It's a tough job,

being a cat at my house....

Captain Tummyrub, reporting for duty!

Baby boy sure has changed as he's matured.  He's not really the world's bravest, most outgoing cat, but he can be quite the little slut when it comes to getting his belly rubbed!  Whodathunkit?

So, I entered a mud race.  While my last race - last two races, really - involved mud and other fun things, they were technically trail races, while this one, part of the Merrell Down and Dirty series, is in the emerging genre of mud runs.  It includes mud, water crossings, and military style obstacles.  The race is 10K (there's also a 5K), and several of us from the dojo are planning to run together, which should be fun.  Hopefully we'll manage to get a few pictures afterwards, when we're at our beautiful best.  The run falls at a pretty good time in my ultra training, right about where I wanted to take a little bit of a break.  The schedule doesn't build in breaks, but it anticipates that you might throw in a race or two during your prep.  I'm not sure this is exactly what the program writers had in mind, but it works for me.

I've been enjoying using the Garmin.  Considering I believe I paid a comparable price for a heart rate monitor some years ago, I'm very impressed with the amount and quality of information I get from the Garmin.  The GPS tracking is a little less spot on than I originally believed, based on my uploading my data to Map My Run - little did I know, MMR was correcting the data so it mapped directly to roads!  When I map it to Garminconnect, I see the course as plotted, which looks more like what I expected it to look like because I know these things just aren't THAT good.  Still, it's close enough to not be worth arguing over.  The elevation data is good, and matches well with what the road says.  And to my surprise, I actually LIKE having the heart rate data, even though it more or less tells me exactly what I think it should be telling me (meaning, my heart rate is where I think it should be at any given time).  I think that will be valuable information to have over time, and will probably be quite valuable when I start doing speedwork again (whenever that might be).

Took a break from New Rules this past Friday, and took the TRX to the gym to play with.  That thing is a LOT of fun, I must say; it also makes for a very compact workout, since you pretty much stay in one spot, changing only the length of the straps between exercises, if necessary.  I have about a month of NR workouts left (that's what I get for just doing it twice a week), and I have the feeling that will try my patience a bit...  which is unfortunate.  I didn't start this program with a clear idea of how it might dovetail into an ultra training program and I'm afraid I'm not going to finish this all that neatly.  If I'd stuck with the three day a week schedule, I'd be just about done by now.  Anyway, there's a question in my mind as to whether I'm going to continue with the metabolic work when I have to add runs to my strength training days; I plan to run before I hit the gym so I guess I'll just see how I feel a the end of the weight work.  If there's gas in the tank, I'll do it.  If not, oh well.

Makes for a sloppy ending to a good program, which isn't all that satisfying, but all the more reason to do the thing again, right?