home for an island

Over the course of my training I've noticed that often times when I'm done running my stomach will get very upset. The worst instance of this was on Sunday, but it happened yesterday also and I can think of several other times in the past few months as well. I spent some time thinking about it last night, and the only actual cause I could think of was drinking. I can't say about any other times, but Saturday night I went to the Pour House, had a few drinks, and got sick after my run on Sunday. I went out Tuesday night to a fancy dinner, had a few drinks, and got sick after my Wednesday run.

I can see why drinking could cause this, but I know I've drank heavily and run the next day with no problems (my birthday and Friday night come to mind immediately). At least until the marathon, I'm going to cut down on the drinking before runs and see if the stomach problems go away.

Yesterday's run was a really easy 8 miler that Lisa and I did in 1:06:55. I love the fact that 8 miles now constitute a casual run for me. The first long run of this training program was 8 miles, and I struggled through it in 1:28:06. I can now happily run that distance 22 minutes faster with no effort at all, and can blitz it 28 minutes faster and still feel stronger afterwards. I'm not sure that I've ever been in this kind of shape and I'm really curious to know what sort of mile and 5k times I could put out right now.

Total number of runs: 67
Total number of miles: 447.56
Total time: 62 hours, 00 minutes, 12 seconds

I'm nearing the end of the Glade Guard models. I finished the basic 8 of them last night, which leaves me with just two musicians and a Spellsinger left before I never have to paint these things again; I can't wait.

I added some red to the models to break up the boring greens and browns, and I think it helps make the models stand out. My highlighting, while not getting any more technical, is certainly getting faster. I'm glad I can paint to this level at a greater speed, because doing it as slowly as it was going was starting to be a drag.

Only three more to go!