It’s been a minute. I hope you’re doing well.

The runs got so soft in the past few months that they stopped. They all felt hard. I ran all winter, but every effort started to feel like I’d taken the last three months off.

The sway of comfort at home won out most times. “I’ll just give it a mile,” I’d say. “See how it feels.”

And most of the time it stunk.

Familiar routes and hills and paces now felt alien. Stretches I’ve cruised a hundred times before were now misery.

So I got back to softness:

• REST: I took a full week off of running. I looked back through my Strava and couldn’t find the last time I didn’t run in a week. One year I took all of December off from running. I think I’ll do that again this year.

• BALANCE: I got a bike trainer and a Zwift subscription. Biking is easy on the body, and the virtual world is peaceful and calm. Biking is easier on the body, which lets you stay active but without beating up your body. Also, while I appreciate the spin / Peleton universe, the Zwift world is more my style because I can catch up to people and pass them (sometimes).

• SLEEP: I got myself a Whoop band, and then learned how poorly I was sleeping. It was bad. This set me on a path to figure out how to build more restful sleep. Big surprise - I now sleep with an eye mask!

I’ve said before, you can’t fake sleep, and now I’m finally taking my own advice. Drink plenty of water, rest, eat enough, and go slow when you need to.

That’s the Soft Run.