Easy 20 on Saturday

As planned, I got out for an easy 20 on Saturday. I did about 2000' of climbing, running 16+ of the miles on dirt roads and the rest on pavement. I ran the first 16 miles in my new Brooks Cascadia 4s, and I'm pretty sure these will be the shoes I'll start in at WS. Well, maybe not this exact same pair, but the same model. I will wear them at the DRB race next Sunday.

After I'd done about 16 miles, I stopped at home and took one of the dogs out for 2 easy miles. Then, I took the other dog out for the same. It was the first run of the year for either of the dogs, but both of them handled it well. My older dog, Rocket, recently turned 8, and he is definitely slowing down. I don't see him doing any 18-20 milers in the future, but he still likes to run. I think I'm going to limit him to runs no more than 60-90 minutes this year. It's been two years since he last went over 10 miles and I think it's safest to be more conservative with him these days.

The younger dog simply doesn't like to run as much as the older dog; she gets bored after a while. By the time I'd gone 1.5 miles with her, I could see the house and I wanted to be done with my run. But, she was bored and wanted to walk slowly and smell everything. Then, something funny happened. A pick-up truck came by us and a boy leaned out the window and offered Nikki a dog biscuit. She happily took it and I assumed she'd eat in on the spot and then continue her walk home. Instead, she started running hard for home. She was holding the biscuit in her mouth and struggling to breathe through a mostly closed mouth. All I could figure was that she wanted to show the treat to our other dog before she ate it. She's the alpha of the pack and she can be mean to our older dog. Sure enough, she ran home, took the treat inside, showed it to the other dog, and then when he showed some interest, she sat down and ate the treat. My wife called her a b*tch, which is technically true, but not the way that my wife meant it.

Sunday, I took a rest day and then Monday turned into another rest day. My kids had both been sick with some sort of fever and it got me yesterday. I slept most of the day yesterday, finally got up to eat a little bit and watch some TV, and then headed back to bed. I'm still less than 100% right now, so I'm not sure about my run tonight.

I am going to see my chiropractor this afternoon for the ongoing problems I have with my hips and my left leg. My left piriformis has been giving me more and more trouble recently. I can get through my runs without problem, but my stride feels unbalanced, there is discomfort at times, and it can take the fun out of running at times. I'm going to talk to the chiropractor today to see if there might be some more aggressive treatments we can try - perhaps physical therapy of some sort - to help things get better.