Things are Scary...Being it's Halloween and All!

My girls are looking a bit scary...or at least Emily is. It must be that ninth grade attitude showing through!

This has been a crazy scary week of running and with it being Halloween this week has been filled with thrills. I can't figure it out but it has been the most fantastically bizarre running week in my memory. I usually run the same 8 mile or so loop every day. Very rarely do I deviate from the path unless I add some extra loops to it. Anyhow I previously mentioned how on Saturday I ran a minute faster than my fastest time of the year. Then Sunday I ran a minute and 10 seconds faster than that. These were the two easiest runs of the year for me. My hips are all of a sudden loosening up and my legs are swinging free.

Monday I slowed the pace down but it was my 3rd fasted run of the year with only the previous two days being faster. Then Tuesday I slowed down a bit more but it was still my fifth fastest time this year. Still I was feeling great and loving it. I did not run the next two days because of meetings and school work and today I laced up the shoes again. Wow, a little rest sure helps! I ran another two minutes and a few seconds faster than my best time of the week. Now I am down to times I haven't run on this route for many years. Scarily, they are still easy free floating runs. I haven't had a streak of feeling this good for a very long time. The tightness connecting my legs to my hips and all around is disappearing. It is still far from perfect but wow, what an improvement!

I think my sudden improvement has to do with the resistance stretching, and doing the Ming Method releases for the hamstings, quads ands ITB bands is the kicker that has allowed things to happen much more quickly. That is all I can figure because this has been so dramatic. I may just be finding the perfect mix of things that I need to do to get my body working correctly again.

It sure is a great way to finish off a really hard and disappointing year of running by having such good results (even if only on training runs). But it is not the times that are remarkable, it is how loose and easy my legs and hips feel and the additional movement I have that is what is really thrilling. For most of the year and previous years I didn't think I would ever feel this good again. Even if for only one week, it is great to be feeling like a youthful runner again! I guess for at least one week I can say I have "recovered my stride". It does give me hope that I can run well and easy again particularly as in a couple of months I will hit 50 years old!

I found a few photos I haven't seen before on my wife's camera. All my kids were active in sports this Fall and it was fun to cheer them on in all their athletic endevours.

Here is my son, Andy in his last high school cross-country race a couple of weeks ago.

The next day Hannah ran in the City of Nashua's 3rd graders x-country race.

Emily decided to play field hockey this year and enjoyed being on that team.