First Scary Run Down

76 Days to Portland

174 Days to Houston

First of all I should say that the past week has gone well. I was able to get in my "junk miles" for the most part.  I'll explain the "most part" bit later.  I had to run fartleks on Thursday and my training plan increased the number of repetitions from six to nine.  I already don't like these workouts and to have them made longer was awful. But I got them done and didn't hurt too much afterward, so I'll consider that workout a success. 

Friday I was supposed to run four miles.  Supposed to.  I chose to have a night to spoil my three year-old nephew instead.  We played hard, we baked and decorated a cake, and watched movies.  That cake, by the way, decorated to perfection in the eyes of a preschooler, is enough to put you in a diabetic coma just looking at it!

But the funny thing is that after he decorated it, he didn't want any of it.  All he wanted was to eat more of the gum drops (his favorite).  So I have a cake staring at me--and it does taste good! 

The long and short of it is that he exhausted me.  I was planning to go home, clean up the mess we made, hop on the treadmill and put in the four miles I missed, and then pour a glass of wine.  My sister had other plans.

She called me and asked me how much I needed to run.  She needed to do seven (her race is a few months after mine) and when she heard I needed to do four, at first she was let down.  I told her that I would run four with her and she could finish her seven.  At the prospect of running three on her own, she suggested that I run my fourteen instead and she'd try to run it with me.  My sister has run two previous half-marathons, so it isn't like she has never run (close to) that far before, but it has been a while since her training has put her up to these distances.  And how an extra seven miles is better than three alone is beyond me! But run we did.

I struggled a bit in the first miles because I was waiting for my Achilles tendon to loosen up.  After it finally did the run was pretty easy for me.  I didn't struggle much with the extra distance--the longest I have ever run and two miles longer than my longest training run.  My sister really struggled with the extra distance.  I thought she was going to have to stop with three miles left. She pushed herself and I thought she was going to have to stop with two miles left.  She kept pushing herself and finished with me.  Her legs were cramping in ways she had never experienced before. She almost got sick. I was really afraid for her.  We got some carbs in her, put her in a cold shower (not having enough ice for an ice bath) and found some Aleve.  That got her well enough to come put her feet in the pool while I jumped in.  There is something wonderful about how much lighter you feel in a pool--especially after pounding 14 miles. 

This was also my first long run when it started at dusk and ended well after sunset.  It was really nice to start a run in the heat (heat index was still 99 degrees when we began) and finish in the (relative) cool instead of the other way around.  I'll just never be able to get myself early enough to finish a run before dawn. 

This coming week is a recovery week.  I'll be glad to run some shorter distances!