Tired, Tired, Tired

I think the last six months have started to really catch up with me because my last few races have been pretty off. The last few weeks have been especially rough as I have been taking Bella to very early morning radiation treatments at the Cleveland Clinic, trying to sneak in a workout when I get back, and then working a very busy financial media job from 2pm till 10/11pm. Not trying to make excuses because everyone goes through crap in life, but watching your wife get cancer and go through a hell of a lot to finally kick it is pretty draining to say the least. Not near as bad as what she was going through, but it's very hard to watch and not be able to make things better. Thankfully, the Cleveland Clinic has. I can't imagine any other medical team doing a better job than those guys have done. Anyway, I ran a pretty uninspiring 18:16 5K this morning though in all fairness the winds were really awful in downtown Cleveland and it certainly wasn't a PR day, but since running that 17:06 in early October, I haven't really been that on. I feel great early on in races and then seem to tank a bit in the second half. Club Nationals is in 2 weeks so hopefully I can rebound and run a solid race and then I need to re-evaluate my training. Do I do more? Less? Structure my workout sequence in a different manner? Who knows? I'll figure it out. The fun part about this sport is that what works for you and what doesn't work for you constantly changes.

On a side note, part of me wants to run another 5K race next Saturday as my final effort before Club Nationals XC. I'll decide in the next day or two. Feel free to offer any advice!

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Random Update

It's been a while since I've updated this blog. No excuses other than having a lot going on at work and Bella's follow up surgery, which went well. The procedure allows her to bend her knee much more than she had been able to after the first surgery, and to reinforce this she is spending 6 hours a day on an Optiflex machine, which slowly bends the leg back and forth. Good thing she has a laptop to keep her company along with two hyper kittens. Next week she begins the first of her last 8 radiation treatments, which will hopefully be the end of everything. I've learned just to take life one day at a time lately, but both of us are excited to get out of here and go to North Carolina in December. I'm running in the club nationals cross country race in Charlotte on December 11 and we'll be hanging out in NC for a week after that with Bella's brother in Greensboro. The running is going pretty well. I'm amazed that I've managed to stay in similar shape to last year with all the crap that's been going on this year. Trying to keep really focused for that final month. Tomorrow I'll be doing a cross country race in Canton, which should be a lot of fun and on Thanksgiving Weekend I'm going to do a race that I've never run before, The Pigskin Classic. When you sign up for that race, you either get a Michigan or Ohio State t-shirt, depending on your affiliation. Having seen photos of past races, it's basically a sea of red even though Cleveland is more or less halfway between Ann Arbor and Columbus. That said, this year there will be at least one dude up front wearing the Maize and Blue. Take that Buckeyes!

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