Not a lot of fluff this week, just some straight-to-the-point updates and information for y’all.  After a very productive 10-day training block back in Eugene, I’ll be flying back to the East Coast tomorrow for Sunday’s Philadelphia Rock n’ Roll half marathon.  Strictly a business trip – flying from PDX on Friday and back to Oregon on Sunday after the race – this will be my last real tune-up before the Chicago marathon on Oct. 7th.

Speaking of Chicago, a complete list of the men’s and women’s elite fields were announced earlier this week.  As the executive race director of the Chicago marathon, Carey Pinkowski, alluded, “the men’s field is the deepest we’ve ever had in Chicago.”  I’m grateful to be a part of this year’s race and believe that I have a tremendous opportunity in front of me to run well on one of the biggest marathon stages.  I’ll share more thoughts about Chicago as we get closer to raceday.

Turning the attention back to this weekend, I am optimistic that my string of good races in Philadelphia will continue.  My last 3 visits to the City of Brotherly Love have resulted in 3 new PR’s – one for the 10k, one for the 10-mile, and one for the half marathon.  Almost by default, Philadelphia has become one of my favorite cities to run races.  I’m not necessarily looking for a new half marathon PR this weekend, especially considering the 132 miles I logged last week.  But Philadelphia is noted for putting up some fast times, so if I accidentally stumble across one, I won’t complain.

An added bonus to racing in Philadelphia, will be the short, but quality time, I get to spend with a few of Philly’s best doctors, Pat and Virginia Harvey.  If nothing else, I’ll return back to Oregon a smarter person; you can’t spend 5 minutes around the Harveys without learning at least one new/interesting fact.

I’ll end by giving you some reading material for the weekend.  When I was in London, I met up with current OU journalism student, Danny Medlock.  He stumbled across my website and realized that we were both in London during the Olympics, so he reached out to me for an interview.  We had to work through the difficulties of trying to coordinate a time and place to meet sans phone service, but like any good Bobcat, he adapted well. Ohio’s journalism school is one of the best in the country, and it’s because of students like Danny, and the opportunities OU provides them.  I might be a little biased, but he put together a fantastic narrative on my running career – past, present, and future.  Give it a read.

3 weeks from today, I’ll be in Chicago.  There’s still a lot to do between now and then, but it’s close enough to start getting a little antsy!

Go Bobcats! (sitting 34th in last week’s AP poll, in case you were scoring at home).