Back on the horse

Wow, I haven't posted anything here since January! That feels wrong, but I also haven't been doing much training recently either. That's the good news, marathon training has begun again in earnest already. This years' marathons are on consecutive weekends in September, the Boring Marathon in Oregon and a 12 hour race outside of Knoxville. So one training cycle should be good for both states.

September is still a long ways off, so I'm starting with some base building. For the first 6 weeks, the long run is only 5 miles. I've got to build some kind of base for weekly/monthly miles before trying to ramp up the distance. In February I had 32.5 miles total, which does exceed the 30 mile month streak I had been putting up.

and yet those 170 mile months don't seem like so long ago....

it will come back. it has to come back. Right now it all hurts. and I really do love base building.

Some recent family updates too - Morgan's wife is pregnant with their first kid and we are all very excited for them. It's a boy and will be the next John Flynn after Michael and I had nothing but girls. I got to chaperone my first field trip. Ella and I with about 100 other 8th graders got to go up to Boone to visit Grandfather Mountain and Linville Cavern. It was a trip. And I finished the masonry on my front porch recently. Woodworking should wind down when it's time for marathon training to really ramp up. And grad school is going well - I got an A in corporate finance, supposedly the hardest course in the entire program.

Framing the roof rim - this is totally safe

The last brick column is as tall as I am!

Nice sunset

Ella is insane

Outside of Linville Cavern

On the swinging bridge at Grandfather

the bridge

Here's a little practice roof I built over the driveway

Front porch is coming along really well too