out with the old, in with the new

Goodbye to 2015, hello to 2016.  A 30+ mile running week plus my first bike ride since face-planting pavement almost 5 weeks ago.  I'm trying to start adding some "speedwork" into my runs.  The primary purpose for that is to try to build my lungs back up.  I can't keep jogging forever, I really want to be able to race again.  I'm afraid to pound my feet too much yet, but as I learned today, I can't actually go that fast anyway because my lungs are stupid.  

On Monday, I made it about 1 minute into the Pub Run and then realized that I had forgotten to use my inhaler.  I ran the whole 4.3 miles anyway, but it was slower than usual, and my lungs were definitely struggling a lot.  I was doing ok on the flats as long as I stayed focused on breathing, but anytime I would try to talk, or anytime we went up a hill, it got really hard for me.  Still, it is nice to know that I can survive without my inhaler (and I was able to recover without it as well). 

Today, I decided to do 4x400 "sprints."  They were basically just a lung workout.  My legs thought it was a joke, but my lungs were hurting.  I had hoped to add more sprints later in the run, but my lungs were having none of that.  

Run

Bike

Saturday was Daryn's birthday and his memorial service.  I carpooled to the service in Ohio with a couple of other people.  There ended up being 7 of us from Lewisburg who made it out there, so we all went out to dinner together afterward to celebrate Daryn with pizza and beer.  He probably would have liked for us to sing German drinking songs, but we settled for singing him Happy Birthday instead.