LSD and More Milestones

Today was a long run. In the past my long run pace was about the same as my easy run pace, which I do not think is a good thing to do. All week my plan was to do this long run at a much slower pace and to make it my longest distance yet. A couple of steps that I hope will build my endurance.

Four miles was the planned length. I was afraid that I would need to cut it short because my left leg has been bothering me for a couple days. I keep telling myself that it is just shin splints, and I think that I am correct because it did not hurt at all during the run, even though the leg has been sore the rest of the day. I plan on resting it for a couple days and if it does not feel better I will probably look for a doctor to check it out.

So the leg felt good during the run. I changed the display on my Garmin to show nothing but the pace so that I could focus on keeping it slow and steady, and not worry about the time or distance until I got closer to the end of the run. At first it felt weird going so slow, (which is doubly weird since a few months ago that was fast for me.) but I got in the groove and my legs coasted along the road.

I figured that I might need a walk break or two, since this was my longest run ever, but I did not feel like I needed one at all during the run. Even when I went through a park and passed the water fountain that I planned to stop at, I decided to keep going and not stop.

It felt so good to run for such a long distance. When I came to the end I slowed to a walk, and my legs felt like they wanted to keep moving faster.

So all in all I did 4.02 miles in 50:33 which comes out to a 12:35 pace. Just where I wanted to be.

So a few more milestones... I ran the longest distance I have ever run. I ran the longest time I have ever run. I needed no walk breaks at all. And I had my longest weekly mileage.

I am feeling very good about my running right now, and am so motivated to keep going and building my mileage. As long as my leg feels better and nothing is wrong, I should be able to build up my mileage over the next couple of months and start training for the Broad Street Run. God willing.

I have a lot more topics going through my head, so you will probably see multiple post over the next couple of days. And since I need to rest my leg and can not run, the only thing left to do is write about running!

Good For What Ails You

This week has been a little rough.

After getting home from the marathon on Sunday I started feeling sick. It came on pretty strong Sunday night and when I woke Monday morning I felt like I was about to die. I had to call out of work, not something I usually do, and I slept most of the day.

Tuesday, a day I normally run, I felt good enough to go to work, but not good enough to run. My body ached and I wanted to stay in bed. I couldn't though because it appeared my youngest son was getting pink eye and I had to take him to the doctor. No pink eye, but he was developing an ear infection.

Wednesday was better. I had a full day of work, but I still felt kind of crappy. I was late getting out of work because I had so much to do and when I got home I felt like doing nothing but sleeping... too bad though, I needed to go out and get a few things for Thanksgiving.

Thursday... I can not believe Thanksgiving is here already. I wanted to run a Turkey trot today, or at least do a long run in the morning, but did not feel up to it. I did have a good day though, we deep fried a turkey and had a great feast. We had a fire going outside and stood around it talking while keeping an eye on the turkey fryer.

Friday morning. I still felt stuffy, but after sitting up for a while my head cleared a bit. I decided to go for a run. Since it has been so long since running I decided to do a very slow pace and only do a mile. I ended up getting to a mile and a quarter a decided to keep going. I got to a mile and a half and still kept going. I decided to stop at two miles.

The run was actually the best I had done in quite some time. Very good quality at a comfortable pace. My head was cleared up and my headache was gone. I did start coughing and almost chucked a little, but that was only from all the snot and mucus that drained into my stomach. Sorry about being so gross.

This just boosted my love for running. It actually makes you feel better.