the good, the bad and the ugly

While my blogging hasn't been very consistent, keeping up on my training has...  for the most part.  The latter has proved to be more and more difficult in the last few weeks.  Let me break it down for you.

The Good:

1.  I am more than halfway done with marathon training.
2.  I have finally lost a few pounds... 3.5 to be exact.  Anything at this point is welcomed.
3.  I have had some awesome runs where I really kept a consistent "race pace" and felt good afterwards.

The Bad:

1.  Knee pain, especially in the last week or so.  This Friday I ran 9 miles at race pace and I could hardly move my left leg later that night.  The pain has persisted all weekend.  I think it is an IT problem because the pain goes up the outer upper thigh.  I am pretty concerned about this being a lingering problem at this point.  I don't know how to balance taking time of to heal (hopefully) while keeping up my training/fitness.
2.  Over the next 7 weekends I have one 19 mile run and three 20 mile runs.  If I felt healthy I wouldn't be as weary about this.  I felt great after a 17 mile run a week and a half ago, but that was before my knee problems.

The Ugly:

1.  My top of middle toe on my left foot.  No matter what shoes I wear or what I do I get a nasty blister.  You can thank me for no picture. 
2.  Me running in "hot" weather.  I have stated this before,  I don't do well in heat.  And since I live next to the coast where it is perpetually overcast this time of year, I classify anytime the sun is shining on a clear day as hot.  A few weeks ago it was one of those clear days and I was miserable.  As I was running my wife drove by on her way to the dentist.  Since she knows my disdain for running while its sunny out and the fact that I looked like crap, she made a point to look at the temperature gauge on the car.  It read 65 degrees.  Seriously, 65 degrees.  Most people would give anything to run in weather sunny and 65 but not me.  Am I the biggest wimp or what?
3.  I forgot band aids over my nips for an 8 mile run.  I had scabs the next day.  Enough said.

Hopefully it won't be another month until I update this blog again :-)