The Rowe Family Blog

Yesterday, at around 1 PM I hit a new milestone in my running “career.”  I ran my 1,000th mile in 2008!  In 2007 I didn’t keep a full record of the miles I ran.  I’ve crushed my mileage for 2007 and I still have 3 months left in the year.  I expect to post high mileage (for me) for the next 1.5 months.  After the big day my mileage will drop but I’ll probably keep it around 30-40 miles per week.

I haven’t been posting much about running.  I’ve been running.  A lot.  I’ve been roughly following my training plan since returning from vacation.  This year has been fantastic.  During my runs my effort hasn’t increased but my times keep dropping.   That’s not to say that training is easy for me.  It takes up a lot of time, is tiring, and makes me incredibly hungry.  The time I spend running is time that I almost always enjoy…except maybe the last few miles of 20 mile runs!  It’s tiring but that helps me to sleep well.  I’m hungry and eating like crazy but not gaining any weight.  For many people that’s a dream come true (if that’s your dream then just start running!).

My most important runs while training for a marathon the long runs.  Read the rest of this entry »

On Friday August 1st I did two things I don’t usually do.  I got to see an old friend and I ran a 5k, the Father Murphy 5k.  I don’t usually run 5ks because I tend to prefer longer races.  It’s just not a good value paying $20 for 20-30 minutes of racing!  Three times now I have splurged and run 5ks.  The first time I wasn’t yet a runner and threw up before I finished the race.  The second time was at Geneseo on a hilly course.  This time the course wasn’t as hilly and it was on my home turf.  The race was about 1.5 miles from my house and was partly in an area that I run often.  Read the rest of this entry »

This post is about 3 weeks late but here it is none the less. Read the rest of this entry »

If you’ve paid close attention to this website you already noticed that I added a link (on the left) to a shark attack map. Most people that know me know that I’m rather fascinated by sharks and particularly shark attacks. For quite some time I’ve been helping to maintain a map cataloging shark attacks around the world.

The shark attack map is not my map. It was started quite some time ago by “Bianca2000.” I’ve never met “Bianca.” I started contributing to her map because she was cool enough to leave her map open for contributions from anyone. Attacks posted by “endOfPath” are from me.

The map won an award from Platial (where it is hosted) in the outdoors category for 2007. I’m not sure why I never got around to posting here about the map. Since it is Shark Week I thought the timing was right to post about this. This is the one week out of the year that I actually wish I paid for television service (luckily I can rent Shark Week DVDs!).

Mary has organized the first (annual?) Matlyn Drive Streetsale.  It will be on August 16th from 8 AM to 4 PM.  More than 10 homes are participating.  That’s almost the entire street.  Photos of some of the items are available here.

There will be a lot of different items for sale including:

• 4 Poster Queen bed frame
• Solid mahogany bedroom set including double bed, mens dressers, womens dresser, two night stands, and mirror from Kling (Kling became Ethan Allen)
• Glass dining room table
• Glass coffee table
• Solid wood dining room table, chairs, and hutch
• Every day Pfalzcraft dish set of 6
• Silver China Set
• 13″ TV/VCR combo
• Movies
• Toys
• Tools
• Items for babies and kids

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Today was the first scheduled day of my training for the 2008 Marine Corps Marathon!  I’m already deviating from the schedule.  Last week I was running and had to stop a few times from the pain. Read the rest of this entry »

This morning I set out for my weekly long run. I did set out to run my usual route, the Rowe Half, at about 7 AM. The weather was great! It was about 70 and “partly sunny.” There were more clouds than sunshine but it was very comfortable for the entire run. It was humid but 70 degrees and humid isn’t a big deal.

Since it is now summer there’s plenty of roadkill. I saw what I think was an o’possum. At least it may have been one…some time ago. At this point it’s just a twisted mess of leathery furry grossness that has left a stain on the road. It’s not easy to stain asphalt! I also witnessed an alarming PRK (phantom road kill). PRKs are never pleasant but they are somewhat easy to deal with. Holding your breath while running isn’t fun but it’s necessary sometimes. What frightened me about this PRK was that I witnessed it running past the butcher shop. Read the rest of this entry »

Yesterday I ran the 2008 Fast and the Furriest 10k road race. This event has a 10k road race followed by a 1 mile dog walk. They are different events. The runners don’t have to walk dogs to complete the race.

This was my second 10k. The first one, the Dorschel Madd Dash, I didn’t run as a race but rather just as a training run with John last year. I had forgotten until yesterday that I had run the Madd Dash and so I thought this was a guaranteed PR. It wasn’t but I knew I could beat my previous 10k time. Read the rest of this entry »

Exactly one week ago I had the best long run I’ve ever had. I wasn’t going to write about it since
posting about every single run I do is excessive and boring. However I got on a kick reading old blog entries and realized the value about writing about exceptional runs. I found some posts talking about long runs, my times, and how I felt. Not only were they far more entertaining than what I usually write but they showed me how I’ve progressed with running. So I will share my a recent long run. It was the best I’ve had so far! Read the rest of this entry »