FEBRUARY 2024 Monthly Running Challenge

SummerSkier · February 3

Sat done and dusted. A really slow 4 miler but glad I got out. Yesterday I avoided a skunk who decided to cross in front of me . whew. no phew. Today the sky was really interesting alternating between low fog and small almost rainbows and it was impossible to know if it was going to rain or be hot and sunny.

Work has been incredibly busy with a new account but I am enjoying it right now and a new boss is coming in May from our CA factory who seems a LOT better than my current one who I am barely surviving with so a nice change. I could retire if things got stressful but since I am not burning with desire to go traveling or other adventures I am happy to continue working. I was a bit bored for almost a year and thought I might be just winding down until this opportunity came along.

@chris_in_cal I have seen you struggle the past few years. I think if you wanted to try another approach thru some medication under a Drs supervision that sounds reasonable. I think we all need to use ALL the tools in the tool box.

@quilteryoyo what a long sad journey you have had with your cousin. I am sorry for your loss and applaud what an excellent caretaker you have been over the years for him.

Scott6255 · February 3

Nice run @martaindale!

Felt like I was running an obstacle course with all dodging of puddles. Glad I ran in old retired shoes. Even so, tied my fastest 10 mile run. Anxiously waiting for my new shoe(s) delivery. 😄

polskagirl01 · February 3

shanaber wrote: »

I will catch up on posts later but wanted to share this article about Matt Fitzgerald. I had no idea he had long Covid and was no longer able to run. Made me think of @polskagirl01!
It is a gift article so you all should be able to access without hitting a paywall.

Great article, and a good picture of some of the struggles endurance athletes have with this illness. I did find the ending, where he's signing up for Javelina 100, to be a bit dark though. I'm not sure even the writer realized it - it may take someone who knows what consequences doing that race could have for him. I had heard him talk about his illness a while back on Marathon Training Academy podcast, and started following him on social media, but then he only posted about his books, so I wasn't sure if he was in remission/recovered or what. Unfortunately not.

BTW guinea pigs, long and not running-related:

The kids would LOVE to have more guinea pigs. I would not. No room for more cages, and I don't think the adult males would be happy with new housemates, LOL. I did offer to let either of the males visit the neighbor's piggy-girl if they wanted babies. They decided to go with the more predictable option of purchasing a second female. I see videos of big herds of guinea pigs doing fine together, but they must be spayed/neutered or selling a LOT of babies.
The kids are much better now at independently cleaning cages weekly, and we've moved them out of bedrooms and into a spot in the basement, so that helps with the bedding mess. But still. No more babies, please!

Making a salad in Dad's workshop (while he's away)

Watching out the window for the kids to come back. Tim was being so naughty, I gave up and took individual pictures 😆
Tim, Mack (dad)

Summer and Katey (mom)

When Tim & Summer were born, there was also tiny Meg, but she only lived 11 days. She did manage to get her pilot's license (in a Lego plane) and got lots of cuddles and love from all the neighborhood kids during that time. They're born with their fur, eyes open, and ready to run. So cute.

Kids are back from camp. I managed driving to and from the pick-up spot, standing around waiting, and then got home and went for a walk up to the field to be nosy about why the police and fire department were rushing towards the prison that's visible from there. Couldn't see anything. Husband is out of town, so I'm on my own with the kids on winter break for another week. It's not very wintery out though. If this keeps up, we'll have an early Spring!

polskagirl01 · February 3

@quilteryoyo so sorry for your loss. Sending hugs and prayers for your family.

daria0919 · February 3

@quilteryoyo so very sorry to hear of your cousin’s passing. I’m glad you listened to your body and didn’t push to get more mileage in.

Great run @Scott6255! Same to you @martaindale!

Thanks for sharing more about the guinea pigs @polskagirl01.

Walked 3 miles with the hubby this afternoon, then did another 1.5 miles a bit later by myself. Wanted to get at least 4 in today.

shanaber · February 4

So many great runs and nice long runs and rain runs today!

