It's Been a Long Time Since I Rock 'n Rolled

It's been a long time since my last race. In fact on Saturday it will be 244 days since I "broke the tape" as my AG winner at the Rock 'n Roll Half Marathon.  After taking a few weeks off thereafter, I realized that the major leg soreness and general fatigue from constant training would take more than just a few weeks to recover from. So, I pretty much stopped running in August, September and October and my only exercise was walking the pups and maybe an occasional visit to the gym (hence my absence from here). It's funny that once I started to cut out the miles, I was able to sleep longer and feel less fatigued all day. Did running mega miles cause me to sleep less? Who knows, but eventually the soreness went away too.

I started up gradually in November and December - only running occasionally and keeping my runs between 2 to 5 miles. Currently, I'm running about the same low number of daily miles, but since January, I'm back to running seven days a week. In order to stay limber and strong I am going to the gym every other day, and yoga once a week. So here's hoping that should help keep me on the roads and out of PT.

A few weeks ago at an MRC run, Mo told me about the Shamrock Mile which would take place the day before the Shuffle. So, naturally once I got home I looked it up and figured I could at least race a mile. So, I signed up and threw down the Mile as the marker for my racing "comeback". Then a couple of weeks later, I decided to throw in for the Shuffle as well and contacted Xaarlin and she put me on the MRC Shamrock team.

Anyway, I am pumped for this weekend, although once the course map came out, I had a complaint about a the number of sharp turns in this one mile race! Since there is nothing I can do about it,  I will just try and put forth a decent race and try and hold a nice even-paced effort.

2019 Shamrock Mile Course

So, it looks like I'm back at it and ready to rock. Maybe not as fast as in the past, but I'm looking forward to still competing and seeing where lower mileage, while staying fresher and healthier leads me.