Who Am I?

I am an avid runner and have been running since I was 15 years old. I began running low to medium distances while on my high school track team, running the 800 meter and 1600 meter races (I was a sub 5 miler and a 2 minute 800 runner). In addition to the track team, I also joined the cross country team. After high school I still wanted to run and decided to start doing road races. I have probably ran a couple hundred 5k races (16.29 PR)along with many 10k's as well. In 2009 I decided to step up my game and try to tackle my first marathon. I will be honest; the only reason I did this was because my father ran a few and I wanted to show him that I could do what he did. I trained poorly for my first one and regret it. If you are going to run a race, train like you want to win. I still continue to run marathons and other distances as well, and every race is a chance for me to better myself.
I started this blog to hopefully communicate with other runners and to shed any knowledge I may have about the sport that can help other runners. I believe running is the best sport and can be a great stress reliever. I encourage all runners to spread the word of our sport and show people why running is so good and why the community of runners has such great people. You can follow me on twitter @byrne1324 or find me on facebook- Shaun Byrne

Sunday, November 30, 2014

Recap November 24th thru the 30th

      This week was a great week for me. I haven't been able to run for a few weeks and all I wanted to do was get back on the road and run.

MONDAY: I went to the gym and did 3 miles on the treadmill. I was nervous at first because every time I ran it seemed like my cold came back.  I started out at a 10 minute pace and felt really good so I dropped to a 9 minute mile for the second. I still felt really good so for the last mile I dropped down to a 8:30 pace. I ended with a half mile walk just to get my lungs back to normal. I honestly wanted to get off the treadmill and chest bump the person next me. I was so happy to finally get in a run I didn't know how to act. I don't think the girl next to me would of appreciated me bumping chest though. After I finished running I used a few machines to work on my hips. I also did a few workouts for my abs.  When I left I felt great.

TUESDAY:  REST DAY:  Since I was so screwed up for the last 2 weeks I decided that it would be best to just take this week nice and slow until I knew for sure I was 100 percent.

WEDNESDAY:  Having a race the next day I used this day to just do an arm workout at the gym. I still felt really good and finally started to feel like my cold was almost gone.

THURSDAY: HAPPY THANKSGIVING: I ran the YMCA Turkey Trot 5 miler.  You can read my previous post to see the review. I ended up running a very safe race. I wanted to go hard but my lungs weren't up to it. I finished in 43:55, but I didn't really break a sweat and it felt awesome to get back on the road.  It never even occurred to me that running at the gym and running outside would be two different things. I think I was so happy to be running that I never even thought about the weather factor.

FRIDAY: I didn't want this day to be a rest day, but not running for a while had me beat. I figured next week is finally a week where I can get back on track and start outside again.

SATURDAY: RUCKSGIVING: I met a few obstacle racers at the point to go and hand out food to the homeless. Let me give you the rundown of this shit show of a day. We meet at 2 pm. and every city that was doing this had team leaders that were supposed to find shelters and places that we could deliver the food too.  Our team leaders called some places but it seemed like everything fell through.  We decided to head into town and see if we could find some people that may need some help. Apparently Pittsburgh's homeless hide when people are looking for them, because we couldn't find one person.  I came up with the idea to head to the Greyhound station and see if we could find anyone. We did not, however we did talk to a bus driver who pointed us into the direction of Light For Life. It is a shelter located on the north side of Pittsburgh for men.  We headed over to the shelter hoping to have some luck. Once there we talked to a supervisor who told us we could hand out our food to the people waiting for a room that evening. One stop and we unloaded over 100 sandwiches, 2 cases of water,fruit, and can goods. It felt nice to help out so many people and I am looking forward to doing it again next year.  I am sorry for not posting the time and location on my blog, we did not get the time and everything until 2 days before. All in all we ended up doing a little over 4 miles.
 SUNDAY: TODAY: Today I am just relaxing and having a few people over for the game. Tomorrow starts a new week and a week where I can run outside finally. I am also doing a run challenge for the month so I am really looking forward to that.

Until next time stay safe.

How did you spend your Thanksgiving?

8 comments:

  1. Glad to hear you are feeling better! That is so awesome you all handed out food to the homeless. If we all did nice things like that, it would be a different world out there!

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    1. I agree Sarah it would be a different world. We may have not cured the problem that day but we still made a difference in a few people's lives. It was really nice and I was thinking about trying to talk to some people and do this with the running community.

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  2. Sorry Saturday's event wasn't more organized, but it seems like it worked out really well overall. When you can help someone who really needs the help AND get a run in, that's a good day!

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    1. Yes it is. Not to many times we can say we ran and helped others as well. Hopefully I can put something together for the running community and we can do this across the country

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  3. I'm glad that you're feeling better! I think it's great to rest when you're sick, I know for me, if I keep running, it seems to prolong things.

    I have still never ran the Turkey Trot downtown, I really need to register for it some year.

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    1. Kristy you def need to run the turkey trot one year. The only thing that sucks about the race is it is always bitter cold, but it's an easy course and they get tons of people

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  4. Even though Saturday was a bit disorganized, I think it's so awesome that you didn't just throw in the towel and went way above and beyond to make sure the food was delivered to people who needed it!
    I'm also glad to hear that you're feeling better and ready to get back to it! I always appreciate running so much more after I've had to take time off!

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    1. I have never really taken a few weeks off like this before but I have to agree with you I have never appreciated it so much. I am glad to be back running again and hopefully I don't get another cold for a very long time

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