A Running Goal after Asia

We did a ton of walking in Asia.  A few stair-heavy climbs to sights, and lots of hours of just traipsing about.  Quite a bit of the work on travel days was with 20+ pounds of packs on on our backs, fronts, whatnot.  We'd regularly look at the map, decide it was only a mile or 2 from where we'd exited transit and just hoof it with everything we owned in Asia on our bodies.  A 20 minute mile with 10+ Kg of extra weight will get the heart rate up, my friends.  Especially if there is an increase in elevation.  All things considered, after Asia, I actually feel relatively fit in a way I don't in my normal life. 

However, I did not do much running in Asia at all.

All told, in the last 10 weeks I think I ran about 10-15 times in gyms (wherever there was I gym in our hotel I tried to put it to good use, often doing core and weights as well), plus another 10-15 attempts outside, most of which didn't go super well due to road conditions, safety, getting lost, etc.  The typical outdoor running attempt probably took around an hour and resulted in somewhere around 2 miles of total running plus lots of walking, figuring things out, pushups, dips, and other random exercises, typically at outdoor gyms (they are all over the place).

We've been back in the US for a week now, and I've definitely increased my running frequency, but I'm still battling a deep chest cough that I developed after my second brutal cold in a row in Japan.  Those Japanese colds were horrid (E claims I got asian bird flu), but I can't complain because my body was kind enough to keep my head nice and clear for the diving portion of our travels (when, if I'd had a cold, I would have been unable to equalize my ears, so no diving).

My runs since we've been back have been 1-2 miles of easy jogging uphill followed by 2ish jog/walk miles back down, hacking up gunk from my lungs.  Nothing fast.  Nothing high effort.  But something aerobic and it feels so good.  I totaled around 6 miles run/walking in 2 days in the hills this week and I was *sore* the third day, but I still fit in another 1 mile up running, 2 miles recovery coughing, and another 1.5 hiking up and down the hills while catching up with a friend on the third day.  So 9 miles in 3 days plus some down days for travel this week...

Clearly, I have some running ground to recover.

But, we're in the US for another 6 weeks before we head out to Europe, so my goal is to slowly increase my mileage and running fitness, and then, unless I discover a random race where we're staying the US, my next goal race is a parkrun in Paris!

Either Mont Souris or Bois de Boulogne April 22nd.  After I've actually been running consistently for a couple of weeks, I'll come up with some actual goals.  But in the meantime, I'm super excited to have a goal race for the first time since Summer 2016.