Once a runner...

Well,
I am back on the streets, the trails, the roads. I've taken up running again, I'm learning that it is possible to be a runner with a family, that there are enough hours in the day for it.

I think that as a runner who's done thousands of miles that they stay with you somehow when you take a break. I took most of the fall and winter off, barely getting in 1 run a week. Probably good for my legs and joints in the long haul but horrid for my speed. But when I go out now, I feel the legs remember what to do, the form is good, the speed is not but it will come I think. While the speed and endurance thing is hard to get used to I find that the routine is still familar, the run can be enjoyable still.

I've found new routes around the neighborhood that weren't there last year, a new trail and a new street. New routes are saving me and letting me get my legs back without constant comparison to old times and courses. I'm even considering a spring marathon. If I can string together some good weeks in March with 3 runs a week with long runs of at least double digits on one of them, and then do the same in April, stretching the long run to 16-20 miles, I think I'll go for it. It won't be fast, it won't be pretty but it could be doable.

The latest test of fitness comes this weekend, the Jones Town & Country 10-miler in Amherst. Can I string together 10miles in a row? Stay tuned?

I think that once you're a runner, you're always a runner.