Serenity

You can't really tell from the fuzzy picture, but tonight's ride was another winner... Rolling through the hills and enjoying the oddly crisp evening air. This weather's fantastic for afternoon/evening workouts, but man, it was freezing this morning. And if the weather stays like this, I'm sure not going to be a happy camper - getting into the water on race day - in the upcoming weeks.

Funny how this time of year, workouts are becoming less and less for training, per se, and more and more for simple pleasure. That feeling of breaking free from work, from people and from life, and rolling into the peaceful backdrop of Nowhere, NY that really centers the soul.

This weekend we'll be serving up a pretty intense bike/run brick workout on Saturday, followed by a leisurely long run on Sunday. Recently, I've given up on trying to phase into my new orthotics...My feet just aren't taking to them on the runs. But since I've switched back to my old ones, despite their bulky, broken down condition, my body has been much happier at the end of the day. I'll be working with my doctor on getting my new ones tweaked in time for the off-season and, with any hope, I'll be good to go when I resume my big volume runs over the winter.

In other news, I've taken a hiatus from swimming over the past week as I've tried desperately to identify a new place to swim. The two pools that I belong to are closed until mid-September (being high-school pools, apparently now is a good time for maintenance), and it's been a bit of a mad scramble to find a place to swim. Luckily, a solution presented itself to me, and I'll be getting in the tank tomorrow for a good, long swim.

Enjoy the weekend.