I haven’t run more than 20 miles since the marathon in October, and the thought of starting again makes me cringe. I’ve been following Jason Calacanis (he’s down 15+ lbs. yesterday) and others as they blog about their quest to lose weight, and have thought about fatblogging myself, but just haven’t quite made the leap to action. Then today, while scanning the headlines, I came across this article summarizing the results of a study revealing that office workers (i.e., people like me that sit at a desk all day) are most at risk for deep vein thrombosis (DVT). That’s the scary condition where blood clots form in the legs, and in some cases break loose heading directly to the lungs or heart, often resulting in a quick demise. The condition has frequently been attributed to air travel and other situations where sitting for long periods of time restricts the flow of blood in the legs.

Well that’s enough for me. I’ve got to make some changes. I’m have a trip tomorrow… while I’m gone, I’ll work on setting some health goals, which will include getting up off my arse at least a couple times a day, shedding some weight, and getting back to daily runs. I’ll post my plan and progress once I get back.

We ran out-and-back from Fit Right Northwest on 23rd Ave., north to Thurman St., then west up to (and a couple miles in) the Leif Erickson trail at Forest Park. Our group is training at a 3:50 target marathon time, but I think the pace setter may have thought they said 2:50! The 3.5 miles uphill were brutal. Rick pointed out that last week, we were all carrying on conversations, this week… not a word. Coming down we had the wind and rain in our face, but I thought it was great. For me, there is just something refreshing about running in the rain. Nobody bothered to clock it, but it looks like we came in about 1:04 for 7 miles. Not too shabby!

I have read much about the Leif Erickson trail, and even in the dreary weather it was beautiful. Along most of our run, we looked out over the Willamette river. Under favorable conditions, the view must be spectacular. This will definitely be a favorite Spring/Summer run.