Island Mode

Today’s submission is being penned from the balcony of a Gulf front condo on beautiful Sanibel Island, FL. Our family and close friends have been gathering here every summer for an annual reunion for the past 30 years. In all that time, this island has not changed a bit.

I got up early this morning for my first ever run on the island. I ran a 5 mile route around the perimeter of a nature preserve at the heart of Sanibel. I did manage to include about a mile and a half along Periwinkle Way, Sanibel’s main street. Periwinkle is of course pockmarked by gift shops and vacation rental offices but also long standing landmarks like Bailey’s General Store and the epitome of island health food cuisine – Cheeburger Cheeburger (excuse me while I take a moment to wipe the drool off of my keyboard).

There were surprisingly few people out at 7 am. During the 45 minute run I only saw 4 other runners and couple of bicyclists. I did manage to get chased by a dog. No run would be complete without that.

It was a great way to begin August and finish and my first week of marathon training. I ran my long run yesterday, Deland’s infamous 9 mile hills route. I am still sore today, especially in my Achilles, so I treated today’s run as a recovery run at an easy 9:40ish pace. Afterward I waded into the Gulf (no tar balls here), the water probably wasn’t cold enough to offer much benefit, but the massaging action of waves felt good.

The run went surprisingly well considering my poor nutrition, hydration and sleep over the past 24 hours. It was a travel day so we ate fast food and I “camelled up” with several beers late into the evening.

I finished July just a hair over 100 miles. A little less than I have been averaging over the past few months, but I was focusing on speed workouts instead of distance. In fact my longest run of the month was yesterday’s 9 miler. I did run 22 days last month, including two, six day stretches of consecutive running days. So while the mileage was down, the intensity was way up. I’m feeling great now and ready for week two of marathon training.