Welcome back @TheMrWobbly! Aren't you in the London area? That is were @tarun_yadavA is from as well.
@chris_in_cal - I listen to the Sanjay Gupta podcast, Chasing Life, on occasion and he recently had one about the new weight loss drugs that are really old diabetes drugs. You might want to take a listen. They talk about how they work, the efficacy and longterm implications. Here's the link if you want it. I am sure you can find it on Spotify or other platforms but this one is just on the web.
@quilteryoyo - I hope your HR recovers from all the stress and gets back into your normal range.
@martaindale - glad you were able to have a little quiet time to yourself today.
@polskagirl01 - my daughter adopted (bought) a guinea pig from our local pet store only to find out about a week later that she was pregnant and we were now the proud owners of 6 guinea pigs, instead of one! Our Lakeland Terrier at the time was fascinated by them. I was worried he would hurt them but he treated them like his babies and moved them gently from place to place and they would climb all over him. Fortunately we were able to find them all homes. I was trying to find a picture of him with them but so far haven't located one. I know it is somewhere.

I did a run/walk yesterday for 3.44miles and managed to get the run intervals to 11.5-12mm. It felt great but today my body and legs were tired. I got Hobbes out for a 2.3mile neighborhood walk, trying to take advantage off the weather before the super storm hits tomorrow afternoon. We are expected to get up to 9 inches of rain from Sunday night to Tuesday morning. I saw on the NOAA site today that the river we live by (where I normally run) is normally at about 1.5 feet high and is expected to hit 11.5 feet! I mostly hate that the river is channeled but right now I am very thankful for that channel!

chris_in_cal · February 4

shanaber wrote: »

We are expected to get up to 9 inches of rain from Sunday night to Tuesday morning. I

C'mon don't exaggerate it's only going to be 8.5 inches! Stay safe.... lots of mud and lots of water are coming. Thanks for the link, I'll take a look.

PrestonHaywood · February 4

Starting my running journey! I did this years ago with prayer jogs every morning and lost a ton of weight! Looking forward to starting and being here!

How do you all keep track of miles?

polskagirl01 · February 4

Is the new member request in the Strava group (initials J.K.) someone here with us?

@shanaber FROM THE PET STORE?!? That's a bit irresponsible on their part. But probably a ton of fun for the kid 😊

tarun_yadavA · February 4

Morning all.

Got in a 10K. Ran first 2.2M (of 6.24M) with 9yr old. 10"00 pace overall.

@shanaber well done on 3.44!
Im in London; and @TheMrWobbly is on the South coast. About a 2+ HR drive away.

Always up for meeting anyone here for an IRL run!
I'm gonna go FL and NJ later this year, to see bestie and first cuz.
CA peeps at some point could work as brother is there.

Happy Sunday everyone!

Laurz9191 · February 4

@quilteryoyo I’m so sorry to hear about Gary. You really took care of him during this hard time. He was very lucky to have you in his life!

Laurz9191 · February 4

Today I did a test run of my second pair of shoes - brooks ghosts with goretex. It rained yesterday, so I had lots of puddles and mud to see if my toes really would stay dry. They did. I think these will be my wet weather shoes from now on.

I took the last 2 days off and went on an easy 10km run this morning. So far 20.3/200km for February

.

Shoes in the spoiler

.

Teresa502 · February 4

Yesterday, I got in 3 5Ks (one at 9:00 am, one at 10:00 am and one at 1:00 pm). I had planned to do 4 but other people had plans for my day also and it didn't exactly go as planned. All good. Sometimes you just have to roll with it.

@quilteryoyo - So sorry to hear about Gary's passing. He was so blessed to have you step in and help take care of his needs a couple of years ago and I'm sure his life was better for it. Sending you a big hug.

Thanks for the article @shanaber. I guess even the greats aren't invincible against COVID.

daria0919 · February 4

1.55 mile walk with hubby.

polskagirl01 · February 4

Today I ran out of energy halfway through deep cleaning the kitchen. Tried to pace myself and do what I could sitting down. Finished all but the fridge, and will do that tomorrow while cooking. Meanwhile kids were supposed to be cleaning their rooms, but 3 hours later I can't even tell what they were doing. I have a list of cleaning I hoped to finish with them tomorrow so we could all chill for the rest of winter break... this is gonna take forever. I guess this is a normal young-teenager thing, but I wish I could convey to them the power of just doing the job and moving on with your life 😆

Unfortunately all of the sirens yesterday were going back to the ponds where I used to run (where the super-muddy path and swans are).

