So I went out for a run today. Didnt feel like going, youngest was up most of the night, so didnt sleep well, then had to work - but went anyways.  Ran easy yesterday, think there will be a time crunch tomorrow, so figured today was the time for a harder workout. Decided to run a fartlek style workout.  Got home, barely had time to look at garmin before jumping into family stuff. So now I sit looking at ... a four mile fast run, with the last three miles in sub 10 min / mile pace! That is HUGE for me. In the three or so years I've been running, I never really approached it. I was starting to just figure, well, I started running late, have a family and job, and not the right genetics, I'll always be slow. Now I realize that 9:48 min/mil is still slow for a lot of you , but that was a hard earned achievement for me, and gives me hope that one day I'll be running an "easy" run at that pace, in the same way I currently run "easy" at paces that used to feel impossible. YAY!

My goal for the rest of the month is to just ... keep going. I've got a half scheduled for the end of the month, and while I would love to PR over last months half, I don't want to over-push myself ... so my goal is to NOT have a finish goal time, just a finish STRONG goal ...

Greg put in another monster week with over 90 miles. The team had a solid showing and we're in 4th for cumulative points, but it's been a long time since we've had 100% posting. It looks like we're losing Roy for 3 consecutive weeks of not posting.

Not much chatter anymore. Not sure why.

Wow, how things can change in a week. First off, George, I am going to ask that I be placed on IR for an undetermined amount of time.

On the morning of 2/1 I woke in the middle of the night with shoulder pain and pain under my rib cage. Initially I thought I had just slept on it wrong, but the pain did not go away and only got worse with time. I woke my DW at 4 AM and had her take me to the ER. To make a long story short, after a number of tests (ekg, bloodwork, chest x-ray and finally a spiral CT) they found out that I had a bilateral pulmonary embolism. A blood clot in my left leg had dislodged and decided to make its way into main arteries of both of my lungs.

I spent a total of 4 days in the hospital and was released on blood thinners with a TON of questions. They still don't know root cause but they are digging. The main message from each of the 10 doctors I have seen so far has been that my running greatly lessened the severity of the event. My PCP went as far as to say that he feels my fitness (running) saved my life...the clot was that big. It helped my body compensate and deal with it quite well.

I still have an active clot in my left leg and I'll be on blood thinners for at least the next 6 months. I am pretty much barred from any physical activity until they know it's not going anywhere. I can walk as much as I like, just no impact or heavy cardio activities. Most of all, listen to my body. I go back in 4-6 weeks for another scan of my lungs and legs to see how the clots are doing. I am hoping that they will resolve themselves, but I know there is a chance they may not. Only time will tell. One day at a time.

I have every intention of running again as soon as it is safe to do so. It's been an emotional ride for me so far. I'll stop back on occasion to say hello. Wishing you all the best.

Got dressed and ready to go run and changed my mind at the last minute. The cold and wind were mild deterents, but what convinced me to stay inside was a hacking cough that had me doubled over and almost gagging. Odd that there's no other symptoms like a fever, but I thought avoiding exercise in cold air was probably the better part of discretion. I don't want to chance it developing into bronchitis or worse.

The most scary thing about it is that a PE is commonly overlooked in healthy individuals because the risk factors just aren't there. If it hadn't been found and treated when it was the outcome could have been much worse.

Thank you both for your well wishes.

Thanks, Nuinta. I'm on coumadin at the moment, and there is no talk of a filter at this time. I am seeing my hematologist tomorrow and I go back to get re-scanned on March 6th to see how the clots are doing. One day at a time.

Live well.

Hey everyone, sorry I guess I've been a little bit negligent on posting outside of FB for the last month or so....

Things are going hard alright - I've been having trouble the last half of January into February with reduced speed and had been feeling my ankle/achillies a little bit worse than I wanted to over the past few weeks. Trying to push myself like last week over 90 miles all while doing 2 speed days, a LR and a day of stairs and sprints was probably too much for me. I went through some reduced mileage last week (like 51+ miles) and it still didn't feel that much better so I went to a PT.

Turns out that I got in really early and that's a good thing: my hip was a little off and I was really pushing some improper moves on my left leg. I caught the achilles before it became achilles tendonosis and the PT gave my tibialis posterior a good massage since it was tight as well. End result is that I'll be ok without having to take any kind of serious time-off, though I'll probably be cautious and keep my mileage around 50-60 this week as I get 1 solid day of speedwork on Thursday with the team.

So....my mileage will be lower, but the good news is that my goal (37:30 or better) is still possible for the 10k as long as I keep on working. No more am I going to try to keep with the kids, I'll be happy with my own paces and hopefully can hold 5:58-6:03 for the entire race on March 17th.