The first run of the week is always a wildcard and usually the odds are with the house. Marathon Maiden described her experience as “slow, heavy and difficult.” I completely agree. Running is always pleasant, but there are days that are less pleasant than others. The first run of the week falls into the latter category!
With that backdrop, I headed out for a run. It was perfect running weather at 45*, sunny and a nice breeze. My legs didn’t give me any indication of what the run would be like. I started off on the Bridle Path. The crunch of the leaves under the feet is better than any music from an iPod. Just amazing stuff. Towards the end of the 4-mile warm up, I noticed my quads tightening up. This is highly unusual. I didn’t feel like I was expending that much energy or pushing it hard at all. It’s possible that the quads felt overworked due to the 50 miles last week / 20 miles over the weekend. Not entirely sure. After an annoying restroom stop, I checked my watch. Nothing out of the ordinary … on track at a tempo pace. Not sure about you all, but I never check my watch while running. I always wait until I stop. I try to focus on feel rather than time while running and believe my concentration would get screwed up if I actually knew the pace. As I get closer to races, I pay a bit more attention to it. Strange.
After a solid warm up, I moved next to the hills. Yippie. Since I skipped repeats last week, I was oddly looking forward to them. I managed 4 repeats and then went up and down another hill while heading back towards the Reservoir. In honor of See Jess Run beasting the San Antonio Marathon, I accelerated a bit more for the Last Mile Party. I don’t have total recall, but this morning is probably the best first run of the week I’ve had in a couple of months. 8.25 miles at 8:34 pace with a hot mix of tempo and hills. I felt like I put in some work, but not exhausted in any way. Satisfaction.
No “celebrity” sightings lately, but I was very pleased to see elite runners Lesley Higgins and John Henwood doing their work. If you are a true running junkie, you know how cool it is to see elites in training. They are laughably fast.