It's time to run

From fall 2012 until November of this year I trained nonstop, never taking more than 10 days off at a time and that only was when recovering from races. After Plain, Spider Gap and then Carkeek, I needed a good break.

Five weeks off from running was fantastic. I worked out in the gym 4-5 days a week, had a fitness assessment to develop a good cross-training routine to mix in with running and got out for some fun hikes. I'll continue hiking and going to the gym for winter-spring, but this morning it felt great to be running again.

It's a good time to end the break as Dave and I will be sweeping the Deception Pass 50km next Sunday and the weekend after I'll be putting on the second annual Winter Solstice Longest Night group run, this year taking place on Chuckanut (last year was on Cougar).

Unfortunately I (and all my friends) came up snake eyes in the Western States and Hardrock lotteries yesterday. It's likely that after some early season races I'll do just for fun (Capitol Peak Fatass 50km in January, Yakima Skyline 50km in April) I'll focus on adventure runs for the whole summer and shoot for an end-of-season 100 miler like IMTUF or Plain again.

The break was also good for some free time to:

New tattoo, lucky #8: a panorama picture I took on Copper Ridge, North Cascades

Quick six-day trip to Mongolia...fingers crossed that the jetlag doesn't wake me up at 3am tonight

 Now, it's time to run!