Rob and I fin­ished our fifth week of train­ing strong last night, run­ning for more than 40 miles and record­ing per­son­al best dis­tances just six days apart (13 miles last Sun­day, 14 miles Sat­ur­day morn­ing.) The 14 mil­er was a great run that took just over two hours to com­plete. We start­ed on Poplar behind East­ern State Pen­i­ten­tiary, ran Kel­ly Dri­ve past the Falls Bridge, final­ly mak­ing a right into Wis­sahick­on Creek Park. We turned around just as we reached the first mile­mark­er on the For­bid­den Dri­ve trail and then ran back to Fairmount.

How am I doing? My right ankle’s tak­ing it bad­ly and I’m treat­ing the sore­ness, bruis­ing and swelling with a reg­u­lar icing reg­i­men. Stretch­ing has become a reg­u­lar part of my rou­tine as well, both before and after run­ning. I think that I still need to find a way to lose anoth­er 20 pounds if my legs are going to hold up to this abuse. I’ve been stuck at 190 for what feels like for­ev­er now, even as I’m going on longer runs. That 14 mile run burned over 2000 calo­ries! I want to see results!

I’m look­ing for­ward to Week 6 of train­ing. It’s a step-back week, which means short­er runs and a chance for my body to recov­er a bit. It’s a fun­ny thing to say, but I breathe a sigh of relief when the longest run of the week is 10 miles.