I hadn't got around to posting about some of my earlier races, so thought I'd combine them all into one. This will be a long post! This year I set out early in the year to train for a spring half marathon - using an actual plan for the first time. I tried to follow Hal Higdon's advanced half marathon plan. In the plan it's suggested to do a 5, 10, and 15k races working up to the half. I ended up with a 5k and two 10k races, though I'll skip over the 5k race in this report since several of us thought we were at the turn around and ended up severely shorting the course! Whoopsie! Training went fairly well, though some of my training was with minimalist shoes since it was early in February. I had to really juggle many of the workout around my work schedule though, doing 1/4mi sprints at fast pace just wasn't a good idea after sitting in...

My youngest child belongs to a boys group called Royal Rangers. As part of the advancement system they are required to attend various activities with the outpost. For this month I would be required to accompany him on a 5 mile hike up Mt. Hedgehog in the White Mountains of New Hampshire, USA. IF I didn’t go, he couldn’t go and wouldn’t earn this quarters badge since I had already opted out of the overnight campout. My big question was should I attempt this hike barefoot?

The trail conditions for the area said the trails were all clear of snow and the weather forecast was for temps to be above 40° F in the nearest town. No snow was encouraging, but still colder than I normally walk around unshod. I look at my dwindling shoe collection and realize I have several nice pairs of barefoot style shoes, but my summer hiking boots have all worn out and been tossed, except...

Note: Technically, our birthday was yesterday. Oops!

This was the first half I'd run in about 7 years. The last time I ran it I had my trusty old Asics on, did a 2:03 and was limping for a week. After I recovered from that I tried to get back into training and ended up with shin splints thanks to my stomping overstrides. It was the painful beginning of my minimalist journey because I knew there had to be a better way.

This Saturday ended up being a nice end cap to my minimalist/unshod "transition" these last 7 years. I did the whole 13.1 miles over rough chip seal pavement, scored up pavement under construction and gravel all in the rain totally unshod and ended up finishing in 1:46. It was the longest distance I'd ever run at that fast of a pace and it was so much fun.

My original plan for the weekend was entirely different a few months ago. I was already signed up...