I’d like to say I haven’t posted in several weeks because the end of the semester was busy. Which it was, of course, but the more proximate cause was actually insomnia. I normally have a couple weeks of insomnia every spring (because spring is the worst), but this year a couple weeks stretched into a couple months and thus, the internet silence over here.
Last week I finally started sleeping soundly for multiple nights in a row, so fingers crossed that that continues. I’ve been consistently running 10-15 miles a week, which was not where I wanted to be by now, but was about as much as I had energy for between the insomnia and other responsibilities. A brief recap in pictures:
Took advantage of spring snow showers
My easy pace has somehow been getting faster, despite the low-ish mileage. I guess consistency pays off?
Ran this road a handful of times while it was closed to vehicles.
Swept a trail race.
Failed to convince Kara that the ducks don’t want to be her friends.
Survived one run in Texas.
Made it 2/3 of the way to Mt. Baldy before the snowfields stopped me…
…a trail I’ll be seeing a lot more of between now and August, since it’s part of the course for this race:
The Ridge Run is 19.6 miles of technical, often steep trails. My only goal is to make the aid station cutoff times, which translates to finishing in around 8 hours. So…the training begins now.
Do you have any big summer race plans?
Lovely to see you back and how cool to get the roads to yourself when they were closed to traffic! And good luck on your technical trail!
I have a marathon this coming weekend then my 31 mile ultra on 14 July, with a 10-mile trail race to work me in / terrify me in mid-June. Quite a lot of racing for me, actually!
Glad the insomnia has retreated, horrible!
I remember your ultra, but didn’t realize it was coming up that soon! Good call getting in a shorter trail race first, but I’m sure you’ll be fine for both.
I am so sorry about the insomnia. Most of the time I actually do sleep well, but I almost always have a day or two (sometimes more) when I don’t — I’ve been going through a string of them lately. Never fun.
My mileage is also quite low, I’ve been sick a couple of times in the past couple of months (ok now, knock on wood). Luckily, though, I don’t have any big plans in the near future so it’s no big deal. Just trying to keep that base.
I’m laughing at your caption of the TX run. We lived in Austin 17 years — which is not anywhere near as humid as the coast, but it forever changed the way I view humidity. People here often complain when it’s not that bad, but that’s just because it’s all relative.
The weather where my parents live is probably similar to Austin – but it was either storming or about to storm the whole time we were there, so, very humid.
That race looks so amazing! How will you train for it?
I’m well acquainted with insomnia, unfortunately!
My training plan is a work in progress! I’ll probably do a post about it once I have a better idea how I want to approach it.
I’m so sorry to hear about your insomnia. I can’t imagine how difficult is must be to deal with that. You mentioned that it happens every Spring – do you think it’s the change in seasons that causes it? I am not the best sleeper, but at the end of last year I got a weighted blanket for Christmas and it’s been very helpful.
I think the season is definitely it – it’s never lasted (almost) all spring before though. I’ve thought about trying a weighted blanket, but I’m such a hot sleeper I’m not sure how that would work for me.