Back Again

Just like my running over the last decade, where I leave it behind and then come back to it.  Its the same with this blog, I leave it behind and do my thing and then come back to it.  So here I am again, to share my thoughts and experiences from my little part of the world.

I live near the shores of the Chesapeake Bay near Annapolis.  It's a great area to live in and enjoy all year round.  Of course summer is the best time to enjoy the Chesapeake and its tributaries.  There are communities along the bay, where beside modern conveniences haven't made large changes.  The town I live in has a population just short of 6,000 people, but doesn't have a traffic light.  We have 2 small grocery stores where you can still have a 'tab', so you don't have to always have money or credit cards on you.  It's amazing to see this still exists in America.

Running and cycling in this area is amazing.  Sometimes, you run a street or path you're not familiar with and you turn a corner and find an amazing view of the bay.  Here are two I see frequently.

Sometimes the surprise is that the guy down the street has a cannon in his side yard.  (Not to discuss gun control, but if you're worried about assault rifles, where do canons rank on your list?)

And early the only traffic on some early aren't cars.

This is why I live where I here.  It's easy to forget the simple things when you get caught up in your own busy life.  I'm also not far from Annapolis or Washington, DC, if I need a experience city life, which I get plenty of during the work week.

I've had an amazing year of running so far.  I started the year by deciding to eat vegan. I also committed to really focus on zone 2 training.  Both have been an amazing experience and I have really improved.  In 6 months, I took almost 2 1/2 hours off of my 50 mile race time.  I took 30 minutes off of my 10 mile race time and I have done 5k race simulation 5 minutes faster than my best race ever.

This was all before summer.  The summer has been difficult for me to maintain my diet and training.  I have run over the summer, but at the end of July, I was suffering from heat illness and decided to take some time off to recover and recharge myself before the heavy training started.

My dietary preferences, were put on hold numerous times this summer to allow me and my family to enjoy ourselves.  I am not a ethical vegan, I want to be a HEALTHY vegan, so I am not against, animal products.  I have found that I feel better and perform better while not consuming them.  I subscribe to the idea that if it works for you, then that's what you should do, as long as you aren't in any stress about your decision.  So when the time comes and maintaining my vegan preferences may put stress on me or my family, I simply allow myself to eat something different or that I will enjoy.  What's the point if you don't enjoy it?  There are more important things to be worried or stressed over, food shouldn't be one of them, but it doesn't mean you can eat poorly either.

My next big race ( Marine Corp Marathon ) is now 2 months away and it is time to put my diet and training into full effect.  Hopefully, I'll be able to show you this improvement over the next few months. I'll try to show you what I eat and how I train.  I didn't expect to make the running improvements I did, so maybe what I do can help someone else out there.  It also doesn't mean it will work for you. We're all an experiment of 1.