A man fell through the ice and got trapped underneath, sadly did not survive. It hasn't been below freezing for quite some time, so I have no idea what he was thinking going out there. I've seen people ice fishing at those ponds, but never in this weather. From pictures, it doesn't look like they had much trouble breaking ice to get the rescue boat and divers to the spot. People sure can come up with stupid ways to die.

I miss running so much. Not even just the running, but also the places I enjoyed being in, watching places change with the seasons, being able to go out and move, think through things... ok. Enough moaning!

emmamcgarity · February 4

Hi everyone. Thank you all for the warm welcome back to running.

@quilteryoyo I’m so sorry to hear of your loss. My prayers are with you.

@chris_in_cal It sounds like you have some concerns and reluctance about the medication. I’d encourage you to spend some time journaling your concerns and researching the side effects etc. Then schedule another visit with your doctor to review the risks of medication vs. your current plan. My brother-in-law is diabetic and is on one of the weight loss medications with great success. But as I understood his explanation, there was something related to the diabetes that the medication addressed aside from weight loss. He is now a healthy BMI but is advised by his doctor to continue the medication. I’m hopeful that you’ll find the answers that are right for you.

So, I finally went out last night for a run after taking six months off and just continuing walking. It felt good. I did 5 minute walk run intervals at an easy pace just to see how it played out. It felt good, and I felt stronger than expected. I managed a little over 2 miles. I think I’ll stick with these intervals the next few times to make sure I don’t do too much too fast.

chris_in_cal · February 4

PrestonHaywood wrote: »

How do you all keep track of miles?

Some electronic dodad.

I have:
$20 - Fitbit
$250 - Android phone
$400 - Garmin

Any one of them will do an adequate job of tracking distance. I do not carry my phone with me, I usually have my Garmin watch strapped on.

Any one of these will also sync with MFP so the milage is magically uploaded here for tracking.

yirara · February 4

01.02 6.5km 51min 7:50/km Goal pace repeats
02.02 6.4km 52min 8:08/km slow
04.02 6.5km 51min 7:58/km slow

19.40km/103km, 5.2km ahead

Lungs were still acting up yesterday. Decided to use steroids and quickly felt better. Went running again today, and had a fab run! I guess I should always run on prednisone 😬😅

chris_in_cal · February 4

chris_in_cal wrote: »

2.7 lbs. December weight loss (247.5 lbs -> 244.8 lbs)

Oops, that was my January loss.

chris_in_cal · February 4

I was bamboozled, the weatherman said rain last night and then hard rain for the next couple of days.

I was planning this morning for my first treadmill run in years. When I woke I tried to hear the rain on the roof, and nothing. I opened the draperies and was greeted with clear blue skies, a light breeze, and 60 degree temps. Nice.

February Running Goal: 13 runs,40 miles

Feb 2 -2.87 miles
Feb 4 -3.48 miles

Current: 2 runs, 6.35 miles

shanaber · February 4

@chris_in_cal - awesome that you had blue skies and nice temps! Cloudy, windy and chilly up this way. We did have rain overnight but none this morning. Supposed to start around 3pm and rain for 3-4 days...

kgirlhart · February 4

February Goal: 130 Miles

2/1: 6.02 miles
2/2: 3.25 miles
2/4: 11.11 miles

20.38/130 miles completed for February

It was chillier than I expected this morning and overcast. I was worried that the run would suck, but it was actually a pretty good run and I ran11 miles. I wore shorts and a t-shirt with sleeves and some fingerless compression gloves. I was dressed just right. I did take the sleeves off about 7 miles into the run, but I was definitely glad I started out in them.

