The Adventures of Cowboy Hazel

This morning’s seven mile run in Central Park brought me to 132 miles for the month of July. Out of curiosity, I went back and checked my running logs and, sure enough, this month’s 132 miles is the most I have ever run in a month (the previous record was 129 in October 2001). That was a much-needed boost to my running confidence. My pace has been slowing and I’ve been having trouble keeping up with my friends on some of the tempo runs and intervals lately. But, looking at the numbers, I can see that what I’m losing in speed, I’m gaining in distance. And, I’m hoping that the speed will come back as I become more accustomed to the distance and continue to train.

My other running news is equipment related. I bought a pair of Nike Zoom Vomero 3’s yesterday along with the Nike+ chip and wristband to go with them. This is the first pair of non-New Balance running shoes that I’ve had in years and I felt like a bit of a traitor for buying them (my mom works for New Balance.) But, the simplicity of the Nike+ system and comfort of the shoe were so alluring that I had to have them, even if I do feel like a sellout now. I broke them in this morning with my run in the park and had no problems at all. If anything, my feet feel better than normal.

Other than that, there’s not much to report. Just work, work, work as always. I went out to the Yankees game Tuesday night and lost my voice cheering on the comeback that was dishearteningly close to succeeding and am headed out to California on Saturday for a family get-together. Seeing the fam will be good, although I’m dreading the flight. I’d keep writing but I really have nothing else interesting to say (and what I’ve said already isn’t even that interesting.)