Some Cruel April Fools' Joke

The month of April started off OK, with a morning drive with my wife, family visits, a short run to cap off another successful pre-training week, Chipotle for dinner, an Old Fashioned made "the way dear ol' dad used to," and the second episode of this season's Mad Men. Then, by the end of the episode, I was feeling bloated and queasy. A few hours later, I was yacking into the toilet. Another couple hours of tossing and turning, and I was doing it again.

Going through the events of the last day, I tried to come up with a reason for my sudden sickness:

• Too much running?
• Chipotle poisoning?
• Old Fashioned intoxication?
• Mad Men madness?

After the first bout of nausea, I went downstairs to attempt to sleep on the couch. Mrs. Viper came down the next morning not feeling well herself. We thought maybe food poisoning since we both had it and both had the steak from Chipotle. We barely ate anything yesterday. The doctor told us it wasn't food poisoning, but a virus.  Now I'm wondering who got us sick.

Kind of a shame to end the weekend like that.

Friday, Saturday and Sunday featured some good running. Despite a series of mishaps to start Friday's run, my three-miler turned out to a be one of my quickest of the year. I wore my new reflective vest for the first time and decided to try out the chest pocket to carry my phone.

I didn't make it past my next door neighbor's house before turning around to grab my running belt. By the time I got back out the door and down the road just enough not to turn back, it started raining. I wished I had a hat and my gloves, but oh well. Then my sock started slipping below my heel, but oh well.

When I finished, I was surprised to see the fast pace. My run benefited from "rain speed."

rain speed n. 1. unexpected quickness due to downpour, 2. when the desire to get out of rainy weather causes one to move faster than normal.

Saturday's long trail run was one of my more awesome runs of the year. I took a slightly new route on the Buckeye Trail and looped over to the Valley Bridal Trail for eight miles. The scenery was excellent, I saw many deer along the way, and I'm pretty sure I saw a Sasquatch. It was a perfect way to wrap up March's mileage.

Sunday's three-miler should have been slower, because my legs were tired and were clearly in need of recovery. Nevertheless, I wrapped up another good week of running.

With all that said, March went out like a lamb and April arrived with showers. Here's last month's statistical rundown:

• Total Miles: 65 miles (15 runs)
• Total Time: 12.12 hours
• Highest Weekly: 17 miles
• Average Weekly: 16.25 miles
• Average Pace: 11:11/mile
• The Monthly Dif: +18 miles (47 miles in February)

My average pace slowed again this month, but all my longer runs have been on trails, where my average pace is 12:18 per mile. March also included my first race of the year -- also on trails -- the Dirty Dash 10K.

April's pre-training plan has me getting up to double-digit long runs, finally. This week I have four runs planned for a total of 18 miles, with a long run of nine miles and at least one run on trails.

An Old Fashioned Guy
BrianFlash inspired to make some cocktails this weekend. I'm usually a beer or straight Scotch man, but his musings about Bourbon got me thinking about Old Fashioneds. I picked up some Elijah Craig, bitters, maraschino cherries, and oranges, then set about to make some beverages.

Just press the button marked booze.

Mrs. Viper also picked up a bottle of Mr. & Mrs. T's mixer, which was surprisingly tasty, although I don't care for the high fructose syrup content.

Farewell Caballo
If you missed my update from Sunday, Micah True (aka Caballo Blanco) was found dead Saturday after being reported missing when he didn't return from a run in the Gila Wilderness in New Mexico. Christopher McDougall, who introduced the world to the man who started the Copper Canyon Ultra Marathon, which was the central storyline of Born to Run, has this tribute on his blog.