kgirlhart · February 4

Thanks for sharing the article on Matt Fitzgerald @shanaber. I had no idea he had long covid

quilteryoyo · February 5

1 Feb - Walked 1.00 miles - Ran 2.00 miles - treadmill intervals
2 Feb - Walked 1.00 miles - Ran 0.00 miles - treadmill
3 Feb - Walked 1.00 miles - Ran 0.00 miles - driveway laps
4 Feb - Walked 2.00 miles - Ran 0.00 miles - driveway laps wun

7.00/85.00 miles

I went out for a driveway wun (very little running again) this afternoon. My HR was a little higher than normal, but much better than yesterday. I did 2 miles in 30:06 min. Avg Hr was 126 with a max of 140 bpm. The max was about 7 min into the wun and then it settled down.

I think a lot of the HR could be because of my sleeping, or lack there of. On Friday night, my Garmin sleep score was only 37, partly because my avg stress overnight was 32. Last night, my sleep score was 64 with an avg stress of 18. I'm going to pay more attention to all of that, just to see if it does correlate. It sure did this weekend.

quilteryoyo · February 5

Thank you @SummerSkier . I'm glad you are enjoying your work again.

You are getting so fast @Scott6255 !

@polskagirl01 Love the Guinea pig pictures/info.

Thanks @daria0919 . Love that you had a nice walk with your husband.

You are doing great @shanaber . It really sounds like you are enjoying your runs/walks. I hope you aren't affected by all the rains out there. You either @chris_in_cal . The news looked bad today.

Welcome @PrestonHaywood . You have found a wonderfully supportive group here. I use a Garmin watch.

Thank you @Laurz9191 . Love the shoe porn. Great running.

Thanks @Teresa502 . You are doing great getting ready for your race. I know what it is like to have life get in the way, but it is what it is.

@polskagirl01 I am still inspired by all you do get accomplished. I tend to be like your early teenagers and keep putting stuff off. I am a horrible procrastinator. I try, but I often fail too.

It is sad about the accident.

Thanks @emmamcgarity . Sounds like you have a great plan for getting back into running and glad it felt good today.

Glad you had a nice run @yirara . I hope your lungs get better and you don't have to continue using steroids.

Glad you had such a great run @kgirlhart .

@chris_in_cal I'm glad you had good weather today. I hope the rain they are calling for stays away, but I saw where some of CA got high winds and rains.

tarun_yadavA · February 5

Morning all
Got in 4.36M(7K) at 09'30

@Teresa502 well done on those series of 5Ks

Laurz9191 · February 5

Hello everyone,

We have high winds expected all week (fun fun), so I figured it didn't matter which day I decided to try to run a speedy(ier) workout. I opted to get it done today. The first half was fine (tailwind), the second half was interesting. There was such a cross wind that I felt that I was running in slow motion and trying not to veer off to the left. In between gusts I was able to increase the speed a bit. In any case, I wasn't blown away and ran 10.3km to start off the week.

30.6/200km for February.

eleanorhawkins · February 5

Wow, I'm so far behind it's crazy. Tried to speed read but so tired most isn't registering. Having said that, @quilteryoyo so sorry to hear about Gary.

I ran my Backyard ultra on Saturday. It wasn't my day but I learned a lot and decided to stop at 7 loops rather than risk wearing myself out or ending up injured. Pro-tip everyone probably knows but I forgot... don't eat a tonne of roast veggies and chickpeas the day before a race. My watch claims I did 51km but it was really only 47 - 150 people inside a sports hall once an hour upset all our watches.
We still won a prize though, so that was cool.

Mari33a · February 5

@quilteryoyo - Sorry for your loss.

Teresa502 · February 5

I ran 5 miles this morning with a friend. The temp wasn't bad at 34F.

Congratulations on your backyard ultra @eleanorhawkins! The real question - would you do it again (minus the roasted veggies and chickpeas the day prior)?

@polksagirl01 - I too am enjoying the adventures of the guinea pigs. So tragic about the man who drowned. What a horrifying way to go.

Welcome @PrestonHaywood! I also use a Garmin watch to track my running and walking activities.

FEBRUARY 2024 Monthly Running Challenge

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