Saturday, July 21, 2007

Back to Running (Hooray!)

I am re-posting a few blog posts from another blog that I recently deleted, but wanted to save the running related posts. I'll post them over the next week or so, starting with the earliest. This one was originally written in July, 2007:

I started running again - with much motivation - almost exclusively on trails, and love it. I am fortunate to live in an area with an abundance of trails and I have been making good use of them. This time around, I have been running with a much keener eye to avoiding injury, though it didn't take long for me to roll an ankle. While it hasn't stopped me from running, it has made me slow down and modify my stride and foot strike somewhat.

I ran a trail race last month. It was the Santa Cruz Mountains Trail Run, put on by Pacific Coast Trail Runs. I ran the 21K race - they offered a 10K, 21K, 29K and 50K. A fun race, and I finished in about 2:18. Not too bad for my first foray back into trail racing (I have done the Dipsea twice, but about 10 years ago). This Sunday I am running the Wharf-to-Wharf 10K. This is a fun road race that starts at the Santa Cruz Beach Boardwalk and ends up at the Capitola Wharf. I'm going to really push myself and see if I can break 40 minutes. No biggie if I don't, but it will be fun (???) to try.

Lori (my wife) and I also went to Hawaii last month for a family reunion. We spent almost a week on Maui and had a great time with relatives on my dad's side of the family. It was great to catch up with a few cousins and their kids and see my aunt and uncle as well. Good times were had by all. I even got in a nice trail run on an old trail from the Lahina side of Maui up and over a hill to another area, I think it is called the Lahina Pali trail. The distance was a little over 10 miles and pretty good elevation gain.