Blur o' Pope

First off: Come on Sandi!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! We're all behind you! It may seem hard now, but you'll be able to grind through it and it WILL get easier!


Two things about Sunday's long run:

1) I felt great. I was concerned after drinking most of a bottle of white wine the night before while staying up late entrenched in a massive cribbage game/card tournament of attrition with Tessa. But when I woke up, I felt good. Super good.

This good:

Distance: 8 Miles
Time: 1 hour 1 minute 23 Seconds
Average Time: Can't say. The flex capacitor kicked in again, and I finished the run in 1955, effectively melting my watch. But I did get to help my dad meet my mom. So I had that going for me.

Seriously, the speed work has been working for this guy. But, in the interest of full disclosure, I only started hitting the track last week. Until then, I had been employing 30 Pack's genius method of counting telephone poles...Basically, I would pick a landmark during my run and sprint to it, then slow down until I found something else to sprint to. The next run, I would sprint to a landmark a little bit further than that...and so on. It was the best method of medium scale, unprofessional fartlekking I could muster. But it seems to be effective.

We've been developing a more scenic running route since a huge portion of the run was on not-so-pretty university property that has, in the last few weeks, turned into a giant bog of mud that probably houses rodents of unusual size. I think we have settled on one that takes us straight to the city's green belt via a residential canal system. It's absolutely gorgeous, and slightly downhill the whole way home. Which basically ensures negative splits. Which allows me to pretend I'm in better shape than I really am...
Anyway, we exploited the new path for this long distance run, and I really think that the right environment can contribute so much to a good performance. Running can suck sometimes; there might as well be something pretty to look at (and running with a mirror is so damn unwieldy).

I'll post something from MapIt as soon as I sort out the best way to do so.

2) The weather never turned too cold over the Winter (I'm so sorry I'm writing this, Forest, you can kick me really hard later). I was convinced I would have to join a gym before we moved here but, after bundling up, we never missed a run because of the cold. In the last week, it has really turned Spring-like though, and Sunday was the first "perfect" day for running of the year. The sun was warm, but it was still cool enough that you didn't overheat after a few miles. A lot of trees are trying to turn green again, while daffodils and little flowers that Tessa calls "Daisies" are growing all over the place. In fact, the weather was so great that half of Cologne decided to run as well. We were so impressed with the amount of people running that we, um, actually counted them and decided to make a game of it:

Game of it: Guess how many runners Dayton and Tessa counted over the course of their 8 miler! Post your guess in the comments box, and the person who is closest will receive a special "Drunk Runners Germany" surprise in their mailbox! (after the requisite time it takes for a small package to reach America from Germany.)

The contest ends Sunday, and no members of Drunk Runners Germany may enter. Either of them.