Reflections (on a year)

It’s been about a year since I started reflecting on my running in blogger-ville. How much can change for a runner in a year? We ALL know the answer: A LOT. Here are some of my favorite changes.

 1. Getting faster. Duh, of course this is fun. Chopped about a minute off my 5k PR. Win.

A 5k PR moment

     2. The Oiselle Mesh tank. I can’t get enough of this thing. Every time I wear it I feel fast, sleek, and stylish without fail. It also got my through the Southern summer weather, which is quite a feat!

Just a regular run...and sweaty as can be.

    3.  Running more volume and more days.  Post-Boston Marathon, I decided to make the change from running 5 days a week to 6-7. I love it and my body is handling it quite well since I started paying attention to the word “easy” in the phrase “easy run”.

    4. Inspiration a la Eugene X2!

The Pre-Classic was my first major track meet to attend and it was so amazing. Watching international folks throw down IN PERSON is crazy awesome (although I love watching flotrack)

Mo and Galen tearin' in up!

 Then, the Olympic Trials…heaps of excitement everywhere! It was impossible not to leave the trials feeling invigorated about the sport of running and feeling more patriotic than I have ever really felt.

Ladies lined up for the 5k

      Both of these track-tacular events gave me the urge to really work on my speed and maybe run a track race myself someday (ha, we’ll see about that!) 

      

      5. Letting go of marathon goals for a while. After my hard-to-swallow Boston Marathon experience, I haven’t been fired up to run a marathon again anytime soon. Partially because my life is not conducive to such training right now, and partially because there are other distances out there that I can work on.  As I mentioned in a previous post, short races are lower stakes in terms of commitment, which is a nice mental break. 
     
    6. Staying injury free *knock on wood*.  I had just recovered from an injury a year ago, and I’ve managed to ward off any other major problems except a really weird blister that I keep getting every once and a while. 

      

      7. Living in a new place, with new races, and new running buddies. Don’t get me wrong, I MISS all of my old running pals, my favorite routes, and my annual races (like the Resolution Run on new year day), but it’s pretty cool to scope out a new territory, get the lay of the land (HILLY, here) and race against the locals. 

Not an example of hilly, but a cool viewpoint down the tracks

                                  What changes have you had  in your running over the last year?