total program distance: 45.5 miles
pain level: my right arm is aching from all the bowling. But everything else is fizz-ine.
As I mentioned below, running in Montana was great. I was staying at a ranch off a hardpack dirt road, very easy on the legs. What wasn't easy on the legs was the temperature in the mornings. On Tuesday it was 20 degrees! I'm sure people from the Northern plains are scoffing and snorting into their mufflers at my puny, weak Portlandian tolerance for cold, but man, it was COLD. Portland sees 20 degrees maybe twice a year. The running pants I brought were grossly inadequate, and I never felt like I really warmed up. Consequently, I ran in the afternoons for the rest of the week and felt much better.
Oh, and of course, as soon as I pointed out how nice the weather has been the rain shows up. And the high winds. Yesterday was one of those days in which it was completely impossible to stay dry because the wind was blowing the rain both sideways and up, somehow, thus rendering even the most advanced, coastal-weather-ready, rain jacket/hat/umbrella combo powerless to stop the soaking. After the first few weeks, though, you stop trying and accept that for the next four months you will be damp at all times. I brought my gym clothes to work today, so I can run on the treadmill. Depending on the weather (oh who am I kidding, it'll be rainy), I think I'll run at the gym during the week and do my long weekend run outside. Yakima has a history of being dry on race day, but there is no point in tempting fate by not acclimating to running in wet weather. (I would run outside more during the week, but I can't stand the thought of a day where I: get up in the dark; go to work in the dark & rain; leave work in the dark & rain; get home, change out of my soggy clothes into dry clothes; and then head back out into the dark & rain to go running. It might break me.) Portland is a great city and there is a lot to recommend it during the winter months, but the weather? Not one of them.
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