Practicing Solo

I'm going bloggin'

After midnight
Can't get no shuteye
What am I supposed to do?
So here I'm bloggin'
After midnight
Posting for you.

Sorry, Patsy.

I started getting drowsy in the nine o'clock hour and thought things were falling into place for a restful night before an early a.m. Saturday run. But a mere few hours later, I find myself very much awake, so I'm pecking away at a running-related blog post I was planning to write sometime this weekend anyway.

I've decided against joining a marathon training group this year. The Katy Fit experiment last year was going okay up until I found myself out for the season sick. (No, I'm not blaming all those nice people for that.) Training for Houston 2012, however, I know I really want flexibility in my schedule. I can easily see a lot of long runs fitting in on Sundays instead of Saturdays. I certainly didn't need the coaching tips, which are abundant online and on my bookshelf.

With autumn creeping up on the calendar horizon, I want to solidify my weekly mileage. June certainly challenged us with the unusual triple-digit heat. (Unlike inland parts of Texas, Houstonians traditionally had an understanding with Mother Nature to have mostly "moderate" summer high temps in the mid 90sF in exchange for pea-soup-thick Gulf humidity.) And I've been dragging for nearly two weeks of July thanks to a head cold.

So here's hoping that things "fall" into place in the coming months. I'm thinking that a return to the 13.1-miler at Rock 'n' Roll San Antonio would be a good waypoint along the way. Surely in three years the city has figured out how to host this event since my first terrible taste of the RNR series, right?

Now it's back to another attempt at gathering some bits of sleep before putting on the shoes for . . . I don't know . . . five miles? I'm in full control of my schedule after all.

How has your summer running been? Has it been dreamy, or has it been like a fight with the snooze button?

Freedom 5K

This morning I ran my fastest 5K in more than 12 months. You'll have to take my word for it, however. In opposition to all the race day things I did right, the one detail I managed to miss was remembering to bring my timing chip.

Since you won't find me among the official results, here's the rundown from my GPS:

Mile 1: 10:06
Mile 2: 10:19
Mile 3: 10:12
Last .1: 1:19
5K elapsed time: 31:56 (per Garmin Forerunner 205)

This was my sixth time to run this Fourth of July event in Sugar Land, and I'm not seeing a reason not to come back for a seventh. The registration is relatively cheap, the tree-shaded course provides refuge from the sun, and there is a building track record of luck in the door-prize department. This year, a restaurant gift certificate rode home in the car with us.

This race report wouldn't be complete unless I document the following exchange from the last mile:

• Spectator: This is the last hill!
• Me: They always say it's the last hill!
• Spectator: Sorry, we're just inclined this way.

It's not very often that someone else is dropping the wretched pun on me. Good show, sir!

Happy Independence Day, y'all.