On the direction of this blog

This is a new blog, and I'm new to blogging. I'm having fun with it so far, but I haven't been to go back and describe the evolution of my transition from nonrunner to three-days-a-week runner (some might say "jogger" given my pace) over the last several months. It's enough to keep up with the present, so that's probably what I will do, most likely. I hope to write about new trails I find, and new trail races I enter (or re-enter in the future). I plan to go back and report on my three races from 2008 for anyone curious about Florida trails. (An aside: I keep spelling trails as "trials" when I type too quickly. They can be trials as well as trails, but they're the kind I deliberately seek out to test myself, and so are preferable to the other kinds of trials life springs on you).

If anyone is in their first few months of returning to running, or starting running, I've just been through that initial stage and will be more than happy to discuss it. I've made some gains but I'm not satisfied; the challenge now is not to lose focus. I do want to run a trail half-marathon, so it's time to pick one, even if it's not until fall, and get my long run from 9 miles (current) to 13+.

Penguin waddling a little faster

I had no race on my schedule this past weekend. I skipped the local 5K because it was (a) a 5K, and I've done a few of those before, and (b) it was on pavement and this year is about new running experiences - and TRAIL running above all. Yet, I felt like running fast (well, for me). So I opted for my fourth one-mile time trial of the year to gauge my progress (a technique recommended by Galloway's Book of Running). The good news is that for the third straight time trial, I improved by 10+ seconds. Still at "penguin" speed - and there's nothing wrong with that - but waddling a little more quickly each month. I had enough left to run a two-mile cooldown jog to make it a five-mile day too, and I could not do that back in January - one hard mile and I was spent.

A couple things concern me though. With the weather heating up, there are fewer trail races in my area (and I mean a two hour driving radius). How to stay focused and motivated? Will building my long run to half-marathon distance be enough? I may need to set a specific target race. Also, along with the hot weather comes deerfly season, which makes many trail locations miserable. I have neither a gym membership nor a treadmill right now. I'll probably stay on the trails until I'm forced off by those winged fiends.

Favorite running books

One of the books I turned to in resuming running was my tattered copy of Jeff Galloway's Book on Running. Galloway has been a significant influence on my running - I've always liked his emphasis on proper rest, as opposed to pounding the roads every day of the week. As I was starting over from scratch, I felt this formula would work for me. There are many running books out there, but a lot of them either do not cover, or gloss over, an important part - the beginning.

I also acquired a copy of Galloway's Half-Marathon: You Can Do It. I was going to need to rely on walk breaks as I built up my endurance, and this book is a good source for planning. One of my goals I set for myself was to run a half-marathon in 2008. As I increased my running in the fall of '07 (slowly, gradually), I came across Dean Karnazes' Ultra-Marathon Man. That was very inspiring reading for me, but more on that another time.

If you have any suggestions for practical or inspirational running reading, let me know.