Tough week.  I’m kind of glad to see it fading in the rear view mirror.

I started out Monday with a seized-up back.  An old injury from chopping out a tree stump flared up and I could barely walk.  We’re talking little 4 inch steps, bent over, with my elbows flared out.  Then I ended up blistering my feet worse than they’ve been in years.  I think because of how awkwardly I was running with my back issue and the uneven terrain I was on.  Definitely feeling like a rookie lately.

Running can be such a humbling sport.  Just two weeks ago I was feeling light as a feather, fast, and strong.  Now I feel fat, slow, tired, and OLD.

The week took a turn for the better when I got a very thoughtful and encouraging note from a friend on Wednesday.  We are all so busy with work, family, and just living life in general.  It feels good when someone takes the time to specifically reach out and give you a boost.  Definitely need to pay that forward.

My back pain gradually diminished over the past few days, and I had a good time camping.  All set up to have a great week ahead now!

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Monday
10.4 miles

I knew from previous experience with my back issue, that even though I almost couldn’t walk at all, I could still run.  That was my theory, anyway.  The first half mile was ugly, but I started feeling better and could tell that it was going to work out so I continued on.  I think it helped it relax a little in the process.

Went up on the hogsback last night to mess around with the camera.

Unidentified Flying Pine Cone

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Tuesday
7.2 miles

Back felt about 50% better today.  Ran fairly hard and didn’t think much about it after I got going.  Still can’t walk very well, or stand up straight.  I got sloppy with tying my shoes and ran with them pretty loose over uneven terrain.  Since I was sockless and sweating a bit I ended up with some monster blisters.  Now I really look dumb when I’m trying to walk.

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Wednesday
13.3 miles

Pushed hard.  Was looking to run a strong 13.1, but cracked bad @ 11.5.  Just stopped in my tracks.  The final miles were a very slow shuffle.  I knew I was on borrowed time after mile 8, but kept after it thinking I could pull a mind-over-matter trick.  Matter won.

My wife doesn’t check the blog as far as I know, so I think I’m safe posting these here before Sunday.  I took some portraits of the kids as a surprise for Mother’s Day and sent them off to be printed and framed today.  My setup was ghetto, but the final product turned out nice.  We went out in the side yard on an overcast evening and one kid held up my Bighorn 100 blanket for the background, while another used the dull silver side of my car’s window shade as a reflector to even out the shadows on the faces.  Then we all told really bad jokes to try and get the subject to laugh.

And I’m getting this printed as a custom notebook cover:

With Katie on the inside of the cover:

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Thursday
0 miles

Too much going on to get in a run, but I did do my best TRX workout in a while.  It seems like I’ve hit a plateau, or even regressed, in my strength exercises lately.  It felt great to finally muscle through a good one for a change.

The Atomic Pushup:

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Friday
7 miles

This was the hardest easy run I have done in a long time.  I was jogging along, feeling sorry for myself and having an internal conversation about how crappy my legs felt, when someone in a wheelchair rolled across my path.  Good reminder of what a selfish dingbat I am sometimes…  Time to quit whining and run while I still can.

Spent the night at a scout camp on top of Lookout Mountain.  The Supermoon put on a spectacular display.  I was oblivious to it until I glanced over my shoulder while we were out on a mountain bike ride.  When we finished, I hopped in the car and hustled to an overlook to get some shots.

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Saturday
26.2 miles

A mojo-restoring run if there ever was one.

I got up at 5:15 and trotted off into the pre-dawn darkness.  There was a trail that went by our campsite that I had my eye on.  I ran it out to the Buffalo Bill overlook and back.  Each ‘lap’ was just under 4 miles.  I ran 7 total plus a little extra to hit the marathon.  3,500′ of climbing to keep things interesting, and an even mix of rocky technical stuff and smoother hardpack.

The sunrise was spectacular.  It almost looked like a forest fire coming through the trees.

I paused at an overlook to admire the awesome view in the beautiful morning light.

After the rough start to the week, it was so nice to be running trails in the mountains with the forest all to myself for a while.

About halfway through my run, I started noticing strange footprints in the dirt.  Hmmm, I know someone that leaves tracks like that…

Malcolm was up and out for a lap on the trail, too.  The nut doesn’t fall far from the tree.

I tried to maintain a steady/even effort from start to finish, and think I succeeded pretty well.  The 7th trip up the climb hurt me, but I averaged a 9:55 pace and a 151 heart rate overall.  My blistered feet made things mighty uncomfortable for a spell, slowing me down a bit, but I was having too good of time to let that get me down.

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Sunday

OFF

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Total:  64.1 miles / 9:59