Yesterday's run was brought to you by wind and cloud cover.
Its actually the only run I did this week although I did manage some strength training.
Barry was working so I was on my own for crewing this run and instead of getting everything ready ahead of time I pulled a "It'll be fiiiiiiiine" approach and regretted it almost immediately.
As of right now the boys are still in school so Fridays are my long run days and it works out really well except I'm a slow runner and sometimes I come right up against the deadline of needed to go pick them up. Which is almost what happened yesterday.
I have approached the last couple of runs that way I would Habanero, walk the first half and do running intervals during the second half. The reasoning for this is that HH starts at noon. It starts at noon so you are fresh when you hit the hottest part of the day and as you start getting tired, it starts moving into the evening and cooling down. This is a great plan except that my training long runs have to start at 8am so I can finish before I have to go pick up the boys. Meaning I start when its cool and it gets hotter as I get higher in my mileage.
I decided to do this run backwards and run intervals from miles 1-8 so I could bank time to be able to walk the hottest part of my run and it worked great! I was able to run my tiny little intervals and add a little length to the interval with each mile. I was able to maintain those intervals all the way until the last three miles where I ran out of ice and water. I still felt surprisingly good, not perfect, but really good considering this was my longest run in a really, really long time.
I will say that miles 11-14 were incredibly difficult. It was hot. I knew that when I ran out of my current ice there was no more. I worried that if I pushed too hard and got woozy there was no one near (that I knew) that could come help me. I was worried that even if I could finish the distance I would be putting myself and my boys at risk when I went to go pick them up from school. If I pushed too hard because I felt good during the run would that hold up and allow me to get home safely?
And then I worried that I was worrying too much and making up ridiculous situations because other than being hot and tired I really was fine.
Welcome to my brain.
In the end everything worked out great! I was able to hit an awesome pace considering I included all of my potty breaks and time I spent refilling my pack. The potty breaks wont take as long during the race because I will just use the porta potties and not have to let myself back into the house, go to the bathroom, then lock everything back up again. And Barry/my crew will have my packs ready for me so that will save time during the race as well. So I'm REALLY happy with my pace for this run.
That being said, my run took so long that in the time it took me to finish it, two guys built a shed in their backyard.
This was also an important run because my last two long runs I had to cut short because of time or because I was ill-equipped for the run and had to quit for safety reasons. I needed to finish this run or I wouldn't be able to gradually increase my mileage over the summer. As it is I'm up against the wire. This is my current plan (highlighted workouts are ones I've completed):
I have my long runs set up to increase two miles each long run and I alternate weeks between long runs and shorter recovery runs (those 8 milers). If I miss a long run or two the increase from week to week will be too much to do safely. But I am DETERMINED to get this race done. A 50K has been on my list for years now and its starting to give me an eye twitch that I haven't finished one.
I really feel like this is my year to do it. My mom can watch the boys for my long runs and I can run my shorter runs on the treadmill. I have almost finished my first 12 week Sweat program. I completed 30 days of 75 Hard. I'm starting to get my discipline back and realizing that I can do hard things. And that those hard things, aren't as hard as I thought they were.
-Ri
