Let the Disney taper begin...

Haven't had time yet to do the weekly roll-up from last week, but the important thing to note is that I'm now in taper mode for my first marathon. I did my second and final 20-miler Saturday with Michele--felt light years better than the first 20-miler, even with the snow and even colder temperatures. We ended up running mostly roads and parking lots to get our mileage--we spent about 2 miles attempting to run our normal path (normal being the only path I sort of know up there) along the Des Plaines River trail, but with about 6-7" of snow still on the ground and compacted, we opted for safer plowed surfaces so neither of us killed an ankle. Really cold, but I was still going strong at the end--well, strong might be pushing it, but I felt a lot better than I did at the end of my first 20-miler. Michele had a rough run, though, and being the crappy running partner that I am, I ran out of encouraging things to say fairly early into the burn...guess that's something I need to work on as well.

It's been brutally cold so far this week--thankfully, I didn't have to venture out to run on Sunday or yesterday, as both were the sort of cold days that makes even the heartiest loyal Midwesterner question what in the hell makes us live here. Today was only slightly warmer--at least the wind chill was above zero for most of the day...but it's supposed to start warming up more tomorrow. Nevertheless, it's a treadmill week for me--I'm resolving not to run outside again unless the wind chill is above 10 degrees, so I'll be doing my 6-miler inside tomorrow morning. At least I'm done with the mid-week 8-milers for now...those are brutally tough to fit in before morning meetings.

Not sure when I'll get my weekly stuff summarized or post again, so Merry Christmas, everyone...