Out of gas

With most of the snow from last week's storm gone and bright sunshine streaming through the east-facing windows, it looked almost spring-like outside this morning.  Appearances can be deceiving though.  Sometimes you have to step outside to experience reality.  With an air temp of 26 degrees and gusty northwest winds producing a wind chill of +13, outside reality quickly trumped inside hope.  Reminding us once again that hope is more fragile than Humpty Dumpty.

After cross training yesterday, I put in a solid 90 minutes of running this morning.  I wore my Brooks PureFlow for only the second time and really enjoyed them.  They fit great, and best of all, have ample room in the forefoot.  They also seem to encourage a faster turnover.  The big test is durability and can't be known  for quite a while.  But, for now, I'm a happy Brooks camper.  

The highlight of this week is a 24-mile long run, but until the weather picture comes into clearer focus, I don't know when that will be--somewhere between Friday and Sunday.  Between now and then, I have a couple of days of maintenance runs and a couple of days of cross training.  Stay tuned.  

With gas prices on the rise--headed to $4 and higher according to the experts--I'm rethinking my racing plans for 2012.  It's not that I can't afford the gasoline, it's that I don't want to afford it.  Despite the speculators, oil prices (and that of derivatives like gasoline) eventually obey the law of supply and demand.  So, if we don't like the high prices, we need to drive less.  Ultimately, that will bring down prices.  Plus, there's the environmental benefit of less oil/gas consumption.

I'm already signed up for the Colorado Marathon and have a room reserved in Ft. Collins.  Not to mention, I've been training for a couple of months now.  So, despite the run-up in gas prices, I'm going.  It's 843 miles from my garage to Ft. Collins--1686 miles round-trip.  My Honda CR-V gets about 25 mpg on the road.  So, that's 67.44 gallons of gas.  If the price is $4 by May 1 as many analysts are predicting, that's $269.76.  Ouch!  And, I keep telling everyone that running is an inexpensive activity.

But, my resolve not to encourage the oil companies by driving unnecessary miles means that I won't be signing up for the Pikes Peak Ascent in Manitou Springs in August.  It also means that I'm leaning against running the North Face Endurance Challenge in Madison, Wisc., in September.  Madison--actually Kettle Moraine State Park--is much closer to my home here in Hog Heaven than Colorado, but it's still 360 miles round-trip.  That's not chopped liver.  And, it's not like there aren't comparable events close to home.

Like my home-town marathon: the Quad-Cities Marathon.  On September 23.  See here for more information: http://qcmarathon.org/

The race features a flat, fast, and scenic course that crosses and re-crosses the Mississippi River from the start in Illinois to Iowa and back to the finish in Illinois.  The marathon itself--there's also a half-marathon and 5K--attracts a respectable field of around 700 so it's large enough to be competitive but not overly crowded.  And, the community support is excellent. 

I haven't decided to sign up for the Quad-Cities Marathon, but I'm leaning that way.  It just seems like the smart thing to do.