I had an excellent weekend full of relaxation including time spent with Val, family, and great running.
Great runs
I decided to sleep in Saturday morning. Evidence that the body can be "programmed" to wake up at a certain time is evident in my waking up at 5:30AM without my work/weekday alarm being set. Well, 5:30 wasn't working for me that morning, but 8:30AM seemed like a good time to wake up. Truthfully, I can't recall the last time I woke up at past 7:45..sleeping in is just not something I do.
It didn't and doesn't help that I still don't know what I should be focusing my training right now. I was so excited for the Via Marathon in Lehigh Valley, PA, but that sold out not too long after I decided I would register. Womp womp...
So I walked out the door Saturday and figured I'd get in 2 hours before Val came down for the weekend. I couldn't believe how great I was feeling and managed to run 16 miles at an averaged 7:16 per mile pace, while negative splitting the run (running the second half of the run faster than the first half).
While I was running I knew that the next day would probably consist of a light recovery run or a very slow long run. I was sure that I wasn't going to be able to run anything significant after my last mile of the 16 was around 6:36, but I was wrong.
Sunday morning came around and it took me forever to get out the door. Val wasn't feeling too well and wasn't sure if she was going to go out for her bike ride. The last thing I wanted to do was leave her at the house and go for another 2 hour run...so I went for a 10 miler instead! And boy was this one heck of a ten miler. My calves were tight from the outset, but my breathing was spot on and I knew after my warm-up that I would be able to sustain the sub 7 pace I was running. I told myself: If I can finish no slower than 1:10 (a 7 min/mile pace) then I'll be able. I averaged 6:41 mins/mile for just under
1 hour and 7 minutes. I was ecstatic!
How these runs happened
I couldn't even tell you how these two runs occurred. The last thing I thought I would be doing 3 weeks after my 6 hour would be running 10 or more miles under 7:30 pace. I did take 3 days off last week I've read a lot about how a nice gap in running like that allows the body to not only recover, but really process the training you've been putting in and enhance overall fitness. Given that my diet didn't change and my hours of sleep have diminished slightly, I think I can only look to the rest days I took to explain this weekend's runs.
So next time you don't want to take a rest day or think that a day or two off is going to really set you back or decrease your fitness, take solace in the knowledge that this won't happen. It generally takes about 3 consecutive days to start to lose fitness so as long as you don't go through that (a "rut" is what I like to call it), then you should be just fine.
Going forward
So after this weekend's running I think I'm going to stick to the pavement this fall. I'm looking to run the 2014 Staten Island 6 hour just about a month on September 20th. This ultramarathon is run on a 2 mile loop on pavement which is something that might not be great for my joints, but I am looking forward to nonetheless!
For after this race, I have my eyes set on the Runner's World Half Marathon festival 3.5 weeks later and I don't know if I want to attempt the hat trick (5k, 10k, half-marathon). THENNN comes the NJ Trail Series One Day in November which is another timed event on a 1 mile loop. Don't know if I want to run that or attempt a marathon instead. I guess I have to figure all of this out!
Okay, I'm realizing that tonight's post is a lot of text to read and for that, I don't want to keep typing too much more. I'll go into the "vegan love" aspect of this post tomorrow instead as I don't have any images to share with you, unfortunately.
Happy Running!
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