Back in January, Wife and I ran the Carlsbad Half Marathon, my first half marathon. Those 13.1 miles were the first in a series of three half marathons, making up the Triple Crown. We are now training for the La Jolla Half Marathon on April 26th, 2009. This is week 1 and 2 of that half marathon training program.

Wow, so it has been three weeks since I last updated the running diary. So I will try and keep this relatively short since I have a lot to cover.

Tuesday – 3 miles – 27:04 (Husband)

This is the first time since we started training back in November that Wife and I ran separately. Wife ran on a treadmill because the weather was a little to cold in Seattle for her to run outside. I ran our normal 3 mile loop. I ran my fastest while wife ran a little slower, however, she set the treadmill to change inclines on her so she would get the hills in.

Friday – 5 miles – 47:43

Just the standard 5 mile loop around the neighborhood that gives us some hills to run up.

Sunday – 6 miles – 59:23

We wanted to get away from the neighborhood so we drove down to Balboa Park. The Friends of Balboa Park have mapped out and marked some great running trails. You can download the map of the trails here. The fourth route was a little short so we knew we would have to add on .6 miles. The best part of the route was not only the sites of Balboa Park you never see but the hills. During the route you run down through the cactus garden, up Pershing (a mile plus long incline), down into Florida Canyon, up Florida canyon at about 45 degrees (this hill is killer), and then up some more to the finish line. We should be able to take Torrey Pines!

Tuesday – 3 miles – 28:00

Another fun run around the neighborhood.

Friday – 5 miles – 47:05

Our fastest 5 miles yet. And we are able to talk throughout most of the run. Funny part is I was not feeling that well.

Sunday – 7 miles – 1:07:45

Still not feeling well, I did not want to miss a run. This time we headed up to the end of Adams Ave to take a look around University Heights. Mostly it is because wife likes to do house shopping. Even while sick Wife still managed to drag me to an under 10 minute mile.

Tuesday – 3 miles – 28:58

We ran this one at night because I could not run in the morning. As you can see not our best time but a decent time nonetheless.

Friday – 5 miles – 49:51

Another quick jaunt around the ol’ neighborhood.

Sunday – 8+ miles – 1:15:00ish

We were under a tight deadline and had to be home by 11:30 (Wife had to work), so that meant our plans to run in La Jolla were dashed. Instead we decided to run the Balboa Park loop with some additional mileage added on. Unfortunately our GPS watched died (I forgot to charge it) at about mile 1 so you can see that our time and length is a guesstimate. According to mapmyrun.com we ran over 8 miles (I underestimated the distance added). That made us feel good because that was an 8+ mile run with the same big hills (Pershing and Florida Canyon).

Only four more weeks until La Jolla. So far we are feeling good and ready!