Week 3 of my marathon training ended yesterday. The miles are racking up and considering I am only running three times a week they’re increasing steadily just as the paces are decreasing. My long run for yesterday was a scheduled 17 at 8:24 pace. I set my Garmin for a 8:20-8:30 alert spread, that gives me enough wiggle room allowing for ups and downs etc! I was late getting out and instead of being on the road by before 9am it was closer to 10:30, skies had high cloud and it was coolish. A 26oz hand bottle; which I would refill at a gas station, and two gels were coming along for the ride.
Ten miles later I was cooked, and the wheels were coming off, I was also at the furthest point from my house. I had a walk break to cool down in the shade and collect myself. I pushed on another couple of miles and walked again, I was on the home stretch and a sideways loop was needed to hit the 17 mile mark, it did cross my mind that I could just trudge around and finish up the distance but the whole basis of the FIRST training program is quality over quantity, so I decided to cut things short and try and pick up the pace as best I could. I finished up the run at 14 miles, 3 miles short and an average pace (excluding walk breaks) of 8:30, at the upper end of my bracket, here are the splits:
Once I got home I felt pretty crappy mentally and physically. I was reminded that this is my longest run since, well last week but really since last September before my injury. My other consolation was that the thermometer in the garden (picture above) read 106f! Now it does sit in the sun all day so even if you offset it against the one in the car which read 92f, it averages out at 99F. So however you look at it, it was toasty!
Not to be out done I really wanted to finish off the mileage, next week is a 20 mile long run, the first of five in this program, so I need to get the time on my feet. I laced up my shoes and headed out in the cool of the evening to claim my extra 3 miles, I wanted to added some speed so I decided on a nice progression run, getting faster each mile, the splits speak for themselves:
I was starting to freak myself out in the afternoon over my fitness and although this is not the best way to do things it’s nice to know that I can pull off things like this.
I was once again reminded we all have bad runs; it’s what we do afterwards that counts.
Well that sucks, but I guess that it'll serve as a bit of a warning that you should get out earlier to avoid the heat.
ReplyDeleteOf course running hard when you're tired might end up with you getting injured, which isn't a good place to be; unless you want to sit with me in the biff corner?
That is mighty hot! I had a not so great run today- a wake up call for me to adjust my nutrition and hyrdration for the warmer weather, that's for sure. I just remind myself that its ok to have the bad run during training, so my body can recover and learn from it to lead to a better race day.
ReplyDeleteConsidering the heat, it sounds like you made the right choice to cut the run short. I couldnt imagine running in temps that high. Ouch
ReplyDeleteI'd say give yourself some more training time and yes run shorter now and more spicy than dragging yourself and risking getting injured. You'll get there...a bad run happens to the best;-)
ReplyDeleteMy bad run is better than most peoples best day :-) I want it to warm up!!
ReplyDeleteSorry the run didn't go as you expected. It is better to have a few bad training runs that a bad race.
ReplyDeleteI would say you claimed those 3 miles nicley!!
ReplyDeleteThose temps...holy cow it seems to early in the year for that.
Agreed, some days it doesn't go so well but how you deal with it matters. That's pretty hot and toasty and I suspect the heat was the major culprit. Nothing wrong with your running just your heat tolerance which is expected since we just came off our winter season of cool temps and rain. I remember the weekend of Coyote Two Moon we had great weather here and you guys were hammered by a storm. More hot and toasty runs should cure you of that:) Lucky you, I have to sit in a sauna to get heat training because it doesn't get that hot in SF.
ReplyDeleteYesterday I had a bad run myself. Less than halfway through I was already dreaming of home which was bad. Lack of sleep was the culprit for me. We will shoulder on anyway and make the good ones happen.
Dang, hot mama.
ReplyDeleteThe first few runs* of the year in real hot weather always suck - so don't fret about it too much!
*By first few hot runs, I mean, for me - all year long.