It's taper time!.................................

And I gotta tell you I have never been so excited about taper time as I am this time. What is taper time you ask?

When training for a race, the idea is to slowly increase your mileage until you are at race distance or even a little above. Then two or three weeks before the race you begin to rein in on the miles so that your legs are nice and fresh on race day.

The reason I am so excited that I can begin to run shorter distances from here on in is not because of the distance, but because of the elements. It is friggin cold outside! I ran twelve miles yesterday, and it took me two and a half hours because one it was so cold my muscles never really got warm and then after a couple of hours of being in the cold they became stiff and felt like lead, and two I ended up eating the left over brown sugar cinnamon mixture from the coffee cake I made and FIVE mint cookies. Of course I didn't want real food after binging like this so I had a nice sugar high when I started out and then crashed and had no energy, except what little I got from the box the raisins I eat along the way. Bad Patty!

So, the cool part of the run... The temperature was in the single digits to begin with, and the wind chill made it somewhere around zero. I dress in layers, and I really never felt cold, except the tiny part of my face that is not covered, when running into the wind (which really seemed to be most of the time). I had meant to call the running store and ask the experts how long was okay to be out running in the current temperature, but I got all tied up doing important things like polishing my nails (I got a cruise coming up remember) and playing a computer game (I have won enough that it is really hard to beat my high score now) and totally spaced about making the call. I know, I have to work on getting my priorities straight.

Oh Ya! I forgot to tell you that due to scheduling I was not able to run Monday, Tuesday, or Wednesday, and so Thursday I went out and ran six miles (at the time I was planning on doing my long run today, Saturday). Much of the route had two and three inch snowdrifts in the road, which doesn't seem like much, but in actuality is just like running on sand. My quads were not happy to find I was running again, especially when the same little drifts were now three and four inches deep. The way to get a muscle stronger is to really fatigue it so I just told my quads to suck it up and stop whining.

After about two hours of running, I noticed that my waddle (named after that thing that hangs down on a turkey, a fleece thingy that goes around your neck and can cover your mouth, cheeks, and nose if needed) was stiff. The darn thing was frozen all down the front. When I got home and took off my (outer layer) wind-breaker, all these little ice balls fell out. I guess they formed from the sweat I gave off while running. HOW COOL IS THAT? I felt really powerful for having completed what I set out to do in spite of the elements. When (my) Mister told me that my oldest had called and her message to me was that "I was a stud!" I had to agree with her.

Still, there is a part of me (the sane part) that thinks I was foolish to go out for that length of time, and I am glad that I will not be faced with that need again until it is warmer outside.

Well, I have to get ready to go to financial class with my youngest. I will share all the details of that in tomorrows blog, but don't loose any sleep over it...it won't be THAT exciting.