August already....

Once again, I'm shocked at how fast time has flown.

LifeTime tri seems like eons ago -- it's been almost a month since the event.

Last weekend, I ran in the Urban Wildland 1/2 marathon. The day was cool but very humid and a little drizzly. I ran with a bunch of my friends from my running club. We all had successful days, with several of us posting PRs. I ran the 1/2 in 2:16 -- about 3 minutes faster than my 1/2 at Grandma's.

I'm very happy with my running so far this year. That heart rate training stuff really works. (I suppose that losing weight certainly helps too...) I'm hoping that I can stay healthy and strong between now and Chicago Marathon, which is less than 2 months away.

I've been jammed up at work -- Sale Conferences, traveling, projects due. Earlier this week I was in Salt Lake City for a few days for work. SLC is actually a very pretty city -- clean, walkable, designed for people to actually live downtown (meaning complete with grocery stores, parks and other people amenities.)

I got a fun workout in "running" up a canyon. There are some trails that will take up up the mountain through a park -- all very beautiful. I had a much easier time running down than up. SLC's elevation is over 4,000 feet. Minneapolis is only 900 some feet. Big difference.

I also took their light rail to the University of Utah one morning so I could swim at the Steiner Aquatic Center. The U of U campus is very pretty. Parts of it are relatively new -- rebuilt for the 2002 Winter Olympics, which were held in SLC and Park City, which is a mountain town close to SLC.

The Aquatic Center was great. They have a huge indoor pool (25 meter lengths) and a really terrific outdoor lane pool with 50 meter lengths. I swam outside. That was really wonderful. Warm sunshine, great pool and mountains all around me.

Hubby and I have been golfing quite a bit. We played a very fun 18 hole public course near our house last weekend -- very hilly and challenging but a lot of fun. I'm very glad that we have an outdoor hobby that we can really enjoy.

The Sales Conference and travel have gotten my eating and sleeping a bit off track...no disastrous consequences, but I know that I need to get back in to the routine of getting lots of rest and eating right.

Plans for this weekend: golf league tonight; long run tomorrow (16 miles); visit with my cousin, who is in town for a week, on Sunday.

Plans for next week: get through two days of work and then finally have a few days of vacation to gear up my training and to relax. Yee ha!