I Live in Iowa: Chapter 1

After weeks of debate about what to call my new weekly series (with virtually the same content as the old series) I decided on something pretty simple. So here we go, living in Iowa. When will this series end? I figure when I move out of Iowa, go on an extended expedition (and have no home), or die.
Well I started work this week and it is a very different situation than I was in at Kohler. There I was the only person that did finite element analysis while I was there. Now I sit in a honeycomb cubile thing with three others who do exactly what I do, and have all been doing it long than I have. When I have questions I just shout out the problem and whoever is available will answer. It’s a little more formal and tactful than that, but not much.
So far there have been no big surprises at work. They don’t have a coffee machine, so no on-sight lattes. The cafeteria is somewhat large, far smaller than any college, but big enough to have a variety of food. There are windows in the room I am in as well as huge windows in the cafeteria. Of course when I stand up at my desk the room is so big with so much stuff that I can’t see the windows, but that might be due to my height as well.

I only worked four days this week. John Deere had Good Friday off, so I had off as well. I felt guilty about taking time off because that means that I already have a deficit as far as hours worked and hours that I should work. On the other hand, it was nice to have a day off. I considered going in on Friday to do a few hours of work, but I ended up sleeping in two hours and not feeling like working. Instead I went out to coffee and then ran all after noon.

Speaking of running, this was quite the week for me. I started off by doing the 20+ mile tempo that I consider one of my core workouts leading up to Green Bay but it was incredibly windy Sunday afternoon when I tried so after averaging 6:15 pace for 13.6 miles I quit. That’s at least 5 seconds per mile slower than I wanted. As an example, The first two miles were run into the wind in 6:22 and 6:40. Both of those were at what I considered 6:00-6:10 pace. The one mile I measured going with the wind at that same effort was only 5:50. In other words the wind slowed me down maybe 15-20 seconds per mile going into the wind but only gave me 10 seconds per mile going with the wind. It was brutal. Then I moved to Iowa…

After a few days of running up and down the bluffs trying to find a nice place to run I ran a track workout Thursday. I ran an 8k in 27:14, which is really good for me. That’s 20 seconds faster than my 8k cross country personal record. That was one of the five workouts I want to get done before I race the marathon and it went better than expected, which is always a good sign. Still feeling good Friday I decided to take advantage of the afternoon and do a long run. At least, give myself the opportunity to do a long run if I feel good enough a few miles into the run. Well, I discovered (was told about by a coworker and bicycle store employee) the Heritage Trail just north of Dubuque. It is AMAZING!! It is pancake flat, flatter than all the other rail trails I have run on. It is nice and cinder/dirt so a little softer than pavement. The moral of the story is that I went through two miles in 13:38, very surprised to be going that fast, but I never slowed down. I do not think I had even one mile over 7 minutes. I ran 15 miles out in about 1:42 and 15 miles back in about 1:41 which includes approximately a 2:57 marathon. I was pretty exhausted the last few miles, but still managed to maintain the same pace and even kick it in the last mile. Basically, it was the second best long run I have ever had, behind only the 20 miler at 6:20 pace that I ran about 16 months ago. Also, to do it the day after a tempo, is rather surprising.

In other news I watched three Redbox movies and wrote another sonnet. My mom and sister also brought a couch, dresser, television, and my bicycle down so now I have more than a bed in my apartment. All in all, a good week.