not to run this race!

 !

Friday we are planning (weather permitting) to climb Mt. LeConte.  And next Monday, August 26, marks the beginning of yet another 16-week marathon training plan.  Once again to the summit!