Food, Fitness, Photography

Food, Fitness, Photography

Sunday, July 14, 2013

Long Runs

(and a 4 mile race)

I'm working on getting my mileage up...and I need to do it by adding more long runs, not by doing 4 or 5 miles every day.  Right now the important thing for me is to get my feet/body used to running for long periods of time.  I planned a hilly 10 mile run for Sean and I on Monday, that we were going to do before I headed to a meeting at 4:00.  However, my meeting got cancelled.  We didn't get out the door until about 3:30.  Then, as we were nearing home, we were at about 9.3 miles, and I felt good.  I wanted to keep going, but it was already probably the longest run Sean had ever done, and his blisters were bothering him, so I sent him home, and I kept on going.  I figured I would do about 12 miles.  But then I was getting near 12 miles, and I my legs were chugging along on auto-pilot, so I decided to go for 2 hours.  I ended up getting home at 14 miles in just under 2 hrs.  I was crawling at that point, but I didn't care.

I took Tuesday off, and then Wednesday we headed to the Greenbrier River Trail in the cool of the morning to do a long flat run, and ended up getting 10 miles. We picked up the pace for the last 2 miles, and Sean ran off ahead for the last 1.5 miles or so to stretch his legs and I just kept chugging along at my pace.  I slowed back down for the last 1/2 mile so I wouldn't have to jog my cool-down.

Sean ran on Thursday, but I needed a break.  Friday he took a break and my planned 4-6 miler turned into an 8 miler.  Saturday was the 4 mile John Henry Days race.  I wasn't quite sure how it would go, since I hadn't had a single run all week that was less than 8 miles or 1 hour long.  But, turns out all those long runs did not hurt my ability to PR a sprint race.  I PR'd by about 20 seconds.  And won the race for the 3rd year in a row.  I came in 5th overall, I got passed by 2 kids in the last quarter mile.  Not sure where they came from, I don't remember noticing them around the 2 mile turn around, but clearly they both had good end-of-race kicks.

Today, I didn't want to take the day completely off, but wasn't sure if I would have enough energy to get through a run or not, so we went for a bike ride instead.  I've never found biking to be a very satisfying workout before, but I put a lot more effort into it today...and felt a whole bunch of muscles that I have not felt in a long time.  So clearly I have just been far too lazy on all my other bike rides.  Might be time to fix that.

This Week:
 M: 14 / 1:57:34 / 8:23 (9.3 w/Sean)
T: rest
W: 10 / 1:17:38 / 7:45 (River Trail w/Sean)
R: rest 
F: 8.15 / 1:06:18 / 8:08
Sa: 4 / 25:04 / 6:16 (race)
Su: 6.9 / 27:28 / 15.07 mph (bike)
total : 36.15 miles (run)
6.9 miles (bike)

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